Come to the Waters

Isaiah 55:1-5

Pastor Buss

Susan Jones shares the following true story from her childhood. She writes: “One day, my mother was out and my dad was in charge of me and my brother, who is four years older than me. I was maybe one and a half-years-old and had just recovered from an accident in which my arm had been broken, among other injuries. Someone had given me a little tea set as a get well gift and it was one of my favorite toys. Daddy was in the living room engrossed in the evening news and my brother was playing nearby in the living room when I brought Daddy a little cup of tea, which was just water. After several cups of tea and a lot of praise for such yummy tea, my Mom came home. My Dad made her wait in the living room to watch me bring him a cup of tea, because it was ‘just the cutest thing!’ My Mom waited and sure enough, there I came down the hall with a cup of tea for Daddy and she watched him drink it up. She then said, ‘Honey, did it ever occur to you that the only place that baby can reach to get water is the toilet?’”

As disgusting as that sounds, there are many people in our world today who do just that – they unwittingly drink from the wrong water source. In a vain effort to satisfy their lusts, they lap up the polluted waters of the sinful flesh and the corrupt world around us. They are so desperate for love and acceptance, satisfaction and fulfillment, that they will look anywhere to quench their thirst – work or recreation, sex or relationships, drugs or alcohol, books, movies, music – you name it. They look in all the wrong places for the answers to life’s questions. And they only get more and more dissatisfied, sick in heart and soul, and farther away from God.

Such was the case in our text for today. The prophet Isaiah was writing to the people of Judah, who were exiled in Babylon. And in their captivity they too were tempted to drink from the polluted waters of the flesh, tempted to conform to the hedonistic, pleasure-seeking lifestyle of their captors, or to give in to the dishonest business practices of the Babylonians. In short, they had grown so comfortable in their new foreign home, that they were becoming just like the ungodly people around them, even to the point of worshipping their false gods. And so, Isaiah said to them: “COME, EVERYONE WHO THRISTS; COME TO THE WATERS; AND HE WHO HAS NO MONEY, COME, BUY AND EAT! WHY DO YOU SPEND YOUR MONEY FOR THAT WHICH IS NOT BREAD, AND YOUR LABOR FOR THAT WHICH DOES NOT SATSIFY?”

Here God exhorts the people to turn away from their sinful, worldly ways and to turn back to Him for true satisfaction. In a way it’s like the old story of a farmer, whose dog followed him to town one day. As he hitched his horse and buggy to a post in front of the country store, the storekeeper, seeing the panting dog, chided the farmer for making the dog run all the way in. The farmer replied, “That dog ain’t tired from following me to town. What tired him out was all his wandering around. There was not an open gate, a hole in the fence, or a tree stump that he didn’t explore.”

My friends, that same thing can happen to you and me. Like the dog, we become so curious about the worldly wisdom and philosophies around us, that we start to explore avenues that we shouldn’t. As a result, like the people of Judah we wind up conforming to the ungodly practices of this corrupt world. It might be a temptation to cheat someone, or tell a ‘little white lie,’ maybe to gossip about someone behind their back or hold a grudge. It might eve something a simple as forsaking our daily Bible reading and devotions for some other pleasure. But whatever it is, drinking from these dirty waters not only tires us out but leaves us spiritually dissatisfied and sin-sick in heart and soul.

That’s why God also exhorts us today to turn away from our sinful, worldly ways and to turn back to Him for true satisfaction. In other words, to daily repent of our sins in humble contrition and sorrow. For repentance is indeed a ‘turning around.’ Like when a commanding officer tells the soldiers to make an ‘about-face.’ So also, repentance is an about-face, where we turn away from sin and turn towards the Lord for forgiveness and salvation. And what does He promise to do? You know, if it were us, we’d probably start tightening the thumb screws on the victim. In fact, we often do that. We sometimes withhold forgiveness altogether, or very grudgingly parcel it out. And maybe that’s why we think God will do the same to us.

But our text reassures us, in no uncertain terms, that such misgivings are unfounded. For God is always more than ready and willing to forgive and absolve us. In fact, He longs to comfort us with his pardon and peace, and to satisfy us with His forgiveness and salvation. That’s the meaning behind the gracious invitation in our text: “COME, EVERYONE WHO THRISTS; COME TO THE WATERS; AND HE WHO HAS NO MONEY, COME, BUY AND EAT! COME, BUY WINE AND MILK WITHOUT MONEY AND WITHOUT PRICE.”

Now at first glance, it may seem like an oxymoron, a contradiction in terms. How can you buy something without money or price? How can you buy something that’s already free? But that’s whole point! The only way we can receive God’s forgiveness and salvation is as a free gift from His gracious, merciful hand. There are no good works we can do to labor for it; no righteous deeds we can do to earn His favor. He simply gives it to us pro bone, ‘on the house.” And the reason He does is because someone already paid the price – namely, Jesus Christ our Savior. He picked up the tab for us. By living a perfect life in our stead, and giving His life as our ransom on the cross, He paid off the debt of our sin and cancelled out all our iniquities forever. He purchased for us God’s free forgiveness and eternal life at the cost of His precious blood. That is the cleansing stream which He shed to scrub away all our sinful, grimy stains and to make us pure and holy, spotless and beautiful in His sight. And He showered it upon us in richest measure at our Baptism!

Christian author, Ted Dekker, in his book, The Circle Trilogy, writes about a desert world, where the land has been blighted by a terrible curse, and all the inhabitants infected with a deadly disease that turns the skin white like leprosy, cracked and parched and very painful. But on this desert world, there is an oasis – a beautiful green forest, and in the middle there is a crystal clear lake. And whoever bathes in the lake is cured of the disease and made whole and well again. But the only way to maintain this healing is by bathing in the lake every day, because it’s the water that heals.

In an even better way, that’s what our Baptism is like. Only it’s not the water, it’s the Word of God that has the saving power. When we were brought to the font, Jesus Himself baptized us with His cleansing blood to cure us of the disease of our sin, and make us whole and well again, free from any taint of guilt or shame. And we maintain that healing by renewing our Baptism each and every day in contrition and repentance. That’s the meaning behind the phrase, “Come to the waters!” As we come to the font He washes us and make us whiter than snow. As we come to His Holy Word He gives us the reassurance that we are His precious blood bought children. As we come to His house for worship, we hear the blessed pronouncement that we have been absolved and exonerated of all blame. And as we come to His table He feed us with His very body and blood for the remission of all our sins. And all of that without money or price, free of charge, as a gift of His grace!

In fact, even the ‘coming’ is not our doing but His doing. He first came to us, to seek and to save the lost, and to bring us back to Himself and restore us to our rightful place in His kingdom, so that we are saved. That’s what Isaiah was getting at in the verses immediately following our text, when he said: “SEEK THE LORD WHILE HE MAY BE FOUND; CALL ON HIM WHILE HE IS NEAR. LET THE WICKED FORSAKE HIS WAY AND THE EVIL MAN HIS THOUGHTS. LET HIM TURN TO THE LORD, AND HE WILL HAVE MERCY ON HIM, AND TO OUR GOD, FOR HE WILL FREELY PARDON.”

In other words, the only reason we can seek the Lord and come to Him, is because He first sought and found us and freely pardoned us through Jesus Christ. As a matter of fact, the Hebrew text literally says: “He will abundantly pardon us, or multiply His pardon to us.” Which means that as abundant as our sins may be, God’s pardon for those sins is thousands of times more abundant. It keeps on multiplying, and increasing, and exceeding our sin. No matter how dark or deep or numerous our sins may be, God has the grace and forgiveness to cover them all. And He offers it to us freely, simply through the gift of repentance and faith in Jesus Christ.

A dear friend of mine from North Dakota, Pastor Howard Jording once served a vacancy in a congregation where they knelt for the confession of sins. However, they did not have kneelers, so they knelt right down on the cold, hard floor. Pastor Jording’s young son, Timothy, had never seen this before. So the first time he witnessed it, he was a bit perplexed. He watched for a moment, then he hunkered down on the floor beside his mother and asked: “What we lookin’ for?” And with a wonderful word of wisdom, she replied: “Forgiveness!”

Dear friends, how good it is to know that no matter how many times we come looking for forgiveness, God never turns us away, and He never runs out. He has a never-ending supply of mercy and grace to abundantly pardon all our transgressions. And He pours it out to us richly in the cleansing waters of the Word and Sacraments. May that encourage us, then, to stop searching in the wrong places to quench our thirst. But instead to come daily to God’s cleansing waters, and to share them freely with others. For His name’s sake, we pray. Amen.