Hosea chapter 5, let us listen attentively to the word of God. For the spirit of harlotry is in their midst, and they know not the Lord. The pride of Israel testifies to his face, therefore Israel and Ephraim stumble in their iniquity.
Judah also stumbles with them. With their flocks and herds they shall go to seek the Lord, but they will not find him. He has withdrawn himself from them.
They have dealt treacherously with the Lord. They have begotten pagan children. Now a new moon shall devour them and their heritage.
Blow the ram’s horn in Gibeah, the trumpet in Ramah. Cry aloud at Beth of En. Look behind you, O Benjamin.
Ephraim shall be desolate in the day of rebuke. Among the tribes of Israel I make known what is sure. The princes of Judah are like those who remove a landmark.
I will pour out my wrath on them like water. Ephraim is oppressed and broken in judgment because he willingly walked by human precept. Therefore I will be to Ephraim like a moth, and to the house of Judah like rottenness.
When Ephraim saw his sickness, and Judah saw his wound, then Ephraim went to Assyria and sent to King Jerob. Yet he cannot cure you, nor heal you of your wound. For I will be like a lion to Ephraim, and like a young lion to the house of Judah.
I, even I, will tear them and go away. I will take them away, and no one shall rescue. I will turn again to my place till they acknowledge their offense.
Then they will seek my face, and their affliction they will earnestly seek me. Let us pray. Gracious God above, we yearn for your churches and for our lives and ourselves, God, to continue to seek you, whether we’re in affliction or not.
But we certainly see here in this chapter why you give such difficulties and such warnings upon them, God, that they indeed would seek you, that you withdraw your goodness upon them and your mercy, your temporary mercy of the physical blessing upon their lives here, that they would learn, God, to trust and to flee to you and to reject their false worship. Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, help us, we pray, to be encouraged and strengthened. Help us, we pray, to draw nigh unto you in this teaching, God, that even in the midst of affliction, you use it for our good, and you are there in showing love in such a way as parents show love to rebellious children.
Our gracious God, and may this soften our hearts all the more towards you, we pray, amen. Continuing the theme of spiritual harlotry, that phrase is actually used in these verses. From the prior chapters, Hosea expands the judgment against churches then, the Old Testament church, to include the leaders of the nation, he gets more specific here, and the priests.
They cannot blame the people only, the priests are also involved in causing problems as well as the political leaders, the kings themselves. Further, the Lord continues to warn them of the impending punishment by foreign powers. We’re going to see a historical connection here that we know exactly what happened in part of what’s prophesied here and explained, even with the name of the king.
The Spirit, through Hosea, finishes this section with a call of repentance in the very last verse, explaining why all this is coming upon them, through the mouth of Hosea. This is not true just for individual Christians, of course, but for the church as a whole, that God brings afflictions upon them, that they would repent. The warning here to Israel, the first section here, verses one through seven, I’m dividing it into two parts.
Warning to Israel’s Leaders
The priests and the king here, hear this, O priests, take heed, O house of Israel, that’s the common focus of all of them, give ear, O house of the king. Both the spiritual and the secular, the religious and the political are all involved in the corruption of God’s people in the Old Testament. The religious and the political leaders, in particular, are named here and pulled apart for judgment.
They make a difference in the life of the nation, as we know. We’re living through these sad times in America. Not only do they often reflect the state of a nation, they influence the state of a nation unto wickedness, as they are doing here.
They, in turn, influence and shape it. In fact, he describes it as a snare because you have put a snare in Mitzpah and a net spread on Tabor. These places, these well-known places in Israel are the leaders used to encourage false worship and spiritual harlotry not just there but everywhere, in all the high places, as we saw.
And as leaders, of course, of God’s people, they are doubly accountable in this matter. All of us are. All the members of a nation or a community that are involved in sin have their own accountability between themselves and God to be sure, but once you become a public leader, you now have a double responsibility on top of your individual responsibility, and that is to be a godly and a good example and to protect God’s people, to protect your community and the like.
And here they entrap their followers. We don’t know exactly how or why, and that is specifically how in particulars and to what end and all the details, but certainly false worship is part of a spiritual harlotry. By their bad examples, one way they snare them, by their false teaching, their weak teaching, their excuse-making, whatever it is.
These are the ways in which they describe here. Peer pressure, of course, that’s part of what happens with public leaders. We forget this.
It’s an interesting kind of peer pressure. They exert extra peer pressure as one individual compared to a number of us because people take them seriously, they respect them perhaps or they just simply want to stay out of their way, out of their trouble so they’re just going to follow what they do so they can not be seen by the masses. Whatever the reason is, the influence is real.
And we ought to pray, therefore, for our church leaders, our political leaders, of course, as well, to be good examples even in spite of themselves. Unbelievers, as you’ve heard from me a number of times, can do a number of good formal things outwardly and be good examples, and I pray for that. I, of course, especially pray for their salvation.
These are chief places I mention here. Mitzpah maybe is in Benjamin. We don’t know exactly where it’s at.
It’s mentioned as a place where Samson brought judgment upon the people of God. Tabor is a famous mountain site for Baal worship. And again, these are presumably well known at the time and thus represent all the false places of worship.
Revolters, verse 2. The revolters are deeply involved in slaughter, though I rebuke them all, God says through the mouth of the prophet here. These are rebels to God’s true worship. This is what we were speaking of, revolting against the black letter commands of Deuteronomy, of Exodus, that tells them you’re supposed to have worship of God with God’s priests in the temple.
The temple is in Jerusalem. And they’re not. They’re divided as we know.
They’re two nations. They’ll join at the hip historically as one people. And the northern tribes want to do their own thing.
They want to mix their worship with pagan shrines. They make it even worse. Wrong place of worship, and they turn around and mix it with the pagan approach to their own gods.
And here, therefore, from that context, we saw in the prior chapter, and here in the verses that continue on here, it describes in verse 4, for example, spirit of poetry. What we are reading then of a slaughter is not a killing of people, but a great slaughter of the beast on the altars. All throughout the land, in the high places, in the groves, and there, of course, in the city of Bethel, which was supposed to be the main headquarters of the worship of the northern tribes.
And so here, this idea of slaughter, of course, he takes it and uses it against the Jews as a derogatory term. This is a bad thing. You have a great number of basically useless killings, because they’re not honoring me with these animals that they are sacrificing, because it is false worship, and is exercised, therefore, without faith, without informed faith, or even against their own knowledge.
That’s even worse. It is informed, insofar as they were told this is wrong. Presumably the leaders knew this, although many people, after several generations, may just grow up in ignorance.
It mentions, as you recall, in the prior chapters, the fathers and the prior generations being a bad influence upon the kids. And you grow up this way, and they’re just basically in ignorance. Whatever the case is, it’s all bad, and it’s not what? A sweet savor unto the Lord.
We run across that in the Bible, right? That God smelt it from Noah, using that metaphor, basically saying God accepts the sacrifice by faith in the Messiah to come. That’s how the sacraments are supposed to be exercised in the Old Testament, just like the sacraments in the New Testament. Supposed to be by faith in the Messiah, and the Lord God above will accept such offerings of our life and our actions as a sweet savor unto Him, but not in this case.
It’s a stench in His nostrils. Knowledge versus ignorance, verses 3-4. I know Ephraim, God, saying, I know these people, and Israel is not hidden from me.
Ephraim is the main culprit of the tribes of the northern ten tribes of Israel, and Ephraim is where Bethel is, the main headquarters of the false temple. They never stayed there, as you know. They spread out and went to all the high places.
That’s why it’s being hammered all the time. It’s the source of wickedness, of false worship in the northern tribes. For now, O Ephraim, you commit harlotry.
Israel is defiled. They do not direct their deeds toward turning to the God. The spirit of harlotry is in them, in their midst, and they know not the Lord.
They do not know the Lord. And that’s why I speak of knowledge versus ignorance in these verses here. On the one hand, God says, I know you, I see, I know what’s going on.
You can’t hide from me and pretend this is real worship. I know better. I know what you’re doing in the groves up there.
And on the flip side, in verse 4, and they do not know the Lord. That is no hymn in some cases in a saving way. Other ways, no hymn enough to be sanctified and mature.
They’re immature Christians, some of them are. We have these questions sometimes right today. What about my friend who’s in this church, this false church, the Roman Catholic church? Are they really saved or not? And my answer is usually I don’t know, but I do know they need to be called out from amongst that wickedness.
Just like here. So you have a mixed bag in this case. And God just tells them all, this is bad.
You don’t want to be hanging out with these guys and these leaders and this false worship. If you’re truly His, you want to know the Lord and have the proper knowledge. So this is one of the themes we talked about in chapter 4, verse 6. My people are destroyed for a lack of knowledge.
A lack of godly knowledge. A true knowledge of worship, of course, and even beyond that. So here you have this startling contrast.
God is saying, I know what you’re doing. And you’re living in ignorance. Often willful ignorance.
They don’t want to learn more. And God says, you can’t excuse yourself. I’m still going to judge you.
That’s the knowing that we see here. I know what’s going on. I’m, by implication, going to judge you.
Because you will not turn toward their God. Verse 4. They do not direct their deeds and their life and, of course, turning away from their false worship towards turning to their God and praise and adoration and submission to His will for their life. Verse 4 here, spirit of harlotry.
There’s that explicit phrase, now up to now, especially in chapters 1 and 2, it seems like it’s a real activity going on here. There’s a real marriage. But we know that’s really a picture, a mirror of the spiritual unfaithfulness that they have exercised towards God.
And now, finally, in chapter 5, He makes it more explicit. It’s a spirit of harlotry. It’s not literal harlotry, although that was involved as well, as we saw in the temple.
That was going on, but He was especially offended by their spiritual harlotry, going after other gods, a violation of the first table of God’s law. So, it’s here, of course, metaphorical, but we know it was also real in chapter 4 as well. Coupled with the ongoing lack of repentance makes it all the worse.
So, in verse 5, we read about pride. We saw about that in the last chapter as well. The pride of Israel testifies to His face.
It’s a known error and a problem amongst them. They’re so arrogant, it’s public and known. Everyone sees it.
Therefore, Israel and Ephraim stumble in their iniquity, and Judah also stumbles with them. I mentioned this before. Don’t look to Israel, Judah.
Don’t follow in their wicked paths. They have their own sins to be sure, but it’s even worse up north, apparently, with their false and mixed worship. And it’s reminiscent there of verse 16 I mentioned in chapter 4. For Israel is stubborn like a stubborn calf.
The northern tribes just persist and dig down. They plant their heels, and they will not move. They like what they’re doing.
It’s fun. It’s enjoyable. We’ve done it for generations, perhaps.
Whatever their excuse is. And, of course, stubbornness is often associated with pride. Pride goes before destruction and a haughty spirit before a fall.
Therefore, Israel and Ephraim stumble in their iniquity, and they stumble as well, Judah, with the implication, of course, that they’re going to stumble and they’re going to fall if they do not repent and turn back to the living Lord. If they persist in their wicked worship of God Almighty. Self-sufficient is their pride, and they tend to get tunnel vision and don’t see their path in this life, and they’re going to fall and stumble.
And pride goes before destruction and a haughty spirit before a fall. Proverbs 16, 18. And thus they will be missing God, verse 6, with their flocks and herds.
They shall go seek the Lord, but they will not find Him. He has withdrawn Himself from them. This too is judgment.
They will seek out prosperity of the Lord. Perhaps the idea of bringing the flocks, of course, is to bring them and sacrifice them again, because the context is spiritual harlotry, over and over again in these opening chapters of the book of Hosea. And God’s mercy and compassion will be missing.
They won’t find it. Judgment will come, as we’ll see in the next few verses, judgment of the foreign empire. The Assyrian army is coming along into the northern tribes, and will take them and conquer them, and Samaria will fall in 722 B.C. It’s going to happen, and I presume at that time they’re crying out for mercy.
This is terrible, God! How can this come upon us? God’s like, I’m not going to hear you. You’re not going to get any reprieve. You’re not going to be protected.
You’re going to have affliction. That’s the picture here. Not as though God can never hear them, of course.
He’s omnipresent. He always hears them. It’s a metaphor to say God has withdrawn His good presence and His blessings upon them.
And even though they seek Him, the presumption here, of course, is the seeking is selfish seeking. It’s not true repentance. If it’s true repentance, God says over and over again, I will hear you.
If you flee and run away from your wickedness, if you have a contrite heart, we read in the psalm this morning, I will hear you. Thus here, clearly, when they come after the Lord, it’s a false seeking. It’s a self-serving seeking.
And thus God will be missing in their lives this way. Unfortunately, verse 7, they, the northern tribes in particular, have dealt treacherously with the Lord, for they have begotten pagan children. And He gives them more punishment upon them.
The new moon, which would normally have been a blessing, it’s a religious festival in the Old Testament. It becomes a curse upon them, in other words. The widespread and blatant breaking of the covenant of God for Israel, described as, what, violating the marriage vow, now comes, is combined with the imagery of a traitor.
That’s the imagery of a nation, of a community. We read this in Jeremiah 3.20 as well. Just like in Jeremiah, we read of the marriage picture, and you’ve broken the marriage vow here.
You’ve broken the national relationship. You’re now a traitor amongst your own people. Surely as a wife treacherously departs from her husband, so have you dealt treacherously with me, O house of Israel.
I think we take it seriously when we talk about traitors, although it seems more and more in the American scene, we don’t have an idea of traitor anymore. It’s just like, okay, whatever. No serious consequence.
But for a very long time, in many cultures, I think you’re aware of, in your own life, you’re like, I can’t imagine traitors. What would you do with a traitor? This is terrible stuff. In your bosom, with you, your spouse, your family members, your friends, generations of it, and they turn around and stab you in the back.
That’s the picture of a traitor. And it’s a terrible picture to describe the Jews of the northern tribe. It’s one thing to sin from ignorance.
We make some excuses a little bit. We’ve done this as Christians, to hide our sins. But another, to brazenly and publicly defy God.
That is what’s been going on over and over again in this worship of theirs. This pagan worship. The consequences of continued unfaithfulness is what? Pagan children.
They have begotten pagan children. Not Christians, not Jewish Christians. Pagan children.
In some charismatic circles that I grew up in, they talked about generational curses. Like a disease that can’t be overcome except for some miraculous way and a faith of something along those lines. Unless they pray really hard.
But generational curses in the Bible come from generational choices. Persistent choices. And I’m reminded of this in Ezekiel 18.
Ezekiel 18 just cuts that kind of thinking off at the knees. When God speaks of these generational curses, for example in the Ten Commandments, He’s speaking with respect to them persisting in the sins of their parents. You’re going to do that, you’re going to have more curses, you’re going to have, that is, more judgment and more bad effects upon your life.
Affliction. Ezekiel 18.14 we read, if, however, he that is the father, the wicked father, and after he goes through a description of that wickedness, begets a son who sees all the sins which his father has done. He grows up and says, this is terrible.
And considers but does not do likewise. I’m going to go the opposite direction and gives a list of him doing faithful and holy things. As executed my judgment and walked on my statues, he shall not die for the iniquity of his father.
He shall surely live. And it’s always been the case. God calling the northern tribes to repentance.
And we see this terrible picture. You’re like, is anybody saved up there? God says it’s possible. Ezekiel 18.
And some of them probably did. That’s why God gave them the affliction. I want you to repent.
Hosea was repentant. We forget that there are a number of them. But since most of them, or too many of them, whatever number that is, did not repent, God’s going to really go after them.
You’re going to focus on that high percentage of people who are just living in open public rebellion, treacherous rebellion against God’s covenant. But they too can repent if the Lord wills. The children see, therefore, and imitate these things and become pagan children.
There’s a question of, is it literally, again, the harlotry. So they have other wives and other women. They have pagan kids.
Literally. But also, he means spiritually. That is, religiously.
They’re living because it’s mixed worship, like pagans. And the kids will grow up that way. Even if you don’t have kids.
The kids will grow up and see how you live. And what you do with your life. And they’re going to imitate it.
One way or the other. Unfortunately, they seem to be attracted to sin. Because that’s the gravity that we are born with.
Afflictions for Israel’s Repentance
The natural position. Second point. Verses 8-15.
Afflictions for Israel’s repentance. Afflictions for Israel’s repentance. Where he ties it all in at the last verse here.
And explains why these things are going on. There’s a warning here, again. … Look behind you, O Benjamin.
Pay attention. Things are happening. They blow the horn.
That’s a warning. That’s to communicate urgency. Urgency, of course, against spiritual harlotry.
But even more than that, as we shall see. What’s the significance, then, of Gibeah, of Ramah, and of course Beth-Avin. You may remember that from Chapter 4. They create a straight line from south to north.
From Jerusalem. If you remember, more or less in the middle of Israel. Kind of there, Judah.
Northwards. Presumably of the military path and the warning of the foreign invaders of Syria. We have, from 735 to 732 BC, what is called the Syrio- Ephraimite War.
Ephraim. That’s the headquarter. That’s the main tribe of the northern tribes.
Calling the shots, as it were. They cooperated with Syria. Not to be confused with us-Syria.
I remember as a kid growing up, what’s with the us-Syria and Syria? What’s going on here? I don’t understand. They’re different. Syria was up north.
Same region we have Syria right now. Us-Syria covered part of the north into Babylon, the northeast and the west side, and down around Israel a little bit. More or less in that area.
The northern tribes attacked Judah. Syria attacked them and took the territory at Judah’s request. Judah asked for help.
Assyria gave it and went after the northern tribe, Ephraim. That was about two years worth of a war. And it’s going to be tied in to later verses here in verse 13 and following.
I’ll show you. Beth-Avin means the house of iniquity or idol again. It’s a riff off of Bethel.
And that’s where the main shrine is. Not the only shrine, but the main one. Ephraim is rebuked, verses 9-11.
Ephraim shall be desolate at the day of rebuke, that is the day of the Assyrians slaughtering them among the tribes of Israel. Make no wetter shore. It’s going to happen.
The princes of Judah are like those who remove a landmark. I will pour out my wrath on them like water. Ephraim was oppressed and broken in judgment.
This is the judgment of war because he willingly walked by human precept. Therefore I will be to Ephraim like a moth and the house of Judah like rottenness. I will bring decay and destruction upon their small little petty empire.
Ephraim again. Why Ephraim? They were the main source of the wickedness. Hosea 12.8 we read, and Ephraim said, Surely I have become rich.
Remember I said that’s the background what’s going on in the book of Hosea. Look, I’m prosperous. God has done good things for me, so I must be doing okay, morally speaking.
I’m okay with God. I’m in a good relationship with Him. I can keep doing these things.
He’s happy with my worship. Surely I have become rich. I have found wealth for myself and all my labors they shall find in me.
No iniquity, that is sin. I’m clear. I have a clear conscience.
That’s bad stuff. And that’s Ephraim, the center of false worship at Bethel. And thus the leader of spiritual harlotry.
And God hammers them over and over again in these verses and in the book of Hosea. That’s why Ephraim is there and described therein. Desolate is a word used here.
The wrath of God is mentioned. Oppressed, broken, and rotten is up to verse 12. All these different ways of saying judgment, judgment, affliction, difficulties, trials, and tribulations because of your persistent public violations of what is clearly my will for you.
The various descriptions also of the coming invasion. The fall of Samaria is in 722. It was 735 and 732, about 10 years later.
They finally fell. They still hadn’t learned the lesson, unfortunately. When Ephraim saw his sickness and Judah saw his wound, they tried to fix their political problems by being buddies with the Assyrian king.
With Syria and the Assyrian. They went their different ways. Northern tribe went to Syria to get help.
Judah went to Assyria to get help. That is political help. I mean, you can easily read this and say, well, God must, Hosea must be talking about a moral issue.
They saw their sickness, my moral sickness, their wound. No, it’s political. It maps very well with the politics of the time because they sent to King Jerob.
Then Ephraim went to Assyria and the like, seeking out help. They didn’t want to be beat up anymore. They were tired of it.
They tried to fix their political problems by being buddy buddies with Assyria. Archaeology shows this agreement between Ephraim and Assyria after Assyria came along and took some of their tribes up north and they said, we don’t want to fight you. It’s an agreement to be more or less a vassal to pay them some tithes.
We haven’t dug up. You can read up some of this here in 2 Kings 15 and following. But verses 5-9 of Isaiah as well talk about this event in detail.
And verses 8-10 here are some of the verses description here in chapter 5. And it’s more explicit. After being beaten, Ephraim struck a deal with Assyria not to be beaten up anymore. And we have that in history.
That’s why we tie this explicitly to the politics of the day. It wasn’t a moral matter. Of course, it was moral behind it.
God brought the politics to a head to war because of their moral depravity of their worship. Like Orion, God describes himself, further incursions of the Assyrian army because God guides and directs all things. And war is part of his providence.
Even though we don’t like it, he uses it for the punishment of his people. And the fall of Samaria is not very far beyond this. Repentance, verse 15.
I will return again to my place. God’s going to withdraw his presence from them until they acknowledge their offense, that they seek my face, and their afflictions they will earnestly seek me. This is why I’ve given them war.
That they would call out for mercy. To return, that word again, they return again to turn away from giving help is the idea here in the first part of verse 15. So that he is not found, as we read in verse 6, they’re going to seek him out and they won’t find him.
The Lord’s goodness protection is removed from them until they acknowledge their offense. Their offense before God Almighty. He is quite offended in their false ways until they admit their sin.
The same, of course, is true today. God withdraws blessings. Praise be to the Lord we don’t have war.
Bad things come upon us in life and they’re not random. The flood that hit Japan, the tsunami turned into a flood on the land, was not random. Random act.
It was there to wake them up. What we have in America is the same thing wherever the churches are and we’re supposed to remind people the unbelievers around us and ourselves. This is a wake up call that we live in a fallen world.
These afflictions are upon us. For them that they would repent and believe in Jesus and be born again. For those who are born again that they would repent and renew their faith in Jesus if they are indeed living in sin.
And for those who are not living in sin as Christians, that is sins that are related to the afflictions. Nothing overt and serious. Again, that’s why I highlight and remind you this is overt, public, perpetual violations of his first table.
That nevertheless God uses it for our good. To teach us patience. To teach us to help those who are struggling in their sin perhaps.
Come alongside them and the like. God has a purpose. It doesn’t matter who’s involved.
He has a purpose behind it all. Afflictions and hardship, of course, as I said, are not always about our particular sin. Nevertheless, it is a time to always examine ourselves therein.
Do we have sin? Have we brought this upon us? Is God trying to teach us something in our lives? As the prophet sees the afflictions here as proof of needed repentance. In their affliction they will earnestly seek me. God is describing, of course, those who would truly be repentant.
But things are so bad it becomes so public it should be obvious even to non-prophets, I would argue, that this is bad news. You need to learn from this lesson. I don’t think it needs a special vision from on high.
We read about this in 2 Timothy at the end there where he describes that there are those people in the church that their works go before them. They’re so manifest. Everyone knows who they are, whether good or evil.
I think the same, of course, is true collectively of nations and of cultures. It’s so bad. I don’t have to wonder, what’s God saying? God is saying, repent.
This is bad stuff. I think if we see these things in people’s lives on a small scale, of course on a large scale in a nation, if we have opportunity to warn them and say, you need to repent. You need to find Jesus or you need to come back to Jesus or whatever the case may be.
Verse 15 tells us corporate sins can be broken. The consequences of the sins. I will turn away until they acknowledge their offense.
So there’s an opportunity that they can acknowledge their offense. It’s another way of saying, repent. That they will seek my face, contrite hearts, and in their affliction they will earnestly seek me.
That’s God’s desire for them. In Ezekiel 18.21 again, even if a wicked man turns from all his sins which he has committed, keeps all my statutes, and does what is lawful and right, he shall surely live, he shall not die. The opportunity is always there, brothers and sisters, within the church and without the church, if the Spirit of God is there.
The father, the priest, the king, may all be wicked. You may be surrounded by wickedness and your family up to the neck in wickedness. But you can repent and follow Jesus.
And that should be encouraging to us, especially as believers, because you will fall. You will feel like perhaps the prodigal son or prodigal daughter in your life. Maybe not.
It depends where you are, but the afflictions in your life, the hardships that are there, are there to wake you up if you are persisting in your sins. The best of us, indeed, do slack off spiritually. We do turn into couch potatoes sometimes in our life, I think.
Wandering off the path of holiness, but our father will never leave you. He will bring these things upon us, whatever they are in your life. There’s a warning, there’s a bell.
Ding, ding, ding. Hey, wake up. I’m here.
You need to come back to me. Because I love you. That’s why he’s doing it.
Thank the Lord for difficulties in your life, not for the difficulties as such. We read that in the New Testament. Paul talks that way.
You’re like, what is he talking about? He’s rejoicing in his affliction? Is he a crazy man? No, he’s rejoicing in what? The point of the affliction. How God uses hard things in your life, even sin itself, to wake you up, to bring you back to Him. Praise be to His name.
And only He can do it. To mold us and to draw us away from wickedness towards a life of contrition and repentance. Praise be to His name forever and ever.
Amen. Let us pray. We rejoice, Lord, as only You can move and shape things in our life.
Here we see entire empires moving about and bringing about war upon the church of the Old Testament to bring them to the end of themselves, to show that all the ease and comfort they had that they were relaxing and relying upon were false props. They were broken wreaths that they rested upon that pierced their hand. Our Lord and Savior, may we not rest upon these things in our life, God, but always and continually to rest upon You, we pray, by the blood of Christ Jesus and the power of the Spirit within us to bring conviction, we pray, as we need in our lives.
We cry out to You. Amen.