A Translation and sermon by Nate Wilson for Christ the Redeemer Church, Manhattan, KS, 18 Feb 2007
24 Does the plowman plow every day to sow?
He will open and break up his soil.
25 When he has leveled its surface, does he not scatter dill and sow cumin?
Then he places wheat in rows and barley as designated and spelt is his border.
26 So He disciplines him toward justice;
his GOD teaches him.
27 For is it not with a sharp-toothed instrument that dill is threshed,
neither is a cart wheel rolled over cumin,
rather with the stick dill is beaten out
and cumin with the rod.
28 It will be crushed for bread.
He will thresh it - although not to be threshed unendingly,
so the wheel of his threshing cart will clatter, but his horse will not crush it.
29 This also comes out of Jehovah of Hosts: He makes counsel wonderful; He increases sound wisdom.
Read excerpts from p. 5-8.
The martyrdoms of the apostles may make all our hardships from the past week or so seem petty, but even when you don’t have people trying to kill you, life is hard. Why all this suffering? Is there any hope? That’s what the Jews were asking themselves after hearing Isaiah preach for some time about the destruction of this nation and that nation and how the Jews had sinned and would be punished and how judgment would come over the whole world. What’s the point?
A parable about farming begins here and runs to the end of the chapter. It emphasizes 3 things: The wise and wonderful plan of God is (1) a process, (2) it is appropriate, and (3) it is for a good purpose:
I) God’s work is part of a long-term process that happens in stages (PASS AROUND FARMING PHOTOS)
A. v.24 describes preparing the ground: Does the plowman plow every day to sow? He will open and break up his soil
1. Plowing – uprooting weeds, breaking clods, & softening the soil for seeds to grow in.
2. Harrowing - dragging a heavy branch over the ground to level it (particularly important in terrace-farming on the sides of mountains to hold rain on a flat terrace rather than rain running down the mountain and washing away your seeds and soil),
3. Furrowing it to “open” the ground for planting seeds,
a. lit. “open”=KJV,ESV
b. turn=NAS / break up=NIV
c. make furrows=Young - Ex. 28:36=engravings of words on a golden plate
B. v.25 describes Planting When he has leveled its surface, does he not scatter dill and sow cumin? Then he places wheat in rows and barley as designated and spelt is his border. Five things planted:
1. dill=Owens,ESV,NAS / poppy seed=Delitz. / fitches=Strong,KJ / black cumin= BDB,LXX,Young / NIV=caraway
2. cumin (transliteration)
3. wheat
4. barley
5. spelt=ASV,NIV / emmer=ESV / rye=KJV,NAS
C. Then vs. 27-28 describe processing the harvest with Threshing (beating the chaff off the grain and the hulls off the fruit), and Milling (Grinding) the finished product to make bread. …with the stick dill is beaten out and cumin with the rod. It will be crushed for bread. He will thresh it - although not to be threshed unendingly, so the wheel of his threshing cart will clatter, but his horse will not crush it.
D. The explanation of the parable is that just as there is a process to farming, so God is in the midst of a process with His people.
1. The farmer first plows before planting, so God has to punish the wickedness in the nation, getting rid of the weeds and rocks and softening the ground before establishing his people in faithfulness and beginning the church. (Prov. 20:30 “Stripes that wound scour away evil…”)
2. Even after that happens, the seeds that are planted will take time to mature into harvestable grain for bread. Even so, it will take time for God’s plans to mature.
a. (Gal. 4:4 “When the fullness of time came, God sent forth His only-begotten son” – 600 years after Isaiah!)
b. Eph 4:13 speaks of “the building up of the body of Christ; until we all attain to the unity of the faith, and of the knowledge of the Son of God, to a mature man, to the measure of the stature which belongs to the fullness of Christ.” The growing process takes time.
3. The grain is then harvested, but it still is not ready to mill because it’s covered with chaff. That grain has to be knocked around to free the good grain from the chaff hulls. God does His share of knocking us around to get rid of our rough edges and making us more Christlike, more pleasing to Him. (James 1:2-4 “Consider it all joy, my brethren, when you encounter various trials, knowing that the testing of your faith produces endurance. And let endurance have its perfect result, so that you may be perfect and complete, lacking in nothing.”) Trials produce the perfecting of God’s people.
4. God has a wise and wonderful plan – we are in the midst of a process of God preparing a people for Himself and making us perfect and complete!
II) The parable emphasizes that that although suffering will come, it will be perfectly appropriate - not lasting too long and not done with too much force.
A. SUFFERING WILL COME: this is part of the process God uses in our lives:
1. Mark 10:29-30 Jesus said, "Truly, I say to you, there is no one who has left house or brothers or sisters or mother or father or children or lands, for my sake and for the gospel, (30) who will not receive a hundredfold now in this time, houses and brothers and sisters and mothers and children and lands, with persecutions, and in the age to come eternal life. The “Prosperity gospel” leaves out some of God’s promises; Jesus promises both wealth and persecution if you follow Him.
2. I Thes. 3:2-4 “we sent Timothy, our brother and God's coworker in the gospel of Christ, to establish and exhort you in your faith, (3) that no one be moved by these afflictions. For you yourselves know that we are destined for this. (4) For when we were with you, we kept telling you beforehand that we were to suffer affliction, just as it has come to pass, and just as you know.” It is your destiny to suffer!
3. I Peter 4:12-19 “Beloved, do not be surprised at the fiery trial when it comes upon you to test you, as though something strange were happening to you. (13) But rejoice insofar as you share Christ's sufferings, that you may also rejoice and be glad when his glory is revealed. (14) If you are insulted for the name of Christ, you are blessed, because the Spirit of glory and of God rests upon you.” Suffering should come as no surprise!
4. When we suffer affliction for the sake of Jesus Christ, we witness to the whole world that Jesus Christ is valuable. He is worth suffering for; He is more important than the idols of personal peace and security that everyone around us worships.
B. Isaiah’s farming parable underscores that although suffering will come, it will be appropriate. Three points in the parable illustrate this:
1. v. 24 “Does the plowman plow every day [or continually]?” No, of course not, once plowing season is over, the farmer turns to planting. The punishment God brings will not last forever. If you endure discipline rather than trying to protect yourself from it, the discipline will end in good time, and God can get on to the more pleasant stages of His process. ILLUSTRATION: Spankings – 3 licks, don’t get your hand in the way!
2. v.27 The farmer knows better than to thresh light spices like dill and cumin with the heavy instruments one would thresh wheat or barley with. He knows that you use lighter instruments like a flail instead of big heavy threshing machines, and he doesn’t thresh the stuff too long either, lest he damage the finished product. So God knows how much chastisement is enough to bring repentance without destroying His people. (1Cor. 10:13 “No temptation has overtaken you but such as is common to mankind; and God is faithful, who will not allow you to be tempted beyond what you are able, but with the temptation will provide the way of escape also, so that you will be able to endure it.”) “God measures the instruments of His purpose to the condition of His people” (E.J. Young) and it will not be more than you can endure.
3.
In v.28 a third illustration of
the appropriateness of the farmer’s work appears: We can picture
a horse pulling a noisy cart over the pile of grain on the threshing floor so
that the wheels of the cart break the chaff away from the grain, but, the
farmer takes care that his horse does not step on the grain and ruin it.
This is speaking of God’s chastisement of His people:
a. This word for “horses” has already been brought up in 22:7 describing the horses in an army that God will use to chastise His people,
b. The word for “sledge” – root meaning “pointed” is translated figuratively as “decisive” or “determined” in several scriptures describing God’s punishment of His people through exile:
§ in v.22 And now, don’t you scoff! Otherwise your bonds will become strong. For I have heard from my Lord, Jehovah of Hosts, it is complete and determined over all the land.
§ 10:22b “destruction is determined, overflowing righteousness”
§ Dan 9:27 “in the midst of the week he shall cause the sacrifices… to cease; and upon the wing of abominations shall come one who desolates; and even unto the full end, and that determined, shall wrath be poured out”
c. Even so, the Farmer will not let the horses ruin the grain by stepping on it. He breaks the chaff off with normal machines for threshing. Likewise, God will not over-punish or do wrongly.
C. Just as God knows how to carry out the agricultural process correctly and instructs the farmer how to do it, God also knows how to work with people:
1.
Do you ever fear that you won’t be
able to handle the stress that you’re under?
Do you ever wonder if you’re going to snap under the load?
Do you ever wonder if God is aware of what you’re going through?
2. Here’s the answer to that question right here. God is very much aware of what you are going through, and He is carefully measuring the stress so that it does exactly what He wants to purify you without destroying you.
3. Hebrews 12:3-11 “consider Him who has endured such hostility by sinners against Himself, so that you will not grow weary and lose heart. (4) You have not yet resisted to the point of shedding blood in your striving against sin; (5) and you have forgotten the exhortation which is addressed to you as sons, "My son, do not regard lightly the discipline of the lord, nor faint when you are reproved by Him; (6) for those whom the Lord loves He disciplines, and He scourges every son whom He receives." (7) It is for discipline that you endure; God deals with you as with sons; for what son is there whom his father does not discipline? (8) But if you are without discipline, of which all have become partakers, then you are illegitimate children and not sons. (9) Furthermore, we had earthly fathers to discipline us, and we respected them; shall we not much rather be subject to the Father of spirits, and live? (10) For they disciplined us for a short time as seemed best to them, but He disciplines us for our good, so that we may share His holiness. (11) All discipline for the moment seems not to be joyful, but sorrowful; yet to those who have been trained by it, afterwards it yields the peaceful fruit of righteousness.”
III) Thirdly, This farming parable emphasizes that God has an end result in mind.
A. The scoffers
think God’s work is haphazard (v.10 “a little here, a little there”)
But v.25 describes Gods process as being very orderly:
1. in rows=NAS, ESV / measured=Calvin
2. appointed=KJV / in [proper] place/ plot=NAS, NIV, ESV / marked off with signs, designated =Delitzsch, BDB, Strong, Targums
B. It is all moving towards a goal.
1.
The farmer is thinking of that
golden, steaming loaf of bread and how good it will smell fresh out of the oven,
and how good it will taste with a coating of butter and homemade jelly spread
on it.
This is the object of all his work of tilling and planting and harvesting and
threshing and cooking – to have that delicious loaf of bread to eat at the end
of that long process.
2.
Likewise, God has a wise and wonderful plan.
He punishes sin, and sends His word out to us, and labors
day and night to woo our wayward hearts and minds and shape us
into His character through hardship - all with an end result in
mind.
Like the farmer is thinking of that loaf of bread, God is thinking of the day
when we will enjoy intimate fellowship with Him in heaven and worship Him
perfectly, free from all sin.
a. The book of Romans unfolds that wise and wonderful plan some more. In Rom. 11:30-33 Paul speaks of the Gentiles as “you” and the Jews as “they” saying, “For just as you once were disobedient to God, but now have been shown mercy because of their disobedience, so these also now have been disobedient, that because of the mercy shown to you, they also may now be shown mercy. For God has shut up all in disobedience so that He may show mercy to all. Oh, the depth of the riches both of the wisdom and knowledge of God! How unsearchable are His judgments and unfathomable His ways!” In other words, the Jews disobeyed and were punished so that we Gentiles could be included in God’s mercy in a new way, and the end result is that God’s grace could then be shown to everyone!
3. Because God’s wise and wonderful plan is moving toward a goal, we have HOPE:
a. Col. 1:4-5 Paul and Timothy write that they have “heard of your faith in Christ Jesus and of the love that you have for all the saints, (5) because of the hope laid up for you in heaven. Of this you have heard-before in the word of the truth, the gospel” We have the hope of heaven promised in the Gospel, and that hope enables us to have faith in Christ Jesus and to love others.
b. Peter wrote his letters in the Bible towards the end of the first century, preparing the church for the coming Roman persecution. In I Pet. 1:13 he says, “Therefore, preparing your minds for action, and being sober-minded, set your hope fully on the grace that will be brought to you at the revelation of Jesus Christ.” We prepare to endure by setting our hope on the future when Jesus comes back!
c. Paul told us to comfort one another with the hope that Jesus is coming back to bring a glorious end to the story we are now experiencing: I Thess. 4:16-18 “For the Lord himself will descend from heaven with a cry of command, with the voice of an archangel, and with the sound of the trumpet of God. And the dead in Christ will rise first. (17) Then we who are alive, who are left, will be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air, and so we will always be with the Lord. (18) Therefore encourage one another with these words.”
d. The apostle John also points us to the return of Christ in his first epistle, encouraging us to “abide in Him so that when He appears we may have confidence…” (I John 2:28) and John also gives us a picture in his Revelation of what it will be like when Christ appears:
e. Rev. 7:9-12 “…a great multitude that no one could number, from every nation, from all tribes and peoples and languages, standing before the throne and before the Lamb, clothed in white robes, with palm branches in their hands, (10) and crying out with a loud voice, ‘Salvation belongs to our God who sits on the throne, and to the Lamb!’ (11) And all the angels were standing around the throne and around the elders and the four living creatures, and they fell on their faces before the throne and worshiped God, (12) saying, ‘Amen! Blessing and glory and wisdom and thanksgiving and honor and power and might be to our God forever and ever! Amen.’” This is the glorious end of history when God reaches His goal of redeeming a people for Himself to spend the rest of eternity with and to be glorified by!
f. There are about 70 more places in the New Testament that speak of our hope. We are a hopeful people because:
A) God has a
wise and wonderful plan – His work is in process, it is appropriate, and He is
moving toward His goal.
v.29 This also
comes from the LORD of Hosts: He makes counsel wonderful; He increases sound
wisdom.
1. We’ve seen in Isaiah 9:6 that Jesus is the “wonderful counselor” – both words appear here in v.29
2. The word for “wisdom” in v.29 is an unusual one, indicating “substance”=Strong, “working”=KJV or that which is “sound/efficient/successful”=BDB / Prov. 2 He stores up sound wisdom for the upright.
1. Seek to understand His plan by studying the Bible and orienting ourselves towards His goal rather than coming up with our own agendas for how to spend our lives.
2. Since God has a wise and wonderful plan, we need to Patiently trust Him to do what is best. We sang in the hymn “Whate’er my God Ordains is Right… He leads me by the proper path; I know He will not leave me; I take, content, what He hath sent… He holds me that I shall not fall; And so to Him I leave it all.” God has a wise and wonderful plan; we can place our hope in the future of His plan and be freed from anxiety!
3. Since God has a wise and wonderful plan, we need to Be patient in the midst of suffering: James 5:7-11 “Therefore be patient, brethren, until the coming of the Lord. The farmer waits for the precious produce of the soil, being patient about it, until it gets the early and late rains. (8) You too be patient; strengthen your hearts, for the coming of the Lord is near. (9) Do not complain, brethren, against one another, so that you yourselves may not be judged; behold, the Judge is standing right at the door. (10) As an example, brethren, of suffering and patience, take the prophets who spoke in the name of the Lord. (11) We count those blessed who endured. You have heard of the endurance of Job and have seen the outcome of the Lord's dealings, that the Lord is full of compassion and is merciful.”