Sowing and Reaping

Lately I've been reading through the book of Hosea in the Bible. Sometime previously when I had read it, I had highlighted verse 12 of chapter 10, which caught my attention again.

"Sow for yourselves righteousness,

Reap in accordance with kindness;

Break up your fallow ground,

For it is time to seek the LORD

Until He comes to rain righteousness on you."

One could argue that a theme woven through the Bible is the principle of sowing and reaping. That which is sown will eventually produce a harvest of some sort. The dead of winter, agriculturally speaking, may seem a strange time to think about sowing. But even aside from the fact that farmers and gardeners actually do start planning to plant while the earth is still lifeless and frozen, there is never a time or season when we can't or don't sow seeds in our lives. They could be valuable crop seeds or weed seeds. Seeds that bring life or destruction. Hosea 10:12 speaks of sowing seeds that bring life.

I was looking at some of the Hebrew words in this verse (I am such an amateur at studying Hebrew, but even just knowing the alphabet/aleph-bet can open you up to some pretty cool insights from the Holy Spirit!). In the second line the Hebrew word for "in accordance with" is, as I understand, a form that results in this prepositional phrase. But I also looked at the root word, which can mean mouth or breathing or blowing. It contains the letter pey, which also carries the meaning of mouth. And that seems significant to me.

First, God's people are implored to sow seeds with righteousness in view (seeds of life and not destruction). Then "reap in accordance with kindness." Or "reap in proportion to kindness". Because of the meaning of the middle root word, I can't help but wonder if this reaping is connected to what we speak and declare...what we breath in and blow out. Let there be no end to the kindness which flows out of us!

Do you know what fallow ground looks like? A mess, in a way. Whatever plants were already there, or the dead version of them, any seeds hiding in the ground that found the right conditions to germinate despite the competition, maybe a mix of weeds, that's what you see. Sowing seeds on fallow ground is only really effective if the fallow ground is somehow disturbed. Seeds need contact with good soil and access to the light. This might come through tillage (not necessarily recommended in regenerative agriculture, haha!), or some other form of disturbance, like thousand pound beasts en masse, trampling down the dead plant litter and pushing little seeds into the soil with their hooves. The last two lines of the verse are the reason for the instruction to break up the fallow ground. In Jesus' parable of the sower, the soil represents our hearts. Can we truly seek the LORD without readying the soil of our hearts to receive the goodness He is offering?

I find it interesting that our pursuit of the LORD leads to showers of righteousness...it sounds very much like the LORD is bringing the harvest of the very thing people were instructed to plant. Reminds me of the Apostle Paul's words, "I planted, Apollos watered, but it is God who makes things grow."

So, what do you want to reap in 2023? Prepare that fallow ground, sow only the best seed, and declare accordingly. In all this, seek the LORD, who brings the harvest in its time. May you reap 100 fold of all the seeds of light, life, kindness and righteousness you have sown in the past! Happy New Year!