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Ring of Truth provides 366 daily ‘proofs’ that the Bible is consistent throughout from Genesis to Revelation, and relevant for our lives today!
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Hosea 3:1-2
“The Lord said to me, ‘Go, show your love to your wife again, though she is loved by another and is an adulteress. Love her as the Lord loves the Israelites, though they turn to other gods and love the sacred raisin cakes.’ So I bought her for 15 shekels of silver and about a homer and a lethek of barley.”
What is your price?
Joseph was sold as a slave for 20 pieces of silver, Jesus was betrayed for 30 but Israel (Gomer) for only 15. That is how ‘worthless’ she was.
She had gone back to where she had come from. She had betrayed and violated her marriage covenant with Hosea and continued her adulterous prostitution. But what had she gained? She had gained nothing. She had virtually lost her soul, her respect, her dignity, her self-worth, her security and her significance. What a price to pay. It is never worth it. Satan deceives us into thinking that we will gain so much, but he never reveals the true cost.
How often we see that in materialism, let alone misplaced relationships. We go for the fast, temporary pleasure not realising that in so doing, we end up like Esau, selling our birthright for a bowl of stew. We lose everything for something that loses its worth as soon as it is gained (see Genesis 25:27-34).
Maybe you feel that is where you are today. You longed for something, maybe even a relationship and what you received turned sour as soon as you gained it. But there is good news.
Our God is a good God. He is the God of the 2nd chance. Yes, even of the 3rd, 4th and 5th chance. Just as with Gomer. Hosea was told to go and get her back. Why? “Love her as the Lord loves the Israelites.”
Although she was virtually worthless, although she had become dirty, unattractive and unloved, Hosea bought her back, brought her back and made her his wife once more. She regained love, self-worth, self-respect, security and significance.
So will you? Come back to Jesus, confess where you are at, receive His forgiveness, determine never to go that way again and allow His Spirit to fill you and be the answer to your deepest needs.
Yes, the Israelites would live without a king for a time but “Afterward the Israelites will return and seek the Lord their God and David their king. They will come trembling to the Lord and to His blessings in the last days” (v 5).
Never forget this - God is a gracious long-suffering God. Look again at Psalm 103 – read it all – it has the same ‘Ring of Truth’!
Remember this, too – if you want to live in blessing – you have to be where God is.
But listen. He paid the price to redeem you. And do you know what? It cost a whole lot more than 15 pieces of silver. More than 20, indeed more than 30. It cost the life of Jesus, the Son of God.
You have been set free to love and serve Him for the rest of your life.
Now go and live in the blessings that are yours because you do so.
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