Free steak dinner.
That’s what the advertisement said that compelled my wife to sit through a two-hour seminar on the benefits of buying into their insurance plan as twenty-somethings. At one point, the speaker informed us that if we weren’t responsible with our finances now, we’d reap a whirlwind later.
I wasn’t even sure exactly what a whirlwind was, much less what it meant to reap one. I’d heard of people talking about a windfall, and it sounded like something good. But this guy was making me think that I wouldn’t want this whirlwind.
It turns out his little phrase “reap the whirlwind” comes from the Bible. What does it mean to reap the whirlwind? Is that a good thing, or is it something we want to avoid?
Hosea is one of the most interesting books in the Old Testament. God calls the prophet, Hosea, to “take to yourself a wife of whoredom and have children of whoredom, for the land commits great whoredom by forsaking the Lord.” Hosea’s marriage to the unfaithful Gomer is a picture of God’s covenant relationship with Israel.
Historically, the people of Israel were sandwiched between two superpowers, Egypt and Assyria. When Hosea began in ministry, it is likely that they were in the heyday of Jeroboam II’s reign.
They were extending their borders and enjoying great prosperity. But much of this prosperity was because of their relationship with both Egypt and Assyria. Jeroboam had made shrewd treaties with these nations, and it led to much prosperity.
But when they became a vassal state of these nations, it often meant peace not only with the people but also with their gods. This time of prosperity was also a time of rampant idolatry. Jeroboam and the people considered their actions wise political maneuvering, but God called it apostasy.
Hosea 8 is a lengthy threat of judgment. Starting in verse 7, he switches to a three-part proverb. The proverb is that if you “sow the wind, you will reap the whirlwind.”
This is the age-old principle that you reap what you sow. And in 8:9, we see the specific situation that Hosea is considering sowing the wind: “For they have gone up to Assyria.”
What is Hosea saying? What does it mean to sow the wind and reap the whirlwind?
If you plant tomato seeds into the ground, you’re going to grow tomatoes and not apples. That is what it means to sow and reap. You sow tomato seeds; then you reap a tomato (hopefully).
But here in Hosea, what would it mean to “sow the wind”? What exactly are the Israelites planting?
The wind is a thing you do not grasp. To sow the wind would be to go into a field with no seed in your hand and go through the motions of planting.
To “sow the wind” is essentially planting nothing. But it’s not exactly “nothing” that they are planting. — they are engaging in idolatry.
Think here of 1 Corinthians 10, where Paul talks about the idols not having any actual existence. It’s the same thing that we see throughout the Old Testament in God’s polemic against idols.
They are nothing. They do not have existence in themselves. That is the point of Psalm 115. And it is also a bit of what Hosea is saying here. The Israelites are sowing the nothingness of idolatry.
If you went into the field with nothing in your hand and started “sowing,” what would you expect to crop up come harvest time? Nothing, right?
If you sow nothing, then you get nothing. But here, it isn’t “nothing” that they reap; it is a whirlwind. A whirlwind is like a tornado. They have sown nothingness, the wind, and they end up reaping a tornado.
Joshua Moon, in his commentary on Hosea, says it well:
“We may also find here a polemic against the fertility gods: the people make their calf to ensure agricultural fertility, calling out to YHWH through the calf. Yet in Hosea’s view, the people are running after futility and then receive the non-existent fruit of their labors” (Apollos Old Testament Commentary).
If you’re trusting in nothingness, then you’ll get nothing in return. But that is as devastating as a tornado when you need that idol to come through for you.
And here, specifically, their treaty with Assyria isn’t going to bear any fruit. Or at least not fruit that will actually sustain them. The fruit they will reap will be the rancid fruit of their own destruction. That is Hosea’s point.
The principle which was true in Hosea’s day is true in our own. You reap what you sow. In the New Testament, Paul picks up this principle in Galatians 6:7-8,
Do not be deceived: God is not mocked, for whatever one sows, that will he also reap. For the one who sows to his own flesh will from the flesh reap corruption, but the one who sows to the Spirit will from the Spirit reap eternal life.
It is interesting to note that the word for Spirit is connected to the Hebrew word for wind, but here Paul isn’t talking about sowing into nothingness. He is talking about sowing into the very real and substantive Spirit of God. When we do this, we reap life.
Cornelius Plantinga has this to say about Paul’s words to the Galatians:
“No matter what we sow, the law of returns applies. Good or evil, love or hate, justice or tyranny, grapes or thorns, a gracious compliment or a peevish complaint — whatever we invest, we tend to get it back with interest. Lovers are loved; haters, hated. Forgivers usually get forgiven; those who live by the sword die by the sword. ‘God is not mocked, for you reap whatever you sow” (Not the Way It’s Supposed to Be).
But there might be an even more specific way in which we can apply Hosea’s words in our day. The Israelites, politically calculating, were sowing with Assyrian seed, and they reaped Assyrian destruction.
Might there be a lesson for us in this? Is it possible that if the church, politically calculating, compromises integrity for a dash of political power and sows the seeds of a secular party, will end up reaping our own destruction?
Are we potentially tempted to make the same compromises that Jeroboam made for the sake of temporary prosperity?
We know from Galatians 5 what the fruit of the Spirit looks like. When we sow into the Spirit, we can anticipate a crop of love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control.
And we know what happens when we sow with our flesh; it is a whole host of love-violating, community-destroying, and self-exalting sins.
So, what have we been sowing? Is it working? Are we seeing the fruit of the Spirit? It’s easy to look at the world “out there” and bemoan a lack of spiritual fruit. But that isn’t Paul’s point. He is calling us to look internally. Does our heart look like a whirlwind or the Spirit?
Maybe we would do well to drop the feed sacks of political posturing and the shrew calculations which lead us to focus on a temporary kingdom and commit ourselves to sow with the seed of the Word and the Spirit of God.
You reap what you sow.
For further reading:
What Is the Meaning of 'You Reap What You Sow'?
Are Karma and 'Reap What You Sow' the Same Thing?
Who Were Hosea and Gomer in the Bible?
Photo Credit: ©iStock/Getty Images Plus/SingerGM
Mike Leake is husband to Nikki and father to Isaiah and Hannah. He is also the lead pastor at Calvary of Neosho, MO. Mike is the author of Torn to Heal and Jesus Is All You Need. His writing home is http://mikeleake.net and you can connect with him on Twitter @mikeleake. Mike has a new writing project at Proverbs4Today.