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“What is it like when you think you planted love and received nothing but pain in return?”
One of toughest things for a parent is watching children grow up. At birth we are all told, “oh, they will grow up so quickly!” There is no way that registers in our mind as we saw a helpless infant. We never consider that eventual truth until the day they are grown up and it is time to leave home. Where does time go and how it does fly! And suddenly, a day comes when they make their decisions and we are no longer in control. Sometimes they do well and sometimes they don’t. What is most difficult at the moment the tide is going out to see is to realize their decisions are their decisions, and either they will sink or swim. Whatever influence we had on their development is no more. It is a time of joy for them and trepidation for mom and dad. You know that to be true either from your own parenting, or as you consider how your parents walked you to the edge of the shore and you began to sail on your own.
Isaiah spoke to Israel after their transition from desert dependence in Sinai to a wonderful life in the promised land. But too often they forgot their heavenly father and turned to the ways of the world with all its selfishness, anxiety, problems and pain. They floundered. They abandoned God in their eagerness to do it their way. They ignored his love, become selfish in daily living, and found themselves in all sorts of hot water. God’s painful, parental care (full of loving pain) was the lament voiced by the prophet Isaiah over the children of God. Isaiah’s cry was inspired by of God’s pain as the families of Israel stumbled and strayed. Over and over he mouthed God’s sorrow, “what more could I have done? What more could I have done.” Has there ever been a more heart-rending cry until one day Jesus sang the same song from a cross?
Isaiah chapter 5 is a powerful love song of God for his children … a tender, bittersweet ballad of parental love in the midst of their suffering and pain. Like a farmer caring for a vineyard, he had nourished their lives, pruned what was stunted and diseased, daily sharing his tender loving care. And in the end, it apparently was to no avail.
After all his efforts, God’s children had rebelled, ignored his guidance, and chased after the temptations of the world around them. They lost their way and didn’t notice how the enemy had lured them into a trap. As a result, the tribes of Israel were lost forever, carried off by the Assyrians while a few years later the remaining tribe of Judah was taken into exile in Babylon. The vineyard called a promised land was overgrown with weeds, empty places of worship, as a land of milk and honey was strangled with weeds of selfish living rather than the faithful love God had planted.
Isaiah channeled God’s voice in his words. God’s lament was the wailing of grief! His words, echoing from hill to valley, were simple and direct. “What more could I have done?” That was the only sound only cry the empty, once fertile land would hear. What a terrible moment that is for anyone whose loved one has strayed. Such frustration is born of the pain of unrequited love. That is the plaintive cry of parents who feel they have failed their children! We know the lyrics all too well, of that song, “what else could I have done, and why was my love not enough?”
You understand the pain when love is not rewarded or returned. You have endured such pain and have cried that cry. And sometimes that cry was for you. We understand all too well, the pain when love, passion, and faith-filled guidance just don’t seem to be enough. There is nothing left but to sing the blues, which Isaiah learned from God. In Matthew 21Jesus shared a different story with a similar theme. He told the crowds of a beautiful vineyard an owner leased to tenants while he travelled far away. Despite the blessings of good work and great pay, the workers revolted, stole the harvest, refused to pay the rent, and killed the owner’s son when in response to the rebellion. For Jesus, this story was as old as time itself, and a prophetic message as Jesus anticipated when his messianic journey would be rejected. The son of a heavenly father and owner of a beautiful vineyard called earth would be abused, crucified and planted in a tomb, as his message from this heavenly Father was rejected by the powers of a broken world and the forces of darkness and death. Looking ahead, like the prophet Isaiah, Jesus mouthed the words of God himself as he anticipated the cross of Calvary and cried out, “What more was there to do for my vineyard that I have not done for it?
Filled with the pain of Isaiah’s lament, God came to earth in the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus. He chose not to give up on the vineyard but to do even more. When Jesus was rejected and sealed with a stone in a tomb, God responded with Easter. Jesus’ prophetic proclamation “that the stone that the earth’s builders had rejected would become the cornerstone of a new kingdom” had now come to pass. And it continues to bring life today. That is the surprise of the Gospel, and the love that has no other description than to be called “grace.” Despite God’s frustration with Israel and Judah, out of a remnant of that kingdom came the Messiah. Despite the crucifixion and burial of Jesus, out of that tomb came the resurrected Savior of all.
Despite our failures, Easter brings life to death and love to self-absorbed living. The future is not dependent on our goodness or destroyed by our sin, but given back by our God who refuses to stop loving. Even while singing the blues, our God of love proclaims the great hosanna of his victory. God is that parent who is so frustrated with a child’s disobedience but cannot help but continuing to love, and yet continues to love and love some more. It doesn’t make sense, which is why there is no other word than grace! And how that cry of despair was changed by the halleluiah chorus of Easter! Just as empty water jugs became filled with wine at Cana, so the sour grapes of our sin are changed by Christ into the refreshing new life of discipleship and faith. Just as the darkest Friday of all time was simply the prelude to Easter’s dawn, so even our selfish rebellion can be turned around by God’s love. We need only remember the struggles and pain we have felt to understand how we have let God and our loved ones down in the same way. When we have forgotten whose vineyard it truly is and what our work is called to be, we have forgotten the meaning and purpose of living. As we remember who gave us birth, who nourished, nurtured, and invested such love, how can that not change how we live?
Like workers in the vineyard who rebelled out of selfishness and greed, our first impulse is often to say “mine” and we mistakenly lose sight of who we really are and why we were created to be. And always and again God does the unexpected by forgiving, renewing, and given us another second chance to get it right. He buries our weakness in Easter’s tomb and restores us to a new life full of hope filled joy. So, what will tomorrow bring? How will our vineyard song sound? Will we live as if everything is about me, or understand what it means to be stewards of God? Will planting and loving be enough, or will we try to play god? Will crops rot on the vine? Will we keep abundance for self? Will selfishness strangle stewardship? OR will we faithfully serve AS we have first been served?
More than our successes or failures in working the fields, daily remember whose field it is, in which we have been privileged to serve as parents, neighbors, students, workers, citizens, and friends! Despite the sour taste of sin God no longer sings the blues but the new Easter hymn of triumphant forgiveness and love. And as Jesus continues to promise his disciples today, he will never leave us alone but fills us with the gift of his spirit to fill our lungs and warm our hearts that we might learn that same song of faithful never-ending love. No matter what our circumstances, style, or gifts his love is the greatest gift we can share. It is the song of love, forgiveness, and freedom we have learned at his feet. And like children moved by mother’s tender love songs, we are ready to leave the nest so that God’s love song becomes our life song.