So we ended the year in our Elpis, Elpis, Olapis.
I've said a lot of ways over Advent. In the Greek,
we now go to the Hebrew. Remember good Hebrew?
You kind of get that in the back of your throat.
Half of you are phlegmy, so it's probably easier,
right? Chesed, one, two, three. Oh, that was
really good. That was very good. Now apologize
to the person you spit on in front of you. But
chesed, right, the steadfast love of God. I love
how the hand, that's not glitchy, that was created
that way by Mike. It's a trembling hand because
chesed is an unfailing love of the Father, even
though we... tend to fail to love him. And that's
why we're going to look at this first week, a
love that pursues. Okay? A love that pursues.
We're going to talk about that in a minute, but
I have a question. To start our new year, we're
going to start super joyful, right? Mountaintop
experiences. What causes you to quit things in
life? Right? So think about it. Whether it's
a New Year's resolution that you end up quitting
statistically, really not one I just made up,
statistically by the first week in February,
it's usually like 75 % are done. Whether, you
know, when you think about quitting something,
what causes someone to quit? Again, if you're
a guest here this morning, I like to ask questions.
We have a little bit of interactions, and then
I solely get to judge the answers that are given.
Frustration, right? Things get super frustrated.
I just want to quit, right? That's a lot of what
happens when the Holland donors play any form
of monopoly, okay? In all of its various forms.
There's a cheater's monopoly out there. Have
you ever played that? Has anyone ever played
that? Don't, right? It causes fights. It breaks
households. And so, yes. Anything else? What
causes us to quit? Did someone say salary? Oh,
no. What did someone say? Discouragement. Sure.
Yeah. Discouragement. Absolutely. What else?
Failure can cause us to quit. I can't do this.
Right? I failed again. I quit this. Any positive
reasons to quit? I just think about, I don't
know why. I've never smoked a day in my life.
But quitting smoking. Right? That's a healthy
thing. What else? Fear. We quit out of fear.
That's a good one. I think that one's in two
weeks. Other reasons why we quit? Unfair criticism.
Sure. Pain? Yeah. Someone asks you to. I'm not
going to read into that at all. Hang on a second.
Let me sit on that one. This is the danger of
asking questions. Some are so profound that they
cause to pause. Way to go, Nikki. Because someone,
hang on, guilt, we'll get there. Because someone
asks you to. All right, I'm going to store that
one back. Guilt, absolutely. Laziness, all good
answers, right? That we can quit for a variety
of reasons. Let me change it. I'm going to ask
a similar question. What causes people to quit
other people? Yeah, in the back. Mistrust, distrust,
absolutely. Broken trust can cause us to quit.
Sure, that was a really good one. Now to go into
the rest of the sermon. Anything else? Yeah.
Selfishness. Oh, yes. Absolutely. Betrayal. Trust,
right? That's a breaking. Absolutely. Anything
else? Lack of boundaries. Interesting. Randy.
Randy. For three points. Holy cow. An indifference
towards. That's the danger. Wow, why am I getting
emotional about that one? I'm very indifferent
to that answer. No, that was really good, Randy.
That's great, great. All good questions. We're
going to stop there because two have already
wrecked me. So we're not going to go any farther.
But it has to do with something usually that
happens. Something, an event takes place, and
at some point it's just trust can't be built
up again. Right? Even though we believe we can
live unconditionally as people, it's very hard.
it is almost impossible for us to live unconditionally.
Because we put conditions on everything. We put
conditions on everything if we are being honest.
Whether that's covenantal love of a spouse, right?
As the one who reads the vows and have them respond
back, whether they wrote it themselves or we
use the vows that I have put together, right?
We verbalize an unconditional love. And I'm not
going to say that every marriage is a sham because
that's not true or that we lie in our vows. That's
not true either because the intent, the desire
is there. But we put conditions on everything.
We can put conditions on our jobs. We can put
conditions on our family, our relationships,
all of those aspects. But what Hosea is going
to teach us today, what Hosea is going to teach
us about the chesed love of God is that chesed
And what we learn from Hosea is that it's a love
that refuses to quit. Let that sit for five seconds.
Because that cuts through all of those answers.
A love that refuses to quit. That if you're in
a relationship, you are my ride or die. You are
my person come hell or high water. We are going
to make it. through together, yet we had 17 different
answers of why people quit. But this is a love
that refuses to quit. If you want to understand
chesed in just a very easy sense, it's God's
steadfast, loyal, covenant -keeping love. And
you don't start with... I don't know. You don't
start with warm feelings. You don't start with
poetic metaphors. You don't start with poetry.
This is just refuse to quit, not out of stubbornness,
but out of a commitment to that love, even if
it gets down to the one centimeter depth. It's
a refuse to quit. It begins with a broken marriage.
It begins with a betrayal. It begins with Hosea,
one of our minor prophets. Again, we're going
to go do a flyover of a lot of the minor prophets
here in this sermon series. Hosea is God's visual
sermon to his wandering people, the Israelites,
also us. It is an unfiltered picture of what
grace looks like when sin has made an absolute
mess of everything. If you just visualize that
you're just sitting there and it's just desolate
all around you probably because of you. This
is a very, very raw picture of grace. And over
the next seven weeks, Hosea is setting this emotional
tone for the entire series. God's hesed is a
pursuing love. God does not want us to come back.
He comes after us. Because when we think we can
do it, we actually put it on us then. Chesed
has nothing to do with us. Chesed has everything
to do with God's pursuing. That's not only Hosea.
That's the message we find in one of our confessions.
Right? Our confessions. Let me go to Dan Arsma,
the three forms of unity we hold. Heidelberg
Catechism, Belgian Confession, and Canons of
Dort. And that, the Canons of Dort, is going
to be our accompaniment over this sermon series.
That God's grace, you know, the Canons of Dort
teaches us that the grace is God's initiative,
not ours. It's God's pursuit, not ours. It's
God's faithfulness, not ours. Because if it's
put on us, We don't do it. Right? Our grace has
conditions. We stop pursuing when we're indifferent,
we're hurt, we're angry, we're tired, we're hungry,
all of those things. And we're not faithful.
We are faithful -less people at times. That the
cans of Dort will come alongside of us as a warm
blanket on a cold night to help us understand
grace. To me, one of the greatest gifts we have
on this earth. As a believer, as a non -believer,
it's still the greatest gift, you just don't
understand it. And hopefully, if you're a non
-believer here today or you're watching online,
by the end of this sermon series, you should
have a better understanding. So let's dive in.
The shock of Hosea, that God commands a broken
marriage. Hosea 1, verse 2. When the Lord first
spoke to Hosea, the Lord said to Hosea, go take
to yourself a wife of whoredom and have children
of whoredom. For the land commits great whoredom
by forsaking the Lord. Biggest word in that paragraph,
and. Just kidding, it's not. But understand,
this is a weird thing to read in a church. Welcome
to 2026. But this is God first spoke. This is
Hosea's ministry. His ministry begins with the
kind of command that any pastor gives this command,
instantly fired or hospitalized. Right? If this
is the command that is given, go and do this.
God tells his prophet to enter into a marriage
that is guaranteed to fail. Because what he's
doing, he's teaching Israel and us. That this
is our own story when it comes to God. Let's
give some context. Hosea prophesied in the 8th
century B .C., before Christ, during the reign
of Jobarim II, a time of economic success. We
see a lot going on. There's political stability,
but there is moral collapse. Israel is outwardly
prosperous, but inwardly corrupt. They have aligned
politically with the unfaithful. They've aligned
with Assyria and Egypt, also known as Gentiles.
Their spiritually adulterous Baal worship is
running rampant in the church. They're thinking
you can do both, but people are leaning more
toward Baal. There's a lot of reasons why that
makes for more of a PG -13 movie or above. And
they are socially unjust. The poor is being exploited.
Exploited? That's not a word. What am I trying
to say? Thank you. Don't laugh at me, Rachel.
Sometimes I can't talk. The people thought they
were doing fine, but God wants to see truth.
God wants them to see the truth. And he's doing
that through Hosea. It's their saying, you love
everything but me, yet I still love you. Put
that in the context of your marriage or your
engagement. What if that was you? You love everything
but me. Maybe that's you saying that to your
spouse. Maybe that's your spouse saying that
to you or a family member or a deep relationship.
Yet I still love you. That is covenantal love,
not contractual love. We've been there. We've
done that with all the mowing of the lawns for
millions of dollars. Thank you, Randy. But understand
that that's covenant love. That is what God is
trying to tell the Israelites. Chesed isn't demonstrated
when someone is lovable. Chesed is demonstrated
when someone is unfaithful. This is what builds
this hesed word for us. This is a week wrecker,
a month wrecker. Let's just call it for what
it is, a 2026 wrecker. So, during these sermons,
we're going to go back to school a little bit.
We're going to go to Grace 101. Grace 101 to
start. The canons describe God's grace as directed
not toward the spiritually strong, but towards
those dead in sin, undeserving of... Mercy. Two
concepts that the canons give us all day, every
day. Grace 101. So we look at head three and
four. Humanity is corrupt, inclined to evil,
unable to return to God on their own. Ouch. But
it's true. This is what total depravity means.
We are bent against God. Even though you might
be the strongest Christian in the room, you still
have a bent against God. There's still a friction,
your flesh and your spirit, at war always. And
then we see in 1, line 7, God's love is rooted
in his free, sovereign good pleasure, not in
anything he sees in us. Think about that. If
God looked at you and said, okay, I've got to
find something I can love, guess what? It doesn't
happen. Thank God for Christ's righteousness,
but we'll get there later. Hosea is a living
illustration of a divine initiative. God is initiating
something. God's love is not a response. It is
the initiating heartbeat of covenant grace. Guys,
grace is not anything that we can really lean
into. But God's love beats grace for us. That
is the center part of God's love, is covenant
grace. Now quickly, we're going to take a little
bit of a rabbit trail, but they do mean something,
is the names of the children. Because God's actually
going to tell us about sin with these names.
Hosea and Gomer had three children, each named
by God as a prophetic indictment. How many of
you named your kids with prophetic indictments
in mind? I hope not. I hope not. That'd just
be mean. But we have Jezreel. God scatters and
God judges. A reminder of the bloodshed in Jezreel
under Jehu. This is all historical. It doesn't
mean a whole lot for us in 2026. It meant everything
back then. Lo ramaha, no mercy. God's hesed is
not sentimental permissiveness. That God's hesed
love means everything. It's not conditional.
It's not, oh, they're having a good day. I'll
love them. That's not what it means. God, his
covenant love includes holy discipline. Right?
That's what we talk about cheap grace all the
time. Lord, forgive me for what I'm going to
do this upcoming Friday. That's not okay. That's
cheap grace. But what we need to understand is
that Israel's violence and corruption have not
gone unnoticed, and his covenant love includes
a holy discipline. Sure, will they be forgiven?
Absolutely, when they come on their knees in
true, pure confession. If we confess our sins,
he is faithful and just. Lo, am I. Not my people.
The covenant fractures under the weight of sin.
This is the covenant lawsuit of a wounded husband.
He was put into a no -win situation, at least
from the look of it. This is not God withdrawing
love. This is God withdrawing comfort so that
his people would awaken to their spiritual adultery.
You have worshipped other gods. That's commandment
one. Right? That's in the first four. And they
knowingly are going to just worship other things.
I don't know about you, but there's this binding
going on in me. That God is withdrawing comfort
so that his people would awaken to their spiritual
adultery. This is what church discipline is completely
based on. But more on that later. Grace 201.
What do the canons teach us about this? The canons
teach that apart from God's sovereign initiative,
this chesed love on the move, we remain blind
to our sin. Head 3 and 4, 10 and 11. God works
through the word and the spirit to enlighten,
open the heart, and make the will alive. Right?
It's not until we come face to face with the
ugliness of our sin. That we're going to make
that turn. Because we love sin. We do. It feels
great. That's what worshiping Baal was all about.
Do what you want. Be your own God. And it got
super dark and destructive and bad. And the people
who knew Yahweh, whose family line knew Yahweh,
said, yeah, that looks better than Yahweh. Friends,
we do the same thing. Whether it's on the computer
screen with another individual, within ourselves,
with money, with fame, whatever it is. We can
see both roads and go, this is what God wants
for me in this moment, but this feels too darn
good. I'm just going to fall in that. And then
what the believer can do is say, because God's
going to ultimately forgive me. Friend, you can't
play hide and seek with someone who's omniscient
and omnipresent. Who's the fool in that sentence?
It's not God. It's us. It's me. It's you. Just
as Israel couldn't see their own sin without
Isaiah's prophetic shock, we cannot see our own
sin unless God reveals it. Yet we like to think
we can just put our sin right over here and we
can just live our life and think that it's not
under his lordship. Why do you want to live outside
of God's lordship? If God is the sovereign God
who created the stars, the moon, the skies, and
you, Why do you want to hide it from them? Because
we're scared. Because we don't fully trust. Because
we can't have chesed love for God, yet he has
it for us. Chesed includes the grace of truth
-telling and living it out. Yet God says, I will
allure her. This is where grace starts to pick
up some movement. A grace that pursues. After
the judgment comes one of the tenderest passages
in all of Scripture. I read this and I'm just
like, okay, we can make it another minute. We
can make it another hour. Hosea 2. Therefore,
behold, I will allure her and bring her into
the wilderness and speak tenderly to her. Notice
what God is not saying. He's not putting conditions
on it. If she returns to me, if she improves,
if she repents enough, if she comes to church
enough, if she says the right prayers, if she
gives the right money, if she volunteers in the
right things, she, he, this isn't just hers,
this is his as well. God initiates, I will allure.
I will pursue. Friends, when do we pursue things?
Keep it clean. When do we pursue things in life?
Anybody? When we love them. Thank you. Austin,
absolutely. When you love them, right? At that
point, it would have been just, could you just
go put your arm right over her? Good job. I did
their wedding. I can do that. Understand that
when we desire something, when we want something,
right? Right? When you want something, you pursue
it. I'm not even going to bring up Carrie and
I. I'm not going to do that for you. But you
can understand. That's why Carrie runs so fast.
But understand, when you want something bad enough,
you pursue it. Whether it's that, what is that
called when you get a better job? A raise, right?
Whether you want a raise, you pursue it. I mean,
I don't know how many people just go, second
day of your new job, I'm going to be the CEO
next week. And you just sit, right? We don't
know. If you want it, you pursue it, right? Gen
Alpha, millennials, remember that. If you want
it, you need to pursue it. You need to work after
it. I will allure her. This is language of romance.
This is language of pursuit. This is language
of chesed. That is why Randy's comment destroyed
me and should destroy us. Remember what his comment
was? On this side, what was Randy's comment?
When you become indifferent. Thank you, three
people. When you just become indifferent. I mean,
when all of a sudden you're looking at your marriage
and you're like, yeah, that's my wife. Yeah,
that's our relationship. You want to go on a
date today? Yeah. You want to watch the Bears?
Heck yeah, I do. No, wrong time to clap. Wrong
time to clap. Holy cow. Father, we pray for whoever
clapped over there. We pray for that marriage.
I mean, we get it, don't we? What we desire,
we want to pursue. This is the language of Chesed.
This is the wilderness of the honeymoon. In the
ancient world, the wilderness, we see it on display,
was not simply a place for wandering, but it's
where covenants were formed. It's when Israel
at first learned to trust God. It is where God
provided manna, water, and protection. The wilderness
is the honeymoon suite for Israelite faithlessness.
Sometimes we've got to be taken out into the
wilderness. Quick question, is the wilderness
comfortable? Not at all. If it was, everyone
would want to go there. The wilderness is not
comfortable. It's uncomfortable. That's part
of the process of God's chesed love. I'm going
to take you back to the beginning. I'm going
to remind you who I am. Israelite needed to hear
it through Hosea. Friends, we need to hear that
every day. Grace 301. When the canons of Dort
speak of irresistible grace, they don't mean
grace that coerces the will. It means grace that
wins the heart. 3 and 4, 12 and 13, God sweetly
and powerfully bends the will, making us willing
to return. Type A's, you can't stand this because
you believe no one can touch your will. Okay,
I'll put, no one can touch our will. I'll put
myself in that. I could be type A. I know you're
shocked. But we don't like that. Our will is
our will. I created this. This is for me. I get
to say. And some of us do that. We bang our feet.
What we need to understand is your will to God,
I mean, what? That's nothing. God can bend your
will. Head five, one through three. Even after
believers fall, God preserves and renews them.
Friend, this isn't a one and done. This isn't
like we have to try out like we're in high school.
Where if you do something wrong, you're probably
on the bottom list. You don't make the cut. That's
not God ever. That's not chesed love. This is
what God does with the people in Hosea. Grace
does not chase us because we are faithful. Grace
chases us because God is faithful. We can give
him all kinds of birds. He's still going to chase
after us. We sang about it. We declared it today.
And this is when we see God buys back his bride.
Grace that redeems. Hosea 3. So I bought her
for 15 shekels of silver and a homer and a lehef
of barley. None of that really means anything
to us, and that's fine. Gomer has not just left
Hosea. She has sunk so low, she is now being
sold, likely into slavery or some kind of exploitation.
I think we all know what I mean. And Hosea, representing
God, does the unthinkable. He buys back his own
unfaithful wife. This is the Mount Everest. This
is the top show of chesed that we have outside
of Christ on the cross. This moment anticipates
the redemption of Israel from Egypt. It anticipates
the restoration of exile and ultimately brings
alive 1 Corinthians 6 .12. You were bought with
a price. That's for us. We were bought with a
price. God does not merely forgive. He redeems.
At all costs. Namely, his son. On the cross.
For you and for me. Grace 401. Ed 2 .8. Christ's
death effectively redeems the people the father
has given him. 3 and 4 .14. God opens the closed
heart and he softens the hard heart. In a game
of stubbornness between you and God, guess what?
You lose. I lose. All day. Every day. Hosea buying
back Gomer is a living picture of the particular
love of God, the effective redemption accomplished
by Christ, and the personal application of grace
by the Spirit. If you hear anything today, hear
these things. We do not rescue ourselves. We
are rescued, we are redeemed, and we are restored.
So what does Chesed teach us for today? Let's
land the plane here. If we only admire Hosea
from a distance, we miss the point. We got to
get into it. This covenant story Hosea reveals
is also our calling. To live as people who have
been loved first. We do not obey to earn God's
love. We obey because we've been pursued by grace.
This is the reformed order of salvation, right?
Grace, gratitude, obedience. We obey because
it's worth it. And don't try to weigh that in
your mind. Christ went to the cross so we don't
have to. We obey. We live out the call of Christ
because of grace and our gratitude. If you don't
have gratitude about God's grace, you are dead
inside. It's probably the best way I can say
it. That God's grace is so irresistible. If you
want something else in this world besides God's
grace, you are a fool. I am a fool. We are called
to extend chesed to others. Knowing we'll never
get it perfectly, but it's a good model, pursuing
love, but not conditional love. If God pursues
us when we're unfaithful, we cannot withhold
kindness from those who hurt or disappoint us.
So this is going to ruffle the feathers of that
quitting conversation because we ought to forgive.
Chesed in practice means, ooh, this is tough.
And I look first here at Jim. Forgiveness when
forgiveness feels costly. Compassion when compassion
feels inconvenient. Patient with people who we
think don't deserve it. And faithfulness when
others are inconsistent. Third, let God tell
the truth about your sin. Hosea's children remind
us honesty about sin is part of God's loving
pursuit. Repentance isn't punishment. It's the
path home. It's the going down the sin path,
the pause. That pause is so important. It's recognizing
who God is, who we are, and our need for God,
and then knowing that when we turn, his blessed
love's already there. We walk in it. We live
in it. Finally, remember that grace is not passive.
Grace pursues. Munster Church, as we enter this
new year, entering a season, and understanding
grace deeper will mean something. Our understanding
of grace deepens, that means we need to walk
it out or we've gained and learned nothing. Grace
in growth, grace in conflict, grace in building,
grace in welcoming, grace in disciplining, grace
in stretching out our faith. Chesed will be your
guide. What does Disney want to tell us? Our
conscience will be our guide. Wake up. Our conscience
will be our guide. That is a lie from the pit
of hell. Grace will be our guide. We love because
he first loved us. His love is stronger than
your failures. Hosea's story ends, not in heartbreak,
but in a homecoming. If you forget anything else
today, remember you, I am Gomer. God is Hosea,
and his hesed is stronger than our failures.
The canons of Dor declared the same truth today.
Grace pursues, grace awakens, grace redeems,
grace restores, and grace keeps us. And friends,
that grace is not abstract. It is God himself.
The God who runs towards sinners. The God who
refuses to let go. The God whose covenant love
endures forever. Let's pray.