Sow To Yourselves

Hosea 10:12  "Sow to yourselves in righteousness, reap in mercy; break up your fallow ground: for it is time to seek the LORD, till he come and rain righteousness upon you."

We have in our midst many farmers, much more experienced than I in planting, much more successful in the harvest. Farming is a lot easier today than it was years ago. In years gone by farmers had to till with mule and plow, harvest by hand, weed with a hoe, and diligently seek God that He would, in His Grace, allow rain in the proper proportions at the proper time. Today the modern farmer relies on tractors, combines, and pesticides. With the advance of technology, farming has become easier, though it is still a job that only a few are strong enough to do.

The basic principles of farming have remained constant, though technology has advanced.

You must break or till the ground for it to be profitable. Sitting in your front porch rocker and wishing the ground to be tilled is useless. You can wish all you want, but you have to get up and break the ground, whether by mule or tractor, if you expect an eventual reward. If you fail to break the ground something will grow there, but nothing profitable. There is no market for weeds.

You must also plant the right seed, or you also lose out. If the seed you plant is diseased, then your harvest will be poor and diseased. If you plant the wrong kind of seed, for instance, if you plant wheat when the market is already glutted with wheat, then you lose out. The right seed is crucial if you want to farm another year.

You must rely on the Lord to provide rain in due season. You can plant all the seed that you want, but unless God waters it your profit is pitiful, the harvest withered. And finally,

You must gather in the harvest or else it is unprofitable. The harvest must be gathered at the right time, and in the right way. If you gather too soon you lose money, for the crop is yet green and underdeveloped. If you gather too late, the crop will rot on the way to market.

What is true in farming is also true in the spiritual life. Let's see what God has to tell us.

Hosea 10:12  "Sow to yourselves in righteousness, reap in mercy ..."

God reasons with each and every one of us today to "Sow to yourselves" the right spiritual seed if you expect to reap a harvest. So many of us are sowing things in our lives that are not only unprofitable, they are downright destructive.

While in Jerusalem Jesus went to a pool called Bethesda, a wonderful pool that God created to teach an object lesson. Every time this pool bubbled, or was stirred by an angel, whoever was first in the pool was immediately healed. The key was you had to be first or there was no blessing.

Lying next to the pool was a man who had been laying there for 38 years, unable to get to the water because he was crippled. Imagine this man: for 38 years he saw the water stir, and as he struggled toward the water, under his own feeble power, someone else who was stronger would always step over him and receive the blessing. What a horrible situation to be in, always passed over, always bereft of blessing!

One day, while this poor man laid here, Jesus passed by and asked a simple question:

John 5:6  "... Wilt thou be made whole? "

The man didn't answer Jesus directly, but made the complaint that "every time I try to get to the water, someone else beats me to it". Jesus ignored the man's complaint, and said:

John 5:8  " ... Rise, take up thy bed, and walk."

Immediately the man was healed. But why did this man lay in such a pitiful position for so many years? Was it to be an object lesson, or a natural occurrence, a fluke of nature? No, it was because of something more ominous, something I never noticed until I read this passage again just the other day. After healing the man Jesus went back to him and found him in the Temple, and - look what our Lord said:

John 5:14  "... Behold, thou art made whole: sin no more, lest a worse thing come unto thee."

This man planted, some 38 years before, the wrong kind of seed in his life. The harvest of that seed, sin, was crippleness, terrible loneliness, a terrible state of always feeling deprived. How horrible it is to plant the wrong seed in your life and have it come to a tragic harvest. Young people, plant the righteousness of God in your life, not foolishness from peer pressure, not alcoholism, not drug abuse. Older people, plant the right seed by giving your life to Christ, not to the television, not to laziness, not to apathy.

I have been asked the question before, "do I believe AIDS and others sexually transmitted diseases to be judgments from God"? My answer - NO, but they are indeed the harvest of planting the wrong seed in your life. Jesus may walk by Bethesda and take that harvest from you, but why should you be flogged to the throne room of God? Follow after the righteousness as shown in God's Word, as led by the blessed Spirit, and while under the blood of Christ. The wrong seed will destroy your lives.
 

A Vermont native, Ronald Demuth, was touring the Eagle Rock African Safari Zoo with a group of Russians. Mr Demuth was bragging on American inventiveness, and used a tube of "Crazy Glue" to illustrate how "smart we Americans really are". Demuth took the tube, squirted about three ounces in the palms of his hands, and jokingly placed his hands on the backside of the Zoo's Pet Rhino. Of course, the glue immediately stuck. At first the Rhino, a pet from its birth, wasn't overly concerned, but as it moved away Demuth began screaming and this startled "Sally". Suddenly she started galloping around the Zoo, goring a shed wall, killing three pygmy goats and one duck, and then destroyed two fences, allowing numerous animals to escape. Of course, throughout the ordeal Demuth was stuck to "Sally's" posterior, and where she went, he went. It took the zoo keepers quite some time to quiet Sally and unbond Demuth. Be careful what you grab to bring into your life - it may be grabbing you!

Hosea 10:12  " ... break up your fallow ground"

So many people stand around today saying, "Where's God, Why can't I sense Him?", yet God has not moved nor is He at fault. We must break up the fallow ground of our lives before He can work around and within us. This is what the "Whosoever Will" passages of Scripture teach us.

When you put oil and water in the same jar, the two repel one another. You can take the jar and shake it, and seemingly blend the two for but a moment - yet when the disturbance is past they re-separate into two distinctly different things. So it is with our Father.

During this dispensation, the Church Age, God has decreed that He will accept none into His Grace apart from our own will. I cannot say, on the one hand, "I will, and I will unto myself", and on the other hand expect God to be visibly active in my life. Satan made the same mistake when he stood in the Heavens and said, "I will be like the Most High, I will ...". King David gave the perfect illustration of the broken life, the life willing to be led of God, when he said:

Psalms 27:7-9 "Hear, O LORD, when I cry with my voice: have mercy also upon me, and answer me. [8]  When thou saidst, Seek ye my face; my heart said unto thee, Thy face, LORD, will I seek. [9]  Hide not thy face far from me; put not thy servant away in anger: thou hast been my help; leave me not, neither forsake me, O God of my salvation."

If you want to know more of God today, if you want the peace of God in your own life that passes all understanding - then the Lord says "Seek ye My face". You cannot seek His face while "I" sits on the throne of your life. You cannot seek His face while "I" is preeminent as you go about your daily routine.

If you refuse to break the fallow ground today, if you refuse to give your life to the Lord, then you will learn the farmer's lesson: the ground that lies fallow grows weeds. This is true in the field, and certainly true in the spiritual life. Nature, and super nature, both abhor a vacuum. If you refuse to bow your self to God, then you will find yourself adrift on the sea of life, with weeds popping up and troubling you all about.
 

One day as a mother was scraping and peeling vegetables for a salad her daughter came in and asked to go with her girlfriends to a certain movie.  The movie was sexually explicit, but the girl defended her request with "all my friends are doing it".  The child reasoned, "what's the harm", and began a barrage of excuses to support her right to go. As the girl talked, the mother took a handful of discarded vegetable scraps and threw them into the salad. Startled the girl said, "Mom, you're throwing garbage into the salad!". "Yes", the mother said, "but since you don't seem to mind a little garbage in your life, I figured you wouldn't mind a little garbage in your food." The child thoughtfully removed the offending material from the salad, said "thank you", and left to tell her friends she wouldn't be going with them. If you have spiritual indigestion and a sick testimony, perhaps you have allowed too much garbage in your spiritual diet!

Do not do as the Children of Israel did. God offered them Manna to sustain life, and they grew tired of its offering. God offers you Manna today, the Gospel Manna, the truth that Christ, eternal God, came and died for your sins. If you will break that fallow ground, bend your knee and accept that offering, your life will be blessed. If you refuse the Christ and allow the ground to lay fallow, expect weeds to overwhelm you. This is truth - hear it.

Hosea 10:12  " ... for it is time to seek the LORD"
 

Imagine that there is a bank that credits your account each morning with $86,400.00. It does not carry that balance over to the next day, allows you to keep no cash balance, and every evening cancels whatever of that money you refused to spend. What would you do? Draw out every cent, obviously. Each one of us has such a bank, and it's called "time". Every morning you wake up you have 86,400 seconds to do something with. Each night it burns the remainder of these seconds. What will you do with the time that God has given you?

When is it time to seek out God? Now, of course. You came to Church this morning, and God gave you 3600 seconds of worship, 1800 seconds while this sermon was being preached. To some of you this 1800 seconds will have been a waste of time, wasted because you came for any reason other than that of seeking God's face. Yet to some it will have made a difference.

God has only allotted each of us a certain time on this earth, a time to seek Him, a time to learn of the Christ and be saved - and yet so many refuse to use this time wisely. When Jesus walked the earth He chose twelve disciples to walk with Him and eat directly from the Master's table.

John 6:67-71 "Then said Jesus unto the twelve, Will ye also go away? [68] Then Simon Peter answered him, Lord, to whom shall we go? thou hast the words of eternal life. [69]  And we believe and are sure that thou art that Christ, the Son of the living God. [70]  Jesus answered them, Have not I chosen you twelve, and one of you is a devil? [71]  He spake of Judas Iscariot the son of Simon: for he it was that should betray him, being one of the twelve."

Jesus' time on the earth was limited to three years, such a short period, but in that period of time each of the twelve had an ample opportunity to accept Him as Saviour. Each had ample opportunity to hear the words of life and grow by them. And, though all deserted Him at the end, eleven did learn and went on to be the leaders of the newly formed Church of Christ. But what of Judas?

Judas had the same opportunities the others had. He was given the same amount of time and careful teaching as the other eleven. Jesus called Judas, even knowing that his heart was not right, for the Shepherd had the same love for the one lost sheep as He did for the other ninety and nine. Yet, through it all, Judas refused.

Show me a miracle and I will believe, show me profit and I will follow. Judas' heart is the same as the hearts of many men today. Perhaps you, too, are sitting here this morning and waiting for a miracle before you commit your life fully to the Saviour. Let me remind you, the miracles only come after you believe. Judas, though he followed closely after Jesus, never gave his heart to the Lord - never accepted Jesus Christ as Saviour. He sowed evil, he sowed apathy, and died the death of the lost.

Have you committed your life to Jesus Christ this morning? Are you certain, if you were to pass out of this life in the next breath, that you will be in Heaven with the Lord? If not, today is the day of salvation. Now, this is the time you must accept Him as your own. Do not be as Judas, but redeem the time while there is time!

Hosea 10:12  "... for it is time to seek the LORD, till he come and rain righteousness upon you."

John 21:12 "Jesus saith unto them, Come and dine."
 

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