Without Money? Without Price?

We humans are a suspicious lot.  If we see a sign “Free Puppies”, we figure there must be something wrong with them.   What’s the tricky motive behind giving away free food & clothing at the Thursday night’s Shepherd’s Supper?  We’ve seen the motto, “There’s no such thing as a free lunch”.  The Scripture lessons we’re presented with this weekend fly in the face of our need to pay for everything, our need to control our independence even from God.

Isaiah 55:1-5 (and beyond) towers like Mt. Ararat over the Caucasian highlands.  Counter-cultural to both Testaments, it spins images of a prodigal God, a perfect gift and empowered recipients.  “EVERYONE who thirsts, come to the waters…come, buy wine and milk WITHOUT money and WITHOUT price!”   The only admission to the Banquet is a heart-felt yearning to be involved in it.  What does this say to Hebrew contemporaries of Isaiah about sacrifices and sin-offerings?  What does this say to present-day Christians about deeds of penance?  Or doctrines of Atonement??

Romans 9:1-5 is Paul’s lament that his fellow Hebrews are missing out on the gracious gift of participating in God through Christ.  He has “great sorrow and unceasing anguish in my heart” because the Israelites have come so close…  From them has come the Messiah who is over all–yet most have chosen to set the gift on a closet shelf.  Twenty-First Century  church people may likewise be dismayed at the widespread distrust of God’s Gifts.  If I accept them, will I relinquish my freedom to choose?  Will I lose my “independence”?  Yep.  Sorry, Frank, you can’t do it your way.

The Gospel according to Matthew (14:13-21) remembers the story about Jesus feeding a gigantic crowd with meager rations.  It takes place in “a deserted place” where many of the devout would feel uncomfortable; the wilderness reminds them of wandering homeless, rebellious and tempted.  “The desert raises profound questions about the source of human meaning and identity, security and sustenance.” (Iwan Russell-Jones, in FEASTING on the WORD, A 3:308)  The riff-raff is fed only because God loves them–and there’s still  twelve baskets of left-overs to distribute to all the Tribes!  The Disciples were thinking in commercial terms of buying provisions; Jesus spoke in radical terms of GIVING them what they needed…  Jesus told them to dream bigger, outside the box.  As the Disciples made the distribution they also realized their own roles in the Kingdom.

Once again Holy Writ stands over and against the prevailing wisdom.  It’s gonna be hard to relinquish our stores of provisions for old-age security.  In the desert we don’t think there’ll be enough to go ’round.  Besides, nice capitalists like us should always pay our own way, assuming we’re gods and don’t need the charity of  grace.  Yet the word still is shouted over the midway, “Come & Get It!”  Without money?  Without price?