Amazing Love: How Can It Be?

When the Lord first spoke through Hosea, the Lord said to Hosea, “Go, take to yourself a wife of whoredom and have children of whoredom, for the land commits great whoredom by forsaking the Lord.”

Hosea 1:2

I recently read a novel by Francine Rivers called Redeeming Love, which is a retelling of the story of Hosea.  It was a timely read given so many of the things going on in my life right now.  One thing in particular has struck me again through this book. 

I am the whore of this story. 

Believe me when I say that I’d rather not apply that title to myself if it weren’t true!  But it is simply in agreement with what God’s Word says.  Consider James 4:4 with me:

You adulterous people!   Do you not know that friendship with the world is enmity with God?  Therefore whoever wishes to be a friend of the world makes himself an enemy of God.

When I choose the world’s offerings over God, I whore myself out to the world for my own gain.  When I befriend the world, I make myself an enemy of God.  I become the harlot that Hosea married in the story. 

God uses this language to get my attention and to get yours as well.  He is so much more worthy of our devotion than the sum total of what the world offers that it is absurd to think that we would ever turn from Him!  And yet we do.  Just like Hosea’s wife of whoredom rejects the goodness of this man, so we too reject the goodness that God offers us.  It’s a condition called total depravity and it requires a divine remedy. 

God has provided that divine remedy by sending His Son, Jesus Christ, to live a life of faithfulness (not like a whore) and then die on a cross taking all of our sin and God’s wrath against our sin upon Himself.  Then as we will celebrate soon, He rose from the dead and ascended to Heaven where He now sits on a glorious throne in complete control over everything that goes on in the entire universe.  Jesus’ life, death and resurrection provide the solution for whores to be reconciled to God, whom we have actively and foolishly rejected in order to suit our own interests. 

When the Son of God was lifted up on the Cross, He was calling all the prostitutes and murderers and cheaters and liars and gluttons and hypocrites back into right relationship with God by putting their faith not in their own abilities but in His finished work.  He was showing the world a love that is preposterous and impossible to comprehend if it weren’t put so fully on display at Calvary. 

Having realized this and confessed my sins to Jesus Christ and received His forgiveness and reconciliation, I find myself in a familiar place.  I still want to run from Him.  Only now, it is for a different reason.  I’m no longer compelled to run to sin because it offers something better.  (although there are still times when this is the case)  Instead, since I have tasted and seen that the Lord is good, I run to sin because I don’t believe that I deserve His love. 

“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 (Achor means trouble) 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.

Hosea 2:14-15

See what God does for us?  He allures us.  He shows us His glory.  He gives us sweet hope that cannot be moved. 

And what do I do?  I reject Him.  I reject His love.  I refuse to believe that it is really possible for a holy God to love a despicable whore like me who is so easily enticed by transient rubbish that is going to turn into a big flaming ball of nothing when Jesus comes back. 

And so I flee His love.  Everything in my heart tells me that it is simply too good to be true. 

But then I remember Jesus.  I remember the Suffering Servant, the God-man who gave His life for me, and I am filled with hope.  I am filled with hope that God’s love for me is really real and that I can trust His goodness for me.  And I run back to Him begging for mercy because of my foolishness and adultery.  And I experience yet again, as if for the first time, the love God has for me in Christ. 

Amazing love!  How can it be!  It can be and it is because Jesus came into the world to save sinners, even terribly wicked sinners like me, whose hearts are far from God and need to be rescued from the brothel that is the world. 

And I will betroth you to me forever.  I will betroth you to me in righteousness and in justice, in steadfast love and in mercy.  I will betroth you to me in faithfulness.  And you shall know the Lord.

Hosea 2:19-20

This is God’s promise to us.  Will you embrace it?  By God’s grace, I plan to.