Let me tell you a story. It's not a fairy tale. It's a true story. It's the story of a preacher. A preacher who ministered in a land very much like ours. His nation had military might, political influence, and economic stability. But also, like our land, his people had turned from the God who had showered those blessings upon that land. This preacher was well known. He established a long-lived nationwide ministry. During his tours about that land, he met a young woman. She was not really what you would call the religious type. She was from a very poor family. It was obvious she was willing to do whatever it took to get ahead, even if that meant compromising her morals. But as the preacher got to know her, he felt very definitely directed by God to marry her. I can't explain it or excuse it, but there it is. He gave his new bride everything she ever desired, all the things that she had never had, and she in return gave him three beautiful children, a son, and then a daughter, and then another son. They seemed to be the perfect family. Then one day, his wife, the mother of his children, just up and walked out. She'd found a boyfriend and she was shacking up with him over the next few months and years. She was with various other men. Of course, the preacher's life was shattered. His marriage was over. I ask you, can you imagine how he felt? Can you feel what was in his heart? It's important that you feel with this preacher this morning, for I have just told you the story of Hosea. Hosea is one of the minor prophets in the Old Testament. We call them minor prophets not because they are less important than the major prophets like Isaiah and Jeremiah, but simply because their books are shorter. Hosea lived near the end of the kingdom period, during the reign of Jeroboam II, king of Israel, during the golden age of the northern kingdom. Probably most of you don't realize this, but just 30 short years before its demise, before the northern kingdom was carried off into captivity, They were a political power to be reckoned with. They reigned over almost all the land that David had reigned over and Solomon had reigned over during their reigns. Israel was a very strong and powerful nation at this point. Her fortress capital, Samaria, was lavishly decorated with imported ivory. And because of the political situation, the people of Israel knew almost unparalleled prosperity. Does any of this ring a bell? What nation does this sound like? But the nation was rotten within. She had turned her back on the God who had given her all these blessings. The Israelites at that time were worshipping the Baals. In fact, the worship of the golden calf at Bethel, which was originally supposed to have imitated the worship of Jehovah, had degenerated to the point where it really was very little different than the worship of Baal. And in the midst of all this prosperity and all this apostasy, God called Hosea. We don't know very much about Hosea personally, but his ministry was unique. It was different than any other prophets because he simply did not preach his message. He lived that message out before the Israelites. Let's read the first three verses of this book, Hosea chapter 1, verses 1 through 3. If you can find it, it's tucked just after the book of Daniel. Isaiah, Jeremiah, Ezekiel, Daniel, Hosea, Joel, Amos, Obadiah. So, find that. It's the first of the minor prophets immediately after the book of Daniel. Beginning in verse 1, Hosea 1 and verse 1, the word of the Lord that came to Hosea, the son of Beeri, in the days of Uzziah, Jotham, Ahaz, and Hezekiah, kings of Judah, and in the days of Jeroboam, the son of Joash, king of Israel. When the Lord began to speak by Hosea, the Lord said to Hosea, go Take yourself a wife of harlotry and children of harlotry, for the land has committed great harlotry by departing from the Lord. So he went and took Gomer, the daughter of Diblaim, and she conceived and bore him a son." See, I told you. It's a true story. God directed Hosea to marry a wife of harlotry. That's what verse 2 says. Now, it's easy to misunderstand God's command here. I do not believe that God asked Hosea to marry a known harlot. The law of Moses prohibited priests from marrying harlots, and it's probable that the same regulation applied to all of God's spiritual leaders in the Old Testament, including the prophets. Look closely at verse 3. Excuse me, in verse two it says, take yourself a wife of harlotry and children of harlotry. The same exact words are used to describe his wife as used to describe his children. If that phrase means a woman who actually practiced prostitution, then the second phrase actually has to mean child prostitutes. And we have no evidence whatsoever that this was the case. Rather, I think that phrase, a wife of harlotry, describes the character of Gomer. She was a loose woman. She was someone who would probably, sooner or later, commit adultery. And she would beget children who had that same loose character. Now, why would God direct one of His prophets to do such a thing, to marry a woman of such character? Think about what this meant to Hosea. He knew what he was doing. He knew what the future held. God told him, this is a wife of harlotry. Sooner or later, she's going to commit adultery. I want you to pick that kind of woman and marry her. God gave this direction The end of verse 2 tells us, because the relationship between Hosea and Gomer was to reflect the relationship between God and Israel. Marriage, in its essence, is a covenant relationship. And when God brought Israel out of Egypt, they entered into a covenant relationship with God. They, as it were, became His wife. There was, as it were, a wedding ceremony there at the base of Mount Sinai. We find the wedding vows recorded in Exodus chapter 24 and verse 3. And all the people answered with one voice and said, all the words which the Lord has said we will do. They entered into that covenant relationship with God. So the relationship that Hosea had with Gomer paralleled the relationship that God had with Israel. Now get what that means, folks. That means up front, when God chose Israel, He knew She would go into spiritual adultery. God knew up front that the nation of Israel would be unfaithful. If you go back to the book of Deuteronomy, you will find that God knew. He said, in the future, this is what you're going to do, and when you do it, here's how I'm going to respond. God knew up front. Yet he still committed himself in love to the nation of Israel. Isn't that amazing? But there's a further parallel here. I hope you see in your bulletin. I've tried to give you a little chart there to try to graph out, to try to communicate visually this parallel. There is a parallel for us as New Testament Christians. Even though Hosea's message was specifically aimed at the nation of Israel, there's an application for us today because we also are in a covenant relationship. The church is called the Bride of Christ time and again in the New Testament because we are in a covenant relationship with Jesus Christ. He is our Bridegroom. We are the Bride. In the same sense in which Israel belonged to God in the Old Testament, the church belongs to Jesus Christ now. We have that same kind of covenant love relationship. And get what this means, folks. Christ sets His love upon each one of us knowing up front that from time to time, we're going to be unfaithful. It's part of the deal. Because God's love is a love that cannot be broken. That's what we're going to discover as we work our way through this story. Now, the story of Hosea and Gomer continues in chapter 2, if you'll turn over there with me. And let's read verses 2-5. Hosea 2, verses 2-5. Bring charges against your mother. Bring charges, for she is not my wife, nor am I her husband. Let her put away her harlotries from her sight and her adulteries from between her breasts, lest I strip her naked and expose her as in the day she was born, and make her like a wilderness, and set her in a dry land, and slay her with thirst. I will not have mercy on her children, for they are the children of harlotry. For their mother has played the harlot. She who conceived them has behaved shamefully. For she said, I will go after my lovers who give me my bread and my water, my wool and my linen, my oil and my drink. In these verses, God describes shameless unfaithfulness. Shameless unfaithfulness. These words apply to both Gomer and Israel. God was picturing the sins of Israel in terms of the actions taken by Gomer after several years of marriage. Chapter 1 tells us that she bore Hosea three children. But then, true to her character, she went after other lovers. And Hosea was hurt so deeply that he cut off his relationship with her. Do you see what verse 2 says? She is not my wife, nor am I her husband. Some interpreters actually believe that Hosea at this point divorced her. One way or the other, Hosea did not even regard Gomer as his wife anymore. As far as he was concerned, the marriage was over. The relationship had been broken by the actions that Gomer had taken. Now remember, Gomer's adulteries picture the spiritual adultery that was going on in the nation of Israel at that time. Verses 8 and 13 here in chapter 2, I'm not going to read them, specifically mention Baal worship. After all the blessings that God had showered on Israel, Israel pursued other gods. Now I believe, and this is where I want you to stick with me. You don't hear anything else I say this morning. I believe God asked Hosea to marry Gomer so that he could experience, right here, what it was like to watch his wife commit adultery after adultery after adultery, so that he could relate, not here, but here, to God's experience with the nation of Israel. Usually in the midst of a sermon like this, I ask you to think. But this morning, I ask you to feel. Feel what it would be like to know that your spouse was committing adultery openly with not a care for what it did to you. How would you feel? I want you to feel that. I want you to try to feel that. See, I believe God was engaged here in trying to shock the nation of Israel. He told Hosea to do what he did in order to shock that people. God wanted to shock that nation as they beheld what was going on in this prophet's life. Can you imagine what it would be like to see this happening in the life of a preacher today? Wouldn't it shock you? That's what God was trying to do. Trying to shock that nation. Trying to get a hold of them. Trying to get them to feel what He felt. Viscerally, right here. God didn't just want Hosea to preach it. He wanted him to experience it. And He wanted everyone who saw Him and everyone who knew Him to experience it along with Him. Just as each of us would be grieved and wounded and angry and jealous if our spouse were to do such a thing, that was God's response to Israel. And that's what He was trying to communicate. You know, in the early church, the theologians taught that God doesn't have emotion. You know, they said emotions change all the time. And, well, God doesn't change, so God must not have emotions. I don't buy that. I understand their logic, but I can't agree with it. Because what is God trying to communicate here? He is trying to communicate His heart. He's trying to communicate His emotion. But again, what Hosea experienced reaches even to us as New Testament believers. The Lord Jesus Christ would have us feel His hurt His grieved heart, His jealousy, His anger when we are unfaithful. When we allow someone or something to take His place in our hearts. When we would rather serve some other interest than serve Him. When we would rather please some other person than please Him. When we would allow our business, our job, our career to distract us from daily communion with Him. When we prefer family or entertainment to focusing on Him on the Lord's Day. And I could go on and on. We don't bow down to Baal today, but we are just as capable of spiritual adultery today as the Israelites were. And when we are unfaithful in that way, When we lack the love that Christ deserves, it raises these same emotions in His heart. That's what this book is intended to convey to us. God complained against Israel because He had rescued them from Egypt and given them the promised land, and they still went after other gods. Don't you think Jesus feels the same way? He looks down from heaven and he says, I died for you. I paid the ultimate price to purchase your salvation. How can you pursue others and forsake your bridegroom? I don't think there's one of us here this morning that would think of committing adultery in the literal sense against our marriage partners, but we think so little of the heart of Jesus Christ that we're willing to do that in our spiritual lives. We're willing to have competitors for Jesus Christ in our priorities and where our hearts really lie. I've already indicated to you Hosea's response to Gomer's harlotries. He wrote her off. In the words of verse 2 here, he said, she's not my wife and I'm not her husband anymore. I mean, really, there wasn't much else that Hosea could do. But it's interesting, here, the story of God and Israel departs a little bit from the parallel with Gomer and Hosea. Hosea couldn't do anything more, but God could. Almighty God says, I'm going to reclaim this nation of Israel. And here in chapter 2, we see the sovereign God use all of the resources at His disposal to draw Israel back to Himself. This chapter indicates a three-fold response of God. three chastening acts that God took with regard to Israel. And I'm going to try to go through these quickly. First of all, God disowned Israel. The statement in verse 2 applies equally to God as it does to Hosea. He said to Israel, she's not my wife and I am not her husband anymore. This fact gets interesting emphasis in chapter 1. In chapter 1, God himself named Hosea's children. And in particular, the name of his second two children are interesting. Look back with me to chapter 1, verses 8 and 9. Now, when she had weaned Lo-Rehama, And that is, those are literally the words, no mercy. I like actually the way one of the other new versions, the English Standard Version, translates this verse. It says, when she had weaned, no mercy. That was the name of the child. She conceived and bore a son. Then God said, call his name Lo-Ammi, which means know my people, not my people. Call his name not my people for you are not my people. I will not be your God. God says I cut you off. I've heard some theologians say God is a divorced person. Based on this passage. That God divorced Israel at this point. He said, you're not my people anymore. You're no longer my wife. I no longer have a covenant relationship with you. Now you see in your bulletin, you've got three parallels there. We have Hosea and Gomorrah. Hosea wrote Gomorrah off. He said, you're not my wife anymore. God wrote Israel off. He said, you're not my people anymore. And I believe something similar happens between believers and the Lord Jesus Christ and His Spirit today. Now listen carefully or you're going to think I'm a heretic and you're going to go out of here and say, Pastor Gerard, he's into heresy. When we persist in unfaithfulness like Israel did, I believe that God's Spirit, who dwells within every believer, withdraws from us the assurance that we belong to Him. That we are eternally secure in His love. Notice carefully what I said. When we backslide into sin and we refuse to deal with that sin, when there is rebellion in our hearts and we cherish that rebellion, when there are idols in our hearts and we refuse to tear those idols down, we don't lose our salvation, but we lose the assurance of our salvation. When we persist in unfaithfulness, God withdraws that assurance that comes through His Spirit. We begin to doubt that we belong to Him and we ought to. You hear me? I don't believe that any person can continue in willful rebellion to God and God continue to give the comfort of His assurance to that soul. I didn't say he withdraws his salvation. I said he withdraws his comfort while that person persists in his sin. That comfort is gone. That assurance is not there. The Holy Spirit no longer whispers, you are mine. And we have no longer the confidence to go into God's presence crying, Abba, Father. Oh, listen, my friend. No Christian can go into willful sin and enjoy it. Because his heart will doubt that relationship. God will no longer whisper to him, you are mine and I love you. There are times when I believe that there are people who have so rebelled against God. They belong to God. They're God's people. They're saved individuals. But they have so rebelled against God that they can't tell one way or the other whether they're really saved because they refuse to repent of that sin. God made two more responses to the nation of Israel, and they're outlined here in verses six through nine of chapter two, Hosea 2, verses six through nine. Therefore, behold, I will hedge up your way with thorns and wall her in so that she cannot find her paths. She will chase her lovers, but she will not overtake them. Yea, she will seek them, but not find them. Then, she will say, I will go and return to my first husband, for then it was better for me than now. For she did not know that I gave her grain, new wine and oil, and multiplied her silver and gold, which they prepared for Baal. Therefore, I will return and take away my grain in its time and my new wine in its season. I will take back my wool and my linen given to cover her nakedness." In the second place, what God did with Israel is He withdrew her blessings. He withdrew her blessings. When God's people mistake God's blessings, He withdraws them. Notice what God says to Israel here. He said, You didn't realize it, but your prosperity came from me. He said, I gave you your grain. I gave you the wine. I gave you the oil. I multiplied your silver and gold. Look what he says in verse 9. My grain, my new wine, my wool, my linen. God says it all came from me. But you thought it came from Dale. And so you went after him. Do you know anything about Baal? Do you know anything about Baal worship? Baal was a fertility god. And the nations that surrounded Israel convinced Israel that the harvests and the plenty that they had had come from Baal and that they had better engage in Baal worship if that was going to continue. God says, you've got it all wrong. You're attributing this to an idol. You're attributing this to a false god. And so I'm going to withdraw those blessings from you. Hosea teaches us the danger of mistaking the blessings that Christ gives to us today. You see a person get saved, his life has been in shambles, drunkard, drug addict. He gets saved and his life turns around, or her life turns around. And good things begin to happen. There are blessings in the family. Usually there's financial blessings. This person can now hold down a job. And things begin to go right. And things begin to move forward. And it's easy at that point, just like the nation of Israel did, to say, well, you know, I'm doing a pretty good job here. I guess I really do have some ability. I guess I really am a good worker. I guess I really can make a good way. And begin to set up idols in the heart instead of saying, thank you, Lord. This is all from your hand. Folks, when we attribute things to false gods, to idols in our hearts, God withdraws His blessings. God says, I'll teach you who these came from. They came from Me. You need to be pursuing Me. I need to have the right place in your heart. And then in the third place, I like this. God hedged up her way. Verses six and seven here in chapter two are some of the most amazing verses in the Old Testament. God said, I'm going to hedge you up. You want to pursue these false gods? He said, I'm going to hedge you up so you'll never catch them. You know, I almost see when I read these verses, I almost see a cartoon in my mind. You know, it's like this. God puts a hedge that finally comes and it meets. Can you imagine yourself running between two hedges? And you keep running, you're pursuing those false gods, and all of a sudden, what? You can't go any further. God has hedged you in. There's no way to go. The only way to go is what? Back. Back to the true God. That's what God says here. He said, I'm going to hedge you in, Israel, so that you return to me. Now, how did this literally happen with the nation of Israel? I love this, boy. Think about the United States. Think about the United States of America as I make these statements. Israel was on top of the world politically at this point. She had a strong army. She had a worldwide political presence. She controlled territory that was nearly as large as the territory that King David had controlled and King Solomon. And within 30 years, she was in captivity. Wow. God says, I will hedge you in. I will turn you around. And he did just that. Israel went into captivity, and when she came out of captivity, folks, she had been cured. You can say whatever you want about the Jews. Since that day, they worship only one God. God cared. God hedged in their way. And they turned back. Now, folks, he does the same thing with you and I. You set up an idol in your heart and God will hedge you in. You know how he does that? Why do we worship idols? We worship idols today in the sense that we give ourselves, we give our time and our effort and our thoughts and our money to something because we think we're going to get what back from it? We're going to get joy and peace and contentment. And God says, I'm going to hedge up your way. He said, you can put your money in that, and you can put your time in that, and you can put your thoughts in that, but I'm going to hedge up your way, and you will not find that joy, and you will not find that peace, and you will not find that contentment. We may chase other lovers, but we will never again be satisfied until we return to the Lord. You know, some of the most miserable people in the world are Christians who are pursuing other lovers. Because they are on a path that's been hedged up. And God is seeking to bring them back to Himself. by hedging up their way. Now, it's natural to think that the story ends here, but actually, when I began my message with that little story that I told you about Hosea, I did not tell you the end of the story. This story does have a good ending. The ending is found in chapter three. Very short chapter, just three, excuse me, just five verses. Quickly, I only have a few minutes, let's read Hosea chapter 3 verses 1 through 5. Then the Lord said to me, that is to Hosea, go again, love a woman who is loved by a lover and is committing adultery. Just like the love of the Lord for the children of Israel who look to other gods and love the raisin cakes of the pagans. So I, this is Hosea, bought her, Gomer, for myself for 15 shekels of silver and one and a half homers of barley. And I said to her, You shall stay with me many days. The idea there is indefinitely from now on. You shall not play the harlot, nor shall you have a man. So too will I be toward you. For the children of Israel shall abide many days without king or prince, without sacrifice or sacred pillar, without ephod or teraphim, Afterward, the children of Israel shall return and seek the Lord their God and David their king. They shall fear the Lord and his goodness in the latter days. Finally, we have a story of unfailing love, God's unfailing love. God directed Hosea to take his wife back again, to love her again. So Hosea, it says here, went and purchased her. And what's interesting is if you add up the value between the cash and the foodstuffs, the value was 30 shekels. 30 shekels was the price of a slave. I'm not sure of the significance of this, but I wonder if at this point the idea isn't that Gomer had actually sold herself into prostitution and Hosea went and bought her back. The other idea that may be here is that he actually paid a dowry for her again. He remarried her and so he paid a dowry one more time. But in either case, the idea was this time it's for keeps. This time I am purchasing you back for myself and you will be faithful to me. That's the point of verse three. Now again, God asked Hosea to take, I mean, can you imagine being in Hosea's sandals? Can you imagine? God asked Hosea to take this difficult step because it reflected his unfailing, unswerving, unchanging love to Israel. God chastened Israel, yes, but he did so to turn her back to him. God turned his back on Israel, but not forever. In fact, there is a sense in which these first three chapters of Hosea lay out for you and I the entire program, God's entire program for the nation of Israel. The first part of God's program for Israel, God brought her out of Egypt. and married her at Mount Sinai. There was a covenant relationship. And for a while, that covenant relationship was what it should be. God blessed Israel and Israel worshipped God. But there came a point during the time of Hosea where God got so fed up with Israel following other gods that He said, no more. And He forsook Israel. God distanced himself. God divorced himself from her, as it were. And I believe this speaks of the current situation between God and Israel. We oftentimes call Israel the people of God. Folks, I don't believe that. Not today. Not right now. I don't think the nation of Israel has any more relationship to God than the man on the moon. God says they're not my people. I've written them off. What does verse 4 say? He said there's going to be an extended period of time when there's not going to be a king or a prince or sacrifice. There's not going to be anything. Nothing of the former is going to be during that period. But there's going to come a time in the latter days, verse 5 says, when they are going to turn back to God. And God, as it were, is going to remarry Israel. And they are again going to become His people. I believe that will happen at the end of the Tribulation period when God establishes His Millennial Kingdom. Then, according to verse 5, the children of Israel shall return and seek the Lord their God. They shall fear the Lord. You see how this lays out God's program for Israel? It's beautiful. But God's love for Israel also speaks of the love of the Lord Jesus Christ for the backslidden Christian who might be here this morning. Why does the Lord chasten you and I? Why does He hedge in our way? Is He an ogre? No. He's an offended bridegroom who wishes to bring his bride back to himself. See, God's love never fails. God is the God of the second chance and the third chance and the fourth chance. There's someone here this morning far from God, someone with idols set up in his heart, someone who's rebelled, and God says, I'm the God of second chances. I want to purchase you back and bring you again into my embrace. I don't know if you have found this, but I have. I have found that when I have strayed from God, when my spiritual life has begun to go into a decline, and I find myself at a distance from God, God not only chastens me, it's interesting, at the same time, He also draws me with cords of love. I will find that at that time, God often comes into my life and gives me extraordinary opportunities for Him. It's an amazing thing. Not only does God hedge in my way, but God comes to me and says, I want you to come back into my blessedness. I want you to come back into my embrace. And this morning, God says the same thing to any believer here this morning. who has set up an idol in his heart, who has rebelled and refused to seek God's forgiveness, God offers you that second chance, that third chance, that fourth chance to come back into His embrace. Can I have every head bowed, please, and every eye closed? I don't have x-ray vision into your hearts. I don't know what idols there may be. I don't know if there are things in your life of which God, the Lord Jesus Christ, might be jealous, have reason to be jealous, because they take His place in your heart. Would you take a few moments and would you just ask the Lord Jesus, would you ask Him right now, are there things in my life of which you're jealous? Are there things in my heart that have displaced you? And would you in that silent moment wait for His answer and then respond appropriately? Let's take about 60 seconds. You pray and respond.