Then said the Lord unto Moses, Behold, I will rain bread from heaven for you; and the people shall go out and gather a certain rate every day, that I may prove them, whether they will walk in my law, or no.

I am often told that my church, which I believe receives direction from God, asks a lot from its members. For example, we are asked to pay ten percent of our income as tithing. We are asked to attend three hours of church each Sunday. We are asked to not go shopping on Sundays. We are asked to not consume alcohol, coffee, tea, or tobacco. Some things may even seem very trivial. For example, we have been instructed to refrain from getting tatoos and excessive earings (women may have one pair; men none).

While these may seem trivial with apparently no logic or reason to the commandments, an example from exodus illustrates why the lord may ask such trivial things. The isrealites had just left Egypt only to discover that they have no food. They complain to moses who in turn complains to the lord. The lord responds with the following:

Exodus 16 Then said the Lord unto Moses, Behold, I will rain bread from heaven for you; and the people shall go out and gather a certain rate every day, that I may prove them, whether they will walk in my law, or no.
When some of the people fail to follow the the commandment and gather more food than their family can eat, they discover that the food spoils and gets worms. This wasn't stated in the commandment. He does not tell them that if they gather more than they are told to that it will spoil. They are only told what to do not why.

So it is with us. Most of these commandments come with blessings, but most do not explain the consequence or the reason associated with not keeping the commandment. Some members have tried applying their own reason. That's why you have some members who say caffeine is against the word of wisdom-coffee and tea both have caffeine so caffeine must be harmful. But that is not the lord has said. What the lord says is do this so that I can see if you will walk in my laws or not. He didn't tell Abraham that he wouldn't make him sacrifice his son until after he knew that Abraham would keep his commandments to the end no matter how hard or how trivial.




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