Start with a basic two-door sedan loaded with luggage for a vacation trip. Add a father, mother, and three children under the age of ten. Aim the car at an objective that is 500 miles down the road. After 350 miles have passed, examine the scene. What is the condition of what has become a traveling circus? Pretty discouraging?

Now, magnify that situation thousands of times over, move it back some 3,500 years, eliminate the automobile, and you will begin to understand Moses’ predicament in Exodus 16. The thrill of freedom and the excitement of the exodus were soon erased by the discomforts of travel. Gratitude usually gives way to grumbling.