Isaiah 28:23

Give ye ear, and hear my voice; hearken, and hear my speech.

Give ye ear, and hear my voice - calling attention to the following illustration from husbandry (Psalms 49:1). As the farmer does his different kinds of work, each in its right time and due proportion, so God adapts His measures to the varying exigencies of the several cases: now mercy, now judgments; now punishing sooner, now later (an answer to the scoff that His judgments, being put off so long, would never come at all, ); His object being not to destroy His people anymore than the farmer's object in threshing is to destroy his crop. This vindicates God's "strange work" () in punishing His people. Compare the same image, ; This vindicates God's "strange work" () in punishing His people. Compare the same image, ; ; .