Be a Good Grape

Read Isaiah 5
 
Isaiah 5:1-2 I will sing for the one I love a song about his vineyard: My loved one had a vineyard on a fertile hillside. 2 He dug it up and cleared it of stones and planted it with the choicest vines. He built a watchtower in it and cut out a winepress as well. Then he looked for a crop of good grapes, but it yielded only bad fruit.
 
THE Bible is written in many literary forms. One of the forms is poetry as shown in Isaiah 5. Poetry says “the usual things of life in unusual ways”. Here we have the image of Israel as a vineyard of lost potential.
    Israel is the poetic vineyard and God is the “loved one”. Do you see what the “loved one” did? As Israel is dominated by mid-level mountains and hills, the LORD planted a vineyard on the fertile hillside and planted good grapes – his chosen people – to grow and produce good lives. But something went wrong. The good grapes produced bad grapes. In other words, God’s people had the opportunity to use his gifts to enjoy his blessings. But the people rejected the blessing to become soured and dried up. God’s vineyard was devastated. It yielded no good grapes. Can you imagine such pervasive disobedience among an entire nation?
    What would be the LORD’s response? Isaiah prophecies he will act as a good vintner. He will clean his vineyard of useless grapes to begin again. The final poetic stanzas of this chapter are God’s cleansing angels who will remove the dead vines.
    Now I ask you: Has God planted a vineyard into your life? In other words, has he given you faith to know his love and his truth so you can be a “good grape”? I believe he has. That’s one reason you are reading this. Trust his gifts to you. Use them to grow and be a “good grape” full of flavorful juice and aroma for God. When people know you they will “taste and see that the Lord is good.” (Psalm 34:8a).
 
Consider how precious God’s blessings are and use them to grow well in him.