February 2

Manna and Quail

                 The Lord spoke to Moses and said, “I have heard the complaining of the Israelites; say to them, ‘At twilight you shall eat meat, and in the morning you shall have your fill of bread; then you shall know that I am the Lord your God.’”

In the evening quails came up and covered the camp; and in the morning there was a layer of dew around the camp. When the layer of dew lifted, there on the surface of the wilderness was a fine flaky substance, as fine as frost on the ground.  When the Israelites saw it, they said to one another, “What is it?” For they did not know what it was. Moses said to them, “It is the bread that the Lord has given you to eat.” 

Exodus 16:11-15

            The Israelites were hungry.  An entire nation was walking through the wilderness and resources were scarce.  They were faithfully following God, but it quickly became clear that there was not enough food.  Unless something changed quickly, they were going to die.

            Some worried.  Some prayed.  Some criticized their leadership.  Some questioned leaving slavery in the first place.  All were aware of the gnawing hunger in their bodies.

            God heard the cries and criticisms of His people.  He sent food…and the people did not recognize it.  “Manna” is literally interpreted as, “What is it?”  The people had never seen this substance before and needed to be instructed on what it was and how to use it.  At night the ground was covered with quail so the people could eat meat and in the morning the dew burned off to reveal this mystery bread from heaven…every day...for 40 years.

            I wonder how often God hears our cries and sends us resources that we don’t even recognize.  I’ve written about Tae Kwon Do before, but we almost never got involved.  When I was working at the IDD Services organization, several of our clients had regular activities in the community that they were involved in every week.  We made sure that they had rides to get to their activities and whatever kind of supervision that they needed in order to fully participate in the group.  One of our members had been going to Tae Kwon Do for years and loved it, but all that I knew about it was that it lived on the weekly schedule.  About the same time, our weekly Occupational Therapy Sessions were coming to an end.  My son had accomplished everything that they were equipped to teach him and their strong recommendation was that he find a group or an activity that he could join where he could practice the physical and social skills that they had been working on for 3 years.  Believe it or not, Fairbanks, Alaska does not have a lot of options for groups that an autistic teenage boy can join for the express purposes of growing his physical and social awareness.

            I was mulling over options in my office as I heard some of my employees talking about the Tae Kwon Do organization.  Midnight Sun Martial Arts even had a class designed for special needs students with an instructor who is both a great teacher and the parent of a special needs student as well.  We decided to check it out, keeping one foot solidly out the door the whole time.  The room is a little echo-y.  The lights are a little bright.  When my son is attending a typical class, the experience can be a little overwhelming since instructions can be hard to hear and often there are multiple different patterns being performed at the same time.  There is a lot of trial and error, which he hates, as he works on mastering skills and sets of movement.  There have been times when we had to leave early and tears flowed on the car ride home.

            However…all that being said, this is the resources that we did not know that we were looking for.  It has stretched his physical awareness and ability.  The little boy who would run himself to exhaustion and bang his head on the walls in order to find where his body ended just received an award for excellence in jumps and jump kicks.  It has stretched his social awareness.  There is a pattern and rhythm to classes that he has internalized and is comfortable with.  He is learning to tune in to the voice of the teacher and follow others when appropriate or do his individually assigned pattern while others do something different.  He is learning how to win and how to lose with grace.  He is learning that his body is not something to be feared, but a tool that can be harnessed and focused.  He is growing in confidence and maturity and self-control right before our eyes.  Will he continue all the way through becoming a black belt?  I hope so but that is a long way from here.  There is a conceivable future where he could actually travel to the world championships as the world Tae Kwon Do Federation offers a special needs category of competition.  His teacher gets a gleam in her eye when she talks about what he could do.

            The Israelites looked at manna and grimaced, wondering what it was and why God was not providing food for them.  We did the same thing when we heard about Tae Kwon Do as we wondered why God was not providing better opportunities for us.  Sometimes what we ask for comes in forms that we do not expect.    

A moment to reflect:

What are things that you are asking God for?  Could there be resources around you that look different than you are expecting?