Address—Stephen Rule
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Let's begin our meeting this afternoon by returning to a hymn we sang yesterday. We won't sing as much of it this time. We'll sing 4 verses out of it #64 if we'd sing verses 3:00 to 6:00.
But someone else have to start in a moment before we do these. The words that impressed me yesterday when we were singing it. And part of the burden on my heart is that when we're done this afternoon, we would see more of the person who's actively at work in our life. And so when we sang the words yesterday, our God, the center is his presence, fills that land.
I thought it would be a wonderful way to begin singing again this afternoon, so if someone would start.
#64 Beginning with verse three, we'll sing down to verse 6.
I'll share with you a little bit of the burden on my heart and I'll give you a little outline of where we'll head this afternoon.
I'd like to take up the subject of idolatry in the Book of Hosea.
That sounds intimidating and scary and abrasive. That's not the burden that's on my heart. Burdens that's on my heart is what we shared in the hymn that we would come to know the person who's actively at work in our lives to remove those idols. So we're going to apply some things the book of Hosea has written to Israel, obviously.
Dealing with primarily the 10 tribes.
The problems that they had with idolatry and how good God took them away.
But yesterday we had how or not yesterday, but Friday, how we were called out or called out people. And Abraham was called out and he was called out from that land of idols. And we were referred to Joshua 24, how he was called out from beyond the flood where there were idols. He comes into the land, he's got that altar, he worships God and he leaves it and he has to be brought back.
And Jacob comes along.
And Jacob goes back, and what's he bring from that far land in Rachel's baggage? He brings idols, and those idols need to be taken care of to enjoy the land. And so finally, later in his life, when he's heading to Bethel, the place where Abraham spent time, those idols get buried.
And then the nation of Israel gets taken out of the land of Egypt, and they come out of that land, and what do they bring with them? They bring idols, and they're in the wilderness and they're not very far along their way, and they're worshipping the golden calf. And the Lord has to take it out so that he can enjoy that fellowship that he wants with his people.
And that's the burden on my heart, I want to tell you.
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I've already said the focus, the center, what I've enjoyed in reading and rereading and reading and rereading the book of Hosea and certain chapters in it is over and over and over again. We're going to hear those words. I will.
It's God at work in your life. It's God at work in your life when he frustrates you.
It's God at work in your life when you feel abandoned by Him, and we'll see that in the book of Hosea.
It's God at work in your life when it goes through the baby book of your spiritual journey and He draws out and explains His love to you. And it's got at work when He brings us in to that point where we can leave those idols behind. But it's a process. It was a process with Israel. This book that will spend most of our time in this afternoon was written approximately 2750 years ago.
And most of it's not accomplished yet.
2750 years of God's patience.
That same patient God is at work in your life and in mine so that He can bring us together in full fellowship with Himself to enjoy Himself. That's the burden that's on my heart. But sometimes we slip when we fall and we have to go back over things. So I'm going to give you a visual picture to hang part of the message on.
Monday morning.
I was in our kitchen and running just a little bit late. A few minutes late. And so I was hustling around, went to the fridge, grabbed milk for Paul and the orange juice and a bottle of hot sauce and a nice quart jar of chopped up jalapenos. And Add all four of these things in my arm and I was hustling a little faster than normal across the kitchen floor and the next thing I knew I was flat on.
Back and the jalapeno jar was smashed. There's glass everywhere and there were jalapenos everywhere and I was lying there stunned. I didn't, I didn't get up for a moment or two. How did I get here?
I had no idea how I got there. I had to think back through it.
We have a refrigerator and about six weeks or so ago that refrigerator developed a problem where the defrost drained, that water started to pool at the bottom of the fridge and then we first noticed it when it pulled to the bottom of the fridge and overflowed onto the floor. Found the problem and.
Having tried to learn in life to not leave problems that involve solutions that require technical expertise that I don't possess, I went to the.
Fount of all knowledge YouTube and.
Speaking facetiously but there's a lot of useful information and I was looking for our model of fridge and I couldn't find it but I found something similar so I watched the 10 minute video or something on how to repair your defrost drain on your fridge and it's beyond me.
It was beyond my technical expertise you had. I would just have to handle it on a Saturday someday where you can take everything out of the fridge and put it all in the back porch and remove all the shelves and unscrew the inside of the fridge and get some kind of hot water and make sure you have plenty of it. And you pour it down this drain in the center of the fridge and you'll clear it out. So I'm going to do this, but it's warm outside and it's going to take a while and I'll wait till it's a little cooler and in the interim we'll.
The bottom of the fridge.
Done that in your life, Found a problem, recognized it and gone. Looking for a solution somewhere and it's complicated. Can't get rid of that problem, but I'll patch it up.
You may have an idol in your life and you're aware of it, and you'll patch it up. And so we did. We mopped out the bottom. We waited for the colder weather. Colder weather came, and it wasn't quite so convenient to deal with quite yet.
And a whole week went by instead of a few days, and that water had come out of the fridge along underneath the mat in front of the kitchen sink. And when I took off across the kitchen, thinking about hurrying with the breakfast routine, my foot hit that get it out from under me and I was flat on my back.
And that may happen. We're going to look at how the Lord uses frustration in our life to bring us to really deal with an idol that's been there.
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That we've been aware of. And so the Lord did. Umm.
Let's spare you the details because it's secondary that night.
That night, not six more weeks, pulled the fridge out and found the blockage in the drain. It was so much easier than it looked like and I got help from multiple people, my dad and my wife, and cleaned out the drain that was clogged with gunk. Put it back in and the next morning checked in the bottom of the fridge and bone dry. Beautiful taken care of.
And I got an e-mail at work partway through the day. There's water in the same spot on the kitchen.
More sometimes these matters with idols, they keep popping up, they go in their back because you haven't gotten to the root of it. Well, we had actually, in this particular case, we had gotten to the root of it. We had found the blockage, but when we put the drain back in, we just kind of aimed it at the bottom of the fridge instead of bending a little bit into the drain pan where it belonged. So that night we got to look at it again and solve the problem and at least.
Thursday morning, anyway, both the spots that we're supposed to be bone dry, we're still bone dry.
You've got to go back to the root and if we're waiting and we're waiting for something to get dealt with.
Then it's not going to happen. We've got to go and allow the Lord. Really.
To go back to the root, help us to deal with it so that we can walk and fellowship with them. That's his delight. So let's turn to the Hosea 14/8.
This was written down on my.
Memory, My memory exists on paper. It's written down on my memory this morning. I don't think I've ever heard it read in the breaking of bread before. Maybe in your local assembly it's a staple, but I've never heard it before until I heard it this morning. Just made me smile. There's 31,109 verses in the word of God. The Lord had that for us this morning. I believe the Lord has that for us this afternoon. So let's begin with that theme for the rest of our meeting.
Hosea 14, verse eight. Here's the conclusion of the matter.
This is what God wants, and it's a conversation. He wants fellowship with you and He wants fellowship with me, and He's going to work to remove all those things where our eyes are turning other places so that He can have that conversation with us. It's got four parts to it. The Lord speaks twice. Israel speaks twice, and so Israel speaks first. Ephraim, the 10 tribes in particular, I'm going to speak of them usually as Israel.
But their special problem was idolatry, for which they were removed from the land. And it says Ephraim shall say.
What have I to do anymore with idols? Isn't that beautiful?
That's what God wants. He wants to bring our heart to the point where we say I don't want him anymore.
What do I have to do with those anymore? I have something, I have someone so much better. What have I to do anymore with idols? And the Lord answers. The next clause is the Lord speaking. And the Lord says I have heard him. You know, perhaps in your life and in mine. We feel like the Lord either doesn't care.
Or he's not paying any attention.
But his ear is listening for the words that he wants to put in our mouth. He wants to hear from them. And we'll get to those at the very end. He's listening to hear from our hearts those words that I don't want anyone else but you. I'm done with idols because I have you. And his ears are listening throughout all of our lives. And he's at work throughout all of our lives to bring us to that point. And then he hears those words and.
Says here, I have heard him. Isn't that beautiful? He brings us to that point all the way to the end until he can hear it, hear it coming from the heart and it delights him. And then it says.
And observed him.
He was watching. It's not just listening to the words, not just listening to the words that are in the heart and the words that come from the mouth. His eyes are on our lives every step of the way, in every action. Everything that's going to happen to you the rest of today, everything that's already happened, the Lord has had His eye on you with a desire for your blessing in the end. And he says I have observed. What has He observed?
I believe I've enjoyed at least that what he observed were those works meet for repentance. John the Baptist when he preached, he preached repentance and there's a need for repentance. There's repentance at the beginning of this chapter, but God is looking not for your and my failure so he can punish him. He's looking for the repentance and the works that come with it that show the repentance and I believe he says I've seen.
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I've observed it. The Lord is giving testimony to the fact that with his people as earthly people, Israel, and we're applying it to the believer in this dispensation this afternoon. He's looking for it and he says that's it. That's what I was looking for and I've observed it and he had delight and he shares it with them. I saw those works of repentance.
An Ephraim answers and they say something that's beautiful. I think I am like a green fir tree.
There may be some special things about this particular tree, but what I've enjoyed is at least it's an Evergreen. They had had little fits of revival, little moments at which there had been maybe a little turning toward God, and then they'd slipped, perhaps even worse, into their idolatry. And maybe you or I have done that. Maybe there's a particular sin in our life, a particular idol that's been there for a long time, and we know it.
And it hasn't been dealt with yet.
It's not been taken away, maybe for a little period of time. We do better in that area and we feel a little bit better, but it hasn't been dealt with. The Lord wants to deal with it and He's the actor in dealing with it. I know that there's a side to things in which we have a personal responsibility. And so in First John, it ends with little children, keep yourselves from idols. There's personal responsibility. The side that's on my heart this afternoon, though, is the work of God in our life to look for it.
And to respond to it. And so they say we're Evergreen. There's a recognition that they've reached and will reach it in its fullness When we're with him in glory, we've reached that point where we're not going to be a dry tree again. We're going to be green. There's not going to be any period of time when there isn't that evidence of life there.
And then the Lord answers, and he says something that he's been looking for the whole time.
He says from me is thy fruit found? From me is thy fruit found. We'll enjoy at the end and make sure we have time for it. A little something a little earlier in this chapter and you'll find it's the person himself that's precious and that brings about that fruit. And really we have it. That life that we have that we were hearing about yesterday. We were being reminded of yesterday. That life that delights to respond in obedience, delights to respond.
Delights to act independence and there's fruit for God there. And so that's the Lord's conclusion from me. Is thy fruit found? Now let's go back and we'll just pick up a few little details and three earlier chapters in the book of Hosea, and then we'll return to this chapter to conclude and pick up a few more details here. But we're going to look and Hosea chapter 2 and how the Lord frustrates us.
We're going to look in Hosea chapter 5 at how we might have a sense of abandonment, and Hosea Chapter 11, we'll look at how the Lord presents to us the way that He's worked in love in our life to draw out our hearts, and then we'll return here. Let's turn to Hosea 2.
And Justice pick up a few little highlights throughout the chapter.
Here's one of the ways in which we're going to start with verse five, and one of the ways in which idols get a grip on our life is given in verse 5. For their mother hath played the harlot, she hath conceived them, she that conceived them hath done shamefully. For she said, I will go after my lovers. I believe in referring to idols.
Literal in the case of Hosea's wife, for she said.
I will go after my lovers that give me my bread and my water, my wool and my flax, mine oil and my drink.
What's wrong with bread and water? What's wrong with food? Apostle Paul says what? The first two sets of these things right? He says having food and raiment will be there with content. Here we started with food, bread and water. Raymond Wool and flax, a covering and the end of the verse. Mine, oil and my drink. I'm not sure.
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At least I have enjoyed this application anyway.
There's in oil, there's a couple multiple ways in which it gets used in Scripture, at least in this verse. I think what she's looking for is the sense of refreshment and those Eastern cultures, they had their might. The Lord said when he came in mine head with oil, the house not anointed. I'm not quoting it precisely. You haven't anointed my head with oil. There wasn't a refreshment that was normal. There's also in Psalm 45. It refers to the oil of gladness. So there's a certain sense of.
Sadness and drink can be different things, but certainly in this book there's the vine and the wine. So I would like to at least apply it here to the wine of joy. And so this person is saying.
Are any of these things wrong? Not in themselves. There's nothing wrong with them. The problem is in the middle of that verse. I will go after my lovers that give me.
These are the sources of those things that I need, and that's where the problem lies.
The heart has been turned to something other than their Lord, and when our heart turns to something other than our Lord Jesus Christ as the source of these things, we're going to go in the wrong direction. After an idol, there's nothing wrong with the things in themselves.
On purpose, at least this afternoon, to only give one at the most 2 examples of idols and a very personal one here in a moment.
Purpose, the burden on my heart is not the point at your life and say, oh, here's your problem because I don't know what your problem is. The Spirit of God knows where your eyes have turned, but the eyes turn away from him because there's something here that I need. I need food, I need clothing, I need joy, I need gladness, and I'm going to find it in my lovers.
I don't know who your lovers are, but I'm going to give you a very simple example to try to illustrate something that I think applies to try to illustrate the point that we can have idols in our lives at any age, and in fact, we probably have a whole lot of them. You'll notice throughout the book, it doesn't say they're idle. They're idle. They're idle. They're idle. It says the idols throughout the book. What have I to do anymore with idol Z Frame is joined idols let him alone. It's plural throughout the book.
And so perhaps in your life there's multiple ones there and illustrate 1.
I had an illustration for you from Wednesday, but I'm going to replace it with one from this morning. Same thing.
And it's very personal in this sense, but.
I like to be in control. You could stop and put a period there, but I like to be in control of my schedule and be able to plan it out and kind of leave a little bit of slack in there so that there's room for some adjustments along the way and deal with matters and then things work out well.
I've got it planned nicely and it's just flips in so easily. And I'll skip Wednesday's example and I'll give you this morning's. Well, it started last night. I wanted to get a little bit of food for for breakfast place. I went convenience store at a gas station. I went on on Friday morning. It worked out well, better than the restaurant I went to yesterday. So this morning I was going to go back. No, I think I'll go on.
I think I'll go on Saturday night. That'll leave my.
Find clear get rid of some problems that could come in this morning. Keep my mind fresh so I can focus on the word. You know, I'd like to like to have these thoughts fresh in my soul to share them with you with freshness. And so I'll keep the schedule free. And so I went out to go to my car and I remember a couple of years ago this parking lot was just jammed like it is right now. And if I go and get.
This what I'm going to eat for breakfast tonight.
Then.
I'll come back and I'll drive all around this parking lot and I'll park way on the far side and it'll be a problem when we're packing up in the morning and.
I don't want to. I'd love to get this taken care of, but I'm going to go this morning and I'll go early enough that.
Things will work out well.
I like to be efficient. I hate to get dressed twice, so my wife beat me into the shower this morning. So I waited until that was done. I finally I'm ready to go out, go down to the car, get to the gas station, park, go up to the door and it's locked.
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Before I went on Friday morning, I'd read the reviews and they're always locked there, but they weren't on Friday and it worked out really well. So this morning it was going to work too. Now they were locked during their business hours. I couldn't get in, so I went down through multiple extra traffic lights to another place and they didn't have anything appropriate. I found something. I got back to the hotel room this morning and so far.
I wouldn't say so good, but you know, accepting it from the Lord and so on.
I hadn't learned the lesson yet. I hadn't even thought about the lesson yet. Just trying to accept these things from the Lord, you know?
And put down one of the bags of stuff and it got pumped on the floor and now it's strewn on the floor and I'm frustrated.
Because my idol got dumped on the floor. Not the food. My idol of being in control of my schedule that I've had with me my entire life probably got kind of broken up and left on the floor because I'm not in control of my skids. Never have been, never will be. The Lord is, and when He wants to order it for his purposes of good, he's going to order it for his purposes of good.
He will frustrate that situation.
And so whatever it is, and so looking at frustration this chapter, here's this person, Ephraim, chasing these things, good things. Nothing wrong with having a schedule.
Is natural and proper to accomplish things. That is not the problem. Not wrong to have A to do list. That is not the problem. The problem is in this verse to make it so clear. I will go after my lovers that give me. There's the problem. It's my lovers that give me that thing that I need. That's the problem.
And so if we look at a little bit further down verse 6.
What happens?
Therefore, behold, I will. I love that over and over in this book. You can look it up, not just a simple search because Ephraim says I will multiple times too, but look up where the Lord says I will and you'll find it in a lot of context. Some of them are beautiful. It's all the blessing that he wants to bring in. Not this one. This one is his ways to draw out the heart to frustrate.
To turn those eyes from the lovers. And so it says, I will hedge up thy way with thorns, and make a wall. That she shall not find her paths. I like it, Mr. Darby's translation in verse six, because he repeats again in the middle of the verse. And I will. I like that emphasis. Not just once. I will, I will.
If we don't remember anything else from this afternoon and it all becomes a sludgy mess in the memory.
Let those two words ring in your ears. God is at work in your life and in mind with a purpose to bring us into fellowship with Himself. And he says in every circumstance of our life, I will. And what does he do? I will hedge up thy way with thorns, and make a wall, that she shall not find her paths. Very simple example this morning, but I had my paths, I had my plans, I had my idea. Not a bad one either, and not for a bad purpose.
Wanted extra time to keep my thoughts focused and clear, but they were my plans.
And the Lord says that's a problem, and I have to put my finger on it because you didn't ask me about them. Oh, it's just a little simple thing. But the point is you didn't turn to me in everything. And he says I will hedge up. I don't say every time you go to buy something in the store and it's locked, it's because you have an item in your life. That's not what I'm saying. I'm saying he was speaking to me in that way because he's hedging up for this purpose.
And so he makes a wall.
And she can't find her paths. I'm going to skip down. There's a beautiful thing in verse 12 we'll pass by. It talks about vines and fig tree. Beautiful. You'll see those figures throughout the prophets, vines and figuries calling back to some things in Deuteronomy that perhaps we'll get to later. I want to skip down to a beautiful word in verse 14.
That word is therefore.
It was shocking to me and reading through to come across that word. Therefore, and in fact, I've read a little bit of Hosea and I would strongly encourage you if you wish to go back and really get more from the book. Mr. Kelly's introductory lecturers are very good. They're very nice. Brother Bruce Anstey's book on the Assyrian prophets, and the only part I've read is the part on Hosea so far. But very profitable, very worthwhile and I'd encourage you to read it and get more from the book. You'll only get a few.
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Today, go ahead and read it.
But one thing you'll find that some have said, Mr. Kelly at least said it. I can't remember Brother Anstey, but Hosea makes these sharp transitions. You're going along and he's talking to you, and all of a sudden, wait, where'd he go? And if I could put it loosely in this way, he completely juked me out on verse 14. I was leaning One Direction, and whoops.
I was metaphorically on the floor again because the 1St 13 verses is I will and he's frustrating them. And so there's a therefore. So there's a therefore that he's going to bring in judgment. We'll read verse 14.
Therefore, behold, I will allure her and bring her into the wilderness and speak comfortably unto her. And from there to the end of the chapter, you get all these. I will, I will, I will. And this time it's God bringing in His purposes and blessing for his earthly people. But it's the same God. And that's really what I want to bring out this afternoon. It's not so much the historical prophetic side of the book, but the same God, the same heart that He has with His earthly people matches His.
Start with us. The same way in which he deals with idols, with them is so similar to what he does with us. And so in verse 14, you're waiting for the spanking. And you hear what? Behold, I will allure her and bring her into the wilderness.
There must be repentance. I don't want to Passover that side of things. That's why the Lord frustrates and doesn't allow the path to continue on and on without His voice in it. And that's why He speaks into it. But his purpose is not punishment. His purpose is not to bring vindictive judgment. His purpose is to draw out the heart so that we can have that conversation like we had at the end of the book, a conversation between our.
And his heart, and that's what he's at work doing here. And he says I will allure her. And over and over from here to the end of the chapter, I will give her her vineyards. Verse 15, they were taken away. Verse 12 destroyed, left for animals to wander through them. Now you get them back, but in fellowship.
With himself. And so that's the beautiful part going down to the end of the book. But I want to emphasize a couple other things here in verse 16. I shouldn't say it through the end of the book. I should say the end of the chapter, verse 16.
And it shall be at that day, saith the Lord, that thou shalt call me. Is she?
So call me no more Bailey.
There's more than one thought here. It's a beautiful one.
Balaam Bale, I should say, was the idol, meaning Master Bailey. So it may be perhaps does include the thought that when A-frame is fully restored to the Lord in a coming day at the very end of the tribulation and brought back in the least, a remnant brought back into the land, they're never going to turn to idols again. They're not going to go back there. But there's another thought that's been suggested and I find very precious.
Especially in the context of the subject of idolatry, Because with idolatry, so often it's you better not touch that.
But Bailey means master.
And the Lord is our Lord, He says so clearly to the disciples in the night of his before his crucifixion in the upper room ministry. He says, if I then your Lord and Master, he is our Lord. He must remain our Lord. We're to be obedient as obedient men, but that's not enough. That is not enough. That doesn't satisfy his heart. And so at the beginning doesn't satisfy his heart with his earthly people either, that word.
She means husband.
And so he says, thou shalt call me husband. That's what he wants. He wants that personal relationship with every individual. I know in the church that we're members of his body with him in the head. Actually, you get more intimate than that part of the same.
I don't need to know the right words. He's the head and we're the body or his bride, and He's the bridegroom here with his earthly people. He says it's the same heart of God for his own. And he says I don't want a relationship that's based on nothing more than obedience. I shouldn't put it that way because obedience is a wonderful thing and it's beautiful in the Lord. The Psalm 22 is.
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A magnificent expression.
Of an obedient man. It's absolutely beautiful. So I shouldn't make it sound like obedience is secondary. It's vital.
But that's not the full heart of God and the full heart of God is to say, I want you in personal relationship with me. And so his work is done when they can say is she or my husband?
Just a little bit further down, verses 17 and on down in the chapter are loaded with I wills, but just to notice a couple more verses 22 and 23 in the first chapter.
I just want to make sure I'm not.
Getting something vital. But we'll look at 22 and 23, and there shall hear the corn and the wine and the oil, and they shall hear Jezreel. Jezreel, and as mentioned in the first chapter, means scattered. They were to be scattered. Ephraim was the land of Israel. They were to be scattered and driven out of the land because of their idolatry. And it says here I will have mercy upon her that had not obtained mercy.
They were to be told no mercy. LO ruama LOA, here it is mercy. And I will say to them which were not my people, the low am I. I will say to them, thou art my people, and they shall say thou art my God. It's not just when you read through the book of the Prophets, it's not memorizing. Aha, OK, here's Jezreel and here's Loru Alma, and here is.
So am I now Like those aren't in English, so let me memorize the definitions. Aha. At the end of chapter 2, I get there and I see that those are reversed. I got the fact down.
No, it doesn't satisfy the heart of God. You get to the end of chapter 2 and he brought them back into fellowship with himself, and they shall say, Thou art my God. Their heart isn't chasing those idols anymore. It's not after them. It's not full of them. That's not where their corn and their wine and their oil and their flax and their wool is coming from.
Their bread, their water. No thou art.
My God. So God works in frustration. He uses it in his I wills in Our Life, chapter 5.
Chapter 5 in this section. There's more in this section which is hitting a few little highlights.
But in this section, he's dealing with their sense of abandonment.
It may be that there's a sense of maybe I'll expand it a little bit on abandonment to barrenness in your life. There's that sense as that lack of freshness.
There is not that close personal sense of the Lord's presence there one might be.
Religion. There might be the outward things of Christianity applying it to ourselves, and we'll see some of the outward that appears in this chapter that I don't believe was in the earlier chapter, just that it didn't happen to notice it.
But in chapter 5, just pick up a few details, a few principles, Chapter 5 and verse four it says.
In the middle of the verse, the spirit of ********* is in the midst of them, and they have not known the Lord and the pride of Israel that testified to his face. Therefore shall Israel and Ephraim fall on their iniquity, due to also shall fall with them.
They shall go with their flocks and with their herds to seek the Lord.
But they shall not find him.
Perhaps this is where the Lord's at work in your life. Maybe it's not an idol that's quite so obvious. Maybe it's not an idol that most of your brethren could come to you and try to give you a hand with because it's obvious and out there and they can see it. These are ones that are coming to the Lord. They shall go with their.
Lamb and their Bullock.
No, they're flocks and they're herds and they're showing up.
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They're flocks and they're herds. They're showing up for worship and they're bringing flocks and herds. Looks pretty good, doesn't it?
To seek the Lord.
But they shall not find him. He hath withdrawn himself from them Who did it.
He hath withdrawn himself from them. What's happening here? Lord wants a work in our hearts. That was also read in the breaking of bread this morning, wasn't it? If we have time at the end, we'll see it again in the 14th chapter. It's the calves of our lips. It's the sacrifice that's coming from the heart through the mouth to Him. Ultimately, what's real, that's a delight to Him. There can be an impressive outward show. Was it wrong for an Israelite to bring a herd?
Or a flock? Absolutely not. That's not the point. Bringing a herd in a flock was a good thing.
Is it wrong to show up at the meetings? No, it's a healthy thing.
But the Lord wants you. He wants you in His presence, yes, and He wants you in His presence with your heart filled with Himself. And that's how He wants me to. He's not going to be satisfied without it. And so they show up and he says he hath withdrawn himself.
From them, this is another way that the Lord works to get at those idols that may be in our life. And if there is that barrenness, that sense of dryness, the sense of distance, the sense of abandonment by the Lord, and it's lurking in some corner of the heart, I just suggest to you, because that's what the Lord does here. That may be what he's doing at the moment.
In your life to give you a feeling, a sense.
That there's something that needs to be dealt with.
Want to pull a detail from verse 8?
Blow ye the cornet, and give you the trumpet, and Rhema cry aloud at Bethaven after thee, O Benjamin.
Remember Abraham? He came up.
Where did he put his altar? Right that Friday? Already put his altar.
Wasn't it at Bethel, the House of God?
Jacob leaves the land and he comes back and he goes S eventually he's finally, there's all those steps in his life and they're beautiful, but he's brought back and he buries his idols and he comes back to Bethel, the House of God, and he comes to know L Bethel, the God of the House of God. Why do I mention that with this verse?
Because Beth Haven, I believe is referring to the exact same physical geographic location.
It's talking about the same place, but Bethaven means House of vanity, House of emptiness, House of emptiness. Because the people that were showing up there had their idols, they had everything else to attract their heart, and they had Beth Haven. They had their worship and their outward, this and that and the other, and they didn't have the person that makes it all worthwhile.
And so the Lord says I'm going to bring judgment on it. And I call that place Bath Haven, a House of vanity emptiness, because.
In practical heart, they weren't coming to meet him there.
I want to briefly go back.
Read 2 verses of very little comment from the prior chapter.
They had no intention until this morning of reading them and I.
Lost my place on the page this morning and I was reading those verses.
But I was strongly impressed that I need to read those verses, so I'm going to read them to you with very little application.
But I believe the Lord has them for us this afternoon.
Verse 17 Ephraim has joined the idols, Let them alone.
Here's one I said very little application. I'll give just a little. He's joined idols.
That is his whole focus, not something that snuck in and hiding there under the saddle like Rachel's idols. It says hold of focus. He's joined there, let him alone. Isn't that awful? Isn't it awful to not have a sense of the Lord with you in your life?
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But the O Lord makes this comment on his people as He looks down into their hearts. It's not the bird of my heart this afternoon, but I do believe it's here for at least someone. Ephraim has joined idols. Let him alone.
Their drink is sour. They have committed ********.
Can include following after idols, It can include fornication and all that comes with it continually.
Her rulers with shame due love give ye. I'm going to read that in Mr. Darby's translation. Her great men passionately love their shame.
Her great men passionately.
Love their shame.
And that's the case. There can't be fellowship with God, there can't be the enjoyment of fellowship with him, and God says let him alone.
It's not that that's his end. It's not how the book ends. That's what he has to do temporarily to bring about the work of repentance in the heart.
Chapter 5 just to return to Chapter 5.
I'm going to go all the way through the end. There's a lot of I wills in this part and it's the Lord at work. But just one verse 14, I will be unto Ephraim as a lion and as a young lion to the House of Judah. There's a good lion in the next chapter we'll look at, but here it says I even I will tear.
And go away I will take away, and none shall rescue him.
Sure, prophetically, it's referring to what He would do with His people in the land, taking them out of the land and scattering them until that future day of regathering them. But I believe that is how He works when we've turned our back on Him or turned our heart on Him, even though our outward may be. OK, let's turn to Chapter 11.
I'd like to think of this as just as a word picture to help perhaps remember it. This is the Lord taking His earthly people back through their baby book. And as he goes through and he reviews the incidents with him, and He's going to do it in a future day too. When He restores them in a future day, that's what He does. When He restores our hearts, this is what He does. He takes us back and He shows us His hand in our life. That's one of the beautiful things we're going to receive someday as part of His.
Church as individuals that are believers, when we are at the judgment seat of Christ, it goes back and he reviews the whole thing. We're just going to be shocked. We're going to be shocked at that hand that was so perfect in its love and every single step of the way. It's going to be beautiful. And he's doing something similar here, I think, with his people in Chapter 11. And so it says in the first verse when Israel was a child.
That I loved him and called my son out of Egypt.
How long ago was that?
20-30, thirty, 400 ish years, something like that.
More than 3000.
Does he have what he wants with his earthly people yet? Not yet. Has he given up on them yet? No. We're looking at something that will actually happen in the future when he goes back and looks through it. We deal with an incredibly patient God. We deal with the God who, if he reveals to you this afternoon an idol in your life that's been there your whole life and you've never seen it before, it's not like he hasn't seen it before.
He's just ready to work on it. He's incredibly patient. He is so amazingly patient in his love to accomplish the end that he has for each one of us to bring us into that fellowship with himself. And so he goes back and he says, called my son out of Egypt, even applies it in the New Testament to the Lord Jesus out of Egypt. And if I called my son and it's applied to him, when he comes back up there having fled to Egypt, returning to the land, he goes through that same path.
People so that he can be that perfect sympathizer as they called them. So they went from them. They sacrificed them to Balaam and burn incense to graven images. I taught Ephraim also to go taking them by their arms. They knew not that I healed them. Perhaps they don't have the right figure here, but I'm visualizing in chapter and verse 3 apparent, you know, the parent got the child by their hands.
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And the baby's excited and he's taking those first few steps.
The parent is right there enjoying the whole process. You know, on Wednesday night we were enjoying a little baby and that little baby wasn't quite walking yet, but they were standing.
It was just enjoyable and they were rocking maybe a little bit, but it hasn't been that long, I don't think, since they've been standing. And it's a progress and you want to see that development. You want to see them continue to grow and reach manhood. In this case, you want to watch it.
Grow to its fullness. What's the Lord doing? I was right there with you. I was right there with you in your infancy. I was right there with you as a toddler. I was right there with you the whole way along, showing you my love to bring you to that full maturity of relationship with me.
And so he draws with the chords of a man with bands of love. The end of verse four. I was to them as they that take off the yoke on their jaws, And I laid meat unto them.
Different ways to look at the verse, but I've enjoyed this as an explanation from another. It was as though yolks weren't just for the necks. Apparently the yolk can also have some sort of a bridle with it and so that would hinder both the yolk and the bridle with hinder eating. Can imagine an ox that's tread out the corn. It's time to eat.
They have the right to eat or the animal that's done their work of the day and the oak has taken off and they're.
Encouraged, helped to eat. Who was the one that helped his people to eat, gave them food the whole way was the Lord. He got rid of those things that got in the way of their enjoying the food that they needed, and that's what He did for them.
There's more of what he would bring. The sword should abide in the city as in verse 6 and so on, but I want to go down to verse 8.
It's a beautiful touch on verse 8.
How shall I give thee up, Ephraim? How shall I deliver thee, Israel? How shall I make thee as Admiral? How shall I set thee as a boem?
This is, I believe you might say, God having a conversation with himself.
God looking at his people. We don't have time to read the verses. You can read them on their own your own. They're in Deuteronomy 29.
And in Deuteronomy 29, if you're writing it down, you read from verses 17 to 26, you'll get enough context to interpret this reference here. God, as he so often does, He doesn't have to budget an inch. He looks back at where he set them up with their charter in the land back in Deuteronomy. All the things that he expected, he brings them back to. And there in those verses in Deuteronomy, he speaks of one who would in their heart.
Turn to idolatry and they would be a stumbling block to all the others.
And they were going to be cut off and they were going to be made like Adma and Zeboam. Those were cities of the plain associated with Sodom and Gomorrah, and they were utterly wiped out.
The Lord is looking at his people, he says. How can I treat my people, the people as a whole? He cares the same way about idolatry as he did back in Deuteronomy. He wants a cut off.
But when he looks at his people, he says, how can I make them like Admiral and Zeboham? How can I treat them like those cities in the plain that are utterly wiped out and cut off? I can't do that. I can't do that. I'm going to bring back at least a remnant in to enjoy the land that I have for them. That's the heart of our God. If he has been dealing with you and he is dealing with you, with idols that are there in your life.
This is the end that he has. Maybe he needs to show you how awful they are.
Maybe he needs to show me how awful they are so that we'll be done with them in repentance. We've used them as awful. They take the heart away from him. But in his counsels he says, I don't want to destroy. How could I do that? How shall I give thee up, Ephraim? This is in the future in its fullness.
2750 plus years after it was written. He's not going to do it. He won't do it. And there's a reference to a lion in verse 10.
Skipped over a beautiful one. You can go back. There's a lot written on it. The Valley of Acorn Man chapter 2 That intended to go through with you that the Lord apparently didn't. So chapter 14.
For the second time today.
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Hosea 14 verse one O Israel, return unto the Lord thy God, for thou hast fallen by thine iniquity. That's what goes down to the core, not just the outward actions goes down to the core. Take with your words and turn to the Lord. Say unto him, take away all iniquity and receive us graciously in this beautiful Lord. It's not even going to.
I don't know how to put it in the right way.
In a sense, he wants it so much he's not going to risk them getting it wrong. So he puts the words in their mouth. He puts the words in their heart. Really, that's what he's producing in the heart. It's not a vain repetition, but but.
He gives them the words to say.
So will we render the calves of our lips?
They say verse three, Asher shall not save us Asher or Assyria or the big imperial power of their day. Perhaps it represents any other human organized thing that I could turn to, to provide those things that I think I need, those essentials in my life. I'm not going to turn to them.
We will not ride upon horses. Of course, there's the military side to that.
And Solomon turned to them, But making a practical application of it. Horses are anything that extends our personal power. So any kind of ways of of adding to our personal power to accomplish the end that we have in mind. And he says, I'm not going to turn to that. Neither will we say anymore to the work of our hands. Ye are our gods.
For neither fatherless findeth mercy.
He planted those seeds for them back in Deuteronomy and he says to them, what does he have care for throughout the book?
A Levi stranger, a widow, and the fatherless God wanted them to have that heart for those because he had a heart for those. And now they come back and they have no right. They've lost it and their responsibility, they have no right. They're coming back repentant.
And they find a God who will take them not because of what they were by. Genealogy, per Southeast, is restoring as earthly people. I don't want to stretch it too far, but they're not being restored because of their parents, exactly. They're being restored because of the grace of God. And they take that place. They take the place that's fatherless and the Lord loves me.
With no rights, no claims except for his heart.
And that's how we come to him, no rights, no claims, simply in repentance because he loves us and he's at work. I will, I will, I will in grace and in government. Throughout the book, a couple more details.
Verse seven or no one. I want to make sure we get verse five. I really enjoyed this. I will be.
As they do, you know, in Egypt, they used the foot pedals to bring water up from the ground out of the Nile River, to water their fields, to have prosperity. But when they went into the land, they're told in Deuteronomy that there would be rain from heaven and dew from heaven. And in their sin, in their idolatry, it was cut off. Elijah prayed and it was cut off and they had their their drought.
But when they're restored here and they're looking back and they're seeing the dew, they could have seen the dew in the wilderness of the man that was on.
They're not hearing these words. I'll read it wrong. I will give them do. No, it says I will be as the dew.
It's personal, it's the Lord himself bringing out to them that all your fruitfulness and you can trace it through the end, all your fruitfulness.
Is going to come from me we read it at the beginning it was read this morning from me as thy fruit found well not only that I should say not only that that's fabulous that's kind of the conclusion but along the way I.
I will be as the dew.
One expression, let's pray who is what verse nine, who is wise and he shall understand these things prudent.
And he shall know them.
We all say it together in our hearts. I don't mean a response, but when the Lord reviews His life, our life with us, even if it's now in a fullness at the judgment seat of Christ.
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The response of the heart is here. The ways of the Lord are right.
Joshua walkin the ways of the Lord are right.