THE RUGGED ROAD TO REPENTANCE
Hosea 2:1-7
Hosea was a prophet with a
problem. The problem was his wife. He had been told by God to go out and marry
Gomer. The problem wasn’t her name; the
problem was her profession. She was a
woman of the streets. She was a woman
who sold her body to be used by other men.
Commentators have struggled
with these instructions. The Bible is
quite clear in teaching that we are not to be unequally yoked with
unbelievers. These instructions to Hosea
seem to be terribly wrong. Calvin taught
that the Hosea story was just a parable and that it really didn’t happen at
all. I am certain that Hosea wished that
were the case. His story was meant,
after a sense, to be a parable. It was a
living parable. He was to act out in his
life and in his marriage the relationship between the faithful God of the
universe and the unfaithful people of
Why did the prophet have to
be so personally involved in this parable?
I think it was that he might FEEL the pain caused by his unfaithful
bride. He was to feel what God felt. His spirit was to be grieved in the same way
that God’s Spirit is grieved by spiritual unfaithfulness. It was only in such a way that Hosea could
call the people back to repentance.
It is that call that we see
as we come to chapter 2. As we read this
call, we should read with it the pathos and the heart-longing of one who has
suffered the pains of marital betrayal and who yet calls his beloved to come
home.
1 Say to your brothers, "Ammi,"
and to your sisters, "Ruhamah."
2 "Contend with your mother, contend,
For
she is not my wife, and I am not her husband;
And
let her put away her harlotry from her face,
And
her adultery from between her breasts,
3 Lest I strip her naked
And
expose her as on the day when she was born.
I
will also make her like a wilderness,
Make
her like desert land, And slay her with thirst.
4 "Also, I will have no compassion on her
children,
Because they are children of harlotry.
5 "For their mother has played the harlot;
She
who conceived them has acted shamefully.
For
she said, 'I will go after my lovers,
Who
give me my bread and my water,
My wool and my flax, my oil and my drink.'
6 "Therefore, behold, I will hedge up her way with
thorns,
And
I will build a wall against her so that she cannot find her paths.
7 "And she will pursue her lovers, but she will
not overtake them;
And
she will seek them, but will not find them.
Then
she will say, 'I will go back to my first husband,
For it was better for me then than now!'” (Hosea 2:1‑7).
This passage at first glance
does not seem to be pleasant. It is
filled with judgment and contention and hardship. You can feel the pain. But there is also hope in this passage. Our first hint of hope comes in the first
verse where there is a play on the names of the children of Hosea.
Say to your brothers, "Ammi,"
and to your sisters, "Ruhamah." (Hosea 2:1).
In the previous chapter, we
find that Hosea had several children and that their names were prophetically
significant. Their names pointed to
God’s judgment against His people.
• His son was named Lo-Ammi.
The
Hebrew term Lo means “no” or “not.”
Ammi is
“my people.”
His
son’s name meant: “Not my people.”
That
was a crushing name. It was God’s way of
saying, “Even though you are the physical descendants of Abraham, the chosen
people, your sinful unbelief has brought you to the point where you are not My people.”
• His daughter was named Lo-Ruhamah.
The
Hebrew term Lo means “no” or “not.”
Ruhamah
is “to find compassion.”
His
daughter’s name meant, “You will not find compassion.” That is not a very comforting name. Compassionless.
Hosea had started this book
by warning the people that they had come to a point in their spiritual lives where
they were
• Lo-Ammi:
Not God’s people.
• Lo-Ruhamah:
Cut off from God’s compassion.
But now there is a
change. It comes in the form of a
promise how there will come God’s appointed leader — His Messiah. He promises at the end of chapter 1 that
there will come a time when:
(1) They
will be called the sons of the living God (1:10).
(2) Instead
of being scattered, the sons of
(3) They
will appoint for themselves one leader and it will be God’s leader; God’s
Messiah.
You would think that
everything would now be sweetness and light.
It is not. Hosea looks to a
future Messiah, but he lives in a present dilemma of
|
God’s present judgment |
(Tension) |
God’s future salvation |
|
|
How does God bring His people
from their present rebellion to their future repentance? How do they get there from here?
In the case of
I want to look at three of
the landmarks along the way of their spiritual journey. As we look at their spiritual journey,
perhaps we will see familiar landmarks of our own spiritual journey. It is a journey of repentance and it is a
journey designed to bring you home.
1. God
Draws you to Repentance by Exposing your Spiritual Nakedness: Lest I strip her naked and expose her as
on the day when she was born (2:3).
One
of the hallmarks of the Assyrian onslaught would be that the captives would
have their clothing removed. Clothes
were for free people. It was not a right
or a privilege guaranteed to captives or to slaves.
There
is in the Scripture a theology of clothing.
It begins far back in the Garden of Eden. You remember the story. Adam and Eve were placed into a garden where
they had no need of anything; not even clothing.
But
soon there came a smooth-talking serpent and Eve was deceived and Adam went
along with it and a bite of the forbidden fruit led to their eyes being opened
and a realization that all was not right with the world or with themselves. They were
exposed. They were naked. They sought to cover themselves with
self-made garments of fig leaves. The
results would have been less than desirable.
Then
God came and began to ask questions.
“Where
are you?”
“Why
are you hiding?”
“Who
told you that you were naked?”
“What
have you done?”
“Have
you eaten of that which was forbidden?”
Each
question was designed to strip away their fig leaves of self righteousness and
to leave them naked and without excuse before the eyes of their Holy
Judge. It was only when their sin was
exposed that God moved in grace to give them a promise and a covering. The covering came in the form of coats of
skin and the promise looked forward to a future Messiah who would destroy the
work of the tempter and who would set wrong to right.
What
God did physically in the Garden in exposing a physical nakedness, Jesus did
spiritually in His Sermon on the Mount.
The Sermon on the Mount is a sermon that tells what it means to be like
God. It involves a paradigm shift from
the popular self-made religion of the day to a picture of true righteousness
and justice.
Jesus
describes the law behind the law when He says:
• You’ve heard it said that you should not
murder. I say that you should not hate
or harbor bitterness in your heart.
• You’ve heard it said that you should not
steal. I say that you should not covet
or desire the possessions of another.
• You’ve heard it said that you should not
commit adultery. I say that you should
not allow your heart to entertain illicit thoughts.
• You’ve heard it said that you keep your
legal obligations. I say that you need
to keep your spiritual obligations.
Do
you see it? The Law points to the
righteousness of God and says, “That is the standard by which you are to be
judged.” In doing so, it strips away the
veneer of self-righteous fig leaves and it leaves you poor and naked before the
eyes of your God. It is only then, when
you have abandoned your tattered fig leaves, that God comes and clothes you
with His royal robes of righteousness.
Here is the progression:
|
We cover up |
→ |
God uncovers |
→ |
Then God covers |
2. God
Draws you to Repentance by Cultivating your Spiritual Thirst: I will also make her like a wilderness, Make
her like desert land, And slay her with thirst.(2:3).
The
context of this passage looks to the judgment God would bring upon
Most
of you know that Paula and I were recently in the
What
was interesting was when we came into a Bedouin tent and were served food for
our journey. They gave us hot, spicy
food—the kind that catches your throat on fire.
Why? Because that kind of food
makes you thirsty and forces you to drink and to take in the very water that
you need to take in.
What
God was going to do to
He
fills us with a spiritual hunger.
He
entices us with a spiritual thirst.
We
often try our own ways and means to fill those needs. We try to excel in our careers,
we try to grow in power and in popularity.
We try to fill that emptiness with a special person in our lives. We try to find meaning in our children or our
grandchildren. We go out in a vain
search for those twin desires of security and significance and none of it lasts
because those are all insufficient to fill the void that is so great that it
can only be filled by the God of the Universe.
3. God Draws you to Repentance by Restricting your Spiritual
Options: Therefore, behold, I will
hedge up her way with thorns, and I will build a wall against her so that she
cannot find her paths (2:6).
This
is the language of a shepherd. The
shepherd knows his sheep and he knows that the one characteristic common to
sheep is that they tend to wander away.
As long as they follow the shepherd, they are allowed to move about as
he leads them to the pastoral lands where they can feed. But when they begin to wander, he brings them
back to the fold.
Of
what does the fold consist? Of what
materials do you make a sheepfold in the
Are
there any rocks in your life? Any thorns? Are there
things in your life that are hindering your headlong pursuit of the Great
American Dream?
• It might be your financial situation.
• It might be a lack of power or a lack of
prestige.
• It might be a physical issue.
Or
perhaps your rocks are not of the physical nature, but you’ve been no less
thirsty in a dry and thirsty land.
You’ve had the experience of Solomon who tried it all and tasted it all
and found that it really doesn’t satisfy and at the end of days your life has
become a series of empty experiences.
What
is going on? It could be that God is
building a hedge and a wall around your own life to stop you from seeking other
lovers — other things to satisfy the longing that only He can satisfy.
Paul
spoke of a thorn in the flesh that he was given to keep him from exalting
himself (2 Corinthians 12:7). He had
come to the realization that this thorny situation, this rocky road, was there
for his own benefit and for his own spiritual growth. What I am suggesting is that the rocks and
thorns in your own life are there for the same reason.
At
the end of verse seven we read:
Then
she will say, 'I will go back to my first husband,
For it was better for me then than now!'” (2:7).
Have
you come to that point in your own spiritual journey? Note that this isn’t written to those who
never knew the Lord. If that describes
you, if you have never heard how Christ died in your place upon the cross as a
sacrifice for sins, how He was buried, and how He rose from the dead, then you
are invited to hear and to believe that good news.
But
this passage is written for those who heard that good news once upon a time and
who met that message with at least a measure of belief. But then you strayed. Like sheep without a shepherd, you wandered
away. Like a ship no longer attached to
her anchor, you drifted.
Now
you are feeling the unsettling effects of your spiritual nakedness and the
grating dissatisfaction of your spiritual thirst and your very life has seemed
to hem you in.
It
is time to repent, to turn your steps and your heart back to the Lord. God is drawing you back to Himself. It is time to come home.
When
you come, you do not find judgment or condemnation. You find a table and the welcome arms of your
Heavenly Father. You are called to come
and eat the bread that satisfies and to drink that which can quench your
thirst.
We are instructed by the
Scriptures to examine ourselves. Indeed,
the Scriptures place great emphasis upon such self-examination. Listen to some of the following instructions:
2 Corinthians 13:5.
Test yourselves to see if you are in the faith; examine yourselves!
Or do you not recognize this about yourselves, that
Jesus Christ is in you‑‑ unless indeed you fail the test?
Galatians 6:4. But
let each one examine his own work.
1 Corinthians 11:27‑28. Therefore whoever eats the bread or drinks
the cup of the Lord in an unworthy manner, shall be
guilty of the body and the blood of the Lord.
28 But let a man examine himself, and so let him eat of
the bread and drink of the cup.
Why is self-examination so
important? It is important because we
are inclined to depart from the grace of God.
That is why the Scriptures so often call us to return and to remain in
Him.
It is possible to be deceived
regarding our own spiritual status.
Jesus warned that at the last day there would be some who fully expected
to be citizens of the kingdom who would hear those awful words, “I never knew
you.”
There is an old saying that goes:
You can fool some of the people some of the time, but you cannot fool all of
the people all of the time. The truth is
that you cannot fool God any of the time, and while you might be able to fool
others some of the time, you are normally able to fool yourself most of the
time.
That is why Paul says to test
yourself to see if you are in the faith.
When I was with the Fire Department, we would roll up to the scene of
the emergency and we would find an unconscious patient. One of the first things we would do is to
look for signs of life. Was the patient
breathing? Was his heart beating?
If these signs were not
present, then we would take appropriate action.
The Bible does the same thing. It
gives us signs of spiritual life and we can use these to perform a spiritual
diagnosis. It is for this reason that
you are to look at your life and you are to see if there are signs of
life. Is there...
•
Faith and dependence upon Jesus Christ
• A
love of the brethren
• A
growing desire to please the Lord
It may be that God is drawing
you today to repentance, having stripped you bare,
having created a spiritual hunger and a spiritual thirst, having hemmed you in,
so that He can...
• Clothe you with the righteousness of
Christ that has been credited to you.
• Feed you and have you drink of that which
will be an everlasting spring of life.
• Set you free with a real freedom in
Christ.
It is at a time such as this
that you might pray the prayer of the man who brought his son to Jesus to be
healed:
•
Lord, I believe. Help my unbelief.
•
Lord, I love. Help my lack of love.
•
Lord, I want to obey. Help my obedience.
And then you come to meet the
One who...
•
Obeyed in your place.
•
Loved you to death.
•
Accomplished the work on the cross in which you can trust and rely.
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