Have you ever received an apology that wasn’t sincere? Somebody does something to hurt you, and in order to win you back, they say they’re sorry. In spite of their good-sounding words, you know they don’t mean it. You can tell by the tone of their voice and the look in their eyes that they aren’t really sorry, and they don’t really want to change their behavior. Sometimes, such apologies hurt just as bad as what they did to you in the first place. Can you imagine how God feels when we do that to him?
God’s charge against Israel was that “There is no faithfulness, no love, no acknowledgement of God in the land. There is only cursing, lying and murder, stealing and adultery.” (4:1b-2a) They had become evil and corrupt, infected with the idolatrous ways of the world. Yet, through it all, they still maintained the outward appearance of worship. They observed the appointed religious festivals, and they brought the proper sacrifices that were required by the law. Obviously, this kind of charade didn’t fool God. So God said that he would hide himself from them until they admitted their guilt and earnestly sought his face.
Oh, they tried to tell God they were sorry, and on the surface, it sounded good. They said, “Come, let us return to the LORD. He has torn us to pieces but he will heal us; he has injured us but he will bind up our wounds. After two days he will revive us; on the third day he will restore us, that we may live in his presence. Let us acknowledge the LORD; let us press on to acknowledge him. As surely as the sun rises, he will appear; he will come to us like the winter rains, like the spring rains that water the earth.” (6:1-3)
That’s what they wanted. When they talked to God they expected the soft, soothing rain of a springtime shower. Instead, they got a storm! God said to them, “What can I do with you, Ephraim? What can I do with you, Judah? Your love is like the morning mist, like the early dew that disappears. Therefore I cut you in pieces with my prophets, I killed you with the words of my mouth; my judgments flashed like lightning upon you. (6:4-5)
Their understanding of God was seriously flawed. They treated him like a machine: put in your quarter (your offering, your sacrifice, or whatever) and out comes forgiveness. They wanted him to act according to their expectations, but they weren’t willing to act according to his. They brought God their pocket change, but God was looking for a change of heart. He wanted more than just “lip service”. He said, “I desire mercy, not sacrifice, and acknowledgment of God rather than burnt offerings.” (6:6)
THE WAY OF SACRIFICE
At this point, someone might say, “But didn’t God command them to offer sacrifices?” And the answer would be, “Yes.” In Leviticus, there are five types of offerings they had to give: burnt offerings, meal offerings, peace offerings, sin offerings, and trespass offerings. There are also seven festivals they were required to observe: The Passover, Unleavened Bread, Firstfruits, Pentecost, Trumpets, the Day of Atonement, and the Feast of Tabernacles.
In fact, it is fair to say the average Israelite in Old Testament times probably had to work harder at his or her religion than most Christians work on their faith in modern times! There were an awful lot of rules and regulations they had to keep track of—and today, we think we’re doing well if we can just keep the Ten Commandments straight!
The problem is that the people, for all their outward piety, missed the point of what they were doing. They came to see their religion as an obligation to be fulfilled rather than a relationship with the living God! They also didn’t see the connection between their worship life and the way they treated other people the rest of the time.
Before we become too critical of them, however, it is important for us to examine our own lives to see if we’re not guilty of the same thing! How many times do we just run through the words of the Confession, Creed, or Lord’s Prayer without really thinking about what we’re doing? Do we give our worship of God any more thought than the countless other rituals that make up our daily routine, like brushing our teeth or tying our shoes? Or do we simply think that if we can check off one more Sunday that somehow God will be happy with us—that he will somehow let us into heaven if here on earth we have patiently endured the “Purgatory of the Pew”? Have we stood up at the Communion rail without giving any thought to the body and blood of our Lord, there for us to eat and drink? Have we pictured Baptism as a kind of magic incantation that automatically entitles us to heaven, without ever giving any thought to its daily significance in our lives or our promise to remain faithful, renouncing the devil and all his works and ways? Even pastors, if they are honest, will admit that it’s all too easy to just “turn on the autopilot” on Sunday morning.
This kind of thinking can be summarized as “the religion of sacrifice.” It isn’t easy. It isn’t fun. It doesn’t really even work! Religion of sacrifice always starts with a negative balance—a bank account that’s in the red. The problem with religion of sacrifice is that we can never do enough, because we keep adding to the negative balance—even as we try to make up for it! God would rather that we use our time and energy to help people in need instead of just going through the motions of religious rituals as an attempt to undo our sins.
THE WAY OF MERCY
If you’ve been trying to please God your whole life, but constantly felt like you were spinning your wheels or stuck in the mud, there’s good news for you! We don’t have to offer God our sacrifices to make up for our sins any more—we never really did to begin with! Even in the Old Testament, the sacrifices always pointed to something else: The burnt offering demonstrates Jesus’ total offering of himself in submission to his Father’s will. The meal offering demonstrates the purity of Jesus’ sinless service to God. The peace offering demonstrates the fellowship believers have with God through the grace of the cross. The sin offering demonstrates Jesus as the one who carried on himself the guilt of our sin. The trespass offering points to Jesus’ payment for the guilt of our sins. As it states in Hebrews, Jesus IS the “once for all” sacrifice for the sins of the world. Other sacrifices had to be repeated over and over again—they never really changed anything. But with Jesus once was enough! His righteous sacrifice effectively cancelled out our sin.
To put it another way, as God’s gift, through faith in Christ, we now have a positive balance in our account with God. And he keeps on giving! In the book of Romans, Paul talked about Abraham’s faith, and said, “It was credited to him as righteousness.” He went on to say that these things were also written for us because Jesus “was delivered over to death for our sins and was raised to our life for our justification.” (Rom. 4:18-25)
Maybe you’ve been in a situation where you “had somebody by the neck”. You caught them doing something wrong, and you had all the evidence to back it up. You confront them with what they have done, and they have no excuses for their crime, no mitigating circumstances, and no one to speak in their defense. Are you going to let them have it? Our human nature typically would say, “Yes! Throw the book at them! Make them pay!”
Or perhaps you’ve been the one who was caught, and the accusing finger was pointing straight at you. What can you do? There’s no logical or legal defense you can offer. All you can do is simply plead for mercy, and hope against all hope that your accuser has it in his or her heart to forgive you.
Hosea knew about this from his own experience. He took an adulterous wife, named Gomer. She gave him children, but she wasn’t faithful to him. She left him. Even God’s Word would allow divorce in such circumstances, for the marriage covenant has been broken. But God told Hosea to take her back and to love her, even though it meant that he had to buy her back! That’s mercy. That’s the way God loves each and every one of us.
The point is clear. This kind of mercy might not come naturally to us. Others might not even understand it. But it’s who God is! He is always loving and merciful—even if it means that it causes him pain, even if it means he has to buy us back with the innocent blood of his only-begotten Son. God’s mercy to us is in the sacrifice of His Son. No other sacrifice is needed. No other sacrifice will be accepted.
Now, the New Testament still talks about sacrifices we offer as Christians. We offer God our prayer, praise and thanksgiving in worship. We even offer God ourselves to use for his purposes. (Rom. 12:1) But there is an important difference: these are living sacrifices. They are made out of the abundance of love, grace and mercy that God has already shown to us in our Savior. Just ask Matthew, the tax collector! When Jesus called him, Matthew immediately left his tax collector’s booth without a word or second thought. But did he think of it as a sacrifice? Not compared to the mercy that Jesus first showed him in loving and accepting him as one of his own. Just think—might God be calling you today to sacrifice your pride in order to be merciful to someone that you know?
CONCLUSION: Hosea ends his book with another invitation to genuine confession. He says, “Say to [God], ‘Forgive all our sins, and receive us graciously, that we may offer the fruit of our lips.’” (14:2) Because of Jesus, we know God will hear this prayer. Because of Jesus, the mercy God shows—even to the unmerciful—is the same mercy that can also help us to be more merciful in the way we treat others. Thank God! Amen.
