Transcript

Podcast Introduction

Our reading today Hosea 8-14. After the reading, I’ll have some comments for you. I’m calling today’s episode “Boundless Love.” 

Comments on

In Matthew 22, Jesus was asked by a Pharisee what the greatest commandment is. His response was, “Love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your mind.” 

In Hosea, God judged His people because they were not faithful to Him. 

7For my people are determined to *desert* me.
They call me the Most High,
but they don’t truly honor me. (NLT)

Hosea 11:7 NLT

How many times had He told them that judgement was coming, but that He would forgive them if they would repent and come back to Him? 

1 Return, O Israel, to the Lord your God, for your sins have brought you down.

2Bring your confessions, and return to the Lord. Say to him, “Forgive all our sins and graciously receive us,

so that we may offer you our praises. 3Assyria cannot save us, nor can our warhorses. Never again will we say to the idols we have made, ‘You are our gods.’ No, in you alone do the orphans find mercy.”

4The Lord says, “Then I will heal you of your *faithlessness*; my love will know no bounds, for my anger will be gone forever…”

Hosea 14:1-4 NLT

The same Hebrew word is used in 11:7 “for my people are determined to desert me” and in 14:4 “I will heal you of your faithlessness“. The word means “backsliding” or “apostasy”. To desert or to backslide or to be an apostate means that at one point they were *with* God, but then they turned away. 

Notice what God said here in 14:4: I will heal you of your faithlessness, your backsliding, your apostasy. He didn’t say forgive. He said heal! Listen to what Spurgeon wrote about this: “as though he said, ‘My poor people, I do remember that they are but dust; they are liable to a thousand temptations through the fall, and they soon go astray; but I will not treat them as though they were rebels, I will look upon them as patients, and they shall look upon me as a physician.” 

After telling them that He would heal them of their apostasy, He said, “…my love will know no bounds…”. And it is because of His boundless love that he looked at their backsliding as a disease instead of a willful crime. 

Oh beloved, what a God we serve! Isaiah 53 speaks prophetically of the coming Messiah, Savior, Jesus. And in verse 5 it says, “5But He was wounded for our transgressions, He was bruised for our iniquities;

The chastisement for our peace was upon Him, And by His stripes we are healed.” That healed is the same Hebrew word as in Hosea.

Jesus came to earth as a man so that He could be in the same “stuff” as us, the same flesh. But He never backslid, He never sinned. When He was tempted, He never gave in. And so He was the perfect, spotless sacrifice for our transgressions and our iniquities. 

Beloved, the healing that God promised in Hosea was begun on the cross and completed with the empty tomb. And this work was all because of God’s boundless love. Hallelujah! 

God loves you more than you could ever hope to comprehend, and He longs to have you respond to that love by accepting His gift of mercy and grace. I hope you’ve done that. 

What a God! He is worthy of praise, don’t you think? I sure do.

Today’s Bible Translation

Bible translation used in today’s episode: Ch. 8-14 NLT

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Transcript

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Steve Webb 0:00
Why would God do that?

Steve Webb 0:09
There you are. I’ve been looking for you. This is the Lifespring family Audio Bible coming to you from Riverside, California podcasting since 2004. I’m your OG God castors. Steve Webb, welcome. Thanks for letting me share some time with you. This is the daily show where we’re reading through the entire Bible in a year. Today our reading is Hosea eight through 14 and after the reading and I’ve got some comments for you. I’m calling today’s episode, boundless love. The show notes page for today’s episode is in Lifespring media.com/s 12 e 240. You can email me at Steve at Lifespring media.com. I’m always happy to hear from you. Let’s get started.

Steve Webb 0:48
Hosea chapter eight. Sound the alarm the enemy descends like an eagle on the people of the Lord, for they have broken my covenant and revolted against my law. Now Israel please with me, help us for you are our God, but it is too late. The people of Israel have rejected what is good, and now their enemies will chase after them. The people have appointed kings without my consent and princes without my approval by making idols for themselves from their silver and gold they have brought about their own destruction. Oh, Samaria, I reject this calf this idol you have made. My fury burns against you. How long will you be incapable of innocence? This calf you worship oh Israel was crafted by our own hands. It is not God. Therefore it must be smashed to bits. They have planted the wind and will harvest the whirlwind. The stalks of grain wither and produce nothing to eat. And even if there is any grain foreigners will eat it. The people of Israel had been swallowed up. They lie among the nations like an old discarded pot. Like a wild donkey looking for a mate. They have gone up to a Syria. The people of Israel have sold themselves sold themselves to many lovers. But though they have sold themselves to many allies, I will now gather them together for judgment, then they will arrive under the burden of the great king. Israel has built many altars to take away sin, but these very altars became places for sinning. Even though I gave them all my laws, they act as if those laws don’t apply to them. The people love to offer sacrifices to me feasting on the meat, but I do not accept their sacrifices. I will hold my people accountable for their sins and I will punish them, they will return to Egypt. Israel has forgotten its maker and built great palaces and Judah has fortified cities. Therefore I will send down fire on their cities and will burn up their fortresses.

Steve Webb 2:49
Hosea chapter nine old people of Israel do not rejoice as other nations do for you have been unfaithful to your god hiring yourselves out like prostitutes worshipping other gods on every threshing floor. So now your harvests will be too small to feed you. There will be no grapes for making new wine. You may no longer stay here in the Lord’s land. Instead, you will return to Egypt and in Assyria, you will eat food that is ceremonially unclean. There you will make no offerings of wine to the Lord. None of your sacrifices there will please him. They will be unclean like food touched by a person in mourning, all who present such sacrifices will be defiled. They may eat this food for themselves, but they may not offer it to the Lord. What then will you do on festival days? How will you observe the Lord’s festivals? Even if you escaped destruction from a Syria Egypt will conquer you and Memphis will bury you. Nettles will take over your treasures of silver. thistles will invade your ruined homes. The time of Israel’s punishment it’s come, the day of payment is here. Soon Israel will know this all too well. Because of your great sin and hostility. You say the prophets are crazy and the inspired men are fools. The prophet is a watchman over Israel for my God. Yet traps are laid for him wherever he goes. He faces hostility even in the house of God. The things my people do are as depraved as what they did in Gibby a long ago, God will not forget, he will surely punish them for their sins. The Lord says, oh Israel, when I first found you it was like finding fresh grapes in the desert. When I saw your ancestors, it was like seeing the first ripe figs of the season. But then they deserted me for Baal peor giving themselves to that shameful idol. Soon they became vile, as vile as the God they worshipped. The glory of Israel will fly away like a bird for your children will not be born or grow in the womb or even be conceived. Even if you do have children who grow up. I will take them from you. It will be a terrible day when I turn away in Leave you alone. I have watched Israel become as beautiful as tyre. But now Israel will bring out her children for slaughter. Oh Lord, what should I request for your people? I will ask for wombs that don’t give birth and breasts that give no milk. The Lord says, all their wickedness began at Gilgal. There I began to hate them. I will drive them from my land because of their evil actions. I will love them no more because all their leaders are rebels. The people of Israel are struck down, their roots are dried up and they will bear no more fruit. And if they give birth by will slaughter their beloved children. My God will reject the people of Israel because they will not listen or obey. They will be wanderers, homeless among the nations.

Steve Webb 5:48
Hosea chapter 10. How prosperous Israel is a luxuriant vine loaded with fruit. But the richer that people get, the more pagan altars they build, the more bountiful their harvests, the more beautiful their sacred pillars. The hearts of the people are fickle. They are guilty and must be punished. The Lord will break down their altars and smash their sacred pillars, then they will say, We have no king because we didn’t fear the Lord. But even if we had a king, what could he do for us anyway? They spout empty words and make covenants they don’t intend to keep. So injustice springs up among them like poisonous weeds in a farmer’s field. The people of Samaria tremble in fear for their calf idle at Beth Haven, and they mourn for it. Though it’s priests rejoice over it, its glory will be stripped away. This idol will be carted away to Assyria a gift to the great king there. Efrain will be ridiculed and Israel will be shamed because its people have trusted in this idol, Samaria and its king will be cut off, they will float away like driftwood on an ocean wave and the pagan shrines of Haven. The place of Israel sin will crumble. Thorns and thistles will grow up around their altars, they will beg the mountains bury us and plead with the hills fall on us. The Lord says oh Israel ever since Libya, there has been only sin and more sin. You have made no progress whatsoever. Was it not right that the wicked men of Gibby were attacked. Now whenever it fits my plan, I will attack you too. I will call out the armies of the nations to punish you for your multiplied sins. Israel is like a trained heifer treading out the grain and easy job she loves. But I will put a heavy yoke on her tender neck, I will force Judah to pull the plow and Israel to break up the hard ground. I said plant the good seeds of righteousness and you will harvest a crop of love. plow up the hard ground of your hearts. For now is the time to seek the Lord that He may come and shower righteousness upon you. But you have cultivated wickedness and harvested a thriving crop of sins. You have eaten the fruit of lies trusting in your military might believing that great armies could make your nation safe. Now the terrors of war will rise among your people. All your fortifications will fall just as when shaman destroyed Beth Arbol even mothers and children were dashed to death there. You will share that fate Bethel because of your great wickedness. When the day of judgment dawns, the king of Israel will be completely destroyed.

Steve Webb 8:25
Hosea chapter 11. When Israel was a child, I loved him and I called my Son out of Egypt. But the more I call to him, the farther he moved from me, offering sacrifices to the images of Baal and burning incense to idols. I myself taught Israel how to walk, leading him along by the hand, but he doesn’t know or even care that it was I who took care of him. I lead Israel along with my ropes of kindness and love. I lifted the yoke from his neck and I myself stooped to feed him. But since my people refuse to return to me, they will return to Egypt and will be forced to service Syria. War will swirl through their cities, their enemies will crash through their gates. They will destroy them, trapping them and their own evil plans. For my people are determined to desert me. They call me the most high but they don’t truly honor me. Oh, how can I give you up Israel? How can I let you go? How can I destroy you like Admah or demolish you like so? Boyan My heart is torn within me and my compassion overflows. No, I will not unleash my fierce anger. I will not completely destroy Israel for I am God and not a mere mortal. I am the holy one living among you and I will not come to destroy for someday that people will follow me. I the Lord will roar like a lion. And when I roar My people will return trembling from the west. Like a flock of birds. They will come from Egypt, trembling like doves they will return from Assyria and I will bring them home again says The Lord Israel surrounds me with lies and deceit, but Judah still obeys God and His faithful to the Holy One.

Steve Webb 10:08
Hosea chapter 12. The people of Israel feed on the wind. They chase after the east wind all day long. They pile up lies and violence. They’re making an alliance with a Syria while sending olive oil to buy support from Egypt. Now the Lord is bringing charges against Judah. He is about to punish Jacob for all his deceitful ways, and pay him back for all he has done. Even in the womb, Jacob struggled with his brother, when he became a man he even fought with God. Yes, he wrestled with an angel and one. He wept and pleaded for a blessing from him. There at Bethel, he met God face to face. And God spoke to him, the Lord God of Heavens, armies, the Lord is his name. So now come back to your God, act with love and justice and always depend on him. But no, the people are like crafty merchants selling from dishonest scales. They love to cheat. Israel boasts I am rich, I’ve made a fortune all by myself. No one is caught me cheating. My record is spotless. But I am the Lord your God who rescued you from slavery in Egypt, and I will make you live in tents again, as you do each year at the festival of shelters. I set my prophets to warn you with many visions and parables. But the people of Gilead are worthless because of their idol worship. And in Gilgal, too, they sacrificed bulls. Their altars are lined up like the heaps of stone along the edges of a plowed field. Jacob fled to the land of Aram. In there he earned a wife by tending sheep, then by a prophet, the Lord brought Jacob’s descendants out of Egypt, and by that Prophet, they were protected. But the people of Israel have bitterly provoked the Lord, so their Lord will now sentence them to death in payment for their sins.

Steve Webb 11:56
Hosea chapter 13. When the tribe of Ephram spoke the people shook with fear for that tribe was important in Israel, but the people of Ephram sinned by worshipping bale and thus sealed their destruction. Now, they continue to sin by making silver idols, images shaped skillfully with human hands, sacrifice to these they cry and kiss the calf idols. Therefore, they will disappear like the morning mist, like do in the morning sun, like chaff blown by the wind, like smoke from a chimney. I have been the Lord your God, ever since I brought you out of Egypt, you must acknowledge no God but me for there is no other Savior. I took care of you in the wilderness in that dry and thirsty land. But when you hit eaten and we’re satisfied, you became proud and forgotten me. So now I will attack you like a lion. Like a leopard that lurks along the road, like a bear whose cubs have been taken away. I will tear out your heart. I will devour you like a hungry lioness and mangle you like a wild animal. You are about to be destroyed. Oh, Israel, yes, by me your only helper. Now where is your King? Let Him save you. Where are all the leaders of the land, the king and the officials you demanded of me? In my anger, I gave you kings and in my fury, I took them away. Everyone’s guilt has been collected and his sin has been stored up for punishment. Pain has come to the people like the pain of childbirth, but they are like a child who resists being born. The moment of birth has arrived. But they stay in the womb. Should I ransom them from the grave? Should I redeem them from death? Oh death bring on your terrors. Oh grave bring on your plagues, for I will not take pity on them. Efrain was the most fruitful of all his brothers, but the east wind a blast from the Lord will arise in the desert. All their flowing, springs will run dry and all their wells will disappear. Every precious thing they own will be plundered and carried away. The people of Samaria must bear the consequences of their guilt because they rebelled against their God. They will be killed by an invading army. Their little ones dashed to death against the ground. There pregnant women ripped open by swords.

Steve Webb 14:16
Hosea chapter 14. Return oh Israel to the Lord your God for your sins have brought you down. Bring your confessions and return to the Lord. say to him, forgive all our sins and graciously receive us so that we may offer you our praises. A Syria cannot save us. Nor can our war horses. Never again will we say to the idols we have made you are our gods. No, in you alone to the orphans find mercy. The Lord says then I will heal you have your faithlessness My love will know no bounds for my anger will be gone forever. I will be to Israel like a refreshing do from heaven. Israel will blossom like the lily It will send roots deep into the soil like the cedars in Lebanon. Its branches will spread out like beautiful olive trees as fragrant as the cedars of Lebanon. My people will again live under my shade, they will flourish like grain and blossom like grape vines. They will be as fragrant as the wines of Lebanon. oh Israel, stay away from idols. I am the one who answers your prayers and cares for you. I am like a tree that is always green. All your fruit comes from me. Let those who are wise understand these things, but those with discernment. Listen carefully. The paths of the Lord are true and right and righteous people live by walking in them. But in those paths, sinners stumble and fall.

Steve Webb 15:47
In Our reading today, Hosea 11 Seven said for my people are determined to desert me. They call me the most high but they don’t truly honor me. And then in chapter 14, verse four, the Lord says, Then I will heal you if you’re faithlessness My love will know no bounds for my anger will be gone forever. In Matthew 22, Jesus was asked by a Pharisee what the greatest commandment is. His response was, Love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul and with all your mind. And then in Hosea, God judged his people because they were not faithful to him. How many times had he told them that judgment was coming, but that he would forgive them if they’d repent and come back to him? In chapter 14, verses one through four, God said, return to Israel to the Lord your God for your sins have brought you down. Bring your confessions and return to the Lord. say to him, forgive our sins and graciously receive us so that we may offer you our praises. A Syria cannot save us nor can our war horses, never again will we say to the idols we have made, you are our gods. No, in you alone, do the orphans find mercy. The Lord says, Then I will heal you of your faithlessness My love will know no bounds for my anger will be gone forever. Now it’s worth noticing that in Hebrew, the same word is used in chapter 11 Verse seven, where God said for my people are determined to desert me. And then here in chapter 14, verse four where he said, I will heal you of your faithlessness the word means backsliding, or apostasy. To desert or to backslide, or to be an apostate means that at one point, they were with God, but then they turned away. And then notice what God said here in chapter 14, verse four, I will heal you of your faithlessness, your backsliding, your apostasy. He didn’t say forgive. He said, he’ll listen to what Spurgeon wrote about this. As though he said, My poor people, I do remember that they are but dust. They’re liable to 1000 temptations through the fall, and they soon go astray. But I will not treat them as though they were rebels. I will look upon them as patients, and they shall look upon me as the physician. Why would God do that? He tells us, because after telling them that he had healed them of their apostasy, he said, My love will know no bounds. And it’s because of his boundless love that he looked at their backsliding as a disease instead of a willful crime. Oh, beloved, what a God we serve. Isaiah 53 speaks prophetically of the coming Messiah. And in verse five, it says, but he was wounded for our transgressions, he was bruised for our iniquities, the chastisement of our peace was upon him, and by his stripes we are healed. That healed is the same Hebrew word as what we talked about here and Hosea, Jesus came to earth as a man so that he could be in the same stuff as us the same flesh, but he never back slid. He never sinned, when he was tempted, He never gave in. And so he was the perfect, spotless sacrifice for our transgressions, and for our iniquities. Beloved, the healing that God promised in Hosea was begun on the cross and completed with the empty tomb. And this work was all because of God’s boundless love. Oh, hallelujah. God loves you, beloved more than you could ever hope to comprehend. And he longs to have you respond to that love by accepting his gift of mercy and grace. I sure hope you’ve done that. What a God. He is worthy of praise, don’t you think? I sure do. I’d love to hear your thoughts. Go to Lifespring media.com/s 12 e to 40 and leave a comment or reading Tomorrow was John 10 through 12. boost

Steve Webb 20:10
That music tells us that we have an associate producer today, Kirsty came in with her monthly $20 donation. Thank you, Kirsty. God bless you.

Steve Webb 20:32
On this date in church history, April 29 1834, Joseph H Gilmore was born he was an American Baptist clergyman and educator who taught Hebrew for 43 years at the University of Rochester. He’s best remember as the author of the hymn, He leadeth me Oh, bless it thought. And on this date in church history, April 29 1945, Dawson Trotman began teaching Bible memorization to American servicemen in of all places. San Pedro, California, marking the beginning of the navigators organization. The navigators formally incorporated in 1943, and they are now headquartered in Colorado Spring., San Pedro!

Steve Webb 21:24
I have an update for you on my friend Kathi. She went to City of Hope yesterday and had some tests run and for the second checkup in a row, her cancer numbers are up. Not a lot, but they are up which is the wrong direction. So let’s continue to keep Cathy in our prayers. Let’s pray. Our gracious heavenly Father, we are so thankful for your boundless love, for Your Mercy, for your grace, for your healing touch. We are your creation and you love us as a father loves His children. What a precious thought that is. Thank you, Lord for caring so deeply for us. I pray that You would help us to love you with a steadfast, faithful love. Hold us close to you, Lord, may we never waver in our faith. May we always look to you for our every need. Lord right now we lift up Kathi to your Lord and ask that you touch her body and bring healing to her. We thank You that her cancer numbers are not going up quickly are going up a lot. That’s an answer to prayer. But Lord, we’d like the numbers to go down. We’d like the numbers to disappear. We’d like your Lord to be completely cancer free. We know you can do it. And we just ask that it would be your will bless us today Lord bless each one and the Lifespring family in May Your Holy Spirit guide us I pray this in Jesus name, amen. If you have a prayer request or to praise let me know about it it prayer dot Lifespring media.com

Steve Webb 23:02
Remember to share the show I’ve got some easy to subscribe links over at Lifespring media.com comment on the show at Lifespring media.com/s 12 e 240. Email me at Steve at Lifespring media.com And thanks to Kirsty today’s associate producer and the amazing publisher of our newsletter. And also thanks to Sean of San Pedro for making sure the chapters get done every day. And for consistently streaming those SATs and boosting both Kirstie and Shawn get the whole value for value idea, and you can participate in it too by going to Lifespring media.com/support. Until tomorrow may God bless you richly My name is Steve Webb. See you tomorrow. Bye

Transcribed by https://otter.ai