THE CROSS - REDEMPTION
A gem dealer was strolling the aisles at the Tucson Gem and Mineral Show when he noticed a blue-violet stone the size and shape of a potato. He looked it over, then, as calmly as possible, asked the vendor, "You want $15 for this?" The seller, realizing the rock wasn’t as pretty as others in the bin, lowered the price to $10. The stone has since been certified as a 1,905-carat natural star sapphire, about 800 carats larger than the largest stone of its kind. It was appraised at $2.28 million. I hope you understand your value to God today. You may feel like a worthless rock but God sees you for the Gem you are. It took a lover of stones to recognize the sapphire’s worth. It took the Lover of Souls to recognize the true value of ordinary-looking people like us.
Gal 3:13 Christ redeemed us from the curse of the law by becoming a curse for us, for it is written: "Cursed is everyone who is hung on a tree." 14 He redeemed us in order that the blessing given to Abraham might come to the Gentiles through Christ Jesus, so that by faith we might receive the promise of the Spirit.
What is redemption? The word means ’to buy back’. To truly understand what God’s redemption means to us you need to know the heart of God. Sometimes God demonstrates his heart for us by practically calling us to participate in an event which shows us in a way we can understand. A great example of this is found in the book of Hosea:
Hosea 1:2 When the LORD began to speak through Hosea, 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." 3 So he married Gomer daughter of Diblaim, and she conceived and bore him a son. 4 Then the LORD said to Hosea, "Call him Jezreel, because I will soon punish the house of Jehu for the massacre at Jezreel, and I will put an end to the kingdom of Israel. 5 In that day I will break Israel’s bow in the Valley of Jezreel." 6 Gomer conceived again and gave birth to a daughter. Then the LORD said to Hosea, "Call her Lo-Ruhamah, for I will no longer show love to the house of Israel, that I should at all forgive them. 7 Yet I will show love to the house of Judah; and I will save them--not by bow, sword or battle, or by horses and horsemen, but by the LORD their God." 8 After she had weaned Lo-Ruhamah, Gomer had another son. 9 Then the LORD said, "Call him Lo-Ammi, for you are not my people, and I am not your God
Hosea 3:1 The LORD said to me, "Go, show your love to your wife again, though she is loved by another and is an adulteress. Love her as the LORD loves the Israelites, though they turn to other gods and love the sacred raisin cakes." 2 So I bought her for fifteen shekels of silver and about a homer and a lethek of barley. 3 Then I told her, "You are to live with me many days; you must not be a prostitute or be intimate with any man, and I will live with you."
Put yourself in the place of Hosea. He was a young prophet who was a contemporary of Isaiah. The Lord came to him and told him that he had a wife in mind. Imagine the excitement! Maybe Hosea started naming off all the godly Jewish woman he could think of. God ends up saying something that Hosea did not expect;
1. Marry Her -
God calls Hosea to go and to marry a prostitute. Certainly this is an unusual request. If God had asked me to do this I know how I would have answered, ‘No Way’. What about being unequally yoked and all that? What about my reputation? But God was wanting to communicate His heart – showing what He has done for us. He came to us while we were far from Him and showed His love for us.
Romans 5:6 You see, at just the right time, when we were still powerless, Christ died for the ungodly. 7 Very rarely will anyone die for a righteous man, though for a good man someone might possibly dare to die. 8 But God demonstrates his own love for us in this: While we were still sinners, Christ died for us.
God redeemed the human race when we were still spitting in his face. -- Oswald Chambers
Not only did Hosea have to deal with an unfaithful wife but also with children of unfaithfulness. The fact that the word ‘children’ is plural means that at least 2 of the children born to Hosea and Gomer were out of adultery. He had to deal with children that were not even his. Look at the names:
Jezreel means PUNISHMENT (relating to Jezreel in 2 Kings 9 and 10)
Lo-Ruhamah means NOT LOVED (no mercy or compassion)
Lo-Ammi means NOT MINE (no nation or not my people)
So what do you call the children of your unfaithfulness? You might say “Me, I’ve never committed adultery!” Every time we deny God and follow other things we forsake our first love. We chase after other lovers and as a result we become enslaved often to behavior and habits like children which God then has to deal with and take care of. In spite of all of our failings God still loves you.
A London businessman was trying to sell a warehouse that had been empty for months and needed repairs. Vandals had damaged the doors, smashed the windows, and strewn trash all over the place. As he showed a prospective buyer the property, he took pains to say that he would replace the broken windows, bring in a crew to correct any structural damage, and clean out the garbage. The buyer said, "Forget about the repairs. When I buy this place, I’m going to build something completely different. I don’t want the building; I want the site." That’s God’s message to us! He isn’t interested in your renovation but your re-birth. When we become God’s the old life is over. He makes all things new. All He wants is the site and the permission to build.
2. Redeem Her -
We are not told what happens but somehow as a result of her prostitution Gomer is taken into slavery. Even though she is his wife, Hosea buys her back. Would you have done that? I would have said “No God, Not again!. I married her but she has betrayed me. It’s not my problem now!” But Hosea loved her as the Lord loved the Israelites (as we can see from chapter 2).
A father and son worked for months to build a toy sailboat. When it was finished, they traveled to a nearby lake for the boat’s trial run. Before launching it the father tied a string to its stern to keep it from sailing too far. The boat performed beautifully, but a motorboat crossing the lake cut the string, and the sailboat drifted out of sight. Attempts to find it were fruitless, and both father and son wept over its loss. A few weeks later as the boy was walking home from school he passed his favorite toy store and was amazed to see a toy sailboat in the window--his sailboat! He ran inside to claim the boat, telling the proprietor about his experience on the lake. The store owner explained that he had found the boat while on a fishing trip. "You may be its maker," he said, "but as a finder I am its legal owner. You may have it back--for fifty dollars." The boy was stunned at how much it would cost him to regain his boat, but since it was so precious to him he quickly set about earning the money to buy it back. Months later he joyfully walked into the toy store and handed the owner fifty dollars in exchange for his sailboat. As he left the store he held the boat up to the sunlight. Its colors gleamed as though newly painted. "I made you, but I lost you," he said. "Now I’ve bought you back. That makes you twice mine, and twice mine is mine forever."
Hosea redeemed Gomer. Though she was his her actions made her a slave to another. Hosea had to buy her back. That is what redemption means – to buy back. This is a graphic picture of God’s redemption of us through Jesus. God had to pay for someone that was already his.
Like Gomer our sin has imprisoned each of us. We were slaves until Christ paid the ransom price for us and set us free. He has paid the price for our sins. Maybe you are here thinking “Yes, but you do not understand how badly I blew it”. God would never forgive me.
The story of "Wrong Way Riegels" is a familiar one, but it bears repeating. On New Year’s Day, 1929, Georgia Tech played UCLA in the Rose Bowl. In that game a young man named Roy Riegels recovered a fumble for UCLA. Picking up the loose ball, he lost his direction and ran sixty-five yards toward the wrong goal line. One of his teammates finally ran him down and tackled him just before he scored for the opposing team. The play demoralized the UCLA team. At half-time the UCLA players filed off the field and into the dressing room. As others sat down on the benches and the floor, Riegels put a blanket around his shoulders, sat down in a corner, and put his face in his hands. A football coach usually has a great deal to say to his team during halftime. That day Coach Price was quiet. No doubt he was trying to decide what to do with Riegels.
When the timekeeper came in and announced that there were three minutes before playing time, Coach Price looked at the team and said, "Men, the same team that played the first half will start the second." The players got up and started out, all but Riegels. He didn’t move. Coach Price went over to where Riegels sat and said, "Roy, didn’t you hear me? The same team that played the first half will start the second." Roy Riegels looked up, his cheeks wet with tears. "Coach," he said, "I can’t do it. I’ve ruined you. I’ve ruined the university’s reputation. I’ve ruined myself. I can’t face that crowd out there." Coach Price reached out, put his hand on Riegels’s shoulder, and said, "Roy, get up and go back out there. The game is only half over." Riegels finally did get up. He went onto the field, and they won the game. All of us have run a long way in the wrong direction. Because of God’s mercy, however, the game is only half over.
3. Love Her – call me Ishi
The central theme of Hosea is that God loves you us even though we have blown it. He wants to have a personal relationship with each one of us. God longs to draw you near to Him because He loves you. At the centre of the book there is a sentence that sums this up:
Hosea 2:16 "In that day," declares the LORD, "you will call me ‘my husband’; you will no longer call me ‘my master.’
Put yourself in this situation. Hosea had bought back his wife as a slave. He now owned her. She was his slave. He could have treated her as a slave. Instead, he gives grace. Instead of insisting that she call him master (or Baal), he asks that she call him husband or Ishi (in the King James).
God says to each of us this morning – call me Ishi. Call me husband. As a pastor people call be by a variety of different names. By title you could call me Pastor Steve, Reverend Sheane etc. By attribute you could call me Gringo in Spanish or just say “hey you, the tall funny looking white guy”. What I enjoy most is being called by relationship – call me Naomi’s husband or Petra, Hillary and Amanda’s Daddy.
John 15:15 I no longer call you servants, because a servant does not know his master’s business. Instead, I have called you friends, for everything that I learned from my Father I have made known to you.
How do you respond to this kind of grace – you receive it.
Harvey Penick’s Little Red Book on golf, has sold more than a million copies it is one of the biggest things in the history of sports books. In the 1920s Penick bought a red spiral notebook and began jotting down observations about golf. He never showed the book to anyone except his son until 1991, when he shared it with a local writer and asked if he thought it was worth publishing. The man read it and told him yes. He left word with Penick’s wife the next evening that Simon & Schuster had agreed to an advance of $90,000. "When the writer saw Penick later, the old man seemed troubled. Finally, Penick came clean. With all his medical bills, he said, there was no way he could advance Simon & Schuster that much money. The writer had to explain that Penick would be the one to receive the $90,000." People often have Penick’s reaction to the fabulous gift of salvation offered in Jesus Christ. We ask, "What must I do?" God answers, "Just receive."
All of us like Gomer have gone astray. We had everything but threw it away to chase other loves. God has brought us back. Certainly he deserves the title master, but he asks us to call him ‘husband’ or my love.
God knows completely the depth of our sin and adultery and yet loves us still. God deals with our “children of unfaithfulness” and bondages and loves us still. God comes to us even when we again and again hurt Him and loves us still. He deserves to be called Master, yet longs for us to call him My Love.
In The Whisper Test, Mary Ann Bird writes: I grew up knowing I was different, and I hated it. I was born with a cleft palate, and when I started school, my classmates made it clear to me how I looked to others: a little girl with a misshapen lip, crooked nose, lopsided teeth, and garbled speech. When schoolmates asked, "What happened to your lip?" I’d tell them I’d fallen and cut it on a piece of glass. Somehow it seemed more acceptable to have suffered an accident than to have been born different. I was convinced that no one outside my family could love me. There was, however, a teacher in the second grade whom we all adored--Mrs. Leonard by name. She was short, round, happy--a sparkling lady. Annually we had a hearing test. ... Mrs. Leonard gave the test to everyone in the class, and finally it was my turn. I knew from past years that as we stood against the door and covered one ear, the teacher sitting at her desk would whisper something, and we would have to repeat it back--things like "The sky is blue" or "Do you have new shoes?" I waited there for those words that God must have put into her mouth, those seven words that changed my life. Mrs. Leonard said, in her whisper, "I wish you were my little girl." God says to every person deformed by sin, "I wish you were my son" or "I wish you were my daughter."
