In reading through the Minor Prophets one is often rewarded in the discovery of some truth presented in a striking and epigrammatic way. One such instance is found in Hosea 10:1—
“Israel is an empty vine, he brings forth fruit to HIMSELF.”
Here we have a lesson of the greatest importance:
“A self-centred life is an EMPTY life.”
What would you think of a vine that consumed its own fruit? What would you think of the owner of a vineyard who possessed thousands of vines, which consequently produced nothing for him; he was not the richer by a single bunch? You reply, Such a vineyard should be destroyed. A vine is of no value to its owner save for its fruit. Its wood is valueless. Not even a pin to hang a vessel on will it produce.
We can surely see how useless a vine that consumed its own fruit would be. This is just what is stated. “Israel is an empty vine” (or, a vine emptying the fruit which it gives—marginal rendering). But apply the parable to our own lives and how shall we fare? judged by this standard how empty often are our lives. To be wrapped up in oneself is to make a very small bundle. And we must admit how self-centred we are.
It is a good thing when we realize that the only real title we have to life is to glorify God and serve our fellows. We get this illustrated in the first parable recorded in Scripture. We read, “The trees went forth on a time to anoint a king over them: and they said to the olive tree, Reign over us” (Jud. 9:8). How illuminating is the reply of the olive tree! “Should I leave my fatness, wherewith by me they honour God and man, and go to be promoted over the trees” (v. 9). Notice well the words, “By me they honour God and man.” Do men honour God when they see how we live? We all loathe a miser, who is so consumed by love of money that he will not spend that which is proper over himself. But the prodigal is no better. What is the good of solid gold fittings in the bathroom of more than one Hollywood film artiste? Is God or man honoured by the parsimony of a miser, or the vulgar luxury of the prodigal?
The vine is asked to be king over the trees. How good is the reply. “Should I leave my vine, which wherewith God and man, and go to be promoted over the trees?” This vine is not an empty vine. Its fruit cheers its Maker and mankind. Promotion over the trees would indeed be the quaint type of promotion that involves a big step backwards. A quotation from a recent letter illustrates our meaning:“I have two red and one pink trees in my garden, just fulfilling their function of making me give thanks to the Maker of me and of them.” Is that not sweetly put? And it is not an extract from the letter of a sentimental girl or of an old person, tied to a bathchair, but of a young man in the prime of his powers. Would that we all looked through his spectacles!
Take the case of one of the most highly gifted of men, Napoleon Buonaparte. What a name he made for himself! What tremendous will power! What ability to sway the minds of multitudes! How consummate his military genius—his statesmanship! Yet, he was but an empty vine. Stand by his magnificent mausoleum in the Hotel des Invalides in Paris, see the impressive list of his brilliant victories, and look at life as it should be, and ask yourself the question, How fruitful was the great Napoleon’s life?
To gratify boundless ambition and lust for power, he was the instrument of the death of millions of men, and of bleeding white and draining the resources of his country, till at length the nations gathered as one man and hurled the monster from his pinnacle of power. Disappointed and diseased he ended his life in his early fifties on the barren rock of St. Helena. We ask, What was there for God in that life? The sorrowful answer must be truthful. Absolutely nothing. What was there for men in that life? The same answer must be given. Napoleon was an empty vine.
Take the case of another, most highly gifted of men—the Apostle Paul. If he had lived a self- centred life he might have died on a bed of down, instead of laying down his head on the executioner’s block. Once converted to God he consecrated himself and all his power to His service. “Straightway,” we read, “he preached Christ in the synagogues, that He is the Son of God” (Acts 9:20). And as he began so he continued. For Christ’s sake five times received he “forty stripes save one,” thrice beaten with rods, once stoned, thrice “suffered shipwreck,” in perils by land and sea, in perils of city and wilderness, often weary, often in pain, hunger, and thirsty, “in cold and nakedness—all this he endured for God and man. Was that life empty? Was Paul an empty vine? He glorified God and His record is not on any earthly mausoleum, but is inscribed on high. In glorifying God he served man. By his incessant personal labours, his preaching, his inspired writings he has moulded for God the lives of millions. He was a fruitful vine. He lived not in vain.
What a contrast between Napoleon and Paul! Napoleon is dead and it is only a perverted judgment that acclaims such a man as a hero. Paul is dead, and yet he is living today in the lives that his inspired writings, are affecting for God, and through those lives for the blessing of others.
To close and to be practical, What is my life, your life? Am I, are you, a fruitful vine? Am I, are you, touching the need of the world for God’s glory and as setting forth His character? Job says, “If I have … eaten my morsel myself alone, and the fatherless has not eaten thereof … if I have seen any perish for want of clothing, or any poor without covering; if his loins have not blessed me, and if he were not warmed with the fleece of my sheep … then let mine arm fall from my shoulder blade” (Job 31:16-22). Evidently Job was not an empty vine.