Wednesday, January 8, 2024 PM

Isaiah 5 and the Rotten Vineyard of Judah

Tuning into that. In Isaiah chapter 5 we are starting not just a new chapter but we're turning the corner into the last portion of a section that I have put under the question, what hope is there? And this is chapters 1 through 5.

As we see the degree to which Judah has fallen, the amount of their trouble, how desperate their situation truly is. It has gotten to the point where God has told them to stop with all the sacrifices, to stop with the feast days, to stop praying to him.

He's no longer interested in hearing them sing to him. That's how bad the relationship has become. And the question then comes, well what hope is there for these rebellious children who don't even acknowledge God as their father?

And that was the metaphor in chapter 1, that God has children but they are so rebellious to him that they don't even acknowledge that he is their father anymore. And sitting in parallel to that metaphor of rebellious children is chapter 5 wherein we have a rotten vineyard.

And the kind of care that God showed his children Israel that really manifested that he was a good father in chapter 1, he repeats that again in chapter 5. Talks about how much care he took for this vineyard and the vine that he planted in his vineyard.

And just like chapter 1 walks through their rebellion, chapter 5 walks through the failure of the vine to thrive, all the wickedness involved in the life of Judah. And we're going to take a look at that whole chapter tonight, kind of an overview, before we begin going through the various smaller passages.

Prayer and the Opening Overview of Isaiah's Message

But let's begin with the word of prayer. Heavenly Father, we thank you for the day. We thank you for your word. Thank you that it is true and trustworthy. We thank you that you have given us this word, that we may glory in your grace as we look at your Son.

And we thank you that this word that has come to us by your Holy Spirit is given in grace. And we pray that you would, by your Spirit, ensure there's an amen in our hearts as we hear your word. We pray these things in Jesus' name.

Amen. Amen. Isaiah delivers sermons for a difficult present. Of course, the difficulty really is the covenant unfaithfulness of Israel, how bad everything has gotten for them. But the Lord is shown time and again as the true Redeemer of Judah.

This is emphasized especially in the first 12 chapters of Isaiah, so there's no mistaking which direction Judah is to turn. They are not to turn to Egypt. They're not to turn to Babylon. They're not to turn to foreign nations to find some military alliance that will help them out of their problems.

There's only one hope for them. There's only one Redeemer for them, and that is their own Lord. And so we come to the metaphor of a rotten vineyard. Now, if you've ever tried to grow, you know, vegetables, for example, and you labor greatly and labor and labor and invest so much time and energy only to be met with ruin rather than a harvest, then you'll be able to relate.

You'll be able to relate to this chapter. And interestingly, as we walk through chapter 5, there's not a signal of bright hope in the entirety of the chapter. There really is no, there really is no clear signal of hope except for the fact that God plans to burn it all down.

Now, normally that would be, well, I guess that's that. But in the agrarian mindset, to burn something down is to get ready for something new. To fertilize the ground, to clear the space, and to start fresh.

So there's a sense there where you're looking for something new, something better, and that's truly how Isaiah and the other prophets and Jesus and the Apostles take this famous passage about a rotten vineyard here in Isaiah chapter 5.

The Song of the Vineyard and the Seven Woes

So I'm going to begin reading through the sections of this chapter, or three sections, and as we read through I'm just going to comment on kind of what's going on in the chapter. But the first seven verses, God calls Judah to be witnesses, and it's a situation in which he gets them to incriminate themselves through obvious questions, rhetorical questions that there's clearly no other answer for, and by making them give the answer, they incriminate themselves.

And then in verses 8 through 23, there's a series of woes. Seven times God says, woe, and then describes the kind of wicked person he's saying woe against. But then he also describes the character of the woe, the kind of judgment that comes with the woe.

And you know, a sevenfold anything is a complete something, and that's what the last portion of the chapter is all about, a full judgment in verses 24 through 30. But it begins with a song, Isaiah 5 verses 1 and 2.

It's a song. Now let me sing to my well-beloved a song of my beloved regarding his vineyard. My well-beloved has a vineyard on a very fruitful hill. He dug it up and cleared out of the stones and planted it with the choicest vine.

He built a tower in its midst and also made a winepress in it. So he expected it to bring forth good grapes, but it brought forth wild grapes. There's your song. And then the question. And now, O inhabitants of Jerusalem and men of Judah, judge please between me and my vineyard.

What more could have been done to my vineyard that I have not done in it? Why then, when I expected it to bring forth good grapes, did it bring forth wild grapes? And now, please let me tell you what I will do to my vineyard.

I will take away its hedge, and it shall be burned, and shall break down its wall, and it shall be trampled down. I will lay it waste. It shall not be pruned or dug, but there shall come up briars and thorns.

I will also command the clouds that they rain no rain on it. Now, so far, this is all parable. There's the metaphors, there's the song, there's the story, the background, and then, oh wow, he's gonna burn up his vineyard because it didn't turn out well.

Nobody has had the finger pointed at them exactly just yet, though the wise reader probably knows what's about to come. The interpretation of the parable, the interpretation of the song, which is verse 7.

For the vineyard of the Lord of hosts is the house of Israel, and the men of Judah are his pleasant plant. He looked for justice, but behold, oppression, for righteousness, but behold, a cry for help.

So, God is saying, I did everything right, and of course he did. He was generous in his care for Israel, for Judah, and so he was expecting there to be good grapes. He was so faithful and generous and kind to them in this covenant that he made with them, he looked for them to be faithful in the covenant towards each other and towards their own God, their own master, their own vineyard owner, but they only brought forth wild grapes, sour grapes, bad grapes.

And so, in verses 8 through 23 is a series of seven woes, and all kinds of people are identified in this section. There is a woe to the property stealers, the pleasure seekers, and then in verses 13 through 17, the woe is explained.

This is what he means when he says woe. Yes, it is a condemnation against certain sinners, but this is what's coming upon you. When he says woe, this is what he means, and he describes the type of judgment that comes upon them.

There's a woe to the pretentious in verses 18 through 19, a woe to the perverts in verse 20, a woe to the proud in verse 21, and woes to the profligate princes in verses 22 and 23. Sevenfold of woes, all these different wicked folks are identified.

Not only do we see that that God is paying attention to everything that happens, but that it matters to him, and so that he declares these judgments. And finally, in verses 24 through 30, the themes come back to the vineyard as a promise of burning, and very interestingly, God begins to describe the foreign armies that he's bringing to judge Judah, and he describes them in the same way that he described his people Israel in the wilderness.

He made sure that their sandals don't wear out. He makes sure that their clothes last. He makes sure that they have plenty of support along their long journey, and they would have success no matter who they meet along the way.

He used to say that about Israel. He said that about Israel in the wilderness, and now he's saying it about those he's bringing in judgment against them. It's very interesting. Now, when we give some careful and sober reflection on a passage like this, and of course this passage is unique in its parable song, and it's unique in its situation in pointing at Judah during the days of Isaiah, but when we think about passages like this, we recognize that God's righteousness is always vindicated in light of his goodness.

His righteousness is vindicated in the light of his goodness. When we spend time thinking about all of God's grace, when that's given due consideration, we have nothing to say. When we think about his grace expressed in his providence, in the life of creation, or we think about his grace especially manifested in the saving of sinners, when it comes time for his wrath, our covered mouths are the amen.

I've got nothing to say. God is good. He's righteous. He's proven himself time and time again. If he brings wrath and judgment, I've got nothing to say against that, because he's good and he's righteous.

He's proven himself more times than I can count, and in fact, in holier and higher venues, the saints actually sound forth the hallelujah at the sight of God's holy vengeance. Revelation 19, verses 1 through 4, you have a fourfold hallelujah as the saints look on about the Lord's wrath, his judgment, and the saints, they do more than just cover their mouths.

They do more than just refraining from complaint. They actually sound forth the hallelujah and say, God is worthy to be praised because of his wrath. Now, why can they do that? Because God has proven himself so thoroughly already in his goodness, in his faithfulness, and I think we encounter a lot of that in the Bible.

Isaiah 5, Revelation 19, we're just continually reading in the Bible something that reorients us towards God in the right way. We're made in the image of God. It's the Word of God that continually redirects us and reorients us to God's glory.

We're made for this. We're made for religion. I ran into a very short pithy statement from Hermann Bavink the other day, and he just defined religion as the fear of the Lord. I'm like, that'll do. Where our lives are in orbit around God, we're thinking of him first, thinking of him most, that's what we're made for.

Fear of the Lord and all of its wisdom and wonder and world writing worship. I think that all objective truths and standing values are offensive to the heart of man until we receive them in the fear of the Lord.

And then comes the amen. Then we can say, and we can rejoice in it. Now, in the passage in chapter 5, and you can read it for yourself, it is 30 verses long, but again, you know, go ahead and read it and you can check it off your list.

The judgment of God comes upon a faithless servant, but it comes as the necessary clash of symbols following the judgment of God upon the faithful servant. Remember that God's ultimate judgment upon Jerusalem and the Old Covenant and the unfaithful stewards comes after he's poured out his judgment upon his faithful servant, Jesus Christ, in our place and in our sake.

To put it another way, in the mercy of wisdom of God, the Old Covenant does not pass away until after the clear, bright coming of the New Covenant. There is hope in place. There is salvation declared.

There's a direction to go. There is something in place when the final judgment against the Old Covenant comes. Now, how do we know that that's what's going on? Jesus takes Isaiah 5 and he tells it in his own way.

So he takes up Isaiah 5 and he says, this is a great story, I'm gonna punch it up a bit and tell it in its more full detail. So, Matthew 21, verses 33 and following. He takes up something that sounds very familiar, puts a little twist on it, but this is the basic concept of Isaiah 5.

And in Matthew 21, verse 33, he says, hear another parable. There was a certain landowner who planted a vineyard and set a hedge around it, dug a wine press in it, and built a tower. Sound familiar? He did everything he was supposed to, make it a very nice vineyard, and he leased it to vinedressers, and he went into a far country.

Now, when the vintage time drew near, he sent his servants to the vinedressers that they may receive its fruit. So, in this case, he's not focused on the fruit. This parable, he's gonna be focusing on the vinedressers.

It's gonna turn out that the vinedressers are the ones who are sour. Now, when the vintage time drew near, he sent his servants to the vinedressers that may receive its fruit, and the vinedressers took his servants, beat one, killed one, stoned another, and again, he sent other servants, more than the first, and they did likewise to them.

And Jesus, of course, rebuked the leaders of Jerusalem in Matthew 23 for this. You and your fathers killed all the prophets. Verse 37, then last of all, he sent his son to them, saying, you will respect my son.

But when the vinedressers saw the son, they said to themselves, this is the heir. Come, let us kill him and seize his inheritance. So they took him and cast him out of the vineyard and killed him. Therefore, when the owner of the vineyard comes, what will he do to the vinedressers?

Now, Jesus asks the audience, what's gonna happen next? They said to him, he will destroy those wicked men miserably and leave his vineyard to other vinedressers who will render to him the fruit of their seasons.

And the chief priests and the Pharisees, people who were listening, they knew what he was talking about. They knew what he was talking about. This vineyard is going away. There's going to be a burning.

There's going to be a destruction. But that's not the end of the story. It's a removal of this. It's taking it out of the way. When you read chapter 5 of Isaiah, you don't see any particular hope when you read through it.

But when you read chapter 2, verses 1 through 5, chapter 4, 1 through 6, chapter 6, verse 13, chapter 7, verse 14, and so on, you see that there is hope. There is a heavenly Mount Zion, and there's a new house of the Lord.

And there is hope in a tent and a remnant, something sprouting up from the stump, from the tree that was cut down. And there is a child to be born of a virgin whose name is Immanuel. And there is hope.

There is hope. But it comes in connection with the cutting down and the removal of this current system, the unfaithful stewards of the Old Covenant, as God brings forth his judgment. So, throughout Isaiah, chapters 7 and so on, after hearing about the judgments that God brings in chapters 1 through 5, and we have Isaiah's calling in chapter 6, and then chapter 7 through 12, the focus is all upon the child.

Over and over again, you hear about the child, the child, the child, the child of the Zion that he brings. So, when this passage, when Isaiah 5 shows up in the New Testament, and of course, Jesus uses it in parable, and it shows up in other places in the New Testament as well.

When Isaiah 5 shows up in the New Testament, all kinds of hope become clear, like green ears piercing heavenward out of the ash upon the ground. It's new growth. Something's been removed out of the way, and here's something new, something better.

Covenant, Creation, and Christ

Now, there's a larger note of hope in this passage. It's good to remember that God's covenants addresses all of creation, and they anticipate Christ. You could say it another way. You could say that the covenants possess the shape of creation, and they proceed as the shadow of Christ.

So, when you're reading about the covenants that God makes with Noah all the way through David and so on, what you're seeing is something that's put into the shape of creation, addressing the real issue of man being in God's image yet fallen in sin.

And these covenants not only possess the shape of creation and point to the significance of those made in God's image, but it also points forward to the coming of Jesus Christ, who is the image of the invisible God.

The covenants address the ruin of creation, and they anticipate the reign of Christ. And one reason that's important is that, remember that when God is talking about, through his prophet, that he planted a vineyard, and he did everything just right to make it fruitful, but then it turned out to be sour grapes.

Doesn't that sound a little bit familiar? God planted a garden, and he made it lush and good, and he even adorned it with jewels and gold, and there was a river, and there was trees, and everything was just right.

And then what happened? Adam and Eve end up being bad fruit. They end up being unfaithful servants in the garden, unfaithful tenants. And so God, given this established connection between creation and the covenants in Christ, God is showing that whatever the hopeful resolution is for this covenantal crisis is actually also the hope and resolution for the creation's curse.

The ruined creation, seen again in the covenants, is made new in Christ. So this is our hope of the resurrection, this is our hope of true life in the true vine, as he makes his new vineyard and a new creation.

Living with the Big Picture in View

That's a really big picture, but think about what goes on in Isaiah's day. It's a really kind of a bad time to be alive. It's a hard time to live in Jerusalem. It's a hard thing to be a part of the southern tribe of Judah when Israel, the northern kingdom, has already gone down to the Assyrians, and Sennacherib and his mercenary, cruel mercenary armies are closing in.

It's a hard time to be alive in Jerusalem when you are getting stomped on by all the nations around you. When the worship of God is scarce and idolatry is robust. Hard time to be alive in Isaiah's day.

And yet, if you had the big picture in mind, you would know that God would be bringing about good things. Now, that's helpful for us to remember. The way we interpret Scripture is also to be the way we interpret everything we see in our lives.

Reading this chapter takes us to a moment of time, but it also, as we see, demands that we keep the larger picture in view. We can't really understand Isaiah 5 if we just read one little portion of Isaiah 5 and just stay there.

We don't understand the point of Isaiah 5 unless we look at the larger picture, and the same is true of your each and every day that you and I live. You know, in Matthew chapter 6, Jesus talks about not serving, not trying to serve God and man when you can't serve both, and that each day that we live should not be filled with anxiety and worry.

We shouldn't be worried about what we're going to eat, what we're going to wear. That worrying doesn't add one hour to your life, doesn't make you any taller, doesn't give you any extra hair, doesn't do anything for you.

When Jesus is saying, you know, tomorrow has its own trouble, he doesn't just leave it there and say, just be focused and present in the now, like he's some sort of Eastern mystic. He says, seek ye first the kingdom of God.

Now that's the big picture. Seek ye first the kingdom of God and his righteousness, and all these things will be added unto you. Meaning what? Jesus Christ is the King. He's the ruler of the kings of the earth.

He's the Messiah in the Zion of Psalm 2. He's ruling and reigning. He's got the iron rod, and yeah, nations are getting busted up here, there, and everywhere, and we live in a particular time, and sometimes it can be difficult to live in a particular time.

We live in an information age, but we don't live in an understanding age. We live in a data driven society, but we do not live in a wise society. But we can be understanding, and we can live wisely. As Christ rules and reigns and makes his crown rights known, we can fear the Lord and enjoy the resulting understanding and wisdom.

So next time, we're going to explore the first seven chapters of this seven verses of this chapter, verses 1 through 7, and I'm working on Isaiah's songs. I'm going to try to sing Isaiah's song, so bring an open mind or ear plugs.

Either one will work all right, but it's a compelling little song there in Isaiah 5, verses 1 through 2. All right, well let's turn our attention to prayer.