There are two passages assigned for today!

SCRIPTURE: Isaiah 5
OBSERVATION/APPLICATION:
The vineyard of the Lord Almighty is the house of Israel, and the men of Judah are the garden of his delight. And he looked for justice, but saw bloodshed; for righteousness, but heard cries of distress. [Isaiah 5:7]
Isaiah continues with the vineyard theme, making it clear that it is a symbol for the people God nurtures and cares for, yet sees no harvest of good fruit – only sour grapes.
What more could have been done for my vineyard than I have done for it? When I looked for good grapes, why did it yield only bad? [Isaiah 5:4]
Isaiah shows how the people have instead turned the grapes of God’s blessing into an opportunity for self-indulgence; they have wasted God’s goodness and it has amounted to nothing but a drunken stupor.
A ten-acre vineyard will produce only a bath of wine, a homer of seed only an ephah of grain. Woe to those who rise early in the morning to run after their drinks, who stay up late at night till they are inflamed with wine. [Isaiah 5:10-11]

Then he told this parable: “A man had a fig tree, planted in his vineyard, and he went to look for fruit on it, but did not find any. So he said to the man who took care of the vineyard, ‘For three years now I’ve been coming to look for fruit on this fig tree and haven’t found any. Cut it down! Why should it use up the soil?’ “‘Sir,’ the man replied, ‘leave it alone for one more year, and I’ll dig around it and fertilize it. If it bears fruit next year, fine! If not, then cut it down.'” [Luke 13:6-9]
Right after Jesus teaches about the urgent need for repentance [Luke 13:1-5], He uses a parable about a vineyard to show what happens to those who refuse to produce good fruit.
It is the same message as Isaiah; God loves His people, He nurtures and cares for them and does what He can to bring out the best in them.
But eventually His patience will run out, and He will give up on it, uproot it and burn it.

Do you see your life, and the life of every person, as God’s giving us a chance to produce good fruit.
Do we see God at work in us, nurturing and caring for us to be good people in a bad world?
Do we see Him looking at our branches, and wondering what He will find there?
So what is God finding in your life, in my life?
God is the true and fair judge of these things; He knows what we are truly producing, and not just the outward performance that we use to impress others.
At the end of our lives, when we complain that God was not fair, that He didn’t give us a chance, that it was too hard (whatever excuses we come up with), He will say again, What more could have been done for my vineyard than I have done for it?
God has given us everything we need to live the loving, generous, good lives that He is looking for.
His divine power has given us everything we need for life and godliness through our knowledge of him who called us by his own glory and goodness. Through these he has given us his very great and precious promises, so that through them you may participate in the divine nature and escape the corruption in the world caused by evil desires. For this very reason, make every effort to add to your faith goodness; and to goodness, knowledge; and to knowledge, self-control; and to self-control, perseverance; and to perseverance, godliness; and to godliness, brotherly kindness; and to brotherly kindness, love. For if you possess these qualities in increasing measure, they will keep you from being ineffective and unproductive in your knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ. [2 Peter 1:3-8]
If we do not produce this kind of fruit, we have no one to blame but ourselves.

PRAYER:
Lord, I see some evidence of Your fruit in my life, but there could be so much more. Help me to make every effort to add to my faith… Help me to be effective and productive in my knowledge of You!