Metropolitan Tabernacle Pulpit · Sermon No. 1261
“Sow to yourselves in righteousness, reap in mercy.” Hosea 10:12.
FARMERS are now devoting their attention to putting seed into the ground. They know right well that without sowing in the present they cannot expect a reaping in the future. Seedtime has many lessons. That which we shall learn this morning is very personal and practical. Our hearts are like a field and if we let them alone the only crop we shall get will be the natural weeds of the soil together with those tares which the evil spirit is quite sure to scatter whether we sow good seed or not. We are to sow beside all waters, but we must not neglect to sow to ourselves. There is need that we sow good seed in our own gardens, or else it will be of little use to us to have planted and watered others.
It is concerning this sowing of the home farm, this seeding of our own peculiar acre, that I shall now speak. May the Spirit of God bless the word. Before I launch into the subject, it may be well to observe that it does not apply to unre-newed hearts. It is in vain to sow unto yourselves till the soil has been prepared by our Father, who is the Farmer. Even Christ’s own seed of the Word, pure from His own hands, brings forth no fruit when it falls on unprepared hearts. His ministers are bound to scatter the seed in all places—on the hard rocks, on the highways and among thorns—but still no harvest ever comes till the soil is broken up and made receptive of the Truth of God by the Spirit of God.
Our text stands in the midst of a number of agricultural similes and it is preceded by that of plowing. “I will make Ephraim to ride; Judah shall plow, and Jacob shall break his clods.” Without plowing what is the use of sowing? Some soils need plowing and cross plowing—they are so heavy by nature that in them the kingdom of Heaven suffers violence, and only by mighty ripping of the soil are they saved. Have you ever had a broken heart, dear Hearer? Did the Spirit of God ever drive the black horses of the Law across your heart with the sharp plow of condemnation, killing your false hopes, wounding your spirit and revealing your secret sins?
If you have not known something about this I cannot tell you to sow to yourself in righteousness! You are not prepared for that step—you must first be plowed. I pray the Divine Spirit to operate upon your heart to the breaking up of your fallow ground that you sow not among thorns. Let us, also, add another statement, lest we should be misunderstood. Even when we speak to the people of God and bid them, “Sow to yourselves in righteousness,” we, by no means forget that all true culture of the heart comes of the Spirit of God.
We exhort men as the Scriptures do, as active, intelligent beings. We exhort them as much as if there were no Holy Spirit, but we also pray to the Holy Spirit to make our exhortations, the efforts of His servants, effectual for the designed end. Without His Divine operations, neither the precept of our text, nor any other, will be obeyed. In this, as well as in every matter connected with the Gospel, Grace reigns! If the first sentence of the text might seem to breathe legality, “Sow to yourselves in righteousness,” yet the second clause of it most effectually evangelizes it, for it says, “Reap in mercy.”
Unless we reap eternal wrath we must reap in mercy. If anything comes of what we do—if our prayerful anxiety and earnest faith as to the condition of our heart shall be really productive of holiness—it will be the result of infinite mercy and the effect of the Spirit’s energy! Even the desire to be right before God arises from the operation of the Spirit of God! All the righteousness which is found in us comes by Divine power and is not of ourselves, but, like the whole of salvation, it is the gift of God! So, while I exhort, entreat and persuade, I am not forgetful of the Divine One without whose gracious working we can do nothing at all!
We will now draw near to the text. First, my Brothers and Sisters, we must not neglect seedtime and, secondly, we must not neglect harvest when it comes.
I. WE MUST NOT NEGLECT SEEDTIME. “While the earth remains, seedtime and harvest shall not cease.” Both are necessary and, therefore, God has decreed that time for both shall be given to men. All life is, in some respects, a sowing. All that we think, say, do, or leave undone is a sowing for the harvest of the Last Great Day. And if we sow to the flesh we shall of the flesh reap what always comes of the flesh, namely, corruption. But if we sow to the spirit we shall of the Spirit reap what is congruous to the spirit, namely, life everlasting! As a man sows, so shall he reap. It is not, however, upon that form of sowing and reaping that I am going to speak to you this morning.
As I have already told you, we shall deal with the inner life, for I think the connection shows that this is what was meant, for the Prophet is evidently dealing with the people, themselves, and their condition of heart before God. The outward sowing of righteous actions in the field of the world is, doubtless, very important, but none the less so is the secret sowing of the enclosed garden of the heart. Our subject will be just this—that after we have been plowed by conversion we need to take great care that our spiritual culture commences and is carried on.