From Superficiality to Reality — E.A. Johnston

The Spiritual Necessity of Real Effort

Kids nowadays don't know what real effort is. Everything is handed to them, and what they have is electronic in nature, and it fosters a lazy life of playing on computer toys. Like I said, kids nowadays don't know what real effort is.

Take, for instance, an old-fashioned steel nutcracker like I had when I was a kid to crack open nuts. If you placed a walnut in the steel jaws of that nutcracker, it took some labor, some sweat equity, some effort on your part to crack open that shell and get the reward of that sweet-tasting nut.

And I believe this truth can be applied to our text today, friends, where the hard-hearted Jews in the days of Hosea the prophet were not putting forth the right effort in the return to God. They were backslidden in their relationship to God, and they were tied to their sins of harlotry and idolatry.

They would fall under divine chastisement from God in the form of remedial judgments upon them, and in their sins' misery, they would turn back to God. But God had a difficulty with the people of God in their returning because they weren't sincere in their heart, and soon they would be smack dab in a mud puddle of sin once again and joined to their idols once more until God in his mercy brought more judgments upon them.

They were stuck in a vicious cycle of sin and repentance toward God, and it went over and over again. And here was God's difficulty with the wayward people of God. They were like kids nowadays who would not put forth the required effort to get the job done.

Their return to God was a halfway effort, a half-hearted effort. They were used to living in superficiality in their walk with God, and that had become their norm. But God wanted them to experience him, experience his reality through a total return to him.

From Superficiality to Reality in Hosea

The title of my message today, friends, is From Superficiality to Reality. My text can be found in the book of Hosea in chapter 6. You can turn in your Bibles there now, friends. We will be in verse 4.

Now, some of you will be delighted to listen to this message and apply its truths to your life and daily living. And to those individuals, it will be like a wonderful balm and a great rescue from sin and a transformation from the misery and failure and inconsistency in your walk with God.

To some of you else, it will be a message that will fall on deaf ears as you have no real interest to be parted with your darling sins and no real desire to truly return to God earnestly and sincerely, to do business with him.

Returning to God With Sincerity and Earnestness

God says in Malachi, return to me and I will return to you. But how are we returning? What does he mean by that statement? I believe the answer can be found in Hosea 5 .15, which declares, I will go and return to my place till they acknowledge their offense and seek my face.

In their affliction, they will seek me early. This verse speaks of the fact that sin separates from a holy God. Fellowship is broken by sin. Here, God has withdrawn himself away to his place, meaning he was no longer near.

And if you wanted to get to him, well, it was going to require both sincerity and heart and earnestness and effort. They will seek me early, our text says. It will require a sacrifice of time to get up before dawn and go after God in a pursuit of him.

What costs counts and what counts costs. But the wayward Jews refuse to return to God in sincerity of heart. And because of this, God has a difficulty with them. Look at Hosea 6 .4, our text today. O Ephraim, what shall I do unto thee?

O Judah, what shall I do unto thee? For your goodness is as a morning cloud, and as the early dew it goeth away. God is speaking here to how they return to him in false repentance. The root word of goodness in the Hebrew is the word submission, a bending of the neck in submission.

But the backslidden people of God would not turn back to God in sincerity of heart. They refused to bend their neck in submission to God, but merely returned superficially. And this gave God a difficulty.

Four Failures of Superficial Repentance

What shall I do? We see the difficulty of God in his people's false returns. Number one, there was no permanence in their return. As the cloud and the dew dissipated, so did they. Number two, there was no dependability in their return because they lacked sincerity.

They could not be trusted to be faithful. We have the dramatic story in the opening of the book of Hosea between the prophet Hosea and his wife, Gomer, who becomes unfaithful to him. In her infidelity, she turns to harlotry.

Hosea is commanded by God to do the unthinkable and to go and buy her back for half the price of a slave and to love her despite her infidelity. And here is a vivid picture of a broken-hearted God over his unfaithful people who are marred in sin and hurting from it and joined to their idols.

Ephraim is joined to his idols. Leave him alone. God keeps wooing his wayward people back to him. But the difficulty is, in their return, it's insincere. Why? Number three, there is no submission in their return to God, no lasting obedience.

It is there for a while, but goes away like a cloud in the dew. It does not last. Why, we ask, is this the case? Number four, because there is no substance in the return to God, it is not lasting. It lacked effort.

It was superficial, a surface turning to God with no depth or reality there. So here, God Almighty, who created heaven and earth, faces a difficulty. Surely this astonishes even the angels in heaven. Why won't the people of God return to God in the reality of God and experience the blessings he wants to bestow upon them?

Breaking Up the Fallow Ground of the Heart

We see they need the reality of God in their daily living. But something must take place first. This something is found in Hosea 10 -12, which states, it states the requirements necessary in a sincere returning to a holy God.

Sow to yourselves in righteousness, reap in mercy, break up your fallow ground, for it is time to seek the Lord, till he come and reign righteousness upon you. The Jews were a nation of farmers, and they would understand this imagery of plowing up the hard, fallow ground, which has lain in disuse and has produced nothing fruitful for some time now.

They need the reality of God in their walk with God. For Amos 3 -3 declares, can two walk together, except they be agreed? Well, of course not, friends. You can't have a friendship unless there is harmony there.

You cannot have a love relationship with someone unless their fidelity is there. God desires reality, not superficiality. In their turning back to him, they needed to do some things which require effort on their part.

Number one, the wayward people of God needed resolution in their returning. They need to sow to themselves in righteousness. They need to reap in mercy. They must reform themselves and turn to God in seriousness.

For the return to God to stick, they must be resolute in their returning. Secondly, their repentance must be sincere. They must be willing to break up the fallow ground of their heart. A fallow ground is ground in disuse that has grown hard.

Hard clods of dirt lie on top, and nothing good can be planted there unless first the ground is tilled and broken up. I once helped a friend plant a garden one time, and he rented a motorized tiller, and we had to take time to run that tiller in furrows where the seed was to be planted.

Before the seeds would grow, the ground had to be broken up. The imagery of the fallow ground suggests the backslidden people of God needed to have true heartfelt repentance in their returning to God.

They needed to both break up the clods of fallow ground in their hard hearts and break off from their most beloved sins. When God speaks of the difficulty He is having with their returning, their goodness is not genuine and lasting because they refuse to bend the neck in their returning in real submission and obedience to God.

Consistency, Submission, and Faithfulness

This is what He is looking for, consistency in their walk with Him. And that's exactly what God is looking for us, friends, consistency, submission, obedience, faithfulness, trustworthiness, all resulting in fruitfulness.

So in our returning, He can bless us in the ways He desires with both the latter in former reigns. He longs to rain down blessings upon His people rather than bring divine chastisement upon their heads in corrective measures.

So here we see God's difficulty. They are like a cloud and like dew in their returning to Him, goodness for a little while, and then strangely they run to their sins again and join themselves once more to their most beloved idols.

What can I do? says God. God issues a wooing work by pleas in chapter 6 and verses 1 through 3. Listen to the loving heart of God, friends, as He speaks to His strained people. Come and let us return unto the Lord, for He hath torn and He will heal us.

He hath smitten and He will bind us up. After two days He will revive us. In the third day He will raise us up and we shall live in His sight. Then we shall know if we follow on to know the Lord. His going forth is prepared as the morning and He shall come unto us as the rain, as the latter in former reign unto the earth.

Following On Into a Vital Union With God

Oh, friends, here is the answer. Here is the key to finding reality with God and a vital walk with Him. It's found here in our text. This is what the people need to do. What is needed is found in the two words of verse 3, follow on.

If we follow on, that's what God is looking for. He is looking for the substance, the permanence of our returning. It is found when we follow on. To follow up with our repentance, with the hot pursuit of God, to follow on in a deeper walk with God, to follow on in a greater experience of God, to follow on earnestly and with consistency as we pursue a red-hot love relationship with Him, to follow on and experience the reality of God in a vital union with the living Lord.

That's it, friends. That's where the nut is cracked and the meat enjoyed. But it requires effort on our part. There must be a sacrifice on our part. What counts costs and what cost counts? Anything worthwhile in life, anything worthwhile attaining has a cost associated with it.

Jesus said to the rich young ruler, sell what you have and give to the poor and follow me. Follow on. Jesus turned to Peter after he restored Peter and he said, follow me. Follow on in a deeper knowledge of me.

Spend time with me. Love me. Peter, do you love me? Of course I do, Lord. Peter, do you love me? Lord, you know I love thee. Then follow me. Follow on. Follow on. And Peter followed on right to the place of his own death and crucifixion for his Lord and the sake of the gospel.

Moving Beyond Emotional Rededication

I wonder, friends, how many altar calls have we responded to in rededicating our life to God and we were heartfelt, sincere at the time and even shed a tear or two. But how long did it last? Our emotions were involved.

Our feelings were stirred. We truly were sick of our sins and wanted a higher life, a more consistent life with God and we rededicated ourselves to him in our emotions. But it was surface, superficial, nothing lasting, like a cloud dissipating in the morning sun or dew evaporating out in the heat of the day.

Maybe we held out for a month or two or possibly longer, but soon enough we went back again to our mud puddles of sin as a dog returns to its vomit and the sow to the wallow. Soon enough we were knee-deep in sin once again.

How about you, friend? Has your goodness of your return to God been fleeting like a misty cloud that appears for a little while and is gone? Has your returning to God had tears of regret for sin like the dew, but it did not last?

Now you got dry eyes. Why won't you follow on? The latter rain and the former rain is what God desires for you. He wants to shower you with his presence and with his blessings. I want to read us some verses from the last chapter, Hosea, in chapter 14.

The Blessings of Wholehearted Return

For it is here, friends, we see a vivid picture of people enjoying the presence of God in a right relationship to him that they had followed on and broken off from their idols and were simply enjoying their creator.

Listen to the promises of God's blessings. Look at verses four and following. I will heal their backsliding. I will love them freely, for mine anger is turned away from him. I will be as the dew unto Israel.

He shall grow as the lily and cast forth his roots as Lebanon. His branches shall spread and his beauty shall be as the olive tree and his smell as Lebanon. They that dwell under his shadow shall return.

They shall revive as the corn and grow as the vine. The scent thereof shall be as the wine of Lebanon. Ephraim shall say, What have I to do any more with idols? I have heard him and observed him. I am like a green fir tree.

From me is that fruit found. Who is wise, and he shall understand these things. Prudent, and he shall know them. For the ways of the Lord are right and the just walk in them. But the transgressors shall fall therein.

I will stop their fronts. But here lies the difficulty. God wants to bless, but he's in a difficulty because of their infidelity. Like a spouse who is caught cheating and pretends to be loyal in his return to the injured wife but keeps cheating on her nonetheless.

There is no substance to it, no reality. This was God's issue and difficulty with the wayward Jews in the days of Hosea and it is his difficulty today with his wayward bride who loves the world and keeps going back to it in infidelity.

Following On From Superficiality to Reality

What can I do, says God. We now know what we can do, what is expected of us to return to him in sincerity, to seek him earnestly, to break off from our idols and to follow on to a deeper reality of him, from superficiality to reality, following on and entering into the reality of God in a vital union with the living Lord.

Let us pray.