“I AM the Way, the Truth and the Life. No one comes to the Father except through Me”
John 14: 6
12 “Look, I AM coming soon! My reward is with Me, and I will give to each person according to what they have done. 13 I AM the Alpha and the Omega, the First and the Last, the Beginning and the End.
Amen. Come, Lord Jesus.
Revelation 22: 12-13
Pastors Noreen & Henry Kevern
Hosea, A Story of God’s Love and Judgment and Redemption, part 2
Hear the Word of HaShem, you children of Israel! For HaShem, has a controversy with the inhabitants of the land, because there is no truth, nor mercy, nor knowledge of G-d in the land. Swearing and lying, and killing, and stealing, and committing adultery! They break all bounds, and blood touches blood. Therefore does the land mourn, and every one that dwells therein does languish. Hosea 4:1-3 The Tanach (Jewish Bible)
God knows your heart. What you think, what you do, there is nothing that God cannot see or know. Our lives are an open book to God. Many people think that they have plenty of time, and claim to be a Christian but live a life in opposition to God’s righteous requirements. Surrender is sweet and following the way of the LORD leads you into some very awesome blessings.
Let’s look at life today. There is not much good news. Christians are silent, allowing the devil to use freedom as a way to live in sin. We do not get to decide what is good and what is evil. This is God’s world that He created. There cannot be a different set of rules for each person. No one is perfect, only God is perfect and He calls us to learn His way. God loves us and would rather that we accept His rules. He does not want us to go to hell and burn for eternity. He gave us the gift of free will and wants us to choose to follow Him. God came to earth as a human being, Jesus Christ. Jesus lived a life as God wants us to live. Jesus was tempted in every way that we are, but He did not sin. God will not stop sin; we have to choose to stop ourselves from sinning. We must learn self-control and keep ourselves from sinning. We have to know what sin is in order to learn. We have to call on God to help us to not sin. We must call out to Jesus, saying, “Help me LORD” when we feel temptation to sin. We surround ourselves with GOD in order that He builds His wall around us to protect us from the evil one. Many think that because they have read some of the Bible or go to church and hear some of the Bible, or think that because they have read the Bible once (and not usually the whole Bible but bits and pieces) that there is nothing else to learn. Jesus tells us that we are to come to Him as little children and learn. Jesus did not just appear one day all grown up and start preaching. Jesus was conceived in Mary’s womb, just as we are conceived in our mothers’ wombs. God started His life on earth as an infant, just as we begin life. He nursed on Mary’s breast. He learned to crawl, to sit, to stand, to walk. He learned to talk, He learned to read and write. At 12 He stayed behind in Jerusalem, and talked with the teachers of the Law. He obeyed His parents. He learned carpentry from Joseph His earthly father. He lived and learned as every human does. At about 30, Jesus began the life He came to give. He knew the cross was at the end of this life on earth and He knew it was going to hurt. He came willing to be a human to show the depth of God’s love for us. The people He chose to teach and to learn to walk with Him, the Jewish people, did not follow God completely. After Adam and Eve were sent out of the garden, God sent out prophets to teach God’s people. Time after time, the Israelites would come and follow God and then there flesh got the better of them and they fell into sin again. And so God would send another person to call them back to Him. And when that did not work, He came down here to show us the way.
Let’s look at the 10 Commandments that God gave to us. These are the standards that we will be judged upon and the guidelines for life. From Exodus 20:1-17
And God spoke all these words:
1. 2 “I AM the Lord your God, Who brought you out of Egypt, out of the land of slavery. 3 “You shall have no other gods before[a] Me. This means that we are not to worship anything or anyone above God. Not cars, money, people, houses, clothes, anything that we place as important and above all things in our lives is an idol. The very show American Idol, is idol worship.
2. 4 “You shall not make for yourself an image in the form of anything in heaven above or on the earth beneath or in the waters below. 5 You shall not bow down to them or worship them; for I, the Lord your God, AM a jealous God, punishing the children for the sin of the parents to the third and fourth generation of those who hate Me, 6 but showing love to a thousand generations of those who love Me and keep My commandments. We are not to make an image of angels, of humans, or animals or sea creatures and bow down and worship. We are only to worship God. For instance, if you idolize a baseball player, you are sinning.
3. 7 “You shall not misuse the Name of the Lord your God, for the Lord will not hold anyone guiltless who misuses His Name. You are not to use the LORD’s Name in vain. Jesus Christ is not a curse word. God does not damn someone or something because we say so.
4. 8 “Remember the Sabbath day by keeping it holy. 9 Six days you shall labor and do all your work, 10 but the seventh day is a Sabbath to the Lord your God. On it you shall not do any work, neither you, nor your son or daughter, nor your male or female servant, nor your animals, nor any foreigner residing in your towns. 11 For in six days the Lord made the heavens and the earth, the sea, and all that is in them, but He rested on the seventh day. Therefore the Lord blessed the Sabbath day and made it holy. God wants us to rest from our labors. He wants us to worship Him and praise Him in spirit and in truth. We are to do no work but spend time worshipping God and enjoying our families.
5. 12 “Honor your father and your mother, so that you may live long in the land the Lord your God is giving you. We are to give honor to our mother and father even if they are not following the way of the LORD. We are to forgive them when they fail. It may be hard when your parent is sinful, but we are called by God to honor them. Remember that God is your parent and honor Him.
6. 13 “You shall not murder. This says murder, not kill. What is the difference? Murder is taking someone’s life away because we are angry, or we do not want a child at this time, or because of hate, you take someone’s life. Killing someone in war is not murder. Killing someone in self-defense is not murder.
7. 14 “You shall not commit adultery. Even if you look at another with lust, you are committing adultery. When you marry, grow your relationship with both God and your spouse, firmly committing and growing in God’s grace and continuing to love your spouse as God loves you. We are to be help-mates to each other and to desire and do in love for the other.
8. 15 “You shall not steal. Taking something that is not yours is stealing, even if it is a pencil. Just because a door is open, it does not give you permission to enter and take what you want.
9. 16 “You shall not give false testimony against your neighbor. You are not to spread lies about your neighbor. Gossip is spreading lies even if you think it is the truth.
10. 17 “You shall not covet your neighbor’s house. You shall not covet your neighbor’s wife, or his male or female servant, his ox or donkey, or anything that belongs to your neighbor.” You shall not want things that others have. Cars, houses, any time we wish we had something someone else has, and we keep asking how come they have this or that and we do not, is coveting.
Hosea’s wife left him and committed adultery with another man. God told Hosea to go to her and reconcile with her and to love her. Let’s think about this for a moment. Gomer ran off with another man and God told Hosea to go and love her again. First of all, God tells Hosea to marry Gomer, who was promiscuous (immoral, uninhibited) woman. Then because she is unfaithful to Gomer, she leaves him for another man. Would you want to do this? God is using Hosea to prove His point; when we sin, we commit adultery against God. Sin removes us from God’s presence and leads us into following the devil. God is showing here that He still wants us to come to Him and ask Him to forgive us, to reconcile with God. God’s love never ends and He always calls out to us to come to Him and allow Him to show His love to us. God will never force His love upon us. God calls us to be faithful in all our relationships and to forgive and to continue to love, even what situations between people is adulterous or hurtful. He is willing and does continue to love everyone even though people reject Him. God wants you to choose Him and to love Him. We are created by God and for God. God is always holding out His hand to you, calling to you in your sin, and cries out to you to take His hand.
Hear the Word of the LORD, because the LORD has a charge to bring against you who live in the land; “There is not faithfulness, no love, no acknowledgment of God in the land. There is only cursing, lying and murder, stealing and adultery; they break all bounds, and bloodshed follows bloodshed.” Hosea 4:1-2
Look at our world. There is no faithfulness to God and our leaders have taken God out of our country, our schools, and our very lives. We are told that if we preach the Word of God and hold to God’s truths, that we are bigots, and haters. People curse God, they lie, and murder, sexual immorality is rampart and officially we are now Sodom and Gomorrah with the ruling from the high court of this land about marriage and abortion. “My people are destroyed from lack of knowledge. Because you have rejected knowledge, I also reject you as My priests; because you have ignored the law of your God, I also will ignore your children” (Hosea 4:5b-6) We reject God’s knowledge and embrace Satan’s knowledge. We are destroyed because of our lack of knowledge because we have ignored God’s Word and so we are ignored by God because we have rejected Him. We break all of God’s bounds and have joined with Satan to our ruin. WE have deserted the LORD.
But there is hope for us. Jesus loves us and wants us to come to Him and except Him as LORD and Savior. God is still calling to everyone to return to Him. As Christians, we are called to share Jesus. We are called to be holy people, after God’s heart and to live our lives in His Spirit.