Pain and Healing

  • April 5, 2022
  • /
  • John Tillman

Scripture Focus: Hosea 6.1-3
1 “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. 
2 After two days he will revive us; 
on the third day he will restore us, 
that we may live in his presence. 
3 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.” 

Reflection: Pain and Healing
By John Tillman

Hosea is famous (infamous?) because of the titillating detail that he married Gomer, a promiscuous woman. There are other sexual details in the text as well.

God is angered by idol worship that involves shrine prostitutes and sexual acts. He expresses concern for the illegitimate children born due to this activity. Hosea gives his own children names that highlight that they are adulterously conceived. 

Hosea’s reconciliation forbids Gomer from prostitution, implying that she was a prostitute at one time. Hosea’s poetic analogies, comparing Gomer to Israel, reinforce this. At least one of Gomer’s sexual partners “loved” her. Was she a prostitute or just an adulteress? When did these things occur? Was she always unfaithful or did it develop? Was she sleeping with many men or just “loved by another man”? (Hosea 3.1)

Reading the Bible well includes becoming comfortable with some ambiguity. Obsessing over missing details isn’t the main point of studying the Bible. We can trust that the truths God has for us in his Word won’t be omitted details.

Salacious depictions of Gomer aren’t the point of Hosea. Gomer’s sexual sins only take center stage as a parable comparing idolatry to adultery. It isn’t that God isn’t concerned about sexual infidelity and sin, it is that those actions are symptoms of a deeper disease. Idolatry is the disease. Sexual infidelity was only one manifestation. 

Today, rumors of drug-fueled sex parties might catch headlines and distract us, but God sees little distinction between these alleged events and other expressions of idolatry. Israel worshiped idols promising financial wealth. Alliances formed through idol worship brought political power. When financial benefits, power, or political victories are on the line, do we kneel and kiss whatever ring we must kiss? How then are we different from Gomer?

God describes through Hosea the pain of cutting out the cancer of idolatry from the people he loved. Hosea shows how far God is willing to go to heal and restore. C.S. Lewis describes God’s love as “quite relentless in its determination that we shall be cured of those sins, at whatever cost to us, at whatever cost to Him.” God is committed to our healing and restoration. Call on him.

Lord, we have been unfaithful.
In pursuit of liberation, we are imprisoned.
In pursuit of power, we are oppressed.
In pursuit of thrills, we endure tedium.

May your Son set us free, indeed.

Divine Hours Prayer: The Call to Prayer
Come, let us bow down, and bend the knee, and kneel before the Lord our Maker.
For he is our God, and we are the people of his pasture and the sheep of his hand. Oh, that today you would harken to his voice! — Psalm 95.6-7

Today’s Readings
Hosea 5-6Listen – 3:44)
Psalm 135-136(Listen -4:23)

Read more about Love Stronger Than Death
The holy jealousy of God leads not to destruction but to redemption and salvation.

Love Stronger Than Death

Read more about The Undeserved Banquet of the Gospel
Christ invites all to the banquet. We will surprise someone by being there, and be surprised in return.

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From Individuality to Mutuality

  • April 4, 2022
  • /
  • John Tillman

Scripture Focus: Hosea 3.1-3
1 The Lord said to me, “Go, show your love to your wife again, though she is loved by another man and is an adulteress. Love her as the Lord loves the Israelites, though they turn to other gods and love the sacred raisin cakes.” 
2 So I bought her for fifteen shekels of silver and about a homer and a lethek of barley. 3 Then I told her, “You are to live with me many days; you must not be a prostitute or be intimate with any man, and I will behave the same way toward you.” 

Hosea 4.14
14 “I will not punish your daughters 
when they turn to prostitution, 
nor your daughters-in-law 
when they commit adultery, 
because the men themselves consort with harlots 
and sacrifice with shrine prostitutes— 
a people without understanding will come to ruin! 

Reflection: From Individuality to Mutuality
By John Tillman

It is sometimes difficult for us to understand the metaphor of faithfulness God is employing in Hosea’s story. How could we? Adultery is barely problematic in our culture.

We care about adultery when it happens to us or someone we love. We make a legal fuss about it. We sing vengeful songs about it. Collectively, however, we’ve basically come to expect and accept adultery. When both partners have remained faithful, we find it remarkable, unusual, worthy of celebration. 

It makes some Christians feel better to blame promiscuity and infidelity on “our culture” and the “sexual revolution,” but it’s not true. Rampant infidelity might feel new but people are only doing more openly today what they did in secret before. Sexual exploitation began with Cain’s descendant, Lamech, and never slowed down.

Like Lamech, today’s sexual priorities are individual satisfaction. “What I want, what I feel, what I desire, trumps all. If that means that you or I must betray and leave wife or husband, so be it. It is my right to sate my appetites, no matter what they are, no matter the cost.”

Gomer chased sexual appetites. Like many who have done so, she came to ruin (Hosea 4.14), finding only loneliness, abuse, and bondage. What Hosea offered Gomer, and what God offers us, is a loving relationship of mutuality to replace transactional relationships of selfish benefit.

Sexual exploitation pushes down the weak. God puts genders on equal ground again. He refuses to treat the women resorting to prostitution differently than the men abusing them. Hosea promises to behave towards his wife in the same way he expects her to behave towards him. It’s not a one-way street. 

Like the crowd in John 8.1-11, many voices accuse women of sexual wrongs while giving a pass to men. Righteousness is used to keep at a distance those we call “sinners.” 

Hosea uses righteousness differently. Instead of separating himself from Gomer, he goes to her. Instead of treating her as beneath him, damaged, or as a slave, he lifts her up, restores her, and sets her free. It is no accident that this is exactly how Jesus treats us in our sins. In Hebrew, Jesus and Hosea have names with the same shade of meaning. Both names tell us that God saves. Jesus is our Hosea, our “savior.” Jesus breaks the curse of Eden, restoring the possibility of mutuality, respect, and love.

Divine Hours Prayer: The Refrain for the Morning Lessons
Purge me from my sin, and I shall be pure; wash me, and I shall be clean indeed. — Psalm 51.8
– From The Divine Hours: Prayers for Springtime by Phyllis Tickle.

Today’s Readings
Hosea 3-4Listen – 2:53)
Psalm 132-134(Listen -1:42)

Read more about A Chiaroscuro Parable
The names of Hosea’s children seem harsh yet God makes it clear that his purpose is to lovingly reverse the meanings of these names.

A Chiaroscuro Parable

Read more about The Sins Behind Sexual Sins
Many times sexual sins are a symptom of other sins such as greed, selfishness, inequality, and oppression.

The Sins Behind Sexual Sins

Love Stronger Than Death

  • April 1, 2022
  • /
  • John Tillman

Scripture Focus: Song of Songs 8.6-7
6 Place me like a seal over your heart, 
like a seal on your arm; 
for love is as strong as death, 
its jealousy unyielding as the grave. 
It burns like blazing fire, 
like a mighty flame. 
7 Many waters cannot quench love; 
rivers cannot sweep it away. 
If one were to give 
all the wealth of one’s house for love, 
it would be utterly scorned. 

Hosea 1.2
2 When the Lord began to speak through Hosea, the Lord said to him, “Go, marry a promiscuous woman and have children with her, for like an adulterous wife this land is guilty of unfaithfulness to the Lord.”

Reflection: Love Stronger Than Death
By John Tillman

Today, we conclude Song of Songs and move, over the weekend, into Hosea. What a contrast!

From the idyllic, passionate love poetry in Song of Songs, we turn to the tear-stained legal documents and pleadings of a marriage in crisis. It’s like turning from a Hallmark love story to a gritty, true-crime documentary. 

The beloved’s poem about the strength of love is one of the most well-known passages of the Bible. It is often quoted as a positive. “Many waters cannot quench love” is on the mausoleum dedicated to Ida And Isidor Straus, who chose to die together on the Titanic as it sank, rather than be separated. Ida is reported to have quoted Ruth, “Where you go, I will go,” as she refused to get on a lifeboat without her husband. (Ruth 1.16)

However, there is also a warning within this passage. Love strong as death, like a blazing fire, unable to be quenched, unable to be bought off, or denied…this is a confession. Human love can be twisted, becoming sinful jealousy that destroys what it can no longer possess or takes with force what will not yield to it. This leads to rape, domestic violence, abuse, and often murder. This unyielding love can lead to wickedness in humans, but in God it is the motivation for the gospel. The holy jealousy of God leads not to destruction but to redemption and salvation.

Hosea is God’s stand-in depicting this. His anger and hurt are real and justifiable. His love burns. His jealousy rises. Hosea’s human love is as strong as death and by Jewish law, he could have demanded death for Gomer.

God chose, rather than let us sink in the titanic disaster of our sin, to sink himself. His love is so great, that he did not die with us, sinking into oblivion. Rather, he died instead of us and when he sank into the grave, it was only to lift us up after him.

God’s love is stronger than death. His love breaks the unyielding hold of the grave. His love burns through any barrier that would come between us. His love quenches the fires of sin that would burn us. His love gave all the wealth of his house, becoming poor that we can become rich. (2 Corinthians 8.9) 

Who could scorn this kind of love?

Music: “Love As Strong As Death” – Canticle of Plains by Kevin Max / Rich Mullins

Video: Overview of Hosea by The Bible Project

Divine Hours Prayer: The Request for Presence
Be pleased, O God, to deliver me; O Lord, make haste to help me. — Psalm 70.1

– From The Divine Hours: Prayers for Springtime by Phyllis Tickle.

Today’s Readings
Song of Songs 8Listen – 2:23)
Psalm 123-125(Listen -1:52)

This Weekend’s Readings
Hosea 1Listen – 2:08), Psalm 126-128(Listen -1:158)
Hosea 2Listen – 3:48), Psalm 129-131(Listen -2:03)

Read more about The Naked Emotion of God
Hosea. This shows us a God unashamed of shame, nakedly confessing his love for the unlovable.

The Naked Emotion of God

Read more about He Stoops to Raise
He strips himself.
He lays aside
His Heaven
His throne
His clothes
His life

He Stoops to Raise

Proper Desire

  • March 31, 2022
  • /
  • Erin Newton

Scripture Focus: Song of Songs 7.10-12
10 I belong to my beloved,
    and his desire is for me.
11 Come, my beloved, let us go to the countryside,
    let us spend the night in the villages.
12 Let us go early to the vineyards
    to see if the vines have budded,
if their blossoms have opened,
    and if the pomegranates are in bloom—
    there I will give you my love.

Reflection: Proper Desire
By Erin Newton

If we overheard this kind of mushy, lovey-dovey, colorful language, many of us would turn red. In this chapter, we are privy to the most intimate description of the woman. It is incredibly flattering; he loves everything about her.

In response, she suggests that they run off to a romantic getaway. Interjected into this proposal, she reaffirms their mutual commitment. 

Just like the previous chapter, she is for her lover. In this case, the second half of the line declares that her lover’s desire is for her. Is this sexual impulse, authoritarian rule, or something more?

Debate has occurred over the term “desire.” It is used only three times in the Old Testament. After the fall in Genesis 3, the woman is said to desire her husband. Sin desires to consume Cain due to jealousy. And finally, the lover desires the woman. The rarity of the word draws attention to its use.

In Genesis 3, the mutual relationship between the man and woman in Eden was suddenly disrupted. This fall from paradise produces “one of the most grievous ills of our world: the unequal power relation between woman and man that has been a feature of nearly every society from biblical times to the present” (Ellen Davis). Her desire after the Fall still entailed her longing for the man as it was in Eden but the new order was a distortion of their relationship.

When viewed in light of creation and the fall, it is desire which seeks to return people to proper communion. Aimee Byrd, in The Sexual Reformation, sees desire as the longing to restore the pre-Fall relationship between men and women.

In the Song of Songs, restoration between the man and woman is exemplified in the lovers’ relationship. She is fully committed to him. He longs for her in a way that echoes the woman’s desire in Genesis 3. Let us redirect our desire to restore unity that was lost in Genesis. 

In this picturesque view of intimacy, it is important to realize that despite the ideal nature of their relationship, the lovers can never satisfy their deepest longings. Aimee Byrd aptly warns, “Unlike the many resources marketed to Christians today, it isn’t found in so-called biblical manhood or womanhood. Unlike the many who oppose them, it isn’t found in egalitarianism…Joy is found in properly oriented desire.” And that desire is found in Christ, our Bridegroom. 

Divine Hours Prayer: The Refrain for the Morning Lessons
My eyes are upon the faithful in the land, that they may dwell with me. — Psalm 101.6

– From The Divine Hours: Prayers for Springtime by Phyllis Tickle.

Today’s Readings
Song of Songs 7Listen – 1:55)
Psalm 120-122(Listen -2:12)

Read more about Love is Not a Panacea
Why would we interpret sin on her part for being slow to rise and not sin on the man’s part for being absent in the first place?

Love is Not a Panacea

Read more about Love Without Red Flags
“I am for my lover, and my lover is for me.” This literal translation reveals the self-giving attitude of the husband and of the wife. They are for one another.

https://theparkforum.org/843-acres/love-without-red-flags

Love without Red Flags

  • March 30, 2022
  • /
  • Erin Newton

Scripture Focus: Song of Songs 6.3
I am my beloved’s and my beloved is mine;
    he browses among the lilies.

Reflection: Love without Red Flags
By Erin Newton

…the lover’s pursuit continues. The friends ask (perhaps tongue-in-cheek) where her lover has gone. The woman replies that he has gone away but adds the comment: I am my beloved’s and my beloved is mine. Maybe she was threatened by the interest of the friends. Or maybe it’s another praise of the fidelity of the lovers’ relationship.

What is she trying to say about their relationship? Is this a statement about dominance or authority? Is she simply warding off the possibility of seduction by laying claim to the man? If we understand this phrase as a sexual commitment of two lovers, 1 Corinthians 7.4 echoes this same sentiment. “A wife does not have the right over her own body, but her husband does. In the same way, a husband does not have the right over his own body, but his wife does.” (CSB translation)

Couples will likely give a hardy, “Amen,” to the suggestion of their spouse giving their bodies to one another in the context of sex. The guidance given to the Corinthians reveals the mutual equality of the relationship between these lovers. The idea moves beyond the concept of one person domineering the other; the husband and wife have the same instructions.

“The words express not clutching possessiveness but full belonging, one to the other,” Ellen Davis states. This is the ideal relationship. No red flags. No manipulation. This is the caring, selfless love of two people who seek the best for one another. It is easy to fulfill the desires of your spouse when that sense of mutual commitment and love is present.

This phrase which seems to summarize the essence of the ideal relationship is a four-word Hebrew phrase. You could translate it simply, “I am for my lover, and my lover is for me.” This literal translation reveals more of the self-giving attitude of the husband and the same self-giving attitude of the wife. They are for one another.

On Mount Sinai, God told the Israelites he would be their God and they would be his people (Leviticus 26.12). This relentless, fully committed love from God is our model.

A healthy relationship is a two-way street. The lovers share the same vision of respect, care, and desire for one another. In these statements, it can be hard to differentiate the words of the man and the words of the lover. Love is not self-seeking.

Divine Hours Prayer: The Greeting
Let all peoples know that you, whose Name is Yahweh, you alone are the Most High over all the earth. — Psalm 83.18


– From The Divine Hours: Prayers for Springtime by Phyllis Tickle.

Today’s Readings
Song of Songs 6Listen – 1:48)
Psalm 119:145-176 (Listen – 15:14)

Read more about Sexuality and Spirituality
True love seeks to move beyond the self-absorption that is common in our culture.

Sexuality and Spirituality

Read more about You’re The Top
Balancing humility and honesty while receiving compliments is complex. Neither self-inflated pride nor self-effacing despair are healthy.

You’re The Top