AN INVITATION NOT TO BE REFUSED
I read of a visiting preacher who arrived at the church and read the poster announcing him as a "preacher with the unchanged message". He had a nasty moment when he thought that the news had got out that he had only one sermon to his name! Charles Spurgeon got exasperated with a number of his students whose sermons were below standard. He said of them, "10,000 thousands are their texts but all their sermons one!"
In one sense, a preacher of the gospel has an unchanged message; each sermon may have a different text, but ultimately the gospel has but one message. And that message can be summarized in one word - it’s an invitation from God - it’s the word "Come". Imagine you’re at your shopping centre one Saturday morning. Quite unexpectedly a window on the first floor of a departmental store opens and the manager rings a bell to get attention to the crowd below. He shouts out, “Everybody is invited to come shopping - and everything is free: there’s nothing to pay!”
It was this kind of announcement that Isaiah made in Babylon some 2,500 years ago. Hear the words of God spoken through the prophet, "Come, all you who are thirsty, and you, who have no money, come buy and eat!" (55:1). “Come, all you who are thirsty.” If you’ve been to the Holy Land you’ll have seen the water-seller as he walks the streets of the Old City of Jerusalem. I remember seeing this colourful figure and took his photograph and had to pay for the drink he poured out, although I didn’t fancy it and didn’t drink it! Water, especially in a hot climate, is a valuable commodity and not easy to come by.
Isaiah was addressing the people of Israel who at this time were exiled from their homeland. They had refused to obey God’s laws and now they were suffering the consequences of their actions. God had allowed the Assyrian army to be his instrument of punishment. Their land had been devastated and they had been taken into captivity in Babylon for seventy years. These are the people who sat and wept by the rivers of Babylon, mocked by their captors, surrounded on every hand by the images of the gods who had apparently defeated Jehovah, the living God of Israel.
The people were strangers in a strange land, separated from their homeland by hundreds of miles of inhospitable wilderness. They felt alienated from their God who they believed had turned his back on them. The glory of Jerusalem and its temple were but a faded memory that only brought them pain to think about it. These unfulfilled longings brought them to the edge of despair.
It was into this bleak spiritual wilderness that God’s messenger came with a word from the Lord. It wasn’t just good advice, based on human wisdom and psychology, telling them to resign themselves to their present sad condition. No, it was a proclamation of salvation and hope. It was:
A GRACIOUS INVITATION
Most people like to receive an invitation to a special function, perhaps to a wedding or a celebration dinner. But that sort of invitation is highly restrictive. Wedding invitations are given to relatives and close friends; celebration dinner invitations are restricted to top people in business or politics. But the invitation that Isaiah offers is a universal invitation. Isaiah’s words are those which would have been used in the market place. You can imagine the street traders calling out to the passers-by to try their produce - "Come..." It’s like in a carnival with the town crier ringing his bell and calling the crowds’ attention.
How typical this is of our gracious God. He doesn’t wait for people to go in search of him - he takes the initiative and comes in search of them. His love is such that he wants to be found by them, he longs to pardon them and share good things with them. Jesus said that he "came into the world to seek and save what was lost" (Luke 19:10). It’s as if God stands in the market place and implores the people to come to him to find what they really need.
God knows the human condition. Ever since the disaster of the Garden of Eden when our first parents failed to obey God’s instruction, when they tried to steal from God’s tree of knowledge, to overstep divinely-given boundaries, mankind has been trying to get satisfaction for an inner longing. Someone put it in terms of our having a "God-shaped gap" in our make-up. The famous poet, Lord Byron, described his experience vividly typical of so many of our fellow citizens: he "Drank every cup of joy, drank early, deeply drank, drank draughts which common millions might have drunk, then died of thirst because there was no more to drink." Clearly, he missed the Fount of life that only God can supply.
The prophet’s call is to everyone who is not satisfied, who feels that their life is incomplete; that there’s something they crave for over and above their present possessions. It’s to "all you who are thirsty, come to the waters, and you who have no money, come buy and eat." The only qualification that is made to the invitation is that need must be recognized. The invitation is to "all" - none are excluded who do not exclude themselves. Jesus said that he "did not come to call the righteous but sinners" (Matt 9:13). Those whose eyes have been blinded by the glitter of the "Vanity Fair" of this world; those who falsely depend upon the merit of their own good works for righteousness - these do not thirst. They have no sense of their need.
What a sad condition to be in! And what a dangerous state, because the invitation is also an urgent invitation, for however great is God’s patience, the offer isn’t available indefinitely. Isaiah went on to say, "Seek the Lord while he may be found, call on him while he is near" (6). St Paul echoed the same warning note, "Listen! This is the hour to receive God’s favour; today is the day to be saved" (2 Cor 6:2). God showed tremendous forbearance with the people of Israel, but the time came when judgement had to be executed.
God’s word to mankind is a word of gracious invitation, but not only that, it’s a word of:
GENEROUS PROVISION
Here indeed is good news of abundant provision, of generosity that only God could provide. He makes a personal invitation to "Come, buy wine and milk without money and without cost." The words of the text are a paradox - something which would be absurd if it weren’t true. Isaiah’s hearers, and us too, are invited to "buy, yet without money and without price." Can this be true? Isn’t it a contradiction in terms? The contradiction on the surface is but intended to make this wonderful truth more emphatic.
This offer from God has been termed "the Salvation Market" because it reverses the world’s commercial values where you get "nothing for nothing"! As they say in business: ‘There’s no such thing as a free lunch!’ But here we must recognize our absolute spiritual poverty in God’s sight. We must abandon any claims to self-righteousness. We must put away all ideas of having a part in our own salvation. We must be willing to rely on God’s undeserved love and forgiveness, made possible by the sacrifice by his Son, Jesus, on the Cross. The "Salvation Market" is the only market where the seller pays, not the buyer!
Cheap things are seldom valued. Ask a high price and people think a commodity is precious. But God’s offer is not an illusion. Here is the "heavenly merchant" who died for the buyers in his market. He died that no one coming to his market should ever be sent empty away. The selling price is zero, but that doesn’t mean that these goods cost nothing to the "heavenly merchant". These goods are the cheapest sold and the dearest bought that ever were. All the wealth in the world couldn’t purchase one item in God’s marketplace, for the Son of Man bought them at great price, and now they are all free. No money can buy them because what he offers is without price because it is priceless.
The offer isn’t merely about the basic necessities of life. It’s not just enough to "get by" as if the offer was only for bread and water. No, it’s for "wine and milk" - nothing but the best. These were undreamed of luxuries for a people in exile, living in the prison camps of Assyria and yet, such is the fallen nature of mankind, Isaiah immediately has to ask the question, "Why spend money on what is not bread, and your labour on what does not satisfy?"
The prophet is puzzled. "Why" he asks his hearers, "do you waste your life?" The inference is that, unbelievably, so many refuse God’s invitation to eternal life. Yet human nature finds it hard to accept a free offer and wants to make a contribution of some kind towards it. No one likes to feel permanently indebted, not even to God, such is the stubbornness of humanity.
Isn’t it the case that we can spend much energy on things that bring no lasting satisfaction? They may give a certain thrill for a time but the sense of emptiness continues. There are the stimulants of sensual pleasures, excesses that are positively harmful to body and mind. It’s like shooting oneself in the foot! The evil one doesn’t mind a bit which vice entraps us, whether it is regarded as socially acceptable or not.
Those who do that will end up like the Prodigal Son, shattered and disillusioned with life. God’s values are the opposite of the world. The apostle James warns in forthright terms those who set their affections on materialism, "Come now, you rich, weep and howl for the miseries that are coming upon you. Your riches have rotted, your garments are moth-eaten. Your gold and silver have rusted..." (5:1-3).
God’s generous provision is not only abundant; it’s a free provision. In fact, it can’t be bought, it can’t even be earned - it comes as a free gift. Jesus himself repeats the invitation offered by his Father through Isaiah, "If anyone thirsts, let him come to me and drink" (John 7:37). He spoke of himself as "the living bread which came down from heaven; if anyone eats of this bread he will live for ever and the bread which I shall give for the life of the world is my flesh" (6:51). Here is the antidote to the curse laid on mankind through the Fall in the Garden. Only Jesus could provide this eternal life by the laying down of his life in atonement for the sins of the world.
We come back to the prophet’s words, "Why spend money ... and labour on what does not satisfy?" Why indeed? The free will that God has given us enables us to come freely to him and to be able to enter into the full relationship of sonship. If we reject the generous provision that he has made in Jesus, we deliberately choose darkness rather than light, we turn our backs upon his love. It leaves us without protection and exposed to the forces of evil. We only have to look at the world around us to see the chaos that sin has brought upon its victims.
The good news is that God hasn’t given up on mankind. The gracious invitation, "Come, all...", the generous provision, "buy ... without money", leads on to a:
GREAT EXPECTATION
The commodity in shortest supply among the exiles was hope. Everything that belonged to their past had been destroyed. Their land had been ravaged. The temple in Jerusalem, the centre of their worship, lay in ruins. There was no comfort to be found in their present circumstances. They were overwhelmed by their sense of loss, taunted by their captors, like fish out of water in an alien culture. Life was bleak and the future didn’t bear thinking about.
It was into this darkness that a word of promise came, "Give ear and come to me; hear me, that your soul may live. I will make an everlasting covenant with you..." It was a word of hope. God was telling them that he still rules and is in control of events in Babylon. He’s a God whose purposes are way beyond the grasp of mere humans. He knows precisely what he’s doing and he is willing to transform their circumstances.
The exiles were in despair. They believed that they were doomed to remain in exile and that all was lost. But the word from the Lord through Isaiah spoke of a new beginning. There was, after all, a future for them. There was going to be a second Exodus. For a second time God was going to redeem his people from captivity and lead them across the wilderness. "You will go out in joy and be led forth in peace" (12). God will once again save his people and lead them in triumph.
Our God is the God of the "Second Chance". Yes, the people of Judah had for the most part rejected God but he still loved them, and here he was offering them a fresh start. There’s an urgency, an imperative about the words; there’s a progression in what had to be done. The invitation was to "come, buy and eat" indicating that there’s more involved to God’s offer of salvation than hearing the good news of the gospel and even believing it: there’s a definite requirement that we make it our own by a participation of it, by "eating" it.
"Hear me", says God, "that your soul may live." This would be secured by an "everlasting covenant" as promised "to David". God’s promises to King David and his royal successors after him are now being made freely available to all the people of Israel, both high and low. Covenant privilege has now been extended to the whole people of God. The prophecy was wonderfully fulfilled and made possible by the Incarnation of the Lord Jesus Christ, "great David’s greater son". He is the mediator and trustee of the new covenant. All believers in Jesus are members of God’s royal family.
Here then is Isaiah’s great invitation. It comes to us with compelling urgency to accept God’s offer of a lifetime. It sweeps away our objections. It presses us to respond without delay. It points to God’s immeasurable love and it tells us that whether we are thirsty for his grace or strangers to his covenant or too poor to purchase our salvation, we have only to return to the Lord and he will abundantly pardon. We shall be ransomed, healed, restored, forgiven through Jesus Christ our Redeemer and our Lord.
A story is told of a shipwrecked crew who had been drifting for days in a small boat off the coast of Brazil. They were suffering the horrors of thirst but they dare not drink the seawater because the salt would make it even worse. They saw a vessel coming towards them, and called out, "Water, water!" "Dip your bucket over the side" they were told. They thought they were being mocked. But no, the water was fresh. They had drifted into the flow of the mighty River Amazon bearing fresh water far out to sea.
How like the people of Israel and ourselves. The salvation of God is there for all that will come to him in repentance and faith. Even knowledge of it won’t save us. It is faith, that unique obedience of a relationship with God, which saves. God’s purpose for his people is to give us his life by putting his Spirit within us. Don’t let’s miss it; don’t let’s accept anything less. Isaiah’s word, "Come", is a gracious invitation; it offers a generous provision and provides a great expectation.
We can thank our God for what He’s done for us in Jesus in the words of an old hymn:
“How good is the God we adore,
Our faithful, unchangeable Friend!
His love is as great as his power,
And knows neither measure or end!
‘Tis Jesus the First and the Last,
Whose Spirit shall guide us safe home;
We’ll praise him for all that is past,
And trust him for all that’s to come.”
