Food for Thought
By Rev. Heidi L. Barham | March 23, 2025
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Read Isaiah 55:1 – 9 (NIV)
Our text this morning is found in the Old Testament in the Book of Isaiah. According to scholars, because it foretells of the coming Messiah... the writings of Isaiah are quoted in the New Testament more often than the writings of any of the other prophets.
You may have heard Isaiah being referred to as a major prophet… this is not because he was more important than any of the other prophets… but simply because of the length of his writings in comparison to those of the others.
The Book of Isaiah contains 66 chapters which, as you may have also heard are constructed similarly to the 66 books of the Bible. Like the Old Testament, the first 39 chapters of Isaiah contain words of judgment and a call to repentance… while the remaining 27 chapters, like the New Testament, are filled with words of comfort and hope that arise from the promise of the Messiah.
Now, the passage that calls for our attention today comes from the latter section of Isaiah that focuses on the hope found in the Messiah, the One who is to come.
And it is the message contained in these verses that I want to suggest gives us some FOOD FOR THOUGHT.
Looking at the opening verse of our text, we find an invitation that... at first glance, might sound a little odd. Listen to verse 1 again as it appears in the Message Paraphrase, “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!”
Perhaps someone is wondering, “If everything is free, why would Isaiah say come and ‘buy?’ And exactly how can you ‘buy without money’ anyway?”
Well, I am so glad you asked…
What the prophet is inviting the listener to partake in is not literal food and water, but the spiritual food and water that God provides for us… and that is something for which there can be no monetary price tag… that spiritual nourishment from God is what provides us with FOOD FOR THOUGHT... leading us to abundant life… the priceless gift of eternity in God’s kingdom.
This calls to mind the story of the Samaritan woman at the well found in John 4. As the story is told, Jesus was engaged in a conversation with a Samaritan woman that she took to be about the physical water that came from Jacob’s well…
However, Jesus explained to her, “If you knew the gift of God and who it is that asks you for a drink, you would have asked him and he would have given you living water” (John 4:10).
Jesus went on to say, “Everyone who drinks this water will be thirsty again, but whoever drinks the water I give them will never thirst. Indeed, the water I give them will become in them a spring of water welling up to eternal life” (John 4:13 – 14).
Jesus’ invitation to the Samaritan woman is a reflection of the invitation to the thirsty that is found in our text. It is ultimately an invitation to the eternal life that can only come through Jesus... the One who is the Living Water.
And the nourishment that Isaiah invites us to receive is a spiritual nourishment that can only be derived from our relationship with the Lord. In the same way that our bodies will eventually starve without physical food... our spirits will starve if we fail to feed it with the Word of God.
Now what is offered comes freely, in terms of any monetary exchange… make no mistake... it comes at an extremely high price… the life of the Savior who was sacrificed for us at Calvary.
Looking at the next verse of the text, the Message Paraphrase reads, “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.”
In other words, there is a conscious decision we need to make… are we are going to feed our spirits the “junk food” of this world or are we going to feast on the Word of God?
Just some more FOOD FOR THOUGHT for us to consider...
Have you ever noticed how easy it is to get distracted with the stuff we see on television and social media? We tell ourselves we are only going to watch for a few minutes... only to look up and realize we have been flipping channels or scrolling through Facebook, Instagram or X for hours… wasting precious time reading stuff that does not feed our spirits with anything of real value.
But then when it comes time to read our daily devotions or engage in Bible study or even come to Sunday School... we can barely muster enough energy. We often feel sluggish and are unable to give God our undivided attention... because we have been too busy filling ourselves with the “junk food” of the world.
Try to imagine the feeling you might get after eating an extra-large deluxe pizza with a giant bag of potato chips and dip… and then washing it down with a two-liter bottle of Pepsi or Coke before going in search of dessert.
If you’re like me, you end up feeling tired and perhaps even a little nauseous… wishing, in hindsight, that you had been much more conscientious and eaten a salad with grilled chicken or salmon instead.
But Isaiah invites us to partake in a different kind of feast… it is a feast that will nourish our souls and provide lasting satisfaction rather than leave us feeling bloated and miserable... it is definitely some serious FOOD FOR THOUGHT.
Now, as we move to the next verse of our text, Isaiah shifts our attention to God’s everlasting covenant that stems from the promise He made to David.
“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.”
Now what makes that promise of sure, solid, enduring love that God made to David so significant, is that God made the promise in spite of David’s faults and shortcomings… and without regard for how many times the nation of Israel had already fallen short and would likely fall short again…
That is because no matter how far short we fall... God never has and never will renege on any of His promises to us…
He makes each and every one of them as an everlasting covenant.
Somebody needs to hear that again…
He makes each and every one of His promises as an everlasting covenant.
No matter how badly David and the children of Israel may have messed up… God remained faithful to His promise.
And hopefully this will not come as a surprise to you… but God remains just as faithful to us now as He was to the Israelites way back then! Everlasting means just that… everlasting.
That means no matter how many times we may fall, God makes a way for us... and God helps us to get back up again. And that is good news today, because it seems fair to say we are living in a fallen world that needs all the help it can get.
Now looking at the Message again, the next two verses of the text read:
I set him [meaning David] 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.David was the ultimate example of how God can and does use imperfect people to fulfill His perfect will.
The great King David… the leader of Israel… the writer of many of the Psalms… was an adulterer and a murderer… a man who had an affair with Bathsheba and then sent her husband Uriah out to the front line of the battlefield to be killed.
Yet, he is the same David, who is referred to in both the Old and New Testaments as “a man after God’s own heart” (see 1 Samuel 13:14, Acts 13:22).
And that ought to be an encouragement to us… because the same way that God loved David and used him in spite of his flaws and failures… is the same way that God loves us and will use us for His glory as well.
I honestly don’t think it comes as a secret to anyone that we are living in a fallen and sinful world. In fact, the scriptures tell us point blank that “ALL have sinned and fall short of the glory of God” (Romans 3:23).
Just one look at the news on TV or on the Internet, provides us with more than enough evidence of how far we have fallen short of the glory of God... it is enough to cause us to sink deep into despair... if we spend too much time focusing on everything that is going on in the world around us…
But in spite of any reports to the contrary, all hope is NOT lost... because God is still on the throne and God can turn any and every situation around for our good and His glory… no matter how much of a mess we have made of things.
We can be thankful… because in spite of our multiple missteps and mishaps… God has promised never to leave us nor forsake us. And unlike the promises we may make to one another, to ourselves and even to God… God NEVER breaks His promises to us.
Now, it does not seem like a far stretch to say that there are all kinds of challenges facing us on a daily basis… to the extent that it would probably be easier to pull the covers over our heads and remain in the safety and security of our beds rather than go out and face what the new day holds.
But remember what the Prophet Jeremiah wrote in Lamentations 3 (22-24):
Through the Lord’s mercies we are not consumed, because His compassions fail not. They are new every morning; Great is Your faithfulness. “The Lord is my portion,” says my soul, “Therefore I hope in Him!”The reason we can face today and tomorrow and every day thereafter... is because God is gracious, God is merciful, and God is faithful… and God has promised to provide us with everything we need.
And just what is it that we need?
Well, according to the hymnwriter:
Strength for today and bright hope for tomorrow. Blessings all mine with ten thousand beside… [Refrain] Great is Thy faithfulness! Great is Thy faithfulness! Morning by morning new mercies I see; All I have needed Thy hand hath provided. Great is Thy faithfulness, Lord unto me!God is faithful and God gives us the strength and the hope that will sustain us... today and tomorrow, and every day that is still yet to come.
(“Great Is Thy Faithfulness,” words by Thomas Q. Chisholm, music by William M. Runyon © 1923)
And rest assured, no political unrest, economic crisis, or global conflict can ever change that. No matter how big our problems may seem to us in this moment... they are just the right size for God to handle. Now, I don’t know about you, but that certainly fills my heart with hope and strength to keep pressing on, just a little while longer.
And that brings us to the next verses in our text this morning, which read:
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.That means that even for those who have gone down the wrong path… there is still hope. God is always close and waits patiently for each one of us. Even those who may think they have strayed too far away… God still extends His grace and mercy to us.
During this season of Lent, we are reminded of the two criminals who hung on either side of Jesus at Calvary… criminals who had most likely been found guilty of some extremely horrible offenses... considering that crucifixion was generally reserved for only the most heinous of criminals.
Now, according to the Scriptures, while one criminal taunted Jesus... seemingly oblivious to the fact of his own sinfulness and the ultimate penalty that his crimes demanded… the other criminal recognized the magnitude of what he had done and acknowledged that he and his counterpart deserved the punishment they were receiving.
That man asked for no favors… he begged for no pardon… but simply said, “Jesus, remember me when you come into your kingdom” (Luke 23:42).
And in that moment Jesus extended mercy and forgiveness to him… telling the man, “Truly I tell you, today you will be with me in paradise” (Luke 12:43). This is the essence of the hope that can be found in our text this morning.
As Isaiah wrote, “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.”
The man who was crucified alongside of Jesus got what he did not ask for… the free pardon of his sins... while he did not get the eternal damnation that he rightly deserved…
That is grace and mercy at its finest… something that can be hard for us to comprehend at times… especially because we often think that the other party does not deserve either grace or mercy.
But that brings us to the closing verses of our text which read:
“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.”Aren’t you glad to know that God has a better way of thinking than we do and a better way of working than we do? Because I know if things were left up to me... there is no telling what shape the world would be in.
I, for one, am so thankful that God has everything in control and that God has promised to be with us every step of the way as we make our way through this crazy, mixed-up world.
And no matter how frightening the circumstances around us may be, we have the assurance that God will be with us.
As the Lord told Joshua, “Have I not commanded you? Be strong and courageous. Do not be afraid; do not be discouraged, for the Lord your God will be with you wherever you go” (Joshua 1:9).
The writer of Hebrews draws our attention to this same promise, writing, “Keep your lives free from the love of money and be content with what you have, because God has said, ‘Never will I leave you; never will I forsake you’” (Hebrews 13:5).
In other words, rather than trusting in the material things of this world... we should rely on the presence of God in any and all situations. And that is why the next verse of Hebrews reads, “So we say with confidence, ‘The Lord is my helper; I will not be afraid. What can mere mortals do to me?’”
Believers have the promise of a better way than what the world has to offer. Houses, cars and other material things all depreciate over time… banking and investment accounts can be wiped out, literally overnight… even long-term relationships can turn sour, depending on which way the wind is blowing.
But thankfully, God has made a better way for us through His Son and our Savior, Jesus the Christ, who said, “I am the way, the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me” (John 14:6).
Jesus is the way… the path that leads us to God.
Jesus is the truth… the fulfillment of all God’s promises.
And Jesus is the life… the key to spending eternity in God’s kingdom.
Now, with your indulgence, I would like to leave you with just a little more FOOD FOR THOUGHT.
There are some people who suggest that all roads lead to God and argue that saying Jesus is the only way is too narrow of a road to follow. However, as one Bible commentary puts it, “Instead of worrying about how limited it sounds to have only one way, we should be saying, ‘Thank you, God, for providing a sure way to get to you!’” (Life Application Study Bible, 2005, p. 1773).
So, this morning, I want to invite us to make that more personal... “Thank you, God, for providing me with just what I need every moment of every day... Jesus!”
And if you know and believe in your heart that Jesus is exactly what we need in this day and time, then I want to invite you to stand and join in singing our Hymn of Discipleship: I Need Thee Every Hour #578.
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