Redeeming Love

I cannot stress enough how applicable the Bible is and how personal a relationship with God is. Going through the book of Hosea was intimidating to me at first because I was afraid I wouldn't be able to make it practical and interesting the whole way through with every chapter. It's a good thing God took care of that problem when He had the book written. 2 Timothy 3:16 says, "All scripture is breathed out by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training for righteousness. It is enough that God has said it, but He has gone a step further and has proved it to me consistently with every chapter.
In Hosea 3, God's love is displayed in undeserved faithfulness to an idolatrous people. He commands Hosea to buy back his wife. He does so and tells her in vs. 3, "You must dwell as mine for many days. You shall not play the whore, or belong to another man; so will I also be to you." God expects the same of us, but He is there with us the whole way. Just as Hosea said, "so will I also be to you", God will also be the same to us. We owe it to God to be faithful, but God owes us nothing. It is such a strong display of how far reaching God's love goes. Also, as Hosea bought back his wife, Jesus did the same. Mark 10:45 says, "For even the Son of Man came not to be served but to serve, and to give His life as a ransom for many." Hosea told her, "You must dwell as mine for many days." In vs. 4 it says, "For the children of Israel shall dwell many days without king or prince, without sacrifice or pillar, without ephod or household gods. I mentioned last week that I have trouble relating to having "idols". Vs. 4 has helped me see it from a different perspective. When I thought of these things mentioned like king or prince, sacrifice or pillar, ephod or household god, with the exception of household god, these things are not necessarily evil, but God has stripped them of these to draw them back to Him. It has made me realize how I forget God because of business in my life. In vs. 5 it says that, "Afterward the children of Israel shall return and seek the Lord their God, and David their king, and they shall come in fear to the Lord and to his goodness in the latter days." Coming to God in fear really is something that is downplayed. Gus spoke of it in Sunday School how people treat Jesus as a peer and not as our redeemer. It is apparent in our literature. I don't intend to tear down the author of "The Shack", but I want to point out my own deficiency. In the book the main character was in the presence of God blatantly swearing when the Bible warns against the tongue as being set on fire of Hell. When I read it, I didn't even think of how Moses was afraid to look on the face of God when He appeared to him in the burning bush. I not only forget God, but forget his role in my life. Yes God is my friend and yes He is closer than a brother, but do I live my life for a friend? Do I die daily to my flesh because God and I are "tight like that"? God paid the ultimate price of leaving His son to die at the hands of the ones He created so that an unfaithful people could have a relationship with Him. God is my King. That is why Israel went without one, because they forgot who God was.

God who?

In the 2nd chapter of Hosea, we get a more clear picture of how Israel's relationship with God was. The 1st chapter talks of how God would not protect them from bow or sword and it continues into chapter 2 in vs 2-3 where it says, "Plead with your mother...lest I strip her naked and make her as in the day she was born, and make her like a wilderness, and make her like a parched land, and kill her with thirst." It draws the picture of a nation that is vulnerable. It is like God has taken everything from them in order to show their misplaced trust. The Israelites were not relying on God for their needs. They gave credit to Baal. Thomas McComiskey writes in his commentary that they would place idols of Baal in their fields because it would make the harvest more plentiful. God would give and they would praise Baal. Vs. 5 says, "For she said, 'I will go after my lovers who give me my bread and my water, my wool and my flax, my oil and my drink.' " She gives credit to her lovers when it is really God who gives. Then in vs. 13 God says, "And I will punish her for the feast days of the Baals when she burned offerings to them and adorned herself with her ring and jewelry, and went after her lovers and forgot me. I have always had a hard time relating idol worship with my every day struggles, but one thing I can relate to is forgetting God. Earlier today I drove by a gas station and I saw that gas was 2.85 and it really made me feel secure. I find comfort more in low gas prices than in the knowledge that God provides for me financially. I forget how much God provides just like Israel thought that some stupid idol would make their harvest more plentiful. Why do we think that something we create would provide for us rather than the one who created us? We forget God.
Proverbs 3:12 says, "for the Lord reproves him whom he loves, as a father the son in whom he delights." Through vs 14-23 we see God's great love for the nation of Israel. It speaks of how God will "allure her, and bring her into the wilderness and speak tenderly to her. And there I will give her her vineyards and make the Valley of Achor (trouble) a door of hope." In vs 18 it says, "And I will abolish the bow, the sword, and war from the land, and I will make you lie down in safety." This reminds me of Psalm 23 how it talks about God as our shepherd and how he makes us lie down in green pastures and leads us by still waters. It is through punishment that God draws us back to Him. It is when that relationship is made right that we have that peace in our lives. It is when we walk by him that He leads us by still waters. And even in the valley of the shadow of death I fear no evil because God is with me. This is the God we forget. This is the God we wander from, and it is God's love that draws us back to Him.
"And I will have mercy on No Mercy, and I will say to Not My People, You are my people; and he shall say, 'You are my God.' "

Jezreel, No Mercy, and Not My People

The book of Hosea shows so much wrath from God and his dealings with the unfaithfulness of Israel, yet it is all done in love. God chose the people of Israel. They were special to God above all other nations. The relationship that they had was unlike any other. God's wrath was done out of love, chasing after His people in a righteous jealousy.
The first time God ever spoke through Hosea, He told him to take for himself a wife of whoredom and to have children of whoredom. God had Hosea do this because Israel had forsaken him. The book says that Hosea's wife, Gomer, conceived and bore two sons and a daughter. In vs. 3 it says, "So he went and took Gomer, the daughter of Diblaim, and she conceived and bore him a son." In vs. 6 and 8 it says again that she conceived and bore a daughter and another son. Of the 3 children that she bore, the first is the only one that appears to be Hosea's child. It said that she bore him a son. The 2nd and 3rd times it only says that she conceived. Knowing Gomer's reputation it wouldn't be a long shot to say that she had some illegitimate children. Also, this would be an accurate parallel with the nation of Israel. God's wrath is apparent in the names that he commands Hosea to give his children. The first child was to be named Jezreel. Jehu, who was king at the time killed a lot of people. God was going to punish "the house of Jehu" for the blood of Jezreel. Jehu killed Ahab and his family, friends, and officials as well as Jezebel in the land of Jezreel. Thus the child was named Jezreel. The second child was the daughter named "No Mercy". God said in vs. 6, "Call her name No Mercy, for I will no more have mercy on the house of Israel, to forgive them at all." In vs. 8 it says that when Gomer had weaned No Mercy, that she conceived again and bore a son. God had Hosea name this child Not My People, "for you are not my people, and I am not your God." Those words are harsh considering that this is the nation that was chosen by God. This was the nation God loved. He had mercy on them for so long, but they were unrepentant and unfaithful. Hebrews 12:6 says, "For the Lord disciplines the one he loves, and chastises every son whom he receives.” God may seem like He is done with the nation, but this is not the case. He disciplines because he loves. He chastises those who He has received. Remember, this is only the first chapter. The story is not over yet.
The parallel is not just between the nation of Israel and God vs. Hosea and Gomer. This is my story too. This is probably your story as well. We are an unfaithful people. God disciplines the ones He loves and chastises every son whom He receives. Do not be ignorant to your relationship with God. God said that "they are not my people and I am not their God. " Would God say that of you? God said this of his chosen people. So this is not a matter of salvation on your part, but rather a reflection of your faithfulness to God. Are you faithful to God? Do not be ignorant to your relationship with God.

Prayer

Prayer is one of those things that is so important to the Christian life, yet we get by so easily without doing it. I find that God has provided so much for me that I am really never in need of anything, but it is not because of my prayer life. It is times of need when we really fall to our knees and cry out for God to intercede. My friend Ryan called me last Friday and told me his brother Lucas has cancer and there is not much the doctors can do. It took something this urgent to get me on my knees before God, and I find myself wondering how much weight does my prayer even hold? Does not God have a plan in all this? And why would He change his plan just because I ask of him? If God has an ultimate plan and He doesn't make mistakes than what can I even say? James 5:13-18 talks about the prayer of faith. Vs 16 says, "Therefore, confess your sins to one another and pray for one another, that you may be healed. The prayer of a righteous person has great power as it is working. " Vs 17 goes on to talk about Elijah and how he prayed that it would not rain and it did not for 31/2 years. I want to focus on what vs 16 says about the righteous man. His prayer has great power. I was reading in Titus and chapter 1 talks about the qualifications of an elder. vs 7 says, "For an overseer, as God's steward, must be above reproach. He must not be arrogant or quick tempered or a drunkard or a violent or greedy for gain, but hospitable, a lover of good, self-controlled, upright, holy, and disciplined. He must hold firm to the trustworthy word as taught, so that he may be able to give instruction in sound doctrine and also to rebuke those who contradict it." These things that make a good steward of God are the same things that will make a righteous persons prayer full of power. This list was a qualification for elders, but it was not a special list of excessive good but rather a bare minimum. I want to challenge you to search your heart and make the changes you need to to become righteous so that your prayer will be powerful. I said at the beginning that I wondered how much weight my prayer held. It isn't about how much my prayer can hold, but rather how much my God can hold.