Affinity in Nature

From the Biblical Illustrator:

"God finds vindication in nature:

I well remember two funerals going out of my house within a few brief months during my residence in London.

There were cards sent by post and left at the door, in all kindliness; but one dark night when my grief overwhelmed me I looked at some of the cards and could find no vibration of sympathy there. I had not felt the touch of the hand that sent them. I went out into the storm that moaned and raged alternately, and walked round Regent’s Park through the very heart of the hurricane. It seemed to soothe me. You troy I could not find sympathy there. Perhaps not, but I at least found affinity: the storm without seemed to harmonise with the storm within; and then I remembered that He who sent that storm to sweep over the earth loved the earth still, and then remembered that He who sent the storm to sweep over my soul, and make desolate my home, loved me still. I got comfort there in the darkness, and the wild noise of a storm on an autumn night, which I found not in cards of condolence, sincere as in many instances the sympathy of the senders was. Ah me! when man not only failed to sympathise, but also forgot all gratitude and rebelled against his Heavenly Father, I can imagine God looking out to His own universe, to the work of His own hand, and seeking vindication, if not sympathy, as He spoke of man, his rebellion and folly."  -D. Davies, Biblical Illustrator

peculiar

"For the Lord will rise up, as he did at Mount Perazim,
he will rouse himself, as he did in the Valley of Gibeon
to accomplish his work,
his peculiar work,
to perform his task,
his strange task."

Isaiah 28:21

"God’s judgment of his own people is called “his peculiar work” and “his strange task,” because he must deal with them the way he treated their enemies in the past."  -net notes


Isa 28:23 Give ear, and hear my voice; give attention, and hear my speech.

Isa 28:24 Does he who plows for sowing plow continually? Does he continually open and harrow his ground?

Isa 28:25 When he has leveled its surface, does he not scatter dill, sow cumin, and put in wheat in rows and barley in its proper place, and emmer as the border?

Isa 28:26 For he is rightly instructed; his God teaches him.

Isa 28:27 Dill is not threshed with a threshing sledge, nor is a cart wheel rolled over cumin, but dill is beaten out with a stick, and cumin with a rod.

Isa 28:28 Does one crush grain for bread? No, he does not thresh it forever; when he drives his cart wheel over it with his horses, he does not crush it.

Isa 28:29 This also comes from the LORD of hosts; he is wonderful in counsel and excellent in wisdom.

from the Believer's Bible Commentary:

"Isaiah then inserted a word of comfort into this message of woe and judgment. The judgment would last for only a short while as it was designed to purge the people. A farmer must crush his crops to get the desired results. For example, caraway and cummin, aromatic herbs, are beaten out with a rod or stick, not threshed, because their seeds are so small. Grain is ground by millstone, after the wheat stalks are threshed. Various crops must be treated differently so no one step (plowing, harrowing, planting, or threshing) is done continuously.

Similarly God would bring about judgment but not forever. He is the Master “Farmer,” who knows how to handle each “crop.” Therefore the Southern Kingdom should submit to Him because He is wonderful in counsel (cf. Isa_9:6) and magnificent in wisdom (cf. Isa_11:2).

As Herbert Vander Lugt points out, the prophet illustrates

the way God deals with His children by citing three aspects of a farmer's work. First, he declares that the plowman doesn't continue breaking the ground indefinitely, but stops when it is ready for planting (v. 24). Likewise, our trials are brought to an end as soon as they have accomplished His purposes in our lives. Then the prophet says that the farmer sows his seed with discernment, scattering the cummin but putting the wheat in rows (vv. 25, 26). This assures us that the Lord carefully selects the discipline especially suited to our particular need. Finally, Isaiah portrays the laborer threshing his crop. With extreme care he beats out the dill with a light stick, and strikes the cummin with a heavier flail. For the wheat he employs a wheel just heavy enough to avoid crushing the grain (vv. 27, 28). Thus the Almighty uses the gentlest possible touch for our condition, never allowing an affliction to be greater than we can bear."-Believer's Bible Commentary

Hosea--Neither, Nor, Nor...

In chapter 4, The Lord's complaint against the Northern Kingdom is three-fold:

1. Neither faithfulness (KJ--truth)
2. Nor loyalty (KJ--mercy, ESV--steadfast love, NLT--kindness)
3. Nor do they acknowledge the Lord (knowledge of God)

No one likes doom and gloom, thus my impulse is to "get through" the prophets, as if they were a desert in marathon race.  However, my second impulse is that these three disappointments aren't complaints that I should rush by.

He desires faithfulness.  Loyalty.   Acknowledgement.  

His specific complaints were:
*don't keep your vows
*commit adultery
*steal
*kill
*lying
*violence

The result:

even the land will mourn and its inhabitants

Hos 4:6  My people are destroyed for lack of knowledge; because you have rejected knowledge, I reject you from being a priest to me. And since you have forgotten the law of your God, I also will forget your children.

Hosea, a Beginning Exploration

Understanding the Backdrop

From Ellison via Constable's Notes:

“For us alliances between nations are such a commonplace of life that we can hardly imagine a nation standing alone . . .

“It should have been fundamental, however, for Israel that no foreign alliances were possible. The reason was quite simply that in those days the secular state did not exist, and so in practice it was impossible to distinguish between a state and its gods. In an extant treaty of peace between Rameses II of Egypt and Hattusilis the Hittite king it is a thousand of their gods on either side who are the witnesses to and guarantors of it.[86] So even a treaty on equal terms with a neighbouring country would have involved for Israel a recognition of the other country’s deities as having reality and equality with Jehovah. To turn to Assyria or Egypt for help implied of necessity that their gods were more effective than the God of Israel.”

Breaking up fallow ground is what a farmer does when he plows land that has remained untouched for a long time, even forever (cf. Jer. 4:3). This is a figure for confessing sins and exposing them to God when they have remained unconfessed under the surface of life for a long time.-Constable

"Throughout the book you will see that he refers to Israel and Ephraim. Ephraim was the largest tribe in Israel and sometimes the whole nation was referred to as Ephraim." -Bible.org

“And in that day, declares the LORD, you will call me ‘My Husband,’ and no longer will you call me ‘My Baal.’" -Hosea 2:16 ESV

This commentary from the NET notes granted me more insight into the double meaning of the word husband and baal as used in this verse:

"There are wordplay on the terms אִישׁ (’ish) and בַּעַל (ba’al) here. The term אִישִׁי(’ishi, “my man, husband”) is a title of affection (Gen 2:23; 3:6, 16) as the counterpart to אִשָּׁה (’ishah, “woman, wife”). The term בַּעְלִי (ba’li, “my lord”) emphasizes the husband’s legal position (Exod 21:3; Deut 22:22; 24:4). The relationship will no longer be conditioned on the outward legal commitment but on a new inward bond of mutual affection and love. -NET notes

The nuances of meaning point to the intimacy of the relationship and to the liberation and enlarging scope of the relationship in the future. To some extent, are we all constrained in our relationships with God and with each other?  At least to the extent that it depends upon our abilities.  We have moments of unfaithfulness to God--some more than others--yet He continually forgives.  He made a way past this through His Son, loving us as Hosea loved his wandering wife.  It's a powerful picture.

Pawns?

One of my abiding questions in this book and in larger Bible is---are we merely pawns in the hands of a sovereign benevolent God?  How to reconcile the bizarre reality of a God who asks a man to marry a prostitute as an object lesson?  It reminds me of unsettling elements in the book of Job. Why is a "good" man allowed to be tested? Why were these prophets put through the wringer? Why are we sometimes put through the wringer? I feel like it's all pieces of a much grander question of God's dominion over man. What about the "innocent" children in both of these stories that are pulled into the whirlwind of their parents' lives? What about the people in this world that endure the sins of others or of the nation of their birth?

And, how does God view our lives and our individual hopes and aspirations? To what extent are the individual threads of our lives inherently subjugated and folded into His sovereign plans.  An orthodox view seems to suggest entirely.  Yet we are also called to act and be involved.  It's the whole question of free will vs. predestination over again and confusing. This is about all I can make of it when I push myself into uncomfortable places.

“To the modern Western mind, it might seem unfair that the priests’ mothers and children should be punished for their sins. But the concept of corporate guilt and punishment was common in ancient Israel and is frequently reflected in the Hebrew Bible.”[55] Chisolm via Constable

Isaiah 10-11

I'm forcing myself to slow down as I read the prophets---really I'm learning to slow down through the entire Bible reading process. There is great satisfaction in making headway through the Bible, even a type of spiritual pride can emerge--a sense that I am "faithfully mastering this text."  But the reality is, I'm not, and it's not designed to be mastered.  Instead, the hope is that it will shape and master me.  This requires a huge shift in perspective.

A hope is that the Word will seep into me. And seeping takes time without substitute. If I want a strong cup of tea, I must leave the bag in...no dunking and dipping will achieve the same effect.

Isaiah 8-11 requires savoring. After a few readings, subtle aspects of God's character become clearer. Chapter 10 clarifies powerfully that we are mere tools in His hand and should not misunderstand our role in the progress of time and events:

"But the king of Assyria will not understand that he is my tool; his mind does not work that way." Isaiah 10:7

"After the Lord has used the king of Assyria to accomplish his purposes on Mount Zion and in Jerusalem, he will turn against the king of Assyria and punish him—for he is proud and arrogant. He boasts,
“By my own powerful arm I have done this. With my own shrewd wisdom I planned it."Isaiah 10:12-13

"But can the ax boast greater power than the person who uses it? Is the saw greater than the person who saws?Can a rod strike unless a hand moves it? Can a wooden cane walk by itself?"Isaiah 10:15

God allows us to have our moments of sway in the world, just as he did the King of Assyria.  The warning here is not to confuse a moment of power with our own abilities.  He is sovereignly over every rise and fall of things.