Hi friends! Today we finish the book of Hosea, and my goodness it is a strong finish. Hosea once again uses very human and personal language from God’s perspective about the reconciliation between hurt, forgiveness, and love. By the way, thank you so much for your responses to the survey I put out last week about meeting up to discuss the Bible as a group. It’s looking like Monday evening’s will be the day moving forward. I’m still ironing out the exact details of what the discussion will look like as I don’t want to ostrasize anyone that has fallen behind, but fret not, we will make it awesome. More details to come soon. Anyways, enough from me. Let’s dive into the text together and see what God has to say to you! <3
Scripture to Read
Audio Bible
Questions to Consider
What does this teach me about God?
What does this teach me about humanity?
Inserting Hosea’s personal side of God into the drama I’ve read from in 2 Kings and Isaiah - how does this change my understanding or reflection of the exile?
What line can I meditate on for today?
- My Thoughts -
Early on in Hosea 11 God talks about how God needs to punish Israel for their failures, but struggles to do so because God loves them too much to hurt them even if they don’t seem to share that same love for God that God has for them. It reminds me of a teenager with their parents. As a teenager I rarely wanted to be seen with my parents, in particular my mom around my friends. It’s part of that vulnerability and resentment of shame that I spoke of on Sunday. I was more afraid of what my friends would say about me being a mama’s boy than being respectful to my mother who had sacrificed a TON to be able to send me to a private school. (I later found out they emptied their combined life savings for me to go to Trinity at 12k a year.) I used to make her cry a lot with how dismissive I was of her - either walking five feet behind her when I didn’t think her outfit looked good, or how I’d avoid talking to them much at my track meets.
Things are quite different now. My mom and I are really good “friends” with one another and chat nearly everyday. I’d pummel someone’s face through a wall if they ever made a remark against my mother, so things have certainly changed haha. But, I still carry a lot of that regret and shame of how I was when I was younger. Not to play the what if game, but what if something sudden happened to her like McKInsie’s mom and we would have left on bad terms. This interaction between my mother and I feels a lot like Israel with God in Hosea. God is rightfully so pissed off at Israel’s rejection of Him, but loves them too much to resent them back.
In closing I share one final little lesson from my mama bear. She told me about how she never got to say “I love you” to her mom the day she died. (My mom was only 13 and was at school) 50 years later she still cries at the mention of it. So, she made a heavenly promise to her mom that she would never end a day without saying “I love you” to everyone in her life that mattered most. So, yes, every night mom will text or call me to say I love you, and will do the same with my dad and my sister. What if we did something like that with the people in our lives? What if we did that with God? Maybe it would help to prevent any schisms like my younger years or prevent any shameful feelings after they are gone.
How have your parents/guardian revealed the nature of God to you or helped you understand God?
Prayer:
UMH 129 - Give to the wind thy fears
V. 1
Give to thy wind thy fears; hope and be undismayed
God hears thy sighs and counts thy tears
God shall lift up thy head
v. 2
Through waves and clouds and storms God gently clears thy way
wait thou God’s time so shall this night soon end in joyous day
v. 3
Leave to God’s sovereign sway to choose and to command
so shalt thou wondering own that way how wise how strong this hand
v. 4
Let us in life in death thy steadfast truth declare
and publish with our latest breath thy love and guardian care
My parents liked to play devil's advocate a lot with my siblings and I when we had (and still do, looking at you dad) discussions about moral issues, religion, politics, really anything. They wanted us to look at the grey areas and not just accept everything was black or white. Because of this I have always believed that God is curious, and a bit of a scientist who is always running experiments.
One of my favorite things I've done, and continue to do with my mom is take the dogs for walks. We both use that time to vent a little, but also to get into philosophical discussions. We've discussed how we see God working around us, and God's rol…