epcblog

Devotional thoughts (Monday through Thursday mornings) from the pastor of Exeter Presbyterian Church in Exeter, NH // Sunday Worship 10:30am // 73 Winter Street

Wednesday, July 30, 2008

Hosea 3

It is one thing for a prophet to give a speech to others about the redeeming love of God. It is quite another for him to model that love with actions. Hosea was told here to take the message of restoration between God as husband and Israel as His wayward wife, and to live that out in his own marital relationship. His wife was an adulteress woman. She was loved by another man, just as Israel was in the spiritual embrace of idolatry and worldliness. As the Lord continued to love Israel despite her waywardness, Hosea was to truly love his wife Gomer.

Hosea did this. In order to get his wife back, he actually had to face the humiliation of paying for her. Why would he have to buy her? Apparently she had somehow been sold into slavery. When the people of God leave their true love and give themselves over to false gods, they become slaves of things that are not divine. Because of this condition, if we are to be free, we must first be purchased by our Redeemer. The price would be much more than silver and barley. The cost would be measured in righteous blood.

Hosea’s redeemed wife needed to pursue a different life now that he had bought her back. The prophet spoke to her. The way of life was simple. She would need to live with her husband for many days. When Jesus spoke to His disciples, He instructed them to “abide” in him. It is only when we live with God that we will be able to be fruitful, for apart from him we can do nothing.

Gomer was told that abiding with Hosea would mean that she could not be intimate with other men. Sometimes we are so stuck in our pathways of slavery that the Lord’s instruction to us must be very plain and explicit. It apparently is not enough for us to know that we should live with God. We also need to be told that loving the Lord means that we cannot worship other gods. The Lord is not open-minded on this point. He is delightfully committed to us as His bride, and He will not tolerate our wandering ways.

The encouragement that Hosea gives to his bride is the same one that Jesus gives to His disciples before He ascends into heaven. He tells them, “I will be with you.” This is what Moses insisted upon when the children of Israel were to go into the Promised Land. We are also on a journey, and our destination is better than the land of Canaan. Yet our pathway may take us through some rough terrain. We need the Lord’s presence now, and we need the assurance that where we are going, there He also will be. If He is not there with us, how can it be heaven?

As Hosea had been without his wife for some period of time, there would be a long time when Israel would be without their normal life with the Lord. They would have no king or active dynasty. They would have no system of divine sacrifice or the old places of religious worship. They would have no assistance from their accustomed tools of spiritual guidance or religious ceremonies. This is not to suggest that the kings, the shrines, or the sacraments that Israel had become used to over the centuries of her wayward life were authorized by God. It is just to say that her civil and religious props would be gone. She would not be a sovereign nation, or even an organized spiritual entity. This would be part of the Lord’s discipline of His bride.

Yet as Hosea had purchased Gomer back from that condition, we learn here of a later time called “afterward.” In those days there will be a change in Israel. She will return. She will seek God. She will seek a Davidic king, and would know both the fear of the Lord and His abundant goodness.

This restoration would not come quickly. The nation of Israel would never really be the same. Something better is being referred to here. The purchase of the defiled and unclean people of the Lord would not take place until the coming of the final Son of David, the Lord Jesus Christ. He would pay the awful cost of restoration, buying this sorry Gomer with His blood.

Despite the fact that we still wander away from Him and have a continual need to confess our sins and repent, He does not speak of us as some unclean prostitute. He says that we will be a glorious bride. Despite your own sense of shame and guilt, despite the fact that you cannot imagine that there would be any good news left for you, Jesus really does love you. He gave the fruit of all His righteous labor for you and then He paid for your redemption with something more precious than silver or gold. He knows that you are His rich inheritance. Do not fight against Him. Do not go running off after some other gods. Stay with Him, and be fruitful. He will never leave you. The fact is that He really does love you.

posted by Pastor Magee @ 6:00 AM

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