As I've already said, I'm not normally, the pastor
here, I'm not normally preaching, so forgive
me if I do stumble over anything. We are in Hosea
this morning, the first of the minor prophets,
and we are gonna be ending our study this morning.
It's been a really great time, really, really
has. We're in Hosea 14. But right before I read
this, I do wanna just give a parental warning,
which is a little strange thing to do before
a sermon. There's gonna be a little section in
here that's about a PG -13 level. I'm gonna be
referencing the biblical story that just deals
with violence and sexual abuse. So if you need
to, feel free to step out. I'll give you a little
signal when it's happening, but don't want anybody
to feel obligated to say through that. I'm gonna
read Hosea 14 for us. Israel, return to the Lord
your God, for you have stumbled in your iniquity.
Take words of repentance with you and return
to the Lord. Say to him, forgive all our iniquity
and accept what is good, so that we may repay
you with the praise from our lips. Assyria will
not save us, we will not ride on horses, and
we will no longer proclaim our gods to the work
of our hands, for the fatherless receive compassion
in you. I will heal their apostasy. I will freely
love them, for my anger will have turned from
him. I will be like the dew to Israel. He will
blossom like the lily and take root like the
cedars of Lebanon. His new branches will spread
and his splendor will be like the olive tree,
his fragrance like the forest of Lebanon. The
people will return and live beneath his shade.
They will grow grain and blossom like the vine.
His renown will be like the wine of Lebanon.
Ephraim, why should I have anything more to do
with idols? It is I who answer and watch over
him. I am like a flourishing pine tree, your
fruit comes from me. Let whoever is wise understand
these things, and whoever is insightful recognize
them. For the ways of the Lord are right, and
the righteous walk in them, but the rebellious
stumble in them. Let's pray this morning. Our
Father in heaven. Your name be honored as holy.
We pray for your word to pierce us, to divide
us, to expose us so that we can be healed, so
that we can be more like your son, so that we
can see ourselves for who we are and what needs
to be eradicated from our lives, so we can bring
it to you and you can restore us. I pray for
this time in our hearts that we would be prepared
for this work. In Jesus' name, amen. Anyone here
guilty of a non -apology? Here's the classic
one. I'm sorry you feel that way. It's not an
apology. It doesn't mean anything. I was looking
online to see if I could find another one, and
the other one that I found, you gotta put on
your sincere voice, you gotta slow down, annunciate
really clearly. We all make mistakes. and we
need to be able to move on from them. I know
I have. It doesn't mean anything. Who's at fault
here? Are you at fault or am I at fault that
I move on from your mistakes or should you move
on from my mistakes? Who knows? It's a non -apology.
There's sincere words that don't mean anything.
There's no admission of guilt or even a little
recognition that maybe my words or actions hurt
you, that they affected you. Hosea 14. Kind of
is the opposite of this, and I'm using this as
the intro to wrap up our time to realize that
they are gonna come with an apology. They are
gonna come with real repentance, none of this
fake stuff. And we're gonna see the power of
that repentance, and we're gonna see the effect,
the beautiful restoration that the Lord has for
them. Chapter 14 opens with the prophet calling
for the people of Israel to repent of their sins.
He describes their current condition and is pleading
with them to change their ways. But before I
go on, gotta do a little quick recap right at
the end of the chapter. So I wanna make sure
that everybody has everything that they need
to know about Hosea loaded up in their brains.
Hosea, it starts really strange. Hosea receives
this command from the Lord, go and marry a woman
who's gonna be unfaithful to you. What? But that's
literally the command, go marry a promiscuous
woman. So Hosea does it. He goes and marries
his wife Gomer. And Gomer pursues other men.
It's unclear exactly, but it seems to indicate
that she has children from other men in their
marriage. And those children. In English, they
would be the valley of blood, not my people,
no compassion, crazy names, but they have a purpose.
The Lord is communicating in this kind of parable
analogy that he's going to turn his face away
from Israel because they have been unfaithful,
unwilling to listen and have loved other gods.
And then the next 10 chapters, so that's the
first three chapters, the next 10 chapters are
these warnings about coming judgment, a plea
to return and Israel, again, just Blatant sin
all over the place. And in it, there's mixed
like the Lord's sorrow and a little bit of these
like hints of restoration. They're in there,
but they're hard to see. But the idol worship,
the picture of an unfaithful wife and the pending
judgment of the Lord need to be in our brains
as we're reading this. Because in chapter 14,
all of that is gonna get reversed. Because Israel's
gonna change their heart. Look at verse one with
me. Israel, return to the Lord, for you have
stumbled in your iniquity. Pause, it's really
easy to misread, I'm gonna stop a couple times
to really emphasize what we're saying here. We're
so used to this idea that maybe Israel just tripped,
maybe they just need to, all humans trip, we
fall, we mess up, can't you just give us a little
bit more grace, God? It's so much more severe
than that. This is a final desperate plea. from
the prophet to try to save Israel from judgment.
These are his people, these are the people he's
lived around, and he is pleading with them to
change. So my first point this morning is get
up. Hosea starts with this instruction, return
to the Lord. And again, return to the Lord, pretty
easy. But that word is repeated 13 times in Hosea.
It's been a constant call. Keep coming back.
Stop chasing security, Hosea says. Stop trying
to be prosperous apart from God. Go back to him.
Go back. He's ready to receive you. But for the
first 13 chapters, they just were not willing.
And then the prophet gives the reason why he's
so concerned. You have stumbled in your iniquity.
And again, stumbled in English. It's the right
word, it's the right translation. I'm not gonna
say it's wrong, but it's a kind of a light word,
right? Like I can stumble and trip, or maybe
I just stumble over my words and I don't get
my meaning out correctly. But in Hebrew thought
it's so much weightier. In Jeremiah 46, warriors
stumble in battle before they die. It's not just
trip. In Psalm nine, it says this, evil ones
stumble and perish before the Lord. So stumbling
is not like tripping. in Hebrew thought. Stumbling
is the beginning of the end. And recovering from
stumbling is really hard because it requires
changing your ways, drastically changing. It's
why stumbling usually ends with destruction.
And that's why Hosea is so urgent. You're about
to go into destruction, Israel. You're about
to be ruinous. You're about to lose it all. Turn.
And so here's the picture. Verse one is Israel's
lying face down in an alleyway. They're beaten
up, they're dirty. And Hosea is just pleading
with them, guys, come back, stop chasing your
false lovers. Return to the Lord, stop going
away from him. And I gotta be honest, I'm gonna
double down here. I still think there's a chance
that we might not get this. So, here's the PG
-13 part, okay? I'm gonna use this biblical example
from Judges 19. Anybody read Judges 19 earlier?
Just, you know, it's your Sunday morning read.
No, because nobody wants to read this chapter
of the Bible. It would be why the Bible gets
like an adult only rating if it was turned into
a movie. So let me describe it for you. And just,
here's my disclaimer. Everybody in this chapter
is an Israelite, okay? These are the ancestors
of the people of Israel that we're talking about
in Hosea. A Levi and his concubine were traveling
and they were in Bethlehem and they have to go
back home. So they gotta travel quite a distance
and it's gonna, they gotta stay the night somewhere.
And they're traveling and they pass the Gentile
village and say, no, no, that could be too dangerous.
We need to go to the Israel village. It's a little
bit farther. So they keep trekking along and
they go to the Israel village. They sit in the
square and waiting for somebody to invite them
home so that they can rest. That's normal cultural
for them. And this old man comes and sees them
in the square and it's getting late. He's like,
what are you guys doing out here? You guys get
inside. This isn't gonna be safe for you. That's
like, whoa, why is it not safe? And so they're
eating dinner and all of a sudden, a mob shows
up, angry mob. You know what they wanna do? They
wanna rape the Levite. That's what they asked
to do. They demand for this to happen. And the
old man's like, no, no, no, don't do that. That's
too sinful. Here's my virgin daughter. And then
the Levite's like, sure, take my concubine too.
I'll volunteer them. And so. The angry mob gets
even angrier. How dare you keep us from our sexual
lust? And you're like, what in the world? Don't
worry, gets worse. So the Levite picks up his
concubine, probably hiding from the mob and her
husband, and throws her out the door, locks the
door, closes it for the night. And the angry
mob rapes and abuses her for the rest of the
night. Until the next morning, the Levite gets
up and says, concubine, time to go. And she's
dead. So the Levite takes her home. It's disgusting,
it's revolting. The way that you should feel
is probably the way that you feel right now.
Everybody in that story is an Israelite. And
the thing that is even harder is Israel in the
time of Hosea acted every single one of those
parts. They acted like the angry mob who wanted
sexual lust and didn't care. They acted like
the Levite who was supposed to be a priest and
taking care of the people and abused the vulnerable.
They were also the people who wanted to play
the whore with false gods. And again, that's
not me using charged words. That's literally
the language of Hosea. Hosea is pleading with
its people, stop doing this. This is what you're
doing. He just describes it. Some of the things
that he says is the idol worship was so rampant
in Israel in that time that under every green
tree, there was incense rising, there was gods
and incense rising, none of it to the Lord. They
were so concerned about their military power
that they pursued foreign gods, giving away their
money, giving away their resources and not caring
for the poor in their cities. Hosea describes
daughters being sent off to be religious prostitutes
to Baal. That's how bad it is. So when I describe
Israel lying face down in the dirt, beaten, bruised
and ravaged, Israel chose to do that. They chose
to keep going back. She had done it to others
and it's going to happen to her as well. So don't
think the Lord wasn't patient. Don't think the
Lord wasn't generous. Don't think the Lord wasn't
trying to call her back over and over and over
again, because it's hundreds of years of that.
And she had left every single time. So let me
read verse one again. I think it'll feel different.
Israel returned to the Lord your God, for you
have stumbled in your iniquity. Turn to the Lord,
stop following your ways. You are about to perish,
just go back. Point number two, take words. Reading
at verse two, take words of repentance with you
and return to the Lord. Say to him, forgive all
our iniquity and accept what is good so that
we may repay you with praise from our lips. Assyria
will not save us, we will not ride on horses
and we will no longer proclaim our gods to the
works of our hands for the fatherless receive
compassion in you. Take words of repentance with
you and return to the Lord. So back in Hosea
six. The people said they were gonna do that.
They said that they were gonna return to the
Lord, but they were gonna bring their offerings
and they were gonna make a nice little show of
it. God, aren't you gonna appreciate my nice
big bowls? They're really meaty for you, God.
They thought they could placate God, that they
could turn on the show and that God wouldn't
notice. It would just be a couple of days of
pain and then God would heal them. It's fine,
don't worry about it. Anybody ever hear? Try
to pretend in repentance. Anyone here try to
pretend that the Lord couldn't see you through
your motives as you prayed for forgiveness? Like
maybe you were already kind of planning on how
you were gonna sin again as you were trying to
repent. It's a wonderful and terribly scary truth
that the Lord sees through our motives and rejects
anything less than true repentance. Hosea 6 .6
says, for I desire faithful love and not. sacrifice,
the knowledge of God rather than burnt offerings.
He doesn't want your love bombing. He doesn't
need your gifts. Your bull won't mean much to
his pasture. He owns enough bulls and cattle
guys. What he wants is humble submission. He
wants you to want him and need him. You can actually
see it in the call. The instruction is to pick
up words of repentance and carry them to the
Lord. So here's a question for you, anybody who's
been in a relationship. What is easier to give
to your significant other after you've argued?
A bouquet of flowers or an apology? Yeah. Like
cleaning the house, like detailing the car, that
is so much cheaper than it is to actually be
heartfelt repentant before them. Like the words
feel different, don't they? They feel heavier,
like they're harder to come out, like you just
can't breathe, like there's a pain on your chest,
like I'm trying to say it, and it's just not
coming out. So the image here is that Israel's
supposed to pick up the heaviest thing they can
carry, which is their words of repentance. and
carry them all the way back to the altar of God,
and that's their sacrifice. Actually, in the
Hebrew, the last word in the verse, praise, is
literally bulls. So one translation says it like
this, completely forgive our iniquity, accept
our penitential prayer that we may offer the
praise of our lips as sacrificial bulls. I want
you to hear that again. Completely forgive our
iniquity. Accept our penitential prayer that
we may offer the praise of our lips as sacrificial
bowls. That's their offering. Their offering
is just the words, but the words are not empty.
It is everything in them that is bringing it
there. So the first half is a plea for forgiveness
and the sacrifice they offer is words. But there's
no expectations of restoration in there, is there?
There's no timeline. They are just submitted.
They only offer repentance with the hope of forgiveness.
And that's the true sign of repentance. It's
humility. It's not expecting anything in return.
It is saying that this is what I have done, naming
it, laying it bare, and then just waiting for
the other side to return. Point number three.
No more. We see next how Israel is turning away
from their two false lovers. foreign nation and
false gods. Listen here, Assyria will not save
us. We will not ride on horses and we will no
longer proclaim our gods to the works of our
hands. So Israel is acknowledging how far they
came and what they had been doing. Their hopes
and dreams were wicked. They tried to cozy up
to the big, powerful Assyria. They tried to get
military power. They wanted to ride on horses,
which means they wanted to conquer other people
and defend their land. but they repent of that
dream. Israel also repents of their idol worship.
John covered this deeply last week, I'd recommend
you go listen to that, but they had set up calves
to keep people going down to Jerusalem and worshiping
there. They had set up idols in places of worship
to the local gods called Baal and Asherah. They
set up those all around, just so anywhere you
wanted to go sin and worship, you could go and
do that. They were breaking the first two commands
of God's covenant with them. No other gods before
me and don't make for yourself an idol. They
just couldn't help themselves. And don't think
you are too evolved beyond this same temptation
or somehow they were just naive and you're not.
They pursued foreign nations and made idols because
they wanted security, protection and prosperity.
Anyone here ever? kind of want to get looped
into a get -rich -quick scheme just so that,
you know, it could take care of your family?
Or how about this one? I'm guilty of this one.
Anybody here ever daydream of what it would have
liked to get Bitcoin in 2012? You know, just
to have a little bit more? Or maybe you reserved,
you watched your brother and sister as they got
something and you didn't, and then you kind of
judged them for how better you would have handled
it compared to them? My hands up. But no way
I labeled it what it was, right? No way I called
it idolatry, envy, or greed. I called it financial
stability or pursuing options, like the words
matter. My heart was doing the same thing Israel
was doing. It was chasing false gods. I was looking
for money to provide me protection instead of
the Lord. And we all want the same things that
Israel did. They're good things, security and
prosperity. And we are all in some way so easily
fall into cultural norms or fleshly desires to
get it. That's the human condition, creating
idols and chasing them. And if you think idolatry
is this big word that you don't know exactly
how to encapsulate it, here's a really simple
definition. Trusting in created things rather
than the creator. That's what idolatry is. Trusting
in created things rather than the creator. And
if you notice in verse three, it's like steps.
The statements are descending down until they
hit rock bottom in the last line. Assyria will
not save us. We will not ride on the horses.
We will no longer proclaim our gods to the works
of our hands for the fatherless receive compassion
in you. So there's this thing in Hebrew poetry
where it'll repeat the same word that was used
earlier and change the meaning. And that's what's
happening here. Hosea, in the beginning of the
book, if everybody remembers it, he had to describe
that there was no more compassion going to Israel.
That Israel had gone too far and the Lord was
gonna give them over to their sin. But here,
he's saying that there's this expectation of
compassion. When there was no compassion before,
there is now. For the fatherless receives compassion
in you. And I think there's two intentions here.
One, there's a recognition of God's character.
Israel remembers that the Lord's character towards
the fatherless is generous and kind. Psalm 68,
five. Father of the fatherless and protector
of widows is God in his holy habitation. Deuteronomy
10, 18. He executes justice for the fatherless
and the widow. God cares for the vulnerable and
the oppressed. And the next one, and I think
this is the meatier one, Israel is calling on
the Lord to be compassionate to the fatherless
because they are the fatherless. Remember the
kids? Jezreel, Lo -ru -ha -ma, Lo -ami. Lo -ru
-ha -ma means no compassion. Lo -ami means not
my people. Israel was told they would not receive
compassion because they were not God's people.
They had sinned too much. So here is Israel,
fatherless. pleading for God to care for the
fatherless. They have nothing to offer the Lord.
They recognize their position. It is completely
destitute. All they have is their words of praise,
and that's what they're giving out. Their backs
are turned to the idols, and they fall at the
Lord's feet, pleading for him. And their plea
isn't one, again, of expectation, but of utter
dependence. They're hoping to receive compassion.
This is just like the prodigal son, isn't it?
They're asking for the, the prodigal son returns
to the father after living far away, squandering
wealth and just living in debauchery. He comes
and says, God or father, you don't even deserve
to make me a son anymore. Can I just be a slave?
Please, can I just be your slave? It would be
better than anything else I can find. God loves
when broken people come to him. He never rejects
anybody who really submits to him and humbles
themselves. Before, Before we read God's response,
I cannot stress enough the importance of confession
and the power of what's gonna happen next is
based on this confession of Israel. So if you
wanna see your life changed, if you wanna see
things change, if you wanna see revival happen
in our community, start with confession. Confession
always brings the attention of the Lord. He will
always be drawn to it. And if you're carrying
sin, If you're trying to hide, making sure that
nobody finds you out about that thing, if you're
feeling stuck for whatever reason, stop. Come
with repentance to the Lord. And listen to these
verses because they can be for you too. Verse
four. I will heal their apostasy. I will freely
love them. For my anger will have turned from
him. I will be like the Jew to Israel. He will
blossom like the lily and take root like the
cedars of Lebanon. His new branches will spread
and his splendor will be like the olive tree.
His fragrance like the forest of Lebanon. The
people will return and live beneath his shade.
They will grow grain and blossom like the new
vine. His renown will be like the wine of Lebanon.
So I'm gonna pause and I'm gonna acknowledge
something. Nobody can see my notes. If you were
in first service, I had four points. I'm now
going to have five points. Kyle, two weeks ago,
preached for the first time. And so like he edited
my sermon in between the services. So if it's
bad, it's his fault. Point number four, freely
love. Verses four through seven. This is forgiveness
with restoration. It turns a barren desert into
Eden again. Its effects are deep and abounding,
and it produces fruit everywhere. When we repent,
we can receive this forgiveness without retribution.
Someone could say, as they're kind of reading
between verse three and verse four, and say,
hold on, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, Israel
did a lot of bad things. Actually, Hosea says,
In Hosea 6 .5, this is what I have used the prophets
to cut them down. I have killed them with the
words from my mouth. Wait, God said he was gonna
bring judgment and now he's doing this? That's
not fair. What's wrong with this? My response,
good question. First, great job reading your
Bible. Let's acknowledge what you did, great
job. Second, don't interrupt me, I'm preaching.
I have the mic. Third, I lost my place. Third,
we can see the extent of God's judgment and mercy
by seeing how he responds to true repentance.
It's a little bit dense, but follow me here.
First, God's judgment is used to expose people
to the effects of their sin, so they stop sinning.
He's just exposing them to what they've been
doing. He's letting them experience the consequences.
John, earlier in the series called this severe
mercy, and it's a great way to say it. It can
seem really severe on the outside, but on the
inside, at the end, it's merciful. Like in Hosea
12 .2, the Lord is about to punish Jacob according
to his conduct. He will repay him based on his
actions. The Lord turns the people over to the
sin so they experience it. Second, judgment is
meant to make people desperate for the Lord.
It's not always meant to be final. The Lord can
use pain and suffering to rouse us out of our
complacency. That we are distracted, we don't
think that he's the way and he can use that pain
to bring us back. Listen to this judgment the
Lord has trying to do that same thing. Hosea
5 .15, I will depart and return to my place until
they recognize their guilt and seek my face.
They will search for me in their distress. God
wasn't gonna let them see him, but he wanted
them to be searching for him. But God shows time
and time again and we see it in verses that transition
from verse three to verse four. He's ready to
receive the repentance sinners, just like you
and me. But if people choose not to repent, they
don't choose to follow the Lord, then he just
allows them to choose their sin. God doesn't
force anybody into repentance. He can allow them
to be swallowed up by their sin and just never
let go. And that's a scary, scary place to be.
where God has turned you over to your sin. And
then finally, we see how God responds to sinners.
When the people actually demonstrate true repentance,
what's the response? Well, when they humble themselves
and return to the Lord, did he require anything
of them? Did he say, here's your to -do list?
Was there any validation here? Like, let me soak
on this for a little bit. I'm just not quite
sure. Are hoops to jump through? No. So all those
oracles of judgment, though true, words of repentance
were enough to turn them back. And I wanna drive
this point home, so I'm gonna do this silly analogy.
So this plant over here, like this is budding
new life, this is growth, this is where I wanna
be, this is the Lord. But my sin pushes me all
the way over here. Let's pretend this plant is
not here, just ignore it. So I'm all the way
over here, I'm separated from God. So I could
say, God, forgive me. Like, let me bring some
repentance. Let me bring my words. And he's like,
okay, Nick, I'll give you two steps. You do the
rest. Keep walking. Okay, maybe that's a little
bit too harsh. Maybe I just put God, God puts
me in neutral position. I'm halfway there, halfway
here. You know, like a little bit of love, not
hatred, just a little apathy, you know? Or he
brings me all the way back. I don't do anything.
He brings me back. He restores me. The example
is ridiculous because I want you to see that
he does all of the work. He restores you. You
don't take any of the steps. You're gonna bring
your repentance and then you're done. And that's
the transition from three to four. He restored
the people. The Lord loves to restore his people.
He restores us completely, totally and all by
himself. It's the same analogy in the prodigal
son. The son returns and what does the father
do when he sees the son afar off? Drops what
he has, picks up his robe so he can book it.
And he just unashamedly runs as fast as he can
to his son, throws his arms around him, doesn't
need him cleaned up, doesn't need anything from
him. He's showering him with love. Like that's
the same picture that we get that the Lord is
showing here. Why does he do this? Why does he
restore his people like this? Sure, it's true.
He loves you too much to leave you in your sin.
And he pursues you despite your sin towards him.
But why does he do that? Why is that who he is?
It's because God, the real heart of God in restoring
people is that nothing demonstrate his character
more than providing a way for sinners. That's
why there's no rules. That's why there's there's
no expectation because he wants his whole character
shown by how much he's going to love you by how
much he's going to do for you and I know because
I am a I'm a person and I'm quite proud sometimes
that I really want that self -validation that
I did something I Know that I want to be able
to come home and say I did something for the
Lord today And that is so sinful that is lifting
myself up on a pedestal and say, the Lord needed
me to take steps. Oh, he doesn't need anything
from me. So as soon as you humble yourself, as
soon as your heart turns to him, he is there
to heal you. And he wants his character to be
shown in you and the love that's on display in
you. And don't hear me say that there's not consequences
for your actions. There are consequences. in
this world, and you deserve them if you've sinned.
But with him, full restoration is available.
Just as Paul says, you are never too deep or
too far from the hand of the Lord. Point number
five. This is verses four through seven. This
is an amazing list. of what God has done for
his people. And I'm just gonna, I gotta hit it
real quick. We don't have too much time. And
it can seem like this list is just like really
flowery language with all these trees budding
everywhere and just like joy and hope and wine
and hooray. But it's so much more than that.
It's actually a reversal of almost all of the
judgments that Israel has received. So verse
four, I will heal their apostasy. I will freely
love them for my anger will have turned from
him. God reverses the damage of Israel's apostasy
with his healing. Again, he gonna take the action.
Verse five, I will be like the dew to Israel.
He will blossom like the lily and take root like
the cedars of Lebanon. Two times in Hosea, Israel
is compared to dew and it's worthless. It's like
it comes and it goes away immediately. It's not
actually effective in any way. So what is the
Lord gonna do? He is going to be the dew that's
miraculously producing fruit. Where they were
faithless, he's gonna be faithful. Number, verse
six. His new branches will spread and his splendor
will be like the olive tree. Israel bowed down
to trees in worship, right? Y 'all knew that.
They bowed down, they went to the trees, that's
what they worshiped, that's what they thought
was gonna bring them prosperity. An avengeful
father, what would he do? He would hold the trees
back. No way I'm not giving you any trees, you're
gonna use them against me again. Nah Yahweh.
but the Lord, he gives the trees back. He gets
them exploding with growth. They are abundant
because the trees become a sign of new life in
him. And number seven, this is my favorite. Number
seven, the people will return and live beneath
his shade. They will grow grain and blossom like
the vine. His renown will be like the wine of
Lebanon. And again, if you were reading Hosea
really, really closely, Wine and grain had been
mentioned a few times in Hosea 7 -14. It says,
they do not cry to me from their hearts. Rather
they wail on their beds. They slash themselves
for grain and new wine. They turn away from me.
Israel had plenty. Like the priests and the leaders
were getting drunk with wine constantly. That's
another accusation in Hosea. If you couldn't
tell, there's a lot of sin in Hosea. They had
grain because this was a time of plenty. and
they thought themselves really secure. So God
didn't take away the grain and wine from them.
He took away their satisfaction though. They
didn't have what they actually wanted. Like John
described last week, they made a good thing an
ultimate thing. And in making a good thing an
ultimate thing, it destroyed them because it
eroded the thing that they actually wanted. They
pursued the wine and said, this is gonna bring
me life and it brought no satisfaction. They
pursued food. I love good food, but it produced
no satisfaction in their life. So what does God
do? He gives them the wine. He gives them the
grain with satisfaction. They can now be satisfied.
They can rejoice in it because it's not the thing
anymore. It's not the ultimate thing. It's a
gift in the hand of the giver. So if Israel sees
that the Lord is gonna give it to them, if they
can recognize that he's the one that's blessing
them, then they can actually enjoy it. And he
returns the true satisfaction back to them. That's
what restoration is. It's not just having the
thing, but it's having the joy and the life.
And that's what I wanted the whole time. I wanted
the giver. If I just look at the gift, I'm gonna
get lost real quickly. Let's go ahead and land
this plane. I wanna first just recognize that
how analogous this is to us in our relationship
to Christ. If I come to Christ saying, God, I'm
gonna do something for you here, and not say,
Christ, you died on the cross for me, you bled
for me, you lived a perfect life for me, I'm
gonna lose it. I'm gonna lose the thing that
I'm actually pursuing, which is Christ. I'm gonna
try to anchor myself to what I've done. Next,
if I don't keep coming to Christ with confession,
If I don't keep recognizing that I am a sinner,
that I am messed up, that I don't follow the
rules that God has laid out, I am selfish and
I seek my own kingdom and to establish myself,
I will keep going farther and farther away from
Him. And hopefully He restores me and hopefully
I don't have to go through destruction, but sometimes
you do. Sometimes that's what God does. He does
severe mercy in your life so that you turn and
recognize Him. If you have this idea that God
is punishing you for your sin, or you have to
go through some like sin detox period, where
you just have to clean it up enough and then
he's gonna help you, you got two options. One,
you can give up, just give up. Or if you're stubborn,
double down now. Just double down into it. You
will get so exhausted and so tired and so worn
out, and then you can give up. but come to Him,
He's waiting and ready to receive you. And I'm
gonna call on all of us in a way. I want the
people of village to be a place of confession,
but also of restoration. So if somebody has done
something against you, if you're holding on to
something that you really experienced and that
person comes and apologizes, they confess, forgive
them. Restore them. And it might take a little
bit of time. You're not the Lord. You're not
omniscient. You're not omnipotent. Like it might
take a little validation. That's okay. That's
wisdom. Please, please don't disregard that.
That person keeps coming back and abusing you
or kind of assuming on you. That's okay. You
got to figure that out with them. But you pay
the cost of forgiveness. You pay it. And then
finally, Get up. Take words of repentance. Take
them to whoever in your life you have wronged,
whether that's your spouse, whether that's your
kids, whether that's your boss, a friend. Carry
those heavy words and then actually say them.
Don't be presumptuous that, oh no, we've talked
about it before. We kind of moved past it. No,
no, no, no, no. Say them. Say the really, really
hard thing. It will change your life. It will
change your relationship with that person. It
really will. It is worth it. Because if you want
the blessing, you gotta confess. If you want
that judgment removed, if you want that guilt
removed, if you wanna have new life and growth,
confession is the way. It's not the American
way, I know that, but it is definitely the way
of Christ. Let's pray. Heavenly Father, Your
name be honoured as holy. Forgive us our debts
as we also forgive those who are indebted to
us. Help us be a people of confession. Help us
be a people of repentance. Show us our sin. Put
it in front of our face. Make it uncomfortable.
Make it weighty. so that we can repent of it,
so that we can turn, so that we can see you in
your glorious light, changing lives, loving people,
restoring people fully in you.