Sitting in Shalom

When Brenna and Israel Rubio started off the sermon on Sunday they talked about Shalom and food - how the two often go together in scripture. There is no shalom when there’s hunger, and often a feast is pictured as an image of shalom. In it’s fullness, of course, Shalom is so much more. As the great South African leader Nelson Mandela defined it, “Peace is not just the absence of conflict; peace is the creation of an environment where all can flourish regardless of race, color, creed, religion, gender, class, caste or any other social markers of difference.”

Isaiah 55 is just such a picture. It foreshadows the heavenly banquet that Mandela described and that Jesus spoke about so often.

Take time today and listen intently to the come. Listen with your soul. Listen for yourself. Listen for your world. What is God saying to you today?

Come, all you who are thirsty,

    come to the waters;

and you who have no money,

    come, buy and eat!

Come, buy wine and milk

    without money and without cost.

• Isaiah 55:1