THE PANORAMA OF THE KINGDOM
Five Meditations on Isaiah 55
1 - GOD'S INVITATION
(verses 1 & 2)
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"Come, all you who are thirsty, come to the waters; and you who have no money, come, buy and eat! Come, buy wine and milk without money and without cost. Why spend money on what is not bread, and your labour on what does not satisfy? Listen, listen to me, and eat what is good, and your soul will delight in the richest of fare."
(Isaiah 55:1 & 2)
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THIS CHAPTER in Isaiah is a very precious one. In it God breathes out his infinite yearning love for us poor lost and helpless creatures. It is full of grace and hope and wondrous salvation blessings. It is given to Isaiah by God at a time when God's people Israel had gone from bad to worse. The ten northern tribes of Israel had all but disappeared, if not disappeared altogether. The kingdom of Judah was little better than the Northern Kingdom of Israel. Up until God carried them into exile, there were to be only two kings that were recorded as doing right in the eyes of God. All the rest had this mournful testimony, that they did evil in the eyes of the Lord. It is to a situation like this that God comes with this gracious message in Isaiah 55. Because of this it is a chapter of great comfort, encouragement and hope.
Most of my life, influenced by sermons I have heard, Isaiah 55 has been a chapter of unrelated bits. All very blessed, but not particularly connected. This is not in fact so. The whole chapter is one continuous related message from God. Each section leads into the next. The previous section needs to be understood, if the full blessing and meaning of those that follow are to be received. The whole chapter opens up to us the love and grace of God in Christ.
The first section is verses one and two which are a gracious invitation by God to come and be blessed by him. There is no invitation like it anywhere else in all the world. There is no hidden agenda; no small print to trap us; no hidden bitterness to sour the taste. It is an open invitation without any draw backs.
A WINSOME INVITATION
How wonderfully and how gently does God seek to draw us to accept his invitation. In every human heart there is deep inner thirst of soul. We cannot fail to realise it in the fact that the great motivation in life is to be happy. This is expressed in the desire for a better standard of living. The constant cry for increase in wages, is an expression of this need, for money is perceived as the means by which we can purchase those things and activities which fill the void within, and quench the thirst of our spirits.
The trouble is that this thirst and void is never satisfied or filled. There is temporary quieting of the need, but it comes back. There is a further problem and that is our appetite gets jaded, and what satisfied before needs to be increased in the future to bring the same level of happiness. Solomon in Ecclesiasties expressed this emptiness when he cries, "Meaningless! Meaningless. Utterly meaningless! Everything is meaningless." Ecclesiasties 1:2.
Jesus gently touches this inner need, which we are so reluctant to confess to - "Come, all you who are thirsty". By these words Jesus shows that he understands the emptiness deep within, and feels for us, and cares deeply for us and wants to save us. So cleverly does he speak to win us. "Why spend money on what is not bread, and your labour on what does not satisfy." He touches a chord in our minds which when we are prepared to be honest with ourselves, or when we come to the end of ourselves, we have to admit is there. The effort which we put into finding happiness is enormous. Everything we do goes into this, even when we are doing works of charity. Yet what is there to show for all this effort and cost. In the end there is nothing to show. We are still empty! still thirsty!
The winsomeness of this invitation is seen in that Jesus speaks to us in images that we can understand and identify with. We all understand the concept of thirst in a bodily sense, and it is easy for us to use the same image when we think about our emotional and spiritual needs. That Jesus means, in this use of physical food, the hunger of the soul, is plain. The last phrase of verse 2 reveals it - "and your soul will delight in the richest fare". It is the soul the God has in mind, and to which he makes the invitation.
The problem is a universal one. The problem was the reason Israel failed to be able to heed all the calls of God to come back to him and serve him. It is the problem of the corruption of our nature due to our bondage to the dominion of the evil one. Because the whole world lies in the evil one, all humanity is under his dominion, and our natures, which were made for God, are now biased towards evil. Jesus expressed this sickness of soul in John 3:19 - "Light has come into the world, but men love darkness instead of light, because their deeds are evil."
But here we see God recognising this bondage and corrupting sickness, and engaging in gracious supply of the remedy, and freely inviting us to come and be delivered and our souls satisfied. Because of this he invites us in this winsome way.
AN UNCONDITIONAL INVITATION
There is not invitation like this in all the world. We have built into our culture and mental make-up, the view that one good turn deserves another. When we receive an invitation, we do not offer to pay for what we receive, but we bring a gift, and by this we feel we have contributed a little and not taken our host for granted. This is basically expected of us. People often say that we never get anything for nothing in this world, and that we have to pay sometime. If things are going particularly well, there is the fear that we will have to pay later. If we do something for someone, we are upset if there is not some recognition and some compensating benefit, even if it is only the being given thanks and recognition.
When we think of God and our being accepted by him, we have this feeling that we have to pay in some way, and merit his favour and show that we are worthy. We forget, or do not understand, that the way of doing to win acceptance with God is totally beyond us. Paul expresses the hopelessness of this way in Galatians 3:10 where he declares, "All who rely on observing the law are under a curse, for it is written: 'Cursed is everyone who does not continue to do everything written in the Book of the Law'". This way is cursed because what is demanded of us by it is perfection. The battle is lost already because of the failures of the past.
What a glorious invitation God gives here. It is the very invitation of God in Christ. It is the very Gospel of God's saving love. There are no conditions in this invitation. Jesus simply says "Come!". It is a totally open invitation, for there is no class or quality of people who are excluded. It does not matter how ill prepared we may be to come to a kingly banquet, we are bidden to come just as we are. There is no need to feel embarrassed that the garments of our moral make-up are so torn and filthy. Jesus says come. If we feel our need, then we can satisfy our need and respond, and come just as we are.
Sinners do not have to make themselves clean before they come. We are totally unable to begin to do this. We come with all our dirt. In the parable of the kings invitation to the wedding feast which Jesus told, where the king commands that people be brought in from the highways and by-ways, they are to come just as they are. In the parable, though it is not explicitly told, it is the king who provides the wedding garment, to make his guests fit for the feast. So it is in this Gospel invitation. All that is required is that we feel our need, for that is what Jesus promises to satisfy. We do not have to have repented or even believed. The wonder of the invitation is that as we respond, Jesus begins the transformation of our lives. It is the beginning of the banquet which satisfies our souls. Repentance is worked, as we become poor in spirit, as we mourn for our sins, and are humbled at what we see ourselves to be. It is then, when we hunger and thirst after righteousness, that we are filled, for the Saviour clothes us in his perfect righteousness, and all our shame and degradation is lifted, as we are made fit for the divine presence and bounty.
A FREE INVITATION
How startling is the way this invitation is expressed. "You who have no money, come, buy and eat. Come, buy wine and milk without money and without price." Buy without money! This is a contradiction. It is difficult to see why God expresses his invitation in this way, but one thing is absolutely plain, and that is the total freeness of the spiritual food that is offered. It does not cost us anything whatsoever.
Perhaps Jesus expresses the freeness of salvation in this way to make us feel at home with the terminology. We are so used to having to pay, that he talks about paying without money, etc. If this is so, it is another example of how lovely and understanding God is for us in our foolishness and failure, and lightens our sense of total failure. It is so difficult for us in our human pride to have to come empty handed. We feel that we must pay something. Early in my days, I used to visit a grand old lady. She had received many hard knocks in her life, which she suffered and endured with great fortitude. When I explained to her the freeness of the Gospel invitation, she could not receive it, because her innate pride would not allow her to accept that she could not contribute anything to gain favour with God.
The Gospel invitation is totally free to us. This is not because the banquet is of poor quality. We find as we come, that the food is of exquisite quality and taste. We receive complete and total forgiveness, cleansing, renewal and exaltation to the family of God. It is not that the feast is not costly. The cost to God to provide these blessings was the death of his Son, which value cannot be quantified. But to us who are invited, God gives all totally free.
AN INVITATION TO THE RICHEST FARE
We do not realise the blessings we receive when we come at God's invitation, but they are that which is the richest food, and which will delight all the taste buds of our soul. The last words in verse 2 are so vivid - "Your soul will delight in the richest fare". What a contrast to the 'thirsty' in the first line of verse 1.
We do not realise all at once what we have received. In fact the food is served to us gently, so that we may not be overcome by too much blessing at the beginning. We know the deep peace of sins forgiven, and the burden of guilt removed. We know something of the cleansing of the blood of Jesus, so that we feel washed. We know the blessing of being clothed in the perfect righteousness of the Saviour. But we only know the beginnings of these delights, to say nothing of entering into the privilege of being Children of God, and dwelling in the love of God.
The world's pleasures give the best at the very beginning, and every pleasure then fades after this. The blessing of the spiritual food of God is that each time we receive it by faith, the taste is more rich and there is some further flavour we had not tasted before. The enjoyment and richness will deepen, and even when we have reached heaven we will have only begun to receive and know the richness of this fare.
CONCLUSION
This is the whole wondrous message of the Bible. It is expressed even in the last chapter of the Bible in Revelation 22:17 - "The Spirit and the bride say, 'Come!' And let him who hears say, 'Come.' Whoever is thirsty, let him come; and whoever wishes, let him take the free gift of the water of life."
Dear friends, embrace this Gospel more and more and always come and continue to come by faith, feeding more and more on the food of Christ. Never let the devil, or human wisdom, or the views of others, or your failures, keep you from freely feeding on Christ. As you came freely when you first responded, go on coming freely, for there is no possibility of exhausting the rich fare that God offers. Live in the glory of this free grace and love, and let your soul delight itself in this richest food.