Hosea: What Is Love?

Behold He Comes

WELCOME

Welcome! (in-person/online)

Announcement 1

Announcement 2

Now turn in your Bibles to Hosea 2:14 as Teresa comes to read for us.

Scripture Reading (Hosea 2:14-23)

Prayer of Praise (God is faithful)

BAPTISM

To God Be the Glory

Blessed Assurance

Prayer of Confession (Don Karns)

How Deep the Father’s Love for Us

NCC #17 & PASTORAL PRAYER (Mike Klaassen)

SERMON

What is love? Much ink has been spilt trying to answer that question. . .

Aristotle—“Love is composed of a single soul inhabiting two bodies.”

Augustine—“Love is the beauty of the soul.”

Shakespeare—“Love looks not with the eyes, but with the mind, And therefore is winged Cupid painted blind”

Voltaire—“Love is a canvas furnished by nature and embroidered by imagination.”

Friedrich Nietzsche—“There is always some madness in love.”

Sigmund Freud—“Love is a state of temporary psychosis”

Victor Hugo—“Life is the flower for which love is the honey.”

John Lennon—“Love is a flower you got to let it, you gotta let it grow.”

The Beatles—“Love is all you need”

A novel titled Love Story popularized the catchphrase, “Love means never having to say you’re sorry.”

Culture Club and frontman Boy George—“love is love” creating a catchphrase for the entire gay rights movement

Not to be outdone by LeAnn Rimes who sang “love is love is love”

Pat Benatar—“Love is a battlefield.”

The British rock band Flyte says “love is an accident.”

The Scottish band CHVRCHΞS says “love is dead”

Prince Hans and Princess Ana—“love is an open door”

With all these different takes on love, it’s no wonder Haddaway sang, “What is love? Baby don’t hurt me no more.”

Whatever else people may say about love, it is treated as the ultimate good in our culture. All you have to do is call something “love” and no other defense is necessary. “Love made me do it.” No further explanation required.

The Bible says “God is love.” We say, “love is god.”

Foreigner— “I wanna know what love is. . . I want you to show me.”

The book of of the best places to learn the truth about love is the book of Hosea

(TURN TO HOSEA)

Today we’re beginning a sermon series answering 12 major questions

And we’re going to find the answer to each question in the writings of one of the minor prophets

The minor prophets refer to those 12 little books of Scripture that are notoriously difficult to find and make up the final books of the OT

Two strikes against the Minor Prophets:

Old Testament

“Minor” — not like minor leagues. Just means small.

These 12 books represent the last four centuries of OT history, from 8th-5th century B.C.

We believe these books were placed together in one scroll as early as the 3rd century B.C.

I think you’ll find over the course of our study that these small books answer some pretty big questions

Let’s begin by answering the question we opened with this morning: what is love?

Hosea 1:1—The word of the Lord that came to Hosea, the son of Beeri, in the days of Uzziah, Jotham, Ahaz, and Hezekiah, kings of Judah, and in the days of Jeroboam the son of Joash, king of Israel.

The word of the Lord—God’s Word

When is Hosea writing?

(SHOW SLIDE)

After Solomon died (around 930 B.C.) the kingdom was split into two

Hosea is prophesying mostly to the northern kingdom of Israel during the reign of Jereoboam II (2 Kings 14), around 755 B.C.

Northern Kingdom = sometimes called Samaria (capital city), Ephraim (largest tribe), or simply Israel

On the surface, this is a great time to be a part of the nation of Israel

Under Jeroboam II the nation’s borders were expanded to include almost all the land God had promised their forefathers (2 Kings 14:25)

In addition, Jeroboam ushered in an era of great prosperity. In Hosea 12:8, the Northern Kingdom boasts “I am rich”

But just like today, national and economic prosperity may lead to spiritual disaster. After all, in Hosea 12:8, right after boasting about her wealth the people of Israel boasts that they have no iniquity and no sin.

But as we’ll see, nothing could have been further from the truth.

The people of Israel are steeped in unrepentant sin, and yet they are still loved.

Four Truths About Love:

1) Covenant: Love is a Commitment

Word covenant is used 5x in Hosea (2:18, 6:7, 8:1, 10:4, 12:1)

But the idea of covenant is all over the story that opens the book

Hosea 1:2-3a—When the Lord first spoke through Hosea, the Lord said to Hosea, “Go, take to yourself a wife of whoredom and have children of whoredom, for the land commits great whoredom by forsaking the Lord.” So he went and took Gomer, the daughter of Diblaim

Why in the world would God tell a prophet to marry a “wife of whoredom”? What does that even mean?

Three Main Views on Gomer:

(A) The Parable View

God wouldn’t tell a prophet to marry a prostitute

Gomer wasn’t real, this is just a parable to prove a point

Although great Bible teachers like John Calvin have held this view, I believe its the least likely

(B) The Promiscuous View

Gomer wasn’t a prostitute but had promiscuous tendencies

God is foretelling what Hosea will endure by marrying this woman

(C) The Prostitute View

Gomer was a prostitute

Problem, why would God have a prophet marry a prostitute?!?

Regardless, the point is that Hosea chooses to enter the covenant of marriage knowing his love will be spurned.

Kids: God is telling Hosea to love a woman that will not love him back.

Notice the word “for” in v. 2. God is using Hosea’s marriage as a divine sermon illustration.

Not much of an obvious outline to the book of Hosea

Think of Chapters 1-3 as an opening sermon illustration from Hosea’s marriage to Gomer

Chapters 4-14 are the sermon itself, a series of prophecies about sin, judgment, and covenant love

Just as Hosea chose to love a woman that did not love him back, God chooses to love a people that does not love him back.

Hosea 4:1-2—Hear the word of the Lord, O children of Israel, for the Lord has a controversy with the inhabitants of the land. There is no faithfulness or steadfast love, and no knowledge of God in the land; there is swearing, lying, murder, stealing, and committing adultery; they break all bounds, and bloodshed follows bloodshed.

God didn’t choose His people because He was looking for love. . .

Deuteronomy 7:7-8—It was not because you were more in number than any other people that the LORD set his love on you and chose you, for you were the fewest of all peoples, but it is because the LORD loves you and is keeping the oath that he swore to your fathers, that the LORD has brought you out with a mighty hand and redeemed you from the house of slavery, from the hand of Pharaoh king of Egypt.

Michael Barrett—“God did not fall in love with Israel. From the outset, His love was a matter of choice. He decided to love them, and the reason for that loving choice was not in their attractiveness or worthiness. Moses forthrightly said that, in essence, God loved Israel because He loved them (Deut. 7:7–8). God’s love is totally of grace.”

The same is true for us, His New Covenant people . . .

If God didn’t start loving you because He needed your love, He doesn’t keep loving you because you keep loving Him as you should!

Sally Lloyd-Jones—“Never Stopping, Never Giving Up, Unbreaking, Always and Forever Love”

Application:

Receive this love!!!

If you’ve been loved this way, love this way!

Husbands/wives

Church members/church

Friends

Kids/parents

What is love? The message of Hosea and the entire Bible screams that love is a commitment. It’s rooted in covenant.

2) Sin: Love Hurts

Love hurts, love scars Love wounds and marks Any heart Not tough or strong enough To take a lot of pain, take a lot of pain Love is like a cloud Holds a lot of rain Love hurts

(So sang the Scottish rock band, Nazareth, in 1975)

Anybody who has loved deeply knows there is profound truth in those lyrics. Love hurts. Either you lose the people you love, or they hurt you.

Hosea knew this firsthand. . .

Hosea 1:3b-5—and [Gomer] conceived and bore him a son. And the Lord said to him, “Call his name Jezreel, for in just a little while I will punish the house of Jehu for the blood of Jezreel, and I will put an end to the kingdom of the house of Israel. And on that day I will break the bow of Israel in the Valley of Jezreel.”

So far so good! (except for the naming)

Hosea 1:6-7—She conceived again and bore a daughter. And the Lord said to him, “Call her name No Mercy, or I will no more have mercy on the house of Israel, to forgive them at all. But I will have mercy on the house of Judah, and I will save them by the Lord their God. I will not save them by bow or by sword or by war or by horses or by horsemen.”

Quite possibly not Hosea’s child

Contrast v. 6 with v. 3—“bore him [Hosea] a son”

Hard to tell when your wife is a harlot

Hosea 1:8-9—When she had weaned No Mercy, she conceived and bore a son. And the Lord said, “Call his name Not My People, for you are not my people, and I am not your God.”

Once again, some question if Hosea is the daddy

Whether Hosea’s the dad or not, we know that Gomer is unfaithful to him because Hosea 3:1 calls Gomer an adulteress who is loved by another man.

The word used to describe her adultery in 3:1 suggests this wasn’t a one-time slip-up. She was completely enslaved to immorality.

Love hurts.

Just as Hosea is pained by a wife that sins against his covenant love, God is pained by the sins of His people. . .

Hosea 6:4-7—What shall I do with you, O Ephraim? What shall I do with you, O Judah? Your love is like a morning cloud, like the dew that goes early away. Therefore I have hewn them by the prophets; I have slain them by the words of my mouth, and my judgment goes forth as the light. For I desire steadfast love and not sacrifice, the knowledge of God rather than burnt offerings. But like Adam they transgressed the covenant; there they dealt faithlessly with me.

How had Israel sinned? Let me count the ways. . .

As is often the case, a sinful people is often led by sinful leaders

4:18—their rulers dearly love shame.

9:15—all their princes are rebels.

Not just the leaders. The people were guilty of . . .

4:2—swearing, lying, murder, stealing, and committing adultery

7:1—they deal falsely; the thief breaks in, and the bandits raid outside.

4:11 and 7:5—[drunkenness]

7:4—They are all adulterers

These are just symptoms of a deeper problem, their religion was wrong!

13:2—And now they sin more and more, and make for themselves metal images, idols skillfully made of their silver, all of them the work of craftsmen. It is said of them, “Those who offer human sacrifice kiss calves!”

As G.K. Chesterton reportedly said, “When Man ceases to worship God he does not worship nothing but worships everything.”

What are you worshiping? Where do your affections lie?

Israel’s sin has grieved the heart of God. . .

Hosea 11:8—How can I give you up, O Ephraim? How can I hand you over, O Israel? How can I make you like Admah? [dirt] How can I treat you like Zeboiim? [one of the cities destroyed alongside Sodom and Gomorrah] My heart recoils within me; my compassion grows warm and tender.

Application:

Fight your sin, knowing that it grieves your God

Ephesians 4:30—And do not grieve the Holy Spirit of God, by whom you were sealed for the day of redemption.

Charles Spurgeon—Sin everywhere must be displeasing to the Spirit of holiness, but sin in his own people is grievous to him in the highest degree. He will not hate his people, but he does hate their sins, and hates them all the more because they nestle in his children’s bosoms. The Spirit would not be the Spirit of truth if he could approve of that which is false in us: he would not be pure if that which is impure in us did not grieve him. The Holy Spirit’s grief is not of a petty, oversensitive nature. “He is grieved with us mainly for our own sakes, for he knows what misery sin will cost us; he reads our sorrows in our sins . . . He grieves over us because he sees how much chastisement we incur, and how much communion we lose."

If you’re going to love like this you’re going to get hurt like this

Pastors’ lunch—if I open up, I’ll get burned. You’ll get burned either way.

C.S. Lewis—“To love at all is to be vulnerable.”

What is love? The message of Hosea and the entire Bible east of Eden reminds us that love hurts. That’s the reality of love in a world of sin.

3) Redemption: Love is Scandalous

Hosea 3:1-2—And the LORD said to me, “Go again, love a woman who is loved by another man and is an adulteress, even as the LORD loves the children of Israel, though they turn to other gods and love cakes of raisins.” So I bought her for fifteen shekels of silver and a homer and a lethech of barley.

She’s enslaved to immorality. She’s left the home. Hosea is a single dad raising three kids by himself, and he’s not even sure if he’s the father. And somehow she’s got herself in trouble, because Hosea has to pay to bring her home with him. Maybe she’s become a slave somehow. 30 shekels was the normal price of a slave. This is scandalous.

Watching romantic comedies—charming single lady meets a handsome man with a job and an apartment. They hit it off. But somewhere towards the end of the film, his old flame shows up. Sometimes it’s even his ex-wife, or his current wife because his divorce isn’t finalized. But the film has made it obvious to you that this woman doesn’t really love this man the way the charming single lady does. After all, she’s been unfaithful to him. He can never trust her again. And so you find yourself cheering for the handsome man to finally forever dump his first love for the charming single lady.

That’s not what Hosea does.

He pursues her. He buys her back. If she has indeed become a slave, Hosea can’t afford the price to redeem her. So he barters for her return. 15 shekels plus some produce. But he doesn’t bring her back to gloat or manipulate her. Verse 1 says he’s to love her again. And Hosea obeys. This is scandalous!!!

You’re not supposed to love someone this bad and broken.

As bad as Gomer was, God’s people were worse. And yet God wants His people. . .

Hosea 2:14-23—“Therefore, behold, I will allure her, and bring her into the wilderness, and speak tenderly to her. And there I will give her her vineyards and make the Valley of Achor a door of hope. [Valley of Achor where Achan was killed in Joshua 7] And there she shall answer as in the days of her youth, as at the time when she came out of the land of Egypt. “And in that day, declares the Lord, you will call me ‘My Husband,’ and no longer will you call me ‘My Baal.’ For I will remove the names of the Baals from her mouth, and they shall be remembered by name no more. And I will make for them a covenant on that day with the beasts of the field, the birds of the heavens, and the creeping things of the ground. And I will abolish the bow, the sword, and war from the land, and I will make you lie down in safety. And I will betroth you to me forever. I will betroth you to me in righteousness and in justice, in steadfast love and in mercy. I will betroth you to me in faithfulness. And you shall know the Lord. “And in that day I will answer, declares the Lord, I will answer the heavens, and they shall answer the earth, and the earth shall answer the grain, the wine, and the oil, and they shall answer Jezreel, and I will sow her for myself in the land. And I will have mercy on No Mercy, and I will say to Not My People, ‘You are my people’; and he shall say, ‘You are my God.’”

14x —“I WILL”

You’re not supposed to love someone this bad and broken.

Even in Christian culture, we sometimes think this way. Pastor Matt Chandler from the Village Church in Texas tells the story of a sermon he heard as a young man.

Pastor shows a crowd of 1000+ young people a beautiful red rose

Tells them to touch and smell the rose

Begins preaching about sexual sin. How it makes you disgusting, etc.

Then at the end of his talk, the preacher asks someone to bring the rose

The stem is broken, petals have fallen off, it looks disgusting

“WHO WOULD WANT THIS ROSE?!? THIS IS WHY YOU NEED TO BE PURE! NOBODY WANTS THIS ROSE!”

JESUS WANTS THE ROSE!!!

"But what about punishment? What about wrath? What about consequences for sin?”

Over 100 times in Hosea, God uses the words “I will”. But often he’s talking about coming judgment. . .

1:4—I will punish . . . I will put an end to the kingdom of the house of Israel

1:5—I will break the bow of Israel

1:6, 2:4—I will have no more mercy

2:6—I will hedge up her way with thorns, . . . I will build a wall against her

2:9—I will take away my wool and my flax

2:10—I will uncover her lewdness

2:11—I will put an end to all her mirth

2:12—I will lay waste her vines and her fig trees

2:13— I will punish her

Which is it? Will God punish or will He pardon? Will He cast away, or will He draw near? Will He destroy, or will He restore?

YES. THE GOSPEL!!!

Jesus is punished, we are pardoned. He is cut off so we could be drawn near. He is destroyed so we could be restored.

1 Peter 2:9-10—But you are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people for his own possession, that you may proclaim the excellencies of him who called you out of darkness into his marvelous light. Once you were not a people, but now you are God's people; once you had not received mercy, but now you have received mercy.

Application:

Do you believe you’re too far gone for Jesus to love you?

Are you willing to love the unlovely, even if it scandalizes you?

What is love? The message of Hosea is that real love is scandalous. That’s the glorious beauty of redemption.

If God loves like that, people will abuse His love! They’ll take advantage! What about holiness? What about obedience?

4) Repentance: Love Transforms

Visiting Dr. in Norfolk before Zeke—the best therapy is a loving home

After buying Gomer back, Hosea says this to her. . .

Hosea 3:3—And I said to her, “You must dwell as mine for many days. You shall not play the whore, or belong to another man; so will I also be to you.” 

Explain—“you’re not leaving me!!!”

Once again, Hosea’s life is an object lesson. It’s a picture of what will happen with God’s covenant people.

Hosea 3:4-5—For the children of Israel shall dwell many days without king or prince, without sacrifice or pillar, without ephod or household gods. 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.

The latter days are referring to what God would do through Christ, ushering in a New Covenant

God loves you as you are, but He loves you too much to leave you there

Hosea 14:1—Return, O Israel, to the Lord your God, for you have stumbled because of your iniquity.

Application:

Have you truly repented? Have you returned? Like Gomer, have you wandered away again?

If you repent, here is the promise for you. . .

Hosea 14:4—I will heal their apostasy; I will love them freely, for my anger has turned from them.

We don’t know the rest of Gomer’s story. At the lowest point in her life, her only hope was the undeserved love of Hosea. And I’d like to think that after she returned home she finally loved him back. Not perfectly, but truly.

So too with us. Our only hope is the undeserved love of Christ. And if we’ve truly received that love, we will love him back. Not perfectly, but truly.

What is love?

Here is love vast as the ocean, Loving-kindness as the flood, When the Prince of Life, our ransom, Shed for us His precious blood. Who His love will not remember? Who can cease to sing His praise? He can never be forgotten Throughout heav’n’s eternal days. On the Mount of Crucifixion, Fountains opened deep and wide; Through the flood-gates of God’s mercy Flowed a vast and gracious tide. Grace and love like mighty rivers Poured incessant from above; Heaven’s peace and perfect justice Kissed a guilty world in love. Here is love that conquered evil: Christ, the firstborn from the grave; Death has failed to be found equal To the life of Him Who saves. In the valley of our darkness Dawned His everlasting light; Perfect love in glorious radiance Has repelled death’s hellish night. That same love beyond all measure, Mocked and slain by hateful men, Lives and reigns in resurrection And can never die again. Here is love for all the ages, Radiant Sun of Heav’n He stands, Calling home His Father’s children, Holding forth His wounded hands. Here is love, vast as the heavens; Countless as the stars above Are the souls that He has ransomed, Precious daughters, treasured sons. We are called to feast forever on a love beyond our time; Glorious Father, Son, and Spirit Now with man are intertwined.

CLOSING SONG

BENEDICTION (Mike Klaassen)