What to do with Knowledge

Hosea 4:6-11

Do you remember the show, are you smarter than a Fifth Grader? What was the premise of the show? An adult would face off against a child in questions of things that we would learn in school.

It was quite comedic, and if you watched the show, tough. It’s funny what things we can recall, and it’s quite embarrassing of the things we have forgot.

Having knowledge on a subject helps us make decisions, it helps us to know what has occurred, and what the result will be.

It has been said that knowledge is power, and indeed there is value in understanding and knowing about something.

And with that thought, having knowledge about the Lord and His Word, is imperative in our lives.

It is our responsibility to study the word of God and grow in understanding of what it says. When we fail to gain knowledge and understanding from God’s Word, we fail at being His Children.

The passage that we are led to tonight, gives us a warning. What happens to a people who turn away from knowledge and take a different path.

(Read Scripture)

Hosea, a prophet used by God to deliver a message to Israel, gives us the warning, that though we may be knowledgeable on many things but if we do not have a knowledge of God, a knowledge of His Word, a knowledge of His Son, then we are dooming ourselves.

Think about what we see from the passage when it comes to knowledge.

The Rejection

· Israel was the chosen nation of God. A people that were to be separate, to be peculiar. To be an example to the rest of the world.

· But even though they knew they were to be God’s people. They rejected God. Instead, they wanted to live like the rest of the world.

· God did not call them to be like everyone else. He instructed them and taught them what He wanted. And yet they rejected him. They disregarded his Word.

· And in essence they said to God through their lives they lived, that we reject what you are trying to teach us.

· That would be like a student sitting in the class, and the teacher is trying to impart knowledge onto the student, but the student instead looks out the window, or doodles on their paper, or falls asleep on their desk.

· What are they doing? They are rejecting knowledge being given to them.

· Now think about how we are living. As the Children of God, we have the same standards placed on our lives.

· We are to live differently, to act and speak different. To know who God is, in our heads and within our hearts.

· And yet, much like Israel, we fall into the same habits of rejecting God. Rejecting His instruction and teaching.

· We become disinterested and we see something else that intrigues us, and we just flock to it.

· I know that some of you are teachers in here, so you understand this quite well, and the rest of you as parents will be able to relate to this.

o Say you have a child that you are sharing something important too. I mean you have thought about what you were going to say, you have prepared yourself for this moment, but while you are sharing your heart to this child, the child is looking away. Say they are looking at a dog rather than listening to you, I mean here you are trying to give them something precious, and their mind is on something else.

· It is rejection, friend and we are guilty of doing the same thing. We are guilty of letting our mind reflect on something else other than God.

The Ramification

· Now Israel rejected God, they rejected his knowledge, and friends when you reject knowing God there is ramifications that come along with it.

· Israel was to be an example of the goodness of God, knowing the love of God, and yet they turned away. And because they turned away, God turned away from them.

· These people had a head knowledge of God, but they didn’t have a heart knowledge.

· And friend that is a dangerous way to live. Because many today, walk this earth, professing to love God, and yet they reject his Word. They reject him. And friend when you reject Christ, there is a consequence that lays in store.

· The nation of Israel would go into captivity, they would be ruled by foreign outsiders. They would lose their possession and home, they would lose so much because they wanted to be like the world.

· Friend, if you want to live like the world, God is not going to stop you, but when you are in the world God will hold back his blessing on you.

· Listen, rejecting God and living a worldly life has consequences. You can’t play both sides of the field.

· What did the Lord tell us in Matthew 6:24 “No man can serve two masters: for either he will hate the one, and love the other; or else he will hold to the one, and despise the other. Ye cannot serve God and mammon.”

· You know why Jesus said that? Because it is impossible for you to do it. You have to be decided.

· You can’t come in here and sing to the Lord, pray to him at the altar, hear the preaching, and go out into the world and live like the world and think that everything is okay.

· Now what is the ramifications for rejecting God? Well friend, there is a separation. You don’t want to have anything to do with God, then he will have nothing to do with you.

· And friend that path leads to Hell. It leads to eternal damnation.

· There is a consequence if you come in here and leave out of here, having heard the Word of God and then rejecting it in your life.

· Now don’t think just because you’re a child of God that you can reject his word. Notice what verse 7 says – “I change their glory into shame”

· It breaks my heart when I hear someone who says that they are a Christian, that they are a child of God, who goes to church, being arrested for something they ought not to have been doing.

· Friend when you play with sin, when you reject what he says, that glory that you have in your life, it will turn to shame.

· People will see you differently. Now you may think you are getting away with it. But friend listen, you can’t keep sin hidden.

· Numbers 32:23 “But if ye will not do so, behold, ye have sinned against the LORD: and be sure your sin will find you out.”

· Friend if you give into sin, if you live like the world, it will come out. You might get arrested, you might lose your family, you might lose your job, you might cause yourself illness, you might lose your wealth. Friend sin will destroy.

· The only thing that keeps sin from destroying us, is Jesus.

· Now notice what he says in verse 9 – the people and the priest would be punished for their ways.

· Know this friend, God demands that we live different. And if we know we are to live different and we still choose to turn to sin, punishment will come. God will chastise your life.

· How does he do this, well he tells us here in verse 9-10, first he will reward their doings.

· What are the wages of sin? Death. Friend, you give into sin and you continue to live a life away from God, you will find death waiting for you.

· And don’t think that sinful living is rewarding. It may seem like it at first, but you will quickly find that its not the case.

· “For they shall eat, and not have enough” – you will find you are never satisfied. Think about it, this is the case in so many lives today.

o Someone who begins to take drugs, aren’t satisfied, do they begin to do more drugs.

o Someone who turns to illicit images, destroys their mind and they turn to more graphic things.

o Someone who begins to drink to feel better, finds that they have to continue to drink more.

o Someone who turns to money for happiness, finds that they never have enough to satisfy their craving.

· Listen, sin will leave you hungry. But if we would come to the Lord, like we know we should, we will find that we will be filled.

The Reason

· Now what is the reason why we reject God in the first place? Well think about what he says in this passage.

· Look at verse 7 The nation grew, they seem prosperous in their eyes. Things seem to be going their way.

· Wealth was coming in, the economy was doing great, people were having a good time. People became more interested in their on lives and enjoying themselves, that they began to reject God.

· Friend be careful when life is going good, money seems to be pouring in, got so much that you don’t know what to do with.

· This is when people often drift away from God. Instead of coming to the Lord’s house, they go off every weekend and live it up.

· Instead of giving unto God, they go and build up their homes, they buy all their stuff, they get involved in things that takes their time away from what they should be giving to the Lord.

· They are rejecting God.

· That is not the only reason though, look at what verse 8 says. “They set their heart on their iniquity”

· Israel’s mind wasn’t on God, it was on their sin. They were more interested in what they knew they shouldn’t be doing, than living for the Lord.

· Now there was two main reasons why these people turned away from the knowledge of God, and it is the same two things that plague us still today.

· Sex and alcohol. They took what God had ordain for marriage, and just filled their society with it. These people knew it was wrong but they had grown to accept it.

· Today, the push for this WOKE movement, is turning away from God and what He tells us, and rejecting that knowledge and going to something else.

· The whoredom that is taking place in our land, is taking place among many who sit in the house of God.

· And it is not just this, but it is the influence of alcohol. Friend, as Christians, we should abstain from alcohol, because what does it do, it slows the mind. It distorts reality.

· It gives us the lie that everything is okay when it isn’t.

· We use these things because they make us feel good, but friend what makes me feel good is knowing I am living for the Lord.

· Don’t be fooled into thinking that living like everyone else out in the world is the way you are to live. God has taught you and showed you different.

The Return

· Now quickly, what should we do if we know we have followed this way? Well friend, repent and turn back to God.

· You know what Jesus preached to the people when he walked this earth? Matthew 4:17 tells us “From that time Jesus began to preach, and to say, Repent: for the kingdom of heaven is at hand.”

· What if I told you, there is a source for all of life’s questions. That it has the answer for how you are to live, what to say, what to do. It is the greatest source of knowledge known to man.

· Well friend, it exists, and it isn’t locked up in some vault or safe. It lays right before you, hopefully in your lap or next to you. It is the Bible. It is the Word of God.

· I remember in school hearing the teacher teach us about a subject and my mind would be somewhere else. And then that night I would have to get my homework done, and you know what I would have to do? I would have to look in the book.

· There is where the knowledge was. Friend, you want to have knowledge, you want to know what God wants for you in your life. Open up the book.

· Proverbs 1:7 says the fear of the LORD is the beginning of knowledge. There it is. Don’t reject him, don’t reject what he wants to give to you. Turn unto him.