Why Don't You Love Me?
Year C - 2021-2022 • Sermon • Submitted
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1 Let me sing for my loved one a love song for his vineyard. My loved one had a vineyard on a fertile hillside.
2 He dug it, cleared away its stones, planted it with excellent vines, built a tower inside it, and dug out a wine vat in it. He expected it to grow good grapes— but it grew rotten grapes.
3 So now, you who live in Jerusalem, you people of Judah, judge between me and my vineyard:
4 What more was there to do for my vineyard that I haven’t done for it? When I expected it to grow good grapes, why did it grow rotten grapes?
5 Now let me tell you what I’m doing to my vineyard. I’m removing its hedge, so it will be destroyed. I’m breaking down its walls, so it will be trampled.
6 I’ll turn it into a ruin; it won’t be pruned or hoed, and thorns and thistles will grow up. I will command the clouds not to rain on it.
7 The vineyard of the Lord of heavenly forces is the house of Israel, and the people of Judah are the plantings in which God delighted. God expected justice, but there was bloodshed; righteousness, but there was bloodshed;
Why Don't You Love Me?
Why Don't You Love Me?
Why don’t you love me is a question that millions have asked down through the ages. I did a quick Google search on songs about lost love and there were over 125 million hits. That doesn’t mean that there are 125 million songs, but there are that many postings.
As I was preparing for today, there were several songs that ran through my weird brain. The first was one by the Righteous Brothers. It has these words in the chorus:
You lost that lovin' feelin'
Whoa, that lovin' feelin'
You lost that lovin' feelin'
Now it's gone, gone, gone [1]
Later in the lyrics, the words change and there is the cry to bring back that lovin’ feelin’.
Anyone who has gone through the heartbreak of a lost relationship understands those words.
Diana Ross sang a song entitled Missing You. It has these words in it:
I'm missing you
Tell me why the road turns
As I look around
I see things that remind me
Just to see you smile
Made my heart fill with joy
I'll still recall
All those dreams we shared together
Where did you run to, boy?
I'm missing you
Tell me why the road turns [2]
That is a heart breaking song of a lost love.
This passage of scripture is a song that God sings. It is titled the Song of the Vineyard.
Isaiah 5:1 (CEB)
1 Let me sing for my loved one a love song for his vineyard.
The words sing, singing, and song appear over 400 times in the Bible. It is about the same amount as pray appears. Singing must be important to God
God opens this chapter with singing a love song for his loved ones about his vineyard. Have you ever had someone sing a song to you? Maybe you’ve had a group sing Happy Birthday to you. It is incredible embarrassing if you are in a public place and they do that.
The most embarrassing time for me was at the Mississippi District Camp Ground. We were there on my birthday and Darlene got the entire dining hall to sing happy birthday to me. That was several hundred people, very embarrassing.
Just image God singing to you. The prophet Zephaniah wrote
17 The Lord your God is in your midst— a warrior bringing victory. He will create calm with his love; he will rejoice over you with singing.
He will create calm with his love; he will rejoice over you with singing. Wow! What reassuring words those are. And here in Isaiah God says He is going to sing a song.
God goes into great detail about this vineyard.
Isaiah 5:1–2 (CEB)
1 My loved one had a vineyard on a fertile hillside.
2 He dug it, cleared away its stones, planted it with excellent vines, built a tower inside it, and dug out a wine vat in it. He expected it to grow good grapes
My grandmother’s one brother had vineyards near the shores of lake Erie. He raised grapes for the Welch’s company. You would drive past acres and acres of grape vines. Apparently he had the right soil conditions because he was very successful.
God describes his vineyard, he says it was on a fertile hillside. With gardening you are only going to be successful if you start with the right soil conditions. If you soil isn’t right then what ever you are trying to grow will not produce for you. You have to get the right fertilizer and soil conditioners.
God’s vineyard was on a hillside and the soil was fertile, meaning it had the right conditions.
God dug it up, he tilled the soil. He cleared away the stones. If you’ve ever dug here around the church he will find lots of stones, little ones and really big ones. Where I grew up it seems that every year that we tilled the garden we had a new crop of stones. Year after year there would be more stones.
The next thing after having the right soil and preparing it is to have good seeds or plants. You can have all the conditions just right, but if your seeds or plants aren’t any good you are not going to have much of a crop.
God planted excellent vines. He’s God, everything He does is excellent. He doesn’t put a second rate effort into anything. Everything that God does is first class.
God next built a tower and apparently a wall around it. The tower was so that someone could keep an eye on it to make sure no one tried to break in and steal or ruin the vines.
God planned this vineyard to be in long term use. A rock wall and a tower give a sense of permanence. This wasn’t some temporary situation.
A wine vat was dug out. This also indicates long term use. The vats were often built into the rocks. There would have been two parts. The firsts was where the grapes were crushed and the juice would drain into the second part where the solids would settle out and fermentation would begin.
Everything was done that was needed to be done. The soil was prepared, the rocks removed, a wall was built, a tower was built. Then excellent vines were planted.
Now it was time to wait. I remember as a kid I was given some seeds and a little plot of ground to plant. I prepared the soil and planted those seeds. Every day I would go and check to see if the seeds had started to grow. My problem was that I didn’t look just for the plant to start growing, I would dig up the seeds to see if they had sprouted. I’m pretty sure that nothing grew.
With grapes, it may take 3 - 5 years before the vines begin to produce enough that wine can be made. That is a long time to wait, but God is patient.
After that long wait, the expectation would be that a good crop of grapes would be ready to pick. Look at verse 2:
Isaiah 5:2 (CEB)
2 He expected it to grow good grapes— but it grew rotten grapes.
I don’t know about you, but if I invested all that money and labor and all I got was some rotten grapes I would be pretty angry. One commentator wrote suggested that the vines produced diseased grapes. I think we will see in a bit, that this is a good description.
What more could have been done? Everything that could have been done was done. The conditions were perfect. The best plants were planted. The vineyard was attended to. Everything was perfect, but all that was produced were rotten, spoiled, and diseased grapes.
What do you do if something doesn’t turn out the way you expected? There is a saying that when life gives you lemons you make lemon aid. That might be partially true. If you get rotten grapes, or diseased grapes there is nothing that you can do with them.
3 So now, you who live in Jerusalem, you people of Judah, judge between me and my vineyard:
So the people were to look at the situation. They were invited to judge between God and his vineyard. They were invited to look at the situation and decide where things got off track.
We don’t want to rush to judgement. God says next
4 What more was there to do for my vineyard that I haven’t done for it? When I expected it to grow good grapes, why did it grow rotten grapes?
God asks the question “What more was there to do?” “Why did it grow rotten grapes?”
The obvious answer is that there wasn’t anything else God could have done. All the right conditions were there, the soil was prepared, the best plants were planted and all that he gotten was rotten and diseased grapes.
So what is God going to do with this vineyard.
5 Now let me tell you what I’m doing to my vineyard. I’m removing its hedge, so it will be destroyed. I’m breaking down its walls, so it will be trampled.
6 I’ll turn it into a ruin; it won’t be pruned or hoed, and thorns and thistles will grow up. I will command the clouds not to rain on it.
So God is going to destroy what he had created. He is going to utterly destroy it. The walls will be broke down. The vines aren’t going to be taken care of. The thorns and thistles will grow. There will be no water on it. This was the end of the vineyard.
So what is this song about?
It is about Judah and Jerusalem. God states in verse 7:
7 The vineyard of the Lord of heavenly forces is the house of Israel, and the people of Judah are the plantings in which God delighted. God expected justice, but there was bloodshed; righteousness, but there was bloodshed;
God makes the point here and says “God expected justice, but there was bloodshed; righteousness, but there was bloodshed.”
One author put it this way:
The Preacher’s Commentary Series, Volume 17: Isaiah 1–39 What Can I Do?
The point of the parable is made: God did not abandon the children of Israel—they abandoned Him. Therefore, He is justified in His decision to leave them to their own devices and let them suffer the consequences of their sin as the only way to redeem them.
God had created all of the right conditions for this special group of people. Everything was prepared for them to enjoy all of the blessings of God.
What happened? They walked away from God, they utterly abandoned Him. They resembled spoiled, rotten and diseased grapes that God was going to destroyed.
What had happened to them? God said that He expected justice and righteousness. If you read the remained of this chapter you see 6 sins that God identified through Isaiah that Judah had committed. Those sins were:
Greed
Drunkenness
Carelessness
Deception
Pride
Injustice
This song from God is one that we need to listen to. These sins that Judah was guilty of are the sames sins that are rampant in the church today.
Lee Ann Dunlap wrote:
It is a lesson to which our own nation must pay attention. We are a people planted in rich soil drawing nutrients from the faith and courage of our ancestors. We are blessed with abundant resources, enriched by a wealth of cultures. We have thrived in freedoms that most of the world has never known and we are protected by military capabilities unmatched anywhere on the globe. God has blessed America and yet we are systematically ejecting God out of our public life. The Ten Commandments can no longer be viewed in our courts, biblical religion is no longer accepted in our schools, and religious symbols are not welcome as part of our public holiday celebrations. Like those ancient Hebrews, we are in danger of forgetting our covenant past and polluting our divinely bestowed blessings.
This is a lesson to which the church must give heed. Most of us sit comfortably in our padded pews. We are surrounded by beauty and ample material possessions. We worship in freedom and (with few exceptions) safety. We are not persecuted or harassed for our beliefs. By all calculations, we should expect to grow and thrive, to produce spiritual fruit of spectacular quality; but not many do. Christ commands us to invite others in but instead we chase them out. Rather than the sweet wine of communion and grace, we offer the putrid vinegar of criticism, hurtful words, and indifferent attitudes. [3]
The Preacher’s Commentary Series, Volume 17: Isaiah 1–39 The Woe of Greed
The true story is told of a woman who wanted to break into the elitist social circle of horse farm owners. She spent a fortune on a grand old mansion and redecorated it in order to be “hostess with the mostest” for the extravagant parties at Kentucky Derby time. The invitations went to a highly select company, but when the night of the party came she waited alone in the midst of her splendor. No one came and the woman was so enraged that she abandoned her mansion and left the state forever. Greed has a price that not even money can buy.
The second sin was related to abuse of alcohol. Throughout our society we see this. I work with people everyday who are addicted to some substance. Often I discover that the substance is a way to self-medicate for some reason. People can self-medicate with a lot of different things, it could be alcohol, drugs, food, gambling, shopping, pretty much anything.
The third sin was carelessness. The people were being careless about their relationship with God.
The Preacher’s Commentary Series, Volume 17: Isaiah 1–39 The Woe of Self-Deceit
The scene is reminiscent of the cartoon showing a white-bearded, long-robed prophet walking in the marketplace carrying a sign that reads, “The End Is Near.” Those who pass by laugh at the prophet because he returns each day with the same message and nothing happens. Meanwhile, they go about their sins with a flourish.
The fourth sin was deception. This is a horrible sin in the church today. Good has become evil and evil has become good. David McKenna wrote:
The Preacher’s Commentary Series, Volume 17: Isaiah 1–39 The Woe of Self-Justification (5:20)
An observer of our contemporary culture illustrated this moral reversal by noting, “A thief in the night sneaked into the store and changed all of the prices on the items. The most valuable are now cheap and the cheap are now valuable.”
That is what is happening in the church today. What once was considered sinful is now considered blessed and holy. Jesus died for our sins. When we praise sins that Jesus died for we cheapen grace.
The fifth sin was pride. This is the sin that was first seen with Adam and Eve. I can be like God. I know better than God. They were making decisions based on their own wisdom.
22 While they were claiming to be wise, they made fools of themselves.
The final sin is injustice. The judges were supposed to enforce the law but they were abusing the poor. People were more interested in making money rather than promoting justice.
What is the answer?
Repentance. Each of these messages from the Old Testament over the past several weeks has had the theme of repentance and revival.
What does the Church need today? Revival
What the most amazing things about God is that He doesn’t discard us when we sin. Even though we damage the relationship with Him, He invites us to renew that relationship through repentance and obedience.
Well, Christians, there are three things that you must do to overcome your sin. You must confront the sin, then you must correct the sin, and finally you must crucify the sin. First, you must confront the sin. You cannot remove something if you deny that it is there. If you deny that you have bad habits, bad attitudes, or bad behavior, then you will just deceive yourself. But you won't deceive anyone else. You must admit that you can't control your emotions. You have to acknowledge that there is a sin between how you act and how you want to act. Then you must face this sin, confront it with yourself.
Second, you must take the steps to correct the sin. You must realize that you must change and be willing to start to change. If every time someone disagrees with you, you blow up with an explosive temper, then you must calm yourself, correct yourself, and stop the explosion. If every time something happens that you don't understand you become suspicious and jump to conclusions, then you must slow yourself down, sit yourself down, and think about what you have seen and heard, before you jump to conclusions. You must repent.
I realize that many of you have tried to confront your sin. You have recognized that you have a problem, and taken the steps to confront your problem. Some of you have even taken steps to correct your problem. You have tried to stop doing what you were doing, tried to stop saying what you were saying. You have taken therapy and counseling, tried behavior modification and self-help courses. And despite what you have tried, or how often you have tried, you find that you have failed. That is because you have taken two steps, but you haven't taken the final step. You must crucify the sin on the cross. When I say crucify the sin, that means you have to give it to Jesus. When you can't control your anger, give it to Jesus. When you can't control that habit, give it to Jesus. When you can't control your life, give it to Jesus. Maybe you can't handle it, but God can. "If you have the faith, He's got the power." Listen to the words of Romans 6:6-7: "For we know that our old self was crucified with him so that the body of sin might be done away with, that we should no longer be slaves to sin -- because anyone who has died has been freed from sin."
And when you crucify your sin on the cross of Jesus, you become transformed. In the words of Romans 12:1-2 “1 So, brothers and sisters, because of God’s mercies, I encourage you to present your bodies as a living sacrifice that is holy and pleasing to God. This is your appropriate priestly service. 2 Don’t be conformed to the patterns of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your minds so that you can figure out what God’s will is—what is good and pleasing and mature.”
Confront your sin. Correct your ways. Crucify your desires on the cross. Your sin will die, but your spirit will rise again. And then you will become a Christian, with no sin of interest." [4]
[1] Songwriters: Barry Mann / Cynthia Weil / Philip Spector You've Lost That Lovin' Feelin' lyrics © Abkco Music Inc., Sony/ATV Music Publishing LLC
[2] Songwriters: Brenda Harvey Richie / Lionel B. Jr. Richie Missing You lyrics © Lbr Music, Brockman Music, Brenda Richie Publishing
[3] https://sermons.com/sermon/song-of-the-vineyard/1439207
[4] https://sermons.com/sermon/a-christian-with-a-conflict-of-interest/314