Dan Olinger

"If the Bible is true, then none of our fears are legitimate, none of our frustrations are permanent, and none of our opposition is significant."

Dan Olinger

Chair, Division of Biblical Studies & Theology,

Bob Jones University

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What Peter Learned in the High Priest’s Palace, Part 2: Growth

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Part 1: Introduction

Peter begins his second chapter by describing his audience as babies (1P 2.2).

That’s not normally a compliment; nowadays, when you call somebody a baby, you’re saying that he’s acting immaturely, selfishly. You’re saying he needs to grow up.

In some places, them’s fightin’ words.

Peter’s point, however, is not at all hostile or demeaning. He’s telling us something he learned through his failure.

When you come to Christ, you’re not just getting your sins forgiven and escaping from judgment; you’re starting a whole new life. This is happening in the spiritual sphere rather than the physical, but there are significant points of comparison between the two. When you first come to Jesus, you’re a spiritual baby, and like a physical baby, you desperately need to grow up spiritually. This isn’t an accusation; it’s a fact. We don’t denigrate babies for being babies; we nurture and protect them—and we feed them like crazy: all they want, whenever they want. We rearrange our lives around the baby’s hunger pangs.

If babies don’t grow, they die.

That’s true in botany as well as human development. Some people—we say they have a “green thumb”—can make plants grow seemingly without effort. Others—including yours truly—kill everything they touch. I once killed a barrel cactus.

Do you know how hard it is to kill a barrel cactus?

The growth principle is true in business too. You can’t just create a system and cash checks while the system hums along smoothly; you need to grow, constantly adapting to new market conditions. If you don’t, your competitors will eat you alive. (See under “Howard Johnson’s Restaurants.”)

Children know that they need to grow. They follow their advancing age a half a year at a time: “I’m not five; I’m five and a half.” They mark their advancing height on the closet door frame. They talk about what they’re going to do when they’re whatever age.

I recall when my daughter turned 6 and was allowed to go to the stage productions on campus. Her first one was an opera—Barber of Seville if I remember correctly—and when the overture started, she slid forward in her seat and hardly moved for the rest of the night. What a delight it was for her to experience growing up.

Children talk about it all the time: “When I grow up, I’m gonna … “ I’ve never gotten over that; I’ve enjoyed every year more than the one before.

We love to grow, to mature, to get better at things we enjoy. Growth is good.

One dark night Peter learned that in his life in Christ, he was a baby; he had a lot of growing to do.

What makes a baby grow?

Nutrition. Lots of it. He eats and eats and eats, and eats some more.

That’s how we grow spiritually as well; we need to eat spiritual food, as much as we can hold. So Peter says, “As newborn babies, crave the unadulterated milk of the Word” (1P 2.2). He has just observed that “the Word of the Lord endures forever” (1P 1.25); there’s no better or more powerful source of spiritual nutrition than that.

We need to feed hungrily on the Word, filling our minds and hearts with it, building spiritual muscle, gaining wisdom and experience, so we’re not likely to do the spiritual equivalent of running out into the street and getting hit by a car.

That’s pretty much what Peter did in the high priest’s palace.

But by the power of the Word, and the Spirit, Peter began a new life. Not a perfect one, by any means (see Galatians 2), but a generally healthy and productive one.

So how’s your growth going? How do those little pencil marks on the closet door frame look?

Part 3: Sacrifice | Part 4: Praise | Part 5: Witness

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What Peter Learned in the High Priest’s Palace, Part 1: Introduction

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Among Bible students, Peter has become almost a stereotype of himself. We all feel like we know him: outspoken, impetuous, the bull in the china shop, lots of braggadocio with comparatively little accomplishment.

Some would say that’s the early Peter, before the Lord changed him at Pentecost. He famously went from “the fear of the Jews” (Jn 20.19) to facing down the Sanhedrin’s threats (Ac 4.5-20) and even to being soundly asleep in prison the night before his scheduled execution (Ac 12.1-7). That’s an astonishing change, not one to be sniffed at.

But then he disappoints us again, allowing the presence of Judaizers in Antioch to intimidate him into withdrawing fellowship from Gentile believers and apparently returning to Mosaic dietary restrictions (Ga 2.11-12)—and this after a vision from God (Ac 10.9-16) affirming what Jesus had taught during his earthly ministry: that all foods were now clean (Mk 7.19).

We can say confidently at least that during Jesus’ earthly ministry, Peter the coarse, tough fisherman indeed fit the stereotype. He was brimming with confidence, speaking out of turn (Mt 17.4), boasting of what he would accomplish (Mt 26.35), even rebuking his Master for a solemn pronouncement (Mt 16.22), and earning a greater rebuke in return (Mt 16.23)—and that shortly after proclaiming him “the Christ, the Son of the Living God” (Mt 16.16).

But as we know, his world came crashing down one dark night in Jerusalem. Despite his boasting (Mt 26.35), he did indeed deny his Master, not once, but three times (Mt 26.69-74)—and a threefold cord, the Preacher tells us, is not quickly broken (Ec 4.12). His denial of Jesus came from fear of a couple of servant girls (Mt 26.69-71). Crashing down, indeed; “he went out,” Matthew tells us, “and wept bitterly” (Mt 26.75).

A hard lesson in the high priest’s palace.

But the Lord has plans for Peter. After the resurrection the angel at the tomb makes special mention of Peter to the women: “Go your way, tell his disciples—and Peter—that he’s going before you into Galilee” (Mk 16.7). And in Galilee, while several of the disciples are fishing on the lake, the resurrected Jesus invites them to come join him for breakfast on the beach (Jn 21.12). After they eat, he invites Peter, and apparently only Peter (Jn 21.20), to go for a walk on the beach. In a tender conversation, he gently reminds Peter of his threefold failure of love (Jn 21.15-17), each time calling his failed disciple to return to service: “Feed my sheep.” And with a stronger threefold cord, not breakable at all, he binds up Peter’s spiritual wounds.

And then he tells him the greatest news of all: Peter is going to serve Jesus until the day he dies (Jn 21.18-19).

And he does. That service lasts a long time, more than three decades according to well-attested tradition. He stays in Jerusalem for some time, during which he faces down the Sanhedrin, as we’ve noted already (Ac 4.8ff); he miraculously establishes order in the Jerusalem church by exposing a lie (Ac 5.1-9); he exposes a false convert in Samaria, while also serving as the vehicle by which the Holy Spirit is given to the Samaritans (Ac 8.14-25); he raises a saint from the dead at Lydda (Ac 9.32-43); he brings the gospel to the first Gentile to believe (Ac 10.44-48); he survives an attempted execution (Ac 12.1-16); and he helps lay a solid foundation for the unification of Jews and Gentiles in the body of Christ by his biblical and theological contribution at the Council of Jerusalem (Ac 15.7ff). According to tradition, he helps start the church at Rome and ministers there.[1]

And later yet, after long service, he writes two letters to believers in what is today Turkey, to encourage them during persecution and to urge them to be faithful until the return of Christ.

In those letters, he leaves a written record of what he learned in the high priest’s palace.

For a few posts we’ll look at just a portion of one of those letters.

[1] Irenaeus (Against Heresies 3.1.1, 3.3.2, and 3.3.3), as well as several citations in Eusebius’s Church History, report this, along with others.

Part 2: Growth | Part 3: Sacrifice | Part 4: Praise | Part 5: Witness

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On God As Lord, Part 3

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Part 1 | Part 2

Peter has argued that God is Lord in multiple arenas. He’s Lord over the course of history, including over those who consider themselves his enemies. More than that he takes the evil acts of his enemies and incorporates them into his purpose and plan; the assassination of the Christ was, after all, the most evil act in history, and not only does it not frustrate God’s plan, but it is at the very center of it; God’s redemption of his fallen image in humans cannot proceed without it. He’s also Lord over death, our greatest enemy; Jesus dies—in fulfillment of God’s plan—but is almost immediately, over a weekend, brought back to life, never to die again. And along the way God has demonstrated that he’s Lord over all the cosmos in that he is not bound by the natural laws that he himself created. He can do miracles, and he can even delegate miraculous powers to others. His Son does miracles at will, and he—the Son—delegates those miraculous powers even further, to twelve ordinary men.

This is lordship writ large.

But Peter’s sermon is nowhere near done.

Raising his Son from the dead, it turns out, is only just the beginning of the Lord’s elevating his Son. He gives the Son all authority on earth—Jesus claims that in Matthew 28.18—and extends that delegated authority to the heavens as well—same verse—and then makes that delegation visible by taking the resurrected Son in the clouds, before a group of reliable witnesses, all the way to heaven itself, to the right hand—the authoritative hand—of the Father, where he sits down in his presence (Ac 2.33-34). The images of authority are just piled one upon another.

The Father has more to demonstrate. He gives to his Son another promise, the Holy Spirit—himself a member of the Godhead—and authorizes the Son to pour him out on his followers, with visible evidences that are themselves miraculous: hovering flames over each head, and the ability to speak clearly and fluently obscure tribal languages that they have never spoken or learned (Ac 2.33).

And the Father makes the Son another promise. “I will make your enemies,” he says, “your footstool” (Ac 2.35). He has already demonstrated their defeat by frustrating their purposes in killing the Son, and in raising him from the dead. But frustration is not utter defeat, and the Father is not going to stop halfway. He will prostrate Christ’s enemies visibly and physically before him, under his feet. And while Peter doesn’t include the end of that story, we know from his fellow apostle John that those enemies will be finally and irrevocably judged and sent forever to the lake of fire (Re 20.14-15).

Peter sums up the Father’s delegation of lordship to the Son with a direct statement: “God has made him both Lord and Christ” (Ac 2.36). Only a Lord can make someone else one.

It’s interesting that Peter uses the word “Lord” 5 times earlier in this sermon (Ac 2.20, 21, 25, 34 [2x]), and in 4 of the 5 times he’s quoting or alluding to an Old Testament passage that refers to Yahweh, the personal name of God. So when he says immediately later (Ac 2.36) that the Father has made the Son “Lord,” does he have that specific meaning in mind?

Maybe, maybe not. But calling Jesus “Yahweh” would be consistent with numerous passages throughout the New Testament.

Peter closes his sermon by answering the question of his hearers: “What shall we do?” (Ac 2.37). His answer is simple:

  • Repent. Turn in discontent from your old life. Reject it.
  • Believe. Trust in Christ, the Lord: the effectiveness of his payment for your sins, and the goodness of his will for you.
  • Be baptized. Publicly profess what has happened in your thinking, believing, and doing.

What a privilege it is to serve such a Lord! What confidence and joy such service brings!

I have lived—imperfectly—under his care and direction for more than 60 years. By his grace, I will live with that confidence and joy for the rest of my days. That is my testimony.

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On God As Lord, Part 2

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Part 1

The crowd thinks that these babeling (yeah, I meant to spell it that way) Christians are drunk. Peter, the leader of the group, and apparently still impetuous, even after being baptized in the Spirit, can’t let that slander stand. He speaks up.

He denies that they’re drunk. It’s only 9 am. How could all these people be drunk this early in the day?

And then he begins what one commentator has called “the first Christian sermon ever preached.” I suppose. If you don’t count the ones by Christ. Or the centurion at the cross.

He takes as his text a passage from Joel 2.28-32 (Ac 2.16-21). God, the prophet said, would pour out his Spirit on all flesh.

This is a new thing.

In the Hebrew Scripture, what we call the Old Testament, the Spirit “came upon” relatively few people—warriors facing battle, sometimes, and some of the prophets. Joel foresees a day when “all flesh” would receive this gift: men and women, young and old, even servants. This would be a decisive shift in the timeline of history, what Joel calls “the last days.” That’s what’s going on at Pentecost, at Jerusalem, in the days after Jesus’ resurrection.

Peter continues his quotation of Joel beyond that. He describes astonishing things, apocalyptic things: “blood and fire and vapor and smoke” as well as changes in the heavenly bodies (Ac 2.19-20).

Hmm. Don’t see any of that happening there in Jerusalem.

Interpreters have taken different views of what’s happening here. Some say Joel’s prophecy wasn’t fulfilled at all, because none of it will happen until the end of the world. All Peter was doing was using it as an illustration. I find it difficult to square that assessment with Peter’s direct words: “this is that which was spoken by the prophet Joel” (Ac 2.16).

Others say that Joel’s prophecy was completely fulfilled at Pentecost—that references to the sun and moon are symbolic, meaning that the earthly powers will be humbled before the reigning Christ. I find that one unsatisfying as well, because there’s nothing in Joel’s prophecy to indicate to the reader that he’s moving from literal prophecy (the pouring out of God’s Spirit) to symbolic prophecy (the earthly authorities being described as the sun and the moon).

Which leaves us with a third possibility: Joel’s prophecy is partially, but not completely, fulfilled here. The pouring out of God’s Spirit on all flesh initiates a new age, which will eventuate in the apocalyptic events he describes. His prophecy plays out over a long period of time—so far, more than two millennia. Pentecost is the beginning of the “last days,” when God’s plan for history and eternity will come to maturity and fruition.

Why now? Why is the pivot point of all time here?

Peter proceeds to explain. He brings up, for the first time to this audience, the name of Jesus of Nazareth (Ac 2.22).

  • This man was endorsed by God, who empowered him to work miracles, mighty acts that some of those in the audience themselves had witnessed (Ac 2.22).
  • He was executed as part of the very plan of this God, who directs all things according to his will and for the goal of his glory (Ac 2.23).
  • And he was resurrected because God is Lord over death as well as life (Ac 2.24).

Why did God do these things? Because he had promised that he would not leave this one in the grave (Ac 2.25-28). Peter here cites another prophecy, this one by King David, in Psalm 16.8-11. But wasn’t David talking about himself? Didn’t he say, “You will not leave my soul in the grave”? Peter sees this objection coming, and he answers it conclusively.

David, he says, is still dead, a thousand years later. But David was a prophet—here his hearers would agree with him—and he knew that God would fulfill his promise to him, to have a king eternally on his throne (2S 7.12-16), even after he was dead.

This God is Lord over all. He empowers his people—ordinary people—to speak in the tribal languages of all present in this thronging crowd. He endorses an itinerant Galilean preacher, and that simple endorsement changes everything about how we view the man. He directs in the hearts of kings to arrest and execute this preacher, thereby perfectly fulfilling his plan. And then he raises him from the dead, demonstrating his lordship over unearthly as well as earthly powers.

Lord.

And there’s more to come.

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On God As Lord, Part 1

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It’s been said that biblical Christianity is not a religion, but a relationship. I’ve said before that the Bible uses metaphors of multiple relationships to describe our relationship with God. It’s as though no single human relationship can embrace all the complexities included in our relationship with God. Over the years I’ve thought of nearly 20 such metaphors.

In recent posts I’ve meditated on God’s standing as Father and as Husband, two of the most common metaphors in the Scripture. Here I’d like to do something similar for a third, his standing as Lord.

I could do that, I suppose, by surveying all the Bible verses that reference this concept. That would guarantee me something to write about for the rest of my life, and it would be a worthwhile study for both of my readers. But I think I’ll approach the topic in the same way I did the topic of God as Husband: I’ll choose a single passage that discusses the topic robustly and then see what’s to be found there. The passage is Acts 2, and as you know from the reference, the event is Pentecost.

For Israel God arranged a calendar designed to keep his people in constant fellowship with him. In addition to the weekly Sabbath, there were annual holidays, involving either fasting or feasting. Three of those holidays—Passover, Pentecost, and Booths—were designated as “pilgrimage feasts,” when the Law required all Jewish males to appear before God, first at the Tabernacle and later at the Temple. By New Testament times, of course, this meant coming to Jerusalem, to Herod’s Temple, the grandest Temple yet.

Pentecost occurred 50 days (thus the name) after Passover, which would be in our late spring (late May this year). Because weather was typically good, this festival was usually very well attended, with Jews returning to their homeland from all across the empire. It was a time of reunions, good food, and great rejoicing.

Luke tells us that the day “was fulfilled” (Ac 2.1). Some commentators see that wording as prophetically significant—that Luke was saying more than that a date on the calendar had come. John Polhill writes, “The ‘fulfillment’ language bears more weight than mere chronology as the fulfillment of the time of the divine promise for the gift of the Spirit (1:4f.). The time of waiting was over” (Acts, The New American Commentary Series, 96). He notes another passage (Lk 9.51) where the same author, Luke, uses the expression to mark another key turning point in the history of salvation, the crucifixion.

In the midst of all this hubbub, Jesus’ disciples gathered, perhaps in the Upper Room, but certainly inside a building (Ac 2.2), when to their surprise, the Spirit of God arrived and manifested himself in a most unusual way—a way not described anywhere else in biblical history. There was a sound of rushing wind (Ac 2.2), and tongues of fire appeared over their heads (Ac 2.3). And then they all began to speak in foreign languages—not because they knew those languages, but because “the Spirit gave them utterance” (Ac 2.4).

I think it’s safe to assume that at this point the small group of disciples erupted from the “house” and began speaking in those foreign languages to the massive crowd out in the street (Ac 2.5-6). This crowd was astonished. Those from the far reaches of the Empire were hearing the good news spoken, not in Greek, not in Aramaic or Hebrew, but in their local tribal languages—Elamite, from way east in Persia (Iran), and Cyrenian, from way west in North Africa. (That’s a 1500-mile spread, which covers pretty much the whole known world at the time—Marco Polo having not yet informed the “known world” of an entire well-developed civilization yet farther to the east.)

The crowds were perplexed. How did these people know all these languages?

Someone suggested that the disciples were drunk.

Now, I’ve talked to a lot of drunk people in my time, and never once has being drunk helped anyone speak any language more clearly.

There has to be a more sensible explanation.

Do you hear echoes of Babel?

The God over all nations, who once scattered its people around the globe by confusing their languages (Ge 11.1-9), now gathers its people from across the globe and brings them grace instead of judgment, using those very languages, or at least their linguistic descendants.

God is great, and he is good.

More next time.

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On God As Husband, Part 4

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Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3

How does Hosea act out God’s covenant love for his people?

He pursues his wife, to get her back.

God says, “Go again, love a woman who is loved by another man and is an adulteress, even as the Lord loves the children of Israel, though they turn to other gods and love cakes of raisins” (Hos 3.1).

One commentator says, “They turn to other gods and love—what do they love?—raisin cakes! These were probably used in Canaanite rituals. They show just how carnal and unworthy is Israel’s outlook” (New Bible Commentary, 769).

So Hosea finds his wife and buys her back (Hos 3.2). Apparently she has sold herself into slavery, perhaps to get enough food and shelter to survive. Like the prodigal son, she has learned that a life of licentiousness is one not of freedom. She is not in an attractive state, but her husband pays the redemption price.

She is now technically and legally his slave. The penalty for adultery is death, and he could take her to the civil authorities for execution, but he does not choose that route. (That calls to mind the thinking of Joseph, “a just man,” about Mary in Mt 1.19.) He tells her that she is to live under his support and without immorality, but also apparently without marital relations, for a period of time (Ho 3.3). This is to illustrate the fact that Israel will be exiled, without a king, for “many days” (Hos 3.4).

But the time will come when Israel will seek to return to David her king (Ho 3.5). In Hosea’s time David was long dead; we know that the one she will seek is David’s greater Son, the Lord Jesus, the Christ (Ac 2.29-36).

One commentator notes,

The pain was just a step along the way of God’s efforts, not to destroy, but to get his people to respond to his love. … The pain was caused by their sin but was motivated by God’s loving desire to restore their original relationship of love and obedience. The pain is designed not to make believers run away from God but back to him (Tyndale Concise Bible Commentary, 323).

That day has not yet fully come. Israel today remains resistant to the rule of its Messiah, though many individuals from that nation have recognized and believed in him. But in the meantime, as Paul has noted, God has used this ongoing resistance to bring into his kingdom all nations of the world:

Now if their trespass means riches for the world, and if their failure means riches for the Gentiles, how much more will their full inclusion mean! (Ro 11.12).

This is about more than Hosea, and it’s about more than Israel.

It’s about more than “the heart of Gomer, who cannot remain faithful, and the heart of Hosea, who cannot abandon his commitment” (Bible Reader’s Companion, 523).

It’s about God, and it’s about us.

The chastisement of God’s people took place within the context of God’s unchanging commitment. His goal through discipline was his people’s perfection, never his people’s eternal destruction. Through his unfailing love, God desired to inspire a similar love in his people. Hosea emphasized that the essence of God’s kingdom was a relationship of response to God’s love (Tyndale Concise Bible Commentary, 322).

We have a heavenly Husband, who loves us as no other ever has or ever will. We need to leave our trivial paper gods and serve Him with our whole hearts.

He is our Husband. Let us love Him.

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On God As Husband, Part 3 

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Part 1 | Part 2

Hosea’s experience with his wife Gomer is not just an ancient story with an obvious moral: marry someone with the character to be loyal. This is a story that began because God commanded it, with a command contrary to all common sense: “Marry a woman who will not be faithful” (Hos 1.2).

Unlike pretty much everyone else in the story, Hosea does what God tells him to—thereby condemning himself to a miserable marital relationship.

Why would God command such a thing?

God exercises flawless teaching technique, and he often uses educational methods that have proven over centuries to be highly effective. For example, he has Ezekiel repeatedly act out scenes for the exiled Jews in Babylon (Ezk 4.1-8, 9-17; 5.1-4; 12.3-7, 17-20). Here he’s going to use a case study, implemented experientially, so its lessons will hit close to home and be both highly impactful and long remembered.

Hosea is going to be a character, the lead character, in a morality play. And, astonishingly, he’s going to play the part of God, at God’s request. A command performance, if you will. What actor would take on such a role, and at such real personal sacrifice?

Hosea’s marriage represents God’s marital relationship with Israel. He entered into a covenant with them at Sinai, a covenant most thoroughly expressed in the book of Deuteronomy, which Moses wrote down and delivered to the people just before they entered into the land that God had promised to them. He had made promises to them, great and precious promises, and they had responded with a corporate shout, “All that the Lord has spoken we will do!” (Ex 19.8). But from almost that very day the people had turned away and demonstrated a shallow view of the marriage and a lackadaisical commitment to it.

Now, centuries later, their pattern of infidelity has been consistent. Through the shocking infidelity of Gomer, Hosea’s wife, God illustrates the many ways his people have broken his heart.

Let me count the ways.

  • She has worshiped other gods (Hos 2.8, 13), which God calls “other lovers.” Idolatry, seen clearly, is spiritual adultery, even prostitution (Ezk 16.33). From its first days as a nation under Jeroboam I, the northern kingdom of Israel had worshiped at shrines—golden calves—in Bethel and Dan (the southern and northern regions of their land) (1K 12.25-33). King Ahab married the Canaanite princess Jezebel and then built a shrine to Baal in Samaria (1K 16.29-33). The astonishing thing is that Baal, the Canaanite god, was the supposed protector and prosperer of the Canaanites, whom Joshua’s army had defeated in battle. How does it make sense to worship the gods of the people you’ve just defeated?! This is not only faithless, but it’s just, well, stupid.
  • She has failed in her obligation to know the Law and its Lord. She is not practicing the attributes of God—truthfulness, faithfulness, kindness (Hos 4.1). She is not loving her neighbor. She has no interest in knowing what the Law teaches about God, let alone practicing it in daily life. She has rejected the Covenant.
  • She is turning to other champions—her own military leaders, and alliances with other nations such as Assyria and Egypt—for her strength and security (Hos 1.7).
  • She is practicing social Darwinism, with the powerful and connected taking advantage of—abusing—the weak, the poor. “There is swearing, lying, murder, stealing, and committing adultery; they break all bounds, and bloodshed follows bloodshed” (Hos 4.2).

So they have broken, and continue to break, the two great commandments: to love God, and to love your neighbor. Over centuries. Despite national commitment and promise to treasure the special relationship that God has granted them.

How does God respond to this?

He speaks with anticipation of the day when he will woo her back to himself (Hos 2.14-23), when his unfaithful wife will call him “my husband” and not just “my lord” (Hos 2.16). He speaks of “steadfast covenant love” (hesed) in his relationship with her (Hos 2.19). He still loves her and wants her back.

And as we shall see, Hosea will act out that role perfectly.

Part 4

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On God As Husband, Part 2

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Part 1

Chapters 1 and 2 of Hosea tell us about his marriage relationship, which is, to say the least, pathological. God tells Hosea, “Go and marry a woman of promiscuity, and have children of promiscuity” (Hos 1.2).

Now, right away we have an interpretational problem. Did God tell Hosea to marry a prostitute? The difficulty we have with that prospect has led to a host of suggested interpretations—

  • Some have suggested that the command was not literal. John Calvin and Carl Friedrich Keil, both noted commentators, hold this view. Perhaps she was an idol worshiper; God frequently calls idol worship spiritual adultery. But this still seems objectionable; why would a prophet of God marry an idol worshiper?
  • Perhaps she wasn’t promiscuous before they married but became promiscuous later. The New Bible Commentary makes this suggestion, as do others.
  • But maybe the text means what it says; she was promiscuous, even a prostitute, before her marriage. This is the view of the New American Commentary and many others. It certainly illustrated Israel’s history accurately; she was sinful when God executed His covenant with her. And there was no lack of such women in Israel (Hos 4.14). Perhaps she was a Baal cult prostitute, a pagan practice designed to encourage the gods to grant the land fertility. It was against the Mosaic Law for priests to marry any woman who was not a virgin, but there’s no indication that Hosea was a priest.

I would suggest that attempts to soften the situation miss the point. As will become clear, Gomer’s sin represents Israel’s sin and by extension our own, which is heinous, brutal, and sociopathic. We were sinners when God found us, and that’s the whole point!

In the normal course of events, this marriage yields children, beginning in the very next verse.

The first child is a boy. God instructs Hosea to name him Jezreel, for the valley where Jehu had judged Ahab’s idolatrous line in the past (2K 10.1-11) and where God will carry out judgment (Hos 1.3-5).

The second child is a girl, whom God instructs Hosea to name Lo-Ruhamah, or “no mercy.” This is a clear prophecy of the coming judgment; God is no longer extending mercy to his unfaithful wife. In his paraphrase of the passage, Eugene Peterson renders God’s statement as “I’m fed up with Israel.”

This is astonishing. God is longsuffering, patient. Can the patience of an infinite God be exhausted? Has he broken his covenant promises to Abraham? to David?

No, he hasn’t. In the next sentence (Hos 1.7) he contrasts his judgment on Israel, the Northern Kingdom, with his mercy toward Judah, the Southern Kingdom. Judah is where the sons of David rule—and while they’re a mixed bunch in terms of their obedience to God, his mercy continues there. For now.

Hosea’s wife has one more child, a son. Again God himself names the boy: Lo-Ammi, or “Not my people.” I don’t know, maybe Hosea wasn’t confident of the boy’s paternity?

And with this name, God makes explicit what was only implied by the daughter’s name: Israel is no longer God’s people; the covenant is reversed.

Now it’s horrific.

But again, in the very next sentence God assures these idolaters that the reversal, the judgment, is only temporary:

10 Yet the number of the children of Israel shall be like the sand of the sea, which cannot be measured or numbered. And in the place where it was said to them, “You are not my people,” it shall be said to them, “Children of the living God.” 11 And the children of Judah and the children of Israel shall be gathered together, and they shall appoint for themselves one head. And they shall go up from the land, for great shall be the day of Jezreel (Hos 1.10-11).

Verse 10 in particular should sound familiar to us, as it undoubtedly did to Israel. This is the wording of the Abrahamic Covenant itself (Ge 22.17)—which was unconditional. God’s patience is not in fact exhausted.

In the end, God is faithful, even when his people are not.

In the next chapter Hosea is going to make explicit the spiritual lessons of his troubled marriage.

More on that next time.

Part 3 | Part 4

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On God As Husband, Part 1

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In the previous series we’ve looked at one of the facets, or metaphors, of our relationship with God: he is our Father. It seems appropriate now to turn to another metaphor, that of husband.

This relationship is commonly acknowledged among Christians, but there is surprisingly little biblical information about it. I suppose most people think first of Ephesians 5.22-33, where husbands are instructed to love their wives in the same way that Christ loves the church. This passage is the text for the pastor’s charge in pretty much every wedding ever performed. I’ve been convinced by a colleague, however, that this passage is commonly misinterpreted. Dr. Gary Reimers, a longtime friend and professor at BJU Seminary, has observed that the husbands are instructed “to love their wives as their own bodies” (Ep 5.28)—and since this same epistle notes that the church is Christ’s body (Ep 1.22-23), then to love “as their own bodies” is to love like Christ (Ep 5.25). So I don’t view this passage as primarily presenting Christ under the metaphor of husband.

That leaves just two other New Testament passages that speak of Christ having a bride. The more well-known of those, I suppose, is Revelation 21, which speaks of “the bride, the Lamb’s wife” (Re 21.9). Earlier John has heard an announcement of the pending “marriage of the Lamb” (Re 19.7), at which his wife is dressed in “fine linen [which] is the righteousness of the saints” (Re 19.8). Now he sees “the holy city, new Jerusalem, coming down from God out of heaven, prepared as a bride adorned for her husband” (Re 21.2). But here the bride is said to be not the church, but the New Jerusalem, which I would say includes the church but is more than that.

The other passage, less well known, is 2Corinthians 11.2, where Paul tells the Corinthian church that he has “espoused you to one husband, that I may present you as a chaste virgin to Christ.” But that stops short of saying that the universal church is the bride of Christ, although I think it’s safe to assume that by extension from the passage.

So I think there’s little to no clear biblical evidence for the statement that “the church is the bride of Christ.”

But in the Hebrew Scriptures God regularly describes himself as the husband of his people. And since the Old Testament saints will be in the New Jerusalem as certainly as we, I think we can legitimately apply what God says there to our relationship with him as children of Abraham by faith (Ga 3.7).

Several OT passages speak to this relationship. Isaiah 54.5 mentions it, and Ezekiel 16 speaks very directly of Israel’s idolatry as sin against God her husband. But I suppose that the most concentrated and well-developed description of this relationship is in the prophecy of Hosea.

Hosea writes during the reign of Jeroboam II (Hos 1.1), in the waning days of the Northern Kingdom of Israel. You can read about the culture of Israel at this time in 2Kings 17. It’s not a pretty picture. One commentator writes, “This is a period when Israel is prosperous, proud and pagan—and thoughts of God and judgment seems ridiculous.”[1] Hosea writes to explain the reasons for the Assyrian judgment (e.g. Hos 12.8) and, perhaps surprisingly, to give hope for the future (e.g. Hos 13.14; 14.4-9).

Much of Hosea’s prophecy follows the standard outline of the Old Testament prophets:

  • Israel’s sin (chapters 4-7)
  • Coming judgment (chapters 8-10)
  • Future restoration (chapters 11-14)

But the book begins with an illustration from Hosea’s marriage, a metaphor for God’s relationship with his people. Hosea’s marriage is not typical (!), but it tells us much about our relationship to God as our Husband. 1Peter 2.10 applies the names of Hosea’s children to the church, as does Paul in Romans 9.22-26 (note “not from the Jews only, but also from the Gentiles,” Ro 9.24).

So let’s glean what we can from this remarkable story of a failed and restored relationship.

More next time.

[1] Andrew Knowles, The Bible Guide (Minneapolis: Augsburg), 353.

Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4

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On God as Our Father, Part 5: Accountability

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Part 1: Introduction | Part 2: Likeness | Part 3: Provision | Part 4: Oversight

A father’s oversight leads easily and directly to the final characteristic of fathers that Jesus teaches in his Sermon on the Mount.

As fathers pay attention to us, they also hold us accountable. When we occasionally (?!) engage in risky or outright harmful behavior, they step in, both to prevent injury and to teach us the importance of doing what older and wiser people tell us to do.

This brings us to the topic of authority, obedience, and discipline.

We live in an age when authority is often abused, and when pretenders to authority seek to abuse the compliant. I think it’s important to note that not all authority is pathological, and there is a healthy way to hold and exercise authority. A good father doesn’t view his authority as primarily about himself or his machismo; he uses his position of strength to guide his charges down a path that is in their own best interests—that will prevent physical injury or death, or negative social or psychological or spiritual consequences. And he does that gently, that’s in a way that is appropriate and healthy for the maturity level of the child. Further, he does it out of love for the child, not for the protection of his status or manhood.

In that light, we’re in a position to understand Jesus’ teaching toward the end of the Sermon that the kingdom of heaven is limited to “the one who does the will of my Father in heaven” (Mt 7.21).

God is not a bully, fearful that his authority will be questioned or eventually overridden. How can an omnipotent God be insecure? How can an omniscient God be fearful? Can I say something reverently? God is comfortable in his own skin. He has nothing to prove and no need for applause or encouragement. He calls for worship not because he needs the personal boost, but because worship is what most directly assures our personal growth and positive outcome; it’s in our best interest, and as our Creator, Father, and the one who loves us most, he is devoted to that outcome for us.

In a very real sense, God’s call for obedience is not a threat; it’s an invitation to joy and perfect fulfillment.

It’s an act of supreme love.

Even the necessary occasional chastening.

The Scripture affirms this repeatedly:

  • As a father shows compassion to his children, so the LORD shows compassion to those who fear him (Ps 103.13)
  • For you did not receive the spirit of slavery to fall back into fear, but you have received the Spirit of adoption as sons, by whom we cry, “Abba! Father!” (Ro 8.15).
  • See what kind of love the Father has given to us, that we should be called children of God; and so we are (1J 3.1).

I have known many people who have grown up without a father. The consequences of that, both in personal pain and in frequent outcomes, is substantial. I have known some of them to find healing, hope, and even joy from finding a relationship with a heavenly Father who supplies what their earthly father did not.

I can testify that my heavenly Father has never mistreated or abused me; that he has ever watched out for my needs and supplied them consistently, completely, and abundantly—far more than I needed. And often in ways that I could not have imagined in my simple prayers.

How, then, do we respond to Him? As sons and daughters—with reverence, obedience, loyalty, and love, looking to and depending on Him for our provision. 

So.

Grace, mercy, and peace to you, my friends, from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ. 

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