Okay, open your Bibles if you
would to Hosea chapter two. I named the message Unsought
Mercy. Unsought Mercy because Gomer
doesn't seek mercy. She's off in doing her thing
with her lovers. She's not even thinking of mercy.
She's just, she's caught up in the pleasure of sin. That's where
we were before the Lord saved us. We didn't think of mercy. We didn't think we needed mercy.
We thought, well, you know, I'm not that bad of a person. Surely
God will just be, you know, he lets good people into heaven,
doesn't he? And the pleasure of sin had caught
me up, and I was consumed by it. And so, as Job said, I drank
sin like water. I know you were all in the same
boat. We were in the same boat, so I'll just say we. We drank
sin like water. Sin was very pleasurable for
a season, wasn't it? And now, now the love of Christ
constrains us from sin, right? We know we're still sinners,
but we don't want to do anything. We don't want to do the things
we used to do. And it's the love of Christ that compels us, right,
to desire to live for Christ. When we think of how much he's
loved us with an everlasting love, when we think, this is
something I want to segue into tonight. Think of this. Think
of how much we were just doing our thing, but the whole time,
do you know God was hedging us up even then in protecting us?
that we didn't destroy ourselves? Think of that with Gomer. We're
gonna see. God's gonna hedge her up. She
got nowhere to go. He's gonna hedge her up. Oh my,
chapter three, we're gonna see redemption so plainly and clearly. And she didn't even know that
the gifts she was receiving were all coming from Hosea. We didn't even know the things
that, think of this, in our everyday life, we thought, okay, I gotta
work, I gotta do this, working's great, I gotta do all this, and
I get, look what I got, look what I did. Right? But the Lord was taking care
of us, providing what we needed. Not always what we wanted, even
then, right? But what we needed. We always
had it, even before we were saved. See, we attributed it to us,
right? Look at what I've done. But now I can look back on it
and go, look what the Lord did. He kept me safe. He kept me from
destroying myself. He kept me out of that situation.
I was in that situation. He took me out of it. Oh my. And we marvel, don't we,
at the faithfulness of God, the graciousness of God, the mercy
of God. And that's all because we're
in Christ, beloved. We don't know we're in Christ. We don't know that. We don't
just get put in Christ when we believe. We were in Christ from
the foundation of the world. And the reason he went to the
cross was to save us from our sins. It's wonderful, beloved. It's absolutely wonderful. I'm
gonna preach a sermon tomorrow. One of the many sermons. You
know what it's called? Absolute security. Man, my heart was singing
when I was putting it together. Because we have absolute security
in Christ, not based upon anything we do, but all based upon what
Christ has done. Now, some people say, well, you
talk like that. Again, you hear the standard
thing. You talk like that, your people
are going to go off. You're an antinomian. No, we're
not antinomians. The love of Christ constrains
us. It's like a broken record for some. We have to just keep
saying it, don't we? But it's true. You know, we have to say
it to ourselves, too, don't we? Oh, my. And the whole time, it's
God keeping us. using that fact of the everlasting
love of Christ to constrain us, beloved. It's amazing! Think of how we would be if God
didn't restrain us from how we could be. We're already sinners
saved by grace, right? We already sin more than we want
to, but we're conscious of that now, but before we weren't, were
we? Okay, with that, Let's look at
this portion here. We who are the people of God,
we've received, understand undeserved mercy and unsought after mercy
in Christ Jesus. He saved us from all our sins.
And we'll see a picture of God's mercy to us and how long suffering
is in the picture here with Gomer,
how Hosea is long suffering with Gomer. And think of how long-suffering
God was with Israel. Israel's a picture of the church,
right? Think of how long-suffering is with us, beloved. Do you know that portion of scriptures
that some folks use to say, see, God wants everyone to be saved?
We're gonna look at that. That God's long-suffering and
He doesn't desire, we'll look at it anyways, it's in Peter.
He says he wants all to be saved. That's written to Christians.
That's not written to the world. And I'll tell you what, all that
Christ died for shall be saved. There won't be one of them missing.
And we rejoice that we're included in that number, don't we? Because
it's undeserved mercy. And it's unsought after grace
and mercy, isn't it? We didn't seek it. He sought
us. He sought us. He made us willing. In chapter,
this chapter here, there's three therefores found in verses six,
nine, and 14. And each one introduces something
that God does when we refuse to come back to him. Now, he makes us willing, doesn't
he? He hedges us up. Do you know
He's hedged us up our whole life? And we didn't know it. It's amazing. We fell in Adam with no hope
of recovery by anything we do. And if we're saved, we are saved
by the mercy of God in Christ. Because salvation's all of the
Lord, right? It's not of our doing. It's all
of Him. Let's read Hosea chapter two, we're starting verses two
to six, the first section here. Plead with your mother, plead,
for she is not my wife, neither am I her husband. Let her therefore
put away her whoredoms out of her sight and her adulteries
from between her breasts, lest I strip her naked and set her
as in the day that she was born and make her a wilderness and
set her as a dry land, and slay her with thirst. And I will not
have mercy upon her children, for they be the children of Hortums.
For their mother hath played the harlot. She that conceived
them hath done shamefully. For she said, I will go after
my lovers that give me my bread, my water, my wool, my flax, mine
oil and drink. Therefore, behold, I will hedge
up thy way with thorns, and make a wall, that she shall not find
her pass. Look at that. Verse therefore
is, I'll hedge up her way with thorns, and make a wall, she'll
not find her pass. Now again, Israel at this time
had been following false gods, right? Off they went with the
worship of Balaam, and other gods. And Gomer is a picture
of us in our natural state, right? We follow false gods of our own
imaginations, whether we were serving self, or whether we were
worshiping false gods in religion, or whether we were just like
New Agers or whatever like that. That's what I got into. I was
Catholic. And I got into New Age and all
that junk. Dangerous stuff, beloved. If
you know someone into that, warn them. Get out of it. It's dangerous
stuff. It's dangerous. Now marvel here
at the mercy and grace that our great God has despite our wanderings
and our following after false gods. Before we were born again, God does not let us destroy ourselves. Marvel at the long suffering
of God with his people. We saw the things she's doing.
That was us by nature. fallen in Adam, dead in trespasses
and sins, pleasing whatever the flesh wanted to have pleased. My, oh, my. 2 Peter, this was
the one, 2 Peter 3, verse 9, it says this, and remember, this
is written to God's people. It's not written to the world.
Will God allow one of his sheep to be lost? that Christ redeemed
with his blood. Will God allow one of them not
to be bought into the fold? No way, sister. Not one, right?
Not one. He'll get them all. He'll get
them all. That's why we pray for our family
members, because we don't know who the sheep are, right? And
our friends, we don't know who they are. Just keep praying for
them, beloved. Man, just plead. Plead with our great God. Lord,
if it be your will, please save them. Listen to this, though.
This is what hope this gives the believer. The Lord is not
slack concerning his promise, okay? So we can make promises,
and we're slack about them. We say, oh, you know, well, husbands,
we're great at this, right? Oh, I'll do this, honey. No problem.
I'll get that done. And time passes, right? And then
we forget about it. And sometimes our wife would
be like, well, you promised to do that. Oh, man. I forgot. Right? And of course, every wife is
so understanding. They'd be like, oh, it's no problem,
honey. It's okay. I had to put that in there. I'm
sorry. And husbands, too, right? We're
so understanding, too, when there's something like that. Oh, my. But listen to this, though. See, God's not like us. Man thinks
God's like us. We thought that way, didn't we?
Before the Lord saved us, we thought, well, God's like us.
He's, oh, here, let that go. It's not that bad. No, God's
a God of holiness. So holy that we must have the
righteousness of Christ to be able to stand in His presence.
The righteousness of the perfect man. who knew no sin, did no
sin, and died the sinless sacrifice as a substitute for his people.
My, oh my, the Lord Jesus Christ. Listen to this. The Lord is not
slack concerning his promise, as some men count slackness.
So he knows us. He knows what we are like. But
I love this. Listen to this. Again, he's writing
to born-again blood-washed believers that are scattered. They're being
persecuted for their faith. 2 Peter 3, 9. But his long-suffering-to-us
word to God's people. Not willing. Now, if God's not
willing for something to happen, what's going to happen? It's
not going to happen, is it? Right, Zane? If he's willing
for something to happen, what's going to happen, brother Zane?
It'll happen. But look at this. Not willing.
This is the God of the universe. Not willing that any should perish. Now notice the to us word. That's
important. He's writing to Christians. He
doesn't say to the world. He says to Usworth, not willing
that any should perish, but that all, look at that, all should
come to repentance, every single one of God's sheep. See, he knows
us from eternity. We don't know him until we're
regenerated and born again. Then we find out who he is, don't
we? And we find what mercy, God himself, Sister Dee saved us.
God himself did that. God himself has loved us with
an everlasting love. Unchanging. See, my dad and I
didn't have a great relationship, my father. But my father, I have
my father in heaven. He's not like my earthly dad. He's loved us with an everlasting
love. Oh my. No wonder we praise Him. No wonder
we thank Him for saving the sinner. I'm only a sinner saved by grace.
No wonder we sing that with such joy. My, oh my. Our great God loves us with an
everlasting love. Therefore, we see in verse 6,
He hedges us up. and protects us even before we're
born again. Even before we're born again.
Because we have been objects of his everlasting love from
before the foundation of the world. I know I keep hitting
that. You're going to keep hearing it. Because I marvel at that. Do you? His love for us has never
changed. Never. And it's real. We see in verse seven that Gomer,
let's read verse seven now, Gomer, a picture of God's people in
their natural state, refused to acknowledge the fact that
Hosea, who is a type of Christ, gave her all the good things
she received. She thought they came from her lovers. Now think of that. She's off
into adultery. And Homer, I mean, Hosea, he
really loves her, doesn't he? It's a real love. Because he's given her gifts
still. Even though she's off finding
love in other men's arms. Oh, his love hasn't changed,
has it? My, oh my, look at verse seven.
And she shall follow after her lovers, but she shall not overtake
them, and she shall seek them, but shall not find them. Then
shall she say, I will go return to my first husband, for then
it was better with me than now. Well, in verse six, we see God
erected a hedge and closed up Gomer's way so that there may
be no way of access open to her fellow adulterers. She's being hedged up. And basically, it shows us how
spiritually we were chasing after other gods. God hedged us up, didn't he?
Even before we were saved. Do you remember when you first
started thinking about God and who he was? I'll tell you what. I still remember I told you about
that young fellow that gave me a Bible, and then for years,
I just, I had it, I read part of it, and then put it away.
And then I moved down to a small town, probably 10 or 15 years later, and met someone
who first started talking to me about Christ. And I won't forget that time,
because something changed in my thoughts towards God. I had an interest in what this
man was telling me, when the day before I had no interest
at all. But all that time, beloved, in
my youth, in my teenage years, in my adult years, living recklessly,
God hedged me up and protected me, and he did the same for you. Isn't that amazing? Watched over
us. Kept us from falling into outright
idol worship. Why didn't I keep pursuing what
I was into? Because God set a hedge, hadn't
he? Oh, my. You ever think of that,
beloved? My, oh, my. God hedges up his people to Christ. He shuts us up to Christ. Remember
the illustration of the cattle, when they're going to take care
of the cattle, and they have a chute that they run them into.
Right? And then they shut the door,
and that cow, he can't go backwards, and he can't go forwards. And
they can do whatever they want then, whatever they need to do
with them. That's how God does to us. We're in the corral with
all the other cattle, all the other sheep, and the goats mixed
in together, right? He says, oh, that one right there. Hedges us right up, shuts us
right into Christ. Isn't it beautiful? And then,
we hear His voice, and we follow Him. We hear the voice of the
shepherd, we never heard it before! Oh my! Christ died for my sins! He's my Savior! Praise His mighty
name. I'll tell you what. So we have nowhere to go but
to Christ. And he does this for his wandering scattered lost
sheep who were chosen in him before the foundation of the
world. He makes us willing in the day of God's power. By his
power, he makes us willing to flee to Christ. Why? Because
we were chosen in him before the foundation of the world.
And he purchased our eternal souls at Calvary's cross. Therefore,
we must hear the gospel and we will be gathered in and hedged
in to Christ. We will come to repentance after
we're born again. We will be granted faith and
repentance by God, the Holy Spirit. And we will love Christ for the
rest of our being and all the way into eternity, all because
of unsought mercy and unsought grace. Oh my. And God will do this. He'll do
this for his people. Because he's faithful. He's long-suffering
with us. But he's faithful. He's faithful
to his name. He's faithful to his promises.
He's faithful to his nature. And he will not allow the ones
that he loves to be destroyed by this world's idols. They will
come to Christ. No matter what they're into,
before the Lord saves them. Well, before they're born again.
He saved us at Calvary, didn't he? But before we're born again. Saved by his grace, right? For
by grace you save through faith. And that not of yourselves, it's
a gift of God, not of works, lest any man should boast. It's
wonderful. When we refuse to give God the
glory for life's necessity, he begins to remove them, which
is introduced by the second, therefore, let's read verses
seven to 13 of Hosea chapter two. And she shall follow after
her lovers, but she shall not overtake them, and she shall
seek them, but shall not find them. Then shall she say, I will
go and return to my first husband, for then it was better with me
than now. For she did not know that I gave
her corn." Look at this. Look how much God took care of
us before we even knew Him. The necessities of life. She
did not know that I gave her corn, and wine, and oil, and
multiplied her silver and gold, which they prepared for Baal. Look at that. Therefore will
I return and take away my corn in the time thereof, my wine
in the season thereof, and recover my wool and my flax given to
cover her nakedness. Now I will discover her lewdness
in the sight of her lovers, and none shall deliver her out of
my hand. I will cause all her mirth to cease, her feast days,
her new moons, and her Sabbaths, and all her solemn feasts, And
I will destroy her vines. See, everything that she cherishes,
everything that she's trusting in, it's being taken away. Oh my. And her fake leaves, wherever
she has said, these are my rewards that my lovers have given me.
So she thought all these things that she's been receiving were
coming from her lovers, but Hosea, who's a type of Christ, was giving
them to her. All the things we thought, oh,
look what I've done, oh, look what I got, look it, they were
all given to us by God. My oh my, it's amazing. These are my rewards that my
lovers have given me, and I will make them a forest, and the beasts
of the field shall eat them, and I will visit her the days
of Balaam, wherein she burned incense to them, and she decked
herself with her earrings and her jewels, and she went after
her lovers and forgot me, saith the Lord. Look at verse 9, there's
a second. Therefore, while I return to
her, take away my corn in the time thereof, and my wine in
the season thereof, and I will recover my wool, my flax, given
to her naked. Now remember, the Israelites,
they were off. Off they went. False gods. And then they were delivered
into the hands of their enemies, weren't they? And God delivered
them out. My, oh, my. But you know, there's someone
who's very similar to Gomer in this situation. The second, look
at the second therefore found in verse 9. When God at first
blocked Gomer's paths by hedging her up, she said, I'll go back
to my husband in verse 7. But she had not done it. She
said, I'm going to do it, and had not done it. Well, then hard
times came, right? You know, there's someone else
who went through a similar situation. Turn to Luke chapter 15. Luke
chapter 15. Now she's going to be brought
to the place where she'll remember the good days and return from
her folly. And here's another case similar
to this. And his name is the prodigal
son. Right? Off he went. Oh, but the thing that always
gets me, and now the more that we've been studying on the everlasting
love of God, watch the Father. He's a picture of our Lord, our
Father. He runs to His Son. God's not
willing that any of us should perish. That all his sheep will
come to repentance, beloved. We don't know who they are, so
we preach the gospel to everyone, don't we? And God does the saving. And we rejoice. We rejoice. Oh my. The prodigal son, he had
his fling. Off he went, right? Oh yeah. But then the money ran out. And
then he became a hired hand for a citizen of that far country
and fed his pigs. Look at verses 15 and 16. So
he'd been out in drunken rages, spent his money on women and
wine and whatever he wanted. And then he finds out, I'm broke.
I'm, look at this, bankrupt. Brother Zane, the Lord showed
us we were bankrupt sinners, didn't he? Look at this, verse 15. And he
went and joined himself to a citizen of that country, and he sent
him into his fields to feed the swine. And he would fain have
filled his belly with the husks that the swine did eat, but no
man gave unto him. Do you know what the husks there
represent? False religion. There's no substance for a believer. That's why we
can't stand workspace preaching. It's like the husks that were
fed to the pigs. There's no Christ. Or there's
a Christ of man's imagination who wants to save you, but he
can't. Or he has to have you walk an
hour, pray a prayer, bow your head. It's all your decision. Do we make a decision for Christ?
Absolutely. We do, don't we? But it's because
God makes us willing and gives us faith. It's a hard work, beloved. We go from not believing to believing
just like that. Lord, I believe. And then we
spend the rest of our days, help my unbelief, right? Oh, my! My, oh, my! Look at this, though. And he would have filled his
belly with the husk, the swine did eat, no man gave unto him.
Oh, my! The teaching of false religion
is like the husks here, and it only leads to condemnation to
those who follow those ways. But to the hungry soul longing
for Christ, we must, we must have Christ. He's the substance. He's the sum and the substance
of the gospel, isn't he? We must have him. We must. He's the only savior for sinners. We must have him. We go from
not wanting anything to deal with him to, we must have you,
Lord. And that's all a miracle of grace. And that's undeserved
mercy and unsought after mercy. It's wonderful. We see in verse
17 to 19 of Luke chapter 15 that the prodigal, when the prodigal
had no money and pleasure, it's all gone. Wow, what does he do? He starts to think about his
pangs of hunger, that gnawed at his inside. And it says here,
and when he came to himself, came to an end of himself, beloved,
He said, how many hired servants of my father have bread enough
to eat to spare and I perish with hunger? He's not necessarily
thinking of his father. He's thinking, how many of my
dad's servants have a full belly? They go to bed with a full belly
at night. And here I am, I'm starving. Oh my. I will rise and go to my father
and say unto him, Father, I have sinned against heaven and before
thee, and I'm no more worthy to be called thy son. Make me
as one of thy hired servants. Now, when we fall into sin as
believers, we think I'm not worthy, and we're not. We're not. But God doesn't cast us away,
does he? Isn't that wonderful? And what a picture we have of
that truth right here. He'd taken his inheritance. He'd
squandered it. He'd spent it all on riotous
living. And watch the reaction of the
father. So the prodigal son got up, returned
to his father. By nature, we're all the prodigal
son, by nature. We're all gomers by nature, right? And if God sends you misery to
draw you back to himself, do not merely say, I will return.
Get up and go. Get up and go to God. And all who come to Christ, you
know what? He'll welcome you just as the
father of the prodigal son welcomed the prodigal son. He'll not send you away. Let's
read Luke 15, 20 to 24 and marvel at the father's love for his
prodigal son. And he arose and came to his father. But when
he was a great way off, his father saw him and had compassion and
ran and fell on his neck and kissed him. His dad saw, he'd
been looking for him. He'd been watching him. Now think
of this. Our God has his eyes upon us,
Sister Dee, even before we're saved. He knows when our time
of love is going to come. He knows when we're going to
be born again. And he's watching us, isn't he? And do you know
what the father ran to the son? Remember the lost sheep at the
first of this chapter? Where's the sheep? He's out wandering
around, right? Who comes to him? The shepherd,
eh? That's a picture of Christ. He
comes to us. We're wandering off. We're wandering around,
Sister Barb. We're wandering around this wilderness, wandering
around, not caring. And He comes right to us. And
He goes, you're my lost sheep, Brother Jim. And He puts us on
His shoulders, and He carries us home. So what does His Father
do? His love, notice this too. Notice
this. This is wonderful. His love for
His Son has not changed. Even though he went out and spent
everything he had, his love has never changed for him. He's watching. One day my son's gonna come back.
He's hoping, isn't he? Oh my, this is so beautiful.
Look at this. His father saw him and had compassion
and ran and fell on his neck and kissed him. He didn't say,
what did you do? him. He gave him a kiss. He had
compassion on him. Oh, son, you're back. Son of my love. Oh, my. This is beautiful. And look what
the son says. And the son said, Father, I've
sinned against heaven and in thy sight, and am no more worthy
to be called thy son. See, those who God adopts here
never turn us away. We're his sons by choice in Christ. We're his sons by redemption.
Christ shed his blood for us. We're his sons by the fact that
the Spirit is sent into the Spirit of those who are heirs of salvation,
whereby we now cry, Abba, Father. And because we're sons, God sends
the Spirit into our hearts. He doesn't do that for those
who are not his sons. And look what the father says,
I love this. I never caught this until about five years ago. I
was reading this text. And I called Donny Bell. I said,
oh my gosh. And Donny's like, I never saw
that either. Notice what he calls the robe. And it's the robe of
righteousness. It pictures Christ's righteousness,
beloved. Look at this. But the father said to the servants,
bring forth the what? Best robe. Singular. Beloved, God the father has clothed
us in the righteousness of Christ. The best robe. The best robe. Oh, it's wonderful. and put it
on him, and put a ring on his hand, and shoes on his feet.
This is my boy. This is my son. Oh, it's wonderful. And bring him
in a fatted calf, and kill it, and let us eat, and be merry. For this my son was dead, and
is alive again. He was lost, and he's found. And they began to be merry. Praise
the Lord! He saved him! What a picture
of our salvation, eh, Brother Zane? It's wonderful. It's wonderful. My, oh, my. The Lamb's been slain. All right? We're redeemed. Let us rejoice. Let us rejoice. Oh my. Marvel at the grace of
God. Here we come to the third therefore. Marvel at the grace that's shown
in verses 14 and 15. I said 13. Look at verses 14
and 15. This is where it is. Therefore,
behold, I will allure her and bring her into the wilderness
and speak comfortably unto her. Despite everything she's done, Remember the father? Bring forth
the best roll. Let's get a fatted calf and we're
going to feast. Look at this. And I will give
her vineyards from thence in the valley of Accor for a door
of hope. And she shall sing there as in the days of her youth and
as in the day when she came up out of the land of Egypt. Now,
that is the third therefore in verses 14. Verses 14 and 15 brings
forth God's amazing grace shown to his people. She doesn't deserve
this, does she? And yet here Hosea is showing
her mercy. Undeserved mercy. She didn't
even seek it out. Oh my. This is a picture of God's amazing
grace shown to his people who are sinners. We're sinners by
birth, nature, and choice, aren't we? That's what we are. Now, we've seen God's judgments,
and we wonder, what will God do to Gomer now? Will it be sickness,
pain, or death? Well, we see in verses 14 and
15, it's none of that. My, oh, my. We're not expecting these things,
but God opens the hand of his grace and mercy. And see the
word akkor there in our text? Do you know what it means? It
means troubling. And look what it says here. In
the valley of akkor, for the door of hope. Out of trouble comes hope. Out of trouble comes hope. This
verse is used three times in the Bible. It's used in Joshua
chapter 7, verse 26, the Hebrew word. And they raised over him
a great heap of stones unto this day. So they turned from the
fierceness of his anger. Wherefore, the name of that place
was called the Valley of Achor unto this day. Now, that was
about the sin of He took what God told him not
to take, remember? And he hid an idol. He hid an
idol. And because of that, Israel was
defeated in battle. And then when his sin was discovered,
he and his family were stoned in this valley. And hence it's
called the Valley of Troubling. the valley of troubling. It's
mentioned in Isaiah 65, 10 as a resting place for herds. And
then here in Hosea, it becomes a place of hope. A place of hope. One might ask, how can a place
of judgment be hopeful? Well, we cannot make a place
of troubling a place of hope, can we? We can't do that. We got no power to do that. But
there's one who can, and there's one who does. God sets hope before us when
all seems lost, beloved. When he hedges us in and we've
got nowhere to go, then the Holy Spirit reveals
Christ to us. And by God-given faith, we believe. We look to him. There's another
place, though, where trouble was turned into hope. Oh, my. Listen to this. Christ Jesus, our Lord, was troubled
in the Spirit. Beloved God, God made a time
of trouble our hope. a time of trouble in our hope.
Two thousand years ago, the Lord Jesus Christ took our trouble
upon himself, took our sin upon himself. Think of the Savior's words in
the hour just before his death, John 12, 27 and 28. Now my soul
is troubled. And what shall I say? Father,
save me from this hour. But for this cause came I unto
this hour. Father, glorify thy name. Then
came a voice from heaven, saying, I have both glorified it and
will glorify it again. Christ Jesus, our Lord, was troubled,
and the Spirit is brought forth. If you want to turn there, John
chapter 13, verse 21. Oh, one may ask, well, why was
Christ troubled? Well, he's troubled in our place. As God troubled him with our
sin, that we might be saved from it and be bought back to God. Look at this in John 13, verses
21 and 22. When Jesus had said this, thus
said, he was troubled in the spirit and testified and said,
verily, verily, I say unto you that one of you shall betray
me. Then the disciples looked on one on another, doubting of
whom he spake. And we know in another narrative
of the same situation, they said, Lord, is it I? They all knew
they were capable of it. It's like all of us is capable
of it. My oh my. It's like when people say, well
if I was there when they said crucify him, I never would have
said that. You don't know how sinful you
are then. Because I know I would have said it in my natural state.
We all would have, wouldn't we Zane? We all would have said
that. Left to ourselves. By my very sin I was saying that. Because it's my sin that he had
to go to the cross to redeem me from. My oh my. God wasn't in my thoughts then.
It was on the basis of Christ's
death that he was troubled in the spirit.
Let us marvel that we have peace with God now through the Lord
Jesus Christ. And it only comes, peace with
God only comes through the perfect sin atoning work of the Lord
Jesus Christ and on our behalf. And then in John chapter 14 verse
1, I always like this verse, but in studying this and understanding
it from the aspect of he's saying this to his disciples, and he's
going to go to the cross. See, what troubles us? Our sin. especially before we're saved
and the Lord heads us up to Christ, right? We see our sin, we think,
oh man. We cry out to Christ. But look
what he says here, and this is about his death coming up. Look
at this. Let not your heart be troubled.
You believe in God, believe also in me. The Savior has told his disciples
that one of them would betray him, and that they would all
be offended because of him, and that he would go where they could
not come. At this time, Peter, he also
said Peter, he'd deny him three times. And this laid heavily
upon their hearts and greatly probably depressed their minds.
They're humans like us. These are not super people. For
some reason, we vault Bible characters to a place where they're so much
better than we are. No, they're just a bunch of sinners
like we are. And now in the multitude of those
thoughts of fear and grief and unbelief, our Lord comforts them
and exhorts them to exercise faith, which is the best way
to get rid of depression and fear. It's to believe God. Believe what God said. Believe
on the Lord Jesus Christ. Look to Christ. When I'm down
and depressed, I look to Christ and maybe sing a few songs, maybe
it's not long, my heart's rejoicing. It's so true. Look at this, you believe in
God? He's saying, put your trust in God. Put your trust in God. Remember, and remember, he's
the faithful servant. He's fulfilling all righteousness
for our sakes. He's sinless and spotless. He's
perfect. And then He says, believe in
me. We know He and the Father are one and the Holy Spirit,
they're all one, the three are one. He says, for I and the Father
are one, I'm of the same nature and in essence with Him. If you believe in the Father,
remember that one disciple said, show us the Father. He says,
if you've seen me, you've seen the Father. They're one. They're one in will, they're
one in nature, three distinct personalities, but one and united,
united together. And the Savior knew that their
faith in him as Messiah and mediator and God-man was still weak, just
like ours. Right? My faith is so fickle
sometimes. I'm being honest with you. Something
will come up and I'll wig out for a little while. And I'm like,
oh man, what are you doing, Lane? I'm just being honest. So he exhorts them to exercise
faith in him, telling them, you have nothing to fear. You have
nothing to be troubled about. Let us remind ourselves that
when we go through these situations. Because the reason we have nothing
to fear and nothing to be troubled about is because God is our Savior. And you know what? He's our mediator.
Right now. He's our Redeemer. He has saved
us from our sins. It's done. And think of this, he will take
care of all our concerns. Isn't that amazing? He's done
it, hasn't he? We've seen it time and time and
time again. My oh my. In chapter three of
this wonderful book, which we won't get to next week, but we'll
get to probably the week after in chapter three, we will see
Christ's redemptive work so plainly brought forth. But before we
get there, we're going to finish this chapter next week. So may
we leave here rejoicing in the fact that the mercy we saw Hosea
show Gomer is the same way that God shows mercy to us, mercy
to his sheep. Now think of this. Before and
after we're saved. And all we say is, praise be
to God. Praise be to God. What a wonderful,
merciful Savior. Oh my. Heavenly Father, oh we
thank Thee. Oh what a picture we saw tonight.
of how we are in our natural state, and your everlasting love
is set upon us. You hedged us up. You brought
us to Christ. You shut us up to Christ. Oh,
we praise Thee and thank Thee, Father. And we thank Thee, Holy
Spirit, for coming into our hearts, whereby now we cry, Abba, Father,
and regenerating us and giving us faith to believe, to believe
the Word of God. And Lord Jesus, when we go through
troubles and trials and times of weakness, let us remember
what you said to your disciples. Let not your heart be troubled.
And let us believe on you, Lord. Let us trust you and take you
by what you say in your word. You never leave us nor forsake
us. You're ever with us. May these thoughts comfort us
this week. And may we think upon the wonderful
things that we looked at tonight and how, Father, your love for
your people never changes. And Lord Jesus, your love for
us never changes, and Holy Spirit, your love for us never changes.
Glory be to God, the Father, Son, and the Holy Spirit, in
Jesus' name, amen.