Finding the New Wine

 5th Sunday after Pentecost – C (Proper 7)                                                                         LSB #709
Text – Isaiah 65:8
 
Thus says the Lord: “As the new wine is found in the cluster, & they say, ‘Do not destroy it, for there is a blessing in it,’ so I will do for my servants’ sake, & not destroy them all.”


FINDING THE NEW WINE
 
 
In the ancient world, wine was a really big deal.  When it was time to harvest the grapes the people celebrated.  When the wine was ready for drinking, the people celebrated.   The alcohol had something to do with that, but it also had to do with the scarcity of water.  The water that ended up in the grapes had been purified by the process the vine uses to gather the water.
In a desert culture, in ancient Israel, quite unlike the abundance of water we have here in Michigan, it was much easier to find safe drinking water in the form of wine, than it ever was to find safe drinking at the end of a faucet in the kitchen.  And because of the alcohol in the wine, it did not need refrigeration or chemicals to preserve it from spoiling.
Leading up to the reading from Isaiah 65, Israel had been praying for God to intervene in their lives by displaying His power & might.  As usual in this type of response, they had left God behind, He disciplined them through exile to another country, & finally they had turned back to Him for help.  Today’s reading is the beginning of God’s answer to their prayer:
“I was ready to be sought by those who did not ask for me; I was ready to be found by those who did not seek me.  I said, ‘Here I am, here I am,’ to a nation that was not called by my name.  I spread out my hands all the day to a rebellious people, who walk in a way that is not good, following their own devices…”
That doesn’t sound like the typical child who’s been good all year & can now expect their Christmas list prayers to be answered.   Yet the description in verses 1 & 2 of Isaiah 65 does sound like someone we know.  It sounds like us – a rebellious people following our own devices.  Yes, that may be difficult to believe, with as prim & proper as all of us look this morning,   but it’s true.  We just can not, & we will not, follow the ways of God.   After all, He expects us to forgive each other when we’re offended or hurt, & above & beyond that, He even expects us to love,   & forgive   & pray for   our enemies.
Have you even attempted that in the past week?     When answering that question you should remember St. Paul teaches us to pray without ceasing.  That sounds difficult if we’re praying for Christmas presents, though some children might hound you constantly on that one.  But to pray for our enemies – without ceasing?  
Keep in mind that, in our natural state, by our own efforts, each one of us is an enemy of God.  It’s not just the radical Muslims that are the enemy of God.   It’s not just the Democrats or the Republicans.  All of us are God’s enemies.  The people of Israel certainly demonstrated that throughout the OT.  The disciples of Jesus demonstrate that throughout the four Gospels. 
In the end, the bottom line reason that our heavenly Father gave us the Bible, is not to show us how to live.  It was given to show us that in spite of how we live, the Lord of the universe chooses, every moment of every day, to call us back to Him for healing from sin:
  “I was ready to be sought by those who did not ask for me; I was ready to be found by those who did not seek me.  I said, ‘Here I am,   here I am,’ to a nation that was not called by my name.  I spread out my hands all the day to a rebellious people, who walk in a way that is not good,   following their own devices…”
If we’re only reading verses 2-7 there is no hope, so that’s why verse 8 is the sermon text: Thus says the Lord: “As the new wine is found in the cluster, & they say, ‘Do not destroy it,  for there is a blessing in it,’  so I will do for my servants’ sake,  & not destroy them all.”   That’s where the Word of God really gets down to business.  That’s where the tension comes into play between our sinful rebellion & God’s gracious love.   It can be explained this way: ‘As men do not destroy a juicy cluster of grapes,  just because there are a few dried up or rotten ones in it,  so Yahweh will not utterly destroy the entire nation  even if  most of the people have rejected Him.’ 
In other words, “As the new wine is found in the cluster, & they say, ‘Do not destroy it, for there is a blessing in it,’ so I will do for my servants’ sake, & not destroy them all.”   Isaiah is reassuring the faithful people of God that no matter how depraved & twisted their culture becomes, the Lord God will be able to work perfection out of those who will trust in Him. 
We see an example of that with the man in the Gospel reading: “He was kept under guard & bound with chains & shackles, but he would break the bonds & be driven by the demon into the desert.”  (Luke 8:29c ESV)   Jesus came along & cast out the demons. 
“Then people went out to see what had happened, & they came to Jesus & found the man from whom the demons had gone,  sitting at the feet of Jesus, clothed & in his right mind, & they were afraid.”  (Luke 8:35 ESV)   The tension is clear.  Yahweh’s gracious love sets the man free of demon possession.  The rebellious people, who came to see, were afraid & asked Jesus to leave. 
For the sake of the man who was healed, for the new wine found in the cluster, Jesus did not destroy the entire cluster.   The unbelievers were seized with great fear, so Jesus leaves them behind.  Fear is the natural reaction of sinful beings to a demonstration of unearthly power.  The recognition of a loving God behind that power leads to a glorifying of God. 
The tension between our sinful rebellion & God’s gracious love, demonstrates itself in that, when Jesus performs miracles, some people ask Him to depart, while others glorify our heavenly Father.  Belief & unbelief, submission & rebellion, good grapes & sour grapes, those pairings reflect the ways in which people respond to Jesus’ revelation of truth.
Much of the final 11 chapters of Isaiah can be seen as God’s filing of a covenant lawsuit. 
Israel had entered the covenant in the Sinai wilderness.  Before Moses even made it down from the mountain, the Golden Calf was a foreshadowing of things to come.   Now, Yahweh is the Judge, Isaiah the prosecuting attorney, & the rebellious Israelites are the guilty defendants who have shattered the covenant of Sinai. 
There’s an intense law-Gospel interaction at work in Isaiah 65, between a God who has “held out my hands all day long” (v. 2 ESV) & a people whom God “will indeed repay into their laps both your iniquities & your fathers’ iniquities together.”  (vv. 6–7 ESV)   Nevertheless, God’s loving kindness has the final word:
“As the wine is found in the cluster, & they say, ‘Do not destroy it, for there is a blessing in it,’ so I will do for my servants’ sake, & not destroy them all.”  (v. 8 ESV)   That word of promise is for both Jew & Gentile, (v. 9 ESV) & we need to hear it today.  As our culture moves away from Christ, we are becoming a minority – we could say a Remnant. 
This is the doctrine of the remnant cast in a new form.  In the nation of Israel, former believers predominate, but mixed within the people is the faithful remnant.  Something valuable is in these grapes so the cluster must not be completely destroyed.  The word ‘destroyed’ in v. 8 is the same Hebrew word used in Noah’s flood & in the judgment of Sodom & Gomorrah.
The Remnant is a common theme in the Word of God.  Noah & family were a remnant.  Believers in the time of Elijah were a remnant.  Lot & his daughters were a remnant.  Zechariah & Elizabeth, Mary & Joseph were a remnant.  The remnant is the fruit of the good news of salvation in Jesus Christ.  It is those who take the hard & narrow way that leads to life.
With The Remnant, new life comes from what would be discarded as hopeless & dead.  A shoot burst forth from Jesse’s burned-out stump as Christ was born in the stable at Bethlehem.  Being The Remnant is living a theology of the cross, instead of living in glory.  When God’s
judgment strikes the community, it won’t be indiscriminate.  Yahweh will spare The Remnant of believers who are accounted clean & righteous by the holy Work of the justifying Servant, which is Jesus Christ.  Through the prophet Isaiah, Almighty God illustrates The Remnant by means of a grape cluster. 
The divine blessing is to be found in His elect servants, whom He has 1st sought out & who then respond in faith by seeking Him.  They alone are the ones who will inherit & possess the ancient promises to Abraham of “blessing.”  Only the humble & contrite servants will inherit the kingdom of God. 
Regardless of their broken outward appearances, Yahweh will take them to glory in the next life.  The first will become last & thus the last will become first.  Judgement will remove those who claim to be members but are not, while also purifying those who truly are believers. 
In order to encourage us to remain faithful & to warn the disobedient of the horrors awaiting them, the Lord depicts the joy & misery which will result when He separates the sheep from the goats.  The Remnant from among all nations, saved by grace through faith, will one day gather before the Lamb of God to give thanks to Him forever. 
As children of God these are also our promises.  The nation of Israel is no longer defined by ethnicity or geography.  It is made up of all who embrace new life through the death & resurrection of Jesus.  There are enough faithful servants left for God to achieve the purpose for which He created His chosen people, so He spares the whole cluster rather than destroying it. 
Making wine was a really big deal in desert communities of the ancient world.  Making children for Himself is an even bigger deal for our heavenly Father.  Of ourselves you & I are full of contamination, unfit to drink like the water in Flint, MI, but through the Vine, which is Christ, we are purified, & all of heaven rejoices when even one of us repents.  The Holy Spirit is an expert at seeing into our heart & finding the new wine.  Abraham, Moses, David, all of them were deeply flawed men.  All their failings, on the part of men who were revered as heroes of the faith, serve to underscore the lesson Israel learned at the foot of Mt. Sinai. 
Not only did Israel become the people of God by His choice & His action alone, but also Israel’s continuance as the people of God depends not on Israel’s ability to keep the Torah, but upon the gracious & compassionate character of God. 
Three times the people of Israel swear to keep all of God’s commands – Exodus 19:8, 24:3 & 7 – & then they immediately break the 1st commandment in the most egregious way possible.  They made & worshipped the golden calf before Moses was even finished receiving the instructions Israel had sworn to obey. 
Today’s OT reading shows this = Even when no one is looking for God, Immanuel is here looking, waiting for us.  That’s not frustration.  That is grace.  “This is my body.  This is my blood,” – waiting for you, so that He might once again give to you the new creation. 
“The man from whom the demons had gone begged that he might be with him, but Jesus sent him away, saying, ‘Return to your home, & declare how much God has done for you.’  And he went away, proclaiming throughout the whole city how much Jesus had done for him.”   (Luke 8:38-39 ESV)   Amen.                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                 
 
 
 
Perverse & foolish oft I strayed, but yet in love He sought me & on His shoulder gently laid & home rejoicing brought me.  And so through all the length of days Thy goodness faileth never;   Good Shepherd may I sing Thy praise within Thy house forever!  Amen.   LSB 709:3