JESUS IS INVITING YOU

SOLEMN WHISPER DEVOTIONAL

Sunday, 23rd May,2020

JESUS IS INVITING YOU

(Matt 11:28-30; Isaiah 55:1-3)

MEMORY VERSE: "Come to Me, all you that labour and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. (John 11:28)"

I want to believe that we've all experienced having to carry a heavy load, either at the market, farm or home. Don't you just wish that there was someone present at that very instance to help you? Or have you ever been in a state where you were thirsty and had a long journey to make, most likely in the heat of the scourging sun? Don't you wish that someone would know exactly what you needed and offer you a drink, so you could find strength for the rest of the travel?

God's invitation is not defined on the invited, but on the Invitee's ability to satisfy the hunger of the invited. Matt 12:29 says, "Come to me, all you who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. Take My yoke and learn from Me for I am gentle and lowly in heart, and I will give you rest".

Considering Isaiah 55 verses 1-2, you may wonder what kind of people are invited by the Lord – the thirsty who are broke and cannot pay, and the thirsty who think they can pay and work their way to satisfaction.

Water corresponds to the need for refreshment. When you are most thirsty, desperate and dehydrated, it’s water that you want, and nothing else. “He leads me beside still waters. He restores [refreshes] my soul” (Psalm 23:2–3). God invites you to receive refreshment, restoration, revival and a new beginning.

Milk corresponds to the need for ongoing nourishment. When someone is gasping for life, you give them water. But when you want a little baby to grow day after day, you give it milk again and again. Milk is for health in the long run. Jesus invites you not only to come alive with water, but also to be stable and strong with milk.

Wine corresponds to the need for exhilaration. We want to live and not die, strong and stable instead of weak or wavering. But that is not all we need in life. No matter how stoic, unemotional, phlegmatic, laid-back, or poker-faced we may seem to others, there is a child inside of every one of us that God made for exhilaration — for shouting and singing and dancing and playing and skipping and running and jumping and laughing.

God is willing to revive us from the heat of Death Valley with the miracle of his water. He us willing to make us strong and healthy and stable with the miracle of his milk to give us endless and ever-fresh happiness with the miracle of His wine.

God is daily issuing out invitations. The big question is, what will your response be?

PRAYER: Ever merciful God, we ask that the eyes of our hearts become open to recognise your diverse invitations, so we may accept them in Jesus' name we pray, Amen.

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Bassey Edoho