Sunday Service
Notes
Transcript
I. The Purchase of Gomer, 3:1-3.
I. The Purchase of Gomer, 3:1-3.
The LORD told Hosea to seek out in love the woman whom he formerly loved. This is Gomer, who was to be loved even though she was an unfaithful wife, committing adultery with other men.
Hosea’s action was to be similar to the actions of the LORD Himself, who loved the Israelites even though they had willfully chosen to become spiritually unfaithful to Him.
They had made a deliberate choice turn to other gods, and were enticed by that which was sensual, even loving the raisin cakes that were a part of their worship of Canaanite gods.
This became true of Judah in the days of Jeremiah: Jer. 7:18
“The children gather wood, and the fathers kindle the fire, and the women knead dough to make cakes for the queen of heaven; and they pour out drink offerings to other gods in order to spite Me.
“And,” said the women, “when we were burning sacrifices to the queen of heaven and were pouring out drink offerings to her, was it without our husbands that we made for her sacrificial cakes in her image and poured out drink offerings to her?”
Hosea is going to do what God asks of him: to love Gomer and take her back.
But first Hosea has to buy Gomer back. The Lord wants Hosea to feel what He feels as his nation Israel has been unfaithful to Him. Then as Hosea proclaims God’s judgments upon the nation, he does so with emotional intensity, expressing God’s love, Israel’s apathy toward God, God’s promise of impending punishment, and the loyal-love of God that will someday bring Israel back to Himself.
There is a payment of a redemption price to buy Gomer back. Likewise, we have been redeemed. We had to be freed because we were slaves to sin, that which separates us from God. We could never be free from sin’s slave market until someone greater, who was free from sin, could purchase us out of the slave market of sin.
Hosea purchased Gomer, a “used woman” for the price of 15 shekels and 1 1/2 homers of barley, which was worth about 15 shekels. Hosea couldn’t afford the full value of a dead slave, yet Gomer was valued by those who owned her as less than a dead slave. Gomer wasn’t worth it, but neither were we worth the redemption price paid for us.
knowing that you were not redeemed with perishable things like silver or gold from your futile way of life inherited from your forefathers,
but with precious blood, as of a lamb unblemished and spotless, the blood of Christ.
Jesus had to shed His blood, to suffer and die to make our redemption possible. We need him because we were lost sinners, sold under sin and in bondage to it.
That is the spiritual condition of each us before Christ. Until we come to God for salvation, we were dead in trespasses and sins. When the sin issue is settled--when we are born again and have received a new nature — it is only then that we can do anything to please God. And that sin issue is settled when we receive Jesus Christ as our redeemer from sins past, present, and future.
Hosea has purchased Gomer at her very lowest point. She is to live with him from now on because she is Hosea’s by marriage and now by purchase. She was not to play the harlot or to have a lover any longer. Hosea in turn promised to be faithful to her.
II. The Period of Discipline, 3:4.
II. The Period of Discipline, 3:4.
In like manner, Israel would remain for a long time separated by their idolatrous practices. During this time they would not have a king or prince, indications of national sovereignty. They would not have sacrifices or sacred pillar, enabling them to engage in formal religious activity. They would not have ephod or household idols to enable divination. There would be nothing to mark them as God’s people or that they had used to worship idols.
There is no length of time given in verse 4; unusual because the children of Israel were told three times that they were to be put out of their land and that they would be returned three times. The first two times, God gave them how long they were to be out of the land—but not the third time.
God told Abraham in Genesis 15:13
God said to Abram, “Know for certain that your descendants will be strangers in a land that is not theirs, where they will be enslaved and oppressed four hundred years.
Now the time that the sons of Israel lived in Egypt was four hundred and thirty years.
And at the end of four hundred and thirty years, to the very day, all the hosts of the Lord went out from the land of Egypt.
Later The LORD told Jeremiah:
‘This whole land will be a desolation and a horror, and these nations will serve the king of Babylon seventy years.
‘Then it will be when seventy years are completed I will punish the king of Babylon and that nation,’ declares the Lord, ‘for their iniquity, and the land of the Chaldeans; and I will make it an everlasting desolation.
The third removal from the land is “many days without a king ...”, spoken of the northern kingdom, which never actually returned to the land. How long is “many days”? Why no specific number? After Israel left the land in A.D. 70 and the time they will return, God has been calling out a people to His name from among the Gentiles and has been building His church. The Lord is coming soon, but we do not know how soon; after all, Jesus said, “Behold, I am coming quickly ...” and almost 2,000 years later, it is closer than ever. But God is not constrained by our schedule or time. We currently are seeing the stage being set for His return and the action will begin when the church is removed from this earth.
The church itself is a called-out assembly, a group which is the bride of Christ. Jesus paid the biggest price for the church.
So Israel is going to remain for several days ...
without a king … There is no Israelite living today who can say, “I am in the line of David; I have a right to the throne of David.” The only One who can claim this is presently at God’s right hand, the Lord Jesus, King of Kings and Lord of Lords.
without a prince … no one to succeed to the throne.
without a sacrifice or sacred pillar … There are many holy places in Israel today. Israel not only does not possess these sacred spots in the land, they dare not touch them. All they really have is the Wailing Wall. They have no sacrifice except the one we Christians have—Jesus.
without an ephod or household idols … God did not give Israel any images. Exodus 20 4
“You shall not make for yourself an idol, or any likeness of what is in heaven above or on the earth beneath or in the water under the earth.
He did give them an ephod, the sacred garment worn by the high priest. They made small objects which became items of worship. God says that they will not have anything that would draw them back to idolatry. Israel today has turned away from idolatry, but have yet to turn back to God.
III. The Future Repentance and Restoration, 3:5.
III. The Future Repentance and Restoration, 3:5.
“Afterward” — according to God’s timetable, Israel will return to the land. We see that today, yet Hosea describes the way that they shall return: they shall “seek the LORD their God and David their king; and they will come trembling to the LORD and to His goodness in the latter days.”
So Israel is back in the land, but this does not fulfill this prophecy, because when they return, they will return to God. That has not happened yet; there is no real turning to God in the land.
Upon the celebration of their twentieth anniversary of becoming a nation, they displayed a large motto which read, “Science will bring peace to this land.” The Scriptures say it is the Messiah who will bring peace. But Israel has turned to science not Messiah.
They are looking to prosperity, depending on economics, and putting hope in alliances, not in the LORD.
Israel is currently one of the most difficult missionary fields in the world. There are few missionaries in Israel and most have to come in as vocational workers who happen to be Christians. Thankfully there is a beginning of God’s Spirit stirring among the people of Israel, but it is still the exception rather than the rule.
When they return, they will return not just to the land but to the LORD, seeking ,Him as their God and a Davidic king as their ruler
Hosea 2:7 speaks of their return to God, using a very vivid picture, as does Hosea 5:15
I will go away and return to My place Until they acknowledge their guilt and seek My face; In their affliction they will earnestly seek Me.
Cf. Deut4:29
“But from there you will seek the Lord your God, and you will find Him if you search for Him with all your heart and all your soul.
They will someday soon—in the latter days—come with trembling to the LORD and His goodness, finally realizing that the LORD is their only hope. They will then approach the LORD with a healthy sense of fear because of His rich blessings bestowed upon them. Those latter days refers to the time of the great Tribulation, going through the second coming of Christ and on into the Millennial Kingdom.