Lent 3
Devotional
Water From the Rock
Lectionary Devotional for Cycle C
Object:
Why do you spend your money for that which is not bread, and your labor for that which does not satisfy?
-- Isaiah 55:2
This passage begins with an invitation that seems to be straight from the mouth of a con artist. You can almost hear the voice of a telemarketer who has just called you on the phone: "Have I got a deal for you! If my boss knew that I was making this offer, I'd really be in trouble." "Ho everyone who thirsts, come to the waters; and you that have no money come, buy, and eat! Come, buy wine and milk without money and without price." It is this offer that is too good to be true that the prophet dares to suggest is the offer God is making to this people.
There is a scandal to the grace of God that seems hard for contemporary people to fully grasp. We are more comfortable with the proverbial wisdom that "you get what you pay for." In the face of our skepticism, the prophet challenges us to consider what it is we are paying for. "Why do you spend your money for that which is not bread, and your labor for that which does not satisfy?" We are seduced by our consumer society, abetted by the skilled art of advertising into seeking, through our labors and wealth, products that cannot fulfill their promise. Continuing with Isaiah's image of food and drink, consider all of the food and drink we consume that is actually contributing to the deteriorization of our health. Isaiah declared that God is offering an alternative way to live, which is in response to an unmerited grace of God.
Instead of killing ourselves with empty calories, God offers "rich food" that can fill our lives with meaning. "Seek the Lord while he may be found, call upon him while he is near." He then offers David as a paradigm of the relationship that God offers us. David had broken all of the Ten Commandments but discovered again and again the healing grace of God. David did not earn God's love by his behavior. He could only receive it. This unmerited love of God is the wine and milk that you can buy without money and without price. It seems to contradict all we assume about the nature of reality. Lent is not only a time to acknowledge our sins before God, but also it is a preparation to receive the grace of God. "Let them return to the Lord that he may have mercy on them, and to our God, for he will abundantly pardon." Lent is a time to learn again that God's "thoughts are not your thoughts, nor are your ways [God's] ways...."
-- Isaiah 55:2
This passage begins with an invitation that seems to be straight from the mouth of a con artist. You can almost hear the voice of a telemarketer who has just called you on the phone: "Have I got a deal for you! If my boss knew that I was making this offer, I'd really be in trouble." "Ho everyone who thirsts, come to the waters; and you that have no money come, buy, and eat! Come, buy wine and milk without money and without price." It is this offer that is too good to be true that the prophet dares to suggest is the offer God is making to this people.
There is a scandal to the grace of God that seems hard for contemporary people to fully grasp. We are more comfortable with the proverbial wisdom that "you get what you pay for." In the face of our skepticism, the prophet challenges us to consider what it is we are paying for. "Why do you spend your money for that which is not bread, and your labor for that which does not satisfy?" We are seduced by our consumer society, abetted by the skilled art of advertising into seeking, through our labors and wealth, products that cannot fulfill their promise. Continuing with Isaiah's image of food and drink, consider all of the food and drink we consume that is actually contributing to the deteriorization of our health. Isaiah declared that God is offering an alternative way to live, which is in response to an unmerited grace of God.
Instead of killing ourselves with empty calories, God offers "rich food" that can fill our lives with meaning. "Seek the Lord while he may be found, call upon him while he is near." He then offers David as a paradigm of the relationship that God offers us. David had broken all of the Ten Commandments but discovered again and again the healing grace of God. David did not earn God's love by his behavior. He could only receive it. This unmerited love of God is the wine and milk that you can buy without money and without price. It seems to contradict all we assume about the nature of reality. Lent is not only a time to acknowledge our sins before God, but also it is a preparation to receive the grace of God. "Let them return to the Lord that he may have mercy on them, and to our God, for he will abundantly pardon." Lent is a time to learn again that God's "thoughts are not your thoughts, nor are your ways [God's] ways...."
