Keep sharing good news without ads.
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 had his blessings to the reading of his Holy Word. We'll ever forgot you had something.
Like a tool.
Maybe something 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 gonna 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 of 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. It's 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 of 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 They're 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 without 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 and 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 was 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. There's 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 every kid maybe because of that. They've forgotten God. They might be living together now with a boy or girlfriend without marriage. They may be 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 an 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 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? Save for retirement take care of family and pay off God and you think we 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.
They've got five or six Kings in that short amount of time. Many of them just rain 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 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. 244 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 off the King because we'll make rules for ourselves.
That you're gonna kind of the 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 that 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 bare 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 to spice 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 kind of 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 you know, that's why you have pastors for so people are 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 once 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 their misdirected dependence. This time he states the judgment up front up to now. He's 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 seemed 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 the 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 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 a Syria that may be later on Egypt. They may go back to a Syria or maybe in allies other countries. They can they can gather together but they sent to help from a Syria 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 that 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 is so 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.
He's not here in church. But have you forgotten him just practically as part of your daily life of how you how you make decisions of? 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 about God. It's when it no longer does that when we misremember what religion but 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 are 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. They're probably meaning that they have they made a lot of altars to sacrifice sin offerings on offerings to pay for their sin.
In other words.
Since I multiply them there's altars everywhere go to some area 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 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 multiplied offerings for sin. God says I'm not accepting any of them. They're all meaningless sacrifices because they misremembered what their religion is supposed to be about.
So God says that he will Remember their sin they've 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.
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 a spouse or whatever but depend on him. They misremembered 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. 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 a Syrian 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. Don't forget.
That.