July 14, 2024 | Thirst-Quenching Worship

Transcript:

This morning we're going to be in Isaiah chapter 55. Kids, if you're headed out the door to Children's Church, you're welcome to go ahead and step out. We love to have you here. If you want to stay with us as well.

As we're in Isaiah 55, we're taking a step out of our normal series in first Peter, and we're going to jump back hundreds of years to the prophet Isaiah. But we're going to see some of the same themes in the book of Isaiah. And that's because humans haven't changed. You'll see the people in Peter's day needed certain things.

They needed to be told certain things, and the people in Isaiah needed to be told certain things. And we need the same truths today. See, everyone wants to be satisfied. Every human that you've ever met longs for fulfillment and purpose, for security, for peace, to be satisfied. And that's really just another way of saying every human worships something.

Everyone assigns ultimate value to something. We look at something and say, in this moment, that is the highest treasure and the best goal I could have. Now we don't always keep it the same thing. We might jump from one thing to the next, but every human, at every moment we are worshiping beings. We look and say, what's the best thing I could have right now?

I want that we want to be satisfied. The question this morning is not whether or not you pursue satisfaction, because we all do. The question is, are you going to pursue satisfaction in something that will actually satisfy you? Or are you going to turn from one thing to the next, to the next in an exhausting search for satisfaction and fulfillment?

In Isaiah 55, God speaks through the prophet Isaiah to his people, to a people who, if you remember the history, had forgotten who they were really. They had forgotten what God had done for them. They'd really forgotten who God was. They forgot that they were God's people. But Isaiah, at this point in the book is prophesying that even though they had forgotten and even though they had been exiled.

God was going to restore them. And if you heard that story for the first time, you might think, how? How will that happen? How will God's people be returned to joy and peace and satisfaction? Well, that's Isaiah 55. Let's hear his word together. Come, everyone who thirsts, come to the waters, and he who has no money come, buy and eat.

Come by 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. 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.

Behold, I made him a witness to the people's, a leader and commander for the peoples. Behold, you shall call a nation that you do not know, and a nation that did not know you shall run to you because of the Lord your God and of the Holy One of Israel. For he has glorified you. 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. 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.

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.

Father, this is your perfect and powerful word. May we hear it this morning? Amen. This morning I want to give you a couple pegs. Just little words that can help you connect the flow of Isaiah 55. He starts with an invitation, and that invitation is given. God invites you to be satisfied, to be filled. He uses the picture of food especially, and we all know what it's like to be hungry.

I was thinking about a hike that we went on. My wife and I went on years ago. It was a four mile hike. You climbed down about 1000ft, and then you walk about two miles, and then that loops you back around and you climb back up 1000ft. I said it was a four mile hike because that's what it was supposed to be.

But as it turns out, if you get down and you miss a turn on that loop, it turns into not a four mile hike. But by the time we realized it, a seven mile hike with 1000ft climb on the end of it. And the plan was, we brought some snacks and we're going to walk and hike, and we come back up, and then we'll go get lunch and we think that'll be it, you know, 1:00, so we'll be hungry, but it'll be fine.

Well, when four miles turns into seven miles and 1:00 turns into 4 or 430, I was starving. The snacks were long gone. Thankfully, this is before we had a lot of kids hiking with us because I think they would have just died on the trail. Probably.

But when we went and got lunch, I was ready to eat everything. You ever go in and you think I'll take one of everything you have? Just bring it. I'm hungry because you're hungry. You're starving, and you want to be satisfied. You want to be filled. That's God's invitation to you. Just come. Be satisfied. Be filled at the heart of the gospel, at the heart of everything that this book teaches and what we meet for here at Berean Bible Church is invitation and gift.

It's not commands and performance at the heart of what God gives you is not do this and do it well enough. And maybe something good will happen. But come receive this gift. That's his invitation at the beginning. And as we look at this invitation, we're going to see Isaiah uses different words and different places to refer to either what the invitation is or how to receive the invitation.

So first come. That's one picture, a second word. Come delight. Notice the end of verse two. Eat what is good and delight yourselves in rich food. God does not invite you to come. Survive with him for a while and be miserable. Sometimes I think people get the idea that that's what God says we're supposed to do. That's not God's invitation to you.

And think about it. Even with food. Why did God make food taste so good? Especially the fattening foods, right? Why did he make food taste so good? He didn't have to. God could easily have made every food that you enjoy taste like gravel and yet nourish you like God is. He didn't have to do it this way. Why did he do it this way?

Because God made food to taste good and satisfy you, so that you have a better idea of what it means to taste God and be satisfied.

See, God didn't say, oh, I made food this way, and now I want to communicate to these people that I am satisfying. What can I use? Oh, food would work. Now, God knew all along he was going to use food to illustrate what it means to come and say, taste and see that the Lord is good.

I want to encourage you in a little bit. You'll probably go eat lunch, I'm assuming, and I hope it tastes good. And when it does, would you give thanks to God? Say, God, you made this taste good so I know how good you taste.

And you think the food that tastes the absolute best and it satisfies the most. God made that so that you would have an idea of what it's like to be satisfied in him. And here he points to it. But it's not just here, right? Jesus says, I am the bread. We read in first Peter like newborn infants, long for the pure spiritual milk because you've tasted God is good.

That pleasure is there so that you see the goodness of God. So his invitation is come and not just come and receive whatever food you think is not that good. For some of you, that might be salads. You think I have to eat them, but I don't want to. He didn't say, come and eat your salads or your brussel sprouts and survive through it.

He said, come and delight yourself in rich food. Well, invitations, that's the first thing. An invitation. The second thing is conditions. Invitations always have some form of condition. If I invite you to a wedding, you have to come on the day the wedding actually happens. If you come at the right time, if I invite you and say, let me know so I can buy a ticket to a sporting event, well, you have to let me know so that you have a ticket.

There's always conditions that are related to an invitation. So what are the conditions for God's invitation? Well, it's not money. Notice he says he who has no money come by and eat. Come by wine and milk. Without money and without price. Now, that kind of invitation given to everyone can only come from one who has no needs. If you think about it, if you could be generous and say, I want to give something to someone and I don't need them to pay that, that works fine.

And you might be able to do that for a few people, but probably most of us can't say I want to be generous and give something significant to everyone in this room. You say, I'm going to run out of money. I can't keep buying it because I have needs.

And much less. Could you say, everyone in America, I want to give everyone in America a gift. You'll run out of resources because you have needs. That's why when we come in, God's invitation is different. Because God has no needs. He doesn't need you to bring money because he doesn't need money for anything. Scripture says if God were hungry, he would not tell us because the earth is his.

He doesn't need you to bring like. Like the pagans used to bring sacrifices as food for the gods. He doesn't need that. Scripture says God is not served by human hands as if he needed anything. I want you to think about this connection in one sentence. God is the most generous of beings because he needs nothing. If you think of God as if he needs something, you won't appreciate the full grace that he gives you.

God needs absolutely nothing so he can say, don't bring money to buy this. Instead, you just come and delight yourself in the good gift that I am giving you. Now, maybe it's obvious he's not only talking about literal money here. Certainly we don't bring money. You don't come to God and say, here's my retirement account. I'm going to give that to you, and so you'll satisfy me as if you purchase it.

But it's not just money. Let's dive a little deeper. What other things might we bring to God? Sometimes we bring our own self-righteousness and we say, God, thank you that I'm not like these other people. And since I'm better than they are, I deserve some kind of fulfillment. You see, I'm pulling out my metaphorical wallet and taking the currency of my self-righteousness and saying, God, will you give me a little satisfaction because I offered you this or my good works?

Any form of good works. God, I did this. I was kind of them. So can you give me a little bit of fulfillment? Can you give me some meaning and some purpose? Because I've done some pretty good stuff. See, I'm pulling that wallet out again, and I'm just flipping out the dollar bills of my good works and saying, God, come on, I've earned this.

Or maybe we bring our intelligence and think I'm smart enough to figure out that I need you, God. So I'm bringing all that intelligence to you. And since I've done that, instead of chasing all these other things satisfy me. But I'm still looking at something about me giving God that currency and saying, would you fulfill me? Would you satisfy me?

That's not his invitation. But before we go on, think about this. Even if that were the case, if you knew that, you could have perfect satisfaction, how much would you pay for that? Oh, we often think about it the other way. But think if you knew that if I lived this way with these good works, God would completely satisfy my soul.

If you really believed that, I think you'd try really hard to live that way. If you knew, it would cost you $50,000, but you'd have perfect satisfaction. For $500,000 or 5 million. Whatever price tag you put on it, if it's really full satisfaction of the soul, we might say, I don't have enough to buy it, but it would be worth it.

And God says, don't bring your currency to me and try to buy it at all. Come and delight yourself. So how do you come without offering anything in payment? If you're not coming and saying, here's my self righteousness, I deserve it. Here's my intelligence and deserves something from you, God. How do you do it? Isaiah uses two different words to refer to what it's like to come to God.

If you look at verse six, seek the Lord while he may be found. Call upon him while he is near you to seek you. Come to him you call. In other words, instead of saying, God, look at something about me. God, look at me and satisfy me. You come and say, God, I'm only looking to you. Would you satisfy me?

You seek and you call on God rather than coming and saying, God, look at my efforts. Look at my works. God freely, generously offers you satisfaction simply because you're coming to him. What grace. What love. We know people who are generous. We know people who might give wonderful gifts. God offers perfect satisfaction and says you can't bring anything to buy that.

But I'll give it to you if you seek me. Now, that doesn't mean make a careful distinction here. That doesn't mean that coming to God costs nothing. We'll use a phrase like the cost of discipleship and say it cost. In fact, another phrase we use is is opportunity cost. Right. If you say, I'm going to choose to do this, I lose the opportunity to do everything else.

If you're going to seek God as your satisfaction, you're going to have to say, I'm not going to look at money or people or approval for the satisfaction of my soul. It may feel like a cost not because you're buying it, but because you're not pursuing those other things. You have to come to God to receive his invitation.

You can't come to money and say, God, would you help money to fulfill the deepest needs of my soul? God's not doing that. God says, come to me. Turn from pursuing money or approval or whatever else it might be.

We don't come with money. So what is the condition for this invitation? There's really two here. One, we come with dependent thirst. The biggest condition for you receiving God's invitation is that you need it.

We come with dependent thirst. Every person is thirsty. We hear this thirst in phrases that might echo around in your brain, saying things like, if only I had this. Whatever it is, if only I had these possessions. If only people really accepted me. If only people really loved me. If only I had a relationship with that person. If only, if only, if only then I would be satisfied.

Then I would be happy. Then my life would have purpose. Whatever you put afterwards. Every one of those if only statements is just saying I'm thirsty. I need something not physically thirsty, but the kind of longing from us parched, dry soul and this is not something only Christians say. This is human. Let me give you a couple examples.

Steve Jobs once said, the only way to be truly satisfied is to do what you believe is great work. Think about what he's saying. He says, I know you want to be satisfied. He just assumes that he assumes you're thirsty and says, Now I've got a plan for satisfaction. You need to find something you think is great work and give yourself to it.

How much does that work cost? Have you ever seen someone who threw away their family? Because they were pursuing great work. Because they were so thirsty to have that satisfaction? Sure. What happens when you can't work like you used to? Some of you are at that point.

And if you thought that work was going to scratch the itch of satisfaction, like Steve Jobs says, what do you do?

What happens if you try some great work and you fail and you don't get the big sales contracts that you thought you were going to get? The small business you started up doesn't succeed. To satisfy or as Isaiah asks, why do you spend your labor for that which does not satisfy? It's like Isaiah is speaking to Steve Jobs from 2000 years earlier.

Steve, you really think good work that you think is great. Pursuing that with everything. You really think that's going to satisfy your soul? Or Oprah Winfrey said, the biggest adventure you can take is to live the life of your dreams. Says, I know you're hungry. I know you're thirsty. You want something? Well, the adventure you can have. All right.

Just pursue the life of your dreams. That's where satisfaction comes. Have you ever had a dream that came true and didn't satisfy? Of course.

Sometimes people are a little bit more obvious about what they're saying. David Lee Roth said money doesn't buy happiness, but it can buy a yacht big enough to pull alongside it. And we laugh and I hope we cry a little. He knows he's thirsty. He knows everybody around him is thirsty. And he says money won't really do it.

He got that far. But I'm still going to chase money anyway. And Isaiah says, why do you spend your money for that which is not bread? Everybody's thirsty. And God through the mouth of Isaiah says, why are you chasing the things that are empty? Because in this text there's two kinds of food. There's food that satisfies and food that doesn't.

There's no third category. There's not other options or other restaurants you can try. There's just food that doesn't satisfy and food that does. And every one of these people knows they're thirsty and they're looking in the wrong place. They're looking at food that will not satisfy. Everyone is thirsty. And that thirst is both a grace, a good thing and a danger.

The thirst is a grace. It's good that we're thirsty because we know we need something. Think of what it would be like to go through your life and never feel anything in your soul that says, I need God. And just eat all of the emptiness of the world and drink all of the poison of the world, and end up not any more satisfied than you were.

It's good that we have thirst. It's good that everyone has thirst. That's God's grace. It's a danger because when you're thirsty enough, you might drink something harmful or empty. At least. So God says, here's your invitation. Come and delight yourself in rich food. What are the conditions? You don't bring any form of currency, anything about you to look at and say, God, you have to satisfy me because of this.

You come with dependent thirst that says, I'm thirsty. Would you fill me? The second condition is you come at the right time. As with other invitations, it's foolish to assume that you can accept it whenever you want to. If you're invited to a birthday party, it does you no good to decide. I'll come a week later.

Scripture says there will be a time when you won't be able to respond to God's invitation. Says it's appointed unto man to die once, and after that the judgment. There's a time when humans will not be able to respond to this wonderfully generous invitation of God, but not only looking at final judgment. This is also a warning to us to say, respond when God works in your heart.

The way Isaiah said it. 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. I want to plead with you today. Maybe you feel the emptiness and the thirst this morning.

In a way that you haven't.

Maybe you long for God's satisfaction today and you say, God, please satisfy me. You might not feel that way tomorrow. Not that your thirst will ever completely go away, but you might not feel it as acutely today.

I want to encourage you and plead with you. If God opens your eyes to emptiness in anything in your life. Turn from it towards him. If he gives you this glimpse that says, I do really want to be satisfied, and God. Turn towards him. Respond to that while God is doing that in your life. So he gives you an invitation.

He gives you some conditions. Then he talks about how this grace comes to you. The first thing is it comes to you through Jesus. Now maybe you go. Wait, pastor Jerry, I did not see the word Jesus anywhere in that text. Where are you getting that? Well, first, it's built on Isaiah 53. If you remember where Isaiah points to Jesus as the suffering servant who would be crushed by the father for his people to gather a people together.

And if you read from Isaiah 53, Isaiah 54 is just response is based on that barren people should sing based on that. People who are tossed back and forth in the storm have a foundation. And based on that, thirsty people can drink and be satisfied. So it goes back to Isaiah 53. But even if you didn't go back there, just here in this text, the end of verse three says, I will make with you an everlasting covenant.

My steadfast, sure love for David. And Jesus is the King in the line of David. He's the Messiah. Peter actually quotes this same phrase in acts chapter 13, and when he quotes it, there, he says, Jesus died and was raised. And guess what? That is the steadfast, true love for David. So Isaiah didn't know all the details of that, and Isaiah's readers didn't know everything that steadfast your love for David meant.

But he gives us enough in this text to point us to the Messiah, to the message that both Jew and Gentile, because of the suffering servant Jesus who would die, come back from the grave and live forever. Both Jew and Gentile can be satisfied. So God fulfills this through Jesus first, second through his word. Notice some other terms in this text I mentioned.

Come delight. Seek, call. But notice a few others. If you look at the end of verse two, listen diligently to me. What do we listen to? To someone's voice? To their words? Listen diligently to me. Look at verse three. Incline your ear and come to me. Hear that your soul may live. He's going to go on in this text and tell us you need the Word of God.

Because verse eight. My thoughts are not your thoughts, and your ways are not my ways. Because as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways and my thoughts than your thoughts. Now we can say that about all God's ways. His ways are higher than ours. But which way? Specifically in this text.

Notice right before he says that he speaks of God's compassion, let him return to the Lord, that he may have compassion on him. Says God's ways of showing compassion to you by satisfying you are better than our ways. They're higher than our ways. We need God's Word for for lots of reasons. But would you think back to Adam and Eve in the garden?

Before sin entered the world. We don't need God's Word just because we're sinful. We need it because we're human. What's the first thing God does after he creates Adam and Eve? He speaks to them because they were not made with everything they needed in their own heads, and neither were we. We need God's word. They were not made to know their identity or their purpose in life without God telling them, and we're not made to.

This is one of the fundamental lies of our culture. Over and over. You hear it. You hear people saying you need to embrace who you are, which means you can choose to be whatever you want to be. Know scripturally. Embracing who you are as a human is to embrace your need for God. I'm limited. I can't find purpose because I don't even know what my purpose is.

Unless God speaks that to me and tells me what that purpose is, to embrace who you are as a limited creature is to embrace that. You need the one who has no limits. And so we need the Word of God because we are human. I think that's one reason why I can't find satisfaction apart from God. I wouldn't even know where to look.

I'll come up with all kinds of ideas. But his ways are higher than my ways. His thoughts are higher than my thoughts. I'll think I'll be satisfied if I can just get this. This vacation home, this boat, this whatever. I have this relationship, I'll be satisfied there. And that's my way of thinking. That's my thought. And God says, no, that won't really satisfy you.

My ways are actually a lot higher than yours. Let me tell you how to be satisfied. He's not trying to crush you and say you don't get what you want. He's trying to say you will actually be satisfied this way, and you won't that way. My ways are higher than your ways.

And so if we come. Say I want to follow that invitation. We come with the right conditions at the right time. We say, God, I'm thirsty. I don't bring anything else. I'm not trying to buy it from you. I just need to. Satisfaction. You give. How does he give that to us? Through Jesus, through his word. What is the promise?

That's the end of this chapter. He gives you an illustration. He talks about rain.

As the rain and snow come down from heaven. And don't 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 he. This picture of rain. It comes down, it brings forth fruit. It gives you satisfaction. And you eat it. Not the rain, the fruit.

You eat it and you're satisfied. Why did God make plants like that?

Why does God make rain work like that? I hope this morning you'll take a bigger view of God that says God made it work like that because he wants to perfectly picture the way His word works. He didn't go searching for this illustration afterwards. God made it this way in the first place.

So the illustration is rain. The reality is his word. His word comes down. It comes from God. Ultimately, in Jesus, he's the word who came down and dwelt among us as a human, but also his written word that gives testimony about Jesus and what does that word do? It brings fruit, and he gives you three here, verse 12, for you shall go out in joy.

Do you want joy? Of course you do. It's what it means to be thirsty. God says, my rain of my word comes down, and it accomplishes the purpose that I have. One of those things is to bring forth the fruit of joy in your life. The second is peace. You'll be led forth in peace. If you had joy and peace to the fullest extent, I think you'd call that being satisfied.

I have the best joy I could have. I don't feel like it's going to be stolen from me. Joy and peace. It's satisfaction for you. But this picture of rain, it can only go so far. It doesn't quite get all the way to what the word does. Notice verse 13 says, instead of the thorn shall come up the cypress instead of the brier shall come up the myrtle.

So think about the picture of rain. If I had a small apple tree and rain comes, what happens? I get a bigger apple tree. And then if we get enough rain and nutrients in the soil and all these things and sunshine and all that stuff, we get apples. So we know how that picture works. Small apple tree, big apple tree, fruit with the word.

It doesn't work like that. It says the thorn turns into the cypress. The thorn bush turns into the oak tree. Now, if you in in your backyard had a thorny bush and rain came down and you came out the next day and said, there's an oak tree, that would be weird. You wouldn't know what to do with that.

I'm not much of a gardener, but even I know that's not how it works. Or maybe we could, like, do a southern version of this. And we say the kudzu turns into an apple tree. You figure out how to do that. There's a lot of money to be made. I'm just saying. That's the way the world works. Maybe today you're here and you feel like at my best, I'm a thorny bush.

I don't bear fruit very much. And if I did, nobody would want it.

Say, that little bit of joy that pops up in my life. It's hardly anything. And all these prickly briers are around. There is hope for something far better for you. Radical transformation. Not bigger and better. Like you'll be a bigger and better version of you. But you were a thorn. And now you're a tree that spreads out and bears fruit.

That's what God's Word does. And he says God's word. It's not a question. Will God do it? Maybe it'll happen. No. He says, God's word will not return to him. Empty. It will accomplish the purpose that he sends it for. So you come back over and over to the rain of God's Word and say, God, let that reign transform me.

Shape me. Change me to be not a thorn, but a tree that bears fruit. Why are you transformed in this text? I want us to get as much as we can. The flow of what Isaiah is saying. Why are you transformed? It's not just so you feel better about yourself.

After the first part of verse 13, he says, and it shall make a name for the Lord, an everlasting sign that shall not be cut off.

God promises that His word comes, and as it falls on you and you say, I want that invitation, I'm thirsty. Let me drink it in as it falls on you. It bears fruit. Joy and peace. And that transforms you for worship. That transforms you to say, this is going to make a name for the Lord, to display his glory to yourself, to people around you.

And that worship satisfies your soul.

This morning you may say, I'm not sure that works for me.

God says his ways are higher than your ways. God says this will satisfy your soul. Are you coming? That's the logical flow of the passage. Come. Here's an invitation. Your condition is I'm thirsty. That's how you come. Seek it from God while he is here. Where do I come? What do I do? I look to Jesus in His word with confidence that God will bear fruit of joy and peace and transform me to worship him.

So are you coming to Jesus this morning? When you're discouraged, restless, disappointed, anxious. Where do you run? I want to ask you to be honest with yourself. Nobody's hearing your answers in your head.

Please don't lie to yourself. Where do you run?

Do you run to food? It's a good picture. Do you run to food and think if I can just eat a good enough meal. I'll forget about all the things that are not satisfied in my soul. Do you run to TV and think that four hours of watching people do some other experience is going to somehow numb you, so you forget that your soul is not satisfied?

Do you run to other people? And ask them to do something that only Jesus can do? To satisfy you?

Do you run to shopping and think that if I just buy the next thing? Unlike the 5000 other things I bought, that didn't satisfy this one will do it.

Maybe you run somewhere darker. Maybe you run to the internet and you see sexual immorality played out before you, or described.

And you know it won't satisfy. But you think maybe it'll make me forget that I'm not satisfied because of that little moment of pleasure? Maybe you run to your anger and think, if I just blow up one time, then I'll be able to handle it. After that.

Maybe you run to alcohol or drugs and say, I'm just going to forget that I'm really thirsty.

Our hearts are so wickedly creative that we'll run from one thing to the next, exhausting ourselves to try and find something that will satisfy, or to try and forget that I'm not satisfied. And we'll make up a million ways to try and do that. Isaiah 29 uses this picture. He says it's like a person eating in a dream.

Like in your dream, you're hungry and you eat this amazing feast and then you wake up and you're still hungry. That's what all of those are like. We're like a person walking around in a dream saying, oh, I'll be satisfied with these relationships. And then you wake up to reality and go, that was just dream food. It was just a shadow, not real.

Do you run to these things or do you run to Jesus? He offers you something so much better. He doesn't tell you that. I'll help you forget that you're not satisfied. He says I will satisfy you. I am the bread of life. I am the living water. And he who drinks will never thirst again.

When you're discouraged. Do you run to the one who died to give you a living hope?

When you're restless, do you run to the one who said. Come to me. All you who are weary and heavy laden. And I will give you rest. Jesus gives rest because he died so that you don't have to run on the performance treadmill of your desperate attempts to be good enough. That's exhausting. You can't do it. Jesus died to give you rest.

And if you come to him and what he's done, he will give it. Now, I'm not asking if you come to church. I'm not asking if you read your Bible. And I'm not asking if you pray. Obviously, those are good things, but people have checked the boxes of I attended church. I opened God's word, I read. I said some things in prayer.

People have check those boxes and never really come to Jesus. Maybe that's you.

And then they leave the church thinking Jesus didn't satisfy me. But brothers and sisters, I promise you on the authority of God's Word, if you are not satisfied, then you have not been drinking on Jesus in His word. You might have showed up at a church building.

You might have read the Bible. But do you really come to Jesus in His word when you're disappointed? Do you think I count everything as loss for the surpassing worth of knowing Jesus?

When you're disappointed in yourself. Tim mentioned this earlier. When you're disappointed in yourself. Do you think I've got to figure out how to forgive myself? Or do you think I'm going to run to the one who said, if you confess your sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.

When you're worried, do you cast your anxieties on him because he cares for you? When you're worried, do you run to how can I figure it all out? Or do you run to Jesus cares for me. I want to run to Jesus. He will satisfy you.

The invitation for you, for all of us is to come. Now, if you think I haven't been coming to Jesus, I've been chasing some of those other things. Then repent. Turn from trusting those things. Turn from saying money, people. Something here will satisfy me, at least for a moment. And then I'll get the next thing. Turn from that.

Turn to Jesus. Come, delight. Come enjoy the rich food of his joy and his peace. Come and worship. Because that is what will quench your thirst. And Jesus will always satisfy.

I want to invite you just to take a moment before God in prayer. Seek the Lord while he may be found. Call upon him while he is near. If God's pointed out something that you've looked to for satisfaction, would you confess that? If God's pointed out where you haven't really run to Jesus, would you confess that? Would you turn to him in worship and know he satisfies?