“Our Lenten Fast: Setting Appetites on the Food God Gives”

Isaiah 55

Fasting can be thought of in two ways.  We can speak of fasting literally as a practice of temporarily abstaining from food for medical or spiritual reasons.  But fasting can also be thought of in broader, figurative terms as a symbol for other forms of self-denial and service.  After the first of our services this season, I received an e-mail message that offered a different approach to fasting.  It suggested things like fasting from anger and hatred, giving our families an extra dose of love each day; fasting from discouragement by holding on to Jesus’ promise of grace, and fasting from spending too much money by trying to reduce purchases by ten percent and giving those savings to those in need.  These creative ideas invite of us to think of fasting as a metaphor for repentance. 

 Isaiah 55 is brimming with metaphors: water, food, rain, snow, seed, soil, thorns and briers, cypress and myrtle trees.  All of these images were chosen to speak to us of the beauty and power of God’s grace in Jesus.  They call us to re-discover the wonder of the relationship God has given us to enjoy as His children in baptism.  Because it is a re-discovery for us, Isaiah’s message also calls us to repentance, to turn from things that distract us from living by faith in our amazingly gracious Lord. 

  First we find ourselves with Isaiah in a marketplace: "Come, everyone who thirsts, come to the waters; and he who has no money, come, buy and eat!  Come, buy wine and milk without money and without price. Why do you spend your money for that which is not bread, and your labor for that which does not satisfy?  Listen diligently to me, and eat what is good, and delight yourselves in rich food”. (Isaiah 55:1,2)  What would you think if when you went shopping you were greeted by large, bright posters declaring that today everything in the store was free?  When something sounds too good to be true it probably is, right?  But here Isaiah, mimicking a merchant, declares to us that he wants to give us water, wine, milk and bread for free! 

 The prophet means what he says, but he is speaking of something other and greater than giving us our daily bread for free.  “Listen diligently to me, and eat what is good.”  Our ears are not the organs through which we eat, so Isaiah must be inviting us to think of his food and our eating as metaphors.  “Incline your ear, and come to me; hear, that your soul may live; and I will make with you an everlasting covenant, my steadfast, sure love for David.” (Vs. 3)  The food Isaiah invites us to feast on is God’s covenant promise of salvation through Jesus.  Four centuries before Isaiah lived, God promised King David, His beloved servant, that He would send the Christ into the world through his family.  Six centuries after Isaiah’s time Jesus the Son of David would be born in Bethlehem to establish His new covenant of steadfast love and forgiveness by offering His life on the cross for the sins of all people.  Jesus is that witness of God’s mercy to all peoples.  He is the leader chosen by God to call all people to hear the good news of His salvation, so that they can eat the rich food of God’s forgiveness and live. 
 
The food God gives us really is free.  He loves us even though we can offer Him nothing of equal value in return.  Through Christ, God gives us a place in His family as His children – baptism assures us of this!  Through Christ, God nurtures and strengthens our faith through His Word and through the sacrament of Holy Communion.  “Come to me,” He calls, “come and eat my food, so that you may be blessed by knowing that I love you.  Listen to my Word; feed on it, so that you may be a blessing to others as I love them through you.” 

 God’s food is free, but it is not cheap.  The gifts God showers on us so freely were purchased by our loving Lord at the cost of His precious life.  Jesus gladly spent His life for us, but He did so to set us free from the sin that would otherwise destroy and condemn us.  Eating at God’s table leads us to make changes in our diet and our way of life.  "Seek the LORD while he may be found; call upon him while he is near; let the wicked forsake his way, and the unrighteous man his thoughts; let him return to the LORD, that he may have compassion on him, and to our God, for he will abundantly pardon. For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways, declares the LORD. For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways and my thoughts than your thoughts.” 

 God’s rich banquet is not the only one laid before us in life.  There are foods all around us that promise to feed our desires for security, power, and pleasure that lead us to look away from God for our lives.  Today’s self-help writers and speakers offer us many strategies for bettering ourselves and attaining a sense of fulfillment in life.  Some of them offer tips for achieving success in our work and accomplishing our goals in the rest of life.  Others school us in ways of enjoying ourselves, and of course there are all kinds of products and activities for entertaining ourselves for purchase today.  Many of these can be helpful, but when they promise to satisfy us completely, they become idols.  Idols claim to do for us what only God can do. 

Idols aren’t cheap.  Just ask the Scientologist how much money he spends on learning the secrets of his faith.  Consider the cost in health and well-being the alcoholic or the drug addict pays to escape problems.  I recently heard the confession of a successful doctor who so loves one composer’s music that he spends thousands of dollars on CD’s. 

Idols turn us back upon ourselves, forcing us to struggle to be gods ourselves.  Idols keep us busy, but they never set us free from the desperate sense that we haven’t quite received what we were hoping for.  Only God has the power to release us.  "For as the rain and the snow come down from heaven and do not return there but water the earth, making it bring forth and sprout, giving seed to the sower and bread to the eater, so shall my word be that goes out from my mouth; it shall not return to me empty, but it shall accomplish that which I purpose, and shall succeed in the thing for which I sent it.” (Vss. 10-11)

Idols make empty promises, but God keeps His.  Draw back from those idols, fast from them, and listen to God’s Word.  In God’s Word you encounter a personal message, from a personal God, who knows you and cares for you personally.  I remember the wonderful surprise I had when I attended my first Bible study group.  Having grown up outside of the church, I lived with an outsider’s uninformed opinion of the Bible.  I thought it was just a book of stories about shepherds and ancient people.  What I found were writings that often did two things at once: they told a story of a person or event in relation to God and they invited me to join them in their relationship with God.  I read Paul’s confession of faith, “To live is Christ and to die is gain” (Philippians 1:21), and found myself wondering what it would be like to have that kind of hope in the face of life and death.  I was drawn from there by desire for that same assurance, and I read further in the Bible.  I came across passages that spoke of the promise of eternal life won for us by Jesus’ death and resurrection.  I began to trust them, and I found that hope was born in my heart.  God’s Word, like seed, was planted in my heart and doing its life-giving work! 

The food that God gives us reconnects us through faith in Jesus to the Source of all life – God Himself.  God’s Word of truth and grace frees us from the bondage of lies and idols and the condemnation of sin and selfishness.  When we eat God’s food, listening to His Word and receiving the Sacraments, we trust in Jesus and He causes us to grow into people who honor God’s name and do His will.  When we set our appetites on the food God gives, our lives blossom with beauty that gives praise to our wonderful Lord.  "For you shall go out in joy and be led forth in peace; the mountains and the hills before you shall break forth into singing, and all the trees of the field shall clap their hands. Instead of the thorn shall come up the cypress; instead of the brier shall come up the myrtle; and it shall make a name for the LORD, an everlasting sign that shall not be cut off."   (Vss. 12,13)  Amen.