Genesis 42:36

42:36 Their father Jacob said to them, “You are making me childless! Joseph is gone. Simeon is gone. And now you want to take Benjamin! Everything is against me.”

Ecclesiastes 1:2

Introduction: Utter Futility

1:2 “Futile! Futile!” laments the Teacher,

“Absolutely futile! Everything is futile!”

Ecclesiastes 12:8

Concluding Refrain: Qoheleth Restates His Thesis

12:8 “Absolutely futile!” laments the Teacher,

“All of these things are futile!”

Isaiah 55:2

55:2 Why pay money for something that will not nourish you?

Why spend your hard-earned money on something that will not satisfy?

Listen carefully to me and eat what is nourishing!

Enjoy fine food!

Isaiah 55:1

The Lord Gives an Invitation

55:1 “Hey, all who are thirsty, come to the water!

You who have no money, come!

Buy and eat!

Come! Buy wine and milk

without money and without cost!

Colossians 1:29

1:29 Toward this goal I also labor, struggling according to his power that powerfully works in me.