Hosea 10:12 (NIV): Sow for yourselves righteousness, reap the fruit of unfailing love, and break up your unplowed ground; for it is time to seek the Lord, until he comes and showers righteousness on you.
Just as God urged the Israelites through Hosea, He still urges His people today to be actively involved in their own salvation, their own righteousness, and in the harvest all around them. To many this may seem sacrilegious, but it really is not. Too many want God to “make them holy” while they kick back and just let it happen to them. But God’s people are to be a holy people, from the moment He comes into our hearts all the way through. True, God will purify the hearts of His people when they seek Him with all their hearts for this work of grace, but they must do right things, and they must seek. God will empower us to be His witnesses, but we must go to the people who don’t know Him (just as Peter was sent to Cornelius, and Phillip to the Ethiopian eunuch). God will make us righteous, but we must actively put that inner righteousness into action through our right words and deeds. And it is up to us as God’s people to grow in faith, knowledge, and fruitfulness, by breaking up our unplowed ground, and working the soil of our hearts until our whole lives are ready to accept seed and bear abundant fruit. God will help in the process; He will empower our best efforts, but He will not do for His people the work that we are required to do for ourselves. The kingdom of God is not even vaguely passive, but so forward-moving that Jesus described its advance in terms of force and passion (Matthew 11:12). Like the servants in the parable of the talents, only those who forcefully use what God gives them to advance His cause will receive His approval. Those who kick back hoping that he will magically multiply through them without any effort or intentionality on their part will be condemned. Only those who intentionally put their shoulder to the wheel will receive God’s power and strength to turn it.
Father, forgive us for being laid back and passive regarding reaching the world with Your gospel – the one thing that You are passionate enough about to die for. Help us to see and know Your passion for our lost family, friends, neighbors, coworkers, and everyone else, so that Your passion will find expression through our lives. Amen.