What Happens When God Doesn't Give Up On Us

The Lord does not give up on His people. And sometimes that's what hurts the most in the process of sanctification. 

Hosea married a whore. Gomer deserted him as an illustration of the desertion the Lord experienced with Israel. They took His good gifts and worshipped foreign gods with them. Moreover, they credited the pagan gods of Baal for the good things the Lord actually provided. You can see why God was speaking of disowning the Northern Kingdom in chapter 1 of this prophetic book. 

Now in Hosea 2 we have a poetic dialogue from the Lord on how He determined to sanctify this people and tear their hearts away from the false idols in which they trusted. 

Hosea 2:2 (ESV)“Plead with your mother, plead— for she is not my wife, and I am not her husband— that she put away her whoring from her face, and her adultery from between her breasts;

The poetic oracle looks backward and forward. The nation is cast away from the Lord. Why? Because they have committed spiritual adultery against Him. The first verse of this oracle is an appeal to the faithful in the land to wake up the older generation. I find that God has often called on the younger generation to straighten up the crooked ways of the older generation. Consider the generation that came out of Egypt and failed to believe God but complained. Their children inherited the promises they scorned.

Hosea 2:5 (ESV) For their mother has played the whore; she who conceived them has acted shamefully. For she said, ‘I will go after my lovers, who give me my bread and my water, my wool and my flax, my oil and my drink.’

The Lord now reveals how He will bring this rebellious nation out of captivity to sin.

Hosea 2:6–7 (ESV) Therefore I will hedge up her way with thorns, and I will build a wall against her, so that she cannot find her paths. 7 She shall pursue her lovers but not overtake them, and she shall seek them but shall not find them. Then she shall say, ‘I will go and return to my first husband, for it was better for me then than now.’

First, we see that God will make the abominations of Israel an impossible pathway for them to walk. He will not let the nation find satisfaction in the idols of foreigners. 

Hosea 2:12–13 (ESV) And I will lay waste her vines and her fig trees, of which she said, ‘These are my wages, which my lovers have given me.’ I will make them a forest, and the beasts of the field shall devour them. 13 And I will punish her for the feast days of the Baals when she burned offerings to them and adorned herself with her ring and jewelry, and went after her lovers and forgot me, declares the LORD.

The Lord will also wipe out the blessing they credit to Baal. One of the painful lessons the Christian must learn is how we attribute to false idols the things God actually gives us. Even the false idol of self-righteousness, thinking we've arrived or earned God's blessing, can blind us to the truth - that only God is good and all good things come from Him in grace, not as a wage. 

Hosea 2:14–15 (ESV) “Therefore, behold, I will allure her, and bring her into the wilderness, and speak tenderly to her. 15 And there I will give her her vineyards and make the Valley of Achor a door of hope. And there she shall answer as in the days of her youth, as at the time when she came out of the land of Egypt.

Thirdly, the Lord plans for a season of famine and wandering. The wilderness is where God first cultivated Israel when they came out of Egypt, and if necessary, He brings them back there to once again betroth them to Himself. God will not give up on His people, but sometimes that means we find ourselves in the desert.

Hosea 2:16–17 (ESV) “And in that day, declares the LORD, you will call me ‘My Husband,’ and no longer will you call me ‘My Baal.’ 17 For I will remove the names of the Baals from her mouth, and they shall be remembered by name no more.

When Israel is stripped bare and discovers the charade that Baal has become to her, her heart will turn back to the Lord, and they will no longer speak betrayal, but will be once again bound to their maker. 

This is a process Christians will at times experience. Have you been there? Have you felt the Lord hedge up your evil ways and expose the vanity of your own self-righteousness? Have you experienced the pain of the desert and wilderness seasons? Be glad, God's not done. He's committed to you even through the seasons of drifting.