Manna was the food provided for God's people to strengthen them for their wilderness journey. It was small, round, like coriander seed, in colour white and yet appeared like the precious bdellium, "and the taste of it was like wafers made with honey" (see Exodus 16 and Num. 11). As the bread of God for His people it brings Christ before us, and Christ in the lowliness, meekness and gentleness that marked Him in passing through this world, and in the purity and moral beauty of His Manhood that is so attractive to those who have been able to discern the perfections of the Son of God as seen in the details of His life down here.
When the manna was first given, the Lord commanded Moses to "Fill an omer of it to be kept for your generations; that they may see the bread wherewith I have fed you in the wilderness … and Moses said unto Aaron, "Take a pot, and put an omer full of manna therein, and lay it up before the Lord, to be kept for your generations" (Ex. 16:32-33). The day would surely come when the manna would no longer be given, when the wilderness journey would be over, but the Lord would have the coming generations to understand the goodness of God in His having sustained His people with bread from heaven.
The day also came when Israel wearied of the manna and recalled that which they had eaten in Egypt, conveniently forgetting the oppression of Pharaoh and the mighty deliverance of God. Influenced by the lusting of the "mixt multitude," God's people said, "our soul is dried away; there is nothing at all, beside this manna, before our eyes" (Num. 11:4-6). Then shortly before entering the land of promise, "the people spake against God and against Moses," and they said, "our soul loatheth this light bread" (Num. 21:5). Was it any wonder that "the Lord sent fiery serpents among the people"?
Israel despised and loathed the bread from heaven that God in His goodness had given them, but God treasured up in a golden pot (Heb. 9:4) the food that He provided. The golden pot laid up before the Lord surely brings before us Christ in glory in the presence of God, and in the glorified Christ there is the remembrance of all that He was as Man in this world. It is one thing to feed upon Christ to strengthen us for our wilderness journey, that we might be occupied with Him where He was to be like Him here, and quite another to be occupied with Him where He is in glory, and to recall what He was in Manhood here. This latter brings out the worship and adoration of our hearts to the Son of God and to the Father who has glorified Him in answer to all that He was in this world in lowliness and grace for His glory and the blessing of His own.
It was to the overcomer of the church in Pergamos that the Lord gave the promise, "To him … will I give to eat of the hidden manna" (Rev. 2:17). Although there was much to approve in Pergamos, there was the toleration of evil doctrines that brought the church into association with the world and the things of the world. The overcomer would refuse to be influenced by these evil teachings, and would remain faithful to the Son of God who had been faithful to God as Man in this world. As faithful to the Lord there is this blessed portion of eating of the manna that is hidden from the sight of men, and treasured up in the presence of God in the glorified Christ. While the promise belongs to that which lies ahead, to that which awaits us in God's own presence, there is surely the blessed anticipation of it as we commune with the Father and the Son in relation to what Christ was for Him and for us in the world.
Having crossed the river Jordan the children of Israel encamped in Gilgal, where they were circumcised and kept the passover, both of which had been neglected during the wilderness journey. "On the morrow after the passover" the children of Israel ate of the "old corn of the land … and the manna ceased on the morrow after they had eaten of the old corn of the land" (Joshua 5:10-12). The wilderness journey was over, and conflict was before them, and the Lord who had given His people suited food for the wilderness now provided the food needed to strengthen Israel for the conflict.
Like Israel, we need the heavenly manna to sustain us on our wilderness journey towards the promised land, but we have been also called to the conflict, and for this God has provided that which will give us strength to meet the foe. The old corn for us is found in Christ in heaven, in the same blessed Person in whom we find the hidden manna. In Ephesians 6:10-18 we read of the conflict to which God has called us, and there we learn that "we wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this world, against spiritual wickedness in high places."
We need God's armour to meet such foes, and we need to be strong in the Lord and in the power of His might. To be strong in the Lord we must feed upon Him in the way in which He is presented to us in this epistle. In Ephesians 1 we see Him as the Man of God's purpose who, having entered into death, is now seated at God's right hand in heavenly places. Moreover, we learn that God the Father "hath blessed us with all spiritual blessings in heavenly places in Christ" (Eph. 1:3), and it is as knowing that our blessings are in Christ in heavenly places that we are made strong in the Lord and in the power of His might.
There is no strength in the Christian himself to meet such an array of foes as is set before us in Ephesians 6, but our strength is in Him who "led captivity captive … that ascended up far above all heavens, that He might fill all things" (Eph. 4:8-10). Occupation with Christ in heaven, the Man of God's purpose, and the One who, in His own might, overcame all the great forces that we are called upon to meet, will give us the needed strength and confidence to engage with this great combination of the forces of evil. Our Lord has broken the power of the enemy, and we have but to meet his wiles and fiery darts, which cannot harm those who are strong in the Lord, and who have taken to them the whole panoply of God.
It is therefore evident that both the hidden manna and the old corn of the land direct our hearts to Christ in heaven, the former that we might contemplate in communion with the Father and the Son the perfections of Jesus in His sojourn in this world, and this to lead out our hearts to praise and worship; the latter that in contemplating our blessed Lord as the Man of God's purpose we might be strengthened for the conflict, and thus to enter the more into the riches of the glory of the inheritance that God has in His saints.