| Passage: Hosea 1-7 On Saturday, September 28, 2013, Yujin wrote, My people are destroyed for lack of knowledge. And they do not cry to Me from their heart These two indictments against Israel are related. The first is their rejection of true knowledge from the law of God. The second is the misdirection of their appeals to God, which are not from their hearts for the Lord but rather from their mouths for the benefits they can get from Him. These two indictments are related in that their ignorance of God's truth led them to seek God in a wrong way. Friends, the same could be said for many today. Because people are ignorant of God's truth, they are easily swayed by wrong teaching come from preachers and theologians, who have dangerously taken the liberty not only to extract Scriptures out of their context but also to give new meanings to terms the Scripture clearly defines. For example, a notable theologian, Wayne Gruden, has shrugged off the weight of Scripture and history to redefine what the words "prophet" and "prophecy" mean to give contemporary self-proclaimed prophets a pass in being fallible and mistaken in their prophecies. The prophet of God and prophecies of God at their heart were infallible and without mistake, for this was how they were distinguished from the diviners and false prophets both in the Old and New Testament times. However, if people are ignorant of what God has said, they will take the persuasive words of Grudem as holy writ and allow this nefarious influence and corruption of truth into their churches. This is certainly a kind of wolf in sheep's clothing scenario. It threatens big and small churches alike, for the people are as sheep and the leaders are the ones that are propagating this ignorance and error. Friends, be warned. Your church is not immune. If you have groups taking regular pilgrimmages to places like IHOP (International House of Prayer) in Kansas City, your church is already in spiritual peril, for this would mean that your leadership has either embraced or are sympathetic to the Montanist-like heresy being practiced and propagated by the group. |
| Passage: Hosea 1-7 On Saturday, October 13, 2012, Fernando wrote, Hosea 3 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, I was surprised to read this passage since he was already married. The word for word translation of the ESV and NASB point to God directing Hosea to marry twice, entering into polygamy. Other translations take the interpretation that God sent him after his wayward wife and to bring her back home. But she isn't named. 'A woman' is said, not 'your woman' or 'wife'... Either way, I don't think it is a problem that God would direct a prophet like this. Nor does this give approval of polygamy, as some have claimed. God is not under a moral law, rather it is under him, so he isn't out of his authority to direct Hosea like this. Consider the killing (judgment) that Israel brought upon the Canaan - we are not to judge, but God gave them authority to do this. Consider the unclean deeds Ezekiel is made to do eat from dung-flames, he does not make all things clean till Peter's vision. It isn't against God's character to have his people break ceremonial laws or seemingly break moral laws only to create or enforce a greater law. If God is his people's righteousness what ceremonial rule could interfere? Consider that he uses a lying, deceiving, killer (LDK) to do what you expect an LDK to do... Lie, deceive and kill - namely Satan. Again, God is layered within himself an order. He is both judging and merciful, but does put one above the other given his purpose and means. |
| Passage: Hosea 1-7 On Friday, September 28, 2012 (Last Updated on 9/28/2023), Yujin wrote, “In that day,” declares the Lord, I will plant her for myself in the land; Here we have an early expression of the New Covenant in Hosea. Like the prophets Jeremiah and Ezekiel after him, he spoke of a covenant that God would both initiate and make effective. Thus, God says, "In that day...I will make a covenant...I will remove the names of the Baals from her lips... I will betroth you to me forever; I will betrothe you in righteousness and justice, in love and compassion. I will betroth you in faithfulness, and you will acknowledge the Lord." There does not seem in these statements any room for compromise or failure. The reason for this is that it is God Himself, who is sovereignly initiating and implementing these promises. God's "I will" will accomplish it. While it requires our participation, we are not the effective agents. God gives the faith. God does the work. Just like in Jeremiah, God writes His words upon hearts and minds. As in Ezekiel, God takes away the heart of stone and replaces it with a heart of flesh that is responsive to Him. We can speak of our salvation, but it has been given to us. We can speak of ourselves as saints, but it is the work of Christ that made us so. We can speak of our faith, but it is only effective because God made it so by His Spirit. Hosea and Gomer reflect God's faithfulness to His unfaithful wife. It is not Gomer that first asks for Hosea when she is a slave to her prositution. He goes after her and buys her back with his own initiative. God does the same for His people. They do not ask for Him as they wallow in their stubborn unbelief and sin. He goes after them. Just as Hosea makes Gomer his wife again, so God makes Israel His people again (cf. Hosea 3:1). The problem with both Israel and Judah was a depraved heart, which would not permit them to repent and turn back to God: Their deeds do not permit them The problem today is the same as in the days of Hosea, namely, our stubborn and rebellious hearts will not permit us to believe in Christ as our Lord and Savior. As Paul writes, "We were dead in our trespasses...and by nature deserving of wrath" (Ephesians 2:1,3). It is only by God's grace (Ephesians 2:5), even His enabling Word, that we can believe and be saved, for as Paul writes, "Faith comes by hearing and hearing by the Word of God (i.e. the decree of God)" (Romans 10:17). Now since it is God, who gives us new birth, so that we might believe, how can we fail to believe? While we doubt and sin throughout our Christian lives because we still live within the shell of our sinful natures, God's Spirit (i.e. the Spirit of Christ, the perfect seed), which has been placed within us, guarantees our inheritance of eternal life. Thus, we are secure in our salvation even though our sense of assurance may undulate with our ever-changing feelings and experiences. But as we better align our wavering feelings with the plumbline of God's promises in election, then we can truly throw off every anxiety and freely live as God's eternally chosen people. |
| Passage: Hosea 1-7 On Wednesday, September 28, 2011 (Last Updated on 9/28/2013), Yujin wrote, Friends, in Hosea 2:16-3:4 there is a repeated phrase, "in that day" (verse 16 and 21). This phrase projects the vision of Hosea from the present judgment of God on Israel and Judah to a time when God would reestablish them in the land and restore them to Himself (Hosea 2:23). At that time, they will call God "my husband" (Hosea 2:16). This looks forward to the time of the end, as described in Revelation 19-20, which speaks of the wedding supper of the Lamb and the people of God as the bride of Christ. At that time God says, "I will betrothe you to Me forever; I will betrothe you in righteousness and justice, in love and compassion. I will betrothe you in faithfulness and you will acknowledge the LORD" (Hosea 2:19-20). In Hosea 3:4 we read that for "many days" Israel would be without king or prince or a sacrificial system. These many days represent thousands of years, for that is how long they have been without king or prince or sacrificial system. But as Peter notes, "one day with the Lord is like a thousand years and a thousand years like one day" (2 Peter 3:8). However, there will come a time when they will return to the LORD and to their king, David (or perhaps the Davidic king, even Jesus the Messiah). At that time the sacrificial system will likely be restored. All evidence points to the Millennial Kingdom for the fulfilment of these kinds of end-times prophecies. Speaking of the same time period in the future, Peter writes, "The Lord is not slack concerning His promise, as some count slackness, but is longsuffering toward us, not willing that any should perish but that all should come to repentance." God's primary concern is that everyone, who is chosen for life, come to repentance and not perish in the coming judgment (i.e. the Great Tribulation of Revelation). In light of this, Peter gives this command regarding Christians living in the here and now: Therefore, since all these things will be dissolved, what manner of persons ought you to be in holy conduct and godliness, looking for and hastening the coming of the day of God, because of which the heavens will be dissolved, being on fire, and the elements will melt with fervent heat? Nevertheless we, according to His promise, look for new heavens and a new earth in which righteousness dwells (2 Peter 3:11-13). |