September 7, 2008
"Free to Love and Serve"
Hosea 1; 3; 1 Corinthians 4: 8- 17
You might recall that last Sunday we examined I Corinthians 4: 1, where Paul called himself and Apollos servants of Christ. And we considered what being a servant means. This week we will examine the very last verse of this chapter, verse 17.
What do you prefer? Shall I come to you with a whip, or in love and with a gentle spirit?
When I was studying to be a teacher I attended a seminar on discipline. I remember sitting there half asleep waiting for the class to begin. The door opened and I heard Smack! Smack! Smack! I lifted my head just in time to feel the rush of something brush past me. To get our attention, the professor was hitting our desks with old-fashioned switch. "Is that what we mean by discipline?" he shouted.
Needless to say, he got our attention. And maybe that is a little bit what Paul is trying to do in this verse: get the attention of the Corinthian church. Yet, I think there's something even deeper going on here.
In verse 15 he identifies himself to the Corinthians as their father in Christ. Just a father tries to set a good example for his children; he explained how he had intended to set an example of servanthood for them. That example is found in verses 12- 13
We work hard with our own hands. When we are cursed, we bless; when we are persecuted, we endure it; when we are slandered, we answer kindly. Up to this moment we have become the scum of the earth, the refuse of the world.
Paul points to his and fellow disciples sufferings as what they endured to be servants of Christ and of how they had taken up their cross to follow their Lord. But the Corinthians weren't following his example. In fact some of them were even rejecting Paul and his teaching. Instead of being servants they were using the gospel to support their own agendas-to make themselves look good.
Paul feels betrayed angry and sad. And yet his heart still burns with love for these his children. And as a father frustrated with this children he exclaims,
What do you prefer? Shall I come to you with a whip, or in love and with a gentle spirit?
Yet, we never forget that Paul is speaking for God here. His anger and frustration is God's Word to these people and to us. It is not just Paul whom the people rejected, it is the Lord.
And why is God so pained by our rejection? In Hosea's prophecy, God pictures his relationship with Israel as that of husband with his wife. That is a common picture that is found throughout the Bible. Just as husband and wife are bound together by a relationship of love and commitment, so it is with between our Lord and us. God did not make us primarily to do tasks for him, as the picture of a servant might suggest. He made us to love. Love was the basis for his relationship with his people Israel. In the words of Deuteronomy 7: 7
The LORD did not set his affection on you and choose you because you were more numerous than other peoples,[and hence could accomplish more for him] for you were the fewest of all peoples. But it was because the LORD loved you
But, Hosea's prophecy points out something very important about God's love. When the LORD began to speak through Hosea, the LORD said to him, "Go, take to yourself an adulterous wife and children of unfaithfulness, because the land is guilty of the vilest adultery in departing from the LORD."
God told Hosea to marry a woman who had a reputation as a prostitute. God loved Israel, even though he knew they would be unfaithful. God loved us even though he knew we would be unfaithful. Among the people I admire are Christian people involved in providing foster care for at risk young people and teens. They love these kids and they want to make a difference in their lives. But, they know before they start these kids are going to be problems and they are going to test the limits of their love.
But, imagine what it was like for God, who not only knew there was a possibility of problems, but who foresaw our evil hearts and our rebellion and who knew what loving us would cost him. Yet, he loved us anyway.
The next time you feel that you let God down and that he possibly doesn't love anymore don't forget that important fact. God knew you before he made the world and he loved even though he knew you would be unfaithful.
But this does not mean that he is indifferent to our unfaithfulness. Verse after verse in chapters 1 and 2 tell of the heart cry of God. He is the lover that was spurned and who is torn between his righteous anger and his love. Probably only those of us who have suffered from an unfaithful spouse or who have been otherwise been betrayed can even begin to know the depths of such anguish. Before sending Hosea to go out and prophesy, God gave him a small glimpse of the pain, anger, and love that was in his own heart.
The phone rang. I picked it up. On the other end of the line I could hear a woman crying. With a shaky voice, she began. "I don't know what to do. I saw my brother-in-law's car parked all night by another woman's apartment. He told my sister he had to be out of town for a business meeting."
I encouraged her to confront her brother-in-law. Yet, if what she expected was true, I really wasn't sure what to tell her. Surely her sister should know the truth. But, how do tell someone you love something like that?
Here we have a picture of our God torn between his grief and anger over his people's adulterous rejection and his love and desire to save. Yes, God does punish; he sends his people back into slavery, just as they were when he brought out of Egypt. The Assyrians would come and take the ten northern tribes from the Promised Land. But, rejection is not end of the story. Each of these prophecies end with restoration-with God restoring his relationship with those he loves.
Even the whip is used in love. Notice the three children born to Gomer. Each of them is a child of adultery. Each represents the natural consequences of Israel's adulterous idolatry. The first is direct punishment. The first child is named Jezreel. Note the reason: because I will soon punish the house of Jehu for the massacre at Jezreel, and I will put an end to the kingdom of Israel
In 2 Kings 9 we read the story of God raising up Jehu to destroy the house of King Ahab, the most evil king in Israel's history. In that scripture we read that he commanded Jehu to avenge the blood of the prophets and others that the house of Ahab had killed. So, why was God punishing Jehu's house? He was punishing them because, in spite of all the killing, nothing changed. They were worshiping the same idols that Ahab had worshipped. They were ruthlessly holding on to power just as he had. The same injustices were taking place. The same evils were still there. And so God was directly punishing them for spilling blood without a good reason.
Sometimes our sin and idolatry brings with it immediate bad consequences:-a DUI citation, venereal disease or other such illness, a broken marriage, children who follow our footsteps. It is not always wrong to see these as punishments from God for our unfaithfulness.
Gomer conceived again and gave birth to a daughter. Then the LORD said to Hosea, "Call her Lo-Ruhamah, for I will no longer show love to the house of Israel, that I should at all forgive them."
Sometimes we wallow in our sins and do not enjoy God's forgiveness.
After she had weaned Lo-Ruhamah, Gomer had another son. Then the LORD said, "Call him Lo-Ammi, for you are not my people, and I am not your God".
For a time God may abandon to our idols and let us realize the slavery of the false gods we follow. Money, booze, drugs, sex, thrills. They all come at a cost. That cost is often our own freedom
But note that after the last two punishments the Lord gives a word of hope.
7Yet 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."
Yet the Israelites will be like the sand on the seashore, which cannot be measured or counted. In the place where it was said to them, ‘You are not my people,' they will be called ‘sons of the living God.' The people of Judah and the people of Israel will be reunited, and they will appoint one leader and will come up out of the land, for great will be the day of Jezreel."
For God's people, punishment is never the end of the story. He uses it only to call us back to the joy of our loving relationship with him. In the end God always gives his gentle word of love.
For God's people slavery was not the end of the story. Look at chapter 3: 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 and love the sacred raisin cakes."
2So I bought her for fifteen shekels of silver and about a homer and a lethek of barley. 3Then I told her, "You are to live with me many days; you must not be a prostitute or be intimate with any man, and I will live with you."
I think we know what this symbolizes. We know the price God paid to set his people free. That is the blood of his own Son, our Lord Jesus. But, how have responded to what the Lord has done for us?
New York Times reporter Nicholas Kristof chose two Cambodian prostitutes and attempted to buy their freedom from their brothel owners. He selected young women who were there against their will, willing to tell their story, and who actually wanted to leave prostitution.
Freeing the first woman, Srey Neth, was a simple transaction. For $150, Kristof left with the girl and a receipt. However, with the second woman, Srey Mom, it was more difficult. First of all the brothel owner demanded more money and after that were even more complications. According to Kristov
"After some grumpy negotiation, the owner accepted $203 as the price for Srey Mom's freedom. But then Srey Mom told me that she had pawned her cell phone and needed $55 to get it back."
‘Forget about your cell phone,' I said. ‘We've got to get out of here.'
Srey Mom started crying. I told her that she had to choose her cell phone or her freedom, and she ran back to her tiny room in the brothel and locked the door.
With Srey Mom sobbing in her room and refusing to be freed without her cell phone, the other prostitutes-her closest friends-began pleading with her to be reasonable.
Even the owner of the brothel begged her to ‘Grab this chance while you can,' But Srey Mom hysterically refused to leave."
Srey Mom only stopped crying when Kristov agreed to buy back the cell phone too. Then she asked for her pawned jewelry to be part of the deal.
At the end of this experience Kristov reflects,
"I have purchased the freedom of two human beings so I can return them to their villages. But will emancipation help them? Will their families and villages accept them? Or will they, like some other girls rescued from sexual servitude, find freedom so unsettling that they slink back to slavery in the brothels? We'll see."
I wonder whether we at time may resemble this second prostitute Srey Mom. Though Christ sets us free from sin and death, how often because of our greed and self centeredness we choose to live in slavery rather than choose the life of freedom for which has paid such an unspeakable price. How often, like Israel, do we, in our desire for material prosperity, enslave ourselves again to false gods. Or how often do we like the Corinthians, for our own selfish reasons, stop serving our Lord and each other and destroy the joy and freedom that should characterize our churches.
In the end our Lord's call to be his servants is really a call to be free. It is a call to be free to love him as he created us to. It is a call to serve others the way he made and saved us to, from a heart of love.
Today our Lord calls to us to himself to be his servants-more than that, to be his lovers.
"Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy and my burden is light."
How will you answer his call? AMEN!