The Divine Husbandry Text: Isaiah 28:23-29
Introduction: God in the Dirt
We live in an age that has a deep suspicion of farmers. Not farmers themselves, mind you, but the logic of the farm. We prefer our solutions to be abstract, universal, and immediate. We want a single pill to cure all ills, a single policy to fix all social problems, a single button to solve everything. We are impatient technocrats. But God is not a technocrat. God is a farmer.
The scoffers in Jerusalem, to whom Isaiah is speaking, had a similar problem. They saw the looming threat of Assyria, they saw the political chaos, and they concluded that either God was not in control, or that He was a clumsy, incompetent deity, flailing about with no rhyme or reason. They could not discern any pattern in the chaos. And so, in their arrogance, they made a covenant with Death and Hell, thinking their own cleverness could save them. They were sophisticated, urban elites who had forgotten the wisdom of the soil.
Isaiah's response is to drag them out of their smoke-filled back rooms and into a farmer's field. He tells them, in essence, "You want to understand God's foreign policy? You want to understand His methods of judgment and salvation? Go watch a farmer. The principles of divine providence are written in the dirt." This passage is a parable. It is a lesson in divine husbandry. It teaches us that God's methods are not random, they are not uniform, and they are certainly not pointless. He is the Master Farmer, and His dealings with nations, and with our souls, are characterized by meticulous care, perfect timing, and profound wisdom. He knows when to plow, what to plant, and how to thresh.
The Text
Give ear and hear my voice, Pay attention and hear my words. Does the farmer plow continually to plant seed? Does he continually turn and harrow his ground? Does he not level its surface And sow dill and scatter cumin And plant wheat in rows, Barley in its place and rye within its area? For his God disciplines and teaches him proper judgment. For dill is not threshed with a threshing sledge, Nor is the wheel of a cart driven over cumin; But dill is beaten out with a staff, and cumin with a rod. Grain for bread is crushed, But he does not continue to thresh it forever. Because the wheel of his cart and his horses eventually disturb it, He does not crush it longer. This also comes from Yahweh of hosts, Who has made His counsel wonderful and His wisdom great.
(Isaiah 28:23-29 LSB)
A Call to Common Sense (v. 23-25)
Isaiah begins by demanding their attention, not for some esoteric vision, but for a lesson in basic agriculture.
"Give ear and hear my voice, Pay attention and hear my words. Does the farmer plow continually to plant seed? Does he continually turn and harrow his ground? Does he not level its surface And sow dill and scatter cumin And plant wheat in rows, Barley in its place and rye within its area?" (Isaiah 28:23-25)
The first question is rhetorical, and the answer is an obvious "no." A farmer who did nothing but plow, all day, every day, would be a fool. He would starve. Plowing is not the goal; planting is. The plowing is the hard, disruptive, violent work of breaking up the fallow ground. It is necessary, but it is preparatory. So it is with God's judgments. The scoffers saw the Assyrian armies coming, and all they could see was the plow. They saw destruction. Isaiah is telling them that God is not plowing for the sake of plowing. He is preparing the soil of a hard-hearted nation for a future planting.
After the plowing and harrowing comes the planting. And notice the specificity. The farmer doesn't just throw all his seed into a bucket and heave it onto the field. He is discriminating. He plants different crops in different ways. Some are sown, some scattered. Wheat is put in rows, barley in its designated spot, and rye along the border. This is intelligent, purposeful work. The farmer knows what he is doing. The point is that God deals with His people and His world with the same careful discernment. His grace and His judgments are not a monolithic, one-size-fits-all affair. He is a God of order and particularity.
The Divine Instructor (v. 26)
Where does this practical wisdom come from? Isaiah tells us plainly.
"For his God disciplines and teaches him proper judgment." (Isaiah 28:26 LSB)
The farmer knows how to farm because God has instructed him. This is a profound statement about common grace and natural revelation. The very fabric of the created order is a tutor. God has embedded His wisdom into the way the world works, and the farmer, through observation and tradition, learns this "proper judgment," this right way of doing things. The Hebrew word for judgment here is mishpat, the same word used for God's justice and righteous ordinances.
The farmer's work is a reflection of God's work. The order in the field is a dim reflection of the order in the mind of God. If the scoffers in Jerusalem had simply paid attention to how God governs a field of barley, they might have understood something about how He governs the nations. But they were too clever for that. They preferred their own cynical realpolitik to the simple wisdom God had written into creation. They could not see the divine logic in the mundane, and so they were blind to it in the momentous.
Calibrated Chastisement (v. 27-28)
Now we come to the heart of the parable: the threshing. This is where the grain is separated from the chaff, the harvest is secured.
"For dill is not threshed with a threshing sledge, Nor is the wheel of a cart driven over cumin; But dill is beaten out with a staff, and cumin with a rod. Grain for bread is crushed, But he does not continue to thresh it forever. Because the wheel of his cart and his horses eventually disturb it, He does not crush it longer." (Isaiah 28:27-28 LSB)
The farmer's wisdom is most evident here. He matches his tools to his crop. For delicate spices like dill and cumin, a heavy, iron-toothed threshing sledge or a cart wheel would be absurdly destructive. It would ruin the harvest. So he uses a light staff or a rod. But for the hardier bread grains like wheat, a gentle tapping won't do. A heavier instrument is needed to do the job. The means are suited to the end.
This is a perfect illustration of God's judgments. God's discipline is never arbitrary. It is always perfectly calibrated. For some sins, for some hearts, a gentle rebuke is all that is needed, a light tap with a staff. For more stubborn rebellion, for the hard-shelled pride of the Jerusalem elite, a heavier instrument is required. The cart wheel of the Assyrian army is being prepared. God is not a clumsy giant, smashing everything with the same hammer. He is a wise and discerning Father, and a just King. His chastisements are designed to separate the sin from the sinner, not to destroy the sinner.
And here is the glorious promise embedded in the warning: "he does not continue to thresh it forever." Even the harshest threshing has a purpose and a limit. The goal is the grain, not the grinding. God knows when to stop. His judgments on His own people are always remedial, never purely punitive. He will not allow the cart wheel to turn so long that it pulverizes His wheat. This is a profound comfort. The Lord's discipline, no matter how severe it feels, is finite and purposeful. He is after a harvest of righteousness, and He will not destroy His own crop in the process.
The Wonderful Counselor (v. 29)
Isaiah concludes the parable by drawing the lens back and revealing the ultimate source of all this wisdom.
"This also comes from Yahweh of hosts, Who has made His counsel wonderful and His wisdom great." (Isaiah 28:29 LSB)
The "this" refers to the entire process, the whole agricultural wisdom. It all flows from God. The farmer's field is a small-scale model of the cosmos. And if the wisdom displayed there is so fitting and effective, how much more the wisdom of God in His overarching plan for history? The scoffers saw only chaos. Isaiah saw the "wonderful counsel" and "great wisdom" of the Lord of Armies.
His counsel is "wonderful," meaning it is beyond our ability to fully grasp or predict. It is surprising, intricate, and often works through means we would never expect. His wisdom is "great," meaning it is effective. It accomplishes its purposes. God's plans do not fail. The farmer's plan might be ruined by a drought or a pestilence, but God's plan cannot be thwarted. He is bringing all of history to its appointed harvest.
Conclusion: The Threshing Floor of the Gospel
This ancient parable of the farmer speaks directly to us. We look at our lives, we look at the world, and we are often tempted to the same cynicism as the scoffers of Jerusalem. We see the plow of sickness, the harrowing of financial trouble, the cart wheel of persecution, and we think God has lost control. We think it is all random, meaningless suffering.
This passage tells us to think again. It tells us that our God is a wise farmer. Every trial is a tool in His hand, perfectly suited for the work He is doing in the soil of our hearts. He knows what needs to be broken up, what needs to be planted, and what needs to be harvested. He knows whether we need the gentle staff of a minor conviction or the heavy wheel of a major crisis. Nothing is wasted. Nothing is accidental.
But the ultimate application of this parable is found at the cross. On the cross, the Lord Jesus Christ, the true Bread of Life, was placed on the threshing floor of God's justice. And He was not beaten with a staff or a rod. He endured the full, crushing weight of the threshing sledge of divine wrath against our sin. He was crushed for our iniquities (Isaiah 53:5). He was ground so that we might be made into bread for the household of God.
And because He endured that ultimate, unending threshing in our place, the promise that God "does not continue to thresh it forever" is secured for us. The judgments we face now are the loving, fatherly discipline of the farmer tending his crop, not the wrath of the judge destroying his enemies. He is simply beating the sin out of us with a calibrated rod, preparing us for the final harvest.
Therefore, let us trust the divine husbandry. When the plow comes, let us not despair. Let us trust that the Master Farmer knows His business. His counsel is indeed wonderful, and His wisdom is great. He is at work, and He will bring in His harvest.