...or, Casting Away God's Remembrance
Today in my reading in Hosea, I came upon further statements from Jehovah in the mouth of Hosea, as follows:
(Hosea 2:13, ESV) I will punish her For the days of the Baals to which she burned incense. She decked herself with her earrings and jewelry, And went after her lovers; But Me she forgot," says the LORD.
The nation of Israel, hand-chosen by Jehovah God as HIS people, had joined with the nations in their false worship - had chosen to worship their idols, and to account, as we have seen in the previous sections, her prosperity as a people to the syncretism or outright idolatry that they had practiced since the division of the kingdoms into North (Israel) and South (Judah). Becoming one with their neighbors in worship of false gods, Israel had FORGOTTEN Jehovah. What grievous sin it was for them.
Calvin notes:
But most grievous is what he adds at the end of the verse, "Me", he says, "has she forgotten". God here complains that the fellowship of marriage availed nothing: though he had lived with the people a long time, and treated them bountifully and kindly, yet the memory of this was buried, "Me", he says, "has she forgotten". There is then here an implied comparison between the Israelites whom God had joined to himself, and other nations who had known nothing of true religion, nor understood who the true God was. It was indeed no wonder for the Gentiles to be deceived by the impostures of Satan: but it was a monstrous ingratitude for the Israelites, who had been rightly taught and long habituated to the pure worship of God, to cast away the recollection of him. It was like the bestial depravity of a wife, who, having for a time lived with her husband, and having been kindly treated by him, afterwards prostitutes herself to adulterers, and no more cherishes or retains in her heart any love for her husband. We now see for what end it was added, that the Israelites had forgotten God. It was indeed a grave and severe reproof to say, that they, after having long worshipped the true God, had been led away into such madness as to worship false gods, the figments of their own brains: for they had before learnt who the true and the only God was.
The Prophet, in a word, confirms in this verse (as I have before reminded you) the truth, that the punishment which God was about to inflict on this ungodly people would not only be just, but also necessary; and he proves at the same time, how basely they had violated their marriage-vow, since the recollection of God did not prevail among them, after they had become the followers of idols, and of the figments of their own hearts.
Yet, not through syncretism with the native Americans, but through declension of another kind, very quickly that dedication was lost. I don't pretend to know where it was lost, but it quickly passed from before us. Today, we are infinitely farther gone from our moorings. Do we recognize this!? Do we see what a "monstrous ingratitude" that it is for us to reject the Holy one of Israel as a people?? Do we see what is deservedly God's reaction to this forgetting?
By and large, I think this fact passes over the heads of most Christians today... we have bought so much into the lie that religion is only an individual matter, that I think such thoughts are completely lost on the majority. I fear that as the nation slides further and further into the debauchery that is becoming the norm, Christians will become more and more deadened to the evil that it represents, and be shocked when the social and governmental structures collapse under our folly. Come quickly, Lord Jesus.
Posted by toddpedlar at July 23, 2004 07:09 AM | TrackBack