Isaiah 55:1-9 (NRSV)
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Chapter 55Ho, 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. Verse 2Why do you spend your money for that which is not bread, and your labor for that which does not satisfy? Listen carefully to me, and eat what is good, and delight yourselves in rich food. Verse 3Incline your ear, and come to me; listen, so that you may live. I will make with you an everlasting covenant, my steadfast, sure love for David. Verse 4See, I made him a witness to the peoples, a leader and commander for the peoples. Verse 5See, you shall call nations that you do not know, and nations that do not know you shall run to you, because of the Lord your God, the Holy One of Israel, for he has glorified you.
Verse 6Seek the Lord while he may be found, call upon him while he is near; Verse 7let the wicked forsake their way, and the unrighteous their thoughts; let them return to the Lord, that he may have mercy on them, and to our God, for he will abundantly pardon. Verse 8For my thoughts are not your thoughts, nor are your ways my ways, says the Lord. Verse 9For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways and my thoughts than your thoughts.
Devotion
I remember from my running days the parched feel of summer heat and dehydration. The desperate need for water — the cooling gurgle down the throat or the refreshing flow over the head — becomes compelling. Abraham Maslow argued that, for human beings, water is the next strongest need to air itself. In a desert land like Israel, imagine the joy of one who invites, "Ho, everyone who thirsts, come to the waters ... . Come, you who have no money, buy wine and milk ... ." Cool, refreshing water brings life as to a drought-parched plant. So God does for us always.
Prayer
God, refreshing as a babbling brook, bring cool, healing balm to our lives in this dry, crusted world. We ask this in your triune name. Amen.