Category: Hosea

Reading

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SAA Notes

Sin really is serious. It cuts us off from God, and from all blessings that flow from Him. The horror is in verses 7:8,9 – we get to the stage when we can no longer tell deception from blessing.

SJA Notes

* Lord God, Your word is broad and deep. Please teach us today that we would know You better.

“For I desire steadfast love and not sacrifice, the knowledge of God rather than burnt offerings.”

God is very clear, rote practice is not enough. Following rules is not enough. And He warns against bad religion, head-knowledge spiritualism.

“They do not cry to me from the heart, but they wail upon their beds;”

THE HEART.

True HEART religion is what God wants.

David wrestles with this in many of the Psalms, and we read in Psalm 51,

“For your will not delight in sacrifice, or I would give it; you will not be pleased with a burnt offering. The sacrifices of God are a broken spirit; a broken and contrite heart, O God, you will not despise.”

David tells us that a broken and contrite heart, a broken spirit – These make up true religion that pleases God.

Are our spirits broken before the Lord?

Do we walk in contriteness before our King?

* Mighty God,

We see all around us and through the world the many different practices of false religion.

Please mark us as a faithful people, founded in Your steadfast love and faithfulness.

Please save those around us Lord God, bring them to You. The True God.

Amen.

Reading

Audio, Visual

SAA Notes

God tells Hosea that all paths DO NOT lead to Him. Many paths, much religion, leads to spiritual prostitution. This is how God feels about it when His people follow their own made up god – God as we make him up to be. It is terrible when someone we trust or love is unfaithful and false. Let us be like Jesus: Faithful and True! Revelation 19:11

SJA Notes

* God Above, Please help us understand Your word today.

“There is no faithfulness or steadfast love, and no knowledge of God in the land;”

What a terrible reality this is.

We see God points directly to what happens when mankind rejects Him.

“… There is swearing, lying, murder, stealing, and committing adultery; they break all bounds, and bloodshed follows bloodshed.”

How much the world wants us to think “breaking free” is what we should be doing, breaking the tyranny of oppression!

The world tells us that the anti-hero, the rebel, the one who rejects authority and lives by their own moral code – That these are the true heroes, the ones we should pattern our lives after and even some times worship.

God’s word tells us otherwise.

Outside of Him we are all rebels living in rebellion to God.

Outside of Him we in truth have blind eyes and deaf ears, dead hearts and broken spirits.

Outside of Him we don’t find freedom at all, but oppression and slavery to our own lusts and desires.

What is the answer then?

It’s the same wonderful answer that God’s word gives us from start to finish.

Turn to Jesus!

Life in Christ brings us into a right relationship with our Maker God.

Life in Christ opens our eyes, unblocks our ears and makes our hearts alive, our spirits remade!

Life in Christ brings true freedom, free from the bonds of sin!

Hallelujah, what a Saviour!

* Holy God,

Thank You for Jesus – That because of Him we have a strong and steady assurance of salvation, of sanctification, and of our future hope in glory.

Please strengthen us today and onwards Lord God, draw us closer to You.

Amen.

Reading

Audio, Visual

SAA Notes

Peter quotes 2:23 as applying to gentile Christians in 1 Peter 2:10. Once we were Loammi (not God’s people), but now we are Ammi (God’s people). Hosea bought Gomer out of her slavery to the brothel and restored her as his wife. Is God any less patient and faithful?

SJA Notes

* Mighty God, break our stubborn wills today and show us Your wisdom as we read Your word.

“Now I will uncover her lewdness in the sight of hew lovers, and no one shall rescue her out of my hand.”

This is a hard word from the Lord, an extremely explicit passage.

God takes idolatry, rejection of Him, very seriously.

Israel was FAITH-LESS.

And so God brought punishment on His people for their continued refusal to turn from their worship of false gods toward Him, true worship of the true God.

There isn’t any power or dominion greater than our God.

Nobody can bind Him up and steal from Him, nobody can overpower Him or trick Him.

And nothing, no power or entity whether created or figmented can pull from out of His hand in judgement or in salvation.

And how good it is that God’s mercy allows us to move from one into the other.

“And I will have mercy on No Mercy, and I will say to Not My People, ‘You are my people’; and he shall say, ‘You are my God.'”

This is reality for God’s people today!

In Ephesians chapter 2 we read,

“But now in Christ Jesus you who were once far off have been brought near by the blood of Christ.”

Once we were FAR OFF (no mercy, not God’s people).

In Jesus our Saviour we are NEAR (mercy received, people of God).

This is our hope, our story – The truth to tell the world.

* Father God,

Thank You that You have not forsaken us.

Thank You that in Jesus we who were once FAR OFF are now NEAR.

Hallelujah, what a Saviour You are!

Amen.