Knowing Sin so We Return
Hosea 5:1-14, Colossians 2:13-15
As we have gone through Hosea we saw the relationship with Hosea and his wife Gomer in chapters 1-3. The rest of the book now transitions to looking directly at the relationship with the Lord and His unfaithful people Israel. In chapter 5 you see the Lord continue to expose and indict Israel of all its sins. It is like imagining someone reading from a long and endless scroll of all the sins and wickedness that Israel walked in that the Lord was exposing.
God was not ignorant of their sins, He knew and saw them all. All sins are against Him. He says in verse 3 “I know Ephraim, and Israel is not hidden from me”. No sin is hidden from God and nothing is unseen by God. They were also blatantly and openly walking in their sin. The irony is that they still continued to partake in religious practices, sacrifices, and festivals but it was all a front because their lives showed otherwise. John MacArthur comments and says “Their religious sacrifices and monthly festivals no longer brought divine favor, only judgement”. That is because what God is after and desires for us is a changed heart, a changed life wholly faithful to him and not just compartmentalized religious routines. Not only that but when Israel did realize that they were sick instead of running to the Lord they ran to Assyria, they ran to the world in search of healing of their sickness (v. 13). In the midst of your need for help, where are you tempted to run to? Are there any clear places in your life where your profession of faith does not match your life?
This chapter may seem hopeless and overwhelming as all the sins are exposed and judgement is coming for Israel. But we know and can trust that God strikes us to heal us (Isaiah 19:22). He exposes our sin so that we would know that it leads to destruction and not life in Him. God’s heart is that we would return to Him and. There is a record of debt that is exposed, a long record of our sins. We are reminded what God did with them, “by canceling the record of debt that stood against us with its legal demands. This He set aside, nailing it to the cross.” If we turn from our sins and turn to God, He takes the long record of our debt and He places them on Christ's hands and nails them to the cross. He will cancel all your debts because Christ bore them.
