14 August 2022
[The Way of God 하나님의 방법]
#강해설교 #호세아Hosea 2: 21-23 #Hymn찬송가565

호세아 2:
21 여호와께서 이르시되 그 날에 내가 응답하리라 나는 하늘에 응답하고 하늘은 땅에 응답하고
22 땅은 곡식과 포도주와 기름에 응답하고 또 이것들은 이스르엘에 응답하리라
23 내가 나를 위하여 그를 이 땅에 심고 긍휼히 여김을 받지 못하였던 자를 긍휼히 여기며 내 백성 아니었던 자에게 향하여 이르기를 너는 내 백성이라 하리니 그들은 이르기를 주는 내 하나님이시라 하리라 하시니라

Hosea 2:
21 “And in that day I will answer, declares the LORD, I will answer the heavens, and they shall answer the earth,
22 and the earth shall answer the grain, the wine, and the oil, and they shall answer Jezreel,
23 and I will sow her for myself in the land, And I will have mercy on No Mercy, and I will say to Not My People, ‘You are my people’; and he shall say, ‘You are my God.’” (ESV)

[The Way of God 하나님의 방법]

We struggle with our problems from the cradle to the grave.
Whenever we struggle in living God always answers to solve it. And it depends on our faith rather than our methods.

The Northern Kingdom of Israel was in danger by Assyria’s imminent attack.
God’s message was simple, if they repented the worship of their material idol Baal, then God would free them from Assyria’s attack.
But the Israelites refused Hosea’s message because they had another way of repelling Assyria, leaning on Egypt to help them.

In the Old Testament the speech of salvation is very etymological 1) and of the inward phenomenon from us like wars in our mind for living in this world. As it were, it is our inward struggling between keeping God’s word and the natural or automatic thinking of our flesh.

We always struggle like Hamlet, ‘To be or not to be that is the question,’ with the unconscious phobia of death and thinking of how to live securely day and night.

So we can think about our situation inwardly as born- again Christians, the war between fleshly natural thinking and God’s word in this time. It can be compared between Israel’s Baal worship and Hosea’s word from God in that time.

The Israelites’ worship of Baal naturally led them to seeking Egypt's help from Assyria’s attack.

The Israelites did not understand how to solve Assyria’s attack by God’s word only.
They did not know the myriad of God’s ways to create all things by His word including solving our problems beyond our logical thinking.

Hosea’s strange three kids (1:4, 6, 9) are mentioned (22, 23), Jezreel (fertility), Lo- Ruhamah (no- mercy) and Lo- Ammi (not my people).

The Israelites had their material blessing, Jezreel (fertility), but could not enjoy it fully.
Furthermore they did not feel God’s love, Lo-Ruhamah (no –mercy, love) and did not have any confidence of salvation, Lo- Ammi (not my saving people).

God has already answered our problems if we hear God’s word in the agony of this world.

Hearing God’s word means we wheel around to God’s word from our natural logical thinking.

I am sometimes embarrassed to think in my mind when I notice Jesus who knows my mind in the blasphemous sins in me. Thinking in mind is absolutely free but not free in Jesus which is our responsibility as well as privilege of believing life.

Guhyun Woo
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1) David Allan Hubbard, Hosea, TOTC (Leicester: Inter- Varsity Press, 1989), p. 89.

#강해설교 #다문화가정예배 #한영예배 #호세아