The Prophecy of Isaiah - Part 20 Discussion

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Isa 5:1-7  Wherefore, When I Looked That It Should Bring Forth Grapes, Brought It Forth Wild Grapes?

Isa 5:1  Now will I sing to my wellbeloved a song of my beloved touching his vineyard. My wellbeloved hath a vineyard in a very fruitful hill:
Isa 5:2  And he fenced it, and gathered out the stones thereof, and planted it with the choicest vine, and built a tower in the midst of it, and also made a winepress therein: and he looked that it should bring forth grapes, and it brought forth wild grapes.
Isa 5:3  And now, O inhabitants of Jerusalem, and men of Judah, judge, I pray you, betwixt me and my vineyard.
Isa 5:4  What could have been done more to my vineyard, that I have not done in it? wherefore, when I looked that it should bring forth grapes, brought it forth wild grapes?
Isa 5:5  And now go to; I will tell you what I will do to my vineyard: I will take away the hedge thereof, and it shall be eaten up; and break down the wall thereof, and it shall be trodden down:
Isa 5:6  And I will lay it waste: it shall not be pruned, nor digged; but there shall come up briers and thorns: I will also command the clouds that they rain no rain upon it.
Isa 5:7  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 judgment, but behold oppression; for righteousness, but behold a cry.

The scriptures really are the retelling of the same story over and over and over. Each telling of the story gives us additional details about the mind of our Creator not included in the previous revelations of His mind. These words in Isaiah 5 are a retelling of what happened between God and His creation at the very beginning. God planted a garden in Eden, and in Adam He placed us all in that garden and gave us everything we needed to be well fed and healthy. All we had to do was be obedient to His commandment: "Of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, you shall not eat of it". But we listened to the deceiver who told us that God was lying to us, and so we ate of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. We became aware of the fact that we are naked and that we need to hide the shame of our nakedness. We did not just naturally become aware of our need for repentance of what we had done. Instead we just naturally blamed others for our own sins, and so it has always been. As the book of Job demonstrates, we even go to the extreme of condemning God for the way He has chosen to deal with His creatures. We condemn our Creator so we can maintain our own integrity and our own righteousness (Job 27:5; Job 29; Job 40:1-8). We want to be responsible for our sins so we can also take credit for all the good things we do. We do not like the way God is working with His creatures, and we just know that we could do a better job than He is doing. We think that we have a plan which is manifestly better than His way. So we question our own Creator, as if our ways really were better than His.

Paul was inspired to point out what we just naturally do:

Rom 9:19  Thou wilt say then unto me, Why doth he yet find fault? For who hath resisted his will?
Rom 9:20  Nay but, O man, who art thou that repliest against God? Shall the thing formed say to him that formed it, Why hast thou made me thus? 
Rom 9:21  Hath not the potter power over the clay, of the same lump to make one vessel unto honour, and another unto dishonour?

Paul is referring to this event:

2Ch 20:4 And Judah gathered themselves together, to ask help of the LORD: even out of all the cities of Judah they came to seek the LORD.
2Ch 20:5 And Jehoshaphat stood in the congregation of Judah and Jerusalem, in the house of the LORD, before the new court,
2Ch 20:6 And said, O LORD God of our fathers, art not thou God in heaven? and rulest not thou over all the kingdoms of the heathen? and in thine hand is there not power and might, so that none is able to withstand thee?

Our Creator has every right to judge us, and He is doing so:

Rev 16:9  And men were scorched with great heat, and blasphemed the name of God, which hath power over these plagues: and they repented not to give him glory.

This is figurative language, but all who come to Christ do so only after having blasphemed His name, after believing in and living by the false doctrines of Babylon, and being scorched with fire and having those doctrines and those works burned up by the great heat of His fiery words:

Jer 5:12  They [God's own people] have belied the LORD, and said, It is not he; neither shall evil come upon us; neither shall we see sword nor famine:
Jer 5:13  And the prophets shall become wind, and the word is not in them: thus shall it be done unto them.
Jer 5:14  Wherefore thus saith the LORD God of hosts, Because ye speak this word, behold, I will make my words in thy mouth fire, and this people wood, and it shall devour them.

Just "because [we] speak this word" His words are in our mouths fire, and our old man becomes wood to be devoured by the fire of His Word.

In this particular 'speaking of His Word', which is telling us what God is doing, instead of a 'garden' we are told "My well beloved hath a vineyard in a very fruitful hill". It is the same story. "The dream is one (Gen 41:25)." We are Christ's work. We are His vineyard, and He gives us all we need to be His children. He gives us all His Words, and yet even after we witness Him miraculously feed thousands, and even after we "believe on Him", we still deny and reject Him and His Words (Joh 8:30-44). We do so because we "cannot hear His words", and because we were formed as marred vessels, with the law of sin and death in our members, from the Potter's hand.

Jer 18:4  And the vessel that he made of clay was marred in the hand of the potter: so he made it again another vessel, as seemed good to the potter to make it.

Joh 8:43  Why do ye not understand my speech? even because ye cannot hear my word. 

Young's Literal Translation gets the Hebrew qual tense right, demonstrating that God's creation is a work in progress and was never to be considered as having been completed at the time of the Garden of Eden.

Jer 18:4  and marred is the vessel that he is making, as clay in the hand of the potter, and he hath turnedand he maketh it another vessel, as it was right in the eyes of the potter to make. (YLT)

The apostle John demonstrates that God's creation process is not intended to be progressing in but a few men in this age:

Mat 22:14  For many are called, but few are chosen.

Joh 6:44  No man can come to me, except the Father which hath sent me draw [Greek: helkuō - drag] him: and I will raise him up at the last day.

Joh 8:43  Why do ye not understand my speech? even because ye cannot hear my word.

Paul tells us how God has designed that but few will come to Him in this age. He restricts the masses from seeing Him by placing within us all "the law of sin and death":

Rom 7:18  For I know that in me (that is, in my flesh ["vessel of clay"]) dwelleth no good thing: for to will is present with me; but how to perform that which is good I find not.

Rom 7:21  I find then a law, that, when I would do good, evil is present with me.
Rom 7:22  For I delight in the law of God after the inward man:
Rom 7:23  But I see another law in my members, warring against the law of my mind, and bringing me into captivity to the law of sin which is in my members.

This same story is repeated in Micah:

Mic 6:1  Hear ye now what the LORD saith; Arise, contend thou before the mountains, and let the hills hear thy voice. 
Mic 6:2  Hear ye, O mountains, the LORD'S controversy, and ye strong foundations of the earth: for the LORD hath a controversy with his people, and he will plead with Israel.
Mic 6:3  O my people, what have I done unto thee? and wherein have I wearied thee? testify against me. 
Mic 6:4  For I brought thee up out of the land of Egypt, and redeemed thee out of the house of servants; and I sent before thee Moses, Aaron, and Miriam.
Mic 6:5  O my people, remember now what Balak king of Moab consulted, and what Balaam the son of Beor answered him from Shittim unto Gilgal; that ye may know the righteousness of the Lord.

God wants us to know that He has given our flesh every opportunity to do what is right, but He also tells us, and He also wants us to know that "in [our] flesh there is no good thing" (Rom 7:18). He wants us to know that this is by His design. He wants us to know that His physical creation was created for the express purpose of taking that physical creation and destroying it. He even tells us it "was made to be taken and destroyed" simply because it is "corruption". It is through the destruction of that physical creation that He is bringing forth the spiritual end-product of which Christ Himself is, at this time, the only begotten Son to have yet received "the redemption of the purchased possession":

1Co 15:50  Now this I say, brethren, that flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God; neither doth corruption inherit incorruption.

Eph 1:12  That we should be to the praise of his glory, who first trusted in Christ.
Eph 1:13  In whom ye also trusted, after that ye heard the word of truth, the gospel of your salvation: in whom also after that ye believed, ye were sealed with that holy Spirit of promise, 
Eph 1:14  Which is the earnest of our inheritance until the redemption of the purchased possession, unto the praise of his glory.

2Pe 2:12  But these [flesh and blood], as natural brute beasts, made to be taken and destroyed, speak evil of the things that they understand not; and shall utterly perish in their own corruption;

We are at this time "sealed with that holy spirit of promise", but not yet possessors of "the redemption of the purchased possession". So God is working a work within us, and it involves Him, "through... Christ in [us]" (Php 4:13), giving us all we need to be obedient to Him, but He has also first placed within our natural bodies the inability to submit to Him and His laws, and He, as our sovereign Creator, gives us this story to bring us to see what He is working in us.

Here we have His own words telling us He made us "corruption", which He is intent on destroying as the means and the mechanism of producing a creature which is conformed to His image:

Rom 12:1  I beseech you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, that ye present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable unto God, which is your reasonable service.
Rom 12:2  And be not conformed to this world: but be ye transformed by the renewing of your mind, that ye may prove what is that good, and acceptable, and perfect, will of God.

How is He transforming us? He is doing so by "the transforming of [our] mind[s]. By burning out the mind of our old man and renewing our mind with the mind of Christ.

Php 2:5 Let this mind be in you, which was also in Christ Jesus:

He gives us this parable of what He is doing to us:

Isa 5:1  Now will I sing to my wellbeloved a song of my beloved touching his vineyard. My wellbeloved hath a vineyard in a very fruitful hill:

We must notice how the holy spirit presents this story to us. Christ wants us to "sing a song to [our] beloved touching His vineyard".

What are we commanded to sing to our God?

Jdg 5:3  Hear, O ye kings; give ear, O ye princes; I, even I, will sing unto the LORD; I will sing praise to the LORD God of Israel.

2Sa 22:50  Therefore I will give thanks unto thee, O LORD, among the heathen, and I will sing praises unto thy name.

We are to "give thanks to [our] Lord" by singing praises to Christ "touching [us], His vineyard" which He has placed "in a very fruitful hill". Hills are ideal for planting vineyards, and Christ knows what He is doing, and He goes to great lengths to give His vineyard the best of everything in this physical, natural realm:

Isa 5:2  And he fenced it, and gathered out the stones thereof, and planted it with the choicest vine, and built a tower in the midst of it, and also made a winepress therein: and he looked that it should bring forth grapes, and it brought forth wild grapes.

If Christ planted "the choicest vine", how is it possible that it "[brought] forth wild grapes"? We are told the same thing about everything God first created. It was not just a 'good' creation. Rather it was a "very good" creation:

Gen 1:31  And God saw every thing that he had made, and, behold, it was very good. And the evening and the morning were the sixth day.

If Christ's vineyard is located in "a very fruitful hill... planted... with the choicest vine", how is it possible for 'the choicest vine' to '[bring] forth wild grapes'?

There is only one way for that to happen, and this is how the scriptures tell us it happened:

Job 1:20  Then Job arose, and rent his mantle, and shaved his head, and fell down upon the ground, and worshipped,
Job 1:21  And said, Naked came I out of my mother's womb, and naked shall I return thither: the LORD gave, and the LORD hath taken away; blessed be the name of the LORD.

Isaiah tells us the same thing. From chapter one Isaiah's message is a message of God's judgment upon His rebellious people. Then in the 63rd of 66 chapters Isaiah is inspired by God to tell us why God's people rebel against Him:

Isa 63:17  O LORD, why hast thou made us to err from thy ways, and hardened our heart from thy fear? Return for thy servants' sake, the tribes of thine inheritance.

Jeremiah tells us how Christ has "made us to err from [His] ways". This is what the holy spirit reveals to us of the "very good... vessel of clay" which Adam, and all "in Adam" are:

Jer 18:4  And the vessel that he made of clay was marred in the hand of the potter: so he made it again another vessel, as seemed good to the potter to make it.
Jer 18:5  Then the word of the LORD came to me, saying,
Jer 18:6  O house of Israel, cannot I do with you as this potter? saith the LORD. Behold, as the clay is in the potter's hand, so are ye in mine hand, O house of Israel.
Jer 18:7  At what instant I shall speak concerning a nation, and concerning a kingdom, to pluck up, and to pull down, and to destroy it;

We are not what we are by our will. We are clay in the Potter's hand. "So are ye in my hand..." Adam, and all "in Adam", are "marred in the hand of The Potter". The apostle Paul makes it abundantly clear that the "very good" creation God made in the Garden of Eden had absolutely no ability to choose to do what is pleasing to God in and of ourselves:

Rom 7:17  Now then it is no more I that do it, but sin that dwelleth in me.
Rom 7:18  For I know that in me (that is, in my flesh,) dwelleth no good thing: for to will is present with me; but how to perform that which is good I find not.
Rom 7:19  For the good that I would I do not: but the evil which I would not, that I do.
Rom 7:20  Now if I do that I would not, it is no more I that do it, but sin that dwelleth in me.
Rom 7:21  I find then a law, that, when I would do good, evil is present with me.
Rom 7:22  For I delight in the law of God after the inward man:
Rom 7:23  But I see another law in my members, warring against the law of my mind, and bringing me into captivity to the law of sin which is in my members.
Rom 7:24  O wretched man that I am! who shall deliver me from the body of this death?
Rom 7:25  I thank God through Jesus Christ our Lord. So then with the mind I myself serve the law of God; but with the flesh the law of sin.

Php 2:13 For it is God which worketh in you both to will and to do of his good pleasure.

This is the message of Isaiah five. The reason "no good thing... dwells... in my flesh" is because Christ saw to it at creation that we, "[His] vineyard", were marred in His hand with "the law of sin which is in [our] members... that is in (our) flesh". Our "marred vessel[s] of clay" were designed to "[bring] forth wild grapes" even under the best of conditions, and that is what these verses are telling us. They are telling us that we are flesh in which is no good thing, and that even under the most favorable conditions flesh is still nothing more than "corruption".

There is not one mention in all of scripture of the false doctrine of "the fall of man". Eve, who came out of Adam, had within her members the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes and the pride of life before she ever touched the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, and according to the holy spirit, those three sins encompass "all that is in the world":

1Jn 2:16  For all that is in the world, [1] the lust of the flesh, and [2] the lust of the eyes, and [3] the pride of life, is not of the Father, but is of the world.

It is no coincidence that those are the three original sins committed by Mother Eve, and they are presented to us in that very same order, encompassing "all that is in the [sinful] world":

Gen 3:6  And when the woman saw that the tree was [1] good for food ["lust of the flesh"], and [2] that it was pleasant to the eyes ["lust of the eyes"], and [3] a tree to be desired to make one wise ["the pride of life"] she took of the fruit thereof, and did eat, and gave also unto her husband with her; and he did eat.

So the Lord's garden had been given every opportunity to bring forth good fruit, and instead it brought forth "all that is in the world... the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life", all before Eve ever touched the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. She did so because that was what 'was in her, that is, in her flesh' (Rom 7:18).

We are told "God is love", so why would a loving God "[make] us to err"? Why would a loving God 'give and then take away'? Why would the Lord plant His vineyard in a fruitful hill, gather out the stones, plant the choicest vines, and build a tower and a winepress in His vineyard if His intention is to make it bring forth wild grapes?

The answer to all those questions is that the fruitful hill is a temporal 'fruitful hill'. It is not a spiritual Mount Zion, and it cannot bring forth anything but wild grapes even though it was planted with the choicest grapes. The choicest vines are our "very good... flesh and blood...  bodies of... corruption" (1Co 15:50). We are just naturally the kind of vines that bring forth wild grapes, simply because the fruit and works of a "marred... wild beast" with "the law of sin in [his] members" is 'wild grapes'. As long as we are in that state we "cannot enter into the kingdom of God".

1Co 6:9  Know ye not that the unrighteous shall not inherit the kingdom of God? Be not deceived: neither fornicators, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor effeminate, nor abusers of themselves with mankind,
1Co 6:10  Nor thieves, nor covetous, nor drunkards, nor revilers, nor extortioners, shall inherit the kingdom of God.
1Co 6:11 And such were some of you: but ye are washed, but ye are sanctified, but ye are justified in the name of the Lord Jesus, and by the Spirit of our God.
1Co 15:50  Now this I say, brethren, that flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God; neither doth corruption inherit incorruption.

Before someone comes to me and tells me that in quoting Jeremiah 18, I stopped just short of the verse which proves that we have free choice, and that all these verses of scripture I have quoted just do not mean what they say and that God does not "make us err from [His] ways", let me deal with that blind and rebellious spirit.

Here is the next verse of Jeremiah 18:

Jer 18:8  If that nation, against whom I have pronounced, turn from their evil, I will repent of the evil that I thought to do unto them.

Of course it is obvious that the words "free will" appear nowhere in that verse. But our rebellious Babylonian "man of sin" is incapable of voluntarily abdicating the throne of God in the temple of God within us (2Th 2:3-12). So he makes that verse say that we can voluntarily choose to "turn from [our] evil" ways.

It is Christ Himself who informs us:

Joh 6:44  No man can come to me, except the Father which hath sent me draw him: and I will raise him up at the last day.

And then He adds this little bit of truth:

Joh 15:16  Ye have not chosen me, but I have chosen you, and ordained you, that ye should go and bring forth fruit, and that your fruit should remain: that whatsoever ye shall ask of the Father in my name, he may give it you.

The point Christ is making to us here in Isaiah 5 is that our dying temporal flesh, when given every opportunity to bring forth good fruit, is utterly incapable of doing so. So He poses the question concerning His vineyard:

Isa 5:3  And now, O inhabitants of Jerusalem, and men of Judah, judge, I pray you, betwixt me and my vineyard. 

Isa 5:4  What could have been done more to my vineyard, that I have not done in it? wherefore, when I looked that it should bring forth grapes, brought it forth wild grapes? 

Having just been told that He fenced it, gathered out the stones, planted the choicest vines, and built a tower in a fruitful hill (vs 1-2), it is obvious that there is nothing more that can be done with this particular vineyard to get it to produce good fruit.

What to do? What was it Christ had intended to do all along?

Isa 5:5  And now go to; I will tell you what I will do to my vineyard: I will take away the hedge thereof, and it shall be eaten up; and break down the wall thereof, and it shall be trodden down:
Isa 5:6  And I will lay it waste: it shall not be pruned, nor digged; but there shall come up briers and thorns: I will also command the clouds that they rain no rain upon it.

False doctrines from false prophets and false ministers are the briers and thorns of scripture as this verse among many others demonstrates:

Eze 2:6  And thou, son of man, be not afraid of them, neither be afraid of their words, though briers and thorns be with thee, and thou dost dwell among scorpions: be not afraid of their words, nor be dismayed at their looks, though they be a rebellious house.

"I will take away the hedge thereof", is the same as taking away all the cloths and jewels the Lord had given "His pleasant plant", which demonstrates that the vision of Isaiah 3 and 4, is the same as the song we are to sing to our beloved here in chapter 5:

The vision is one (Gen 42:25-26):

Isa 3:18  In that day the Lord will take away the bravery of their tinkling ornaments about their feet, and their cauls, and their round tires like the moon,
Isa 3:19  The chains, and the bracelets, and the mufflers,
Isa 3:20  The bonnets, and the ornaments of the legs, and the headbands, and the tablets, and the earrings,
Isa 3:21  The rings, and nose jewels,
Isa 3:22  The changeable suits of apparel, and the mantles, and the wimples, and the crisping pins,
Isa 3:23  The glasses, and the fine linen, and the hoods, and the vails.

That is what happened to Job. This is what Job said after losing everything he owned in one day, including his seven sons and three daughters:

Job 1:20  Then Job arose, and rent his mantle, and shaved his head, and fell down upon the ground, and worshipped,
Job 1:21  And said, Naked came I out of my mother's womb, and naked shall I return thither: the LORD gave, and the LORD hath taken away; blessed be the name of the LORD.

Job is a type of us, and we are "the vineyard of the Lord":

Isa 5:7  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 judgment, but behold oppression; for righteousness, but behold a cry.

Before the Lord began to judge Job, He had "a hedge" around Job, just as He fences in His vineyard and places a tower in it to protect His prized possession. In Isaiah 5:5 He even refers to His fence as "the hedge thereof", which He tells us He is taking away, just as He removed His 'hedge' from about Job. Then He actually sent Satan to destroy all Job owned. But the Lord's prized possession is a work in progress, and the taking away of the hedge and the destruction of the kingdom of our old man is but an essential part of the work the Lord is doing to the children of men.

This is how Paul frames what God is doing with all men of all time:

1Co 15:42  So also is the resurrection of the dead. It is sown in corruption; it is raised in incorruption:
1Co 15:43  It is sown in dishonour; it is raised in glory: it is sown in weakness; it is raised in power:
1Co 15:44  It is sown a natural body; it is raised a spiritual body. There is a natural body, and there is a spiritual body.
1Co 15:45  And so it is written, The first man Adam was made a living soul; the last Adam was made a quickening spirit. 
1Co 15:46  Howbeit that was not first which is spiritual, but that which is natural; and afterward that which is spiritual.
1Co 15:47  The first man is of the earth, earthy: the second man is the Lord from heaven. 
1Co 15:48  As is the earthy, such are they also that are earthy: and as is the heavenly, such are they also that are heavenly.
1Co 15:49  And as we have borne the image of the earthy, we shall also bear the image of the heavenly.

Along with His Christ, Christ is securing the salvation of all who are "in Adam":

1Co 15:21  For since by man came death, by man came also the resurrection of the dead.
1Co 15:22  For as in Adam all die, even so in Christ shall all be made alive.

So it is "in Christ... the last Adam" that we become the "vineyard of red wine" of Isaiah 27, and we will "sing a new song" in praise to God for His new vineyard:

Isa 27:1  In that day the LORD with his sore and great and strong sword shall punish leviathan the piercing serpent, even leviathan that crooked serpent; and he shall slay the dragon that is in the sea.
Isa 27:2  In that day sing ye unto her, A vineyard of red wine.
Isa 27:3  I the LORD do keep it; I will water it every moment: lest any hurt it, I will keep it night and day. 
Isa 27:4  Fury is not in me: who would set the briers and thorns against me in battle? I would go through them, I would burn them together.
Isa 27:5  Or let him take hold of my strength, that he may make peace with me; and he shall make peace with me. 
Isa 27:6  He shall cause them that come of Jacob to take root: Israel shall blossom and bud, and fill the face of the world with fruit.
Isa 27:7  Hath he smitten him, as he smote those that smote him? or is he slain according to the slaughter of them that are slain by him?
Isa 27:8  In measure, when it shooteth forth, thou wilt debate with it: he stayeth his rough wind in the day of the east wind.
Isa 27:9  By this therefore shall the iniquity of Jacob be purged; and this is all the fruit to take away his sin; when he maketh all the stones of the altar as chalkstones that are beaten in sunder, the groves and images shall not stand up. 

Psa 33:3 Sing unto him a new song; play skilfully with a loud noise.

Rev 5:9 And they sung a new song, saying, Thou art worthy to take the book, and to open the seals thereof: for thou wast slain, and hast redeemed us to God by thy blood out of every kindred, and tongue, and people, and nation;

Rev 14:3 And they sung as it were a new song before the throne, and before the four beasts, and the elders: and no man could learn that song but the hundred and forty and four thousand, which were redeemed from the earth.