Plant and Plow

“Plant the good seeds of righteousness, and you will harvest a crop of love. Plow up the hard ground of your hearts for now is the time to see the LORD that He may come and show righteousness upon you.”
Hosea 10:12

This verse has snagged by thought path for the past few days. Have you ever had a verse invade your heart, mind, and soul to the point that every other thought  is the verse?

Plant and plow.

These words conjure up images of Pa Ingalls plowing up the land on his Walnut Grove farm. I see the dusty brown air encircling him as he works to keep the oxen moving and the plow in place. Plowing is hard work. The result of Pa’s dirty hard work is a harvest of crops that will nourish his family. The plowing comes before the planting. Without the dirty hard work of plowing Pa knew there would be no harvest.

Hosea pleads with the people of Israel to do the dirty hard work of plowing through the hard ground of their hearts. Hearts hardened by repeated and unrepented sin. Hearts surrendered to idols and pagan gods. Hearts without love.

Like in Hosea’s day, God’s children, are in the need of heart plowing. As these words have rattled around in my head I have been brought me face-to-face with the reality of my own need for heart plowing.

There are days when I am all in for heart plowing, even crying out to God to have His way in me, then the work gets hard and personal, dirty. God wants me to repent of my habitual sin, turn away from my idols, and surrender my heart to only Him. Longing for a harvest of His love and righteousness, I begin the surrender to His work in my life. The plowing comes before the planting. Without the dirty work of plowing there is no harvest.

Hosea also says, “now is the time to see the LORD that He may come and show righteousness upon you.”  The question we must ask ourselves is, “Do we want to see God?”

Plowing is dirty hard work but the harvest of love and righteousness is worth the work. The plowing comes before the planting.

Heart plowing is what we do as we study God’s Word each day. Through next week, July 5, the NIV Real-Life Devotional Bible is on sale. I wanted to let you know about the sale, we girls love sales.  Here the link: Real-Life Devotional Bible. I will be using this Bible in my teaching beginning in January 2014. Now is the perfect time and perfect price to get it in your hands and heart, allowing God to use it to do some heart plowing and planting.