For the Love of God

Woodland Hills Church of Christ

For the Love of God

Introduction: In the book of Hosea, God indicted Israel for her adultery with the idols of the nations. Just as Hosea divorced Gomer for her adultery, so God had put away Israel for her unfaithfulness. Later, God told Hosea to take Gomer back, which pictured that day would God would again bring his people back to him. Peter quoted the first chapter of Hosea to indicate that we Christians are the fulfillment of what Israel of old had done and of how God would bring us back. We were unfaithful to God, but now God has brought us back. Listen to the prophecy God made:

“Therefore, behold, I will allure her, and bring her into the wilderness, and speak tenderly to her. And there I will give her vineyards and make the Valley of Achor a door of hope. And there she shall answer as in the days of her youth, as at the time when she came out of the land of Egypt. And in that day, declares the LORD, you will call me ‘My Husband’” (Hosea 2:14–16)

Jesus repeated this principle in John 6:43-44, “Jesus therefore answered and said to them, ‘Do not murmur among yourselves. No one can come to me unless the Father who sent me draws him; and I will raise him up at the last day.”

In both of these texts, God describes our relationship with him as marital love. I did not grow up with that concept, did you? Maybe you still do not see your relationship with Jesus as love in a marriage. Oh, you’ve heard it, but have you really internalized the fact that you said vows to him?

When Jesus said the greatest command was to love God with all your heart, all your soul, all your strength, and all your mind, did you recognize the love God was talking about was love within a marriage?

This concept was the basis of the Hosea’s prophecy!

1. What does love look like?
   1. In other words, when you observe a couple in love, or people who love their job, or love a sport, or a fan of a sports team, what does that look like? How would you describe it? Consider a couple who just got engaged:
      1. They are giddy with excitement
      2. They are filled with hope for the future and the new life they will have together.
      3. They pursue one another because of their deep love
      4. Their love is the top priority of their lives, and will be for the rest of their lives.
      5. They are passionate about what they have together.
      6. There constant evidence of joy and happiness
      7. Just watch them. Love is unmistakable.
   2. The above is true about every kind of human love. It is desire to the highest degree. And when the Lord talks about love in the scriptures, these are the characteristics we see.
2. Isaiah: What People Do When God Proposes Marriage
   1. Hosea 3:1 states, “And the Lord said to me, ‘Go again, love a woman who is loved by another man and is an adulteress, even as the Lord loves the children of Israel; though they turn to other gods and love cakes of raisins.’”
      What do you think? Could you go and bring back a wife who for years had sold herself to other men, and now had become a slave and was being sold as a slave for a cheap price?
   2. And what if you were the woman who had left and given yourself to every imaginable sin, would you in your wildest dreams think that your husband would be there when you were being sold, and would actually buy you back and rescue you? Incredible! Absolutely no way that would happen.
   3. So, do you relate to being the woman who left her husband and became a prostitute? We don’t relate, do we? We say to ourselves, “I would never do that.” Sorry, but you did do that, and I did that. God used the physical adultery of Gomer to illustrate us leaving him and following our own idols. Peter made that clear in 1 Peter 2:10, “Once you were not a people, but now you are God’s people; once you had not received mercy, but now you have received mercy.” That’s from Hosea, and it is referring to us after we went into sin.
   4. Take a quick journey with me through some passages in Isaiah that illustrate the reaction how people would react when God came and brought them back:
      1. Isaiah 11:3-6
      2. Isaiah 51:3, 11, 22
      3. Isaiah 52:7-9
      4. Isaiah 54:1, 4-10
      5. Do you see the excitement? Do you see the joy and the singing. The unimaginable has happened. That which was impossible has come to pass.
3. How Much Do You Love God?
   1. Luke 7:41-42 “There were two debtors. One owed five hundred denarii and the other fifty. When neither could repay, he cancelled the debt of both. Now which of them will love him more?”
   2. Simon was a religious man, a good church-going believer in God. He didn’t live like this sinful woman who had given herself publicly to the sins of the world and had ruined her life. So, you are Simon. I don’t mean, put yourself in Simon’s place, I mean you, today, are Simon (we go to church and wouldn’t live like this woman). Now, how would you answer Jesus’ question? You owed 50 denarii, not very much, and your debt was forgiven. How much do you love God for taking away your debt?
   3. Now, notice the words, “when neither could repay.” Now how much is your debt? Here’s something to understand. Simon didn’t owe 50 denarii. To borrow from the parable in Matthew 18, he owed 10,000 talents. That is the highest number to Jews had in their vocabulary. No, 50 denarii, was Simon’s perception of his sin.
   4. Now, who do you relate to? Simon? Or the sinful woman? Let’s ask the question differently: How bad a sinner were you? Would you like to answer the question in a different way? Were you a fairly good person before you were baptized? Be honest with how you feel about these two questions.
      1. How bad a sinner? “Well, I was certainly a sinner, but not like other people. I admit, every once in awhile I did something that was bad and I’m ashamed of that. But overall, I wasn’t too bad.”
      2. Fairly good person? “I would say I was. I tried to be nice to people and do the right thing.”
   5. So, here’s the deal. I don’t want to offend you, and I certainly do not want to demean you, but I need to be honest with you. You are Simon the Pharisee. There are two people in this house. Two people who are lost, and only one is saved. Simon is rejected. This text is a warning about how you look at your salvation.
   6. Do you remember what Jesus said to the church at Ephesus? “But I have this against you, that you have left the love you had at first.” Jesus didn’t say the Ephesians didn’t love him; he said they left the love they had at first. Just as a husband or wife demands full, sold-out love from their spouse, without any competition, so the Lord demands the same from us.
4. Love’s Expectations: Matthew 10:34-39
   1. Did you notice the “black and white” in Jesus’ words. The gospel message makes sharp divisions between those who believe and those who don’t. There is a rigid dividing line between what it means to follow Jesus and what it means not to follow Jesus. There isn’t a “half-hearted” follower who is on the same side as the true follower. That’s why the gospel message is a sword.
   2. Second, notice where the sword cuts the deepest: in one’s own family! And then Jesus follows with the words, “He who loves father or mother more than me is not worthy of me, and whoever loves son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me.” Jesus said it differently in Luke 14:26, “If anyone comes to me and does not hate his own father and mother and wife and children and brothers and sisters, yes, and even his own life, he cannot be my disciple.” Jesus uses the word “hate” to indicate the major difference between loving your children, your parents, or even your spouse or your own life compared to your love for him.
   3. We have been studying 1 Samuel and the record of Eli and his relationship with his sons is a powerful challenge and rebuke to Christian parents today.
      1. 2:17 Look how the Lord viewed the sin of the sons taking the best of the offering: “the sin was very great in the sight of the Lord.” This was a “worship sin,” not something people today would describe as a great sin. Not so to the Lord!
      2. 2:22-24 Now we are told of what we would describe as an even greater sin, the adultery by these young priests who are married! Tell me, what should have been the penalty? Death! And we say, “Oh but look, Eli rebuked them!” Look at little deeper: “But they would not listen to the voice of their father…” Tell me why they would not listen to their father! Tell me! It was because they knew he wouldn’t do anything about it.
      3. 2:29 God indicts Eli going back specifically to their worship sins. Notice God’s words, “you honor your sons above me.” What if you were Eli. Would you have said, “But I did rebuke them.” How weak.
      4. 2:31-33 Now look at God’s judgment on Eli. It is not just against Eli and his sons, it is against all of Eli’s descendants forever. Does something sound weird to you about that? Does God punish the sons for the father’s guilt? No (Ezekiel 18). So what is going on here? Eli’s spiritual weakness has set in motion sinful compromise for all the generations after him.
      5. 3:13 Now God tells Samuel the same message and this time is even more definitive: “because his sons were blaspheming God, and he did not restrain them.”
   4. Okay, back to the question: how much do you love God? Eli is a perfect example of loving his sons more than God. If it hadn’t been for God’s explicit judgments on Eli, we would have said, “Well, he was a good man, he just had some bad sons.” No, that is not speaking like God was speaking!
5. Lessons
   1. We should have a new appreciation for what it means to love God. It is not an obligatory love. It is not simply and emotional love. It is a love that proves itself by how we act and the way we treat our relationships, especially our relationships with those we love the most. Do you remember God’s words to Abraham? “Take your son, your only son whom you love…” That was Abraham’s test!
   2. When we raise our children, whether they are young or adults, we will compromise and favor them over God? Son, daughter, if you decide to no longer serve the Lord and will not listen to my rebuke, there will be consequences. Our relationship will be different! You will not receive the blessings of being in this family! I told my children many times, I will not be Eli! I will not lose my soul by favoring you and your desires above God. And I certainly will not do so at the expense of your soul!
   3. Loving God results from understanding the serious condition we were in without Christ. We would have spent an eternity in hell. And don’t say, “Well, I wasn’t that bad!” Ha! That was your condition. But not only that, without the mercy of our Lord, we are still in that condition. We still have sins and Jesus intercedes for us. That fact should accelerate our love for him beyond description! If Jesus walked in here today, would we respond in the same way as the sinful woman?

Berry Kercheville

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