Before I direct you to Hosea's prophecy, had a couple of questions, exactly the same question came to me after this morning's message. So I thought maybe a little bit of a sidebar or an excursus as an order from this morning's sermon on forgiveness. The question that was asked was this. So what happens if the person doesn't repent? The person that sinned against me, what do I do then? I think it's always helpful to answer, first of all, what you don't do. You don't be like this, and I'm not going to forgive them until they actually come to me. I'm going to nurture this really bad attitude toward them, an attitude that's bereft of compassion or any kind of love. That's the bad response. The good response is actually found in the Gospel of Luke. A few verses before what we considered this morning. And the good response we see in the father of the prodigal son. And what's the father doing? He is on his porch and he is looking longingly for his son to come home and longing to give him release. That's the attitude that we need to maintain, that attitude that longs to see that release happening. So is that helpful? I don't know exactly what you call that, a spirit of forgiveness or a posture that longs to forgive, but I think that's enjoined in scripture. So hopefully that's helpful. And if you want to have a further discussion about that, we can talk about it afterwards. So Hosea chapter 8 is where we are. and we're gonna be looking at the entire chapter. Although as we've been moving through the big section of this book, again, we're seeing themes that are being repeated and touched on. So when I find something kind of new in the chapter, I'm gonna couch it in the terms that the chapter has given to us and for the most part, focus on that thing that's kind of new, looking at things from a different angle. So, You're gonna discover that tonight. And the title for this evening's message might strike you as strange, but here it is. Do we consider the law? a strange thing. And in Hosea's prophecy, the law refers to, broadly speaking, the Bible that they had at that point of time, but it also refers, in the immediate context, to the commands that God has given. So we can be thinking about it at two different levels. Do we consider the law a strange thing? And that title is just taken right from the text and it leaked off the page to me as I read this chapter. But it's all set in this context of God judging his people. And whenever we find an instance of judgment in the Old Testament, it is a precursor to that greater judgment. It ought to make us very thankful for the shed blood of the Lord Jesus Christ. But we notice it's all in this context of judgment. And several of the images that are here we have actually seen before. So let's read it together and pray and then get into it. Hosea 8, beginning to read at verse 1. Set the trumpet to your lips. One like a vulture is over the house of the Lord, because they have transgressed my covenant and rebelled against my law. To me they cry, my God, we, Israel, know you. Israel has spurned the good. The enemy shall pursue him. They made kings, but not through me. They set up princes, but I knew it not. With their silver and gold, they made idols for their own destruction. I have spurned your calf, O Samaria. My anger burns against them. How long will they be incapable of innocence? For it is from Israel. A craftsman made it. It is not God. The calf of Samaria shall be broken to pieces. For they sow the wind, and they shall reap the whirlwind. The standing grain has no heads, it shall yield no flower. If it were to yield, strangers would devour it. Israel is swallowed up. Already they are among the nations as a useless vessel. For they have gone up to Assyria, a wild donkey wandering alone. Ephraim has hired lovers. Though they hire allies among the nations, I will soon gather them up. And the king and princes shall soon writhe because of the tribute. Because Ephraim has multiplied altars for sinning, they have become to him altars for sinning. Were I to write for him my laws by the ten thousands, they would be regarded as a strange thing. As for my sacrificial offerings, they sacrifice meat and eat it, but the Lord does not accept them, nor now he will remember their iniquity and punish their sins. They shall return to Egypt. For Israel has forgotten his maker and built palaces and Judah has multiplied fortified cities. So I will send a fire upon his cities and it shall devour her strongholds. Let's pray together. Heavenly Father, we pray that you would be with us once again as we work through this difficult book and this difficult portion of your Word. We pray that you would help me to explain things clearly, help me to draw out exactly what is there. And we do pray that you would make us all good listeners so that when we pick up your word, when we hear it proclaimed, when we read it to ourselves and we come up against your holy word, we rejoice at it. We say our amen, not only verbally, but with lives that glorify our precious savior, Jesus Christ, in whose name we pray, amen. Jose is a difficult book. Can you all put up your hand to that? Prophetic books are really difficult. So I'm really feeling for the Isingas tonight because you've been traveling really long, but this is gonna be a challenge. And it's a challenge to each and every one of us. What is really, really important, whether you have the Bible in this older technology or on this one, is that you're actually following along and seeing that I'm taking the thoughts that I share with you from the text. So please follow along. A bit of a preamble. Let me just talk about some other things first of all. We believe that we are declared not guilty by faith in Jesus Christ alone. That's called justification by faith alone. Amen? Great doctrine. But we believe that true, justifying faith is never alone. It's never all by itself. What do I mean by that? If you have truly placed your faith in the Lord Jesus Christ as a result of the regenerating work of the Spirit, that's going to issue spontaneously, naturally, not perfectly, but increasingly, in good works. True, justifying faith always issues in obedience. always issues in delight for this book, delight for the law of God, delight for the imperatives that we find there, delight with everything that we find there. James says, the half-brother of our Lord, our faith is shown to be complete, shown to be a justifying, saving faith by the works that we do. That's James 2.2. In Paul's words, he calls this the obedience of faith. That is a turn of phrase that you see in chapter 1 and in chapter 16. Very, very important. We have so many Christians out there who are laying stock in some profession that is made for Christ a long, long time ago, and yet, if you look at the evidence of that life, there's no obedience at all, no delight in the law of God at all. true, justifying, saving faith, issues in a life that loves God, loves his word, and loves his law. Always, always, always. Now, in regard to that one portion of the word of God, and thinking particularly about the commandments that we find here and the imperatives, We all believe, I think, what I just said. But in our particular tribe, we have always had some difficulty relating to the law. And I'm thinking about the law in its narrower sense, in terms of the commandments. We have. We hear the term, and some of us, we start to cringe at that which is deemed good by God, according to Romans 7, verse 12. Not exactly sure why this is. Perhaps we are overzealous at preserving the integrity of the doctrine of justification because we believe that this is the article by which the church stands or falls. Perhaps we cringe whenever we hear law or imperative because we want to guard against that kind of preaching that is just moralistic and that you could hear at the local mosque. We want to guard against that, not grounded in The gospel not grounded in the blood-bought work of Jesus Christ who came to destroy the works of the devil and therefore powerless. Maybe that's why we react whenever we hear the law. We cringe. Or perhaps it is because many of us are progressive covenantalists. How do you like that turn of phrase? What do I mean by that? Bible is arranged and God's dealings with man is arranged in terms of covenant, in terms of these relational documents. And a progressive covenantalist would say that all those covenants that we see in the Old Testament scriptures, they are gobbled up, they are subsumed in that new covenant in the Lord Jesus Christ. where we're at here as a church, most of us. You might not understand that term, but all that means to say is that we're still kind of working out the relationship between the Old Testament and the New. We're still trying to figure it all out. We're trying to connect to that new and final priesthood and what our obedience to that priest entails in that new law that accompanies him. That's Hebrews 7 verse 12. Or maybe we just cringe at the law or imperative just because we don't like being told what to do. That's probably where it is, right? Nobody likes being told what to do. We want to be God. We've still got that remnant left in us. I don't want to be told what to do. We come up against an imperative in the New Testament scriptures, we hear it, we don't line up, and then we dismiss it. In any case, whatever the reason, as Christians, we have a Savior who is at the very moment of our conversion, and not sometime afterwards, He's our Lord. You don't accept Him at one point as Savior, and then a little bit later on, I'm gonna make Him the captain of my life. You're not truly converted until He's the captain of your life, until He's your Lord. And this Jesus Christ, he has given us a law. He calls it the law of liberty. Now that should be attractional to you. It is the royal law by which to live, and I mean really live. We follow it, we enter into that path of joy and holiness and happiness. But here's the question. Is it strange to us? Now again, we can be talking about the entire Bible, but what I'm focusing on here particularly is that narrow idea of the law in terms of imperative and command. When you hear it, is it strange to you? In all its varied forms, how we practice church, how we relate to one another as husbands and wives, how we deal with our children, How are we to relate to the world? All the imperatives that are connected to those things, do we consider it strange? Do we hear a New Testament command or practice and we're so entwined with the world and its godless thinking that it doesn't even penetrate? That's what I mean by strange. Not that you just reject it. Strangeness is defined that when you hear it, you think that's not normal practice. Again, I'm not talking simply about hearing a law and then rejecting it. I'm talking about hearing a law and it's so foreign to what we deem as normal practice that it doesn't even register. Do we consider the law a strange thing? That was Israel's problem. and may it not be so of us. A little bit again about the context. Hosea is ministering at a very, very difficult time. Israel, I think I made mention of this early on in this series, their worship had become syncretistic. It's not like, and you see this from the book, it's not like they're just worshiping Baal all the time. and exercising in these ritual prostitution rites at these shrines that are erected all over the place. It's not like they have rejected any forms of the worship of Yahweh outright. You see this in the text. They're still trying to offer love offerings while at the same time they've incorporated some of the practices of the world. This is what's going on at the time. And again, if you were to ask an Israelite at the time whether he knew Yahweh or not, he would say, yes, I worship him all the time. And this is where Hosea is called to speak into all of this and give the word of the Lord. And he gives it in an acted way in chapters one through three. And then that act is actually spelled out in chapters four through 14. A little bit of a review of those chapters in the second section. Chapter four, what did we discover? What is God's indictment against the northern kingdom of Israel? You don't know me. And that is a term of intimacy. You don't know me. You might think you know me, you might confess that you know me, but you don't know me. In chapter 5, we then discover the punishment for such adulterous behavior, such infidelity, and God says He is going to come most certainly and most comprehensively to administer justice to them. In chapter six, we discovered again what the Lord requires through the call of the prophet, know me, he says, press on to know me. And we see how that again is met by Israel with this kind of momentary affection. We want just the perks that the Lord will give, but we really don't want him himself. And then with some Israelites, it was outright rejection. And then we get another aspect of this momentary affection, and even this outright rejection in some cases, in chapter 7 with discovering the nature of what is known in the Bible as worldly sorrow. And there's that striking phrase that we considered last week, they return, God says, but they don't return upward. And again, I have to say this, how many people come supposedly to faith in the Lord Jesus Christ for the perks and not for the living God? This is what is being called out through the prophet by the Lord. Christ died the righteous for the unrighteous, yes, to save us from hell, but to bring us to God and life with Him. So that brings us to chapter 8. And as we continue, you're gonna notice many themes are repeated. It is a chapter of judgment, but what is emphasized in the midst of judgment is the reason for that judgment, yet from another angle, and this striking spiritual disconnect between what Israel professed to believe and what they actually practiced. So, under the introduction, I just want us to consider verses one to three. Let me reread those verses. Set the trumpet to your lips. Remember we saw that trumpet blast coming before? This is a announcement of judgment. We saw this in chapter 5 verse 8. It is a precursor to the final judgment where again we will hear a trumpet blast. And then we read one like a vulture. Another way you can translate that bird is eagle. And I'll tell you why that's legitimate in a moment. One like a vulture or eagle is over the house of the Lord and the house of the Lord here not speaking about the temple but the people themselves. So you have that picture of an eagle looking at his prey. It is an image and it's hovering and it's about to swoop down. God is saying judgment is coming and it's going to come swiftly. Why? because they have transgressed my covenant. We saw that kind of language back in chapter six and verse seven, and rebelled against my law. To me, they cry, my God, we, Israel, know you. There's the cry, there's the profession. But here's the pronouncement. Israel has spurned the good. The enemy shall pursue him. So again, we were working through some of these items again, judgment announced with a trumpet blast pictured as an eagle swooping down to make an end of the nation of Israel. In that image, the reason why I think it should be better translated eagles because of what we have in Deuteronomy 28, 49 to 51. So just turn there because I think Hosea is actually thinking of this passage under the inspiration of the spirit. And this is all in that second giving of the covenant. And there are stipulations to that covenant. Your faithful blessing. You're not faithful. This is what's going to happen. Look at verses 49 to 51. The Lord will bring a nation against you from far away, from the end of the earth, swooping down like the eagle, a nation whose language you do not understand, a hard-faced nation who shall not respect the old or show mercy to the young. It shall eat the offspring of your cattle and the fruit of your ground. until you are destroyed. It also shall not leave you grain, wine, or oil, the increase of your herds, or the young of your flock, until they have caused you to perish." And a lot of those images in Deuteronomy 28, 49-51 are picked up by Hosea here in the language of judgment. And again we're told why they're judged. They're judged because Israel had broken that covenant. And remember, covenant is all about relationship. And this scene in rejecting what God had prescribed and would make for life. The second half of verse one. And then in verse two, the Lord spells it out for them. And spells out for us the kind of thing he's not going to accept. Professing one thing and practicing another. Look at it again. Israel's profession. So many Christians like this. My God, we know you. My God, I know you. And what does God say about their practice? It doesn't line up. You have spurned the good. You have spurned the good. One writer said the word good there signifies more than simply the opposite of evil. It represents what the Lord wanted to do for his people. Again, it's like coming to God for the perks that he can offer, all the material blessings, and rejecting him, rejecting his plan of salvation as well. So let me say it again, faith without words, it is dead. Absolutely stone cold dead. Orthodoxy without orthopraxy. Orthodox doctrine without orthodox practice is an abomination to the Lord and it will be judged. Will be judged. We see that here. And this is just a precursor of the final judgment. But in the midst, we get a picture of what that spurning of the good looks like. We need to mark it well. We don't want to be under the indictment of the Lord in verse 12, when he says of Israel, and the Bible hits them, and his imperatives hit them, and he says, they consider it strange. It's not even penetrating. Doesn't even get in there. They think it's abnormal practice, what I'm commending to them. May we look at this and come away from it, the spirit working in us and say to the Lord, I love your law. I love it. I wanna do what you have commanded. We'll notice two points here. First of all, verses four to 10. They're judged for what they made. They're judged for what they made. And these things that they made, this led them to considering the Bible and the imperatives in the Bible is strange. Very important. Here Israel spurned the good and ended up considering the law of the Lord a strange thing by two things they had made. And we need to observe that the second thing they made drove them to make the first thing that they made. Again, remember the disconnect. Israel professed to know the Lord and practiced whatever they wanted to do. And so we read, number one, verse four, They made leaders. What does Hosea say? What does the Lord say through Hosea? They made kings, but not through me. That's so interesting. They set up princes, nobles, but I knew it not. And you look at Israel's history and what do you discover? The last king of Israel to receive divine sanction, and here's a quiz for you class, who was it? The last king in the Northern Kingdom that received divine sanction from the Lord was who? Or at least answer this, whose dynasty was he a part of? Jehu. Remember Jehu? Jehu, in some respects, did what the Lord wanted him to do. And he says, your dynasty is gonna last to the fourth generation. His name was Zechariah. But after that in Israel's history, all the kings that they set up did not have divine sanction. They made kings, but not through me, God says. They set up princes, but I knew it not. And God isn't saying there, God isn't saying there that he didn't know about it. He wasn't blind to their making of kings. What he is saying here is that they didn't involve him in the process. Now, in order for us to get a handle on this and then to draw out an application for us, we need to ask the question, what kind of leaders did the Lord want for Israel? That's the basic question. And the basic answer is this. He wanted the kind of leaders that would lead the people to the Lord, to walk in His ways, His purposes, His laws, to delight in His Word. And even when Jeroboam, the very first king of the northern kingdom, son of Nebat, Even when he was being set up as king, we notice this desire on the part of the Lord. You don't need to turn there. Let me just read it for you in 1 Kings 11.38. And if you will listen to all that I command you, says the Lord to Jeroboam, and will walk in my ways and do what is right in my eyes by keeping my statutes and my commandments as David my servant did, I will be with you and will build you a sure house as I built for David. And I will give Israel to you. When God makes leaders in the Old Testament, he wants, he desires those kind of leaders who are gonna lead the people in the path and the way of righteousness. Those who delight in the ways and the purposes and the laws of the Lord. Therefore, when we read here that Israel made kings but not through me, they set up princes. What they were doing is setting up the opposite of what the Lord delighted in. They put in place those kind of leaders who would suit their own whims and desires. Now, are you starting to think about applications? It's still happening today, still happening today. The Lord still pronounces, they make kings, they put leaders in place that want nothing to do with me. They set up princes, but I know it not. The church has had and continues to make a steady diet of leaders who are not divinely sanctioned. And this is why when you talk to these so-called Christians about holiness of life, the way of the Lord, the imperatives in Scripture, it doesn't even get in, it doesn't penetrate. In fact, they will think you are from another planet. They will. I've seen this when I've had to counsel people from the outside, particularly. I always point them to the Word. What God says will make for life and will make for joy, whether it's in regards to a marriage, it's usually that kind of counseling, or in terms of a parent-child relationship, or in the workplace. And you just see it in their eyes. It doesn't resonate. It's not even penetrating. They think you got like ten horns on your head and you're totally out of sync with what Christianity is. But my friends, we will always be on the right side of history, always in sync when we follow this book. And I always warn them after I've seen they've rejected it in their eyes that you can go from this place and I can guarantee you you're going to find someone who's going to tell you exactly what you want to hear. And that is the snare that we're living in today. It's exactly like Israel. May we be those. This is not a pride thing up here. We want to be those who stick to this book and we want others, others to stick to this book as well. We need to be praying for revival. That's what we need to be doing. So that Christians stop putting in place leaders who do not love the Lord, His ways and His word. Well, there's a root to this. And the root comes in The second part of verse 4. Where does this all stem from? And it stems from the fact that they don't have God. What are they making? They're making idols. With their silver and gold, they made idols for their own destruction. Why do they make leaders to suit their own whims? Because they have made gods to suit their own whims, although they still profess to worship the one true God. This is what is so interesting about Israel and why it so relates to today. There are so many churches out there that are not really churches. They're not really Christian, and yet they say they're Christian. There are many out there living this disconnect. who think they are Christians and they are not. And God minces no words and says, what you fashioned is a God of your own making and it will result in your destruction. So, back to sort of the main point that I want to draw out. Israel considered the law of God, whether the Bible or His imperatives, as a strange thing. How did that happen? How did they get to that point? Well, I'll tell you how. They rejected God. They made up their own gods, and then they put in leaders in place that basically told them exactly what they wanted to hear, such that when Hosea actually was preaching to them, he was getting this kind of reaction. It's not even penetrating. It's totally strange to them. And God makes that pronouncement as well. And He says, I will judge them. And that destruction is described in the verses that follow. We're just going to move very quickly through this. Remember, Israel spurned the good. They spurned the word of the Lord. They spurned the law of the Lord. And so God spurns them. That's the judgment. I have spurned your calf, O Samaria. Samaria, probably representative of the shrines, the major calf shrines in Bethel and Dan. Remember, Jeroboam set them up. These are the gods who led you out of Egypt. God says, I've spurned them. I've spurned your calf, O Samaria. My anger burns against them. And then you see something of the heart of the Lord popping out in the passage again. How long will they be incapable of innocence, of doing what is right? There's a desire there on the part of the Lord. And again, we need to remember that great promise in chapters 1 through 3 of the great day of Jezreel when the Lord Jesus Christ comes and forever breaks our bent for wandering. In essence, you have spurned the good, I will spurn you. That's the judgment. And then we get these statements that begin with the word for. And he spells out what the judgment will look like. First of all, verse 6, part 1 of that judgment. For it is from Israel, speaking about these idols, a craftsman made it, it's not God. The calf of Samaria shall be broken to pieces, Another translation, go up in flames. Another translation, smash to bits. This thing that you depended on, it's gonna be obliterated. That's part one of the judgment. Part two of the judgment, again, beginning with the word for. For they sow the wind, this is the spirit that they are following, the spirit that is not of the spirit of the living God. They shall therefore reap the whirlwind. Whirlwind signifies all manner of badness and destruction. And here it is linked back to what we found in the stipulations of the second giving of the coven in Deuteronomy 28. The standing grain has no heads. Your crops are going to fail. It shall yield no flower. And if it were to yield, strangers would devour it. You're going to be judged. It's not going to go well for you in the field. Israel is swallowed up. Present tense referring to a future event that happens, and you can refer to it in 2 Kings 17 verses 6 and following, with the very last king of Hosea being exiled in 722 BC by the Assyrian hordes. Then God says this, already they are among the nations as a useless vessel. You will note in Israel's history that their territory gets smaller and smaller and smaller. And that term useless vessel is very interesting. It refers to a once precious article in which God has lost interest. And there's a part three to the judgment, spelling it out. You spurned me, I'm gonna spurn you. Look at the next four. For they have gone up to Assyria for help. How is Israel described? Like a wild donkey wandering alone. Ephraim, another name for Israel, or the largest tribe in Israel that influenced the entire nation, has hired lovers. They haven't come to me. Though they hire allies among the nations, I will soon gather them up. What's the idea there? It's punishment. I'm gonna gather them up for punishment. And the king and princes shall soon writhe because of the tribute. Maybe this is a better translation. They will begin in a little while to suffer because of the burden that they will have to bear. And that burden, probably what's in view here is of the exile. So judgment again. But back to the point. They're judged for what they made. Leaders and gods to suit their own desires. Now a little bit more quickly. They're also judged for what they multiplied, and this too had an impact on them. Why did they consider the Bible strange? Why did they consider the law of God strange? Why did it happen that when they heard an imperative of the Lord from Hosea, it just didn't register with them? In fact, they thought it was the exact opposite of what God demanded of them. Well, we also read they're judged for what they multiplied, and this impacted why they viewed the law as a strange thing. Because Ephraim has multiplied altars for sinning, they have become to him altars for sinning. It's not a funny verse. Read it again. Because Ephraim has multiplied altars for sinning, they have become to him altars for sinning. Do you remember back to the days of the Cold War? So you had America on one side and Russia on the other side. They have their spies in each place. Russia, they've got like 10 nukes. We've got to have 10 nukes. Russia finds out that the U.S. has 10 nukes and what do they do? We're going to have 20 nukes. What does the U.S. do? We've got to have 20 nukes. And on and on and on it goes. That's called proliferation. That's why you had all these anti-proliferation treaties. Nukes naturally beget nukes. That's not a political statement. I'm just sort of like a history student, okay? They beget nukes. It's exactly the same way with sin. Sin always begets sin. It always begets sin. And that's the point here. There's proliferation going on. Do you remember where it all started? You had a big altar way up in Dan in the north and you had one in the south in Bethel. But then what happened? You look at Google Maps and you just see all these icons popping up of all these altars being built all over the place. And guess what happened when they built those altars? Do you think they were just out of use? They used them. And you think about how revolting that was to God and the practices that they were engaged in with these shrine prostitutes. And it's happening all over the place. Is it any wonder that the law of God did not get through to them? Sin always begets sin. Let me give you an example of this. I remember preaching this in Micah, Micah 1.13. You want to turn there, Michael 1.13. Harness the steeds to the chariots, inhabitants of Lachish. It was the beginning of sin to the daughter of Zion, for in you were found the transgressions of Israel." Something happened in Lachish that spread. Sin naturally spreads and begets more sin. Probably the thing that happened there is Lachish as a big city appealed to a foreign power to help them in their time of need. And that kind of thing spread throughout all Israel. It was a rejection of the living God upon whom they ought to have been dependent and who had provided them with everything. And this principle here of sin begetting sin still holds true. Let me explain. Once you allow Satan or sin a foothold in one area, the temptation to sin spreads to other areas, and sin itself spreads. You open the door to one anti-law view, one anti-Bible view, one idolatrous view, and pretty soon things get out of hand. Again, I've seen it happen time and again. There are shipwrecks of faith out there and we need to mark them well. It didn't start big. It started small. Mark them well and hold fast to the word of the living God. They multiplied. Well, again, of course, God's righteous judgment comes. Again, we're not going to spend a lot of time here because we've seen it before. There are a few parts here. Look at verse 12, and this is a judgment. This verse from which we derived our title for the message this evening, were I to write for him my laws by the ten thousands, they would be regarded as a strange thing. were I to write out for him 10,000 points of my instruction, they would be regarded as something strange. Oh God, may that never be said of us. Part two of the judgment comes in verse 13. As for my sacrificial offerings, or maybe a better translation, it's the only place you find this in the entire Old Testament, this turn of phrase. There's a little bit of debate about it. Or as for the sacrifices of my love things. You see, the sacrifices that Israel was commanded to give were to be born of love for the Lord. They sacrifice meat and eat it, but the Lord does not accept them. He does not delight in them, to put it another way. That's part two of the judgment. And then part three. Second part of verse 13, going into verse 14. Now he will remember their iniquity and punish their sins. They shall return to Egypt. What does that mean? Do you remember from last time? Chapter seven, verse 16. Egypt is representative. It is an image. Hosea knows full well where they're gonna be exiled to. He's just using Egypt as a metaphor for Assyria. They're going to be exiled. Why? For Israel has forgotten his Maker. Now, is Hosea thinking about Maker? Is the Lord thinking about himself as Maker? In what sense? In a creative sense or a redemptive sense? I think it's in a redemptive sense. God was the one who brought them out of Egypt redemptively and made them a nation. And God says here, they're gonna be exiled because they have forgotten all about that. It was me who brought them out, not because they were mightier than any of the other nations, but because I set my love upon them, I redeemed them with a mighty hand and an outstretched arm. Israel has forgotten his maker. What have they put their trust in? Well, they built palaces. And Judah, you're not exempt. You've multiplied fortified cities. So this is what I'm gonna do. I'm gonna send a fire upon his cities, and it shall devour her strongholds. So to summarize the judgment here in this section of the chapter, you reject my law, I reject your worship, You shall be set on fire and devoured. Israel is judged for what they multiplied. They multiplied in fractions of the law of the Lord. Judge for what they made, judge for what they multiplied, and this not surprisingly led to the indictment of the Lord of glory in verse 12. Let's read it again. Just let it penetrate. Were I to write for him my laws by the 10,000s, they would be regarded as a strange thing. 730. Word of application. Where are we at? Where are we at, beloved, in the Lord Jesus Christ? We who profess to know him, where are we at? When the Bible is opened, in whatever place, is there an eagerness to hear God's voice and receive it as wisdom? Is there that eagerness? When we hear a command, when we hear a gospel imperative, forgive, love God, love neighbor, go, bear with one another. Do not exasperate, fathers, your children to wrath. bring them up in the fear and the admonition of the Lord. When we hear those things, do they resonate with us? Do we recognize it as true and shout from the depths of our heart, Amen, I want to do that, I love Him so much, for His great love for me in Jesus Christ. That's the application. And if you read the Bible, And persistently, you don't find that response in your hearts. I'm big time worried. If there is not these sentiments, it may be we have drawn to ourselves teachers to suit our own carnal whims and desires. It may be we have become desensitized. We're in some systemic sin, rejecting the law in one area, not as leading us to question other areas. And it may be, if that strangeness to his word and to his imperatives persists, that we weren't born again ever. It may mean that. Amen. I want to do what you say. I love your word. I love you. If that is your sentiment, praise God. Because that's why Jesus came. One of the reasons. He came to destroy the works of the devil and to make us love him and to love his ways. It's evidence that your faith, your justifying faith is true. Justifying faith. And I would just call you persevere in it. Persevere in it. There are so many writers out there, so many preachers on the web. Only follow those who love this book and, in consequence, love the Lord. Persevere in it by God's preserving grace and know life. For all of us, I just pray that the Holy Spirit of Christ would make this our confession. I delight to do your will. I delight to do your will. Oh my God, your law is within my heart. Let's pray. So relevant, so relevant, Heavenly Father, these very old words. You prove time and again that your word is living and active. I trust that I've been of some help just to draw out the main points in the text and your people would have been challenged by it and for those who perhaps have been deceiving themselves, they would truly experience life, that regenerate heart and follow hard after you, placing their faith in the Lord Jesus Christ. Lord, for others of us, some of us may have slipped, maybe we're in that place of sin and we're inclined to dismiss other things that your word has said, I pray that you would stop your children in their tracks and that you would draw them back to yourself, draw them back to the word, grant them that heart that receives it, that wants to obey it. And for all of us, Lord, may we truly make that confession that we love, we love you and we love your word and we love your commands. We pray these things in Jesus' name, amen.