Israel’s Sin and Restoration Lesson 5 May 9, 2010

The Essence of Israel’s Sin No faithfulness No steadfast love No knowledge of God The Restoration of Israel God leaves the door to home open God makes home inviting God provides clear directions for getting home “There is nothing good about sin, not even when God makes use of it to achieve His glory. Israel’s response to God’s love should have been humble gratitude, devotion, and loving obedience, but it was not.” (“Love Divine and Unfailing: The Gospel According to Hosea”, by Michael Barrett, p. 127)

Moses spoke of the great privilege that Israel enjoyed: In the light of that privilege, Hosea admonishes Israel over their sin Deut 4:32-36 – “For ask now of the days that are past, which were before you, since the day that God created man on the earth, and ask from one end of heaven to the other, whether such a great thing as this has ever happened or was ever heard of. Did any people ever hear the voice of a god speaking out of the midst of the fire, as you have heard, and still live? Or has any god ever attempted to go and take a nation for himself from the midst of another nation, by trials, by signs, by wonders, and by war, by a mighty hand and an outstretched arm, and by great deeds of terror, all of which the Lord your God did for you in Egypt before your eyes? To you it was shown, that you might know that the Lord is God; there is no other besides him. Out of heaven he let you hear his voice, that he might discipline you. And on earth he let you see his great fire, and you heard his words out of the midst of the fire.

Israel was willfully forgetting God – not the forgetfulness of advancing age God’s punishment of willful forgetfulness is severe “At the root of this breaking of the covenant was the plain fact that the nation lived in willful oblivion to God: they forgot the Lord.” (“Love Divine and Unfailing: The Gospel According to Hosea”, by Michael Barrett, p. 129) Hos 13:4-6 – “But I am the Lord your God from the land of Egypt; you know no God but me, and besides me there is no savior. It was I who knew you in the wilderness, in the land of drought; but when they had grazed, they became full, they were filled, and their heart was lifted up; therefore they forgot me.” Psa 9:17 – “The wicked shall return to Sheol, all the nations that forget God.”

Some translations have the word truth, but the general idea is one of trustworthiness or dependability. Israel was not truthful about dependability. Israel could not be trusted with keeping the demands of the covenant. Hos 4:1 – “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.” Hos 8:2 – “To me they cry, ‘My God, we—Israel—know you.’” Hos 12:7, 8 – “A merchant, in whose hands are false balances, he loves to oppress. Ephraim has said, ‘Ah, but I am rich; I have found wealth for myself; in all my labors they cannot find in me iniquity or sin.’”

Israel did not have the attitude of loyalty required in a covenant. God’s steadfast love, however, never fails. Israel owed that same steadfast love to the Lord as part of their covenant agreement. That steadfast love would have been seen in obedience. Psa 136:1 – “Give thanks to the Lord, for he is good, for his steadfast love endures forever” Hos 6:4 – “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.”

Israel lacked an understanding about the truth of God. They had no experiential knowledge of God Ignorance of the law is never an excuse, but it is grounds for condemnation. Hos 5:4 – “…they know not the Lord.” Hos 6:6 – “For I desire steadfast love and not sacrifice, the knowledge of God rather than burnt offerings.” John 17:3 – “And this is eternal life, that they know you the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom you have sent.” Hos 4:6 – “My people are destroyed for lack of knowledge; because you have rejected knowledge, I reject you from being a priest to me. And since you have forgotten the law of your God, I also will forget your children.” Knowing God was the problem, but it is also the solution.

God provided messages of hope along side messages of judgment Psa 86:5 – “For you, O Lord, are good and forgiving, abounding in steadfast love to all who call upon you.” Israel had hope because God intervened with grace Eph 2:1-5 – “And you were dead in the trespasses and sins in which you once walked, following the course of this world, following the prince of the power of the air, the spirit that is now at work in the sons of disobedience— among whom we all once lived in the passions of our flesh, carrying out the desires of the body and the mind, and were by nature children of wrath, like the rest of mankind. But God, being rich in mercy, because of the great love with which he loved us, even when we were dead in our trespasses, made us alive together with Christ—by grace you have been saved…” Hos 2:1 – “Say to your brothers, ‘You are my people,’ and to your sisters, ‘You have received mercy.’”

Reconciliation – we know we are reconciled to God through Christ. Prosperity Hos 2:16 – “And in that day, declares the Lord, you will call me ‘My Husband,’ and no longer will you call me ‘My Baal (master).’” Hos 14:5-7 – “I will be like the dew to Israel; he shall blossom like the lily; he shall take root like the trees of Lebanon; his shoots shall spread out; his beauty shall be like the olive, and his fragrance like Lebanon. They shall return and dwell beneath my shadow; they shall flourish like the grain; they shall blossom like the vine; their fame shall be like the wine of Lebanon.”

Promise of Messiah Hos 1:11 – “And the children of Judah and the children of Israel shall be gathered together, and they shall appoint for themselves one head. And they shall go up from the land, for great shall be the day of Jezreel.” “The division of the kingdom was the direct historical consequence of Solomon’s pretensions to grandeur and the foolishness of his son Rehoboam. But spiritually the division demonstrated the nation’s apostasy from God. The people had rejected not only the house of David but also the sanctuary appointed by God in Jerusalem. They turned to worshipping the Lord after the patterns of the Canaanite religions and even to worshipping the Canaanite Baals themselves. The promise of the restoration of the house of David represented a return to a theocratic kingship to be personalized in the Messiah, the son of David.” (“Wayward but Loved”, by Ray Beeley, p. 24)

Promise of Messiah (cont) Hos 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.” “After the fall of their kingdom in 722 BC there was quite a trickle of such converts back to David’s kingdom…but Hosea is looking far into the future to the latter days…So our final verse captures the profound simplicity of the gospel. With the elaborate and humanly corrupted structures of verse 4 swept away, it portrays a people turning, seeking and coming to the Lord and His anointed, with deep penitence, yet – in that they are turning to his goodness – with trust in what the New Testament will call grace.” (“The Message of Hosea”, by Derek Kidner, p. 43, 44)

Hos 14:1-3 – “Return, O Israel, to the Lord your God, for you have stumbled because of your iniquity. Take with you words and return to the Lord; say to him, ‘Take away all iniquity; accept what is good, and we will pay with bulls the vows of our lips. Assyria shall not save us; we will not ride on horses; and we will say no more, ‘Our God,’ to the work of our hands. In you the orphan finds mercy.’” The way home is repentance. Confession – “Take away all iniquity” – they were sensitive to sin when God was in view. Commitment – “Accept what is good” – a true offer of obedience from a desire to please God. Praise – “We will pay with bulls the vows of our lips” – a resolve to worship. Dependence – “Assyria shall not save us…in you the orphan finds mercy” – forsaking every empty hope.

“The just then find a plain and an even way in the word of the Lord, and nothing stands in their path to obstruct their course, and by daily advances they attain to that which the Lord calls them - even their celestial inheritance. The just shall thus walk in the Lord’s ways, because the Lord will lead them, as it were, by the hand; faith will be to them for hundred eyes, and also for wings: and hope, at the same time sustains them; for they are armed with promises and encouragements…But what of the ungodly? They imagine all doubts, even the least, to be mountains: for as soon as they meet with any thing intricate or obscure, they are confounded, and say, ‘I would gladly seek to know the Holy Scripture, but I meet with so many difficulties.’ Hence when a doubt is suggested, they regard it as a mountain; nay, they purposely pretend doubts, that they may have some excuse, when they wish to evade the truth, and turn aside that they may not follow the Lord.” (“Calvin’s Commentaries”, Vol 13, p. 507) Hos 14:9 – “Whoever is wise, let him understand these things; whoever is discerning, let him know them; for the ways of the Lord are right, and the upright walk in them, but transgressors stumble in them.” Hosea provides encouragement for every believer that finds themselves dissatisfied with their spiritual condition – there is a way back to the Lord.