If you close your Bibles, would you open them again to the book of Hosea? Hosea chapter 1. This morning we want to begin a series of messages in the Minor Prophets. The Minor Prophets are called Minor, M-I-N-O-R, not because the content of their books is unimportant, but because the content of their books is smaller. Their writings are shorter than the other prophets like Isaiah, Jeremiah, and Ezekiel. Jewish writers such as Jesus ben Sirah and Josephus spoke of them as a unit. They called the minor prophets the Book of the Twelve, or simply the Twelve Prophets. And very early, In the production of Hebrew manuscripts, these 12 books were written on a single scroll. One of the rabbis said that that was done to make sure that not one of those small books would be lost. Saint Augustine was the first that we know of to have called them the minor prophets. They appear in somewhat of a loose chronological order. It's not a strict order. But the first six books, Hosea through Micah, were written during the time of the Assyrian dominance. The next three books, Nahum, Habakkuk, and Zephaniah, were written during the time of Assyrian decline and Babylonian ascendancy. And the final three books, Agai, Zechariah, and Malachi, were written after the exile. But within those groupings, I say somewhat of a loose chronological order, because within those groupings, the order does not seem to be chronological. Hosea was not the first of the minor prophets. But Hosea is the longest in that grouping, and therefore seems to come first. Hosea had a long ministry. He tells us that he ministered during the reigns of Uzziah, Jotham, Ahaz, and Hezekiah, kings of Judah, and during the reign of Jeroboam. This is not the Jeroboam who established the northern kingdom of Israel, but rather Jeroboam II, son of Jehoash, king of Israel. His ministry was primarily directed to the northern kingdom. Remember, the kingdom was divided and we'll talk about that a bit later. But the kingdom was divided. The northern kingdom was called Israel, consisted of ten tribes, had its capital in Samaria. The southern kingdom was called Judah and retained the capital at Jerusalem. Hosea directed his ministry and lived in the northern kingdom of Israel. with applications and implications for Judah to the south. Hosea's contemporaries included Amos and Isaiah. Amos served in the north with Hosea. Isaiah ministered primarily to the kingdom of Judah in the south. Isaiah names the same kings, the same reigns of the kings of Judah in his calling. He says in Isaiah chapter 1, verse 1, the vision concerning Judah and Jerusalem that Isaiah son of Amoz, that's Amoz, not Amos, the prophet, that Isaiah son of Amoz saw during the reigns of Uzziah, Jotham, Ahaz and Hezekiah, kings of Judah. In Isaiah chapter 6, Isaiah had that great vision of the glory of God in the temple. And he received his calling that was a hard calling. He says in Isaiah 6 verse 8, Then I heard the voice of the Lord saying, Whom shall I send, and who will go for us? And I said, Here am I. Send me. And God said to Isaiah these words, Go and tell this people, be ever hearing, but never understanding, be ever seeing, but never perceiving. Make the heart of this people calloused, make their ears dull, and close their eyes. Otherwise, they might see with their eyes, hear with their ears, understand with their hearts, and turn and be healed. Then I said, for how long, O Lord? God tells Isaiah, you're going to preach. You're going to preach your heart out to people who will hear the words, but won't understand. Who will see you, but won't perceive what you're talking about. People who will not respond to the message of repentance to which you call them. And Isaiah says, how long? How long will I have this hard assignment? And he answered, until the cities lie ruined and without inhabitant, until the houses are left deserted and the fields ruined and ravaged, until the Lord has sent everyone far away and the land is utterly forsaken. That's a hard calling. But the mission of Hosea is harder still. When the Lord began to speak through Hosea, verse 2, the Lord said to him, Go, take to yourself an adulterous wife and children of unfaithfulness. because the land is guilty of the vilest adultery in departing from the Lord. Hosea's whole lifetime, Hosea's whole marriage is intended to be a demonstration to Israel of the faithfulness of God set against the unfaithfulness of his people. J.C. Ryle, in his series of short biographies on various Reformers, spoke of George Whitefield and said that Whitfield's marriage contributed little to his happiness. Whitfield was one who probably ought, from a human point of view, never to have married. He was so bent on traveling that when he made his first proposal of marriage, he wrote to the young woman's father saying that most of the women who make the trip to the colony die on the way, He wants to marry his daughter, not because of that trivial emotion called love, but because he needs a capable assistant to run the orphanages while he's out preaching. And those who don't die in the voyage often come down with illnesses and die there. And so he's pleased that his daughter is healthy and thinks that she will make a wonderful administrator. And, of course, he was turned down. But then he met a widow who was actually, actually the widow was, what we would say dating, the widow was seeing a fellow preacher named Howell Harris. Howell Harris intended to marry her. But knowing that his friend George Whitfield needed a helper in America, Howell Harris said, this is a wonderful woman. and introduced them with a view toward that relationship. George wasted no time, extended to her an invitation to become his wife. Widows in that day were rarely independent financially or in any other way. And with that being the prospect of marriage that she had, she accepted. Ryle says that his marriage contributed little to his happiness. What do you think about Hosea? His marriage contributed much to his unhappiness, to his grief, to his sorrow, to his shame. This is what he faces. And this is the will of God for him. That his marriage to an adulterous woman may be a depiction of God's marriage to a spiritually adulterous people. What is spiritual adultery and how does it occur? There is a human relationship, a creation ordinance given by God in the garden and known in all cultures of all time called marriage. Marriage is under attack today, you know that. The very definition of marriage that has withstood the test of thousands of years is under attack today. Marriage in the scripture has four great purposes. One in Genesis chapter 1 is to multiply and to fill the earth. A second in Genesis chapter 2 is to overcome loneliness and provide intimacy. A third is to provide help in fulfilling one's calling. And the fourth is to illustrate and demonstrate the covenantal loving bond between God and His people throughout the Old Testament and the New Testament. Marriage is used as a picture of the relationship between God and His people. I said used, I don't mean that. It's not as if the writers of scripture looked at marriage and said, ah, let's use that as an illustration. God designed it to be such. God designed it to reflect, to enable us to better appreciate and understand the nature of his loving covenantal bond with his people. Spiritual adultery, like marital adultery, is unfaithfulness. It's the abandonment of the covenant vows to love and give yourself to only one husband in the pursuit of other relationships in other places. God says, go take to yourself an adulterous wife and children of unfaithfulness, because the land, that is the nation, is guilty of the vilest adultery in departing from the Lord. As an adulterous wife leaves her husband, departs from her husband to pursue other relationships, so a spiritually adulterous people depart from the Lord. to pursue other loves, other interests in other places. Spiritual adultery is disloyalty to God. The failure to love, serve, and follow Him alone. We are prone to that kind of adultery. Robert Robinson in his hymn, Come, Thou Fount of Every Blessing, writes in the third verse, O to grace, how great a debtor, daily I am constrained to be. Let that grace now, like a fetter, bind my wandering heart to thee, prone to wander. Lord, I feel it. Prone to leave the God I love. Here's my heart. Oh, take and seal it. Seal it for thy courts above. Hosea, as God's prophet, is called to make his whole life a dramatization of God's relationship to his professing people, Israel. Cornelius Pronk, who for many years was the radio preacher for the Banner of Truth radio broadcast, said that the Lord knew that by this time his people were so far gone in the ways of sin that the preached word made little or no impression on them. Therefore, Hosea must act out or demonstrate the Lord's message so the people will get the point. God wanted Hosea to marry this woman knowing that she would be unfaithful to him to illustrate what had happened to the relationship between himself and his people. As Hosea would feel the pain of his wife's unfaithfulness, so the Lord experienced the agony of a broken heart when he saw Israel going after other gods. The scripture tells us not to grieve. the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit grieves. The Holy Spirit is saddened. The Holy Spirit sorrows when we depart from our faithfulness to God and begin to fool around. It was necessary to demonstrate that. There is a sense in which We are all called to adorn the doctrines that we proclaim by the lives that we live. There's a sense in which when we simply proclaim doctrines, it's abstract, it's untested. But as we live out the doctrines that we say we believe, people see that and often respond to it. Recently, we've been gone for the last two Sundays. We visited Arizona and then went to California for a weekend. In Arizona, we visited a good number of people. We visited our son, John. We visited Jim and Carol in Dugdale and went to their church to worship. Had lunch later that week with their pastor, Gary Johnson, with Pastor Jim Adams, whom some of you know. We saw Jack and Libby Boynton while we were down there. But we also had the opportunity to meet a pastor by the name of John Tock. Now, you'll recognize that name, John and Ann Tock, because we've been praying for them. I have been emailing with John Tock for several years since he became a member of FIRE. But we had never met. He's never been able to come to a conference. And last year when we went down to Arizona, We were up in Sedona and never got over to the area of Phoenix, the Phoenix region where he is. This time we made a point of visiting with John and Anne. We had a wonderful visit with them. Anne, you know, has been very sick with cancer. She's undergoing chemotherapy. It was not a good week for her. But as we talked with her, we talked very briefly about her illness and then we moved on, tell us about your family. And she opened up like you couldn't believe. She talked. And we talked for quite a while. We had a wonderful visit. But one of the things that I know about John is he's been at that church, I think, for about seven years. He's ministering. He's a Reformed man in his own doctrinal understanding. He's ministering in a Southern Baptist church. And the doctrines he's been teaching, the doctrines of grace, have met with some resistance and some opposition. and it's been very hard going for him. That resistance and opposition has not only come from the members of the church, it's come from within his deacon board as well. John has been very discouraged to the point where he was lifting up his eyes to look elsewhere. Is there another church, someplace, anywhere, where I can go and freely preach these doctrines that mean so much to me. And that was when God struck his wife with cancer. John abandoned those plans. He needed to give his attention to his wife. But one of the things he reported as we met with him was that the people of the congregation have been very supportive of John and Anne. And they have also been watching to see how the doctrines of grace that John proclaims support he and his wife during this trial, during this period of difficulty. And the life that John and Anne are living before the congregation as they go through this horrible experience is gaining the ears. of the people as they see how the grace of God actually does sustain them, uphold them, and give them blessing in the midst of very painful times. That's what John Tocque is called to do. That's what Hosea was called to do. That's what you and I, in our own set of circumstances, in our own way, are called to do. Verse 3 says that Hosea married Gomer, daughter of Toblaim, and she conceived and bore him a son. So far, so good. That's how many marriages go. People make vows and covenant together in the presence of God and witnesses in a wedding ceremony. They marry, and in the course of that marriage, they have children. They have a child, a firstborn. God says to Hosea in verse 4, call him. The children of Hosea are part of this representation to the people as well as his marriage. The children of Hosea reflect the message as well as his covenantal union with his wife. And so the Lord takes a prerogative to name the children. The Lord said to Hosea, call him Jezreel. because I will soon punish the house of Jehu for the massacre at Jezreel, and I'll put an end to the kingdom of Israel. In that day, I will break Israel's bow in the valley of Jezreel." How does spiritual adultery come about? Most people who marry don't do so intending to commit adultery. Most people who marry on that happy day when they make their vows to each other in that moment mean what they say. They hope, they intend, they think that this is a marriage that will endure for life until death separates them. They don't make their vows intending to break them. They don't enter into the covenant of marriage intending to break it. But often moving only inches at a time, their heart is drawn away from the true and proper object of their love. to flirt with others. It's meaningless, it's insignificant in their minds, but flirting always leads to trouble maritally, and flirting always leads to trouble spiritually. Jehovah in the Old Testament is represented as Israel's husband and she is his wife. They were joined in a covenantal bond at Sinai when the Lord delivered or redeemed Israel from bondage in Egypt. In Jeremiah chapter 31, Jeremiah speaks of a new covenant that God is going to make. A new day that's coming that has different characteristics And he says, in Jeremiah 31 verse 32, that this new covenant will not be like the covenant I made with their forefathers when I took them by the hand to lead them out of Egypt, because they broke my covenant, though I was a husband to them, declares the Lord. In Isaiah chapter 54 verse 5, Isaiah declares that the maker is their husband and the Lord is his name. Jehovah and Israel are bound in covenant together and the essence of that covenant expressed again and again and again throughout the prophets is, I will be your God. And you know the rest of it. You will be my people. I will be your God and you will be my people. I will be faithful to you and I will bless you. And I look for you to be faithful to me and to bless or to be a blessing to me. Israel is to show her love for her husband by submission or by obedience. by walking in His way, walking in His law, and serving only Him. Almost a thousand years before the coming of our Lord, around 975-977 BC, before Christ, about 175 years before Hosea, the kingdom was divided. You may remember some of the details. It's kind of, for many people, kind of a hazy period, a little cloudy. But Solomon reigned as king, and it was a time of unparalleled prosperity and building. Toward the end of Solomon's reign, the people were taxed heavily to support his many building programs. When Solomon died, his son Rehoboam, became king. The elders, his father's advisors, told him in response to the cries of the people that he ought to lighten their tax load. But Ray Baum didn't listen to the older, wiser counselors. He listened to the young men. He listened to his peers who told him, show them who's king. Increase the taxes. Increase your personal wealth. Exert your power, show who's boss." Jeroboam did that, and the effect was to split the kingdom. In a tax revolt, ten of the tribes pulled out. The ten northern tribes left the union, and they appointed another one, Jeroboam, now known to us as Jeroboam I, the king of the northern tribes. The northern kingdom became known as Israel with its capital in Samaria. The southern kingdom became known as Judah, retaining its capital in Jerusalem. The kingdom was divided for economic, not religious reasons. The argument was not over who we're going to worship. The argument was not over where we're going to worship. The argument was not over how we're going to worship, the argument was over taxes. That's how it began. Jeroboam and the Northern Kingdom did not start out with the intention of worshiping other gods or forming a new and distinct religion that was different from the faith of their fathers. But 1 Kings chapter 12 tells us some interesting things, some interesting observations on the part of Jeroboam. In 1 Kings chapter 12, the scripture tells us that first of all, Jeroboam strengthened his defenses. Expecting some reaction from Judah, not unlike our own civil war, Jeroboam anticipated that the Southern Kingdom would move militarily against the North, against the ones who had withdrawn. So we read in chapter 12, verse 25, of 1 Kings that Jeroboam fortified Shechem in the hill country of Ephraim and lived there. From there he went out and built up the Nile. He built up fortifications, he built up defenses. There was no war, initially. But then Jeroboam, verse 26, thought to himself, the kingdom will now likely revert to the house of David. Why did he think that? Because, all right, we have pulled out, we've established a new country, but where do the people go to worship? Jerusalem. Who are the priests? The Levites? We need to do something about that. If these people, verse 27, go up to offer sacrifices at the temple of the Lord in Jerusalem, they will again give their allegiance to their Lord, Rehoboam, king of Judah. They'll kill me and return to King Rehoboam. After seeking advice, the king made two golden calves. Rehoboam, or excuse me, Jeroboam, initially did not think he was committing idolatry, these golden calves are artistic representations of God, of Jehovah. He said to the people, it's too much, it's too hard for you to go to Jerusalem. It's too much for you to go up to Jerusalem. Here are your gods, O Israel, who brought you up out of Egypt. One he set up in Bethel, the other in Dan, south and north. So the people had two locations. Whichever one is more convenient to you. It became a matter of convenience. You don't have to go to Jerusalem. Go to Dan. Go to Bethel. Whichever convenient. We're going to make this easy for you. And this thing became a sin. The people went even as far as Dan to worship the one there. Jeroboam built shrines on high places and appointed priests from all sorts of people, even though they were not Levites. He instituted a festival on the 15th day of the 8th month, like the festival held in Judah, and offered sacrifices on the altar. This he did in Bethel, sacrificing to the calves he had made. And at Bethel, he also installed priests at the high places he had made. He's trying to, in a sense, duplicate what has been done in Judah to retain, for political purposes, the loyalty of the people. For political expediency, Jeroboam violated what we've seen in our series on worship as the regulative principle and flirted with other gods, committing spiritual adultery. This, by the way, is the background to Jesus' discussion with the Samaritan woman at the well. What are consequences for spiritual adultery? There are some. And Hosea in chapter 1, through his children, identifies three specifically. When the first child is born, God says to name him Jezreel, because I will soon punish the house of Jehu for the massacre at Jezreel, and I'll put an end to the kingdom of Israel. The name Jezreel comes from a root meaning scattered. There's a play on words here in the Hebrew. Jezreel is very close in spelling and sound to Israel. And God is saying that the people who bear God's name, Israel, shall be Jezreel. They'll be scattered throughout the world as punishment for their sins. Israel's bow, Israel's defense, Israel's strength will be definitively broken. And Hosea in this book identifies the one who will break Israel's bow. It's Assyria. Amos tells him that God is going to send a people to judge them. Hosea says those people are the Assyrians. The Assyrian policy, as they built their empire, was not to subjugate and control a people where they lived. When the Assyrians conquered a nation or conquered a kingdom, They said, we don't want there to be enough people here to mount any kind of opposition. And they took the whole population and deported them, scattered them throughout the empire, so that in no village were there more than 10 Jews. Amazing. Secular scholars tell us that millions of people were relocated during the Assyrian ascendancy. God says that's what's going to happen to the people of Israel. They will be carried away and they will be scattered. Jezreel was the site of many battles. It was also the home to a man named Naboth. Do you remember Naboth, whom Ahab had killed in order to seize his coveted vineyard? That act cost Ahab his life. It cost the life of Jezebel, his wife, and it cost the lives of all his family. In executing vengeance, Jehu slew all the sons and the family members of Ahab in a great massacre. He made two piles of 70 heads of the princes of Israel at Jezreel. There were no survivors. But Jehu was not motivated by a zeal for the glory of God's name. Jehu was not motivated by a desire for justice. While God announced vengeance against Ahab, Jehu did it simply to secure his own position, to provide his own political security. And the scripture tells us that Jehu did not turn away from the sins of Jeroboam. God says, for that sin and others, I am going to scatter the nation of Israel. Then Gomer conceived again. The language here is a little bit different. In verse 3, Gomer conceived and bore him, that is, Hosea, a son. Verse 6 simply says that she conceived again. Many scholars believe that this language already hints at the immorality and the adulterous relations that she formed with others. Gave birth to a daughter. Then the Lord said to Hosea, call her Lo-Rukhama. For I will no longer show love to the house of Israel that I should at all forgive them. The word lo in Hebrew is the negative. When you put lo in front of something, it negates it. Ruchamah means loved. It means to show love or pity or compassion. God says in the birth of the second child, call her lo ruchamah. Not loved. Not pitied. No compassion. No mercy. No forgiveness. I will not forgive them. God will remove His love, pity, compassion and mercy from Israel. Yet, I will show love to the house of Judah. The Northern Kingdom is to be terminated. The Southern Kingdom, I will continue to show love and mercy to Judah. And I will save them, not by bow, sword, or battle, but by horses and horsemen, or by horses and horsemen, but by the Lord their God. I'm going to show merciless judgment upon Israel, but I will continue to show compassion and pity on Judah. Then Gomer conceived again. After she had weaned Lo-Ruhamah, verse 8, Gomer had another son. And the Lord said, Call him Lo-Ami. It's the name from which we get our girl's name. Interestingly, this is a boy, but we get our girl's name, Amy, from Ami. Am is people. The E ending is my people. The Lo that goes before it says, not my people. Lord said, call him Lo-Ami, for you are not my people, and I am not your God. What the Lord is declaring through his prophet Hosea is that if you disown God, God will disown you. These people had spiritually disowned God. as their Maker, their Husband, their Lord, their Provider, and God will disown them. Another way of expressing it is that if you do not own God as your God, He will not own you. Jesus put it that way, in essence, in Matthew chapter 10, verse 32, where he says in verse 32 and 33, whoever acknowledges me before men, I will also acknowledge him before my Father in heaven. But whoever disowns me before men, I will disown him before my Father in heaven. If you think of disowning as saying, I don't believe in Jesus, think again. Disowning Jesus is as simple as not acknowledging Jesus. Whoever acknowledges me, I will acknowledge. Some of you want to be secret believers. Some of you want to think that you believe and you will tell people quietly, privately perhaps. You'll intimate that you're a Christian, but you don't want to come out. You don't want to take upon yourself that badge of discipleship called baptism. You don't want to openly identify with God's people and say, I am part of his church. You want to say nothing that will call attention to you as a Christian. And you think that Christ will acknowledge you. What right do you have to think that? And I don't mean that in an unkind way. But given the language of Jesus here in Matthew 10, what right do you have to think that if you will not acknowledge him now, that he's going to acknowledge you then? What makes you think he won't say to you, depart from me? I never knew you. because you never owned Him as your Lord. Baptism and identification with the Church is not an invention of man, it's a command of God. Not to be saved, but to recognize the saving grace of God within you. Is there any hope? for those who have been spiritually unfaithful. These people in Hosea's day perished. The hammer came down, the Assyrian army invaded the land, laid siege to Samaria, and in 722 overran the capital. and the people of Israel were deported, ever to be known as the Ten Lost Tribes. No one can trace where they went. No historian knows what became of them. They were so effectively scattered that as an identifiable people, they disappeared from the face of the earth. But the rejection of Israel was not total and it was not final. Hosea says, yet the Israelites will be like the sand on the seashore which cannot be measured or counted. In the place where it was said to them, you are not my people, they will be called sons of the living God. The people of Judah and the people of Israel will be reunited and they'll appoint one leader and will come up out of the land for great will be the day of Jezreel. Jezreel here is used in a different sense. The word means scatter, also meant to sow, like the farmer who scatters seed in order to plant it. And it's used that way later on in Hosea where God says that he's going to respond in chapter 2, verse 21. And the earth will respond. And they'll respond to Jezreel, verse 22. I will plant her for myself in the land. I will show my love to the one I called, not my loved one. I will say to those called, not my people, you are my people. And they will say, you are my God. Those words have their fulfillment. in the coming of Messiah, who redeems people from every tribe, every tongue, every kindred, every nation under the sun. Peter clearly has Hosea in mind when he writes in chapter 1, verse 10, addressing his letter to God's elect, strangers in the world, scattered throughout Pontus, Galatia, Cappadocia, Asia and Bithynia who have been chosen according to the foreknowledge of God the Father through the sanctifying work of the Spirit for obedience to Jesus Christ and sprinkling by his blood. He goes on to say in chapter 10 that you are a chosen people, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people belonging to God that you may declare the praises of him who called you out of darkness into his wonderful light. Once you were not a people, but now you are the people of God. once you had not received mercy, but now you have received mercy. Paul had the same prophet Hosea in mind in Romans chapters 9 through 11. Paul writes to the Romans in chapter 9 that God has made known to the objects of his mercy whom he prepared in advance for glory, verse 24, even us whom he also called not only from the Jews but also from the Gentiles. As he says in Hosea, I will call them my people who are not my people and I will call her my loved one who is not my loved one. And it will happen that in the very place where it was said to them, you are not my people, they will be called sons of the living God. Isaiah cries out concerning Israel, though the number of the Israelites be like the sand by the sea, only the remnant will be saved. For the Lord will carry out his sentence on earth with speed and finality. Paul goes on to say that God is intent on saving his Israel, his people. It is not the natural seed, it is the spiritual seed who are accounted as Israel. It is those who believe in our Lord Jesus Christ. And therefore, God has drawn together Judah and Israel, and in the church, He is fulfilling His purposes through spiritual Israel, calling a people to Himself, being faithful to that people, fulfilling His promises, and calling upon you and me Be faithful to him. Are you faithful to your spouse? I'm not talking about your literal husband and wife, though that's a good question too. But are you faithful to your spiritual spouse? The church is a bride of Christ. Do you really love him? Do you really serve him? Will you identify with him and walk in his ways?