Dan Sullivan

Hosea 10
ï v. 5 The people who live in Samaria fear for the calf-idol of Beth
Aven.
here Hosea shows that God has renamed Bethel (House of God) to the
House of Wickedness. The people are worried about their god being taken
away by the Assyrians. Can you imagine their fear? “Oh, I hope they
don’t find our god in here. I hope they don’t come and take him away.”
and can you imagine their prayers? “Oh calf-idol-god, protect us and
protect yourself, so they don’t steal you and take you away.”
Of course they wouldn’t want to give up their idols, because their
idols don’t want to be rid of. The bondage that keeps them from knowing
the true and unmanufactured God holds them fast and rules over them.
Who would want to share a religion of legalism and bondage?
Our God is to be shared. His love endures forever to any who would
call on Him. The people of Hosea’s day for got their God, and forgot
all His goodness. They ceased to share Him and spread His good name,
and so He took the blessing away.
I read yesterday that 70 churches close every week in the US. But I
know for a fact that over the last 2 years or so, our church has grown
by almost 1000 people. So what does that mean? where are all these
closing churches, and what denominations are they?
v. 10 Its people will mourn over it, and so will its idolatrous
priests, those who had rejoiced over its splendor, because it is taken
from them into exile.
May God cleanse us of our idols. Show us what we worship besides You,
God, so we can destroy it. May we throw away our greed, our fear of
losing what we have, and our desire for self-pleasure so that we may
give God all He deserves.

This study started in Hosea 8
Jeremiah 11:13
You have as many gods as you have towns, O Judah; and the altars you
have set up to burn incense to that shameful god Baal are as many as the
streets of Jerusalem.

Israel was turned so far from the Lord. He was about to bring affliction
on them so they would either turn to their idols and see they were
worthless, or turn to Him and see His power.

Many are the vanities of hard work without God’s guidance.
Jer 12:13 “They will sow wheat but reap thorns; they will wear
themselves out but gain nothing. So bear the shame of your harvest
because of the Lord’s fierce anger.”
Hosea 8:4 “They set up kings without my consent; they choose princes
without my approval.” - approval is ‘yada’ in hebrew. to know,
intimately, to know well
Psalm 127:1-2 “Unless the Lord builds the house, its builders labor
in vain. Unless the Lord watches over the city, the watchmen stand guard
in vain.
“In vain you rise early and stay up late, toiling for food to eat-
for He grants sleep to those He loves.”
This is convicting after fruitless late nights surfing the internet
looking for a good place to buy a radiator. I hadn’t had a quiet time n
4 days. No still, quiet time with Him since Saturday. Last night I was
about to take my computer home to work on some projects, but all I could
feel like God was saying was “I want you to be with me, all of that can
wait.”
Matthew 6:31-33
So do not worry, saying, ‘What shall we eat?’ or ‘What shall we
wear?’ for the pagans run after all these things, and your heavenly
Father knows that you need them. But seek first His kingdom and His
righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well.”
So if given the option to stay up late making a bunch of money or
sleeping and waking up to have fellowship with God, the latter is the
one to choose. ‘But with that money we could feed the poor or build
great ministries.’ you may say, but without the Lord there would be no
harvest anyway. He KNOWS that we need to feed the poor, He Himself wants
to build great ministries MORE THAN WE DO! (wow. that almost seems hard
to believe)
But unless He Himself is the point, focus, and center of all we do,
it is all a complete waste of His and our time, money, and sacrifice.

Hosea 4-5
ï 4:6 “My people are destroyed from lack of knowledge.” The same things
is happening today, but it need not be God doing some kind of spiritual
cleansing. By simply not knowing Him and disobeying Him, people are
pouring judgement on themselves through disease, criminal suffering,
starvation as a result of greed, addiction, and violence as a result of
pride. God destroys nations by letting them suffer the natural
consequences of their actions.
The next verse says they have rejected knowledge and ignored the Law
of the Lord. This is more of that stuff of people not hearing the
prophet and wondering if he’s right, but flat out rejecting him as soon
as he speaks.
ï Hosea 4:7 “They exchanged their [or *my*] glory for something
disgraceful.”
Romans 1:22-23
Although they claimed to be wise, they became fools and exchanged
the glory of the immortal God for images made to look like mortal man
and birds and animals and reptiles.” They could have worshipped God-He
was there before them ready to receive praise and dispense glory, but
they chose other things. It says later they traded truth for a lie. How
much do we seek after technology, fun, a nice home, or personal pleasure
or happiness from created things or other people, when we should be
drawing all of that from GOD?
Cindy and I saw a HUGE SUV the other day. She asked me what kind it
was. It was an infinity something or nother. I said it costs more than
our house. She was astounded. “Even if we were filthy rich, I still
wouldn’t spend that much on a car.” That’s the Holy Spirit in her. The
desire to please ourselves and satisfy every fleshly craving will not
bear spiritual fruit.
Galatians 5: 16
So I say, live by the Spirit, and you will not gratify the desires
of the sinful nature. For the sinful nature desires what is contrary to
the Spirit, and the Spirit what is contrary to the sinful nature. They
are in conflict with each other, so that you do not do what you want.”
My sinful nature says “Preserve yourself, don’t risk embarrassment.
Enjoy yourself, don’t do things that require perseverance. Satisfy
yourself, don’t do things unless you get a feel good feeling about it.”
I am excited that some churches are taking this approach to their
short-term trips. They could go and build a house or pass out food, or
play games with kids, but instead they are going and interceding before
God for the people. It seems too easy, it seems too lazy or ineffectual,
because what do they have to show at the end of the week???? If we seek
after a good feeling or happy people, if we go to church or on a trip
just to have a good experience, or if we go someplace because it’s easy
and leave the hard-to-reach and difficult places for someone else with
more money and fewer dependents, we are doing the same thing Hosea’s
people and the Romans 1 people did, exchanging the GLORY OF GOD for
something else.
Galatians 5:24 Those who belong to Christ Jesus have crucified the
sinful nature with its passions and desires. Since we live by the
Spirit, let us keep in step with the Spirit.
ï Hosea 4:19 “a whirlwind will sweep them away.” elsewhere it says that
a spirit of prostitution has led them astray. Here we see that as people
do not seek God, their spiritual sensitivities are still played upon.
The word ’spirit’ is ‘ruach’ which also is used of the Holy Spirit. This
unholy spirit makes events happen to lead the wanderer down the path of
death. The spirit of prostitution simply does it through lust and
idolatry. I wonder if this is the ruling spirit around here today. When
people leave church saying ‘I just didn’t get much out of that.’ or ‘I
didn’t like that one part.’ aren’t they giving heed to the ruah zanah?
(spirit of prostitution)
The wind that leads them will sweep them away, just as a desire to
be pleased will drive us to the deepest depravities of self-pleasure.
Instead let us go to give glory to God. Let us go to serve our brothers
and sisters. Let us go to poor ourselves out rather than to fill
ourselves up. AND THEN let us walk out of church to do the same things.
Let us go to God to receive from Him what He’ll give, whether it feels
good when we get it or not, then go out into the world to give His
Spirit away to others.
ï Hosea 5:4 “Their deeds do not permit them to return to their God.”
The rich young ruler did not follow Christ because of his great wealth.
The Pharisees did not follow Christ because of the hardness of their
hearts. They loved to be noticed for being religious, but knew that
following God called for humility and would bring shame.
Today is the best day to turn back to God. With each sin, with each
disobedient thought, we harden our hearts towards God a little bit more.
And not just for those that don’t know God. Each day I buy myself some
trinket or keepsake or gadget, I make it harder to leave all I have at
the call of Christ. “How can I go to the mission field?” someone might
say? “I have a car payment, a house payment, a 2nd mortgage to pay for
this or that. I have family to take care of. I have to wait for my kids
to grow up or my parents to die. I have to finish college or get married
first.”
Hebrews 3:12 “See to it, brothers, that none of you has a sinful,
unbelieving heart that turns away from the living God. But encourage one
another daily, as long as it is called Today, so that none of you may be
hardened by sin’s deceitfulness. We have come to share in Christ if we
hold firmly til the end the confidence we had at first. As has just been
said ‘Today, if you hear His voice, do not harden your hearts as you did
in the rebellion.”