Ultimately, for Israel, the heart of their problem was
the problem of their heart.
God chose a young Chaldeean man from the city of Ur, a
man by the name of Abram. God changed his name to Abraham and made from him
and his offspring a mighty nation numbering in the millions. And while you
already know this, let me remind you that Ur of the Chaldees, Abram’s home, is
near the present city of Nasiriyah south of Baghdad.
God led Abraham’s descendants to the land we know as
Israel. He gave them military victories over their enemies and blessed them
there so that they became powerful, prosperous and prominent.
After all that God had done for Abraham’s people, you
would have thought that they would have been loyal to Him, faithful to His
will and obedient to His law.
You would have thought that but you would have been
wrong. You see the people of Israel did not have a heart for a relationship
with God; they had a heart for rebellion against Him.
To demonstrate that, God lists for Hosea a litany of
lapses in loyalty among the Israelites.
A.
Lying to God (11:12-12:2)
To begin with, God says the people were guilty of lying
to Him. Hosea 11:12 reads:
- 12
Ephraim has
surrounded me with lies,
-
the house of Israel with
deceit.
-
And Judah is unruly against
God,
-
even against the faithful Holy
One.
When I was a child, we sang a camp chorus that
said,
- You cannot hide from God,
- You cannot hide from God.
- Wherever you go
- Whatever you do
- You cannot hide from God,
We sang that 45 years ago in Northcentral Missouri but
the truth has been known longer than that. Elihu, the friend of Job, said:
"For His eyes are on the ways of man, and He sees all his steps. There
is no darkness nor shadow of death where the workers of iniquity may hide
themselves." (Job 34:21- 22)
- And Jeremiah quoted these questions:
- "Can anyone hide himself in secret places, so I shall not see him?"
says the LORD; "Do I not fill heaven and earth?" says the LORD. (Jeremiah
23:24)
David, the sweet singer of Israel asked:
“Where can I go from Your Spirit? Or where can I flee from Your
presence? If I ascend into Heaven, You are there; if I make my bed in hell,
behold, You are there. Indeed, the darkness shall not hide from You, but the
night shines as the day; the darkness and the light are both alike to You.
(Psalm 139:7-8,12)
It is foolish of anyone to think that he can hide from
the Lord, deceive the Lord or lie to the Lord. But that is what Israel was
doing…and I dare say some of us have tried it, too.
A heart that lies to God or in any other way tries to
deceive Him is a heart that is rebellious toward Him. We, too, were at one
time nothing special. But God, from His rich mercy, has called us to Himself
and made us to be what He has termed “a kingdom of priests.” How dare we try
to lie to the One who has done all of that for the likes of all of us?
B.
Struggling with God (12:3-4)
A second sin of Israel is that they were guilty of
struggling with God.
Abraham, the father of the Hebrew race, had only one son:
Isaac. Isaac had twin sons: Jacob and Esau. Esau was the first born of the
twins but when he came out of the womb, his brother, Jacob, was hanging on to
his heel, which is why he was named “Jacob” meaning “to grasp the heel.”
Later, God changed Jacob’s name to Israel. Jacob meant “heel grabber” and
Israel meant “one who struggles with God”.
Jacob was just one of that kind of people: he was always
struggling with God. To use James Dobson’s terms, he was defiant instead of
compliant. That’s why his name was changed to Israel.
And guess what, his descendants, the Israelite people,
also struggled with God. It was just part of their nature.
Now it may have been natural for them to struggle with
God but that didn’t make it right. We all have some traits that are
displeasing to God. It will never do to simply say, “Well, that’s just the
way I am.” We are to struggle against sin, not against God.
The Israelites in Hosea’s day were guilty of struggling
against God.
C.
Forsaking God (12:9-13:3)
Beyond that, they were also guilty of forsaking God.
They willfully and knowingly worshipped false gods (idols) instead of the One
who created them, redeemed them, loved them and led them.
Under the first covenant, God’s chosen people were those
people who were descended from Abraham. Under God’s new covenant, His chosen
people are those who decide to love Him and obey Him. Do you suppose any of
them ever forsake Him and give their highest loyalty to other gods? Do you
suppose they ever worship objects of silver or gold, created things rather
than the Creator?
Do you suppose anyone who has decided to love and obey
God ever goes back on that decision and abandons the God who created them,
redeemed them loves them and leads them?
The Israelites in Hosea’s time were guilty of forsaking
God. And some of God’s people today have done so, too.
D.
Forgetting
God (13:4-13)
Hosea told the people that God
had said:
- 5
I cared for you in
the desert,
- in the land of burning
heat.
- 6
When I fed them, they were
satisfied;
- when they were
satisfied, they became proud;
- then they forgot me.
It is so easy to forget God. We get busy with the
activities of our days and the days of our lives and before we even realize
it, we can go for hours, days, even weeks without a serious encounter with our
Heavenly Father.
Oh, it’s not like we have amnesia and do not recall that
there is a God. Rather, we become practical atheists, living our lives
as if there is no God.
Our tendency is to become forgetful the same way Israel
did. In the midst of a crisis, a catastrophe or calamity, we remember there
is a God and we cry out to Him. But like Israel, when we become satisfied, we
become proud and that is when we tend to forget God.
We can come to think of God a little like an insurance
policy: we only think about it when we need it. We want it there “just in
case” but we don’t give it much thought until we want to file a claim.
Israel had become satisfied, proud and neglectful of God.
E.
Rebelling against God (13:14-16)
In Hosea 13:16, God told Hosea, “16
The people of Samaria must bear their guilt, because they have rebelled
against their God.” Then he tells them that because of their rebellion
against God, they would fall by the sword. God also reveals to Hosea other
punishments that are too graphic and too gruesome for me to relate at this
time and in this setting. Suffice it to say that there were going to be
serious consequences to Israel for their rebellion against God.
In order to quell a rebellion in the north of Scotland,
the English king William III issued a proclamation to all the rebel chiefs to
appear at Inverary on or before the thirty-first of December, 1691. When they
got to Inverary, they were to swear an oath of allegiance to the king. Those
who did not appear were to be treated as outlaws, liable to execution as
traitors to the crown. Although humiliating, it was useless to rebel with
such small numbers.
One by one all the tribal chieftains gave way, and all
had signed their names to the paper except one. MacIan was the leader of the
smallest yet haughtiest tribe. He did not intend finally to rebel, but he
hoped to be the last of the Scottish chiefs to submit to the king’s decree. A
day or two before the thirty-first, he started out. A severe snowstorm
impeded his way, and he did not arrive until nearly a week after the king's
messenger had returned to London.
King William did not accept MacIan’s oath of allegiance
because he had not met the terms of the treaty. A band of soldiers was sent
to force MacIan and his clan into the Valley of Glencoe where MacIan and his
followers were massacred, victims of his stubborn pride.
To this day, pride is the fuel that feeds rebellion and
rebellion against God is a grievous sin.
Without question, Israel had a heart for rebellion but
without question, God had a heart for reunion.
God gave Hosea a message of hope for the people.
Although they were lost and far from home, they could return to Him. But
coming home would require the right route:
A. Coming home
requires repentance of the
sins you have been committing (14:1-3). Repentance is not mere sorrow
(although Godly sorrow can bring repentance). True repentance requires a
recognition that you are going the wrong way and then a turning back to the
right way. You can come home to your Father but it requires repentance.
B. Coming home requires
restoration (14:4-8).
Repentance is our part; restoration is God’s part. We cannot come home to Him
until He heals us and restores us to the place we had before we rebelled. The
great good news is that when we turn toward home, He restores us to Himself.
C, Coming home requires
righteousness (14:9). God
told Hosea, ”9 Who is wise? He will realize these things. Who
is discerning? He will understand them. The ways of the
Lord are right; the righteous
walk in them, but the rebellious stumble in them.” God’s restoration of
us is but a brief respite unless we become righteous and walk in His ways. If
we do not walk in His ways, only too soon we will be lost yet again.
CONCLUSION:
Ernest Hemingway told the story of a Spanish father and
his teenage son. The son had sinned against his father and in his shame he
ran away from home. The father searched all over Spain for him, but still he
could not find the boy. Finally, in the city of Madrid, in a last desperate
attempt to find his son, the father placed an ad in the daily newspaper. The
ad read:
"Dear Paco, meet me in front of the Hotel Montana- noon Tuesday. Come
home. All is forgiven. I love you. Signed- your papa."
The father prayed that
maybe the boy would see the ad and maybe-just maybe- he would come to the
Hotel Montana.
And on Tuesday at noon, the father in Ernest Hemingway’s story arrived at the
Hotel Montana and he could not believe his eyes. A squadron of police
officers had been called out to keep order among the eight hundred young boys
named "Paco" who had come to meet their father in front of the Hotel Montana.
Eight hundred boys named Paco read the ad in the newspaper and hoped it was
for them. Eight hundred "Pacos" came to receive the forgiveness they so
desperately needed so they could return to the home of their father.
Hemmingway was a
novelist so his story is a fiction. Here is a story that is the truth. Your
Father in Heaven has sent you just such a message and He has asked you to meet
Him at the foot of a cross so He can take you home. Will you come?
