23 Listen to me now. Give me your closest attention. 24 Do farmers plow and plow and do nothing but plow? Or harrow and harrow and do nothing but harrow? 25 After they've prepared the ground, don't they plant? Don't they scatter dill and spread cumin, Plant wheat and barley in the fields and raspberries along the borders? 26 They know exactly what to do and when to do it. Their God is their teacher. 27 And at the harvest, the delicate herbs and spices, the dill and cumin, are treated delicately. 28 n the other hand, wheat is threshed and milled, but still not endlessly. The farmer knows how to treat each kind of grain. 29 He's learned it all from God-of-the-Angel-Armies, who knows everything about when and how and where.
Matthew Henry's Commentary on Isaiah 28:23-29
Commentary on Isaiah 28:23-29
(Read Isaiah 28:23-29)
The husbandman applies to his calling with pains and prudence, in all the works of it according to their nature. Thus the Lord, who has given men this wisdom, is wonderful in counsel, and excellent in his working. As the occasion requires, he threatens, corrects, spares, shows mercy, or executes vengeance. Afflictions are God's threshing instruments, to loosen us from the world, to part between us and our chaff, and to prepare us for use. God will proportion them to our strength; they shall be no heavier than there is need. When his end is answered, the trials and sufferings of his people shall cease; his wheat shall be gathered into the garner, but the chaff shall be burned with unquenchable fire.