Isaiah: A Godly Man in a Nation in Crisis
Isaiah 5-6
Because the subject on my heart is of great importance, I want us to get right at our text and I'd like you to turn in your Bible to Isaiah Chapter 5. Isaiah Chapter 5. Before the days of the fall when all our church family is back, I was asking the Lord to give me a word from Him. I didn't really know where in the scripture he'd want me to go but so many things were laid upon my heart, that the other day I found myself reading Isaiah Chapter 5 to see if what I knew of that Chapter did not, in some way, parallel the scene as I view it even in our world and our country and our church today. And through that reading the Lord impressed on my heart that that was the message He wanted me to share with you tonight.
And so I'd like us to look tonight at Isaiah Chapter 5 and Chapter 6. We're going to do an overview of the two of them and yet I want to give you enough detail so you'll understand what's going on. We could well entitle this message Isaiah, A Godly Man in a Nation in Crisis, because that basically is the theme of these chapters.
Someone has well said if men have learned anything from history it is that men never learn anything from history. And so history inexorably repeats itself. The cynicism of the preacher in Ecclesiastes is somewhat justified when he said "there is nothing new under the sun." History becomes for him an endless cycle of repetition. And so he says "that which hath been is now and that which is to be hath already been."
Men and nations seem to go in the same endless cycles of repetition. From glory to destruction, their beginnings are usually bright and hopeful and filled with promise and somewhere along the line they fall into sinfulness and end in destruction. That's the story of man in Eden, and that's the story of every man in every nation since.
In fact, every baby born becomes a living illustration of the inevitable course of men in nations. The little life begins and the loveliness and innocence of infancy moves to the sinfulness of maturity and ultimately ends in death. I see the same path in people today and I see the same thing in our own nation, the United States of America. I really believe in my heart that America is trapped in a dooms day cycle.
That America is simply in larger measure what the individual lives that make it up are. Manifestations of the power of sin to destroy a good beginning and turn it into a fearful ending. As I look at our country I reminded of the greatness of the primitive beginnings of America, that pristine beauty that we knew when people first arrived in this country because they sought to worship God in liberty and freedom.
They wanted to establish in the name of Jesus Christ a community of brotherhood. The Bible was held high as the source of all truth and the authority for life. God was the center of thinking and God was the center of feeling. And God was the center of doing and churches were the center of the community. And in our early history there were great revivals and great awakenings and great preachers and wonderful schools for teaching the scripture and preparing men and women for ministry. There was a standard. There was a norm. There was an absolute for living. It was the word of God.
But that was the time of America's infancy. As maturity came upon America, the drift that so inevitably comes came. It comes to individuals. It comes to institutions. It comes to schools. It comes to churches and it came. The drift into a degraded adulthood was evident. God raised up His Jonathan Edwards, His George Whitfields, His Charles Finneys, His Billy Sundays, His D. L. Moodys and His Billy Grahams, and many others, but the drift never seemed to be subsided.
The schools went bad. The churches followed suit because the pulpits no longer held up the word of God. The government abandoned the scripture and the schools followed suit and so we're in the dooms day cycle and the inevitability of it all is that we face a very, very bleak ending. What has happened? And how do we react to it? I want us to look back in history for some answers. I don't think that all of the answers are to be found in analyzation of the present tense. I think the best lessons are to be found in a look at history.
Because everything that we're experiencing has already been done and if we look to the word of God we'll find out such similarities exist as maybe will shock us. Both in terms of problem and solution. In fact, in 1 Corinthians Chapter 10, I'd like to just draw your attention some verses. You don't need to look them up. Just listen as I read them to you. But in 1 Corinthians Chapter 10 beginning at verse 6, Paul says "Now these things," and he has reference to events in the history of Israel, "these things were our examples or our models to the intent we should not lust after evil things as they also lusted. Neither be ye idolaters as were some of them. Neither let us commit fornication as some of them committed and fell in one day twenty-three thousand. Neither let us put Christ to the test as some of them also tested him and were destroyed by serpents. Neither murmur ye as some of them also murmured and were destroyed by the destroyer."
Now, all these things happened unto them for examples and are written for our admonition upon whom the ends of the ages are come. In other words, God has recorded the history of Israel, and its devastation and its degradation and its dissolution and its destruction for the purpose of setting a pattern that we can look to, to see what's wrong with our own society and come to some conclusions about a remedy. The best thing is not to appoint some kind of social committee to analyze on the basis of economics or political theory or social theory, what's wrong with us, the best thing is to look to the word of God.
Biblical history gives the truest picture of all. And I really feel that if you read the Old Testament, the Old Testament presents to the history of today a series of billboards all along the path of mankind warning about the inevitability of destruction when sin enters the society.
For our lesson tonight, we want to look at one of those billboards and there are many. One erected by the prophet Isaiah. It is a clear insight. It is a very lucid lesson of the deadly sins that destroyed Israel readily applicable to our own society and how a Godly man reacted to that very crisis. And it sets up for us a form in which we too should react.
First of all, look at Chapter 5 and I want you to notice the parable of the Lord. For in this drama, the main character is the Lord Himself. The parable of the Lord, verse 1. "Now will I sing to my well beloved a song of my beloved touching his vineyard. My well beloved hath a vineyard in a very fruitful hill. And he dug it and gathered out the stones and planted it with the choicest vine and build a tower in the midst of it and also made a wine press in it. And he looked for it to bring forth grapes, but it brought forth wild grapes. And now oh inhabitance of Jerusalem and men of Judah judge I pray you between me and my vineyard. What could have been done more to my vineyard that I have not done in it? Why when I looked for it to bring forth grapes brought it forth wild grapes? And now I will tell you what I will do to my vineyard. I will take away its hedge and it shall be eaten up and break down its wall and it shall be trampled down and I will lay it waste. It shall not be pruned nor digged but there shall come up briars and thorns. I will also command the clouds that they rain no rain upon it."
Now stop right there. This is a parable. In fact, it is an exquisite elegy. It is a parable in the form of a plaintive weeping song concerning my beloved end is vineyard. Any many Bible scholars feel that my beloved is a statement by God regarding Christ. The vineyard belongs to the trinity. And it is a weeping song over what happened to that vineyard. Now, in the days of Isaiah, the stony hills of Judah were beautifully terraced and planted with choice and fruitful vineyards. And every citizen of Judah would have understood the meaning of this parable.
He was familiar and she was familiar with the beautiful vineyards which produced very, very luscious grapes. The people themselves knew well how to bring it out of that hard ground in so many cases there had to be a great amount of love and toil and care to make the vineyard productive. They knew how hard the husbandman would labor and work and have in his heart such great hope for a return for all of his effort. And every Judean would understand easily the frustration, the agony, the sorrow, the disappointment when the husbandman found that instead of all of his effort producing the luscious grapes that he wanted there was only the buosheme as they Hebrew says. Little tiny berries hard and sour called wild grapes, useless.
And so the song is parabolic and what does it mean? Verse 7 tells us, "For the vineyard of the Lord of hosts is the house of Israel. And the men of Judah his pleasant plant. And he looked for justice, but behold oppression for righteousness but behold a cry." Now the vineyard is Israel and God is the husbandman. In the 80th Psalm, Israel is likened again to a vine. Owned, protected, cared for, nurtured, loved, by Jehovah. Brought out of Egypt, planted in Canaan, cherished by the Lord's constant providential goodness. The vine says the Psalmist takes deep root and it begins to crawl and it fills the land. And he says the mountains are literally covered by its shadow. It's bows are like the massive cedars. It sends out branches westward to the great sea and it shoots go eastward to the Euphrates. And the great vine of the Lord is firmly rooted in the land.
In like manner, our Lord Jesus in the 21st Chapter of Matthew says here another parable. There was a certain house holder who digged the vineyard and hedged it round about and digged the wine press in it and built a tower and let it out to husbandman and went into a far country and when the time of the fruit drew near, he sent his servants to the husbandman that they might receive the fruits of it. Then having set forth in His parable the persecution meaded out by the husbands of the prophets of God and to God's own Son, the Lord concludes with these words. "Therefore I say unto you the kingdom of God shall be taken from you and given to a nation bringing forth the fruits thereof."
In other words, Jesus says the same thing. Israel was my vineyard, but when I examined it there was no fruit. Psalm 80, it all had a wonderful beginning, but when the examination came at harvest there was nothing but buosheme, sour little berries. Anybody who knew Psalm 80, anybody who knows Matthew 21 understands the meaning of Isaiah 5. A great heartbreak for God.
God did everything. Look back at Chapter 5 again, verse 2. "He duggeth," what it means there is that he fenced it around by digging what is really a kind of a hedge in a sense. You dig down deeply and provide a barrier to keep out wild animals or anything that might enter in to harm it. He's separated them from all other nations is what He means. He isolated Israel. He gave them every opportunity to flourish by cutting them off from intercourse with pagans that would have corrupted them.
Then he says in verse 2, He gathered out the stones in order to make that vineyard grow and to keep the soil loose and productive he took out all the stones. What are the stones? I believe he has reference to the Canaanites in the land. God cleaned out the Canaanites. He removed them and gave them the land. And then it says He planted the very choicest vine. A noble people and He built a tower in the midst of it. I think that's a reference to Jerusalem. The capital where He would place His name and where He would appoint prophets and priests to watch against the spiritual foes.
And He made a wine press or a wine vat and I really believe that speaks of the sacrificial system with its offerings and its worship and its praise poured out. And in verse 4, look at it, "what could have been done more to my vineyard that I have not done in it." God did everything to set Israel up for a blessed history, not unlike our own country. The beginnings were magnificent.
And now he says in verse 3, "After all that you judge inhabitance of Jerusalem. You judge men of Judah. You judge between me and my vineyard. If something has gone wrong whose fault is it? Could I have done anymore than I did?" And then he says in verses 5 and 6, "Divine retribution is inevitable and pending." I'll tell you what I'll do to my vineyard. I'll take away it's head.
They won't have a protection anymore and the nations will overrun it. It'll be eaten up. I'll break down its wall. It'll be trampled. I will lay it waste. It shall not be pruned nor digged. No more care for it, no more concern for it. Briars and thorns will come up and I'll even command the clouds that they rain no rain upon it.
What a terrible disappointment this was to God. That followed it...that following it came a terrible judgment. Verse 7 really sums it up. Look at the end of the verse, God looked for justice. "But behold oppression for righteousness behold a cry." That's a play on words in the Hebrew. He says I looked for mishpath and I saw mispach. I looked for sedakah and I found setakah. I looked for righteousness and it wasn't there. And I looked for justice and it wasn't there. In fact, something else was there oppression and the cry of anguish from the oppressed.
You failed. Israel upon whom God had lavished so much love and so much labor and now there was nothing left but to tear down the fences and let the vineyard be trampled and destroyed until the purging was complete. What a heartbreak. Israel who was blessed says Paul chiefly because was committed unto you the oracles of God. Romans 3. Israel, Romans 9, to whom pertains the adoption and the covenants and the promises.
All of these things. What more could God have done? In Jeremiah Chapter 2, verse 29, Jeremiah says "Why will you plead with me. Ye all have transgressed against me saith the Lord. In vain have I smitten your children." Even my correction he means you don't receive. They received no correction. Your own sword hath devoured your profits like a destroying lion. You've killed your own prophets. Oh generation see the word of the Lord. Have I been a wilderness unto Israel? A land of darkness?
In other words, have I done nothing for you? Have I made it hard for you? No. But in spite of that, you turned your back. I hear the plaintive cry of Jesus to that self same people. He said you will not. "You will not come to me that you might have," what, "life." And we in this country have had a great heritage. No question about it. Not a covenantal one as Israel's, but nonetheless a great heritage. A vineyard blessed of God. In its infancy uniquely blessed. What more could God have done than found this nation on faith in God through Christ? What more could He have done than establish the Bible as the basis of life? And yet people mark it in America is inevitably to be trampled in the judgment of God because we have departed from those things.
There are no good grapes here, only wild ones. Isaiah probably seemed foolish when he made this prophecy as I may to you. Somebody may have said now wait a minute Isaiah, our king Uzziah is a strong capable king. Has not God helped Uzziah to win many battles and establish firmly the power of Israel? Has not this man reigned for 52 years? Has not he been blessed of God? Has not he set the defenses in Judah and Jerusalem in order?
According to 2 Chronicles 26 he established a formidable, well-disciplined army that had the most up-to-date weapons imaginable. Yes, all that's true. All that's true. We've been through those days in America. When we dominated the world in a cold war because we had the weapons, we had the army, we had the sophistication, we had the leadership. But just as in Israel's time the cancer of departure from God was eating at the life of the nation. And the grapes of Sodom grew in the vineyard of God. And so says God there is coming a judgment.
Now listen, it's never the way of God's prophets to speak of judgments in general alone. But always to add specifics. I want you to move with me then from the parable to the Lord to the penetration of the Lord beginning in verse 8. Now here the Lord penetrates to the very core of the problem. And I want you to see this. Six specific sins have led to the ruin of the nation. Six woes and the woe, why that's a word used by John and by Jesus in Revelation. Used by the Lord in the gospels. A woe simply is this, an impassioned denunciation of some evil observed by the penetrating eyes of God.
An impassioned denunciation of some evil observed by the penetrating eyes of God. And God penetrates the situation and marks out six sins. Now beloved it is frightening to notice these six, because they are so true of our nation and may I hasten to add this sadly, they are even true of the church, the so-called church of Jesus Christ. You make application as we go.
Number one, first Isaiah says as God penetrates their sin, verse sin, you are guilty of a grasping materialism, verse 8. Woe unto them who join house to house, who lay field to field. Till there's no place that they may be placed alone in the midst of the earth. Now here you have the sin of Abbarus. It isn't enough to have one house. It isn't enough to one piece of land. They had house to house and land to land until they have consumed the goods and stand alone isolated from everyone. The insatiable greed of the landowners of Isaiah's time cause a great amount of poverty, because what it did was it kept putting all of the resources in the hands of the few making the gap between the very rich and the very poor, wider and eliminating almost altogether anybody in the middle.
Amos speaks of it, Hosea speaks of it, Micah speaks of it and they were all Isaiah's contemporaries. Wealthy men ruthlessly acquiring property amassing fortunes squeezing out the poor and the helpless and making them buy at inflated prices to fill their own coffers. You have to think of 1 Kings 21 don't you and Ahab?
Ahab who had everything, Ahab who was the king and yet there was one man, Naboth, who just had one vineyard and Ahab wanted that vineyard, and he took it, greed. I don't believe God ever intended people to stockpile like that. I believe that's why in God's plan and the book of Leviticus there was a jubilee year when everything reverted back to its original owner. All the slaves were set free. It just washed out the whole economy and everybody started from scratch.
God never intended people to amass those kinds of fortunes out of greed. In Micah Chapter 2, in verse 2, Micah writes they covet fields, they take them by violence and houses. They take them away. The oppress a man and his house, even a man and his heritage, a grasping materialism. Verse 9, he says "In mine ears said the Lord of hosts, of a truth many houses shall be desolate even great and fair without inhabitant."
You know what he says? There's going to come a time when all those great houses are going to be empty. Nobody home, desolate, and it happened you know. For example, in one invasion in Judah in the days of Ahaz, recorded in 2 Chronicles 28 in one day when the nation invaded Pekah was the king and the country was Samaria, in one day they killed, get this, 120,000 men who were soldiers and 200,000 men, women, and children were carried off into captivity. In one day a third of a million people.
Now God can move in judgment when He wants to. The great houses that are being amassed will be swept away. There are people in our country who have contributed to the demise of this country by grasping materialism. Verse 2, he says, "there