Order, Words, & Voices
11.12.23, The Willingness of God, Hosea 1:1-9
Order
Pre Worship Music
Call to Worship – Song Lynn & Team
Forever
Praise to the Lord
Call to Gather/Passage Mitch
Songs Lynn & Team
Great is Thy Faithfulness
Listen to our Hearts
Prayers for our World/Jesus’ Prayer Cricklins
Message The Willingness of God Rick
Music O Come, All You Unfaithful Lynn and Team
Community/Peace Rick
Benediction/Closing Peace Rick
Post Worship Music
Music (slides) Lynn and Team
Give thanks to the Lord
Our God and King
His love endures forever
For He is good He is above all things
His love endures forever
Sing praise sing praise
With a mighty hand
And an outstretched arm
His love endures forever
For the life that’s been reborn
His love endures forever
Sing praise sing praise
Sing praise sing praise
Forever God is faithful
Forever God is strong
Forever God is with us
Forever forever
From the rising to the setting sun
His love endures forever
And by the grace of God
We will carry on
His love endures forever
Sing praise sing praise
Forever God is faithful
Forever God is strong
Forever God is with us
Forever forever
Forever You are faithful
Forever You are strong
Forever You are with us
Forever forever
Praise to the Lord
The Almighty the King of creation
O my soul praise Him
For He is thy health and salvation
All ye who hear
Now to His temple draw near
Praise Him in glad adoration
Praise to the Lord
Who o’er all things so wondrously reigneth
Shelters thee under His wings
Yea so gently sustaineth
Hast thou not seen
How thy desires e’er have been
Granted in what He ordaineth
Hallelujah hallelujah
Hallelujah hallelujah
Praise to the Lord
Who doth prosper thy work and defend thee
Surely His goodness and mercy
Here daily attend thee
Ponder anew
What the Almighty can do
If with His love He befriend thee
Praise to the Lord
O let all that is in me adore Him
All that hath life and breath
Come now with praises before Him
Let the Amen sound from His people again
Gladly fore’er we adore Him.
Let the Amen sound from His people again
Gladly fore’er we adore Him
Hallelujah hallelujah, Hallelujah hallelujah
Call to Gather (Slides) Mitch
We gather for a shared moment before God. We gather with countless others in our community, our nation, and around our world on our common path of Becoming.
We gather with those who are in struggles we cannot imagine and in places where suffering permeates to a depth we will never understand.
We gather with those who have rejoiced in victories as well as those whose pain is guarded with a vigilance that is excruciating.
We gather for a moment of rest in our struggles, a moment of refreshment before God, and a moment to remember the hope found in the empty tomb.
We travel a called and yet chosen path. A path of grace and a path of works. May we continue to move forward on our path of becoming as we gather before the God who is God.
Passage
When Israel was a child, I loved him, and out of Egypt I called my son.
The more they were called by others, the more they went away; they kept sacrificing to the Baals and burning offerings to idols.
Yet it was I who taught Ephraim to walk; I took them up by their arms, but they did not know that I healed them.
I led them with cords of kindness, with the bands of love, and I became to them as one who eases the yoke on their jaws, and I bent down to them and fed them.
They shall not return to the land of Egypt, but Assyria shall be their king, because they have refused to return to me.
The sword shall rage against their cities, consume the bars of their gates, and devour them because of their own counsels.
My people are bent on turning away from me, and though they call out to the Most High, he shall not raise them up at all.
How can I give you up, O Ephraim? How can I hand you over, O Israel? How can I make you like Admah? How can I treat you like Zeboiim? My heart recoils within me; my compassion grows warm and tender.
I will not execute my burning anger; I will not again destroy Ephraim; for I am God and not a man, the Holy One in your midst, and I will not come in wrath.
Hosea 11:1-9 (ESV)
Music (Slides) Lynn and Team
Great is Thy faithfulness
O God my Father
There is no shadow
Of turning with Thee
Thou changest not
Thy compassions they fail not
As Thou hast been
Thou forever wilt be
Great is Thy faithfulness
Great is Thy faithfulness
Morning by morning
New mercies I see
All I have needed
Thy hand hath provided
Great is Thy faithfulness
Lord unto me
Summer and winter
And springtime and harvest
Sun moon and stars
In their courses above
Join with all nature
In manifold witness
To Thy great faithfulness
Mercy and love
Great is Thy faithfulness
Great is Thy faithfulness
Morning by morning
New mercies I see
All I have needed
Thy hand hath provided
Great is Thy faithfulness
Lord unto me
Pardon for sin
And a peace that endureth
Thy own dear presence
To cheer and to guide
Strength for today
And bright hope for tomorrow
Blessings all mine
With ten thousand beside
Great is Thy faithfulness
Great is Thy faithfulness
Morning by morning
New mercies I see
All I have needed
Thy hand hath provided
Great is Thy faithfulness
Lord unto me
How do you explain
How do you describe
A love that goes from east to west
And runs as deep as it is wide
You know all our hopes
Lord You know all our fears
And words cannot express
The love we feel
But we long for You to hear
So listen to our hearts
Hear our spirits sing
A song of praise that flows
From those You have redeemed
We will use the words we know
To tell You what an awesome God You are
But words are not enough
To tell You of our love
So listen to our hearts
If words could fall like rain
From these lips of mine
And if I had a thousand years
Lord I would still run out of time
If You listen to my heart
Ev’ry beat will say
Thank You for the life
Thank You for the truth
Thank You for the way
So listen to our hearts
Hear our spirits sing
A song of praise that flows
From those You have redeemed
We will use the words we know
To tell You what an awesome God You are
But words are not enough
To tell You of our love
So listen to our hearts
So listen to our hearts
Hear our spirits sing
A song of praise that flows
From those You have redeemed
We will use the words we know
To tell You what an awesome God You are
But words are not enough
To tell You of our love
So listen to our heart
Prayer (Slides) Cricklins
[Slide] We pray for Our World (Leave I Tim slide until Lord’s prayer]
O Lord, you who are the True King, have mercy we pray, on the people of the Manipur, Armenia, Israel, Gaza, Zimbabwe, Cuba, Ukraine, Serbia, Nepal, Haiti, the Turkish & Syrian Kurds, and those embattled in Syria, Iraq, and Afghanistan as well as all who suffer at the hands evil and war. God, we ask that you will take pity on the vulnerable, so that true peace and justice might be present in our world. We pray this in the name of Jesus, the Prince of Peace. Amen.
Please join me in voicing the Lord’s Prayer
Our Father who art in Heaven, hallowed be thy name.
Thy Kingdom come, thy will be done, On Earth as it is in Heaven.
Give us this day our daily bread. Forgive us our trespasses, while we forgive those who trespass against us. And, lead us not into temptation but deliver us from evil. For thine is the kingdom, and the power, and the glory forever. Amen.
Message (Slides) Rick
- [Slide] Last week we stopped at Israel’s King Ahab and his wife, Queen Jezebel, and the prophet Elijah. The 7th King over the Northern Kingdom, Israel.
- [Same Slide] We also stopped in the Southern Kingdom, Judah, at King Asa.
- [Slide] Now, we move ahead with the next King of Judah (South) who is named Jehoshaphat. Good. Michaiah remains the prophet. This is around 870 BC.
- [Slide] There are a lot of Kings. So, we will skip past the next 6 Kings to arrive at King Uzziah, G, around 767 BC. Uzziah’s prophet is Isaiah which will be where we look next week.
- [Slide] In Israel (North) we also have a new King who comes after Ahab. This King is Ahaziah, 1 year, E, prophet Elisha. This is around 853 BC.
- [Slide] We slip past 4 of the Kings of Israel to King Jeroboam II, 782. Prophets in this time are Amos and Hosea. We will be focusing on Hosea today.
- [Slide] Now for a point of reference which will be important for today’s look at Hosea – The fall of the Northern Kingdom, Israel, when they will be conquered by the Assyrians and taken into exile, will be in 722 BC. Hosea prophesied for 60 years meaning that the writings of Hosea could have been within a decade of the fall of Assyria.
- [Slide] Thread of God as father to a people who are growing up. Emotion in experience, emotional roller coaster in the prophetic poetry of Hosea.
- [Slide] OT God v NT God
Overview of Hosea’s prophetic life borrowed and adapted from the writings of the Reverend Steve Andrews of Lee’s Summit, MO:
[Slide] The covenant of old is all about the things God was going to do for the people. And…God named the expectations of the people, they were to be circumcised; they were to be blameless; they were to act and live as God’s people. But, the people grumbled, they doubted God, they committed all kinds of atrocious sins against Yahweh, they turned away from God worshipping false gods that they made with their own hands.
[Slide] They did not live as God’s people. This is where the prophets came in. They were God’s messengers to call people back to God. Hosea was one of the latter; he became a living sign of God. The way he lived his life was the pronouncement of God’s message. God told Hosea to go out and to take for himself a wife who was a prostitute, and on top of that, Hosea was to have children with this woman.
[Slide] Among the Israelites, the punishment for prostitution was death. Yet God called Hosea to marry her, to love her, and to raise a family with her – even though she would and did continue to be unfaithful. Hosea’s life was a picture, an accurate picture, of how the Israelites were blatantly living. In forsaking God and following their own lusts, God’s chosen people were just like prostitutes.
[Slide] The Israelites had stopped respecting and appreciating the relationship they had with the God who had created them and kept his promise to them. They whored themselves out for the pleasure and wealth of the world.
[Slide] Hosea knew what he was getting into before he said yes to God’s calling, even after reading the fine print of the life that God laid ahead. Hosea’s life was to be the ultimate in visual aid of the image of God. Hosea represents God, and his wife and children from prostitution represent Israel. The message that Hosea’s life was to communicate was that the Israelites were the unfaithful prostitute.
[Slide] So Hosea does as he was instructed and marries a woman named Gomer, whose reputation was known by everyone. Hosea and Gomer began having children, whose names were also vivid illustrative prophecies.
[Slide] Their first child was named Jezreel “God sows destruction and ruin.” Their second child was then named Lo-Ruhamah meaning “one who has not experienced compassion or love.” The third child was named Lo-Ammi “for you are not My people and I will not be for you.”
[Slide] God did not break the covenant, but His people did. The punishment for breaking a covenant is death. That’s what makes the image of a prostitute so fitting here. The punishment for prostitution is also death. The people around Hosea would have wondered why he didn’t stone Gomer for her wickedness.
[Slide] Not only did he let her live, but he married her, had a family with her, and went after her when she ran off with other men. Hosea was faithful to Gomer just as God is always faithful.
[Slide] At the end of chapter two and as part of His covenant faithfulness, God performs the great reversal. He changes the names of the children. Jezreel goes from being seeds of destruction to the sowing a people. Lo-Ruhamah becomes simply Ruhamah – God will show love to her. And Lo-Ammi, becomes Ammi, ‘God will claim them as His people.’
[Slide] Even after all of this, Gomer runs off from him yet again, Hosea goes after her and redeems her, he brings her back to himself, he takes her again as his wife despite all of her unfaithfulness, he again commits his love to her.
[Slide – Go off screen share until the final passage at end of message – Hosea 4 – There is a blank slide between this and next slide] This is the way God is with His people, Israel and us. Despite our unfaithfulness to His covenant, He continues to keep it. He continues to bring us back to Himself. And in reversing each child’s name, Yahweh continues to show His faithfulness to His covenant.
God navigates the Roller Coaster of Being a Dad/Parent
Jewish Bible ‘fell in love’
The Parental Cycle – Heart Warming (JPA – ‘I fell in love…), Heart Breaking, Anger, Remembrance of the Core of Original Heart Warming
Allowables
Difference in rights and shoulds “If a man has a stubborn and rebellious son who will not obey the voice of his father or the voice of his mother, and, though they discipline him, will not listen to them, 19 then his father and his mother shall take hold of him and bring him out to the elders of his city at the gate of the place where he lives, 20 and they shall say to the elders of his city, ‘This our son is stubborn and rebellious; he will not obey our voice; he is a glutton and a drunkard.’ 21 Then all the men of the city shall stone him to death with stones. So you shall purge the evil from your midst, and all Israel shall hear, and fear.
Deuteronomy 21:18-21
God’s actions v Consequences of our actions – Assyrians, alliances, kingdom desires – 10-12 years later conquered by Assyria because of the Isrealites desire and pursuit of being like the surrounding nations, and to be better than the Isrealites in Judah
God is willing to not do what he is allowed to do but instead acts out of his original love for the people.
Hope – Even as Assyria is approaching, God’s Continues Pleading/Wooing the Israelites/Ephraimites to Return to God. God will continue to do this as the people are in exile (the same as happens later to the Isrealites in Judah as they too are conquered and taken to exile.
[Final 2 Hosea 4 Slides] ‘God says, Return, O Israel, to the Lord your God, for you have stumbled because of your iniquity. Return to the Lord and say to God, “Take away all iniquity; accept what is good, and we will show the genuineness of our return to God with our words and our true inner intentional meaning of our words. We know that Assyria will not save us; instead we will trust fully in God.”
‘O Israel, what have I to do with your idols? It is I who answer and look after you not them. I am like an evergreen cypress; from me comes your fruit. Those who are wise must understand these things; those who are discerning know these things; for the ways of the Lord are right, and the upright walk in them, but transgressors stumble in them.’
Hosea 4:1-3, 8-9
Failure of Church – Tough Love/rejection/shunning
Music (Slides) Lynn and Team
O come all you unfaithful
Come weak and unstable
Come know you are not alone
O come barren and waiting ones
Weary of praying
Come see what your God has done
Christ is born Christ is born
Christ is born for you
O come bitter and broken
Come with fears unspoken
Come taste of His perfect love
O come guilty and hiding ones
There is no need to run
See what your God has done
Christ is born Christ is born
Christ is born for you
He’s the Lamb who was given slain for our pardon
His promise is peace for those who believe
He’s the Lamb who was given slain for our pardon
His promise is peace for those who believe
So come though you have nothing
Come He is the offering
Come see what your God has done
Christ is born Christ is born
Christ is born for you
Community (Slides) Rick
- Next Sunday, Isaiah 5:1-7; 11:1- 5, Still Messy
- Thanksgiving Dinner, Next Sunday, November 19, following morning worship, List in Entryway, Turkey provided.
- Christmas Eve, December 24, 4:40pm/5:00pm, No morning worship that day
- Advent Series, How Does A Weary World Rejoice, Beginning 11.26, Devo Books ready 11.19.23
Benediction (Slides) Rick
We leave this place dependent on the hope proven through the resurrection. We have embraced this path because of God’s extravagant grace. This path connects us to creation as well as the pursuit of becoming the righteousness of the Holy God. We will face the struggles because that is the reality of faith.
We move forward even when we cannot see, we dive in even when the waters appear difficult, we hope even when our despair threatens to consume us, we love because that is the path laid before us.
And, when our faith seems worthless, when hopelessness rules our reality, and when hatred seems to consume our world, we still choose to move forward in trust, to hope in the empty grave, and to love as God loves.
Closing Peace (Slides) Rick
Leader: May the Peace and Hope of the Lord go with you.
Response: And also with you.
Leader: Go in the Peace and Hope of the Lord.
Order, Words, & Voices 