The Lord says to the men of Judah and Jerusalem in the days leading up to their exile:

Break up your fallow ground, and sow not among thorns. (4:3 )

They had been neglecting God, all while claiming him and bringing him sacrifices. 

They gave him outward obedience and fake repentance. They turned to God in pretense and not with their whole hearts (3:10).

These things were written for our instruction (Romans 15:4). Isn’t it soul searching to consider that we could be deceiving ourselves in thinking that we’re honoring God with outward actions, and we’re not reflective enough to realize our hearts aren’t in our worship? In our Bible reading? In our praying and serving?

Jesus, Son of David, have mercy on us, and help us to see. 

If we remember our Lord’s parable of the soils, we’ll find the same concept of our hearts being soil for the implanted word of God.

Are our hearts hard? Are they laden with the thorns of distraction, looking to entertainment or our phones to satisfy us instead of God?

We clear away the brush and break up our fallow ground by true repentance. 

May God grant us mercy to see both him and ourselves clearly. Clinging to Christ as our righteousness, let us make honest confession, laying aside sin and the things that so easily entangle us, and let us “run with endurance the race that is set before us, looking to Jesus, the founder and perfecter of our faith” (Hebrews 12:1-2). 

For him, and for you,

Ben