Get Ready for Revival
Notes
Transcript
Introduction
Introduction
The Lord has led me to preach from Hosea this morning. We are going to be in chapter 10. If you would like to go ahead and turn there in your Bibles, I encourage you to do so.
Hosea, like a few other prophets, were told to do certain things as an illustration to those that they were carrying God’s message to. Hosea was told to marry an adulterous woman. We do not know if she exhibited adulterous behavior before he married her or if she became adulterous after they married. What we do know is that she was unfaithful to Hosea, not just once, but several, if not multiple times.
The Lord led Hosea to marry her as an illustration of how Israel had treated Him. Israel was guilty of spiritual adultery. They had gone after and worshiped pagan gods. They were guilty of idol worship and abandoning the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, who is the true and living God. There should be no doubt in our hearts and minds today that, by and large, today’s Christian is guilty of the same thing.
We have replaced the things of this world as being more important to us than God Himself. Rather than rejecting worldliness, we have embraced it. Up until we had to stop gathering due to COVID-19, church attendance was optional for many church goers in our nation.
Many Christians have given priority to anything and everything besides God and now we are fretting as those things are being taken away. As we begin to see things come back, we must understand that if we continue to place other things as more important than God, they will be taken away again. The Lord must have preeminence int our lives.
As we look at the subject of Revival, we must get our hearts right with God. We must break up the hard, untilled ground of our hearts so that God’s Word may be sewn and that it would produce a bountiful crop in our lives.
Let’s look at Hosea 10:12-13 this morning. Please stand with me in honor of the reading of God’s Word.
12 Sow righteousness for yourselves and reap faithful love; break up your unplowed ground. It is time to seek the Lord until he comes and sends righteousness on you like the rain.
13 You have plowed wickedness and reaped injustice; you have eaten the fruit of lies. Because you have trusted in your own way and in your large number of soldiers,
Pray
We have trusted in our own way
We have trusted in our own way
Let’s look at Hosea 10.13
13 You have plowed wickedness and reaped injustice; you have eaten the fruit of lies. Because you have trusted in your own way and in your large number of soldiers,
Where have we placed our trust?
Have we really trusted God?
I don’t think we have. If we really took an inventory of the time we spent in the scripture and prayer, I am afraid most of us would have to admit that we have been trusting in ourselves more than we have in God.
We’ve been trusting in our retirement accounts and investments, we have been trusting in our jobs and our own ability to earn an income. We may have been trusting in our bodies’ ability to fight infections and to heal itself.
You may say, wait a minute preacher, I attend church, or you may say that you watch several preachers each and every Sunday. I believe the Lord would ask us what are we doing the rest of the time?
Giving the Lord an hour or two each week is nothing more than lip service when we give the world and ourselves the rest of the week.
Notice the the consequences of trusting our own way.
Notice the the consequences of trusting our own way.
13 You have plowed wickedness and reaped injustice; you have eaten the fruit of lies. Because you have trusted in your own way and in your large number of soldiers,
Plowed wickedness, reaped iniquity, and eaten the fruit of lies.
When we trust in our own way, we are trusting in something that is very deceitful and wicked.
9 The heart is more deceitful than anything else, and incurable—who can understand it?
10 I, the Lord, examine the mind, I test the heart to give to each according to his way, according to what his actions deserve.
When we trust anything other than the Word of God, we are deceived. God’s Word is the only thing that is trustworthy. Folks you can not believe everything you read and hear from the news media, and you certainly can not believe everything on Facebook. However, you can believe everything in the Word of God.
When the Lord tells us that our own hearts are deceitful above all things and desperately wicked, we must believe Him and take Him at His Word.
We can not trust in our own way. Our own way leads to destruction.
It destroys the fellowship that we have with God.
It destroys our spiritual growth.
It destroys our desire to grow closer to God.
Jeremiah 17:10 tells us that the Lord examines the mind and tests the heart to give to each according to his way, according to what his actions deserve. Considering the way that we live in this day and age. Considering the media that we consume, the opinions we have about other people, the hate that is in our hearts; what do you think God is going to give us when He gives us according to our way and according to what our actions deserve?
Christian brother and sister, could it be that we are living in a time of chastening? Could it be that God is disciplining our country for our wickedness. Now, I am not talking about God disciplining the lost. The Bible clearly tells us that He disciplines His own.
6 for the Lord disciplines the one he loves and punishes every son he receives.
The condition of our country is not so that the lost would get saved, but so that the saved would get revived! Once true revival sweeps across the churches of this land, then the lost will be saved. Then, and only then will our country turn back to God.
As I said earlier, these desperate times require desperate action. Therefore, we must...
Break up the Unplowed Ground
Break up the Unplowed Ground
12 Sow righteousness for yourselves and reap faithful love; break up your unplowed ground. It is time to seek the Lord until he comes and sends righteousness on you like the rain.
Before we can sow seed, we must prepare the ground. To the Jewish recipient of Hosea’s message, they would have had the mental picture of the Sabbath year. They would work the land for six years and then let it rest on the seventh year.
The land would need to be worked and broken up on the next year. It would have to be turned under. Now, driving a tractor or using a tiller is hard enough work to get the ground ready, but in those days they had to work the ground with an ox or a donkey.
It was something that had to be done, because if they did not prepare the soil for the seed, then the ground would not be productive.
The same applies for our spiritual lives. We must make sure our hearts are prepared to receive God’s Word.
3 For this is what the Lord says to the men of Judah and Jerusalem: Break up the unplowed ground; do not sow among the thorns.
Thorns. The Lord is telling them not to sow among the thorns. Let’s look and see what the Lord Jesus said about the thorns.
18 Others are like seed sown among thorns; these are the ones who hear the word,
19 but the worries of this age, the deceitfulness of wealth, and the desires for other things enter in and choke the word, and it becomes unfruitful.
What are our thorns? The worries of this age, the deceitfulness of wealth, and the desires for other things.
The desire of other things chokes out what God wants to do in our lives. These other things may seem benign at first glance, but as you dig deeper, you may find that they are more important to you than God. That is when they choke word and it becomes unfruitful.
For God’s Word to bear fruit in your life you have to break up the unplowed ground. It is hard work. You will have to work at spending time with God in His Word and especially in prayer, but just like working a garden, you will find the fruit of your labor to make it more than worth it.
How do we break up the unplowed ground?
How do we break up the unplowed ground?
One word: Repentance.
We must repent of our worldly ways.
We must repent of our prayerlessness.
We must repent of our selfishness.
We must repent of our pride.
We must repent of our unfaithfulness to the Lord and His church.
We must repent of entertaining ourselves into spiritual apathy.
We must repent of spiritual obesity. Spiritual obesity is where you constantly consume, but fail to exercise your faith.
There is a difference between reading God’s Word and studying God’s Word.
There is a difference in saying a prayer and doing the work of intercession.
In addition to repentance, we must spend time with Him.
Spend time in the Word of God and spend time in prayer. We must get desperate for the Lord.
More than a cure for Corona, More than having our lives get back to normal, more than our retirement accounts making money again, more than seeing an end to violence in our cities, we MUST BE DESPERATE FOR GOD!
We must break up the fallow ground. Once we do that, we must do something else.
Sow righteousness.
Sow righteousness.
In our garden at home, we have planted sweet potatoes, onions, and tomatoes. We have sown corn and cucumbers. In the garden of my heart, God tells me to sow righteousness. He tells all of us to sow righteousness. How do we do this?
We run from temptation.
We run from temptation.
In other words, we quit sowing everything else.
13 No temptation has come upon you except what is common to humanity. But God is faithful; he will not allow you to be tempted beyond what you are able, but with the temptation he will also provide a way out so that you may be able to bear it.
My understanding from this verse is that the only reason why a Christian gives into sin is because they choose to. Church it is time to quit giving into our temptations and taking the way of escape that God is giving us.
If you are tempted to gossip, don’t listen to it so that you won’t spread it.
If you are tempted to watch things that you shouldn’t, turn off your means of getting it.
If you are tempted to be on Facebook rather than pray, then delete the app.
Walk in the Spirit
Walk in the Spirit
16 I say then, walk by the Spirit and you will certainly not carry out the desire of the flesh.
The Bible is referring to the Holy Spirit here. It is important to note that when we sin, we quench the Holy Spirit. That makes it difficult to hear Him and to walk in Him.
If we are not in God’s Word and in prayer, we can not listen to Him as we should, nor will we be strong enough to take the escape that the Lord has provided.
We sow righteousness by being obedient to the Holy Spirit.For the last point this evening, we turn again to verse 12 of Hosea 10.
12 Sow righteousness for yourselves and reap faithful love; break up your unplowed ground. It is time to seek the Lord until he comes and sends righteousness on you like the rain.
It is time to seek the Lord
It is time to seek the Lord
Never before in my lifetime has it been so important for the church to be right with God. Its not just important for the church to be right with God, but each and every believer must be right with Him. For far too long we have been spiritually powerless. We have been lulled into a comfortable apathy because we have been self-sufficient and self-reliant. It is time to quit relying on ourselves and realize that God is the only one that take care of the different things our churches and nation faces. God has give us a promise that if we draw near to Him, he will draw near to us!
8 Draw near to God, and he will draw near to you. Cleanse your hands, sinners, and purify your hearts, you double-minded.
Let us draw near to God by cleansing our hands and purifying our hearts.
Decision
Decision
The altar is open for anyone that wants to come and pray. It is time for us to break up the unplowed ground of our hearts. It is time for us to see God move in and through us as a church and as individuals. Would you join me in prayer for revival? If so, come and find a place to kneel and pray as we sing our invitation.
Maybe there is someone here this morning that needs to be saved from their sins. If so, come speak to me. I will stand there on the floor ready to receive you.
Let us pray.
Pray
