POWERFUL PEOPLE ARE CALLED TO LOVE THE UNLOVABLE
Friday was Valentines Day. Some people overlook the origin of Valentine's day and assume it is just a day to celebrate love.
The name Valentine is derived from the Latin word Valens which means worthy, strong or powerful.
This evening as we continue in our series on Powerful people Valentine is a good place to begin.
Valentinus was the name of a man who lived in Rome during the reign of Claudius II.
It was a time when Christians were being persecuted.
If you are wondering about the picture on the screen, the left picture is a 3D rendering of what Valentinus may have looked like based on a relic that is currently kept in the Basilica of Santa Maria in Cosmedin, Rome. Allegedly the flower-crowned skull on the right of the picture is Valentinus.
Valentinus was not a Christian, but history records how he was willing to help them. Valentinus was caught and put into prison. In prison, he became a believer in Jesus. While he was in prison he sent messages to his friends saying, “Remember your Valentine!” and “I love you.”
Here is where the story gets a little ugly!
His new-found faith led to Valentinus being sentenced to death. He was beaten with clubs, stoned and finally beheaded. Not really an expression of love - but it does perhaps explain why someone decided to keep his head in a box.
Love. The whole area of love is a big one, and the word appears multiple times in the Bible.
The Bible I use most often is the New Living Translation and in that the word love appears 810 times. In the NIV 681 times and in the King James 546. Regardless of the translation of the Bible you or I use, it is clear that God, through His word, expresses the importance of love.
Throughout the Bible, God gives us many examples of how in love He has powerfully operated in individuals lives. God gives us spiritual lessons and guidance that we can learn from.
In the story of Moses, we see how Gods love for His people enabled them to be delivered from slavery and bondage in Egypt. In the 40 years the Hebrews spent in the wilderness, we can see how God loved His people through His provision for them.
In the birth, life, death and resurrection of Jesus, we see how His love for us brings us out of where we do not belong - the place of sin, darkness and death - and delivers us to the place of forgiveness, restoration and eternal salvation.
From the account of Noah, his family and the ark we see that in love, God provided them with salvation from the judgment He brought upon the sinful world.
In Christ, God has provided us with something far better than an ark made of wood, Jesus is our place of safety and security in the midst of the storms and the floods of life.
There was only one door into the ark, for those with faith to enter in. God in His love has given us one door to forgiveness and salvation, only one way to be saved, repenting and trusting in Jesus as our Lord and Saviour.
Love has many aspects, what I want us to consider together this evening is the truth that: POWERFUL PEOPLE ARE CALLED TO LOVE THE UNLOVABLE
Perhaps one of the best examples of this truth in the Old Testament is the prophet Hosea.
Hosea was a prophet during the reign of four different kings spanning approximately 38 years in the 8th century B.C. God told Hosea to marry a “promiscuous woman” called Gomer. Their life together was an enacted prophecy illustrating the pain God experiences because of our sin and the love He has for us despite our sins.
The words of Hosea’s prophecy speak about the wrath of a spurned husband and the forgiveness of true love.
Just like Valentine, the lives of Hosea and Gomer are linked to love, but their story is not a perfect love story.
There are three parts of Hosea’s story I want to cover:
The Prophet is called to love the Unlovable.
The Unlovable abandons the Prophet, and
The Prophet pursues the Unlovable
The Prophet is called to love the unlovable
Listen to Hosea 1:1-2 - The Lord gave this message to Hosea son of Beeri during the years when Uzziah, Jotham, Ahaz, and Hezekiah were kings of Judah, and Jeroboam son of Jehoash was king of Israel.
When the Lord first began speaking to Israel through Hosea, he said to him, “Go and marry a prostitute, so that some of her children will be conceived in prostitution. This will illustrate how Israel has acted like a prostitute by turning against the Lord and worshipping other gods.”
This is probably not what we would consider the ideal way to begin a marriage. God tells Hosea to find a prostitute or promiscuous woman as some other translations describe her and marry her.
This is a real chalk and cheese relationship, a prophet of God and a ‘working girl’.
It is not going to be simple, it is not going to be smooth, there will be problems, there will be pain.
God tells this Holy man to marry a woman with a bad reputation, a reputation for unfaithfulness, a woman who is sure to break Hosea’s heart.
In the standard wedding vows, a couple makes a promise to love and cherish each other and to be faithful to one another.
Even before the marriage takes place, Hosea knows that his wife will never be faithful, her adulterous behaviour is certain. Gomer will break his heart and bring him frustration and grief.
The obvious question is why would God want His prophet to marry a woman like this?
Because “This will illustrate how Israel has acted like a prostitute by turning against the Lord and worshipping other gods.”
So Hosea married Gomer, the daughter of Diblaim, and she became pregnant and gave Hosea a son.
Hosea lived during the same time as the prophets Joel, Jonah, Obadiah, Micah, Amos and Isaiah
I can imagine people speaking to Hosea and saying, “Hosea, you are one of the many respected prophets of God in this country. But, your wife's behaviour is a disgrace. Why did you ever choose to marry Gomer?”
I imagine Hosea would have responded by saying “The question isn’t why am I married to a woman like Gomer, but why is a good and loving God married to an adulterous people like you?”
Hosea’s marriage to an adulterous woman demonstrated God’s relationship to His adulterous people.
God was showing Israel that His people were behaving in the same way with other gods and idols.
In God’s view, if we worship or serve anyone or anything other than Him we are committing spiritual adultery.
If we are occupied by putting other things before worshipping or serving God we are guilty of the sin of idolatry.
Idolatry can be a very subtle thing. In fact, the more subtle the more dangerous, because we might not even notice that we are allowing something to get in the way of our relationship with our God. It is easy to allow things to divide us from having a powerful relationship with Jesus.
Think about this for a moment:
If you have a problem in your life, are you more likely to write about it on Facebook or pray to Jesus?
Are you so busy reading and writing hundreds of texts, emails, messages or tweets that you just don’t have the time to read or hear God’s Word?
Would Jesus say to you “you say you love me, yet you run to the world as Gomer ran to her lovers”?
God’s message to Israel and to us is the word of Jesus in Mark 4:18-19 applies, “The seed that fell among the thorns represents those who hear God’s word, but all too quickly the message is crowded out by the worries of this life, the lure of wealth, and the desire for other things, so no fruit is produced.”
Don’t be lured away from God by other things, keep Him at the centre of your life so that you can fully experience His presence and His power.
2nd point: The unlovable abandons the Prophet
Gomer was a woman who was looking for love in all the wrong places. Hosea 2:4,5 says, “I will not love her children, for they were conceived in prostitution. Their mother is a shameless prostitute and became pregnant in a shameful way. She said, ‘I’ll run after other lovers and sell myself to them for food and water, for clothing of wool and linen, and for olive oil and drinks.’”
Gomer was someone who was not satisfied with her needs being met, she was willing to sell herself so that her want’s and desires could be fulfilled.
Gomer had a godly man as a husband, yet her children were products of her adultery.
She had a husband, a good man to share her life and still, she chose to run after other men.
In many ways, God had given her something good in her life, yet Gomer behaved as if the blessing God had given her was not enough.
Have you ever behaved as if what God has blessed you with was not enough?
Gomer thought others would provide for her, take care of her and protect her when God had already given her someone to do all those things.
God loved Israel and yet they turned their back on Him and tried to find what they wanted in other places and in other gods.
Here is the application for us: Anything we put before ‘God’ can become more important than our God.
The Bible teaches us that our lives are meant to be lived as a living sacrifice to God.
Yet many people are more willing to sacrifice a powerful relationship with the God who loves them than sacrifice anything that is temporary: comfort, money, prestige, fashion, pleasure, family, fame, or success.
Many things can become our focus, our idol or what we choose to run after.
What are you willing to sacrifice in your life to show your love for God?
The Bible teaches us that there is a cost in following Jesus, our time, our effort, our devotion, our service, our love, our wants, our daily lives, all of these are meant to be secondary things - Christ is meant to be the centre of our love and our lives.
Don’t let other people or other things to diminish your love and worship of God.
God is the one who gives us love, provision, protection and He warns that He is the one that can take it away.
Remember the words of Job 1:21, “I came naked from my mother’s womb, and I will be naked when I leave. The Lord gave me what I had, and the Lord has taken it away. Praise the name of the Lord!”
James 1:17-18 reminds us, Whatever is good and perfect is a gift coming down to us from God our Father, who created all the lights in the heavens. He never changes or casts a shifting shadow. He chose to give birth to us by giving us his true word. And we, out of all creation, became his prized possession.
Every good and perfect gift is from God above and yet His chosen people still run after love, happiness, peace, joy, and fulfilment in the places they should avoid.
In a way, Gomer’s life is an illustration of the church:
The church is often described as the bride of Christ; Gomer was a wife, a bride, who ignored her husband,
there are those who call themselves Christians who choose to ignore the will and Word of God.
Gomer seems to be a bride who wants the benefits of her relationship with her husband but none of the responsibilities of being his bride.
Again, there are those who want the benefits of a relationship with Christ, the forgiveness of sin, salvation, love, protection, provision - but none of the responsibilities of being His disciple, loving and serving God, loving and serving others, witnessing, sharing the Gospel, tithing, worshipping.
To remove Christ from Christianity leaves I-anity, Me, myself and I, that is the mantra of the modern world, what I want, what I need, what I think.
The truth is some people love themselves more than they love God. James wrote in James 4:4, “You adulterers! Don’t you realize that friendship with the world makes you an enemy of God? I say it again: If you want to be a friend of the world, you make yourself an enemy of God.”
James was not referring to physical adultery, he was speaking to people who were putting God in second place to the things of the world. Their spiritual adultery made them enemies of God.
The Bible clearly shows that God has emotions. Can you imagine the pain and rejection God must feel when people choose to run from Him and reject Him?
If Hosea was hurt, did Gomer care? When Hosea cried for her, she ran from him. When Hosea loved her, she loved other men.
Gomer chose not to care. At times we choose not to care about our Lord and Saviour who endured the suffering of the cross for our sins. We bring sadness to the heart of God when we run off and embrace the things of the world.
Sometimes we compartmentalise our lives: This is my married life, this is my work life, this is my hobbies life, this is my friend life, this is my Christian life. Christ is meant to be at the centre of every part of our lives. All of our life is meant to be lived for God.
We are meant to give all of our self to the one we love. Gomer chased after pleasure and forgot her obligations to her husband and children.
If we truly love God then we must prove it with our words and our actions.
3rd point The Prophet pursues the unlovable
Hosea 2:13 “I will punish her for all those times when she burned incense to her images of Baal, when she put on her earrings and jewels and went out to look for her lovers but forgot all about me,” says the Lord.”
She forgot all about me... can you sense the pain of rejection behind those words?
Even in the pain, even in the rejection, there is a desire for reconciliation, verses 14,15, “But then I will win her back once again. I will lead her into the desert and speak tenderly to her there. I will return her vineyards to her and transform the Valley of Trouble into a gateway of hope.”
What? Many in the world would say, “She is not worth the effort”, “leave her in her sin”. Instead of abandoning her to her sin Hosea pursues her, he runs after her, he still loves her and wants to bring transformation and hope. This is a beautiful picture of what God has done in your life and mine. He did not abandon us in our sin, He came to save us, to restore us, to give us hope and a future.
What we have here is a picture of our God, the one with such deep love for His people, His bride, He is willing to do whatever is necessary to redeem us.
Hosea knows pursuing Gomer is worth the effort. For Hosea, she is worth being humiliated for, she is even worth dying for.
You are the bride of Christ. You are worth the effort. You are worth the humiliation He endured. You are worth the suffering He endured. You are worth dying for!
This is not religion, this is relationship. Throughout the Bible, throughout history, in our own experience, God constantly and consistently pursues His people. When we fall away when we grow cold, when we run in the opposite direction, God seeks us out and we can repent and turn back to Him.
In His love we are forgiven, in His mercy, we are restored. Look at Hosea 3:1-2, Then the Lord said to me, “Go and love your wife again, even though she commits adultery with another lover. This will illustrate that the Lord still loves Israel, even though the people have turned to other gods and love to worship them.” So I bought her back for fifteen pieces of silver and five bushels of barley and a measure of wine.
Do you see the amazing love God has for His people, for His church?
Hosea goes searching for his wife who is now owned by someone else.
Sometimes we go have to go from bad to worse before we come back to God. There is a parallel here with the story of the Prodigal Son, sometimes there is a deep descent into sin before we come to our senses “I have a father, a Lord and Saviour who loves me, I will go return to Him.”
Hosea pays half the price of a slave and about a days worth of food to purchase, to redeem his wife to him.
Jesus was betrayed for the price of a slave. Yet the price He paid for our redemption was much, much higher. He paid for our redemption on the cross with His body and His blood. What an amazing expression of love!
The pure and Holy Creator of the Universe seeks out the lost, seeks out the fallen, seeks out the unlovable,
how could anyone choose to not be in a real, personal relationship with Him?
One final observation as I close:
POWERFUL PEOPLE ARE CALLED TO LOVE THE UNLOVABLE
The name Hosea can also be pronounced as Hoshea. The name has the same root in Hebrew as Joshua, and Yeshua, the Hebrew name for Jesus.
Hosea’s love for Gomer was amazing. Christ’s love for His bride, His church is amazing.
The audio for this and other sermons are available here: http://www.deancourtier.co.uk/sermons.html or as a direct download from https://sermons.estuaryelim.church/20200216_apm_dean_courtier(lovetheunloveable).mp3
