Isaiah 5 - Looking for Righteousness
Isaiah 5 tells a parable of a vineyard that was created with hard work and sweat, but for some reason produced only sour grapes. In this parable, God is the owner of the vineyard…
 7 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.
The interesting thing is that God of all the ingredients of righteousness, He wasn’t looking for belief or obedience. He wasn’t looking for purity in relationship. He wasn’t looking for any of the things that make one righteous. No, He was looking for the characteristics that demonstrate that we are righteous, that we are like Him.
Recall that in our studies, the only thing we have found so far describing God’s righteousness is justice. As for people, righteousness does not come from justice, but vice versa. Yet, we saw in Isaiah 1 that justice comes with righteousness, even with people. This reminds of the New Testament adage, that “you will know them by their fruit.” And in this case, the fruit was sour. Among these people created in God’s image, there was no justice, God’s image could not be seen.
Today, I pray that the my righteousness be known by the justice.