"Come To The Waters” Series

““Hey there! All who are thirsty, come to the water! Are you penniless? Come anyway—buy and eat! Come, buy your drinks, buy wine and milk. Buy without money—everything’s free! Why do you spend your money on junk food, your hard-earned cash on cotton candy? Listen to me, listen well: Eat only the best, fill yourself with only the finest. Pay attention, come close now, listen carefully to my life-giving, life-nourishing words. I’m making a lasting covenant commitment with you, the same that I made with David: sure, solid, enduring love. I set him up as a witness to the nations, made him a prince and leader of the nations, And now I’m doing it to you: You’ll summon nations you’ve never heard of, and nations who’ve never heard of you will come running to you Because of me, your God, because The Holy of Israel has honored you.” Seek God while he’s here to be found, pray to him while he’s close at hand. Let the wicked abandon their way of life and the evil their way of thinking. Let them come back to God, who is merciful, come back to our God, who is lavish with forgiveness. “I don’t think the way you think. The way you work isn’t the way I work.” God’s Decree. “For as the sky soars high above earth, so the way I work surpasses the way you work, and the way I think is beyond the way you think. Just as rain and snow descend from the skies and don’t go back until they’ve watered the earth, Doing their work of making things grow and blossom, producing seed for farmers and food for the hungry, So will the words that come out of my mouth not come back empty-handed. They’ll do the work I sent them to do, they’ll complete the assignment I gave them.”

??Isaiah? ?55:1-11? ?MSG??????????

https://bible.com/bible/97/isa.55.1-11.MSG

I’m this country and at this day and time we have aspected The economic theory, and also the lay opinion, that whatever goods and services are provided, they must be paid for by someone - that is, you don't get something for nothing.

The phrase is also known by the acronym of 'there ain't no such thing as a free lunch'.

Before discussing the origin of 'there's no such thing as a free lunch' it would be useful to go back to the days in which lunches were free.

Free lunch was a commonplace term in the USA and, to a lesser extent in Britain, from the mid 19th century onward. It wasn't used to describe handouts of food to the poor and hungry though, it denoted the free food that American saloon keepers used to attract drinkers; for example, this advertisement for a Milwaukee saloon, in The Commercial Advertiser, June 1850:

At The Crescent...

Can be found the choicest of Segars, Wines and Liquors...

N. B. - A free lunch every day at 11 o'clock will be served up.

Free lunches, often cold food but sometimes quite elaborate affairs, were provided for anyone who bought drink. This inducement wasn't popular with the temperance lobby and was also criticized for the same reason that others in the 20th century later introduced the TANSTAAFL idea to economic thinking, that is, saloon customers always ended up paying for the food in the price of the drinks they were obliged to consume. Indeed, some saloon keepers were prosecuted for false advertising of free lunch as customers couldn't partake of it without first paying money to the saloon.

It was into this context that the economic theorists enter the fray and 'there's no such thing as a free lunch' is coined.

Yet in the text today However, it is exactly with this message of free food and drink that the prophet in this week’s lectionary reading is seeking to draw his audience into the world he imagines.

In Isa 55:1-2, the speaker urgently invites the exilic community burdened by imperial policies in a three-fold repetition of the imperative “to come.” They are invited to “come,” “buy,” and “eat” from the rich gifts of food the prophet is offering: the wine and the nourishing milk well-suited for a festival. The audience is called to take part in the feast, to eat what is good, and to delight themselves in rich food (v. 2). Making a connection between food and the word (or wisdom as in Woman Wisdom’s invitation in Prov 9:1-5), this text offers evidence that food increasingly is understood on a spiritual level, intended to still Israel’s spiritual hunger and thirst.

The recipients of the prophetic word in Isaiah 55 are described as being needy. To be thirsty and to have no money (v. 1) indeed are fitting metaphors that describe well the situation of the exilic community. The traumatic experience of the exile and its aftermath had unquestionably depleted not only the physical but also the emotional and spiritual resources of these weary survivors.