How Does God Get Our Attention?
Hosea 5:1-6:3
Pastor Jim Luthy
For several reasons, I haven’t spoken much about my years as a Fingerprint Technician with the Washington State Patrol. I’ve got stories, but I don’t tell them very often. Most of them have to do with crime scenes more than the actual crimes because I was never really part of the action. But it struck me (that’s a funny choice of words) the other day that since I moved down to Gresham I haven’t told the story about when I was stabbed.
It was a regular work day. There were 6 of us in a room—myself, two other men, and three women. One of the guys was talking about his vacation when one of the women handed him a knife and he stabbed me, right in the lower abdomen. The last thing I remembered before I passed out was the women working to control the bleeding. I woke up in a 5th floor hospital bed at St. Peter’s Hospital in Olympia. You wanna see my scar?
I think I better tell you the whole story. It was indeed a regular work day while I worked for the State Patrol, but I wasn’t at work. The room was a surgical room and the 5 other people in the room were my anesthesiologist, my surgeon, and three nurses. They were there to perform an appendectomy, which is why the doctor stabbed me in the gut. Fortunately, he had my best interest at heart and he was nice enough to sew me up when he was finished.
You see, if you don’t hear the whole story, the act of a surgeon cutting into you with a knife can sound quite traumatic. Who would opt for that? But for someone who is sick and in need of relief, it is a welcome wound.
I tell this story to introduce God’s solution to the problem of unfaithfulness I brought up last week. You might recall that last week we asked the question, "Is God ignoring our nation?" The short answer to that question is, most likely, yes. But remember, we are destroyed for lack of knowledge. In other words, God ignores us because we are first ignorant of him. If that is true, then the next logical question is "How does God get our attention?"
Those who don’t hear the whole story might only hear that the Lord will tear into us and go away, like a lion. On that basis, many people reject God, thinking of him as a vengeful judge who waits to destroy all of us who prove unable to follow his commands. But it is more appropriate to describe God as a divine surgeon, who indeed cuts into us, but also binds up our wounds.
Job 5:18 – "For he wounds, but he also binds up; he injures, but his hands also heal."
Lamentations 3:32 – "Though he brings grief, he will show compassion, so great is his unfailing love."
Deuteronomy 32:39 – "See now that I myself am He! There is no god besides me. I put to death and I bring to life, I have wounded and I will heal, and no one can deliver out of my hand."
Hosea chapter 5 describes the surgical work of God. It describes how God gets our attention to remove the rotten decay left by our unfaithfulness.
My appendicitis occurred long before my symptoms. Either a viral infection in my digestive tract or a blockage in the tube connecting my large intestine and my appendix led to an infection in my appendix. That was my sickness. My appendix was literally rotting. After the sickness settled in, I felt a huge gas bubble that wouldn’t go away (meaning my misery was someone else’s relief!). The relief of the symptoms came through surgery, which was painful at the time but critical for relieving my pain and ultimately in saving my life.
Hosea was called upon by God to get Israel’s attention so he could address the decay that had come as a result of the nation’s sickness of sin. In verses 1-2 Hosea charged the priests, the people, and the royal family of oppressing and even slaughtering the people. In verse 3 he charges Ephraim with prostitution and corruption. Verse 4 reveals a heart condition of unfaithfulness. In verse 5, the symptom is arrogance. Verse 6 talks about going "with flocks and herds to seek the Lord," meaning these people were bringing their animals for sacrifice, but it was empty worship. Outwardly they were worshiping, but inwardly their hearts were far from God.
These were a people, not unlike us, who were sick with sin. They were self-seeking and self-centered and assumed they were self-sufficient. They sold out their bodies as well as their moral and religious convictions like prostitutes. They were unfaithful to God, as Gomer was unfaithful to Hosea. Even their sad attempts at worship was empty and void of meaning.
Am I talking about Israel here, or am I talking about us? Do you see your own sickness in Israel half as clearly as I see my own? We are sick with sin. As I mentioned last week, the signs of decay are showing up in our behavior. They are showing up in our environment. At times, wouldn’t you admit, that even our worship is just an act of going through the motions?
It is under this diagnosis that God goes to work as a surgeon. From verses 8-12 we find a series of pronouncements that cut at Israel like the prospective wounds of a surgeon’s knife. "Sound the trumpet…" "Raise the battle cry…" "Ephraim will be laid waste on the day of reckoning." "I will pour out my wrath." "I am like a moth…" "I am like rot…" These do not sound like the words of a loving God, any more than a three inch gash across the belly sounds like the wounds of a healer. But that is exactly what they are. For even though God can be like a lion, his presence is that of a restorer and healer.
By understanding this interaction between God and Israel through his prophet Hosea, we gain the ability to recognize how God is at work to restore us as individuals, the church, and even our nation. Notice three distinct ways that God comes to us to get our attention so he can heal us.
First, he comes like a moth or like rot. In verse 12 he says "I am like a moth to Ephraim, (I am) like rot to the people of Judah." Israel, represented by the divided kingdoms of Ephraim and Judah, were already in a state of decay. It was a slow decay. Much like the slow, natural damage a moth does on your sweater or rust does on the muffler of your car, God had allowed the natural consequences of Israel’s unfaithfulness to rot their nation.
Next, he would come like a lion. If they couldn’t see the signs of decay, he was warning through Hosea that he was next going to come and tear them to pieces. He would carry them off in exile with no one to rescue them. But notice there would be a purpose in this. He would do this until they admit their guilt. He would become like a lion so they would seek his face. "In their misery," he said, "they will earnestly seek me."
Then he would come to them like a spring rain. "Come, let us return to the Lord. He has torn us to pieces, but he will heal us; he has injured us but he will bind up our wounds. After two days he will revive us; on the third day he will restore us, that we may live in his presence. Let us acknowledge the Lord; let us press on to acknowledge him. As surely as the sun rises, he will appear; he will come to us like the winter rains, like the spring rains that water the earth."—Hosea 6:1-3
Ultimately, God loves you and wants you to experience him as the spring rain. He will let you rot in your choices for a time if you insist. If you are stubborn, he will come to you like a lion. But his ultimate purpose will always be to restore you. It will always be to prosper you and not to harm you. His purpose is to give you a hope and a future.
In the middle of this promise to restore, we find a prophecy about our restorer, Jesus. "After two days he will revive us; on the third day he will restore us, that we may live in his presence." Jesus took on the lion’s share of God’s wrath on the cross so that we could experience the spring rain of his presence. On the third day, he rose from the dead. His resurrection is our restoration. In our decay, if we will forsake all to be carried off with him, we by his mercy will be raised up with him to live in the presence of Jesus. He is our spring rain.
Today In our nation, God is like a moth and like rust. He is allowing us to decay because we have, in general, forsaken him. If we do not turn to the gentle rain of Jesus, I dare say that we will soon know him as a great lion. Our nation will crumble as any dynasty that has gone before us. Unless we change, the Western church will be torn apart first.
So the question before each one of us is this: How do you see God at work to restore you personally? This very week, have you lived in his presence and experienced his grace like a spring rain?
If not, I suggest you look carefully to see if God has been like a moth to you. Consider that your spiritual desert might indicate that you are in a slowly developing state of decay. You might not see things changing before your eyes, but before long you may realize that the cloak of righteousness you once wore has been eaten away by the natural consequences of your choices. Have you chosen lesser things? If you are not spending time in the presence of God, you have in essence locked your spirituality in a closet that is infested with moths. I fear that you may try to pull it out later only to find it has been eaten away.
Beware of apathy, because it will rot your spiritual life like rust on a nail.
This week, some of you may have felt him tear at you like a lion ripping at his prey. Perhaps the consequences of your choices have left you in turmoil—a struggling marriage, a criminal charge, the loss of a job. Maybe the pain of sickness or the mourning of death has reminded you of sin’s curse. It could be that the activity of the Holy Spirit has you weighted down by conviction concerning your own sin, and the weight of your guilt is more than you can bear.
If God has been like a great lion to you this week, do not despair. He will bind up your wounds. He came to Peter like a roaring lion with the harmless crow of a rooster. He came to Paul like a roaring lion in the midst of a blinding light. Yet he came to them like a refreshing rain and restored them to places of great significance in his divine plan.
He will come to you too. Will you turn to him and let him wash you like rain? There is only one way to his presence and that is through the cross of Jesus Christ. Let him tear apart your self-seeking and supposed self-sufficiency and restore your soul.
Rejoice, the Great Surgeon comes. He brings healing on his wings. He restores us. He is Jesus, our Savior. And he wants to operate on you. Will you let him?
