“Let me sing for my beloved
my love song concerning his vineyard:
My beloved had a vineyard
on a very fertile hill.”
Isaiah 5:1
This well-beloved Vinedresser is God our Father. For God’s part, this would be a song of joy. Because of the sinful nature of people, it will turn to sadness. Yet as we saw in Isaiah 4, God has an ultimate plan of victory through Christ. The Vinedresser chose a fertile hill. Let’s look at the work He puts in from Isaiah 5:2,
“He dug it and cleared it of stones,
and planted it with choice vines;
he built a watchtower in the midst of it,
and hewed out a wine vat in it;
and he looked for it to yield grapes,
but it yielded wild grapes.”
How could this be? Isaiah 5:3 goes on to say,
“And now, O inhabitants of Jerusalem
and men of Judah,
judge between me and my vineyard.”
Plants can’t be obstinate, but the people represented by this vineyard can.
So can we.
If we’re judging between God and anything, we can already know that God is in the right.
“What more was there to do for my vineyard,
that I have not done in it?
When I looked for it to yield grapes,
why did it yield wild grapes?”
Isaiah 5:4
Why, indeed. The excellent fruit would have made His name known, causing other nations to see that He is the Lord. But Judah misrepresented His care for them by their choices. For the next couple of posts, we will spend time here to learn more about our Vinedresser and how this visual can apply to us. Think about the work God did. Lord, let us be a blessing to You and not a blight!