Scripture Text

Hosea 8:5-7
Hosea 10:12-15
Jeremiah 4:3
James 3:18
Galatians 6:7-9

Theme

God’s call to repentance is a call to break up the hardness of our hearts toward Him and to sow seeds of righteousness unto good works.

Introduction

The accounts we have of God’s dealings with Israel are given to us so that we might learn spiritual lessons that will keep us from making the same mistakes they made.

In these passages we notice that Israel had turned their hearts away from God and had begun practicing idolatry. With this hardness toward God came sinful practices that further placed them in opposition to God and made them spiritually unprofitable to God as a nation.

As a result, God sent messengers to warn them to repent before judgement came.

The Sequence for Spiritual Revival

The sequence for spiritual revival is important:

Break up the fallow ground, the hardened soil of the heart.
Seek the Lord while He is near and draw near to Him while He may be found.
Sow in righteousness the good seed of Spirit-filled living.
Reap God’s blessing upon a life consecrated to Him.

The Fruit of a Hard Heart

(Hosea 8:5-7 & Hosea 10:13-15)

The Idols of a Hard Heart

(Hosea 8:5-7)

The Division of the Kingdom

Following the death of King Solomon, his son Rehoboam came to the throne.

Rehoboam took ungodly counsel from his friends, increasing the taxes upon all of Israel. This resulted in the ten northern tribes splitting away and forming what we know as the Northern Kingdom.

The Northern Kingdom came under the rule of King Jeroboam I.

You will often find that the Bible refers to the Northern Kingdom as Israel, while calling the Southern Kingdom Judah, even though the Southern Kingdom was made up of the tribes of Judah and Benjamin.

The Idols of the North

Jeroboam feared that his people would return to the house of David under Rehoboam if they continued to worship God in Jerusalem.

To prevent this, he established places of worship within the Northern Kingdom.

1 Kings 12:28-31
“Whereupon the king took counsel, and made two calves of gold, and said unto them, It is too much for you to go up to Jerusalem: behold thy gods, O Israel, which brought thee up out of the land of Egypt…”

The parallel between Jeroboam and Aaron is clear.

Aaron

Exodus 32:4
“These be thy gods, O Israel, which brought thee up out of the land of Egypt.”

Aaron attempted to make an image of the invisible God, which was idolatry.

Jeroboam

1 Kings 12:28
“Behold thy gods, O Israel, which brought thee up out of the land of Egypt.”

Jeroboam likewise attempted to represent the God of Israel through physical images.

The Idols of Modern Christendom

There are two degrees of idolatry I want to point out.

The Idol of Things Preferred Before God

An idol is anything in your life that you put before God.

Examples include:

Your job
Cars
Boats
Houses
Money
Friendships
Fame
Popularity

If these things become more important than God, they have become idols.

The Idol of Things Assumed About God

These are assumptions about God’s person, nature, or character that are contrary to Scripture.

Examples include:

Assuming God would act contrary to His Word
Assuming God possesses flaws in His character
Defining God according to human imagination rather than biblical revelation

These are gods of man’s imagining, but they are not the One True God of the Bible.

Therefore, they are idols.

The Sins of a Hard Heart

(Hosea 10:13-15)

The Ploughing of Wickedness

Israel had rejected God through idolatry and had gone even further by trusting in themselves and multiplying their wickedness.

Israel is pictured as breaking up fallow ground only to sow seeds of wickedness.

Having diligently sown wickedness, they reaped a harvest of iniquity.

They had hardened their hearts toward God and made themselves spiritually unprofitable, while simultaneously planting seeds that would produce a harvest of judgment.

The Fruit of Lies

They deceived themselves into believing they could worship God through idolatry.

They claimed the calf in Dan was the god who brought them out of Egypt.

In doing so they falsely attributed God’s mighty works to a dumb idol.

They also deceived themselves into believing God could be represented by things made with human hands.

This was an attempt to confine God to the sphere of human understanding.

Many people continue making the same mistake today by defining God in human terms rather than recognising that the Creator is infinitely above the creature.

They Believed God Was Something He Is Not

(Hosea 8:11-14)

They believed God was indifferent toward their sin and accepting of their worship.

Hosea 8:11-13

They failed to realise that the altars of the calves were an abomination to God.

They also believed they could get along without God.

They:

Trusted in their own wisdom rather than God’s Word (Hosea 10:13b)
Trusted in mighty men rather than God for security (Hosea 10:13c)

The result is seen in Hosea 10:14-15.

Because they trusted in idols and human strength, God allowed them to see the weakness of both.

The Fruit of a Soft Heart

(Hosea 10:12 | Jeremiah 4:3 | James 3:18 | Galatians 6:7-9)

The Call to Repent of Sin

(Hosea 10:12 & Jeremiah 4:1-3)

God Called Israel to Repent

The solution was repentance and a return to serving God in sincerity and truth.

Hosea 10:12

They were called to:

Return to righteous living
Turn away from wickedness
Plant seeds of righteousness
Present soft and usable hearts to God

They would reap in mercy.

This means they would receive blessings not according to their merit, but according to God’s mercy.

The soil of their hearts needed to be broken up so that God could work in them.

The Holy Spirit desires to plough the soil of your heart, removing sinful stones and making it soft and usable again.

Genuine repentance must precede spiritual fruitfulness.

Break Up Your Fallow Ground

The call to the Christian is a call to repentance from sin.

Allow God to deal with sin in your life.

Present your heart to Him as a fresh field where He can plant seeds of righteousness without contamination from the tares of sin.

Break up your fallow ground!

God Called Judah to Repent

(Jeremiah 4:1-3)

Hosea ministered to the Northern Kingdom before its fall to Assyria.

Over one hundred years later, God’s message to Judah remained the same:

Break up your fallow ground.

Present your heart to God as good soil, or judgment will come.

Seed sown on hard and rocky soil cannot germinate properly.

Likewise, spiritual fruit cannot grow from a heart hardened toward God.

When the soil is broken up, it becomes capable of receiving water, nutrients, and seed.

Likewise, when believers turn to God in repentance and faith, their hearts become receptive to the life-giving work of the Holy Spirit.

The Call to Sow in Righteousness

(Hosea 10:12 | James 3:18 | Galatians 6:7-9)

Sowing Different Seed

Having responded to the call to repentance, believers are instructed to sow seeds of righteousness.

This is the opposite of sowing seeds of wickedness and deceitfulness.

The seeds of wickedness may produce a harvest, but that harvest is ultimately judgment.

Sin always produces consequences.

The Works of the Flesh

Galatians 5:19-21

The works of the flesh include:

Adultery
Fornication
Uncleanness
Lasciviousness
Idolatry
Witchcraft
Hatred
Variance
Emulations
Wrath
Strife
Seditions
Heresies
Envyings
Murders
Drunkenness
Revellings

Such things produce an ugly harvest.

The Fruit of the Spirit

The seeds of righteousness produce a completely different harvest.

They are sown by Christians who obey:

Galatians 5:16
“Walk in the Spirit, and ye shall not fulfil the lust of the flesh.”

When our hearts are tender toward God, when sin is removed, and when we sow seeds of righteousness, the result is:

Galatians 5:22-25

Love
Joy
Peace
Longsuffering
Gentleness
Goodness
Faith
Meekness
Temperance

This fruit glorifies God.

The Challenge Before Us

Will we continue sowing seeds of wickedness and reap its ugly harvest?

Or will we repent and present our hearts to God as a field in which He can work and plant the seeds of righteousness that are produced by the Holy Spirit?

Conclusion

What is the condition of your heart today?

Is it full of the stones of sin?
Is your heart hard toward God because of idolatry and wickedness?
Have you put something else before God?
Have you convinced yourself that God will not judge your sin?
Have you convinced yourself that God will accept your worship while you continue in sin?