I enjoyed chatting with Nancy Guthrie about how to teach and preach on Hosea. It was part of her Help Me Teach the Bible podcast. You can listen here and also access additional resources on Hosea.

INTRODUCTION

Fathers, what do you feel when you see your child crying? What do you feel, when you are in ER with your injured daughter. What do you feel, when your child is bullied? What do you feel when your grown-up daughter has a miscarriage? What do you feel when your adult son loses his job? In all these situations you feel compassion, don’t you? You see their suffering, in some senses feel their suffering, want to reduce their suffering, and do all you can to relieve their suffering. Compassion is a beautiful characteristic in a father. To receive a father’s compassion is such a healing experience. The opposite is extremely hurtful and deeply harmful.

Now listen to this verse: “As a father shows compassion to his children, so the Lord shows compassion to those who fear him” (Ps. 103:13). Isn’t that a stunningly wonderful truth? Think of the time that you felt greatest compassion for your children. So the Lord shows compassion to his children. How does our heavenly Father show compassion to us?

BACKGROUND

It’s not easy to understand God. That’s why he uses illustration and analogy so much. In verses 11-14, God comes down to our level and uses three comparisons to teach us about who he is:

• Comparison 1: The height of God’s love. “For as high as the heavens are above the earth, so great is his steadfast love toward those who fear him” (11).

• Comparison 2: The distance of God’s forgiveness. “As far as the east is from the west, so far does he remove our transgressions from us” (12).

• Comparison 3: The depth of God’s pity. “As a father shows compassion to his children, so the Lord shows compassion to those who fear him” (13).

The third comparison that teaches us the depth of God’s pity is connected to God’s awareness of our weakness. “For he knows our frame; he remembers that we are dust. As for man, his days are like grass; he flourishes like a flower of the field; for the wind passes over it, and it is gone, and its place knows it no more. But the steadfast love of the Lord is from everlasting to everlasting on those who fear him” (14-17).

Where can I see my heavenly Father’s compassion?

1. SEE YOUR FATHER’S COMPASSION IN THE BIBLE

See your Father’s compassion in Israel’s life

In addition to innumerable compassionate acts and compassionate laws, God gave specific verses to Israel.

• The Lord said, “I have surely seen the affliction of my people who are in Egypt and have heard their cry because of their taskmasters. I know their sufferings, and I have come down to deliver them (Exodus 3:7-8)
• For if you return to the Lord, your brothers and your children will find compassion with their captors and return to this land. For the Lord your God is gracious and merciful and will not turn away his face from you, if you return to him (2 Chron. 30:9).
• Sing for joy, O heavens, and exult, O earth; break forth, O mountains, into singing! For the Lord has comforted his people and will have compassion on his afflicted (Isa. 49:13; see also Isa. 54:10; 63:7)
• How can I give you up, O Ephraim? How can I hand you over, O Israel? How can I make you like Admah?How can I treat you like Zeboiim? My heart recoils within me; my compassion grows warm and tender (Hosea 11:8)

See your Father’s compassion in Christ’s life

We see the Father in Christs multiple acts and words of compassion (John 14:8-9).

• When he saw the crowds, he had compassion for them, because they were harassed and helpless, like sheep without a shepherd (Matt. 9:36)
• When he went ashore he saw a great crowd, and he had compassion on them and healed their sick (Matt. 14:14)
• Jesus in pity touched their eyes, and immediately they recovered their sight and followed him (Matt. 20:34)
• Moved with pity, he stretched out his hand and touched him and said to him, “I will; be clean.” (Mk. 1:41)
• And when the Lord saw her, he had compassion on her and said to her, “Do not weep.” Then he came up and touched the bier, and the bearers stood still. And he said, “Young man, I say to you, arise.” (Luke 7:13)
• Jesus wept…Then Jesus, deeply moved again, came to the tomb (John 11:35, 38).
• I have compassion on the crowd, because they have been with me now three days and have nothing to eat” (Mark 8:2).

CHANGING OUR STORIES WITH GOD’S STORY

Worship our compassionate God. Think of how many times “compassion” and synonyms for compassion appear in the Psalms. This is one of the major reasons we are given to worship God. Ponder the tender sensitive heart of our God and let this evoke warm worship towards such a remarkable God.

GOD REVEALS HIS COMPASSION
IN HIS REVELATION FOR ADORATION

I see God’s compassion in Israel’s life and Christ’s life. What about in my life?

2. FEEL YOUR FATHER’S COMPASSION IN YOUR LIFE

When does a Dad feel compassion for his children? In the same way and to an even greater degree does our heavenly Father feel compassion for us.

When we are small. Most dads will never forget the first feelings they had when they saw their children for the first time. Until you are a Dad, you really can’t feel this pity for children. God has such compassion for us no matter our age.

When we sin. We are much more patient with the sins of our children than we are with adults. We understand their weakness and folly. We may feel both anger and affection. God has similar compassion for us when we sin.

When we slip. As dads we learn to distinguish between deliberate sins and accidental slip-ups. We see our children make unintentional mistakes that hurt them. Sometimes we know they are making mistakes but we have to let them so that they learn for the future. God has similar compassion for our slip-ups.

When we’re scared. Don’t you hate it, dads, when your child comes into your room trembling because of a nightmare? “It’s OK! I’m here. I’m with you. It wasn’t real,” we assure them. How many times do we hear God saying in Scripture, “Don’t be afraid.” He sees our fear, is moved by our fear, and moves to remove our fear.

When we sag. How do you feel, dads, when your little one cannot keep their eyes open, when they cannot walk another step? You don’t shout at them and demand more do you? No, you pity them and want to carry them or carry them to bed. God is similar when he sees we are tired.

When we suffer. Most dads cannot bear to see their children fall and hurt themselves. Their cries of anguish rip our hearts. Similarly when God sees, our physical, emotional, mental, relational, spiritual sufferings, his heart go out to us.

When we sleep. How do you feel, dads, when you see your children sleeping? No matter how much of a rascal they’ve been through the day, we cannot but melt when we see them sleeping, we stroke their heads and smile. God shows similar compassion to us when we sleep each night, and especially as we go to sleep in death.

FAITH IN GOD’S COMPASSION
HELPS US FEEL GOD’S COMPASSION

 CHANGING OUR STORIES WITH GOD’S STORY

Receive your Father’s compassion. Don’t ignore it, or shrug it off, or try to live independently. But welcome it to comfort and strengthen you for daily life and service. We receive it by faith. We believe it to feel it.

Reflect your father’s compassion. This is not just for dads, but for us all (Col. 3:12; Eph. 4:32; 1 Pet. 3:8). We have multiple opportunities in our lives to show the compassion of our Father.

SUMMARY

A NEW CHAPTER

Gospel. When we seek God’s salvation, he shows us compassion (Matt. 7:7-11). He does not cruelly hide from seekers but loves to be found by seekers. He loves to give good gifts to seekers, especially the gift of the Holy Spirit.

Service. Having received our Father’s compassion we can reflect our Father’s compassion in our family, in our church family, in our neighborhood, in our workplace, in our social circle, in our outreach (Matt. 18:33).

Prayer. Compassionate Father, help me to see and feel your compassion so I can show and express your compassion to the hurting.

DISCUSSION QUESTIONS

1. What other verses and incidents reveal God’s compassion?

2. What characters in the Old and New Testament show compassion to others?

3. Who did you show compassion to in the last week? Who will you show compassion to in the coming week?

4. How can you help your children see our heavenly Father’s compassion through your fathering?

5. What role does compassion have in evangelism?

6. How would you help someone who got the opposite of compassion from their father.

PDF OF SERMON NOTES

INTRODUCTION

How much do you want to be holy? How much do you want to be sanctified? How much do you want to be free of sin and full of godliness? Grade your desire with a number from 1 to 10.

Now do the same with the question, How much do you want to be saved? From a range of 1 to 10, what would your number be?

If we’re honest, most of us have a higher salvation number than a sanctification number. We want to be saved more than we want to be holy. How do we increase our desire for holiness?

Last week, we tried to increase our desire for salvation by showing how much the Son of God wanted to save people even before he came to earth as a man. This week we want to increase our desire for holiness by seeing how much the Son of God wanted to sanctify people even before he came to this earth as a man. In Genesis 32:22-32, we’ll encounter the Son of God in human form proving how much he wants us to be holy.

BACKGROUND

Jacob had to flee his brother for exile after defrauding him. As he left the Promised Land, the Angel of the Lord met him and gave him promises and assurances (Genesis 28).

After spending 20 years in foreign exile, the Angel of the Lord visited him again and told him to return to his homeland and family (Gen. 31:13).

As he entered the Promised Land, the Angel of the Lord together with other angels met him to give him further encouragement (Gen. 32:1).

After hearing that Esau was coming to meet him with 400 men, Jacob sent a large gift to Esau to try to appease him (32:3-21), shepherded his family and servants across the Jabbok ford (32:22-23), and then lies down alone to ponder his likely end the next day. It’s in this desperate context that the Angel of the Lord appears once again to Jacob (32:24-32).

What does the Angel of the Lord teach Jacob about the blessing of holiness?

1.WE LOSE BY WINNING (22-24)

The Arena

Jacob lay down on the ground to spend an anxious night in the dark and desolate desert, perhaps his last night on earth. This is the scene for a life-or-death wrestling match that ends up with both competitors winning. Let’s take our seats ring side as the wrestlers are introduced.

The Wrestlers

Jacob had certainly lived up to his name, which meant ‘heel-grabber’ or ‘supplanter.’ From the day of his birth he had tried to overtake his brother Esau and obtain physical and spiritual blessings by foul means. Having succeeded at Esau’s expense, now Esau was heading his way with a 400-strong army.

We’re told solemnly and ominously that Jacob was left alone (24). He had sent his family and servants on ahead and was now alone with his own thoughts, contemplating the awful day that lay ahead of him–probably the day of his death.

In that fear-filled moment, a shadowy male figure appeared out of the night, advanced towards him, grabbed him, and a life-or-death struggle ensued. Who is this man?

This ‘man’ is called God twice in this chapter (32: 28, 30). When Hosea reflected on this incident, calls the man an ‘angel’, ‘the LORD,’ and ‘the God of hosts’ (Hosea 12:4-5). We therefore conclude that this is the same ‘Messenger of the LORD’ who appeared to Hagar in Genesis 16, a pre-Christmas coming of the Son of God in human form.

The Contest

The Hebrew verb for ‘wrestle’ here, indicates that the contest was initiated by the man not Jacob. The man was the instigator, the aggressor, while Jacob was the defender, fighting for his life. The struggle was momentous and long. As we will see, the ‘man’ could have ended this much quicker, whenever he chose, but (like a Dad with a small boy) decided to accommodate himself to Jacob for the purposes of the matchup.

CHANGING OUR STORIES WITH GOD’S STORY 

Jacob had won each human contest up until this point. He had ‘beaten’ his father Isaac, his brother Esau, and his uncle Laban. He was a winner, someone who won blessings by fair means or foul, usually foul. But his winning ways had brought him to a dead end, an end that looked like death. Many win in this world but lose their lives, both here and hereafter (Mark 8:36). We can lose by winning.

How do I win from God’s perspective?

2. WE WIN BY LOSING (25-32)

The Knockout

When the man saw that he did not prevail against Jacob, he touched his hip socket, and Jacob’s hip was put out of joint as he wrestled with him (25).

Eventually, the ‘man’ realized that Jacob would not give up fighting, he would not surrender, he would not ‘tap out.’ The ‘man,’ therefore, ended the contest with a simple supernatural touch on Jacob’s hip, reducing Jacob to helplessness. After hours of grappling and gripping, he easily dislocated Jacob’s hip, ending the contest and ending Jacob’s winning run.

The Winners

The contest was over and the ‘man’ was the clear winner. But Jacob, like a little child hanging on to his Father’s leg, refused to let go of the man. “I will not let you go unless you bless me” (26), protested Jacob. He’s hanging on helplessly to the one who has defeated him. Jacob is no longer trying to get the blessing but asking for the blessing, he’s no longer scheming for a blessing but begging for it from someone whom he recognized as the only source of blessing. Hosea says that Jacob not only grappled with the Angel, but he wept and pleaded for a blessing (Hosea 12:4).

The Trophy

Who won this wrestling match? Both won, but in different ways. The ‘man’ won by winning, by defeating Jacob, weakening him physically, and weakening him spiritually. He humbled his body and his heart. The ‘man’s’ victory is underlined by his asking Jacob for his name (27). He knew it already, but he’s asking Jacob to say his name as a confession, to identify with his identity as a supplanter, a cheat, a conman, a grifter who got his way by beating down others to get to the top. The ‘man’ gets a trophy of grace.

But, Jacob also won. He won by losing, and ended up with five trophies in his cabinet.

• A new name. The Lord blesses Jacob with a change of character, and confirms it with a change of name. Your name shall no longer be called Jacob, but Israel, for you have striven with God and with men, and have prevailed (28). Israel means ‘Power with God’ he’s given this name because “you have fought with God and have won.” Clearly he did not win by winning. He won by losing. His new name would therefore remind him of his new way of getting power from God and winning with God: through weakness. He leaves force and fraud behind in the desert, together with his old name. He goes forward with helpless faith, hanging on to God in great weakness. The way to have power with God is to be broken by God. As Ed Clowney put it: “Faith wins when it knows that all is lost, and clings to God alone.”

• A new blessing. He asks for the man’s name, but the man gives him a blessing instead. And there he blessed him (29). Where? In the place of weakness, defeat, injury, and tears.

• A new landmark. So Jacob called the name of the place Peniel (‘face of God’), saying, “For I have seen God face to face, and yet my life has been delivered” (30). Like Hagar, he’s astonished that he’s seen God and he’s still alive. He had seen God’s face and lived and therefore he could see Esau’s face and live.

• A new limp. He limped upon his thigh for the rest of his days (31-32) so that Jacob would never forget the strength of weakness. By wounding him, God healed him. Both the sinew and his self-confidence shriveled. Like Paul, Jacob is now going forward in God’s strength (2 Cor. 12:7).

• A new memory. The Lord shows his care for Jacob by giving him and Israel a permanent reminder of the lessons of this wrestling match. Every time they set this sinew aside they would remember the path to blessing is through weakness.

Though remnants of the ‘old man’ would continue, Jacob was sanctified by this encounter with the Angel of the Lord, the pre-incarnate Christ. He learned strength through weakness, and, above all, learned that God was a covenant-keeping God who cared for him and would keep His promises without Jacob’s help. Thus, the chapter ends the wrestling bout with two winners.

CHANGING OUR STORIES WITH GOD’S STORY

Strength lies in confessed and felt weakness before God. As Hosea reminded Jacob’s descendants many years later (Hosea 12:4-6), this incident teaches us that the way to victory is not in wrestling God to the ground, but in having God wrestle us to the ground. In fact, better just start on the ground in confessed weakness. That’s the way to be Christ’s trophy and get trophies from Christ. We win by losing.

Christ came before Christmas to save Hagar and to sanctify Jacob. Charles Drew said: “He graciously adopted such methods to indicate how much he longed for the fullness of time when he should put away their sins and bring in an everlasting righteousness for them.” Or as John Calvin put it, “For even though he (Christ) was not yet clothed with flesh, he came down, so to speak, as an intermediary, in order to approach believers more intimately.” Christ came before Christmas. What an encouragement to us as we seek salvation and holiness from Jesus. He wants this for us even more than we want it for ourselves.

SUMMARY

PRAYER

Messenger of the Lord, thank you for coming to sanctify saints. Please sanctify me with your desire for my sanctification.

DISCUSSION QUESTIONS

1. How would you grade your desire for holiness?

2. What increases or decreases your desire for holiness?

3. When have you seen spiritual losses through winning? What did you lose?

4. When have you seen spiritual gains through losing? What were your gains?

5. How much does Jesus desire our holiness? What effect does that have upon you?

6. What does Christ coming before Christmas to sanctify Jacob tell you about Christ’s coming at Christmas?

PDF of Sermon Notes

We cannot see because there’s too much to see. We do not know much because we know too much.

Listen here.

Reading: Hosea 10:12

We are in great danger of being seduced by the world. When I say “the world,” I don’t mean planet earth. I’m using “world” in the biblical sense of everything that draws our attention away from God. It can be evil things like drink, drugs, gambling, stealing, etc. But it can also be good things like work, relationships, sport, politics, hobbies, etc. If these things are devoid of God or distract from God, they are “the world.

“The world” is everything and anything that displaces God as the center of our life, the foundation of our life, the end of our life (1 John 2:15-16). It could be science without God, art without God, music without God, travel without God, religion without God. It can use corporations, the media, movies, Hollywood, Instagram, politics.

We are in great danger of being seduced by that world. That’s why the world is some-times portrayed in the Bible as a prostitute (Hosea 1:2; Rev.17:5, 18).

• It’s very attractive
• It’s very popular
• It’s very deceptive
• It’s very dangerous

When we read Proverbs 7, we read about a prostitute seducing a young man to his dest-ruction. Of course, this can be literally true. It happens all the time. However, the prostitute is also symbolic of the world’s seductive danger. Solomon put this passage in the Bible to help us avoid and escape the world’s seductive charms. Let’s identify this great enemy so that we can avoid and escape it.

For more see my sermon notes here.