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Do you ever take the time to ask yourself some of the big questions of life? It's so easy to get caught up with other matters of lesser significance and gradually these can take over and dominate completely. You know the kinds of question I mean: who will win Britain's Got Talent? The premier league? The test series? Will I get any tickets for the Olympics? Where shall we go on holiday this year? What shall we have for dinner this evening?

Back in the time of the Reformation many churches made use of catechisms to encourage their members to think about the big questions. Now a catechism is simply a series of related questions and answers that are designed to help a person understand the Christian faith.

Perhaps the most famous of these catechisms was the Heidelberg Catechism and its very first question cuts through the trivia that makes up so much of our lives and immediately goes to the heart of the matter.

Q.1 What is your only comfort in life and in death?

The answer that is given is a fine summary of what it is to be a Christian

That I am not my own,
but belong—
body and soul,
in life and in death—
to my faithful Saviour Jesus Christ.

He has fully paid for all my sins with his precious blood,
and has set me free from the tyranny of the devil.
He also watches over me in such a way
that not a hair can fall from my head
without the will of my Father in heaven:
in fact, all things must work together for my salvation.

Because I belong to him,
Christ, by his Holy Spirit,
assures me of eternal life
and makes me wholeheartedly willing and ready
from now on to live for him.

The second question in the catechism builds upon this answer:

Q.2 What must you know to live and die in the joy of this comfort?

You see how logical the progression is? If the comfort is so wonderful then it is important for me to know just how I am to enter into its benefits.

A. Three things: first, how great my sin and misery are; second, how I am set free from all my sins and misery; third, how I am to thank God for such deliverance.

As we work our way through the prophet Hosea we find that he helps us to a certain extent with each of these three things. In the providence of God he gives us perhaps most help on helping us to understand the gravity of sin.

Now you may or you may not be bothered about this question of sin – that is not really the determining thing. The matter is important because God is bothered by sin and we, all of us, one day will be brought to give Him an account of how we've lived our lives.

God in His love and mercy takes the initiative and comes to speak to us. If sin is troubling you then you may compare this trouble to some ache or pain that takes you to the doctor for a solution. But a lack of trouble doesn't mean all is well. On the medical front you may feel on great form but a routine blood test leads to the doctor calling you in urgently because a problem has been discovered that needs treatment.

So the Christian message involves speaking about sin – not because God is a kill-joy and wants somehow to spoil our pleasures but just the opposite He is love and longs for us to know and enjoy the very best! Man's chief end is to glorify God and to enjoy Him forever!

When you go to the doctor's surgery to learn about the results of that blood test it isn't a pleasant experience, you would far rather it wasn't necessary, but it would be foolish to bury your head in the sand and just pretend the letter calling you in had never arrived.

The doctor will oftentimes prescribe some medication that you've never heard of – it's maybe not pleasant to take just like it wasn't pleasant to learn that you had a problem in the first place but you don't let a little unpleasantness stop you and so you take the medicine - and it works!

The analogy breaks down somewhat as the doctor doesn't always have a remedy to propose. But the remedy God has to propose is always successful!

Hosea has already called the teachers of the nation to account – they have failed in their task and the people are perishing through lack of knowledge. They aren't aware what the LORD requires of them, they've not been told of the seriousness of their turning away from Him to serve other gods, and so they've wandered further and further into moral decline.

The teachers apparently have taken no heed of Hosea charges and the charges must be brought again – only now they are widened out – it is not merely the teachers who are guilty the leaders of the people are guilty too. But the people can't hide either – they too are guilty!

This nation of Israel had been called to be the channel whereby God's blessings would flow out to the entire world but the nation has fallen and is unable to fulfil her mission and purpose in life.

The fall is so bad that language that had previously been reserved for the pagan Canaanite nations is now applied to Israel. The language was used figuratively of prostitutes and is now applied to Israel. The language is that of the snare and the trap. Israel has become so degraded that she has become a danger to others as she tempts and lures others to follow her example.

The places that are mentioned by name in v.1 Mizpah and Tabor were famous places in Israelite history but had become infamous. The time for judgment was fast approaching!

But just because judgment was approaching did not mean that all was lost.

The LORD knew all about Israel/Ephraim – we like to imagine that we can keep things hidden and while we might do a reasonable job of pulling the wool over other people's eyes we can never do that with the LORD God. He knows all about us and He knows what holds us back and what steps He will have to take with us if He is to bring us to Himself.

The fact that God sees and knows all about us is double-edged. On the one hand it is worrying to know that He understands us through and through. On the other it is encouraging in that He'll never find out something about us that will make Him change His mind and go back on His promises of kindness towards us:

Is.57:18 "I have seen his ways, but I will heal him;"

Ephraim was joined to idols – we read that in ch.4 – her old habits were deeply ingrained and as long as she thought she could sort things out herself she would never be able to return to the LORD.

Israel was proud and confident that her religious leanings and practices would win the day. A few sacrifices here and a few sacrifices there and they would restore themselves – or so they thought.

How many today think that a little formal religious activity will do the job?

We should never imagine for a moment that it is a light and an easy thing to be converted. The refusal of the people to do things God's way is a demonstration of faithlessness and causes Him to withdraw from Him – no amount of hypocritical man-made religion will make Him return.

Israel was currently too proud to cry out for help – until a radical change of heart occurred she would continue to stumble and fall as she stubbornly pursued her "I know best" policy.

Judah the southern kingdom was in danger of doing just the same thing. The warnings issued to Judah not to imitate Israel's example seem to have fallen on deaf ears.

Are you in similar anger of failing to heed warnings that you have perhaps heard repeatedly?

And judgment looms…

Is there any hope?

Disaster is coming on a national scale for Israel but will not come all in a rush. The LORD explains through Hosea just how He is proceeding.

The declaration of judgment is still designed to bring about that change of heart and disposition that will render judgment unnecessary. The LORD takes no delight in judgment but make no mistake if the same conditions prevail judgment will be executed.

We see this more clearly when we realise that God employs judgments in varying degrees and in a progressive manner – such judgment is designed as a disciplinary device. But if gentle discipline is unheeded then the discipline will become progressively more severe. And let us not forget that God does this not as some power-crazed tyrant but as a God of Love who desires the best, the very best for His children:

Heb.12:9-10 "Besides this, we have had earthly fathers who disciplined us and we respected them. Shall we not much more be subject to the Father of spirits and live? For they disciplined us for a short time as it seemed best to them, but he disciplines us for our good, that we may share his holiness."

The writer goes on:

Heb.12:11 "For the moment all discipline seems painful rather than pleasant, but later it yields the peaceful fruit of righteousness to those who have been trained by it."

The LORD uses a three-fold procedure designed to bring about the changes He is looking for:

1.       The judgment of the moth and of dry rot

2.       The judgment of violent calamity

3.       The judgment of divine withdrawal

What is in view here is the quiet slow weakening and destroying of that which is valuable.

We know about the damage moths can do. There have been articles in our papers recently about the rise of the common clothes moth. Fine clothes kept in a wardrobe, protected from robbers, protected from the sunlight that would fade the colours, are in danger of quietly being rendered useless if the moth gets in and eats away.

And the moth munches quietly and slowly – no big fuss but a gradual weakening is taking place and the result is destruction.

Similarly dry rot will gradually eat away at the wood in a building leading to collapse if left untreated. The fungus grows silently without a great fuss but the results too can be disastrous.

Israel and Judah were both aware that something was wrong with their national life. They were growing weaker – they were conscious of sickness, of a wound – the discipline was having effect in bringing about a consciousness of the problem!

But the response was sadly all wrong!

And how often this is the case! The LORD shakes and stirs in a fairly gentle manner. He succeeds is communicating some consciousness that there is a problem that needs to be dealt with but the response is totally inappropriate.

Instead of crying out to the LORD for the help that was needed they turned elsewhere. Israel turned to Assyria for help – not only was he unable to cure the wound he would be the one who would compound the problems when the LORD moved to the next level of discipline.

I wonder whether you have been discovering the foundations upon which you have been building your life up till now are not as solid as you used to think they were. I wonder whether the comforts and peaceful expectations of you life are giving way – being eaten into by the moth and the dry rot as it were.

If the LORD is doing this and causing you a certain amount of trouble and distress don't resist Him – He is at work for your good!

Think of it this way: Isn't He kind not to have given up on you. Isn't He gracious is seeking to draw you to Himself. Isn't He kind to intervene in this way so that you don't waste any more of your life wedded to your futile idols which can never satisfy and never save.

Respond to Him in faith and repentance as soon as you are aware of the truthfulness of it all – you have needs and He has the answers – go humbly to Him in faith and repentance.

But let me tell you that if the relatively innocuous moth won't produce the desired response then perhaps the LORD will use the approach of the lion.

The lion destroys in a much more violent and painful way tearing his victim to pieces. Here it is used as an image of war and violence – Israel will be carried off into Assyrian exile, an exile from which the nation would never fully recover. Earthquakes, floods, tsunamis?

How foolish to go on and on resisting the LORD when the judgments don't go away but become severer in nature. Will you really go on and on until you are finally broken? Turn to the LORD now!

The LORD had already begun withdrawing His influences from the nation but as the people persist in rejecting Him and go on turning towards other imagined solutions He states that He will withdraw His presence from them.

Now, there is no place where the LORD is absent so we need to speak with care about such a withdrawal. What is in mind is a withdrawing of His beneficial presence, His presence to do good, to protect and to bless. The repeated rejection of the LORD's overtures of love may lead to exactly what they seem to want – He leaves them alone.

This is actually a dreadful state. There is nothing worse than for the Living God to give up on a person and to let them have their head as they career headlong towards destruction. Paul speaks of the LORD letting people have their head as they reject Him:

Rom.1 passim "For although they knew God, they did not honour him as God or give thanks to him, but they became futile in their thinking, and their foolish hearts were darkened. Claiming to be wise, they became fools, and exchanged the glory of the immortal God for images resembling mortal man and birds and animals and reptiles. Therefore God gave them up in the lusts of their hearts to impurity, to the dishonouring of their bodies among themselves, because they exchanged the truth about God for a lie and worshiped and served the creature rather than the Creator, who is blessed forever! Amen. For this reason God gave them up to dishonourable passions…And since they did not see fit to acknowledge God, God gave them up to a debased mind to do what ought not to be done."

Hosea ch.5 might seem to be a pretty bleak chapter – indeed the subject of human rebellion and stubborn rejection of God is a bleak subject – and yet even here there is hope.

God's purposes of judgmental discipline will not fail.

The moth gives way to the lion and the lion is followed by the withdrawal of divine influences but only for a time! Do you see the little word "until" there in v.15.

It doesn't matter how far into degradation someone might have fallen, it doesn't matter how long this stubborn resistance may have been maintained the LORD keeps open the day of hope.

He disciplines until the discipline is effective: His discipline is designed to bring the stubborn sinner to reason:

a.       To acknowledge his guilt – no more excuses, no more self-righteous attempts at justification, no more running away, but finally an acknowledgement of guilt!

b.       To seek God's face – the acknowledgement of guilt is not meant to crush us but prepare us from crying out to the Only One who can help us.

c.       To seek Him earnestly – no more hypocrisy, no more half-hearted resolves but a diligent seeking of Him Himself.

Hosea doesn't at this point tell us just how it can be that a Holy God can extend such loving compassion and gracious generosity to sinners. But the NT tells us. The loving God of the OT who doesn't want to give up on his wayward wife/people sends in His love His Son to rescue, to deliver and to save. The Lord Jesus doesn't come with exhortations of "work harder to be saved" but comes to pay the price of His people's ransom. The price of that ransom was His own death upon the cross.

Sinner will you not turn from your sin and cry out to the Lord Jesus Christ to be saved?

Acts 3:19-20 "Repent therefore, and turn again, that your sins may be blotted out, that times of refreshing may come from the presence of the Lord, and that he may send the Christ appointed for you, Jesus,"                             AMEN.