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We
all read the ridiculous headlines from tabloid papers as we stand on
line in the check out counter. Some scandalous headlines are so
ridiculous that I have even picked one up and read the story.
People
seem to be hungry and thirsty for stories that talk about celebrity
break ups, DWI’s, and their spoiled brat's temper tantrums. Everybody is
fair game. This is evident in the latest attempt or threat to scandalize
Miss NJ.
Can
you imagine what the headline of the tabloid magazine would have been
back in Hosea’s day when God said to Hosea, “Go, take to yourself and
adulterous wife and children of unfaithfulness.”
I
am sure it would have read something like, “Prophet Weds Prostitute.”
Unnamed sources, what kinds of sources are there but unnamed, say that
the prophet Hosea was told by God to marry a common prostitute and have
her children. Sources also say that Hosea has been told, again by God
that his prostituting wife Gomer will be unfaithful to him. She will
bear many children some will be fathered by other men. When Hosea was
asked for a comment he said, “In obedience to God I married her!”
Someone
once said, “A picture is worth a thousand words. This is definitely true
when it comes to Hosea. Hosea’s marriage is a narrative of God’s
fidelity to Israel, and consequently to us today. The prophet’s marriage
is a parable sending a picture of God’s unmerited goodness and unbounded
patience.
The snapshot of Hosea reminds us who God is — a patient life-mate who
endures with grace all manners of infidelity against him.
The image of Hosea models simple obedience. Verse 3 doesn’t say that
Hosea thought about marrying Gomer or prayed about it or consulted the
wisdom of others or complained to God or chose to find himself a more
appropriate wife. It plainly says he went and took Gomer as his wife.
“So he married Gomer.”
Hosea obedience calls into question what bounds does our obedience have?
Will we lay down future dreams for the kingdom? Will we move to any
country to serve God? Will we give more than feels comfortable? Will we
purchase based on needs rather than wants? Will we seek relationship
with hard-to-love people?
The image of Gomer models disobedience. Gomer has spent her life
sleeping around — always seeking comfort and fulfillment in
relationships with men. Now married to Hosea, she continues her
unfaithful ways (3:1). She goes outside of a relationship of commitment,
love and acceptance, and seeks fulfillment through false promises of
false satisfaction.
The snapshot of Gomer is a picture of Israel — guilty of idolatry by
allowing anything else in life to come before worship of God as first
priority. The snapshot of Gomer is also a picture of Christians.
We are uncomfortable with the concept of prostitution that we can hardly
see ourselves. Yet it calls into question how are we giving ourselves
away to the world around us? How are we idolatrous? In our spending? In
our priority on our image? In what we allow into our minds? In too many
hours given to our careers? In striving to keep up with the Joneses?
God’s faithfulness is not understood without recognizing our own
unfaithfulness to him. And it’s hard but healthy for us to see our sin
and idolatry in its relational context … as a marital violation of the
covenant to be faithful to only One.
“Yet I will show love to the house of Judah;
and I will save them – not
by bow, sword or battle,
or by horses and horsemen,
but by the Lord
their God.”
J.
Allan Peterson writes in his book The Myth of the Greener Grass:
Newspaper columnist and minister George Crane tells of a wife who came
into his office full of hatred toward her husband. “I do not only want
to get rid of him; I want to get even. Before I divorce him, I want to
hurt him as much as he has me.”
Dr. Crane suggested an ingenious plan. “Go home and act as if you really
love your husband. Tell him how much he means to you. Praise him for
every decent trait. Go out of your way to be as kind, considerate and
generous as possible. Spare no efforts to please him, to enjoy him. Make
him believe you love him. After you’ve convinced him of your undying
love and that you cannot live without him, then drop the bomb. Tell him
that you’re getting a divorce. That will really hurt him.”
With revenge in her eyes, she smiled and exclaimed, “Beautiful,
beautiful. Will he ever be surprised!”
And she did it with enthusiasm. Acting “as if.” For two months she
showed love, kindness, listening, giving, reinforcing, sharing.
When she didn’t return, Crane called. “Are you ready now to go through
with the divorce?”
“Divorce!” she exclaimed. “Never! I discovered I really do love him.”
Her actions had changed her feelings. Motion resulted in emotion. The
ability to love is established not so much by fervent promise as
often-repeated deeds.”
The Lord said to me, “Go show your love to your wife again, though she
is loved by another and is an adulteress. Love her as the Lord loves the
Israelites, though they turn to other gods…”
Our response can be honest confession of sin and hopeful clinging to one
who calls us “Children of the living God.” We remember that there’s
image altering that isn’t manipulative like that of our magazine covers.
God is ever altering the image of those who love God — drawing the image
of God into fuller and fuller expression within us.
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