Lord, we come before you once again on this middle-of-the-week evening, asking that you would encourage our hearts and our souls with the truths of your word. We do pray, Lord, that you would be with us as we give our attention to the matters that are before us. We continue to pray for our children's classes and ask, Lord, that you would be with them and those who lead them. We're grateful for the fellowship and the food that we have had. Even as we've spoken, we know there are some who are out of town, obviously quite a few, who are traveling. We pray that you would grant mercy to them and protection for them as well. Now, Lord, as we give ourselves to these matters of your word and prayer tonight, we do pray that you would be with us and encourage us in these things. And we pray for this in Christ's name. Amen. All right, brethren, we're in chapter 10 of the prophecy of Hosea, and we're going to finish this up. It won't be tonight, but pretty soon. And remember that it's in Hosea chapter 10, of course, that the Lord is really bringing to bear upon the lives of the Israelites the issues of their unrepentant sin. I was just working today on going on into a chapter 11 and one of the issues that we're going to look at is there's a transition that takes place at the beginning of chapter 11 going on through chapter 14 at the end of the book. And where we have been really chapters 4 through 10, God has been progressively turning the screw on the Israelites, talking to them about their sin, about the consequences of their sin and the repercussions of the fact that they refused to repent because of their sin. Now with chapter 11 there's going to be a transition where God is really going to woo them back with love and grace, but we're here at the end of that section of chapters 4 through 10 where the Lord has really been confronting His people with their actions and with their covenant breaking. He continues to do that here as we come to this last section of the chapter. Verse 11 is where we are tonight, and it says, And Ephraim is a trained heifer that loves to thrash, but I will come over her fair neck with a yoke. I will harness Ephraim. Judah will plow, Jacob will harrow for himself. Now, I know that blesses your life tremendously, but I'm going to go back and, Chris is saying, are you sure? I'm going to go back and try to help it accomplish some of that. Let's look at the first part of it. Ephraim is a trained heifer that loves to thresh. Ephraim, of course, is maybe the primary way in which Hosea has been referring to the northern kingdom of Israel during the divided kingdom period, historically, where this is. And so we know that God, by way of Hosea, is talking about the Israelites at this point, but he likens them to a trained heifer that loves to thresh. And this I want to suggest to you is a picture, we could call it an analogy of the fact that Israel has been tremendously blessed by God. The picture goes back to Deuteronomy 25.4. where it was a part of the Mosaic law, part of the law of Moses for Israel under the Old Covenant, Israel in the Old Testament, that they were, quote, not to muzzle the ox while it is threshing. Now, that doesn't sound like much of a big deal, but here Hosea is using that to communicate the truth about how God has treated Israel, even in the midst of their unrepentant sin for generation after generation after generation. That principle of Deuteronomy 25.4, of course, do not muzzle the ox while it is treading out the grain, was the idea that the worker is worthy of his wages. There's another way in which Peter talks about that in the New Testament, particularly in the ministry of the church. And the idea was that the ox, under whatever circumstances, whether it was pulling a grindstone or whether it was just simply walking around in a circle on top of the grain and showing it essentially, if you will, however the method was, the ox was always allowed to eat the grain as it was walking around and around and around in all of this. It was a cushy job, in other words. What other circumstances in this time in the ancient world would an ox have that kind of that kind of latitude or that kind of blessing. An ox that has been put in a yoke that's going to pull a plow out in the field, he didn't get a chance to stop and eat grain as he was going along. Or an ox that was hooked up to a cart or a wagon that was hauling needed to get someplace. That's a part of what the work was. And so it was only the oxen that was treading out and threshing the grain that had this great cushy privilege as far as oxen go. And that's what God is talking about now when he says Ephraim is a trained heifer that loves to thrash. He's using this language to talk about the way in which he has dealt with them through the generations even though they have been pursuing idolatry and covenant breaking and sin and they have been doing it without repentance. The point is, Israel's lot, under the grace of God, has been easy. He has been gracious to them. He has been generous to them. He has treated them with kindness. He has been patient with them, again, generation by generation by generation, in the midst of their sin and their covenant breaking. But God is going on to say, that is all going to change. He says, but I will come over her fair neck with a yoke. I will harness Ephraim. The fair neck that the Lord is referring to at this point of Israel is that neck which has had no hard yoke. placed upon it. They haven't had to work hard. They haven't had to pull a heavy load. They haven't been yoked into. Everybody's sitting over here tonight, okay? So I want to make sure you get in the right spot. If you go over here, you're really going to mess it up. So it'll be helpful. We have sheep are all over here tonight. So please come join the sheep. What he's talking about, this fair neck, is one that has not had a heavy yoke placed upon it. And we can see an analogy of some of that even in our modern day, here in the ranch country of New Mexico, that we have. You have a horse that is used a lot, that's saddled up, bridled a lot, and has worked hard, as is often the case, although it may be a bit seasonal, or they're gathering cattle, particularly in the fall for shipping or in the spring to gather the cattle for branding and so on. The saddle, the girth, the bridle, the harness will all leave marks on the horse, on its head, on its back, on its girth, so that a horse that has been used a lot, a horse that has been hooked up a lot, if you will. I'm trying to figure out how to say this to city people. A horse that's been worked hard is going to show the marks that this has been the case. And I have seen that with folks that I've worked with. But what God is saying at this point is Israel doesn't have any of those marks. They don't have the marks of a heavy yoke that has been put upon them, even though, again, because of their sin, God would have been justified long ago To put them under a heavy yoke of his just Judgment, but he has been kind and he has been patient and he has been gentle with them Through the generations, but again as we say that is going to change. He says I will harness Ephraim and so you begin to see do you begin to see what he's what he's talking about this point? He's saying Israel has really gotten off pretty easy That's going to change. It's going to change because they refuse to humble themselves before the Lord in repentance. And so he goes on to say, Judah will plow, Jacob will harrow for himself. Judah, he brings into the conversation at this point. Remember that the kingdoms are divided. Israel, Ephraim is to the north. The southern kingdom is Judah. The prophecy of Hosea is primarily, although it's not exclusively, as we have seen, given to Israel, the northern kingdom. Once in a while, God brings up Judah and warns them, too. And this is one of those instances where the Lord shows that he knows the sin that is going on in the southern kingdom also. He knows the covenant breaking and the unrepentance that is happening. In Judah, too, it may not be as great as it is in Israel at this particular point in time, but it is there nevertheless. And God warns Judah about their sin as well, but he warns them to no avail. He talks about Judah will plow, and then he says Jacob will harrow for himself. Now, here is the tribal national equation, I guess. Ephraim plus Judah equals Jacob. And that's what he's talking about here. Who are Israel? Who are the tribes of Israel? Don't forget the divided kingdom, but the twelve tribes of Israel, the children of Israel. Children of who? Children of Jacob, of course, all the tribes coming forth from each of the twelve sons of Jacob. And so if you put all the tribes of Israel together, even if they're there in the midst of this divided kingdom, you put all the Jews together and they make up what? They make up Jacob. And that's what God is talking about here. And that's what he means in the way that he is speaking. He warns Ephraim, which stands for the northern kingdom of Israel, about their sin, their lack of repentance. He also includes Judah, the southern kingdom tribe as well, about their sin. But as I said, he warns them to no avail because in the end, he says, Jacob will harrow for himself. In other words, God's people are going to be placed under the yoke of his just judgment. So here at the end of the verse, he's talking about how Judah will plow, Jacob will harrow. And I want to suggest to you that this is hard work. How many of you have an agricultural background? Grew up on a farm? Know anything about what it means to do field work? I was afraid of this. Well, I grew up on a farm. I think there is an advantage to agricultural people in their ability to interpret the scriptures. It's just a natural advantage. We just have a certain understanding about some of these things. Take my word for it. Harrowing a field can be very difficult. We live in a day where the agricultural industry has advanced to the point where They do what they now call minimum till or no till, and that is just one swipe through the field and they're gone. They planted for that year and they're out of there. As I was growing up on a farm, it would take us three, four, five sweeps through a field doing a different thing every time before we were finished with the seed in the ground and ready for the harvest to come. Harrowing was one of those things that we would have to do, which was an effort to really sort of break up the ground, and particularly the clods that might be there so that there would be a better consistency of the dirt for a plant to grow. Plowing, you all know what plowing is, don't you? If you've watched Little House on the Prairie, has anybody seen Little House on the Prairie? Don't do this to me. Some of you are yanking my chain. Well, you know what plowing is. It is essentially where you're taking about 12 inches of ground, and you're turning it upside down. And you're breaking up the ground to prepare it for planting. This is hard work, and what makes it even More difficult is when you're out plowing in ground that has not been plowed for several years. I remember years ago when I was, again, growing up on my dad's farm, he sent me out to a field that we had let just sit for several years, and he had me plow it up. That was so hard that by the time I finished and got back to the house, I felt like I'd been beaten up. I mean, it was just, that was a bear to do that. All of that is simply to say what God is talking about and the analogies that he is using here, it is hard work. The things that he is talking about at the end of verse 11, completely different in nature from the work he's talking about at the beginning of verse 11. This idea of an oxen threshing grain where he can just eat as it goes along as much as he wants. That's easy. That's a piece of cake. And God is saying, that's how I have treated Israel. But that is going to change now. I'm going to put Israel under the yoke of my just judgment. And it is going to be difficult for those who refuse to repent. Does that make sense? You see the movement of the verse. And so what we're finding here, I want to suggest to you, is the fact of, or let me put it this way, the patience of God is seen in the very fact of his warning. Everything God has been talking about in the prophecy of Hosea has been a warning upon warning upon warning. The Lord could take those who sin and refuse to repent, and he could let his judgment in its full capacity, fall upon them. And he would be perfectly just in doing that, wouldn't he? He most certainly would. I think that is clear throughout the scriptures. But God, in his mercy and in his kindness and in his patience towards the Israelites, have not done that. Rather, ad nauseum, he has patiently warned them about their sin and called for them to turn from their sin in repentance. And the very fact of these constant warnings that God is giving show that He is being exceedingly patient with them. Contrast the yoke, then, of Hosea 10, 11 with a yoke out of the New Testament, what comes to mind. Matthew chapter 11 verses 28, 29, 30, where Jesus is talking. Can you recite it? Come unto me, all ye who are weary and heavy laden, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you, and learn from me, for I am meek and humble and tender of heart, and you shall find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy, and my burden is light. Two yokes now you see out of the scriptures, one from Matthew chapter 11, one from Hosea chapter 10. The one is a yoke of the just judgment of Christ. The other is the yoke of the merciful grace of Christ. You see that? And the point of the scriptures, and we're comparing these two together, is you will be under a yoke that belongs to Christ. You will be. What matters is, well, it's just a matter of which one is it going to be. Is it going to be the yoke of the judgment of Christ, or is it going to be the yoke of the grace of Christ? And of course, that all comes down to, what have we done as a matter of repentance and faith with Jesus Christ? The Israelites, we understand what they have been doing. We can go back and look particularly at Hosea chapter 8, where Hosea has warned them that they do not fear the Lord, they have not thought about God, they have broken Kono, they have pursued idols. So we see that the yoke that they are moving towards is the yoke of the judgment of Christ, which they're being warned about here. Of course, the Christian, the converted child of God, that Jesus is referring to in Matthew chapter 11, is the one who has taken upon themselves the yoke of Christ's grace. And as is always the case, we need to sit down personally and say, okay, which yoke am I laboring under? There is no more important question to answer from the scriptures than that. Which yoke is mine tonight? Verse 12, having warned Israel and Judah, of course, about God's just accountability for their sin, now in verse 11, God now exhorts Israel to repent. He says, so with a view to righteousness, reap in accordance with kindness. And here, the spiritual principle of reaping what you sow is brought to the fore again. This is a principle that we find in the scriptures. One of the places where we are always going to is Galatians chapter 6, verse 7, where that principle is clearly laid out where the Apostle Paul writes under the inspiration of God's Spirit and says that you will surely reap what you sow. It's that very principle that God is appealing to by way of Hosea now here in verse 12. Sow with a view to righteousness, reap in accordance with kindness. And that word for kindness can be translated as mercy. And so the issue here, I guess the idea here is, do you wish to receive the mercy of God? If the answer is yes, then you must sow in righteousness, for you will reap what you sow. And we'll talk about that a little bit here in terms of the gospel and grace in just a moment, but one of the other issues that well, that's that's the issue of this principle that you You reap in kind what you sow. But another part of this, when we take the principle and we turn around, the principle states that you will not reap what you do not sow. And you see, that's where the Israelites were. They wanted to reap from God mercy, yet they refused to sow in righteousness. You see, we have seen that throughout Hosea's prophecy. The times when they thought of God at all, which were pretty rare, as we have seen, they expected God to be gracious to them regardless of how they have acted or lived in their relationship with him, regardless of whether they have lived with or without repentance. In their view, it didn't matter how they lived or what they had done. or how they dealt with God, or what they thought of God, or how they treated God, or whether God was the object of their worship or not. Those things didn't matter. All that mattered was, in the end, when it came time to reap, they expected God to reap with kindness and graciousness toward them. But what we are explicitly told in Galatians 6, 7 is this. Told this in the context of this principle, you will reap what you sow. We are told God will not be mocked. And that is mockery of God to think that we can simply go out and live in any way that pleases us and expect God to feel obligated to respond towards us with mercy and grace and kindness and patience. That is a mockery of God. And the scriptures are very clear that God will not be mocked. And we also know from the scriptures that God will not be ignored. It is, again, the apostle Paul writing in Philippians 2 who says, there is going to come a day when what? Every knee, every knee shall bow and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord to the glory of God of the Father. Again, the issue here is everybody is going to acknowledge God, and everybody is going to acknowledge that Jesus Christ is the Lord of God the Father. What is going to matter is when are you going to acknowledge that great truth about Christ. You will acknowledge it then as a matter of your punishment and judgment, or you can acknowledge it now as a matter of being a recipient of God's grace. in Christ. And so God will not be mocked and God will not be ignored. And the point is, if you wish to reap the kindness and mercy of God, then you must sow righteousness in your life. And what we recognize as one of the great hallmarks, one of the great fruits of righteousness is repentance. John the Baptist was talking in Luke chapter three, verse eight, when he called for the Pharisees to bring forth fruits that were consistent with repentance. And so practical righteousness will always bring forth the fruit of repentance. Perhaps we can even turn that around and remember, therefore, that this is what was lacking in Israel, is it not? This is what was lacking. Throughout Hosea's prophecy, the people would not humble themselves before the Lord. They would not repent of their sin. And this is then seen in the next metaphor of verse 12, where the Lord says, break up your fallow ground. And as I just mentioned to you a few moments ago, this is hard. Fallow ground is a ground that has been neglected, ground that hasn't been plowed or worked or planted. for some time. It is ground that is hard and grows only weeds rather than profitable produce. And to plow it up is very difficult work. And this is what God is calling the Israelites to do. He is calling them to do the hard thing. He is calling for them to live differently. He is calling for them to change their hard, fallow hearts. But plowing up a hard, fallow heart is very hard to do. For them to change the way that they live is, in fact, impossible on their own. And thus, God goes on to say, after He exhorts them Break up your fallow ground, he says, for it is time to seek the Lord until he comes to rain righteousness on you. The point here is only God can plow up the hard heart. Only God can do that. What God is exhorting the Israelites to do and what he is requiring them to do and what he is holding them accountable to do is something that only he can do. in their lives. Only God can plow up that fallow spiritual heart. Only God can change their lives and ours. True practical righteousness, then, you see, comes only from God reigning it, as he's talking about here, upon us. Now, understand, then, what this is really talking about. The principle here is if you want to receive the kindness and the mercy of God, then you must sow righteousness in your life. Where are you going to get that righteousness to sow in your life from which you can reap the mercy and the kindness of God? You're not going to be able to produce it on the fallow hardness of your own heart. It is too difficult. You're not capable of plowing up your own heart. You're not capable of planting the seed. You're not capable of growing true, practical, genuine, real righteousness in the sight of God before Him on your own. God is going to have to plow up your fallow heart and rain righteousness upon you and plant it in your heart so that it might grow within you, that you might take that righteousness that He has given to you and that you might sow it in your life that from that you might reap the mercy and the kindness of God. Do you see? Who's the Redeemer? God. The very thing that we have to turn around and invest back so that we might reap the kindness and mercy of God has to come from God Himself. He has to give it to us so that we can turn around and sow it back towards Him. And because that principle is true, that our salvation, our redemption, our righteousness begins and ends with God's redemptive work within us. This is why it is always time to seek the Lord. You see how he says that? Break up your fallow ground for it is time to seek the Lord. But beloved, it is always time to seek the Lord. Isn't this a remarkable scriptural truth? These Israelites, we know from Hosea's prophecy, are a truly debauched people. We know that in the two times in Hosea, chapter nine and chapter 10, where God has likened them to the Benjamites of Gibeah. Remember how he keeps talking about that? They are a debauched people. And yet what God is saying even here in Hosea 10 is that he remains ready to receive and forgive them, to restore and to bless them, if they will only repent and seek Him. That's it. The great prophet Isaiah, you'll recall, is a contemporary of Hosea. Put in your notes somewhere, remind yourself in conjunction with Hosea 10 to go back and read Isaiah. 55, where he talks about similar sorts of matters, albeit with with different words. And so, again, the issue for us tonight is where are we in reference to repentance? What is the condition of our heart? Has it been plowed up? By the gospel of Christ, has he done that work in your heart or does your heart remain hard, fallow, growing only the weeds of distrust and disobedience against Christ. I know fairly well all of you, and I'm getting the notice from the rest of you, and I have good hope and trust that it is the latter in your lives that God has indeed sowed the gospel seed within you. But always search your heart with the light of the Scriptures to make certain that he has indeed done that work of reigning righteousness in your heart. Let's pray, shall we? So, our God, again, our souls are laid open. Our souls are bared before you from truths of the scriptures such as this tonight. Lord, as you do that through your word, we pray that you would help us to take a long and a good and a hard look at the condition of our hearts. Lord, we pray that as we do so according to the standard of the gospel found in your word, that we might indeed be a people who are found to have had Christ reign righteousness in our hearts and convert us. Lord, we pray that we might have the assurance that that is the case. And where that remains perhaps a question, Lord, we pray that you would answer it according to the truth of the gospel and that you would convert us and make us to be people who belong to God. A people who belong to God strictly because of the work that you have done in our lives in Jesus Christ. We thank you, Lord, and we worship and praise you for that work of your gospel. Help us, then, Lord, to sow righteousness in this life that we might reap the kindness and the mercy of God. And we pray this in Jesus' blessed name. Amen.