Tried With Fire

I don't consider myself a very emotional person, but I was a watering pot yesterday. It started with Pastor Ryan's sermon on Hosea which culminates in God's call to return to him in chapter 14. This chapter is very personal because it was the text of one of the first sermons I ever read by C.H. Spurgeon after my ex-husband walked out. I wept then as I prayed for him to return to God and to his family. So yesterday's sermon brought a flood of memories. But God's faithfulness to the unfaithful isn't only true of those who commit obvious "bad" sins. His faithfulness extends to all of us because who among us hasn't gone after other gods in our hearts? Yet God continues to draw us again and again with a love that does not let us go. Then in the evening, a lay brother, Will Brown, spoke on Christ fulfilling the office of prophet, priest, and king using John 17 as the text. There were so many messianic expectations over the years, so many wrong ideas...

Pastor Ryan spoke on the book of Hosea today.  It's a sad story - a story of Israel's spiritual adultery.  After being chosen by God from among the nations, delivered from Egypt, given the law, and the temple, they give their hearts to idols.  God pronounces judgment on the nation, and they are carried off into captivity. But this book is an amazing story of the God who is the faithful Husband, extending mercy to His faithless wife.  Even though they will suffer justly for their sins, He promises to restore them.  To show mercy to "No Mercy" and to make a people of "Not My People." This is our story too.  We were spiritual adulterers, giving our hearts and devotion to false gods and turning our backs on the One to whom we owed our existence.  God pronounced judgment upon us, but it did not fall on those who deserved it.  It fell upon His Son on the cross.  Thus He shows mercy to those who deserved no mercy and called us to be His people w...