Isaiah 5

A Song And A Sermon about Israel’s Sin

This chiastic "song" is only the first part of Isaiah’s unified message in this chapter. His song flowed into a sermon. This is the first of several songs in Isaiah.       - Thomas Constable

A Fruitless Vineyard

Expectation

Vs. 1 - I will sing about the one I love, a song about my loved one’s vineyard

Vs. 2 - He expected it to yield good grapes, but it yielded worthless grapes.

Judah and Israel together are likened to God’s vineyard. God did everything possible to make it healthy, beautiful and fruitful, and he expected a good harvest of grapes, but the people brought God none of the fruit he expected. He therefore will cease to care for them, so that they might be left to suffer whatever ruin their sin brings upon them.              - Don Fleming

Preparation

Vs. 4 - What more could I have done for my vineyard than I did? 

The question is simple. Who is to blame for the harvest of only wild grapes? Is it the fault of the owner of the vineyard, or is it the fault of the vineyard itself?           - David Guzik

So the Lord looked for his vineyard, with which he had made every provision and given every opportunity, to yield grapes. But it yielded wild grapes instead. It yielded sour, worthless grapes. All of God’s work and loving actions for the vineyard has not produced good fruit, but sour, stinking fruit.

So now God asks the question: what more could he do for his vineyard? What more can I do that I have not already done to ensure that fruit would come from this vineyard? There was no reason for this vineyard to yield worthless grapes. What can be done for the people of God when a total work of grace has been lavished on them and yet they remain as if grace never touched them?          - Brent Kercheville

Destruction

Vs. 5 - Now I will tell you what I am about to do to my vineyard: I will remove its hedge, and it will be consumed; I will tear down its wall, and it will be trampled.

Because God’s “vineyard” had failed to respond to His careful tending, Isaiah announced that it would be cut down. 

Vs. 7 - For the vineyard of the Lord of Armies is the house of Israel, and the men of Judah, the plant he delighted in. He expected justice but saw injustice; he expected righteousness but heard cries of despair.

The vineyard is the house of Israel and the people of Judah were the Lord’s pleasant planting. The Lord looked for justice and found bloodshed. He looked for righteousness and found outcries of distress. So what were the people doing such that they had received the blessings and grace of God in vain?       - Brent Kercheville

A Sermon of Warnings

In the last section of this chapter, Isaiah described the “worthless grapes” (5) produced in the vineyard:

Greed and Injustice 

Vs. 8 - Woe to those who add house to house and join field to field

Vs. 21, 23 - Woe to those…who acquit the guilty for a bribe and deprive the innocent of justice.

The Israelites were buying out their neighbors, as they had opportunity or made the opportunity to increase their land holdings. The wealthier or smarter members of the community took advantage of their less fortunate brethren and so deprived them of their opportunity to live on land that God had given them.       - Thomas Constable

Willful Ignorance 

Vs. 13 - Therefore my people will go into exile because they lack knowledge

Vs. 21 - they have rejected the instruction of the Lord of Armies, and they have despised the word of the Holy One of Israel.

God’s people had ignored the prophets and insisted upon the excessive pursuit of pleasure.  

Pride

Vs. 15 - Humanity is brought low, each person is humbled, and haughty eyes are humbled.

Vs. 16 - But the Lord of Armies is exalted by his justice, and the holy God demonstrates his holiness through his righteousness.

In contrast to the humiliation of the Israelite pride, Yahweh of armies would enjoy exaltation because what characterizes Him is the opposite of what marked His people, namely: justice and righteousness.      - Thomas Constable

God’s judgment on His people would be a demonstration of His own holiness.  In contrast to His people, He would judge rightly. 

Thus Isaiah ends his preface. The message of the first two sections is that human sin cannot ultimately frustrate God’s purposes and that, in God, mercy triumphs over wrath. But the third section poses a shattering question: When the Lord has done all, must the darkness of divine wrath close in and the light flicker and fade? This was the day of crisis in which Isaiah ministered: a crisis for humankind, for the day of wrath has come and a crisis for God: can mercy be exhausted and defeated?         - Motyer