Let's open our Bibles to the
book of Hosea. Hosea. Toward the end of your Old Testament,
right after the book of Daniel, you'll find the book of Hosea. We've been looking at this portion
of God's Word on Wednesday nights, and I want us to consider what
the Lord commands of us in the first verse of chapter six, the
first verse of chapter six. And I would preface this message
by saying whatever God commands, God provides. But The warrant
that we have for obeying his command is the command. It is the command. So when the
command of God is believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, that's
our warrant for coming. And yet we know that in order
for us to believe, he has to give us faith. God uses the means of his command
in order to provide what's needed to obey that command. He uses
his word. So when we read here in Hosea
chapter six, come and let us return unto the Lord. Let us return. That's the command
of God. Let us come. The Lord tells us to believe. We have to have faith
to come. We have to have a willingness
to come. And he tells us that it is he
that makes us willing in the day of his power. Before we even consider our text,
go back with me, if you will, to Jeremiah chapter 31. Jeremiah chapter 31. And look with me at verse 18 of Jeremiah 31. I have surely heard Ephraim bemoaning
himself. Now, Ephraim is an Old Testament
tribe, but it is a tribe that identifies God's elect. So the
application of this to us is that the Lord's speaking to his
church. He's speaking to his people. Not all the tribes of
Israel, not all of Israel was Israel. Most of the tribes were
scattered and never found again, but Ephraim and Judah, those
were God's elect people. So the Lord say, and I've heard
the bemoaning of Ephraim. He heard the cry of his children
in Egypt. Why were they crying? Because
they were under the harsh taskmasters of the law. The slave drivers were beating
them and requiring of them that which they could not provide.
Why is it that Ephraim bemoans herself today? Scripture says that when the
Holy Spirit comes and convicts us of our sin, that we loathe
ourselves. We come to that place to where
Job was when he said, behold, I, am vile. And when I look to the
taskmasters of the law to try to fix my problem, they only
beat me with requirements that I cannot accomplish. The law can't save me. All the
law can do is judge me guilty. And yet all men, by nature, go
to the law in order to try to remedy their sin problem. If I can just somehow do better,
if I can follow this rule and regulation and they return to
Egypt, they go back to Mount Horeb like Elijah, and they have
to hear the voice of God. who says to them, Elijah, why
are you here? This law cannot save you. All
this law can do is beat you. All this law can do is condemn
you. The Lord puts his people in that
place to where they can find no relief, no relief from the
law. I have surely heard Ephraim bemoaning
himself. Thou hast chastened me, and I
was chastened. As a bullock accustomed to the
yoke, turn thou me, and I shall be turned." So in our text in
Hosea, when the prophet says to the children of Israel, return
unto the Lord, What God commands, God provides. The means by which
he makes that provision is the command. Surely after that I was turned,
after that I was returned, after I was turned, I repented And
after that, I was instructed. I smote upon my thigh. I was
ashamed, yea, even confounded, because I did bear the reproach
of my youth. Is Ephraim my dear son? Is he
a pleasant child? For since I spake against him,
I do earnestly remember him still. Therefore, my bowels are troubled
for him. I will surely have mercy upon
him, saith the Lord. And I, if I be lifted up, will
draw all men to myself. And they that come unto me, I
will in no wise cast out. Go back with me to Hosea, if
you will. Everything, everything in this
fallen, sinful world in which you and I live is contrary to
true life and true happiness. Yet, how often we are tempted
to look for our life and our happiness in worldly and fleshly
things. Most will be able to find contentment
in what they have and in what they do. And the natural man, if he's
not able to find contentment in what he has and in what he
does, finds the hope of contentment in having more and doing more.
In other words, the potential for contentment is always there
in the world. It's always there. If I just had a little more,
if I could just do a little more, I was thinking about Mr. Rogers, that man who spent his
life teaching and entertaining children on our televisions. And he was a graduate from a
Presbyterian seminary, a Calvinist. And on his dying bed, his dying
words, as I understand them, were to his wife, pleading with
her, honey, do you think I've done enough? Do you think I've
done enough? And she spoke false hope and
comfort and peace to his heart by assuring him that he had done
enough. What a blessing it is. What a
miracle it is. When God does a work of grace
in a man's heart and causes him to believe that no amount of
things in this world and no amount of things that I do can give
me satisfaction. I cannot find contentment. I've tried. Solomon put it like
this, you read The Song of Solomon and Ecclesiastes, Solomon says,
I've tried whemany out of a thousand wives. I've tried wine. I've tried wisdom, the understanding
and knowledge that this world has to offer. And I've come to
this conclusion. Vanity of vanities, all is vanity. I cannot, I cannot find my contentment
in what I have, nor in what I do. I've got to have something outside
of that. And then what a blessing it is
when the Lord, as he does in John chapter seven on that great
day of the feast, And he cries out, if any man thirst, let him
come unto me. For as the scripture saith, out
of his belly shall flow rivers of living water. What a miracle of grace it is
when a person is brought to that place to where they've got to
have Christ. I must have Christ. When they're
able to say with Peter, Lord, to whom shall we go? Thou alone has the words of eternal
life. We know and are sure that thou
art the Christ, the son of the living God. Will you shut us
up to yourself? We've got no place else to go. So oftentimes we set our affections
on the things of this world. The gospel is not something to
be preached and processed on an
intellectual basis. It's not something that we persuade men on with reason. It is a message that speaks to
the conscience. It is a message that speaks to
the heart. It is a message that speaks to
the affections. It is a message that goes beyond
all logic and all rational, all reason. And it is a work of grace
convicting a man's heart that I've got to have I've got to
have something beyond what I can do and beyond what I have. I've been drinking the polluted
waters of broken cisterns in this world and they have nauseated
me. They've nauseated me. My attempts
to save myself has nauseated me. I cannot glory in what I've
done. I cannot find any comfort or
peace in what I've accomplished or in what I have presented to
God. I've got to have a savior. So what does the Lord say? Look at our text. Come and let
us return unto the Lord. Now we just saw from Jeremiah
chapter 31 that if we're able to return it's because God turned
us. In Revelation chapter 1, John says that he was in the spirit
on the Lord's day. The Apostle John was an old man.
He was exiled to the Isle of Patmos because of the gospel.
And the Lord gives him a vision. And he records that vision in
the last book of the Bible, the book of Revelation. And he says,
on the Lord's day, we are here on the Lord's day. I was in the
spirit. And that's not some sort of weird
you know, feeling or experience, it is the Spirit of God that
opens the eyes of our understanding, that opens up the Word of God,
that applies these truths to our hearts and causes us to believe
them and to come and to rest in Christ. Only the Spirit of God can do
that. And John said, look, let's turn to that passage. I want
you to read this, Revelation chapter one. Verse 12, the Lord is speaking
to John. The Lord is telling John to write
down the things that he's gonna say. And I turned to see the voice
that spake with me and being turned. I turned to see the voice that
spake to me. And that word being means I was
made to turn. But I didn't know that I was
made to turn until I turned. You don't know that you were
made to come until you come. You don't know that you were
made to believe until you believe. But when you believe, you know
that it was He that made you do it. Turn me, Lord, and I shall
be turned. You don't know that your mind
was changed about yourself and about who God is and about salvation
until you've been given repentance. And yet men will glory in what
they think they know. Here's the evidence that the
Lord has done a work of grace is that, Lord, had you not turned
me, I wouldn't have been turned. Had you not given me faith, I
wouldn't have believed. Come and let us return. And whether a man is turning
for the very first time And to come to Christ, I was telling
a friend this week, he had some religious thoughts about God,
and I said to him, I said, you know, coming to Christ is not
making a 10 or 15 or 20 degree adjustment on the compass. Coming to Christ is 180 degrees
from the direction you're going. Everything that you believe,
is wrong about yourself, about God, about salvation. When God
turns you, he doesn't just tweak the compass or change your, no,
he turns you all the way around. There is a way that seems right
unto a man, but in the end, that way leads to death. And the way
of death is in one direction, and the way of life is in the
opposite direction. What a blessing it is when God
turns us and brings us to that plate. Lord, everything I thought
about myself was wrong. Everything I thought about you
was wrong. Come, let us return. And whether man's being turned
for the first time or whether A man is being turned
again for the 10,000th time. Rarely, let me, what do you mean
by that, preacher? Well, rarely, we sang that hymn,
Tom, Revive Us Again. Rarely, and I say this soberly,
rarely does a man, does the Lord, convert
a man like he did the thief on the cross in the last moments
of their life. Rarely does that happen. And
to presume in thinking that, well, I'll get things right with
God on my deathbed. No, that just doesn't happen. That he does, God saved him. The one person we know is gonna
be in heaven is that thief on the cross. This day thou shalt
be with me in paradise. There'd never been a clearer
declaration of a man's salvation than what the Lord gave that.
He didn't have anything to do with his salvation. The Lord
turned his heart right there. He turned it. And the scripture says that the two
thieves were hurling curses against the Lord but one of their hearts
was changed. Who did that? The Lord did. Lord have mercy upon me when
thou enter into thy kingdom. This day thou shall be with me
in paradise. Most of the time, when the Lord
saves a sinner, he leaves them in this world. for a while. And because of the temptations
that are in this world, and there are many, coupled with the weakness
of our flesh, we are often, often tempted to find our hope. and our happiness outside of
Christ. Sometimes the Lord may allow
one of his children to remain in that place of eating rotten
flesh and fighting with the wild beast of the wilderness for an
extended period of time. But usually, It happens for the child of God
multiple times a day. They lose sight of Christ. They move
their eyes, their affections from the things of heaven to
the things of this earth. And so what does the Lord say
to every one of his children? What does he say? You know, whether
or not the Lord allows one of his children to spend an extended
period of time in the wilderness, or whether it's an experience
that he gives us multiple times a day, he's the one who's faithful. All he would have to do for any
of us to leave us to ourselves And we'd be headlong over the
cliff into destruction. Sometimes people leave the church. And the thing that comforts my
heart is to know that if they belong to the Lord, they'll be
back. If they do, he will not allow them to remain. What a testimony. When we believe
not, he remaineth faithful, for he cannot deny himself." He's
going to keep his children. He's going to restore them to
himself. Whether it be multiple times
a day, or whether it be over an extended... David spent 10
months having lost sight of God after his sin with Bathsheba
and Uriah. And then the Lord sends a prophet
with a word from God, David, thou art the man. And David said,
oh, I've sinned. And what did Daniel, what did
Nathan say? And the Lord has forgiven you.
The Lord has forgiven you. Peter denied the Lord on that
night before his crucifixion with cursing and spent the next
several days bemoaning himself, having lost sight of Christ. And when the Lord rose from the
dead, he said, you tell the disciples and Peter that I've risen. And the Lord made a personal
appearance to Peter and restored him. He always restores his children. What I'm trying to say to you,
brethren, is that let us return unto the Lord is the believer's
life. It's the believer's walk of faith. Turning and returning. And what a testimony of His grace
and of His love that He would pursue us and persist with us. You know, we often talk about
the perseverance of the saints, but the perseverance of the saints
is the persistence of the Spirit. It's the work of grace that keeps
the saints of God persevering, believing unto the end. And so this command that we have
in our text is a word from God to every one of his children.
Come, come, let us return unto the Lord for he hath torn and
he will heal us. It is he, this is the double-edged
sword of the gospel. It is he that convicted us. of
doing what the world does, and being attracted to the lust of
the flesh, and the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life,
and all the things that are of the world. Love not the world,
nor the things that are in the world. And every time we try
to love the world and the things that are in the world, the Spirit
of God says, let us return. We've tasted the bitterness of
that. We know the vanity of it. We know that it can't make us
content. And we know that no amount of
it or no amount of our works, there's no potentiality for contentment
in that. We've been convinced of God,
that life is in Christ. He's the word of life. He's the
light of life. He's our pleasure. He's our hope. What a merciful God He is to
tear us, to take the sword of the Spirit, which is the Word
of God, and to cut us, and then to take the same sword and heal
us, and heal us. It's the Word of God that convicts.
The Word of God in the hand of God by the Spirit of God convicts
His children. The walk of faith is a walk of
faith and repentance. It's a walk of turning and being
turned. And always, always looking. Look, it is he that has torn
us and he will heal us. He has smitten and he will bind
us up. What a blessing it is to be smitten. to be convicted, to come to that conclusion about
ourselves. In me, oh Lord, in me, that is
in my flesh, dwelleth no good thing. I need a savior. Look at verse two. After two
days will he revive us, and in the third day he will raise us
up, and we shall live in his sight." The gospel is the power of God
unto salvation to everyone that believe it. The gospel. And in verse two is the gospel. Verse two is a prophetic reference. It is a type, it is a picture. It is a word from God pointing
to something that can only be, we understand the Old Testament
in light of the new. What happened on the third day? What is the gospel? The Lord
tells us in 1 Corinthians chapter 15, It is the death, burial, and
resurrection of the Lord Jesus Christ. And in two days, he shall revive
us. Any part of a day in the Bible,
the Old Testament in particular, is considered among the Jews.
A part of a day is a day. So the Lord was crucified on
Friday. He was put into the tomb on Friday. He remained there
all day Saturday and was raised on Sunday morning. Three days,
two days, he shall revive us. And on the third day, had the
Lord Jesus not risen from the dead, all that he did in his life and
in his death would have no meaning, would have no power. Yes, he
was offered up for our offenses, and he died in order to pay the
debt for our sin. But he was raised again because
of our justification. The resurrection of the Lord
Jesus Christ is this, it proves. We're not just believing in a
historical event of the Lord Jesus raising from the dead,
we're believing in what that resurrection says, and here's
what it says. On the third day, we shall live
in his sight. When he was raised from the dead,
all that he died for were raised with him. Paul said that I might
know the fellowship of his suffering, that when he suffered, I suffered,
when he died, I died, and the power of his resurrection. When
he rose from the dead, the power of God raised him from the dead,
declaring to us that he was successful in what he came to do. He was
successful in saving his people and that his life is my life,
that I was raised with him from the dead. I was ascended in him
into glory. He is my life. Oh, Lord. how prone I am to wonder. I'm living in this wilderness. I find myself losing sight of
Christ, and yet I hear you say to me that my mercies are renewed
day by day. I hear the Apostle Paul say what
my experience is, I must die daily. I must die to myself if
I'm going to be made alive to Christ. I hear you say, Lord, come, let
us return unto the Lord. It is he that tore us. It is he that will heal us. It
is he that died for us. It is he that rose from the dead.
It is in him that we have our life. All the empty promises
and all the polluted waters of this world cannot satisfy my
soul. They may satisfy another. But I keep going back to that. And I keep, I've got to have the fountain
of life. Lord, I've got to have Christ. Those things. Look at verse three. Then shall
we know. Then shall we know. It's the Lord that turned me.
Here's my hope. Here's my assurance. Here's my
comfort. Here's my hope and my glory.
Then shall we know. And notice that the next word
is in italics. And I really don't have a problem
with it being there because the next phrase, we will do, we will
do. But it's not conditioned on whether
or not we do it. Then shall we know and we will
follow. And we would be brought again
and again and again In this world, there's so many
trials and tribulations and troubles and temptations in this world,
but the greatest affliction of all that the child of God suffers
is the loose side of Christ, the loose side of Him. Is that
not why we come here? Is that not why we must hear
the gospel? Is that not why we find ourselves
Continuing in prayer and going back to the word of God and how
oftentimes the spirit of God Convicts us and speaks to us
and comforts us and rebukes us and oh all these things are Returned
Then shall we know we follow on to know the Lord and we will
follow on and His going forth is prepared as the morning and
he shall come unto us as the rain and as the latter and former
rain unto the earth. He's so faithful. He knows where every one of his
wandering sheep are. He's a loving, faithful shepherd. Adam, I'm so thankful for that
passage you read from Jeremiah. I know the thoughts that I think
toward you thoughts of good, not of evil, to bring you to
your expected end. All the world has to offer is
evil. Everything in this fallen world, everything that man tries
to find hope and comfort in is a false hope. It's just bitterness and death. But the Lord will let his children
He will let His children taste it. He will let them divert their
eyes away from Him. And then He will say, come, let
us return unto the Lord. Five of the seven churches that
John speaks to in Asia Minor receive a rebuke from the Lord,
and the rebuke is come. Ephesus, you've lost your first
love. Thyatira, you have those who are teaching
a false gospel in your church. Laodicea, you've become lukewarm. Come, return, repent. Those who have the Spirit of
God love to hear the voice of their master calling them back
home. Oh, they know like the prodigal. that the servants of their heavenly
father are well fed and well provided
for in the master's home. And they're tired of eating the
husk that the swine do eat. They're tired of the pig pen. And the spirit of God says, come. Let us return again unto the
Lord. It is he that has torn us and
it's he that will heal us and he'll heal us by the gospel. For after two days, he will revive
us and on the third day, he will make us to live, to live. Our heavenly father, thank you.
for your faithful love. Lord, our love is so inconsistent
and so fickle and so unreliable. Lord, thank you for loving us
to the end. Give us ears to hear and cause
us to return again unto thee. We ask it in Christ's name. Amen. Tom, number nine in the Spiral
Hymnal. Let's stand together.