Eat that which is good

“Ho! Every one who thirsts, 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 do you spend money for what is not bread, and your wages for what does not satisfy?  Listen carefully to Me, and eat what is good, incline your ear and come to Me.  Listen, that you may live; and I will make an everlasting covenant with you, according to the faithful mercies shown to David”  Isaiah 55:1-3

Are you thirsty?  Are you hungry?  Have you spent your money on food or drink, but have come away unsatisfied?  This scripture is probably more true today in a dietary sense then it was when it was written.  I know that God is using food to illustrate life, but lets think about this in a literal dietary sense.  Today we have food and we have junk.  We have lots of junk. We eat lots of junk. We eat junk because it is easy to get to and tastes good (sometimes).  It’s deceiving really.  It gives us a quick fill and temporary satisfaction but leaves us wanting.  So we spend our money on that which does not satisfy.  If we are going to spend our money we might as well spend it on something that satisfies! 

God uses this to illustrate what happens to us spiritually and emotionally.  We spend our money on things that give us a quick fix, but leave us wanting.  These things include possessions, entertainment, sports, different relationships, and the like.  Now none of these things are necessarily bad in of themselves, but none of them satisfy; at least in the long term.  They may provide temporary satisfaction, but the will leave you wanting.

There are many people in this world who spend all their money on many things to find satisfaction of soul.  They pursue this and that.  They think, “if I have this one thing – then I will be happy.  If I only had a different wife. If I only had more time to travel. If I only had this nice house were I could entertain my friends.”  The sad part is that many people spend their whole life pursuing that thing they think will bring them satisfaction and they don’t realize that it is empty until they spend their whole life getting there!  What a waste!  And then you also have the people who get there and realize that it isn’t all they wanted it to be.  They either accept the ‘fact’ that life isn’t as glorious as they had hoped and live the rest of their days in dissatisfaction, or they end up turning to drugs, alcohol, and suicide.   

But God says, ‘Come buy food and drink from me without money and without cost!’  Oh, Hallelujah! This is the food that satisfies!  And its free!

Oh, this is so true!  God has allowed me to experience a lot of life in 26 years.  I can give several examples of things I have pursued and turned out to be empty.  One such example is the motorcycle I owned up until a couple years ago.  As far as I can remember, I always wanted a motorcycle.  Now I didn’t believe that owning a motorcycle would give me complete satisfaction, but I had this fantasy idea in my head of how wonderful having a motorcycle would be.  I imagined how great it would be to pick up my girl and have her wrap her arms around me and we’d cruise the streets as others looked on with envy.  Well, I did all that, but it never lived up to the fantasy that I had in my mind.  It didn’t fulfill me in the way that I thought it would.  I know this may be a lame example, but my 26 years are full of such examples and so are the years of most other people in the world.

With God, though, it is totally opposite.  A true encounter with God is so much more satisfying then you could ever imagine!  The joy and happiness that I have experienced in God’s presence is so wonderful.  I would give up everything in life, if I had to, to live in God’s presence.  Most people know that relationships are the most satisfying part of life.  This is the same thing, but just with the most incredible person you could ever imagine.  As a matter of fact, when you do experience God I think it makes everything else a little more dissatisfying in comparison. 

So save your money.  Go to God and buy food and drink without money and without cost.  You’ll be glad you did.