The Lord's Redeeming Love

Intro

How far would you go to recover something that belonged to you? Say someone came into your home and robbed you of a watch that your grandfather had given to you. It was a nice watch, but its value to you was more sentimental. If you discovered who had stolen it, would you be willing to buy it back from the thief? To up the stakes, what if your wife, whom you loved dearly, had left you for someone else, and that someone else turned in to a string of someone else’s. At the end of this string of other lovers was one who was now trafficking her, and you learned she was now up for sale. Would you buy her back?

That’s what the Lord calls the prophet Hosea to do in our text this morning. It would be preposterous if it didn’t also point to something we intrinsically know is true. For we are that unfaithful wife, estranged from our husband, and in desperate need of redemption. Even though the horror of our sin is painted in such graphic details, its the redeeming love of the Lord that is on full display in this text from Hosea 3.

Hosea 3:1–5

The flow of this text is very straightforward. The LORD tells Hosea to do something, Hosea does what the Lord tells him, and the Lord explains the significance of the prophet’s actions. As we walk through these few verses together, notice the theme of Hosea is clear throughout. First, we will consider the LORD’s redeeming love, and then His command, to return and remain faithful.

The love of God towards undeserving sinners

Excursus on a hermeneutic of suspicion v. trust.

Scholars and commentators tie themselves in knots, trying to explain away this text. No way would God have one of his prophets do something like this, to go and “love” his unfaithful wife “again.” It was bad enough that the Lord called him to marry her in the first place, but this is humiliating, not to mention illegal. Isn’t it? Is this woman Gomer? Is this the same episode from chapter 1 just told from a different vantage point? What do we make of the first person perspective Hosea gives in ch. 3 vs. The third person in ch. 1?

Let me give you a very basic hack into interpreting scripture, its so simple but oft neglected. Always begin your reading of scripture from the stance of faith seeking understanding, and not doubt. Ever since Descartes launched thinking man (Cogito Ergo Sum) into the world by trying to doubt away everything, doubt has been the primary way we engage with the world. And this has lead to the widespread adoption of a hermeneutic of suspicion, which Christian’s often unwittingly use to read scripture. We should read with a hermeneutic of trust, remembering as we read that every word in the original is the inspired, inerrant, infallible word of God. Surprisingly that does wonders to your reading of His word. For instance when God tells the prophet Hosea to go “again” love a woman who is an adulteress, we can be certain that “again” means he had loved this unfaithful woman before. Anyway…

Why does God love You?

Just as stories often teach doctrine more effectively than bare propositions, an enacted message can effectively teach both the character and attributes of God, as well as the foolish and sinful state of present-day Israel. Observe that the actions of the prophets are intended to mirror those of the Lord. "Love a woman...even as the Lord loves..." It might have seemed bad enough that Hosea was called to love an unfaithful woman, but to then go and love her after she had prostituted herself to other lovers seems preposterous. However, this stark imagery is intended to teach us the extent of the Lord's redeeming love.

Despite Israel turning to other gods and indulging in what were likely ecstatic, orgiastic, idolatrous worship practices (loving cakes of raisins) to the gods of the surrounding nations, the Lord will love them again. This presents a staggering image of the truth that "God is love."

Here, the Lord is not highlighting his love for the world (Jn. 3:16), but the special love that he has for his bride, the church, even when she strays. The motive for this love lies in election and his sovereign purposes in salvation. He chose her, entered into a covenant with her, and will claim her as his own.

It is a great comfort to know that the Lord loves undeserving sinners. You cannot go through one week without sinning against God, sometimes in grievous ways. Many of you would never think of committing adultery, but you commit spiritual adultery whenever you turn to idols instead of remaining faithful to the Lord. Remember, an idol "is anything more important to you than God, anything that absorbs your heart and imagination more than God, anything you seek to give you what only God can give" (Counterfeit Gods, xvii).

The fact that the Lord loves us again when we are unfaithful is a call to abandon pride and the foolish boasts of those who think they are something when they are only what they are by the grace and mercy of a loving God.

However, most husbands would not respond the way God does, even if they deeply loved their wives. If she were unfaithful to the extent that Gomer was, most men would not even consider taking her back. The reason adultery is grounds for divorce is that it breaks the terms of the covenant bond, with the result that the offending party is as good as dead, given that this was the penalty for adultery under the law. If this were the case today, many marriages might have been saved if the law's threat of death had been held over them. This is one of the uses of the law, as threats of condemnation help curb sin and prevent you from committing it.

Gomer/Israel deserves death for her breach of covenant, but instead, the Lord loves her again.

The price of sin.

Death is the price (wages) of sin; it's a costly affair. How does Hosea 'love again' his unfaithful wife? Notice in verse 2, he must go and buy her. It's impossible for us to recreate exactly what is happening here, but that doesn’t detract from the poignant effect this imagery has on us.

Somehow, Hosea discovers a way to buy back his unfaithful wife. Perhaps her latest lover is trafficking her and, if the price is right, willing to part with her. Or, some commentators suggest that the 15 shekels of silver combined with the barley would have been about 30 shekels, which is the price of redeeming a slave (Exodus 21:32). The term 'bought' in Hebrew often has the connotations of 'haggling' over price. That, combined with the fact that he brings money and barley, suggests that Hosea probably had a difficult time coming up with the money. This implies that it was costly to redeem her, just as it is costly for the Lord to redeem Israel.

One reason we often distrust politicians’ promises is because they have no skin in the game. It won’t cost them anything personally if they don’t follow through on their promises. They can make grandiose statements to win votes and then backtrack once they are in office without facing any consequences. There is a telling scene in 2 Sam. 24 where David is told by the prophet Gad to go offer sacrifices at a certain place to avert the angel of death. When he arrives, the man who owns the land comes out and offers the site, plus oxen and wood for the burnt offering as a gift to David. But David says, “No, but I will buy it from you for a price. I will not offer burnt offerings to the LORD my God that cost me nothing.” David put skin in the game.

You see, the Lord could have chosen to save us some other way. But rather than remain aloof, the Lord steps into human history, sending His Son, in the likeness of sinful flesh, to pay the ransom with His own life redeeming his bride from her sin. On an even grander scale than Hosea the Lord is fully invested in recovering the Church, his bride, from the penalty of her unfaithfulness–namely, death.

It was love that compelled the son to offer up his own life to redeem ruined sinners. His life, which was of infinite value, became the payment given to redeem you from the bondage of sin and death. Only the death of someone capable of defeating death would have been able to satisfy the just demands that our unfaithfulness deserved. Mind you, he did this knowing that you would continue to struggle your whole life to be faithful to him. So, he pledges to give you his spirit as a helper, to both convict you of sin and also to assure you of the grace and mercy of Christ, and produce in you works consistent with who you now are - a redeemed bride of Christ.

The Call to Remain Faithful

Once he had redeemed his wife, Hosea reminds her that she belongs to him and so must consent to remain faithful to him. She may not pursue other lovers.

Essentially in verse 3, Hosea says, "you may not be intimate with anyone, that will include for a time, me." By this, the prophet intends there to be a period of consecration, where she is cleansed from her sins.

There are always consequences to sin. For Gomer, given as she was to sexual immorality, the pleasure and intimacy of sexual relations are removed. The message to Israel is spelled out in verse 4 where God warns that Israel must return to the Lord and be faithful during which time the consequence he will impose upon her is the loss of intimacy with him for a time. During this time, Israel will have no king, symbolizing the loss of their national identity, along with the loss of sacrifice and priesthood, symbolizing the loss of the temple. Essentially, exile.

Just after Hosea's ministry, in 722 BC, Israel is taken into captivity by the Assyrians. Judah will join them in 586 BC when the Babylonians do the same, and also raze the temple to the ground. During the Babylonian Captivity, there was no king in authority over the people of God. With no temple, there were no sacrifices or priesthood to mediate between the Lord and His people.

These are only the sanctioned things Israel will temporarily lose access to, but the Lord would also remove all of their pagan idolatry and its practices. These, of course, would never be restored. The exile was a time of consecration, much like the wandering in the wilderness after the exodus had been before.

When the church turns away from the Lord and is unfaithful, although the Lord still loves her and pursues her to redeem her from her sin, there will be consequences, often akin to exile. I recently read in World that Geneva, a Canton (state) in Switzerland, and famous as the home of Calvin and the reformation, passed a law that baptisms in Lake Geneva are illegal. Back in 2019, they passed a referendum that required the state to safeguard religious neutrality (whatever that is). They reasoned that if someone happened to be passing by and witnessed a baptism, it would be tantamount to indoctrination. What a startling shift from her reformation days. Somewhere along the way the church in that Canton was unfaithful to the LORD, and the consequence is an empty public square.

This is also true on an individual level too. As Ken exhorted us last week, the Lord disciplines every son. When we are unfaithful, sometimes the Lord will withdraw from us our former intimacy. He has not abandoned you altogether, since he promised never to do that, but in an effort to woo you back to your former communion, he consecrates you by purging away your sins.

Dear brothers and sisters in Christ, if you belong to Christ, then your devotion to him must be single-minded. If Christ is your Lord then serve him alone. And as a church, the body of Christ, we too must examine our corporate identity to make sure everything we do is in service to Christ. That our worship is centered on him, and he alone is worshipped and glorified; all of course, in ways that he has set down in his word, and not our own innovations.

Let us render to him worship that is pleasing to him for he alone is worthy. We must praise him for who he is, but also for his great work of redemption. Christ came and paid the bride-price for a filthy whore, marred in sin, and justly deserving death. But he, being rich in mercy, because of the great love he has for his people, went to Calvary to suffer and die in her place. To take on himself the penalty of death, to wash his bride in his blood, purifying her from all her sins and making her wholly true to him alone.

The Promise of Renewal

God's promises to love Israel again, to redeem her from sin and restore her fellowship with him, but only after a period of consecration. After that, in the latter days, he promised that what was once broken by her unfaithfulness would be restored. Notice v. 5:

Hosea 3:5 (ESV)—5 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.

Here the prophet anticipates the return from exile. After their time in exile, Israel would return and seek the Lord. Interestingly, Israel, after the exile, never again fell into the sins of idol worship. She never again mixed the worship of Baal with the worship of Yahweh.

Under the leadership of Ezra and Nehemiah, there was a reformation in Israel to 'seek' the Lord. It was marked by fear and reverence for the Lord and a desire to have the nation devoted to the Lord in holiness and truth. There was a restoration of the temple, and the sacrificial system (sort of), but as time went on, it became clear that the exile was not quite over. Absent a Davidic king to sit on the throne, and due to the political climate, Israel never attained an independent status, but found herself always at the mercy of the different empires in power at the time.

It wasn't until Jesus arrived on the scene that this promise really began to be fulfilled. Notice that there is a subtle connection between seeking Yahweh and seeking David their king. Since 2 Samuel 7 and Psalms such as 110 & 72, it became clear that the son of David who would sit on his father's throne would have to be divine if he was to continue forever. Jesus is that messianic king that Hosea anticipated. As Paul said:

Romans 1:1–5 (ESV) — the gospel of God, 2 which he promised beforehand through his prophets in the holy Scriptures, 3 concerning his Son, who was descended from David according to the flesh 4 and was declared to be the Son of God in power according to the Spirit of holiness by his resurrection from the dead, Jesus Christ our Lord, 5 through whom we have received grace and apostleship to bring about the obedience of faith for the sake of his name among all the nations,

Renewal will consist in a return to the Lord by accepting Jesus as the redeemer and Lord of the people of God. I said earlier that when Jesus came this promise 'began' to be fulfilled because his incarnation, death, & resurrection inaugurated the latter days. This promise of renewal was not for the time of the prophet's message, it awaited a future fulfillment in the coming Christ.

But as the New Testament would make clear, we live in the time between its beginning and its final fulfillment in the second coming of Christ. So the hope of this renewal is still the ground motive for our continued return and seeking of the Lord and His anointed. For who hopes for what he already has?

Wait a second, you're saying that the promised renewal is contingent on Israel's (our) repentance? Wouldn't that just lead to a work-based system? And wouldn't that give us grounds to boast? This brings us to the heart of reformed theology, which teaches that repentance is 'an evangelical grace.' Meaning our repentance is wrought by God through the Gospel. As Hosea says, “I will heal their apostasy; I will love them freely, for my anger has turned from them” The Lord first heals them, which is forgiveness, turning his anger from them, and then He loves them (again) i.e. they are now restored to a relationship with him.

Repentance precedes restoration. But repentance is a spirit-produced effort to turn from sin to the Lord. It is marked by sorrow for sin. True godly sorrow is not merely grieving the consequences of sin. That is only sorrow over having been caught. True godly sorrow for sin recognizes that heinousness of sin and hates it. True godly sorrow for sin produces repentance that leads to restoration.

The message of the prophet does not offer a cheap grace. One that demands nothing of the unfaithful wife. The Lutheran theologian and pastor Dietrich Bonhoeffer put it this way in his book The Cost of Discipleship.

Cheap grace is preaching forgiveness without repentance; it is baptism without the discipline of community … Cheap grace is grace without discipleship, grace without the cross, grace without the living, incarnate Jesus Christ. Costly grace … is Christ’s sovereignty, for the sake of which you tear out an eye if it causes you to stumble. It is the call of Jesus Christ which causes a disciple to leave his nets and follow him … It is costly, because it costs people their lives; it is grace, because it thereby makes them live. It is costly, because it condemns sin; it is grace, because it justifies the sinner. Above all, grace is costly, because it was costly to God, because it cost God the life of God’s Son … and because nothing can be cheap to us which is costly to God. (Bonhoeffer, Discipleship, 44–45)

Christ did not redeem His bride from her unfaithful ways, only to be fine with her half-hearted devotion. He would have her all to himself. He would have her return and remain faithful. The Lord, in his redeeming love, has gone to great lengths to recover you from the slave-market of sin, by redeeming you with the precious blood of His Son. Why then do you return to your sin? Consecrate yourself and put to death all your besetting sins by reminding yourself of the redeeming love of the Lord. Amen.

Charge

Since the Lord has redeemed you from sin through the death of His son, you must return to him and remain faithful.