Hosea 14:3-7 (God's Promise of Restoration)

Feeling exhausted and burned out as a leader? You're likely missing the one thing we can learn from plants about daily restoration. Ken shares how his unexpected physical challenges revealed the fragility of self-reliance and explores three powerful observations about dew from Hosea 14 that can transform how you approach daily renewal. Discover why stillness, early mornings, and consistent daily provision are essential for avoiding burnout and maintaining sustainable leadership energy.

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About Kenneth Ott:

Kenneth Ott is an owner of multiple businesses, entrepreneur, husband, father, and Christian leader. Ken is the co-Founder of Metacake, an Ecommerce Growth Team and Dough Capital. Ken is an author, speaker, and business coach.

Summary

In this powerful episode, Ken Ott dives deep into Hosea 14:3-7 to reveal God's promise to be "like the dew to Israel" and what this means for preventing burnout in leadership. After experiencing unexpected physical challenges that left him unable to walk on New Year's Day 2025, Ken gained a newfound understanding of human fragility and our dangerous illusion of self-reliance.

Drawing from Israel's worn-out condition and their need to surrender false saviors like Assyria, Ken explores how modern leaders often fall into the same trap of believing their strength, abilities, or external opportunities will save them. Through his personal struggle with sciatic nerve issues, he learned that physical ability can vanish overnight, reminding us that life is incredibly fragile.

The core teaching centers on three crucial observations about dew that directly apply to how we can avoid burnout. First, dew only comes in stillness—when the wind dies down and everything becomes quiet. For leaders, this means creating intentional times of stillness away from the chaos of daily operations. Second, dew comes in the early hours of the morning, before everything else begins. This principle suggests that restoration happens best before the demands of the day take over. Third, dew comes daily—plants need this restoration every single day to survive and thrive.

Ken challenges the common excuse of "not being a morning person," pointing out that nobody naturally loves getting up early, but the benefits of early morning stillness are undeniable. He emphasizes that just like plants need daily watering through dew, we need daily spiritual restoration to avoid the exponential negative effects of both increased energy drain and decreased restoration practices.

The episode concludes with practical applications for business owners and entrepreneurs, showing how these biblical principles aren't just spiritual concepts but natural laws that apply to every living thing. Ken reminds listeners that the purpose of his business devotionals is to provide daily restoration for other entrepreneurs, helping them find the "dew" they need to sustain high performance without burning out.

Top 3 Growth Tips

• Create Daily Stillness Rituals - Just like dew only forms in stillness when the wind dies down, we need intentional quiet time away from the chaos of leadership to receive restoration and avoid burnout. [15:54]
• Prioritize Early Morning Restoration - Dew comes before everything else begins, suggesting that our spiritual and mental restoration should happen in the early hours before the demands of the day take over. [18:26]
• Embrace Daily Dependence Over Self-Reliance - Recognizing that we need daily provision from God, just like plants need daily dew, protects us from the dangerous illusion that our strength and abilities alone can sustain us. [22:01]

Show Highlights

• [00:00] Ken introduces the episode: "If you're tired and worn out, you're likely missing out on this one thing that we literally learn from plants."
• [00:46] Setting context for Hosea: "I may be like, you are going through or and go through times, and am going through times where you get worn out, sometimes you feel inspired, sometimes you don't."
• [02:51] Reading Hosea 14:3-7: "Israel's worn out. They've fallen away from God, they've been oppressed and and they're paying the price for it."
• [03:45] On false beliefs about personal power: "This is like, you know, the false belief that you actually have a lot of power in your situation, and the giving it over, the yielding of it to God."
• [04:20] Ken shares his physical challenge: "I literally woke up New Year's Day 2025, and could not walk. It turned out to be this sciatic nerve issue, and it is so debilitating."
• [05:30] On human fragility: "And so all of a sudden, in one day, I realized, like, wow, my physical ability can be taken down in just one day."
• [06:15] Realizing life's fragility: "It created a level of awareness to me that you are so fragile, like life is so fragile. We think we just expect to, like, wake up tomorrow and be able to walk."
• [08:20] On false saviors: "The illusion that someone else is coming to save us, right? Maybe a government or maybe a opportunity, by the way, those things will not save you."
• [09:43] Recognizing our abilities as gods: "Like, how many of us who have a lot of skills, like, who know we can do something, who have a lot of confidence, maybe look at our ability, and those abilities are our gods."
• [10:17] Focusing on the dew metaphor: "I will be like the dew to Israel."
• [10:53] Explaining dew's significance: "Like, it's pretty amazing. Like, you've got all these plants across the world, you've got all of this life and vegetation and every single day, and obviously it all needs water to grow."
• [11:35] Daily restoration through dew: "You got that layer of dudes, that watering, of all these things every single day, the renewal of plants and the restoration and the the feeding of them."
• [12:57] The need for renewal: "If you're tired and worn out, and if you're a leader, like, there are times when you are period, like, probably daily, you're tired and worn out."
• [13:06] The daily provision principle: "Like you need do every day, if, if Part one is like, you cannot rely on yourself."
• [14:53] Learning from plants: "You just gotta apply it. You must realize that that's how this works. You. And be unwise for you to not realize that."
• [15:54] First observation - stillness: "Do only comes in stillness. So it's interesting, like at the beginning, you know, when dew doesn't come throughout the entire day, right? When the sun's at its peak, there's no dew, when there's when there's wind, when there's storms, there's no dew."
• [16:41] On trying spiritual practices: "Oh, well, I've, you know, I've tried that, but, y...