SPEAKER_00: Before I read the scripture this morning for the sermon text, I'd like to make an announcement, invitation really.
SPEAKER_00: There's a ministry in our church, a powerful ministry that may not be well known.
SPEAKER_00: It's the intercessory prayer ministry.
SPEAKER_00: In the intercessory prayer ministry, every week there are dozens, if not hundreds, of prayers that are prayed by the 61 people that are currently on that team.
SPEAKER_00: I'm inviting you to consider to pray about being on that team.
SPEAKER_00: It's just so encouraging every week when I receive personally and read how we can pray for the hearts of our staff, our elders, our deacons, deaconesses, all the ministry leaders.
SPEAKER_00: Very heartfelt prayers.
SPEAKER_00: And then the many other things that we can pray about in this church and outside of this church.
SPEAKER_00: If that's something that God puts on your heart, if God puts intercessory prayer on your heart, would you please follow up with Bailey, our administrator, and let her know that you'd like to be included?
SPEAKER_00: We would love to have you join us.
SPEAKER_00: Hosea chapter 6 is the sermon text this morning in our series from this Old Testament book.
SPEAKER_00: Hosea was a prophet in the north, Israel.
SPEAKER_00: His ministry spanned decades.
SPEAKER_00: He saw Israel at their height under Jeroboam II, and he saw the decline of Israel.
SPEAKER_00: He witnessed the fall.
SPEAKER_00: He prophesied about the coming judgment of God.
SPEAKER_00: He witnessed it firsthand.
SPEAKER_00: Hear the word of God.
SPEAKER_00: Come, let us return to the Lord, for he has torn us that he may heal us.
SPEAKER_00: He has struck us down, and he will bind us up.
SPEAKER_00: After two days he will revive us.
SPEAKER_00: On the third day he will raise us up, that we may live before him.
SPEAKER_00: Let us know, let us press on to know the Lord.
SPEAKER_00: His going out is sure as the dawn.
SPEAKER_00: He will come to us as the showers, as the spring rains that water the earth.
SPEAKER_00: What shall I do with you, O Ephraim?
SPEAKER_00: What shall I do with you, O Judah?
SPEAKER_00: Your love is like a morning cloud, like the dew that goes early away.
SPEAKER_00: Therefore I have hewn them by the prophets, I have slain them by the words of my mouth, and my judgment goes forth as the light.
SPEAKER_00: For I desire steadfast love, not sacrifice, the knowledge of God rather than burnt offerings.
SPEAKER_00: But like Adam they transgressed the covenant, there they dealt faithlessly with me.
SPEAKER_00: Gilead is a city of evil doers, tracked with blood, as robbers lie in wait for a man, so the priest band together.
SPEAKER_00: They murder on the way to Shechem.
SPEAKER_00: They commit villainy.
SPEAKER_00: In the house of Israel I have seen a horrible thing.
SPEAKER_00: Ephraim's whoredom is there.
SPEAKER_00: Israel is defiled.
SPEAKER_00: For you also, O Judah, a harvest is appointed.
SPEAKER_00: This is the reading of God's holy and perfect word.
SPEAKER_00: Would you please join me in prayer?
SPEAKER_00: Father, we we thank you in your wisdom.
SPEAKER_00: You gave us this book, you gave us this prophet, his marriage, Lord, the state of the country, that we might learn.
SPEAKER_00: Oh Lord, let us not go untaught through this series.
SPEAKER_00: Holy Spirit, would you please make your truth come alive to each of us?
SPEAKER_00: That we would see, we would hear what you have for us this morning.
SPEAKER_00: To take deeply into our hearts, we pray.
SPEAKER_00: In the name of Jesus.
SPEAKER_00: Amen.
SPEAKER_00: Last week we ended the service, the text, looking at what God has to do to get our attention.
SPEAKER_00: And we noted the vivid word pictures in the book of Hosea.
SPEAKER_00: Sometimes when we walk away from God and we stray from God, sometimes He sends a moth to get our attention.
SPEAKER_00: A moth.
SPEAKER_00: Seems like harmless, but they can be distracting.
SPEAKER_00: They can do some damage to our clothes.
SPEAKER_00: They can be flittering around, causing us to, again, lose attention, focus.
SPEAKER_00: And we can drift spiritually.
SPEAKER_00: We can drift from the Lord in ways that we're not even aware of.
SPEAKER_00: But sometimes, as we saw last week, the moth is not enough to get our attention.
SPEAKER_00: And sometimes he has to send the lion, the roaring lion.
SPEAKER_00: Not really as much to punish his people, but to get his people's attention to bring them back.
SPEAKER_00: He sends the lion.
SPEAKER_00: And things in our life just get mangled, torn up.
SPEAKER_00: We get torn up.
SPEAKER_00: Our life can be like upside down.
SPEAKER_00: That's what we saw last week.
SPEAKER_00: But I want to come back to the big picture of the story.
SPEAKER_00: Hosea is a story about the God who pursues his people out of love.
SPEAKER_00: God trying to get their attention.
SPEAKER_00: Yet, as we saw last week, when in the throes of addiction, idolatry, their gods don't go away easily.
SPEAKER_00: Our gods don't go away easily when we're in the throes of addiction or idolatry.
SPEAKER_00: When something else has captured our heart other than Jesus, when we're giving the best of ourselves to something or someone other than Jesus, that's idolatry.
SPEAKER_00: As we've been seeing, it could be work, it can be a workaholic spirit, or it could be in other ways, like a fashion that we think about as addictions of this day and age.
SPEAKER_00: But make no mistake, addicts are not just addicted to substances.
SPEAKER_00: Addicts are addicted to ideas, ideology, performance, perfectionism, is a beast of an idol.
SPEAKER_00: There's all these things that God wants to get his people's attention.
SPEAKER_00: And he does.
SPEAKER_00: He knows how to do it.
SPEAKER_00: Jim Boyce, well-known preacher in Philadelphia decades past, told this story about this chapter, and I thought it was worth reading.
SPEAKER_00: True story: a convict was released from a Kansas prison after serving seven years for fraud.
SPEAKER_00: Upon his release, he immediately acquired somebody else's credit cards and went on a spending spree that took him across the state in first-class hotels, gourmet restaurants, and private planes.
SPEAKER_00: He was caught and brought to trial.
SPEAKER_00: In court, the man confessed what he had done, but he asked the judge to pardon him on the ground that he had now learned his lesson.
SPEAKER_00: It was wrong, he said.
SPEAKER_00: I now know that what I did was wrong, and I will never do anything like that again.
SPEAKER_00: The judge was unimpressed.
SPEAKER_00: He said, Sir, I have learned that courtroom confessions last only until the criminal gets to the door.
SPEAKER_00: Then he sentenced the man to prison again.
SPEAKER_00: Dr.
SPEAKER_00: Boyce says that really captures the spirit of what's going on here in Hosea, and I think it does.
SPEAKER_00: How we long for relief from pain.
SPEAKER_00: That's what he is addressing.
SPEAKER_00: J.I.
SPEAKER_00: Packer, the theologian, rephrased the Westminster Shorter Catechism, question one, which some of you know.
SPEAKER_00: What is man's chief end?
SPEAKER_00: To glorify God and to enjoy him forever.
SPEAKER_00: Dr.
SPEAKER_00: Packer says, if I just looked at the church today, I would conclude that man's chief end is to avoid pain at any cost.
SPEAKER_00: As a pastor myself, I would say that may be true.
SPEAKER_00: How that can become all-consuming in us.
SPEAKER_00: We're going to unpack that this morning.
SPEAKER_00: Times are tough in Israel at that time when the decline, threatened by Assyria, the emerging new superpower from the north.
SPEAKER_00: They're coming down, they're encroaching against the border of Israel.
SPEAKER_00: Israel's scared.
SPEAKER_00: It looks like chaos is about to explode.
SPEAKER_00: And frankly, it did.
SPEAKER_00: They're looking to Egypt or Syria.
SPEAKER_00: They have a hard time picking the big brother that's going to protect them.
SPEAKER_00: Is Egypt going to beat them up or is Syria?
SPEAKER_00: But God says, well, but why aren't you coming to me?
SPEAKER_00: You're going everywhere else, but to me.
SPEAKER_00: They're looking for someone to take care of them.
SPEAKER_00: God says, I will.
SPEAKER_00: And they say, no thanks.
SPEAKER_00: We can do better on our own.
SPEAKER_00: Like all idolaters, which we all understand about personally, like all idolaters, remember what Jeremiah said to the people of Israel, you have as many gods as you have towns.
SPEAKER_00: Well, that's quite an indictment.
SPEAKER_00: You have as many gods, little gods, little G's in your life as you have towns.
SPEAKER_00: Well, the whole purpose of worship is that the Holy Spirit will dredge them up that we would see those little gods that we can be drawn to so easily.
SPEAKER_00: They say, no, thanks, we can do better.
SPEAKER_00: We want something or someone we can see, touch, comfort us.
SPEAKER_00: So their eyes and their hearts wandered for relief.
SPEAKER_00: What they're doing in this chapter is they are demanding relief from their pain.
SPEAKER_00: That's what's going on here.
SPEAKER_00: Just like so many people today do.
SPEAKER_00: Years ago, I came across a poem written by a counselor as he worked with college-age students, but by no means is this limited to college-age students.
SPEAKER_00: He called it postmodern martyr mentality.
SPEAKER_00: I fill myself with pain, conjured pain, to numb myself to my real pain.
SPEAKER_00: It's sort of like hitting my thumb with a hammer to forget my headache.
SPEAKER_00: Unto the end that I become blind to my real pain as I nurture and fiercely protect my conjured pain.
SPEAKER_00: This way I can still feel alive and experience pain, as I know I should, while staying away from my true destitution.
SPEAKER_00: I will defend my conjured pain so that there will be meaning behind my existence.
SPEAKER_00: That's pretty profound.
SPEAKER_00: I remember the first time I read that.
SPEAKER_00: I thought, this is, I need to really think carefully and process this.
SPEAKER_00: I think this fits exactly with what was going on in Hosea's day with the people of Israel.
SPEAKER_00: This is what we see in verses 1 to 3 of the text.
SPEAKER_00: Okay, if you have the text in front of you, just look at it again.
SPEAKER_00: This is what he's talking about.
SPEAKER_00: This is Israel speaking.
SPEAKER_00: This is the people of God speaking.
SPEAKER_00: Come, let us return to the Lord, for he has torn us that he may heal us.
SPEAKER_00: He has struck us down, and he will bind us up.
SPEAKER_00: After two days he will revive us.
SPEAKER_00: On the third day he will raise us up, that we may live before him.
SPEAKER_00: Let us know, let us press on to know the Lord.
SPEAKER_00: His going out is sure as the dawn.
SPEAKER_00: He will come to us as the showers, as the spring rains that water the earth.
SPEAKER_00: What are they doing?
SPEAKER_00: They're bargaining with God.
SPEAKER_00: Let's unpack that.
SPEAKER_00: They're trying to bargain with God.
SPEAKER_00: It reminds me of a play I read about years ago.
SPEAKER_00: Your arms are too short to box with God.
SPEAKER_00: Well, that's true.
SPEAKER_00: For any of us.
SPEAKER_00: But look at the ways that they're bargaining with God.
SPEAKER_00: Another word, they're trying to negotiate with God.
SPEAKER_00: Let's break that down, the first point.
SPEAKER_00: Negotiators are desperate for control.
SPEAKER_00: Under that first point, we're going to break that down further to three subpoints.
SPEAKER_00: The blame, the focus, and the formula.
SPEAKER_00: The blame.
SPEAKER_00: These are blame shifters.
SPEAKER_00: They're acknowledging their sin to a certain extent.
SPEAKER_00: They're saying, we know we've messed up.
SPEAKER_00: Okay, we get that.
SPEAKER_00: We know we've messed up.
SPEAKER_00: But they're still blaming.
SPEAKER_00: He, God, has torn us to pieces.
SPEAKER_00: Really?
SPEAKER_00: He has injured us.
SPEAKER_00: There's no mention of confessing their sin here.
SPEAKER_00: They are acutely aware of their pain and their fear, essentially saying, we know that we've messed up.
SPEAKER_00: What do you want from us?
SPEAKER_00: Good question.
SPEAKER_00: They are, in effect, blaming God for their problems.
SPEAKER_00: It might go something like this, and this might sound familiar to hopefully all of us.
SPEAKER_00: God, do you how do you expect me to do better when I am dealing with fill in the blank?
SPEAKER_00: God, how do you expect me to do better when I'm dealing with family dysfunction, health concerns, poor choices, the way I've been treated?
SPEAKER_00: Oh, if we only knew how many times we shake our fist at God.
SPEAKER_00: Many Christians never find the words, perhaps, but the Spirit we all understand.
SPEAKER_00: In ways that we don't understand, blaming God.
SPEAKER_00: How can you expect me to be faithful?
SPEAKER_00: How can you expect me to be trusting when I'm dealing with you filling the blank?
SPEAKER_00: You know, God, you could have done something about this.
SPEAKER_00: There's two things that Christians often do that I've learned in counseling, two things that Christians often do.
SPEAKER_00: First of all, pretend that things are better than they are.
SPEAKER_00: Some of us are really good at that, aren't we?
SPEAKER_00: Pretending that things are better than they are.
SPEAKER_00: Don't let yourself feel what's really going on in the deeper recesses of your life.
SPEAKER_00: Just don't.
SPEAKER_00: How do you do that?
SPEAKER_00: How do you avoid that?
SPEAKER_00: Well, we know.
SPEAKER_00: Stay busy.
SPEAKER_00: Washingtonians really know that.
SPEAKER_00: Just stay busy with good projects, with good things, with church.
SPEAKER_00: You know, I truly believe it may not be you, but there are some Christians that probably need to quit ministry in the church because they're trying to fill the emptiness inside with a lot of outward behavior.
SPEAKER_00: That may not be you.
SPEAKER_00: It may be you, but the point is, is we can do anything, we can go to all lengths to not have to deal with what's really going on deep inside our heart.
SPEAKER_00: And God said to the Israelites, and he says to us, no, that's not going to be helpful.
SPEAKER_00: We can either pretend that things are better than they are, or the second choice is we can live to relieve our pain.
SPEAKER_00: Find something that seems to work.
SPEAKER_00: Find something that seems to numb what you're feeling deep down that you'd rather not have to address directly.
SPEAKER_00: I heard a preacher say this years ago.
SPEAKER_00: What sometimes what we do when we find ourselves in this situation in life is we either hate God or we hate ourselves without ever hating our sin.
SPEAKER_00: Isn't that odd?
SPEAKER_00: Where what God's calling us to is to actually hate our sin.
SPEAKER_00: God's not calling us to hate him.
SPEAKER_00: He's not calling us to hate ourselves.
SPEAKER_00: God doesn't want you to hate yourself.
SPEAKER_00: He wants you to see what lengths he went to to pour out his hate for your sin on his own son.
SPEAKER_00: Idolaters are blame shifters.
SPEAKER_00: Secondly, look at the focus.
SPEAKER_00: They're more focused on their woundedness than their sinfulness.
SPEAKER_00: There's no mention of sin in these three verses.
SPEAKER_00: Isn't that interesting?
SPEAKER_00: No mention of sin.
SPEAKER_00: There's no mention of repentance.
SPEAKER_00: This is a superficial repentance, if you will, but it's not genuine.
SPEAKER_00: God only knows how many times He's heard this prayer of repentance from you, from me.
SPEAKER_00: Over the course of history?
SPEAKER_00: How many times has God heard this?
SPEAKER_00: Superficial repentance.
SPEAKER_00: God, I'm sorry.
SPEAKER_00: I messed up.
SPEAKER_00: I'll do better.
SPEAKER_00: It's not repentance.
SPEAKER_00: The patience of God for me.
SPEAKER_00: The patience of God for you.
SPEAKER_00: Repentance is the core of all meaningful change.
SPEAKER_00: God speaks in verse 4.
SPEAKER_00: We finally get God's voice in verse 4.
SPEAKER_00: What shall I do with you, O Ephraim?
SPEAKER_00: What shall I do with you, O Judah?
SPEAKER_00: Things are not going to get any different if things don't change at the deepest level of your heart.
SPEAKER_00: God speaks powerfully here.
SPEAKER_00: What we learn from this and what we know from the scriptures or what we know from our own lives is hurt people focus on their hurt.
SPEAKER_00: Hurt people focus on their needs.
SPEAKER_00: Yet perfect love continues even in the midst of abuse.
SPEAKER_00: Who's the most abused, hurt, wounded person that ever walked this earth?
SPEAKER_00: Jesus.
SPEAKER_00: And yet, even in the midst of that pain and rejection, he kept his eyes on his father.
SPEAKER_00: He knew that his father, the only one he could turn to.
SPEAKER_00: This fullest expression came at the cross.
SPEAKER_00: And yet, idolaters like us say, oh, I don't want to trust a God I can't control or see.
SPEAKER_00: We are never more out of control than we are attempting to be in control.
SPEAKER_00: That's what we're learning in wits.
SPEAKER_00: It's fascinating to me how wits in this series in Hosea, there's about 80 of us that are going through this journey, it's like, wow, this is this is this is true.
SPEAKER_00: I'm starting to see this in new ways.
SPEAKER_00: You're never more out of control than when you're trying to be in control.
SPEAKER_00: One of the articles we just read in Wits, it was a prayer actually.
SPEAKER_00: Are people weary of you?
SPEAKER_00: Or are people wary of you?
SPEAKER_00: Because your desire to control.
SPEAKER_00: Your desire to control them, your desire to control your own life.
SPEAKER_00: That's what this prayer expresses.
SPEAKER_00: It just wears people out.
SPEAKER_00: And it's actually an addiction for some of us.
SPEAKER_00: It's an idol.
SPEAKER_00: And you say somebody might say, well, no, but it's not like, you know, it's not like the technicolor sins.
SPEAKER_00: Are you really going to try to argue that point?
SPEAKER_00: Are you going to argue that older brother sins are better than younger brother's sins?
SPEAKER_00: I don't think so.
SPEAKER_00: The amount of energy we put into trying to control people, the amount of energy we put into trying to control our own lives, is idolatry.
SPEAKER_00: It's an addiction.
SPEAKER_00: God, don't expect too much from me, which perhaps explains why sometimes we seem to sabotage our lives and our relationship with God.
SPEAKER_00: Let me explain that.
SPEAKER_00: I think we've all done it.
SPEAKER_00: Ways that we don't realize, we sabotage our relationship with God.
SPEAKER_00: Have you ever had the experience perhaps after a meaningful encounter with God at church, at a retreat, or somewhere, after a particularly meaningful encounter with God, have you noticed sometimes that you're tempted shortly after to look at something on the screen or reach for a substance or seize control in a new way?
SPEAKER_00: Why?
SPEAKER_00: Why would we sinners do something like that?
SPEAKER_00: That's what Hosea is getting at.
SPEAKER_00: I know I'll mess up.
SPEAKER_00: This just proves I can't do this.
SPEAKER_00: It's like letting the air out of your own tire.
SPEAKER_00: Makes no sense.
SPEAKER_00: But we do that.
SPEAKER_00: Let the air out of your own tire to prove, so to speak, to God, you can't count on me.
SPEAKER_00: I'm really nothing more than a product of my shame, a product of my guilt.
SPEAKER_00: You understand what we're saying here?
SPEAKER_00: This is everyday life.
SPEAKER_00: God wants us to see through it.
SPEAKER_00: He wants us to understand it.
SPEAKER_00: He wants us to repent of these idols.
SPEAKER_00: He wants us to return to him.
SPEAKER_00: And he's offering us everything we need to do that.
SPEAKER_00: That's the good news.
SPEAKER_00: I know I'm going to mess up again.
SPEAKER_00: This just proves it.
SPEAKER_00: Thirdly, the formula.
SPEAKER_00: Look at the formula in verse 2.
SPEAKER_00: After two days, we know what he's going to do.
SPEAKER_00: We'll come to him with our penance.
SPEAKER_00: We'll come to him with our superficial confession.
SPEAKER_00: But he'll accept it.
SPEAKER_00: Because he's a forgiving God after all.
SPEAKER_00: We presume on his forgiveness.
SPEAKER_00: After two days, he will revive us after he injured us.
SPEAKER_00: He will revive us.
SPEAKER_00: He will raise us up on the third day that we may live before him.
SPEAKER_00: It's a formula.
SPEAKER_00: They think they have found the formula.
SPEAKER_00: Go wander off from God.
SPEAKER_00: Find your idol of choice.
SPEAKER_00: Find your addiction that seems to work best for you.
SPEAKER_00: And then when you really get in a jam, come back to God and say, God, I know you're there.
SPEAKER_00: Forgiven and forgotten, right?
SPEAKER_00: He says, No, it doesn't work that way.
SPEAKER_00: We say, let's make a deal.
SPEAKER_00: I'll go back to church.
SPEAKER_00: I'll stop watching porn.
SPEAKER_00: I'll start reading my Bible.
SPEAKER_00: I'll stop doing you fill in the blank.
SPEAKER_00: All so that I can get back on your good side, God, so that you'll get off my back.
SPEAKER_00: You know what this is?
SPEAKER_00: This is negotiating.
SPEAKER_00: This is exactly what they were doing.
SPEAKER_00: This is negotiating.
SPEAKER_00: It's not repentance.
SPEAKER_00: And God wants you and me to understand this.
SPEAKER_00: This is where deeper repentance takes place.
SPEAKER_00: This is where lives really change.
SPEAKER_00: This is where change happens.
SPEAKER_00: Believe that.
SPEAKER_00: There's hope for every one of us.
SPEAKER_00: This is where change happens when we allow the Spirit in at that deeper level to show us what's amiss, to show us where we've gotten off course.
SPEAKER_00: Even while we come to church, even while we listen to sermons, even while we are reading our Bibles, God says, no, I've got something better for you I want to give you.
SPEAKER_00: Oh, friends, we're here this morning to stop negotiating.
SPEAKER_00: We never could.
SPEAKER_00: We never did it very well.
SPEAKER_00: We just thought we did.
SPEAKER_00: All this comes up short when we don't take responsibility for our wandering hearts.
SPEAKER_00: God says, repent and turn to Christ.
SPEAKER_00: God says, repent from your sin.
SPEAKER_00: Repent.
SPEAKER_00: Despair of your righteousness and trust boldly in the righteousness of Jesus Christ.
SPEAKER_00: This is what God is saying.
SPEAKER_00: We must take personal responsibility.
SPEAKER_00: Negotiators, as we see this first point, negotiators are desperate for control.
SPEAKER_00: Secondly, negotiators concede relationship.
SPEAKER_00: Look at verse 6.
SPEAKER_00: For I desire steadfast love and not sacrifice, the knowledge of God rather than burn offerings.
SPEAKER_00: What does God want most of all from you?
SPEAKER_00: You ever asked yourself that?
SPEAKER_00: What does God want most from you?
SPEAKER_00: Relationship.
SPEAKER_00: Not rituals.
SPEAKER_00: Not outward behavior.
SPEAKER_00: There's a place for that, but it's not foremost.
SPEAKER_00: He desires mercy.
SPEAKER_00: Tom, what I really want from you is I want a broken and contrite heart so that you understand my mercy, so that you will extend mercy to other people.
SPEAKER_00: You'll be patient, you'll be kind with others.
SPEAKER_00: You won't be short-tempered.
SPEAKER_00: Tom, I want my heart more and more in your heart.
SPEAKER_00: He wants that for every one of us.
SPEAKER_00: I want your heart more than your sacrifices.
SPEAKER_00: What good are all your sacrifices without your heart?
SPEAKER_00: It's easier to give God a ritual than a relationship, isn't it?
SPEAKER_00: We can do sacrifice, we cannot do brokenness.
SPEAKER_00: Only the Holy Spirit can do brokenness.
SPEAKER_00: We can do sacrifice.
SPEAKER_00: We can do our duty outwardly.
SPEAKER_00: And you know you can live your whole Christian life missing this.
SPEAKER_00: Don't you dare.
SPEAKER_00: God says, look, I want you.
SPEAKER_00: I want you to hear my word.
SPEAKER_00: I want you to be broken by your sin so that you see how great our Savior is.
SPEAKER_00: I want you to see how much He had to go to to get you back.
SPEAKER_00: God wants you back.
SPEAKER_00: He wants us back.
SPEAKER_00: Return.
SPEAKER_00: But this is the road that it takes.
SPEAKER_00: This is what it looks like.
SPEAKER_00: I fear that too many churches today have completely lost this message.
SPEAKER_00: This is a message that we can't afford to lose.
SPEAKER_00: This is a message that we all need to hear.
SPEAKER_00: We can do sacrifice, I know that.
SPEAKER_00: But we can't do brokenness.
SPEAKER_00: You know who can?
SPEAKER_00: The Holy Spirit.
SPEAKER_00: The Holy Spirit is in this service right now.
SPEAKER_00: The Holy Spirit is present right now.
SPEAKER_00: You invite the Holy Spirit in to show you what you're turning to for comfort.
SPEAKER_00: You invite the Holy Spirit to show you the idols of your heart.
SPEAKER_00: He finds a sincere request, irresistible.
SPEAKER_00: Invite him.
SPEAKER_00: Search me, O God, and show me what's in my heart.
SPEAKER_00: I want to know.
SPEAKER_00: Let me ask you this.
SPEAKER_00: Why would you not want to know?
SPEAKER_00: Why would you not want to know what's in your heart?
SPEAKER_00: Would you rather just go on living with the illusion of who you think you are?
SPEAKER_00: Or do you want the truth that you can handle in Christ so he can make you new?
SPEAKER_00: He can change me from the inside out.
SPEAKER_00: Which brings us to the last point.
SPEAKER_00: We're going to have to fast forward to chapter 14.
SPEAKER_00: I'm just giving a sneak preview.
SPEAKER_00: This is a picture of real repentance.
SPEAKER_00: Return, O Israel, to the Lord your God, for you have stumbled because of your iniquity.
SPEAKER_00: Take with you words and return to the Lord.
SPEAKER_00: Say to him, Take away all of my iniquity, accept what is good, and we will pay with bowls the vows of our lips.
SPEAKER_00: Assyria will not save us.
SPEAKER_00: We will not ride on horses, and we will say no more, our God, to the work of our hands.
SPEAKER_00: That's an interesting phrase, isn't it?
SPEAKER_00: You know, it's possible to think you're thanking God.
SPEAKER_00: It's possible to think that you're looking to God for your deliverance when all this while you're looking inside, you're saying, no, I'm going to figure this out.
SPEAKER_00: They're coming to a point where they realize, no, no more of that.
SPEAKER_00: Which brings us to the last point.
SPEAKER_00: Okay?
SPEAKER_00: Anybody need some hope right about now?
SPEAKER_00: You need some good news right about now?
SPEAKER_00: When negotiators become repenters, return to the Lord your God.
SPEAKER_00: Take words with you.
SPEAKER_00: Why does he say that?
SPEAKER_00: I mean, generic confessions aren't very helpful.
SPEAKER_00: God, I'm sure I've messed up somehow, some way.
SPEAKER_00: You know it.
SPEAKER_00: I mean, God, you already know it, so why should I confess it?
SPEAKER_00: Have you ever thought that?
SPEAKER_00: Have you ever said that?
SPEAKER_00: Shame on us.
SPEAKER_00: God, you know what I've done.
SPEAKER_00: That's enough, you know.
SPEAKER_00: No, the Bible says, absolutely not.
SPEAKER_00: Take words with you, because until I see the sin for what it is, I'm not going to deal with it.
SPEAKER_00: I'm just going to give myself a pass.
SPEAKER_00: Take words with you.
SPEAKER_00: The Westminster Confession of Faith puts it like this on the chapter of repentance.
SPEAKER_00: Praying for particular sins, particularly.
SPEAKER_00: That's a good phrase.
SPEAKER_00: That helps me.
SPEAKER_00: Holy Spirit, show me my specific sins.
SPEAKER_00: Where my pride or my unbelief or my self-righteousness is exerting itself.
SPEAKER_00: The way it's exerting itself.
SPEAKER_00: Take words with you.
SPEAKER_00: Return to the Lord.
SPEAKER_00: Say to him, take away all of my sin.
SPEAKER_00: Do you know he will?
SPEAKER_00: Do you know that?
SPEAKER_00: Look, Christian, if you've been a Christian in church for years, I'm asking you, Toad, do you know that?
SPEAKER_00: Today.
SPEAKER_00: Take away all my sin, Lord.
SPEAKER_00: Oh, show me how foolish it is to look to Assyria to get me out of this jam.
SPEAKER_00: Who's your Assyria?
SPEAKER_00: What is your Assyria?
SPEAKER_00: What is it that you look to for comfort?
SPEAKER_00: What is it that when you're really feeling bad and you're in pain, even if it's conjured pain, what is it that you reach for?
SPEAKER_00: To give you a little bit of relief.
SPEAKER_00: God says, I can do better than that.
SPEAKER_00: Your sins have been your downfall.
SPEAKER_00: In closing, let me say this: repenters don't focus on their sacrifice.
SPEAKER_00: Repenters focus on his sacrifice.
SPEAKER_00: Negotiators become proud when they think they're doing well.
SPEAKER_00: Negotiators despair when they know they aren't doing well, when they know that they're not keeping up their end of the bargain.
SPEAKER_00: I've seen too many times, too many Christians just swing on a pendulum from despair to pride.
SPEAKER_00: That's what happens when we're not really seeing Jesus.
SPEAKER_00: Despair.
SPEAKER_00: And that's not too strong of a word.
SPEAKER_00: When things are going hard, when I don't feel like I'm keeping up my end of the bargain, or when we do think we're keeping up our end of the bargain, pride, right?
SPEAKER_00: You don't want to be that person.
SPEAKER_00: You don't want to be that person that just goes swinging back and forth from being so proud and then so despairing.
SPEAKER_00: Jesus came to do something about that.
SPEAKER_00: I don't think that the, I don't think that the people of the day, even Hosea, probably understood the full force of the words that they said.
SPEAKER_00: Listen to these prophetic words.
SPEAKER_00: Verse 2.
SPEAKER_00: On the third day he will raise us up that we may live before him.
SPEAKER_00: This is pointing ultimately to Christ.
SPEAKER_00: He was the one that was torn to pieces.
SPEAKER_00: That's what this table commemorates.
SPEAKER_00: He was the one that was torn to pieces.
SPEAKER_00: He was the one that was injured.
SPEAKER_00: He was the one that took the full force of God's wrath so that we could be freed.
SPEAKER_00: So that we could be forgiven.
SPEAKER_00: So that we could be loved.
SPEAKER_00: Truly loved.
SPEAKER_00: This is why we're here this morning.
SPEAKER_00: We're here to ask the Holy Spirit to deal with our hearts.
SPEAKER_00: This is worship.
SPEAKER_00: We're asking the Holy Spirit to change the things that we can't change.
SPEAKER_00: We're asking the Holy Spirit to bring us to a true level, an understanding of repentance.
SPEAKER_00: Show me my idols, Lord.
SPEAKER_00: Strip those idols away from me.
SPEAKER_00: And he will.
SPEAKER_00: He will.
SPEAKER_00: But we have to have hope and faith that this is who he is and this is what he can do.
SPEAKER_00: Jesus was torn to pieces on the Good Friday.
SPEAKER_00: He was struck down, but on the third day he was raised up.
SPEAKER_00: And we may live before him.
SPEAKER_00: There was more truth in their words than they realized at that time.
SPEAKER_00: So what does the Holy Spirit have to say to you?
SPEAKER_00: Now would you take your bulletin and turn to the panel with a confession of sin?
SPEAKER_00: Would you take a moment?
SPEAKER_00: Would you take a moment just to read that printed prayer of confession?
SPEAKER_00: Would you stand and confess this with me?
SPEAKER_00: Dear Father, we acknowledge that your grace offers us full forgiveness, and your hand is mighty to deliver us from the slavery of our sin.
SPEAKER_00: However, like the Israelites you delivered from Egypt, we often desire to stay in the familiarity of our bondage rather than walking with you in true repentance and faith.
SPEAKER_00: May we stop complaining and fighting against you and learn to trust that your ways are best for us.
SPEAKER_00: Please teach us to see the salvation of the Lord and to go forward through the sea in faith, trusting your Holy Spirit as our guide.
SPEAKER_00: We know we can only walk this path because Jesus has gone before us on the road to Calvary, collapsing on his merit.
SPEAKER_00: We pray in his name.
SPEAKER_00: Amen.
SPEAKER_00: Friends, let that thought linger for a moment.
SPEAKER_00: Jesus is offering us forgiveness.
SPEAKER_00: Jesus is offering us freedom from the things that would otherwise harm us.
SPEAKER_00: Jesus is here.
SPEAKER_00: Jesus is inviting us to come to him by faith.
SPEAKER_00: I love that definition of repentance.
SPEAKER_00: Repentance is collapsing on Christ and not promising that you'll do better.
SPEAKER_00: Do you need that?
SPEAKER_00: Do you need that this morning?
SPEAKER_00: To collapse on Christ and despair of your righteousness and stop promising that you're going to do better?
SPEAKER_00: This is the Savior who holds us.
SPEAKER_00: This is the Savior who welcomes us.
SPEAKER_00: This is the Savior who loves us.
SPEAKER_00: In Christ, you are forgiven.
SPEAKER_00: In Christ, you are healed.
SPEAKER_00: Christ, you are freed.
SPEAKER_00: This is true.
SPEAKER_00: Too many times we go to church and we don't understand that.
SPEAKER_00: We don't really believe that.
SPEAKER_00: By God's grace, not today.
SPEAKER_00: Not today.