A Heart in Turmoil

I, like every child, had a simple and naive view of the adult world.

I was around about 10 when I first noticed someone writing out a cheque to pay for something.

And for me as a 10-year-old, a cheque book seemed like a great option.

Scribbling on a piece of paper and you could buy whatever you want.

I remember asking them, where do you get one of those from and whether or not I could have one of those?

They said, you get it from the bank and no, you can't have one until you're an adult.

And I remember thinking, oh, how good it would be to be an adult.

They have it so easy.

Here am I having to, you know, scrape together coins, beg from parents in order to buy something small.

And an adult whips out a cheque book and you can buy anything in the world with it just by scribbling on a piece of paper.

That is brilliant.

Oh, how I long to be an adult.

From my perspective, adults seem to be able to do whatever they want whenever they wanted.

And I couldn't wait to be one to have all that freedom and all that power at my disposal.

Now, as an adult and as a father, I see that naivety and that simplicity in my girls.

It is both cute and frustrating.

My girls right now are into horses.

I hope they get out of it before they actually want one.

But so right now, things like saddle club, DVDs, they've got horse heads on sticks and soft toys and Barbie on horse backs.

And it just goes on and on and on.

They've noticed that horses eat grass and that we have grass in our backyard.

And so they conclude, why can't we have a horse?

And I've said to them, well, that's just impossible.

We cannot have a horse in our backyard.

The best you can do is pony rides occasionally, like when we have a church here on some sort of fun afternoon.

And so when we had one recently, the Chinese congregations had three little ponies came in.

I got the job of assisting one of my children on the horse pony ride.

And I was talking to the person leading the horses who owned the horses.

And I said, you wouldn't believe my kids.

They think they can own one of these things in their backyard.

Well, what's wrong with that?

She said, we had three in our backyard before we had to get a bigger backyard.

I'm like, do not tell my children that they can actually have a horse in their backyard.

Now, it's a little more difficult for me when their simplicity or the naivety takes me for granted.

Like little concern for breaking toys and here you go, daddy, fix this.

Because that's what daddy does.

He fixes things.

Or I remember the time we pulled into a car park in the shopping centre.

And as I'm hopping out of the car, I heard the back door of the car go bang against a concrete pillar with a little bit of gusto.

It was an accident.

But I still recall being fairly upset about that incident.

About the careless attitude towards the car.

And I said things like, you need to look before you hop out and open the door.

You could have dented it.

You could have put a big scratch on someone else's car.

And my ranting received the reply.

Little pat on the leg.

Don't worry, daddy.

We could just buy another one.

And I'm like, with what?

Just get out one of those plastic cards or the checkbook that you've got on your desk.

Oh, like father, like daughter.

It is easy for us to have a naive, childlike idea of God.

That is, God is the all-powerful and he's the all-loving.

And so he should, frankly, just get over when things are not right in the world.

He should just get over it.

He should just love everyone.

Pretty simple, really.

God is love.

He is meant to forgive.

And so he should just do that.

He should just forgive.

Anyway, how can he really be hurt by my sin and my rebellion when he knew it was going to happen anyway?

So he can't really be, you know, that deeply hurt.

He shouldn't, you know, it's expectations.

He knew we were going to fail right from the beginning.

And so is he really hurt when we actually do?

He just goes, oh, I just knew that was going to happen.

It is not too hard to take God for granted and treat him like some sort of an emotionless machine in our simplicity and our naivety as we look upon God as the all-powerful, as all the freedom and resources in the world.

And the danger is that we purge God's love of anything that's uncomfortable and we sanitize it and sentimentalize it to the point where most people nowadays are not surprised if you tell them that God loves them.

Well, of course he loves me.

That's his job, isn't it?

Besides, why wouldn't he love me?

I'm cute and I'm lovable.

Or at least I'm certainly more lovable than that other person over there.

So why wouldn't he love me?

And this is where in the last couple of weeks, Hosea has been so helpful for us.

He helps us to see the problem of our sin from the Father's perspective, from God's perspective.

He sheds light on our understanding of our relationship with him from his perspective so that we don't read things like love and forgiveness from our perspective and push them back up to him and say, this is what God must be like.

He has introduced us or shown us what he is like by introducing us to a family that is a miniature of this world.

In Hosea, God is not the emotionless, all-powerful magician, but a broken-hearted husband and father who tears open his chest to reveal to his people what they have done and how they have hurt him.

Hosea 11, which Ken just read out to us, is one of the boldest in the Old Testament, indeed, possibly in the whole Bible, in exposing us to the mind and heart of God in human terms.

Last October, we had a week's holiday visiting my family in Tasmania.

And the entertainment one afternoon was, when I was with my parents, was an old-fashioned slideshow, family slideshow, which sets out to reveal the embarrassing moments of your family history, courtesy of my parents.

Noticeably, most of the photos were about the three children.

Of particular interest and delight for my girls were the photos of their daddy, all-powerful daddy, fix anything, sitting on a potty.

Naked in the shower.

Wet patches around the pants.

Dressed up as a cowboy.

Asleep in cupboards and weird positions.

Covered in grime and food and crying.

I've never heard them laugh so much at times.

And it amazed me that my parents, my dad's 75, were remarkably sharp about the details of when and where those photos were taken.

We were asking, where's that?

When did that happen?

But they knew the details.

They were even able to express something of the emotions of what was happening when that photo was taken.

All these years later, 40 odd years later.

And that's the picture of Isaiah 11.

It starts as if God pulls out the slideshow of his children.

He remembers all the details.

The first photo is the day of the adoption was finalized in verse 1 there.

When Israel was a child, I loved him and out of Egypt I called my son.

He remembers the joy of picking up his own son, his new son, up into his arms and embracing him and taking him home.

I'll never forget the day when I held Isabel for the first time, my first child.

Because she cried for two hours.

I'll never forget that moment.

And the smile which was on my face.

The nurse came in after an hour and a half and said, are you alright, love?

I said, I'm perfect.

He remembers the day that his son learned to walk.

In verse 3, it was I who taught Ephraim to walk, taking them by the arms.

He remembers the pride as his little man pulled himself up on the couch and grabbed his finger and began to walk.

He remembers the chuffed look on his face when he took those first three steps into his arms.

He remembers the day also when he fell and scraped his knee in his staggering around.

In verse 3, it was I who healed them.

He remembers the pity and the compassion he felt when he saw the pain in his boy's eyes and he applied a bandage and he brought comfort to him.

He remembers the guidance that he gave.

Verse 4, I led them with cords of human kindness.

With ties of love, I lift the yoke from their neck.

He remembers having to instruct and correct and to guide his son.

But it was done with gentleness and with tenderness and with love and with kindness.

He remembers the high chair.

He got the photo of the kid with food all over their face in verse 4 where he bent down to feed his son.

He remembers the delight in providing everything that his son needed, the nourishment and the help.

God is portrayed here in these early verses as a doting father over the life of his beloved son.

And every photo as he flicks through the album just recalls the moment, what he felt, the love, the passion, the compassion, the devotion to his son.

And yet, his heart burns.

His heart is broken.

Verse 2, but the more I called Israel, the further they went from me.

They sacrificed to the bales and they burned incense to images.

Verse 3, but they did not realise it was I who healed them.

Their rebellion and sin and cavalier attitude from the son to the father just breaks his heart.

He flicks through the family album, remembering his son and his love for him.

And yet, his son is grown up and is wayward.

Sin in Hosea is not portrayed as breaking an impersonal moral code or standards or a set of rules.

Sin is intensely personal.

It is adultery.

It is spurning a loving husband.

It is spurning a doting father.

It is spurning the love of God.

And we have seen in the last couple of weeks the catalogue of Israel's sin.

Chapter 8, verse 14 pretty much sums it up.

Israel has forgotten his maker.

The broken hearted father is hurt and he is offended and he is angry.

His love has been spurned.

In fact, in chapter 9, verse 15, he says that he hated them.

That's strong language.

And so he pronounces his judgment in chapter 11, verse 5.

Will they not return to Egypt?

Remember in verse 1, I called them out of Egypt?

Will they not return to Egypt and will not Assyria rule over them because they refuse to repent?

Swords will flash in their cities.

Will destroy the bars of their gates and put an end to their plans.

My people are determined to turn from me.

Even if they call to the Most High, he will by no means exalt them.

The wayward son is guilty.

Descended is pronounced.

It is invasion.

It is exile.

And a burdensome captivity.

His son has spurned his love.

He is angry.

He hates it.

And so he's going to throw all of his stuff out of the house.

He's going to cut off the allowance.

And cut off contact.

But he loves him beyond comprehension.

See the next verse, verse 8.

How can I give you up, Ephraim?

How can I hand you over, Israel?

How can I treat you like Abba?

How can I make you like Zeboiim?

He's saying, you are my beloved firstborn.

How can I treat you like the other nations, the nations that were, the other cities which were around Sodom and Gomorrah,

who got obliterated with Sodom and Gomorrah.

Not even mentioned again in world history.

How can I treat you like that?

I have set my heart upon you.

The turmoil in the Father's heart is right there in verse 8.

My heart is changed within me.

All my compassion is aroused.

My heart recoils.

It turns over.

It churns inside of me.

It's not that God is confused.

It's not that he doesn't know what to do.

Those verses just simply express the emotional intensity of God's love in language.

It just helps us to see something of his heart.

He must judge the sin.

His holiness demands it.

But he cannot abandon his promise to love his son.

And so how can the demands of both God's love and his justice be satisfied?

Decision is reached in verse 9.

I will not carry out my fierce anger, nor will I turn and devastate Ephraim.

It's not that God has all of a sudden changed his mind about his son's sin.

It's not like God all of a sudden agree with Israel.

Yeah, you know, you're right.

I should get over it.

I'm much bigger than this.

I should just build a bridge, get over it.

You know, I shouldn't take it so seriously.

I should just love you instead.

What verse 9 means is he decides not to execute the heat of his anger.

He literally holds it back.

He holds back his pent-up anger rather than unleashing it on his rebellious son.

God's compassion is aroused and he will turn his anger away from his son and not devastate him.

How can he do that?

Because verse 9 says he is God.

That's how he can do it.

And he is not a man.

That's how he does it.

That's good.

Except at God's beckoning in 722 BC, Assyria came and obliterated Israel.

They destroyed Jerusalem and deported those who weren't killed into the four corners of their empire.

The ten tribes of Israel never re-entered world history again.

Did God actually go back on his word?

Did his wayward son, after God said this in Hosea 11, you know, so you move on a little bit further,

a couple of years down the track.

Did God's son just commit one more sin, which was just the straw that broke the camel's back and goes,

right, unleash.

Had enough.

Did God's anger spill over in frustration?

Was love not able to win out in the end?

Did God actually turn his back on his promise in Hosea 2?

To take a people, not his, and make them his people?

Big questions.

Judgment on Israel was not the end.

Centuries later, a baby was born in a stable.

And as a boy, he went to Egypt with his parents to escape from King Herod.

Matthew chapter 2 tells us,

Matthew 2 · chapter mention

The name of the Lord appeared to Joseph in a dream and he said,

Get up, take the child and his mother and escape to Egypt.

Stay there until I tell you, for Herod is going to search for the child to kill him.

And so he got up, took the child and his mother during the night and left for Egypt,

where he stayed until the death of Herod.

And so was fulfilled what the prophet had said through the prophet.

And then here Matthew quotes from Hosea 11 verse 1,

Hosea 11:1

Out of Egypt I called my son.

Matthew makes the connection with Hosea so that we might see that this infant Jesus

as more than just another baby boy, but as the son of the living God.

Jesus' identity is made explicit at his baptism in Matthew 3,

when a voice from heaven says,

This is my son with whom I am well pleased.

I love him.

In Hosea 11, Israel was the son of God who disobeyed from the moment

that they were brought out of Egypt and into the wilderness.

And here we have the Lord Jesus, the eternal son of God,

the true Israelite, the true Israel.

He is what Israel should have been.

And Jesus was brought out of Egypt.

And when he has grown up, he was cast out, let out into the wilderness,

but without sin.

He lived the perfect life.

He lived as Israel should have lived.

And it would be the obedient, innocent, guiltless, and beloved son of the Father

who would willingly, willingly resolve the tension in the heart of God

between God's commitment to us and our rebellion against him.

The anguish and the horror as God unleashes centuries of held back anger

upon his beloved son, the Lord Jesus.

As the Lord Jesus takes our sin upon his shoulders and dies

and suffers God's judgment for us.

God resolves the tension of his anger and love within himself on the cross.

The Father said to his beloved son at his baptism,

this is my beloved son.

I love him.

And the son cries out to the father on the cross,

my God, my God, why have you forsaken me?

The father turns his face away, as we have sung,

from his much-loved son and he exiles him to the grave.

But it was the love of the father

that turned back to him and brought him triumphantly from the grave.

And only in the death and resurrection of the Lord Jesus

is the tension in the heart of God satisfied.

He satisfies it himself.

He doesn't look to us to satisfy it.

Our rebellion against God is dealt with as Jesus calls out from the cross,

it is finally over.

And so the lion that pounced in judgment on God's people in Hosea 5

now roars in Hosea 11

to scare off the captives of God's people

and to gather its cubs to himself.

They will follow the Lord.

He will roar like a lion.

And when he roars, his children will come trembling,

no longer taking him for granted,

no longer abusing him from the West.

And they will come trembling like birds from Egypt,

like doves from Assyria.

I will settle them in their homes, declares the Lord.

From every corner of the earth,

no matter how deep the depths of sin and depravity,

the father is calling people from every aspect

into relationship with himself through the Lord Jesus.

And he gives us the status of sonship.

What news!

The Apostle Paul ends Romans 8

proclaiming his absolute confidence

in God's future salvation of his people through Jesus.

He stresses that nothing can stop God from fulfilling his promises

to eternally save everyone who trusts in the Lord Jesus.

He ends Romans 8 with a bold statement of confidence in God's love

that nothing can hinder God's love.

He says,

I am convinced that neither death nor life,

neither angels nor demons,

neither present nor the future,

nor any powers,

neither height nor depth,

nor anything else in all of creation

will be able to separate us

from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus,

our Lord.

Lord.

What a statement!

Just imagine

that you are sitting in the church in Rome

as that letter is being read out from Paul.

You're one of the Jewish Christians sitting in the church

and there are tears

and there are cheers

as the end of chapter 8 is read out.

Great joy.

It seems like it's a great time to break

for the passing of the peace

before the rest of Romans is read out,

the rest of Paul's letter is read out to us.

But instead of greeting your brothers and sisters in Christ,

you just sit there.

You're mulling over the words

of the first eight chapters of Romans

and all that's accomplished in Christ.

You're not feeling as triumphant

and secure as the rest.

You remember that God had singled out

your ancestors Israel

as his special people in the Old Testament.

And God said that he would love them

and promised that he would not destroy them

in Hosea 11

and many places throughout the Old Testament.

But he did.

Ephraim kept on sinning

and Assyria came in 722 BC.

Babylon came and destroyed

the two tribes of the south in Judah

in 586 BC

and only a handful returned from exile.

And you hear this great promise

that nothing can separate me

from God's love

in chapter 8

and you start to doubt

the reliability

of God's word.

Can it be true

what Paul said

at the beginning of chapter 8?

Therefore there is now no condemnation

for those who are in Christ Jesus.

Can those words be trusted

especially when

at the end of chapter 7 of Romans

He talks about the ongoing struggle

of sin

in the life of the Christian

which is real

and it is daily.

God condemned His people

for their sin in their past

and Paul says in chapter 7

that that's going to be my experience.

Is God going to get tired of me?

Is God going to get tired of me?

You want to believe

what Paul has written

about confidence

and assurance in Christ

but unsure if God

can be trusted

to keep His promises.

And then your thoughts

are interrupted

by the reader of the letter

starting at the beginning

of chapter 9.

I speak the truth

in Christ

I am not lying

my conscience confirms it

in the Holy Spirit

I have great sorrow

and unceasing anguish

in my heart

for I could wish

that I myself were cursed

and cut off from Christ

for the sake

of my brothers

those of my own race

the people of Israel

theirs is the adoption

of sons

theirs is the divine glory

the covenants

the receiving of the law

the temple worship

and the promises

theirs are the patriarchs

and from there is traced

the human ancestry of Christ

who is God over all

forever praised

Amen.

It's like Paul's been

reading your mind

what about them?

And then he says

it is not as though

God's word has failed

it is like Paul

knows what you're thinking

did God forget

His promise to Israel?

No

Did He take His word

back from His people?

No

It is not as though

God's word has failed

In chapter 9

verses 6 to 13

Paul backs up

this statement

that the word of God

has not failed

He says that

not all of the nation

of Israel

were God's chosen people

His true people

that is

what He says is

that being a true

Israelite

was not passed on

from ancestry

to ancestry

through

through being born

into the family

it is

through the promise

the covenant promises

that God made

to Abraham

right at the very beginning

being part of God's family

is based on being

chosen by God

not by my effort

or being born

into a nation

His argument

goes on

into verses

14 to 18

where Paul says

that it has always

been God's character

to have mercy

on whom He wants

to have mercy

and that God

is not answerable

to us

about the choices

that He makes

He is God

and I am not

forgotten

and it's then

at the end

of Romans 9

as the clincher

to Paul's argument

that God

has not forgotten

His word

that He quotes

from Hosea

in chapter 9

verse 25

He says

I will call them

my people

who are not

my people

and I will call them

my loved one

who is not

my loved one

Paul makes

the point

that God's love

for Israel

and the world

in Jesus

is not

some new plan

it was the plan

right back

in Hosea

before the judgment

came

God's plan

right back

then

was to love

all those

to whom He would

have mercy

both Jew

and Gentile

He is trustworthy

He has never

turned His back

on His promises

because

as Hosea 11

Hosea 11:9

verse 9

says

I am

God

and to make

it clear

He says

I'm not

man

I'm not

like you

I am God

our assurance

of God's love

for us

in the Lord

Jesus

is based

on His

character

which is

supremely

seen

in the Lord

Jesus

on the cross

God

is not

like

me

God's

anger

is not

one

of His

intrinsic

character

traits

it is a

function

of His

holiness

against

the sin

of humanity

that is

God

is not

part of His

character

is not

that He's

angry

it's not

deep in His

heart

to be angry

it's a

function of His

holiness

which is

part of His

character

against human

sin

that is

He reacts

to human

sin

in anger

that's His

response

but love

is part

of His

character

that is

who God

is

God

is

love

that means

that where

there is

no sin

there is

no anger

and God

has dealt

with sin

in Jesus

and where

there is

no sin

there is

no anger

but there

will always

be love

because that

is who

God

is

God's

love

is part

of His

perfect

character

and is

not

generated

by the

loveliness

of those

who receive

it

get that

point

really

clear

God

is

love

and His

love

towards us

is not

generated

because we

are lovely

it is

generated

it is

self

generating

because He

is

love

He has

actually

not

changed

His

mind

about

His

promise

because

God's

love

does not

react

to my

sin

you see

if it was

up to me

this is

where I'm

different

than God

revenge

or justice

or the

breaking

of ties

would be

my

response

to such

treatment

and that

is where

God and

I are

different

if I

was God

I would

have long

changed

my mind

I would

have redrawn

my love

and I

certainly

wouldn't have

paid the

price of

redemption

for a

faithless

people

but I'm

a man

I'm

not

God

a man

that is

called by

my God

of love

to love

as He

loves

and so

I stand

here as

a man

and I

stand here

as a

father

and let

me tell

you I

really love

my

children

one of

the

you message

with my

kids and

you'll

experience

my

wrath

ungodly

wrath

probably

one of

the really

big things

that I

want for

my kids

is for

them to

feel secure

in their

relationship

with me

particularly

if they're

secure

they'll be

healthy

and they'll

be balanced

I want

them to

know the

security

of my

love for

them

but they

do not

always feel

it

I

still

remember

the

first

time

I

was

really

angry

with

one

of

my

children

and I

could see

the fear

in their

eyes

I could

see that

they were

feeling

insecure

in that

moment

they

weren't

confident

what

would

happen

at any

moment

because of

my

anger

I'm

not

God

they

question

my

love

God's

love is

not like

mine

because God

is love

and so I

must point

my girls

to him

who ensures

that they

will be more

than conquerors

through Christ

who loves

them

and as

for me

as a man

and a

father

my heart

will always

be in

tension

the tension

between my

constant awareness

of my

failure

and my

sin

and my

flaws

and God's

declaration

that I

am free

free from

sin

guiltless

because of

what Christ

has done

for me

and so I

must take

myself daily

to my

heavenly

father

and be

reminded

that he

loves me

with an

unchanging

love

his

assessment

of Steve

Jeffery

is not

based

on a

naive

assessment

of my

love

of my

character

he knows

how dark

my heart

is

but he's

called me

to be

his son

and he

ensures

that in

the Lord

Jesus

I will

be more

than a

conqueror

let's

pray

gracious

father

we thank

you for

your love

for us

God you

are worthy

to receive

all glory

and honor

not only

have you

created all

things you

sustain all

things but

we thank

you for

the Lord

Jesus that

through his

death and

his resurrection

he has

turned your

anger away

from us

so that we

might know

your love

in all its

fullness in

him

we thank you

that he has

paid the

complete debt

of our

sin

we thank

you that

he has

eternally

delivered us

from your

judgment

and so

father right

now we

remember what

you've done

for us

we thank

you that

what we're

going to

do right

now in

the Lord's

supper

that we

have this

bread we

have this

wine and

we pray

that as we

take them

that we

might remember

the cost

of your

love for

us in

the Lord

Jesus

and we

pray father

that you

would deeply

deeply

nourish and

feed us

by your

word

we pray

that the

bread and

this wine

might be a

symbol lord

of all that

you've done

for us

and may we

be deeply

assured of

your goodness

to us in

the Lord

Jesus and

we ask it

for your

sake

amen

friends

we're going

to distribute

these elements

to you in

your seats

and we

will eat

and we

will drink

together