Sunday 4th October – A vineyard Song – Pastor Adrian Kitson

Sometimes you have to be very clever to get people to hear what you are saying. You have to ‘string people along a bit’ with something they welcome in order to hit them with the truth of the thing, which they probably won’t welcome but really need to hear.

Like when you go to the chiropractor … You come in and you tell him what the issue is today. He checks you out and while moving your arm here and your leg there, starts talking about the footy, the house, the car and then ‘crack! – with one sharp accurate forceful move, there is a big blast of pain, a deep breath, a moment of shock, and then nothing – all fixed. Leave your money on the fridge!

Isaiah, in this grand poem of poems we began this year with is doing just this kind of ‘hook’ work to try and get God’s people to hear the truth God is speaking but they don’t want to hear.

This is the famous little ‘Song of the Vineyard’.

Sounds lovely at the start.

I can imagine some of vine keepers around here stepping out into the early spring morning sun among their vines singing a happy tune to those lovely fruiting vines as the day’s work gets under way!

I can imagine some of our men and women singing a happy song of love for their partner just after breakfast on the way out to work!

Lovely. I’m into the song.

Maybe the people sitting around the city square hearing this poem from Isaiah were glad to hear this too, especially from the usually grumpy prophet! “Sing some more, Isaiah!”.

Isaiah continues. It seems that he speaks of a very busy and hopeful God.

No expense spared. Stones cleared, soil prepared. Best vines money can buy.

Protection too. A watch tower to keep those wild animals or thieves out. The wine press is in place too. Ready for a good vintage – oil and wine for life.

But then, the poem turns. God looks for that good vintage and it is not there

Oh. That takes the shine off a bit. It was a good tune until that bit.

It gets worse … If anyone sticks with it and resists the temptation to press ‘pause’ or ‘next song’.

God asks the people what more could he have done to give them a free and flourishing life in his care.

Was it his fault that things have descended into greed, self-service at the expense of others, competitiveness and conflict?

God wanted his people to live in his justice and safety. He wanted them to grow together in his tender care. He wanted them to know the joy of his love and life; to stand up strong and tall; to be free of other things (‘briars and thorns’) that offer the growth and the good life but actually sap the life out of God’s intended full life.

But God looks over his people looking for the good fruit of justice, kindness, self-giving generosity and care for each other finds none.

• Whereas every family was supposed to own a piece of land off which it could live, some people have found ways of appropriating other people’s land by semi-legal means and depriving its owners of their livelihood.
• They indulge themselves in drinking and music to their own glory, not God’s glory and praise.
• They don’t believe Isaiah’s talk about God intending to act against them should they step away from his tending, protection, caring and shaping of them. They think they can look after themselves. They think they have great insight, but they lack it. They think they’re important, but they’re quite dispensable.

This is not God’s fault. Isaiah describes how the nation has caused many in it to cry in pain.

Fast forward to Jesus: The people are like those invited to that wedding reception of which Jesus speaks. They have left the vineyard of God’s protection and care and are refusing to listen to the servant sent to them to call them back to that banquet of God.

God tells them what their rejection of him and his gifts and care and hope; what their self-driven wrongs that cause so much pain to others will be.

And then, to top it all off, God will go beyond his vineyard; his own people and work with their enemies to overwhelm his own people.

Their homes will be devastated. Their crops will fail. They will lose their land. They will die and find themselves in Sheol.^[1]

We are talking, exile. It happened. God delivered on his judgement. But it seems he did not give up on this vineyard. He did not give up on his goal to grow a very good crop of people.

He sends his own Son to call gather and grow his people. They mostly don’t come and don’t therefore grow in him. The Son goes further afield. Jesus goes way beyond just Israel. Many there also don’t come, but some do.

Every one of them; Jew and Gentile are called. They are invited, included. But of course, not everyone comes or knows how to behave when they get there or even where they are – like the guy without a wedding suit on in the presence of the King!

One day when the King comes to tally it all up and find that good fruit of faithfulness, love, loyalty and just living, there will be immeasurable anger and regret and sorrow and the opportunity missed, the vineyard life forsaken, the joy of the feast ignored for many who have only ended up with scratches and allergies and pain from those other things they turned to live the good life – those thorns and briars.

I wonder what fruit is being born in you? I wonder what agent for growth you are seeking? On whom or what are you depending for growth in the life of protection, peace, community and flourishing gifts of generosity, self-givjng love for your relationships?

This old heart of ours has the tendency to leave the vineyard; not hear the Son’s call.

What more could God do for the world? What more could God do for you?

How about willingly load up his Son with all our arrogance and self-interest; our deaf ears and tuneless voices to his grace and exact full judgement on that Son for all who have left the vineyard, thrown out the invitation or forgotten they live life in the holy presence of a holy God who is awesome and authoritative and to be taken very seriously.

Friend, God is now no mere third-party vigneron tending your life from afar. He says he is actually the vine and we, those whom he gathers in from the highways and byways to his vineyard, his banquet, are his branches – so close to him – branches of he himself – so close are we.

From that moment he calls is in, he re-births us sinners; from that moment of life-giving water, his life courses through ours. His holy forgiveness floods our bodies. We grow into him. We grow to be like him together – one vine.

The Father is still singing for you this morning; still whistling to the ends of this earth.

No expense spared on you.

Lots of hard work to keep you and call you and grow you into the likeness of the Son.

He is enough and is doing enough.

^[1] John Goldingay, Isaiah for Everyone, Old Testament for Everyone (Louisville, KY; London: Westminster John Knox Press; Society for Promoting Christian Knowledge, 2015), 26.

PERSONAL REFLECTION

Summary

This is a sermon for Pentecost 19A (October 4, 2026) on Isaiah 5:1-7, the “Song of the Vineyard.”

The approach. Pastor Adrian compares Isaiah’s method to a chiropractor who chats about footy and the car before delivering one sharp, necessary “crack.” Isaiah opens with a love song about a vineyard so that his hearers will lean in and then hear a truth they would rather avoid.

The song. God is the vinegrower who spares no expense. He clears the stones, plants the choicest vines, builds a watchtower and cuts a winepress. Then he looks for good grapes and finds only bad fruit. His question, “What more could have been done?”, makes clear that the failure is not his.

The bad fruit. The sermon fills this out with the injustices of Isaiah’s day:

• Land was seized by semi-legal means, depriving families of their livelihood.
• People indulged in drink and music for their own glory rather than God’s.
• They dismissed the warnings, confident they could look after themselves.

The judgement. God will remove the hedge and wall, leave the vineyard a wasteland of briers and thorns, and withhold rain. He will even whistle for foreign nations to overwhelm his people. That is exile, and it happened.

The turn to Jesus. God did not give up on the vineyard. He sent his Son, who called people to the banquet (the wedding feast parable). Many refused, so the invitation went to Jews and Gentiles alike. But not everyone comes or knows how to behave when they arrive. When the King returns to look for the fruit of faithfulness, love and justice, there will be grief for those who chose thorns over the feast.

The gospel. The sermon asks what more God could do for the world, and answers that he has already done it: the Son bears our arrogance and deafness and takes the judgement. Jesus is not a distant vinegrower but the vine himself, and we are his branches. The closing assurance is that the Father is still singing and whistling for us, that no expense has been spared, and that “He is enough and is doing enough.”

Personal Reflection

What strikes me about this passage is that the song begins in love. Before there is any accusation, there is a Father delighting in his vineyard and doing the backbreaking work of clearing stones. It is easy for me to read Isaiah 5 as a warning and skip the tenderness that gives the warning its weight. God’s grief at bad fruit only makes sense because his investment was so generous.

The question “What more could have been done?” unsettles me because I can’t answer it. I often assume that if my life isn’t bearing fruit, something must be lacking on God’s side: more clarity, more circumstances, more help. The passage closes that door. Where I fail to flourish, the problem is not that God held something back. It is that my heart drifts from the vineyard toward other sources of growth, and the sermon’s image of thorns and briars fits. The things I reach for to feel secure, important or self-sufficient promise life but leave scratches and allergies.

Another line I keep coming back to is the sermon’s description of people who “think they’re important, but they’re quite dispensable.”

That is a hard word, and it exposes how quietly self-reliance can pass for competence. Isaiah’s audience wasn’t cartoonishly wicked. They were comfortable, capable and unconvinced that they needed tending.

The gospel movement is what keeps this from being crushing. Isaiah’s God asks what more he could do, and then, in Jesus, he does the one thing the vineyard could never do for itself. He becomes the vine. Judgement doesn’t disappear. It falls on the Son, and the branches receive his life. John 15 turns the song from “look what you’ve failed to produce” into “abide in me.” Fruit is not something I manufacture to satisfy an inspecting God. It is what happens when I stay joined to the one who is already faithful.

The questions the sermon leaves me with are searching ones. What fruit is actually growing in me: justice, kindness, generosity, self-giving love? On whom or what am I depending for growth? And where have I wandered out of the vineyard while telling myself I’m fine?

I can pray with the last image: the Father is still singing, still whistling for the ones who have wandered. I don’t have to earn my way back into the song. I only have to stop resisting the invitation and remain in the vine.

A prayer. Father, thank you that you have done everything necessary and spared no expense. Where I have trusted my own growth, pull me back to the vine. Let your Son’s life run through mine, and let the fruit be love, justice and generosity to those around me. Amen.

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