Hosea 8, Have You Forgotten God?

Hosea chapter 8 we reading the entire chapter here the Word of the Lord Set the trumpet to your lips one like a vulture is over the house of the

Lord Because they have transgressed my covenant and rebelled against my law To me they cry

My god, we Israel know you Israel has spurned the good the enemy shall pursue him.

They made kings, but not through me They set up princes, but I knew it not With their silver and gold they made idols for their own destruction.

I Have spurned your calf Oh Samaria. My anger burns against them.

How long will they be incapable of innocence? For it is from Israel a craftsman made it it is not

God the calf of Samaria shall be broken to pieces for they sow the wind and They shall reap the whirlwind

The standing grain has no heads It shall yield no flower if it were to yield strangers would devour it

Israel is swallowed up already They are among the nations as a useless vessel

For they have gone up to Assyria a wild donkey wandering alone. Ephraim has hired lovers though They hire allies among the nations

I will soon gather them up and the king and the princes shall soon writhe because of the tribute

Because Ephraim has multiplied altars for sinning they have become to him altars for sinning

Were I to write for him my laws by the ten thousands They would be regarded as a strange thing as for my sacrificial offerings

They sacrifice meat and eat it, but the Lord does not accept them now He will remember their iniquity and punish their sins.

They shall return to Egypt For Israel has forgotten his maker and built palaces and Judah has multiplied fortified cities

So I will send a fire upon his cities and it shall devour her strongholds

The Lord has blessings to the reading of his Holy Word. We'll ever forgot you had something like a tool

Maybe some simple like a putty knife or a piece of kitchen equipment Maybe like an ice cream scoop or an article of clothing like gloves

Something and then you go buy another one only later to discover Oh, I had it already find it in a closet somewhere a drawer.

Probably you forgot it because Because you don't use it that much that frequently and you thought replacing it was easy and cheap

So just go to the store get another one. You're probably not going to forget your car Because well you use it a lot and just the price of replacing it makes you remember.

Oh, yeah Yeah, I already have one of those. So you forget something you have when you two things

I guess you don't use it much and You think it's easy to replace right now

I'm wondering how this this pandemic and the restrictions or large gatherings is going to affect Mega churches you've heard of first world problems, you know, like obesity and body

Wi -Fi Well, there are there are large church problems which thankfully we don't have a lot of for us, you know, we can meet during all these restrictions because We're a small church in a big building

Right, you know the guideline for North Carolina Is that churches can meet with as many people as they can safely socially distance at least six feet apart

Which for us and we have we still have room for a lot more we can have all our members and Many as many visitors as long as we don't pull the curtain and go back to our normal way, but mega churches

Often are not able to meet at all because there's not you know big enough buildings to fit 5 ,000 people each of them six feet apart

They might be trying to do something online Which you understand maybe that's the best they can do for now, but it's really a very poor substitute

I think for actually meeting and now some are trying to meet outside But still that means that many of their people are going months

Without meeting in church and after a while that will just be a habit with them

Just not going to church and some of them maybe many of them will get so out of the habit of attending

Church that when things go back to normal that they'll forget All about church and many of them having forgotten about church

Without the weekly reminder that they get in church will eventually Forget about God.

Oh They won't forget there. There is a God I'm not predicting like I'm not predicting a mass movement to atheism

At least not yet. Just practically by not being reminded of God but not using

God in worship singing and prayer and being like things like the

Lord's Supper being reminded of things like There's sin their need for a

Savior things that we just easily forget Practically then after a while God becomes someone they say they believe in But that he has no involvement in their life and how they live in their decisions how they spend

Their time or their their money. They don't use him anymore. And so eventually

They forget they have him like the way you might forget you have an ice cream scoop if you never scoop ice cream or the you have a pair of Gloves if your hands never get cold,

I wonder if in a long -term Consequence of this pandemic and the response to it is that many people who used to attend churches

Will forget God What about you Have you forgotten

God? Well, you're here in church, so it's probably much less likely for you, but it's still possible

Especially if church attendance is just so much of a habit that you can't imagine not doing it

You're just raised every week. We're going to church this way and you you're gonna keep doing it no matter what

But maybe you forgot Why you do it? Have you forgotten

God? Here in Hosea chapter 8 we see people who have forgotten

God in four reasons Why they forgotten God first their misplaced confidence second their misappropriated

Autonomy third their misdirected dependence and finally their misremembered religion

Well people forget God if they have a misplaced confidence if they're they take the relationship with him just just for granted so like an ice cream scoop

God is easy to forget you can easily replace him. They think right, right. It's just easy.

It's cheap It's easy to replace so people have a misplaced confidence If they have a misplaced confidence in God, they think that even though they can neglect

God for a while Maybe skip worship for months or even years and they never even at home.

They're not praying They're not reading the Bible themselves. They just think they just assume it will be easy to pick back up with him

Again the the relationship with him they think it's cheap It's easy to reinstate

Kind of like a Facebook account ever canceled a Facebook account and you know how to what it takes to continue it

You just log back on and there it is It appears right here's right back just sign back on again and with God they think well sure

I may go months I may go years not even thinking about him, but just a quick prayer. Hey God, and I'm back there's nothing to be alarmed about people think if they go that go weeks or months without church and Then without prayer or Bible reading

Here though in Hosea chapter 8 Hosea warns them set a trumpet to your lips in verse 1 in other words

Sound the alarm that the trumpet was the the siren of their day something alarming has happened

So get the alarm ready get the siren ready There's a vulture over God's house the

Lord's house that is over the people over the nation It sees the vulture sees there's death coming and it's getting ready to feast and that's alarming, too

You see a vulture something dead is there warn people because they have transgressed My covenant

God says they've broken the agreement the agreement that is supposed to hold the relate their relationship with God together

And God says at the end of verse 1 they have rebelled against my law. They just reject it

They just do their own thing. They need to be warned about that with a trumpet an alarm because they have no awareness of it

They are confident that their relationship with God is good. It's fine that they know him

They say they know him in verse 2 to me. They cry It says the

Lord speaking to me. They're crying. So these are praying people sort of they're pleading to the

Lord we Israel Know you They are confident in their knowledge of the

Lord But their confidence is misplaced We know that because already

God has said in Hosea chapter 4 verse 4 that these people are being destroyed Because of their lack of knowledge about God because they don't know him.

But like a lot of religious people They're confident that they that they do know him. They call him my god.

They offer sacrifices. They do the religion thing They're not like those who stay away from church for months.

They're still religious. But despite their religion they forgot God actually Should correct that because of their religion

They forgot God Their religion taught that what

God wanted With sacrifices not steadfast love burnt offerings

Not the knowledge of God maybe today tithe checks not

Worship not connection with God's people So they would scrupulously go through the motions of their religion and then turn around and oppress their neighbor

Maybe make them drink from a different water fountain or send their kids to inferior schools and think well

God doesn't really care about that That they know God because they've done the religion thing. Their confidence was in their religion and it was misplaced we've had here here in the

South a Widespread religion and a teaching it tells people to put their confidence in something they've done

Maybe they came forward at an emotional invitation While the organ was softly playing just as I am or maybe they got baptized

You know those Church of Christ people I debated a little over a year ago tell people to trust in your baptism baptism saves

They tell people that this area is full of people who have placed their confidence in some

Religious thing that they've done and precisely because of that They put their confidence in that religious thing.

They've done usually with them every kid maybe because of that They've forgotten God They might be living together now with a boy or girlfriend without marriage and maybe drunken they may be obscene

They may be a porn addict They may have no interest like one lady We visited sometime back who was inactive member of her church and who admitted that she wasn't interested at all in coming back to church she wasn't interested in CDs of sermons or he listened to anything about the

Bible, but she was sure that she was saved because Look, they told her she was sometime back when she was a kid and she did something religious

They've been given a false assurance Trust in a prayer you pray in a baptism

You went through and maybe in the family's faith everybody in this family is a Christian or maybe just in the fact that they say

They believe So that assurance keeps them sedated and in the dark Feeling everything is fine.

So Hosea says Blow the trumpet Get that siren going warn them because they have put their confidence in something religious

They've done sacrifice without steadfast love They spurn the good in verse 3 like those who don't care about church anymore about the preaching of the word about the body

Because they they think they they don't need to care Because they can take

God for granted. They're fine as they are the result of that God says here the enemy shall pursue him

The world the flesh the devil our spiritual enemies will chase them will overcome them

They'll be conformed to the world. It'll be just like pagan people. The enemy will terrify them

Maybe cause them to panic about a virus because they're just like people in the world They think they basically deep down they think this life is all there is

So if the virus takes it their life is everything's over or maybe you'll make them chase dollars It's the way people in the world are they live for material things

So do they or maybe make them raise their kids just like this culture does and so the kids turn out just like this culture

Does just as narcissistic. This is undisciplined. This is unfaithful all because they forgot

God Jonathan Edwards noticed about people with false assurance Quote true conversion is a rare thing

But that men are bought brought off from a false. Hope of conversion after they are once settled and established in it

And have continued in it for some time is much more rare To unsettle them from it.

We need to to blow the trumpet of God's Word Sound the siren

Tell them like in first John chapter 2 verse 4 he who says

I know him Like these people here right Israel. We know you he who says

I know him but disobeys his commandments is a liar First John chapter 2 verse 4

He should know That he doesn't know God But he says he does because of his misplaced confidence

Have you forgotten God Don't place your confidence in a deal you made

You think with him some time back it puts him in the and the taken care of category

You know you go through life check off your boxes You think that you build a career a safer retirement take care of family and pay off God And you think

I could check that off No, that's how you'll forget God Second is a misappropriated autonomy that is

They thought they were sufficient to rule to lead to decide for themselves in verse 4.

They made Kings Israel in the last 20 years of his existence went through would just made one

King after another Think about five or six Kings in that short amount of time Many of them just reigned lasted just a few months and then they would be assassinated to coup and replaced by another one

And they were these new kings. They were not anointed by a prophet like Jehu They were there was no covenant from God to establish their kingship like with David But just because they they thought they could make themselves

King just because they could they could seize the power They had enough troops behind them.

So God says these Kings were not through me They set up princes, but I knew it not

Interesting there. I think side note. No, no here. I knew it not know here meaning that he he commanded it

Otherwise, he knew it not he did not command it to happen They thought they were sufficient in themselves to set up set up a government

That they could be a law into themselves Autonomous We think the same today when we think that we can ignore the laws of nature

When we make our own laws here in this country, you know, like redefining marriage that this now this country is not

Israel So I don't think we're bound to apply the Old Testament laws like from Leviticus But we are like all countries bound by the laws of nature.

That is God's laws expressed through Nature, it's called natural law

Two hundred and forty four years ago as of yesterday Congress signed a declaration of independence that some have thought since since then that is about Autonomy that is about self -rule that we can just make that we'll throw out the

King because we'll make rules for ourselves That you're gonna kind of the at childish attitude, you know, no one's the boss of me

Antinomian ism applied applied to politics. That's independence like you're independent from all rules but actually

That was not their attitude then that's not what the Declaration of Independence was based on It was based on natural law that God has revealed laws in nature

Like in the Declaration of Independence that all people are created equal and so none should be enslaved That we should submit and we should submit to what

God has revealed in nature So they said in that declaration the laws of nature and nature's

God And that meant that their rights are not just you know, not just kind of a

Autonomous idea. No one has the right to rule over me. No one has the right to tell me what to do That's autonomy, but know that there was a higher power

Than the king it was a king of the universe the creator who has endowed people with quote certain inalienable rights and God is the one who did that this country.

It was not originally based on Autonomy, even if many people now think so, but many people here in Israel Thought that they were also autonomous that they could set up Kings their own government at their own

Will that sense of autonomy if there being no rules though? No laws to have to follow no ultimate

King to have to submit to spilled over Into their religion to also they thought that they could worship.

However, they wanted maybe they make it seeker sensitive So they get they could do in it do in their religion.

Whatever people found Whatever people found exciting whatever draws in the crowds, you know, we got to bring the young people back to the altars

You know, they kind of had it too. They probably had committee meetings. How are we gonna bring the youth back to our altars? I got an idea.

Let's make one that looks like a bull. Yeah Sure, that's exciting Here they made a image of a calf

And now it fits the culture Right the Canaanites liked it for bail. They liked it the

Canaanites it worked for them. Maybe it'll work for us Let's have a calf of our own. They thought people liked the calf.

You can hear him talking in the committee meeting Yeah, people like the calf. They don't like that bear Simple altars that God's law requires.

Oh, that's too austere. It's too simplistic today people like Whatever music that's more about performance than about congregational worship, maybe short motivational speeches instead of expository sermons

You know from Scripture they want to hear positive and insights for living kind of thing

Give them what they want don't bore them with these long sermons on the Bible. Oh, they've misappropriated

Autonomy for their religion too. So God says he spurns Recognize that word he spurns their religion in verse 5 they spurned in verse 3

They spurned what is good. And so God spurns in verse 5 what they think is good that makes

God's anger burn against them and makes them in quote incapable of Innocence, they are incapable of being right

For because this is why they're incapable in verse 6 the calf idol That they made part of their worship and this is probably worship to the

Lord Understand this is not worship of some other God like Baal. This is worship to the Lord They but they thought we need an image despite it up a calf.

That's good But it is from Israel. It's from their imagination. It's from their idea of what is right what's attractive what we're bringing the people back to the altars a

Craftsman made it God says and he made it according to what the craftsman thought was a good idea

It is not from God. It's not God. So the calf of Samaria God says shall be broken to pieces

Now from the Reformation the reformed churches were committed to what they call the regulated principle of worship

Which means that we don't bring anything into worship That's not taught in the Word of God that worship

Is it a it's not just a kind of creative drama or a concert that we just got to throw anything into that We thinks will will bring in the crowds that makes for a good show

It's regulated by God's Word now Sometimes we might disagree on exactly how the

Word of God regulates it on what exactly to do But but we don't disagree on the fact that it does regulate it that it's not just left up to our

Imagination what to do for worship if you don't let Scripture regulate our worship if we just leave it up to our imagination we'll end up making worship and making our idea of God in an image to suit us shaped by us and Will be shaped by the world

In college, I had a friend who was just immersed in a prosperity gospel kind of extreme You know name it and claim it kind of church and and and and that of course

God is all about material blessings You know long life and you get everything the riches you want all about positivity positive confession and We were looking at this book at the inside of the inside cover this book

Which started with some really? harsh negative words like a whole paragraph and then on to the next page and it began with Set the trumpet to your lips and there were no like numbers there

So it wasn't like it wasn't obvious where it was from and so he says he said seeing that that's so negative

That's a bad confession. So I turned the page and then at the bottom of it

Hosea chapter 8 It was Hosea chapter 8 word for word He had criticized the

Word of God Ignorantly because his worship and his image of God was made in his image

About three months ago a local church trying to deal with a pandemic Okay, I got to sympathize somewhat through an online service thought that they could have a

Lord's Supper in which everyone served themselves Whatever food or drink that they wanted out of their kitchen at home

You know what coffee in a granola bar one person said RC Cola and little

Debbie cakes I was appalled. I Thought it was just outrageous

Basically, I think it you know, that's why you have pastors for so people aren't encouraged to do stuff like that We can't just make the

Lord's Supper anything. We want it to be if you can't we can't serve the Lord's Supper Biblically with some form of bread and wine or juice

Jesus one said fruit of the vine With the body discerning that is thinking about your impact on the body

Then don't serve it at all We are not Autonomous kind of self -ruling about what makes for the

Lord's Supper. We we can make it anything. We want it to be No, we can't we can't do that for worship either

Have you forgotten God? Don't think that your relationship with him your worship of him.

It's just totally up to you to suit your taste Whatever fits your culture fits your lifestyle as though hey as though he hasn't revealed anything

Seek to know him seek to know what he has revealed what he wants if you don't the result is in verse 7 judgment judgment more fearsome

Than they could have imagined Well, they've forgotten God because of their misplaced confidence their misappropriated autonomy

And now they're misdirected dependence This time he states the judgment up front

Up to now he says why and then the judgment this time. He tells him judgment first.

They sow the wind and They will reap the whirlwind We know that what?

What we sow we will also reap but here Hosea says yeah, that's true But sometimes you reap a lot more than you sowed

Sin is a seed that produces a bountiful crop

In 1942 a British general named Arthur Harris was put in charge of some of Britain's Air Force They had just beaten back the

German Blitz on England particularly on London when for the whole German Blitz 32 ,000

Britons were killed General Harris soon to be called bomber Harris. It was his nickname said when planning their counter -attack

Quote the Nazis entered the war under the rather childish delusion that they were going to bomb everyone else and nobody was going to bomb

Them at Rotterdam London, Warsaw and half a hundred other places. They put their rather naive theory into operation

They sowed the wind and now they're gonna reap the whirlwind in the bombing campaign that followed

Germany lost more people in some single nights Than their entire

Blitz had killed in England here Hosea chapter 8 the judgment comes first in Famine in verse 7 the standing grain has no heads.

No, no colonels. It shall yield no flour They're gonna starve and this rhymes in Hebrew.

So someone paraphrase it to rhyme in English a grain with no head yields no bread and Then even if they do manage to get some bread some flour out of their wheat

Hosea says strangers would devour it that is they'll be invaded and the invaders will just steal it.

They'll take it away So instead of having something to swallow Israel is swallowed up They're about to be consumed by the world around them because they're already like the world around them in verse 8

They've done this because they depend instead of on God by keeping their covenant with him

They depend on the world here on Assyria There may be later on Egypt and maybe we're back to Assyria or maybe in allies other countries

They can they can gather together But they sent to help from Assyria to make an alliance to rely on them for protection

Or maybe they'll turn to Egypt next whoever next they hire allies from among the nations

Like someone looking for a prostitute willing to pay anything here Israel directs their dependence on them on these allies

Going from nation to nation to make these allies in a desperate attempt to defend themselves

Their kings and their princes it kind of says they're writhing in pain at the tribute that is in the money that they're having to Pay in verse 10 this exorbitant amount of money this they're having to give out to get these allies

For protection, but they would but they would pay it Writhing all the whole time just agony ever thought it haven't had pay something a health insurance or for a car college tuition

So expensive, that's what they were doing for their tribute Even though God had promised them that if they keep their covenant with him

God will protect them But they didn't believe God they had forgotten God So God says he will gather them up and as he will corral them together to be shipped out

To be exiled to be scattered among the nations and that's exactly what happened Despite all they're looking for allies.

They're paying of tribute They're trying to protect themselves in the year 721 BC. The Assyrians came in and destroyed the northern kingdom of Israel Scattered them to the wind

Israel sowed the wind by misplacing their confidence in their rituals misappropriating autonomy thinking if they had the right to shape religion to suit them and Their misdirected dependence on whatever allies they could pay

The result was that they reaped the whirlwind and were wiped out all because they forgot

God finally, they forgot God because they misremembered their religion

Have you forgotten God? Now it's not likely that you've forgotten that there is a

God it's not here in church But have you forgotten him just practically it is part of your your daily life of how you how you make decisions

What decisions you make how you live why you live? Religion is ideally like church.

What we're doing now is ideally about reminding you of about God. It's when it no longer does that when we misremember what religion that the church is for and when we make it about something other than Remembering him maybe make it about patriotism or morality something like that Or just recognizing each other different times of the year when we make it out something other than remembering him worshipping hearing from God It's then that we're vulnerable to forget

God Have you forgotten God Well here

Ephraim as the northern kingdom of Israel has multiplied altars for sinning in verse 11

Probably meaning that they have they've made a lot of altars to sacrifice sin offerings on offerings to pay for their sin in other words

Since a multiply them there's altars everywhere go to Samaria altars every corner and there's a lot of religion which should

Ideally remind them about God if they remember what the religion is for but instead these altars have become

Altars for sinning that is they become an easy way to pay for sin and so get cheap grace you sin

Okay, just go pay for it. It's easy. There's an altar nearby I mean they cost that much of a sacrifice maybe a bird or something and you're forgiven and you go back and send some more so practically these altars encourage sin

Let us sin that sin offerings may abound they said Their religion had the effect then are producing more sin the sin offerings made forgiveness easy and cheap and so Easy to forget

God It's like many churches today where the kind of the unspoken rule is that you cannot mention the sin of any member

You realize that that's just a rule of many churches today You cannot mention you can mention the sin of people, you know, maybe in San Francisco Sure not the sin of people actually here in front of you because they might get offended and leave and above all we think that can't

Happen, right? That's the main Goals keep as many people as you possibly can. So the church then practically is turned into a sin club

Right. I won't can't mention your sin. You can't mention mine We're all happy if we all ignore each other's sin

In fact, we all enabling each other to sin because what we refuse to mention it a man refuses to lead his wife to keep his covenant and the problem something is when that refusal is dealt with so it's a sin

Club and the first rule of sin club is that no one talks about sin club God says in verse 12 that if he were to write for them tens of thousands of laws instead of welcoming the direction

Well, they would you know instead of saying good. Thank you God for the direction. We needed that we needed your guidance We needed your laws.

We need to know how to live. Well, they would see that as strange They don't want to hear from him. They want to do worship their way They want to make sacrifices and think that their religion covers their sin so that God will forget their sin

But he says in verse 13 that he does not accept those offerings, you know They multiply the offerings for sin.

God says I'm not accepting any of them They're all meaningless sacrifices because they misremembered what the religion is supposed to be about.

So God says that he will Remember their sin they forgotten God But God is not going to forget their sin and he will punish them for it the result being at the end of verse 13

That the Exodus is Undone many of them will return to Egypt fleeing as refugees because in verse 14

Israel has forgotten his maker Instead of remembering

God he says they built palaces that is to live in luxury big mansions

As though they will have peace forever you put a lot of money into a big expensive house

You're making a statement of faith that this is gonna last for my lifetime Their great mansions proved that they had misplaced their confidence that they didn't think judgment was coming palaces soon to be torn down brick by brick

Judah in the south multiplied fortified cities Depending on walls and ramparts and towers to protect them from any invader but 20 years after having destroyed the northern kingdom of Israel the

Assyrian army swept down to Judah and destroyed every one of those fortified cities except Jerusalem the fortifications they depended on Didn't save them so Put your confidence on him now sure

He can help you perhaps through through means through medicine or counselors or friends or allies or fortifications or spouse or whatever but depend on him

They misremember their religion Thinking it was about paying fire insurance to avoid the loss paying off God like he's a mafia boss

So they aren't punished for their sins their sacrifices were like like paying for illegal parking get rid of the ticket

Just to get the penalty cleared. Listen, there's no sense of a of a covenant with God no relationship of steadfast love with him

There's no knowledge of God involved here. The result God says at the end of verse 14 I will send fire upon his cities the torches of Assyrian soldiers burning down everything

God is sending those that fire from God through those invaders hands will devour those strongholds

They trusted in have you forgotten God? Maybe if you've misremembered what religion is for If you think it's about paying your dues

So God won't hold your sins against you clearing your record. It's about placating him.

So he doesn't hurt you Not really about a relationship made of love a covenant that you're committed to to really knowing him

Have you forgotten God To not forget about God Remember what church is for so you'll know the

Lord so you'll know that your sins are Aren't little that they're alarming their sound the trumpet

Alarming and if you don't have them dealt with the sin that you are now sowing to the wind

Will come back in a whirlwind of judgment worse than you could ever imagine

Know that the price of forgiveness the price to avoid that fire of judgment

It wasn't cheap It wasn't something that that you you can easily forget it took the

Son of God Dying on a cross for you and For you it demands your life your soul your all