Isaiah 5:18-19 – Bad Fruit: Defiant Bravado
We’re looking at the third kind of bad fruit that Jehovah receives from his vineyard, as we see in the first seven verses of this chapter. When threatened with God’s judgment, the wicked of Judah and Jerusalem go on to sin with more enthusiasm and defy God to do anything about it. If the people turn, if they have faith in God’s promises of redemption, and they repent of their sin, this threatened disaster will not happen. That is always the case when there is repentance, because God gives the repentance. He honours that which He Himself has put in the heart of people, and He turns away from doing what He threatened.
What is the picture that we should have in our minds about those who draw iniquity with cords of vanity and sin as with a cart rope? The words in the Hebrew will work for several kinds of images in our mind. One would be as though these stout sinners are pulling the sin to themselves. It is as though you might cast out a fishing line, and then when the fish bites, you reel it in. The people continue even when threatened with judgment; they work hard at pulling the sin to themselves. Or it might be like the picture of oxen hitched to sin. Even though they are warned to stop and, in fact, to turn around, they continue in the way they are going with the sin hitched up ever more strongly, the harness more firmly and firmly bound to them. Or the image could be that they are bound to their sin and bound by their sin, so that their every move is more and more sin, and they cannot and do not even want to break the tie.
The pictures are not pleasant ones. These folks like their sin, and they are bound to it with ties, growing ties of affection and love, a perverted affection and love. But they cannot break these cords because they will not; and they will not, because as dead sinners, they cannot.
Questions
- What is the third kind of bad fruit?
- What would God do if the people truly repented of their sin?
Prayer Points
- Pray that our nation would come to repentance
- Use prayer points from your congregation.
- Pray for family matters.