Hosea 10:12 Sow to yourselves in righteousness, reap in mercy; break up your fallow ground: for it is time to seek the LORD… This is one of many passages in which the inspired writers make use of imagery derived from the processes of nature and the practices of husbandry, with the view of explaining and enforcing spiritual truth and personal duty. I. HUMAN PREPARATION FOR DIVINE BLESSING. Man must do his part, and is admonished by authority to do so. The readiness which is here required, as a condition of heavenly blessing and spiritual prosperity, is twofold. 1. In the heart and life. By "breaking up the fallow ground" may be understood repentance, by which the heart long hard and stony becomes soft and pliable to what is good, and receptive of heavenly seed. By "sowing to one's self in righteousness" may be understood reformation of principles and of practice. It is not enough to forsake the evil; it is necessary to seek, to cleave to, that which is good. All this, it is presumed, will be done by the aid of Divine grace, and under the influence of Christian motives. 2. By prayer. "It is time to seek the Lord." Human means are good; it is by express instruction from on high that they are employed; but alone they are insufficient. The spiritual life has its devotional as well as its practical side. We have to look earthwards, that we may till the soil and sow the seed; but we have also to look heavenwards, that we may obtain the needed blessing. II. DIVINE BLESSING IN RESPONSE TO HUMAN PREPARATION. 1. God shall "rain righteousness," by which we may understand he will bestow those favors which his own Word has pledged him to confer. By rain we understand also the abundance of those blessings; which are bestowed, not in drops, but in showers - copious showers from the opened windows of heaven. 2. God's people shall "reap mercy." This is the harvest for which all human cultivation and all Divine effluences are designed to concur. Mercy for time and mercy for eternity, from a merciful God, for a mercy-needing humanity. "The Lord grant that we may all obtain mercy of the Lord in that day!" - T. Parallel Verses KJV: 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. |
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