Isaiah 17:11

In the day shalt thou make thy plant to grow, and in the morning shalt thou make thy seed to flourish; but the harvest shall be a heap in the day of grief and of desperate sorrow. It was because the northern kingdom, on the whole, had left the true God that its people had, literally, "planted plantings of pleasantness," had taken up the various sensuous heathen cults and had then planted a strange vine in their garden, namely, by becoming allies of the king of Damascus. The new plant had then been carefully fenced in, namely, by shrewd political schemes, so that the strange plant grew to maturity very rapidly, like a hothouse plant, for the alliance brought about a plan to attack Judah. But the whole scheme was frustrated by the action of Jehovah, who promptly reserved the garden of Ephraim as a heap, heaped up in the harvest, in the day of grief. Such is the consequence of the denial of the Lord and of fraternizing with the enemies of God. While Jehovah, however, used Assyria as His tool in punishing Ephraim, the great world-power itself would not escape His avenging power.