Isaiah 28:23-29

Give ye ear, &c.— We have here the fourth member of this section, in which this severe judgment of God denounced in the preceding verses, is defended by a parable taken from agriculture, wherein the prophet represents allegorically the intentions and method of the divine judgments; asserting that God acts in different ways, but at the same time with the greatest wisdom in punishing the wicked: laying judgment to the line and righteousness to the plummet, and weighing with the greatest exactness the differences of time, of men, and of things, together with every necessity, for severity or mercy. These are represented under a continued allegory, borrowed from agriculture and threshing; which images are in a manner appropriated and consecrated to this topic, and have been already explained in the course of the work. See Bishop Lowth's 10th Prelection, and Vitringa; who has very copiously elucidated this parable. Bishop Lowth reads Isaiah 28:28. The bread-corn [is beaten out] with the threshing-wain. But not for ever will he continue thus to thresh it; nor to vex it with the wheel of his wain; nor to bruise it with the hoofs of his cattle.

REFLECTIONS.—1st, Though judgments are denounced on all God's enemies, yet they will first begin at the house of God, and the sinners in Zion must feel the heaviest scourge. Such is the woe pronounced here on Ephraim, and Samaria the capital of the ten revolted tribes.

1. The sins charged upon them are pride and drunkenness. Their country being rich and fertile, abundance swelled their vain hearts, and sensual appetite abused their distinguished mercies. Carousing at the festal board, their heads with garlands crowned, they proudly defied sorrow, fearless of the wrath they provoked. Note; (1.) Pride on God's gifts is the sure way to provoke him to deprive us of them. (2.) A drunkard is a monster in nature; and he who thus basely chooses to degrade himself into a brute justly deserves to be made a companion of devils.

2. Heavy is the curse which the prophet is commissioned to pronounce on these proud drunkards. As they gave up their senses to the base servitude of lust, and drowned their reason in excess, in just judgment they should be delivered to their foes. The king of Assyria, Salmanezer, like a resistless hail-storm, or winter's flood, should bear down all before him. The crown of pride, their king and his mighty men, or Samaria the metropolis, or the crowns of garlands on the drunkard's head, when they were surprised in this defenceless and intoxicated state, he would cast down, and would tread the drunkards under his feet, reducing them to a state of most abject wretchedness. Their glorious beauty, their numerous inhabitants, or their country decked with vineyards, and valleys thick with corn, shall fade as quickly as the flower's bloom departs, and be devoured by the hosts of Assyria as greedily as the first ripe fruit; so that nothing but desolation should be seen. Note; (1.) They who give the reins to their appetites, and to drunkenness especially, are voluntary slaves, and court a servitude most wretched even now; issuing at present in the ruin of their health, fortune, and families, and bringing them hastily to that place of torment where a drop of water will be sought in vain to cool a flaming tongue. (2.) God's ministers must denounce his woes against men's sins freely and plainly. (3.) Whatever the sinner here is proud of, it is but a fading flower, and at death at farthest, if not before, will vanish.

3. In the midst of the desolations of Ephraim, Judah and Benjamin, the residue of God's people, have a gracious promise made to them. The Lord shall be a crown of glory and a diadem of beauty to them, eminently distinguishing, and protecting them from the power of the Assyrians, under Hezekiah, a type of that son of David, in whom the offices of King and Priest should be united: and for a spirit of judgment to him that sitteth in judgment, which God would bestow on the king and his magistrates, to execute righteous judgment, which is the great happiness of every state; and for strength to them that turn the battle to the gate, enduing their generals and soldiers with courage to vanquish their enemies, and pursue them to the gates of their city. Note; (1.) Christ is his faithful people's glory, and in his wisdom, righteousness, and strength, they are made more than conquerors over all their enemies. (2.) Whatever the Lord is to us, or does for us, we are bound to ascribe the praise of all to him.

4. A heavy complaint is lodged against Judah for her sins. In her were found the sins of Israel, and the same drunkenness led them astray from God. Yea, so generally had their scandalous sins spread, that priest, prophet, and people were alike infected with them. The consequence of which was, that the pretended prophet uttered the fancies of his inflamed brains for visions, deceiving, and being deceived; the priests, instead of the conscientious discharge of their office, mistook God's law, misinterpreted his oracles, and led their hearers into fatal errors: or on the bench decided wrong, to the great injury of truth and justice. Yea, so common and infamous was their drunkenness, that every table was full of vomit, and no place clean; a scene as loathsome (if possible) in the eyes of sober men, as it is detestable in the sight of God. Note; Drunkenness is vile and brutish in every man; but in a priest, a minister of the sanctuary, what words can express the infamy, impiety, and scandalousness of the crime!

2nd, Drunkenness necessarily brought stupidity upon their minds, and steeled them against all the warnings of God.
1. In vain were all the teachings of the prophets, solicitous as they were to make them understand; waiting upon them with patient perseverance, and daily inculcating their lessons; and plainly, and affectionately withal, shewing them how nearly they were interested in the matter, as being the only way for them to obtain deliverance from the threatened evils, or pardon and refreshing to their guilty consciences. Yet as soon might a child at the breast be taught, so stupified were they with their drunkenness, and so obstinate, they would not hear; though the word was ever sounding in their ears, it never reached their hearts; and they seem to have turned it into ridicule, repeating it after the prophet in mockery, לקו קו לצו צו Tsav latsav, kav lakav, or at their drunken feasts jesting with the most sacred words of scripture. Note; (1.) God condescends to teach us as babes; his word is the sincere milk; and, as a nurse cherishes her children, his ministers are sent to wait upon us with unwearied patience. (2.) Children's minds must not be over-burthened; a little, as they are able to receive it, will be the most profitable instruction. (3.) There is rest for the weary in Jesus, and refreshing for the miserable: it argues our folly to be as great as our wickedness, to reject our own mercies, and refuse his calls to come to him, that we may find rest to our souls. (4.) Many hear the word of God, whose hearts continue impenetrable; yea, they will not understand, and none so blind as these. (5.) The last step of hardened wickedness is making a jest of things sacred.

2. In just judgment God gives them up to the ruin they have chosen. With stammering lips and another tongue will he speak to this people, when foreign armies shall waste their country; so that their destruction was determined; that they might go and fall backward and be broken, and snared, and taken, as the punishment of their apostacy from God, first given up to the Babylonians, and at last their country utterly destroyed by the Romans. Note; They who will not attend to God's calls to repentance, will hear his terrible voice of judgment, when their ruin is past recovery.

3rdly, The prophesy beginning at the 14th verse some apply to the desolation of Judaea by the Assyrians; but it seems to belong especially to the Jews in Christ's day, and the desolations which the Romans shortly after brought upon them.
1. The scornful men who rejected the prophetic admonition, too great to take rebuke, and infatuated to their ruin, boasted themselves secure. The death and hell which the prophet threatened, they feared not: they thought themselves as safe as if they had made a compact with the grave, and were confident, whatever overflowing scourge passed through the land, it would not come to them; making lies their refuge, and hiding themselves under falsehood, they trusted in the lying prophets who encouraged them, or in their own strength, wealth, and policy, to overcome or over-reach their adversaries. By the overflowing scourge, the Roman army seems intended, against which they thought themselves safe, but found, too late, their sad delusion. Note; (1.) When we are in covenant with God through a Redeemer, and at peace with him through the blood of sprinkling; then, and only then, have we made a covenant with death, and cannot be hurt thereby. (2.) Vain confidence buoys up sinners to the last, but there will then be found a lie in their right hand.

2. The prophet admonishes them where alone they can safely place their confidence. Behold, I lay in Zion for a foundation, the Lord Jesus Christ, other foundation than whom no man can lay; a stone, a rock, firm, and immoveable; a tried stone, who has been proved the sure support of his saints in every age; or a stone of trial, by whom men's states are discovered, and their characters determined; a precious corner-stone, supporting the whole spiritual building, and inestimably prized by every believer who knows the value of such a Redeemer; a sure foundation, which will stand for eternity, and on which the faithful may safely trust body and soul: he that believeth shall not make haste, but under every trial patiently wait the Lord's leisure; and thus never will be confounded, or ashamed, as it is rendered, 1 Peter 2:6 for he has never failed those who trusted him, and never can or will disappoint the hopes of those who perseveringly rely upon him.

3. He warns them of the folly, sin, and danger of their conduct, in trusting on lying vanities. For when the Lord shall lay judgment to the line, and righteousness to the plummet, as builders to prove their work straight, their ways will be found perverse, and their judgment ensue; then their vain hopes shall fail, and the hail-storm sweep away their refuge of lies. The army of the enemy shall as easily and utterly overwhelm them, their lying prophets, their riches and temple together, or whatever else they trust in, as the waters of the deluge did the sinners of old. Then their covenant with death would be proved a delusion; and the sword of the Chaldeans, or rather of the Romans, as an overflowing scourge, pass through, and as mire in the streets they should be trodden down. From the time that it goeth forth, neither policy nor power will be able to oppose it; it shall take you as prisoners for captivity, or seize you as criminals for the sword; and this continually and thoroughly, till God's judgments are executed. Morning by morning, shall it pass over, by day and by night, without interruption the siege would be carried on, and the devastations increase; and it shall be a vexation only to understand the report, so terrible would the tidings be which those who fled into Jerusalem should carry of the ravages of the Chaldean or Roman army. For the bed is shorter than that a man can stretch himself on it: and the covering narrower than that he can wrap himself in it; which either describes the insufficiency of their projects, and the uncomfortableness of their state, when their beds would give them no repose; or the case of Jerusalem, crowded with those who fled thither, whose useless number increased the miseries of the besieged. For the Lord shall rise up as in mount Perazim, and against his arm resistance is vain; he shall be wroth as in the valley of Gibeon; two eminent instances wherein he displayed his terrible majesty against his enemies, 2 Samuel 5:20. 1 Chronicles 14:11. Judges 10:10 that he may do his work, his strange work; and bring to pass his act, his strange act; he used to fight for them, but now is turned to be their enemy, and their fall is sure. Note; (1.) If God lay judgment to the line, and righteousness to the plummet, who can stand, or bear the scrutiny? (2.) It is the folly of the self-righteous and the hypocrite that they cry peace, when there is no peace. (3.) If sinners cannot bear the report of God's terrors without vexation, nor hear of hell, and torments, and eternal despair, without commotion, how will they endure them? (4.) They who think their moral duties will yield them a covering in the day of God, and seek repose in their own righteousnesses, will find the bed too short, the covering too narrow, and perish in their own deceivings. (5.) Vengeance is God's strange work; he delighteth not in the death of a sinner.

4. The whole is pressed upon their consciences for their conviction and reformation. Now therefore, to-day, whilst it is called to-day, and yet there is mercy, be ye not mockers, despising these divine notices; lest your bands be made strong, and aggravated guilt provoke a heavier judgment: for I have heard from the Lord of Hosts, who cannot lie, and is able to make good his word, a consumption, even determined upon the whole earth, or on the land of Judaea; it shall be swept as with the besom of destruction. See Daniel 9:27. Note; (1.) It is merciful in God to give sinners warning; he leaves them then without excuse. (2.) Mockers will be strangely disappointed, when the terrors which they despised seize them, and the warnings that they ridiculed are proved dreadful realities.

4thly, The prophet, in God's name, calls on them for attention, and gives them a parable of warning.
1. He bids them regard the husbandman; what various methods he uses; how prudently he plows and sows, casting the seed into the proper soil, and in the appointed season; and when he has gathered his fruits, how wisely he manages them, using more force with the seeds which are more firm and difficult to be beat out of the ear, and less with such as would be liable to be bruised. And when the bread-corn is beat out with the threshing instrument, (which was a kind of low cart, drawn by horses or oxen, with iron spikes at the bottom) he does not suffer it to be trampled on too much, or broken with the wheel on the floor, but carries it to the mill to be ground. So,
2. God would not always be warning, and making preparations for the execution of his judgments, but inflict them according to the several deserts of sinners. Note; (1.) All wisdom cometh from above. If the husbandman be taught to plow and sow aright, he owes it to God wonderful in counsel. (2.) The heart of man is as the fallow-ground, obdurate and unfruitful, till God in his word breaks up the stubborn soil, and awakens the sinner's conscience. (3.) Christ is the living seed; the heart which receives him will yield fruit unto God. (4.) God knows the several dispositions of his believing people, and dispenses his word and providences in such a way towards them, as may most effectually answer the purposes of his grace. (5.) In proportion to their guilt and provocations will be the execution of the divine vengeance on the wicked. (6.) In all his ways and works God will manifest his own glory, and appear wonderful in counsel, and excellent in working.