Life in the Vineyard: The Vine & Vinedresser

Isaiah was given a difficult ministry. Israel, as a nation had lost its way through idolatry. God had blessed Israel with his law and land. He entered into a covenant wit Israel and promised divine blessing if Isreal would remain faithful to Him. Unfortunately, Israel was wooed by idolatry, and when trials and tribulations arose, instead of lifting their eyes up to the hills to see that their help comes from the sovereignty of Yahweh, the instead trusted in weak foreign powers. Their heart eventually hardened to the point where they forsook the Lord entirely. And you see their hardness of heart in their apathy toward injustice and callousness for the poor.

By the time you reach Isaiah 5, Isaiah sings a sad song on behalf of God’s lament of Israel. Listen to what he says:

Isaiah 5:1–7 ESV

Let me sing for my beloved my love song concerning his vineyard: My beloved had a vineyard on a very fertile hill. He dug it and cleared it of stones, and planted it with choice vines; he built a watchtower in the midst of it, and hewed out a wine vat in it; and he looked for it to yield grapes, but it yielded wild grapes. And now, O inhabitants of Jerusalem and men of Judah, judge between me and my vineyard. What more was there to do for my vineyard, that I have not done in it? When I looked for it to yield grapes, why did it yield wild grapes? And now I will tell you what I will do to my vineyard. I will remove its hedge, and it shall be devoured; I will break down its wall, and it shall be trampled down. I will make it a waste; it shall not be pruned or hoed, and briers and thorns shall grow up; I will also command the clouds that they rain no rain upon it. For the vineyard of the Lord of hosts is the house of Israel, and the men of Judah are his pleasant planting; and he looked for justice, but behold, bloodshed; for righteousness, but behold, an outcry!

The first seven verses of Isaiah five are commonly called, “The Song of the Vineyard.” Israel is God’s vineyard (v7). God prepared the vineyard and ensured it was protected from wild beasts and strangers. Psalm 80:8-11, describe how God made Israel his vineyard.

Psalm 80:8–11 ESV

You brought a vine out of Egypt; you drove out the nations and planted it. You cleared the ground for it; it took deep root and filled the land. The mountains were covered with its shade, the mighty cedars with its branches. It sent out its branches to the sea and its shoots to the River.

God cultivated his vineyard and expected good fruit. But as you read in verse 4, it yielded wild grapes. Wild grapes were not good for eating or making wine. They are symbolic of wickedness or God’s judgement. Jeremiah alludes to this when he says,

Jeremiah 2:21 ESV

Yet I planted you a choice vine, wholly of pure seed. How then have you turned degenerate and become a wild vine?

At the end of the song God tells Judah and Israel their bad fruit. I looked for justice and found bloodshed. I looked for righteousness, but found an outcry.

The problem with Israel is they were God’s choice vine, a vineyard for the world to taste and see that the one true God, Yahweh, is good and can be trusted, and yet, Israel did not remain in God’s law. They did not keep his covenant. Their heart grew hard toward him and they set their affections on false gods . You feel their hardness when God tells Isaiah in his calling,

Isaiah 6:9 ESV

And he said, “Go, and say to this people: “ ‘Keep on hearing, but do not understand; keep on seeing, but do not perceive.’

And you know they did not remain in Yahweh because they did not obey him, and therefore were bearing rotten fruit. A tree is known by its fruit. A good tree bears good fruit (Matthew 7:17-19). He looked for the good fruit of His justice in the land, and behold he found the rotten fruit of bloodshed; for the good fruit of righteousness, but behold he found the rotten fruit of outcry.

You might ask, “How does this happen?” Moses gives some insight to Israel’s issue. Before they enter the Promised Land, he tells them to guard their heart from complacency.

Deuteronomy 6:10–15 ESV

“And when the Lord your God brings you into the land that he swore to your fathers, to Abraham, to Isaac, and to Jacob, to give you—with great and good cities that you did not build, and houses full of all good things that you did not fill, and cisterns that you did not dig, and vineyards and olive trees that you did not plant—and when you eat and are full, then take care lest you forget the Lord, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of slavery. It is the Lord your God you shall fear. Him you shall serve and by his name you shall swear. You shall not go after other gods, the gods of the peoples who are around you— for the Lord your God in your midst is a jealous God—lest the anger of the Lord your God be kindled against you, and he destroy you from off the face of the earth.

Israel moved in and immediately became comfortable in God’s blessing. Comfortable is the perfect soil for complacency. Complacency cultivates forgetfulness. The fruit of forgetfulness is idolatry. Idolatry is bad fruit.

What strikes me in my heart is the question Isaiah poses in verse 4.

Isaiah 5:4 (ESV)

What more was there to do for my vineyard...

Isaiah’s question feels heartbreaking to some degree. Isaiah new what was on the horizon for Israel. All of Israel was going into exile. The Babylonians and Assyrians were going to execute the curses God promised for disobedience. Since Israel did not remain in him, he was not going to remain in them. Isaiah explains what God does with worthless vineyards:

Isaiah 5:6 ESV

I will make it a waste; it shall not be pruned or hoed, and briers and thorns shall grow up; I will also command the clouds that they rain no rain upon it.

the Psalmist further describes what happens to a worthless vineyard:

Psalm 80:12–13 ESV

Why then have you broken down its walls, so that all who pass along the way pluck its fruit? The boar from the forest ravages it, and all that move in the field feed on it.

The vineyard is abandon, unprotected, and subject to beasts who ravage it. It is consumed by the world and is no longer bearing fruit for the kingdom of God.

What was wrong with Israel? Why couldn’t they keep God’s law and fulfill his covenant obligations?

Ezekiel gives us insight into the heart of the matter. Israel had profaned his great name by playing the harlot with her idolatry. God solution to Israel’s hardness of heart is a heart transformation.

Ezekiel 36:25–27 ESV

I will sprinkle clean water on you, and you shall be clean from all your uncleannesses, and from all your idols I will cleanse you. And I will give you a new heart, and a new spirit I will put within you. And I will remove the heart of stone from your flesh and give you a heart of flesh. And I will put my Spirit within you, and cause you to walk in my statutes and be careful to obey my rules.

Israel proved she could not remain in God’s covenant by obeying his commands. Why? Israel had a heart of stone. There was no life in her. As a nation, she was dead in her trespasses and sins. God needed to give her a heart of flesh, a heart that beats for His love and life and glory. Israel needed to be born again.

Ezekiel is what Jesus had in mind when he spoke to Nicodemus in John 3. Remember, Nicodemus comes to Jesus at night wanting to know how to enter the kingdom of God. Jesus says to him,

John 3:3 ESV

Jesus answered him, “Truly, truly, I say to you, unless one is born again he cannot see the kingdom of God.”

You need life-spiritual life. You cannot love God, nevertheless obey God, if you are not born again. You need life to enter and remain in God’s kingdom.

Spiritual life or eternal life is a major theme throughout the book of John.

The word life is mentioned 47 times in the book of John. John opens his gospel telling his readers

John 1:4 (ESV)

In him [Jesus] was life, and the life was the light of men.

John 3:15–16 ESV

that whoever believes in him may have eternal life. “For God so loved the world, that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life.

John 4:14 ESV

but whoever drinks of the water that I will give him will never be thirsty again. The water that I will give him will become in him a spring of water welling up to eternal life.”

John 10:10 ESV

The thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy. I came that they may have life and have it abundantly.

John 14:6 ESV

Jesus said to him, “I am the way, and the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me.

The reason why John wrote his gospel is so that you and I would have life

John 20:31 ESV

but these are written so that you may believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, and that by believing you may have life in his name.

Jesus describes for us what life is like in him in seven statements. He says,

I AM the Bread of Life (John 6)

He alone nourishes our starving souls.

I AM the Light of the world (John 8)

The true source of light that brings life to our darkened heart and to this world.

I AM the Gate of the Sheepfold (John 10)

Jesus is the door of life for those outside the kingdom.

I AM the Good Shepherd (John 11)

Jesus knows and cares for his orphaned sheep.

I AM the Way, the Truth, and the Life (John 14)

Jesus is the only way to the Father who offers eternal life to those who are lost and deceived.

I AM the True Vine (John 15)

John 15:1 ESV

“I am the true vine, and my Father is the vinedresser.

Jesus is the true source of fruit-bearing life.

Jesus is the promised vine of

Psalm 80:17–18 ESV

But let your hand be on the man of your right hand, the son of man whom you have made strong for yourself! Then we shall not turn back from you; give us life, and we will call upon your name!

and the one promised who will bear a fruitful vineyard:

Isaiah 27:2–6 ESV

In that day, “A pleasant vineyard, sing of it! I, the Lord, am its keeper; every moment I water it. Lest anyone punish it, I keep it night and day; I have no wrath. Would that I had thorns and briers to battle! I would march against them, I would burn them up together. Or let them lay hold of my protection, let them make peace with me, let them make peace with me.” In days to come Jacob shall take root, Israel shall blossom and put forth shoots and fill the whole world with fruit.

When Jesus says he is the True Vine, he is saying he fulfilled these prophecies. The Vine has come and is bearing a fruitful vineyard: the church.

Jesus is making a couple of outstanding claims in verse 1. He is saying there is no life apart from me. All other religions are false and provide no life and no eternal fruit.

Secondly, only Jesus will be able to fulfill God’s expectations of a fruitful vineyard. Jesus is the life giver and he is the life sustainer. Jesus makes it clear in John 15, you cannot work apart from Him. He boldly says,

John 15:5 ESV

I am the vine; you are the branches. Whoever abides in me and I in him, he it is that bears much fruit, for apart from me you can do nothing.

When I talk about life in the Vineyard, I am talking about the true church. I am talking about the men and women and children who are finding their only source for life in the world and the world to come in Jesus Christ. I am talking about those true believers who long to bear fruit, and are actually bearing fruit. I am talking to those who

Exist to joyfully advance the kingdom of God by making much of Jesus.

Who desire

To see the church, community, and home joyfully abiding in Jesus.

You might hear that and say,

“Jason, why do you make such distinctions in the church?”

I make those distinctions because Jesus makes them in verse 2.

Two kinds of branches

John 15:2 ESV

Every branch in me that does not bear fruit he takes away, and every branch that does bear fruit he prunes, that it may bear more fruit.

There are two kinds of people who attend church on Sundays, or even participate in church life. There are branches that do not bear fruit and those that do bear fruit.

The idea that unbelievers participate in the life of the church, but have not life in Christ, is not foreign to us. Jesus taught a parable about the weeds. Listen to what he says,

Matthew 13:24–30 ESV

He put another parable before them, saying, “The kingdom of heaven may be compared to a man who sowed good seed in his field, but while his men were sleeping, his enemy came and sowed weeds among the wheat and went away. So when the plants came up and bore grain, then the weeds appeared also. And the servants of the master of the house came and said to him, ‘Master, did you not sow good seed in your field? How then does it have weeds?’ He said to them, ‘An enemy has done this.’ So the servants said to him, ‘Then do you want us to go and gather them?’ But he said, ‘No, lest in gathering the weeds you root up the wheat along with them. Let both grow together until the harvest, and at harvest time I will tell the reapers, “Gather the weeds first and bind them in bundles to be burned, but gather the wheat into my barn.” ’ ”

Jesus interprets this parable in verse 36-43. Essentially, Jesus says that the wicked and the righteous will coexist in this world until he returns. Part of that coexistence is that the righteous and the wicked will coexist in the church, community, and home. By the church, I do not mean those in the true Vine. I mean the visible institutional church; your Sunday morning gathering.

You can only tell a tree by its fruit. A good tree produces good fruit. A bad tree produces bad fruit. If you are not a fruit bearing branch, then pay attention to what happens to you.

The Vinedresser Makes Two Kinds of Cuts.

The Vinedresser Cuts Into fruit bearing branches.

God prunes fruit bearing branches in order to produce more fruit. We will get to more of that later.

The Vinedresser Cuts Off fruitless branches

There is a theme that has developed all morning in the sermon.

What does God do with worthless vineyards?

Isaiah 5:6 ESV

I will make it a waste; it shall not be pruned or hoed, and briers and thorns shall grow up; I will also command the clouds that they rain no rain upon it.

What does God do with the weeds at the end of the harvest?

Matthew 13:30 (ESV)

Let both grow together until the harvest, and at harvest time I will tell the reapers, “Gather the weeds first and bind them in bundles to be burned, but gather the wheat into my barn.” ’ ”

What does God do with branches that do not bear fruit?

John 15:6 ESV

If anyone does not abide in me he is thrown away like a branch and withers; and the branches are gathered, thrown into the fire, and burned.

This makes me wonder,

What does God do with churches that do not bear fruit?

We are a vineyard. God has planted us in the rocky soil of Litchfield. He expects us to bear fruit for His kingdom. If we are not bearing fruit for his kingdom, then what purpose do we serve in existing as a “church?”

Part of vision casting is we must take stick of who we are and what we are really about. We need to take a careful look in the vineyard to see if and where we are bearing fruit. We need to see if we are in fact attached to the life source of the vine, or have we become life Israel-a fruitless vineyard.

If we are existing to just exist in Litchfield, that is, for pastor Jason to just get up here, tell a few stories that make you feel good, collect my check, and then have you go about your merry business the rest of the week living the American Dream; then I will tell you we are no different than the fool who goes to Antartica to plant and grow a vineyard. You don’t have the ability to grow grapes in Antartica, it is impossible. It is the only continent on God’s green earth where you cannot grow grapes. And so it is to try to be a fruit-bearing church in Litchfield Illinois apart from life in the true Vine.

We are going to study John 15, probably into 16, in order to see what it looks like to live life in Jesus’ vineyard. We may find ourselves at odds with him, even frustrated. Pray for a heart of repentance. Pray for the Vinedresser to prune away the unbelief. Ask God to produce more fruit in you so that the church can produce more fruit in the kingdom.

Do not be like Israel, whose hearts were so hard, that upon hearing they would not understand, and seeing they would not perceive (Isaiah 6:9).

So I ask you this morning, as we enter this vision casting study of John 15, Life in the Vineyard, to ask God to examine your heart.

Am I a fruit-bearing branch?

Is my church a fruit-bearing church?

Am I contributing to cultivating fruit in my church?

That is, have I really boughten into the mission of FBCL?

I exist to joyfully advance the kingdom of God by making much of Jesus until the church, community and home, joyfully abide in Jesus.