May 16, 2013 Repeated Patterns

Read Hosea 7-8 Repeated Patterns Hosea 8:5 Throw out your calf-idol, O Samaria! My anger burns against them. How long will they be incapable of purity? 6 They are from Israel! This calf — a craftsman has made it; it is not God. It will be broken in pieces, that calf of Samaria. “WHEN will they ever learn?” asks Bob Dylan in his song Where Have all the Flowers Gone? as he mourns the unending cycle of life that turns to death of young men in war. He could have written the song about the Israelites. The golden calf keeps showing up in Israel’s history of incredibly terrible sin. When Moses returned from Mt. Sinai with the Ten Commandments, he found his brother Aaron had led the Hebrews to form a golden calf idol to worship. The calf or ox was a supreme deity in Egypt from which they had departed 50 days earlier. They couldn’t let go of sin and worthless idols even when God’s supreme majesty had led them on a miraculous freedom journey to Mt. Sinai. They could even see his frightening holiness on the mountain! Through the centuries Israel continues its sin affair with the idol Baal, symbolized often with a calf or ox. Here in Hosea’s time, Samaria, the northern kingdom of the Hebrew tribes, have chosen the calf idol over their true God. When will they ever learn? They didn’t learn, and they perished. It’s interesting today that cows are considered sacred among the Hindus, people who reject the living God for idol worship. Do you think they’ll ever learn? Do you think we in Jesus’ church will ever learn to put aside our idols and get passionate for our Lord God who offers us his holy salvation even when he has led us on a miraculous life-saving journey out of Hell? It’s True! We need to destroy our idols and worship Jesus.