Banquet with No Food!

10 In little more than a year

you who feel secure will tremble;

the grape harvest will fail,

and the harvest of fruit will not come.

14 The fortress will be abandoned,

the noisy city deserted;

citadel and watchtower will become a wasteland forever,

the delight of donkeys, a pasture for flocks,

15 till the Spirit is poured upon us from on high,

and the desert becomes a fertile field,

and the fertile field seems like a forest.

Isaiah 32:10 & 14-15

The first year my son played high school football, we were invited to attend the “Football Banquet.” I think the appointed time was 6:30 pm and we arrived ready to eat! There was no food! Somehow over the years it was decided that it was too much trouble to feed all those people so the meal disappeared but the name stayed the same.

Satan invites you to a banquet but when you arrive, hungry and ready to eat there is no food!

The story of Joseph in the Book of Genesis is filled with symbols that point to Jesus and the Christian experience. Slavery, suffering, crossing the Red Sea, and freedom in the desert for years while waiting to go in to the Promised Land are all part of the whole story that begins with Joseph being sold into Egypt by his brothers.

For God to accomplish His purposes He withheld the harvest for seven years after seven years of plenty. The lack of food motivated Jacob and his sons to move to Egypt where they grew into a nation. Suffering brought them to Egypt and suffering returned as they became slaves before they were led out by Moses.

Comfort is no motivator. Having your desires satisfied usually does not precede action and accomplishment. If you want your son to become a great fisherman give him hunger not a better fishing rod!

When God withholds what we consider to be a necessity we need to ask this question: “What action is this insufficiency prompting and how is that consistent with what God wants of my life?”

Remember, the World will invite you to a “Banquet,” but it is a banquet with no food. There will be nothing to satisfy your real needs. But when the Spirit “is poured upon us from on high, the desert becomes a fertile field.”