hosea on Attachments

While visiting a city in South America, the British Anglican pastor John Stott learned about a group of young Christian students who had become disillusioned with organized religion and formal churche...

Unsurprisingly, whenever we bring the topic of desire into view, our imaginations easily wander in the direction of sex, which can be as discomforting as it is arousing—but it is certainly not irrelev...

Our gracious God, you repeatedly move towards us, even when we pull away. You are not deterred by our rejection of you nor our running away from you. Your love is persistent. We confess our distrust o...

Do you really accept the message that God is head over heels in love with you?

Brennan Manning recounts the story of an Irish priest traveling through a quiet countryside when he comes across an elderly peasant kneeling in prayer by the roadside. Struck by the man’s devotion, th...

There are at least ten God-created longings of the soul:  1. To see my body as sacred  2. To be wanted, desired  3. To be loved without condition  4. To be intimately connected to God  5. T...

The Hebrew word yada (“to know”) is, in fact, used for both sexual intercourse as well as our relationship with God. Every relational event is a stage that affords one a glimpse into the consumm...

Preaching Commentary Lamenting a Living Son This is God’s own lament: a brokenhearted father mourning the loss of a still-living son.  Throughout the book, God has led Hosea to draw from moments of...

Pastor: Because of the Lord’s great love we are not consumed, People: for his compassions never fail. Pastor: They are new every morning; People: great is your faithfulness. ...

Pastor: Almighty and merciful God has heard your confession. Hear and receive His words of forgiveness: "The Lord is compassionate and gracious, slow to anger, abounding in love.  He will not a...

The 19th and 20th century Canadian-American pastor Harry Ironside once told a story of a new Christian who gave his testimony during a church service. Beaming with joy, the man spoke of how God had re...

Preaching Commentary The Good News or the Bad News? Which do you want first: the good news or the bad news? Well, if you’re preaching Hosea these next two weeks, it doesn’t matter what you want.  ...

Our God, you love us unconditionally and with great sacrifice, yet we reject your love in search of another love other desires. We have make harmful decisions while on this search rather than acceptin...

Pastor: O God, You desire not the death of sinners, but rather that we turn from our evil way and live. We come before You, although we have sinned and deserve only Your wrath; yet we flee to Your m...

Lamenting a Living Son This is God’s own lament: a brokenhearted father mourning the loss of a still-living son.  Throughout the book, God has led Hosea to draw from moments of Israel’s past.  Here, ...

I saw the blessed Trinity working. I saw that there were three attributes: fatherhood, motherhood, and lordship—all in one God. In the almighty Father we have been sustained and blessed with regard to...

Our gracious God, you repeatedly move towards us, even when we pull away. You are not deterred by our rejection of you nor our running from you. Your love is persistent. We confess our distrust of you...

Gracious God, we have lost our ability to love for the long haul.  We give up, lack follow through, and withdraw when things get difficult.  Yet you call us to a loyal, never-ending love towards other...

A mother’s service is the most intimate, willing, and dependable of all services, because it is truest of all. None has been able to fulfill it properly but Christ, and he alone can.  We know that ou...

There is the great lesson of “Beauty and the Beast”; that a thing must be loved before it is loveable.

The goal in handling dragons is not to destroy them, not merely to disassociate, but to make them disciples. Even when that seems an unlikely prospect.

No, it is not yours to open buds into blossoms. Shake the bud, strike it; it is beyond your power to make it blossom. Your touch soils it, you tear its petals to pieces and strew them in the dust. ...

Here’s a testimony from Lisa Sharon Harper, author of The Very Good Gospel: Harper grew up as a child of a single mother. After her parents divorced, she and her mother moved from Philadelphia where ...

Creator God, By Your Grace we are born and born again, Like a mother, You long to comfort Your children, Your Son longed to gather us as a hen gathers her chicks. The love of earthly mothers echoes Y...

Far too easily we settle for holiness rather than wholeness, conformity rather than authenticity, becoming spiritual rather than deeply human, fulfillment rather than transformation, and a journey tow...

Pastor: Loving God, whose glory it is always to have mercy: Be gracious to us who have gone astray from Your ways, and bring us again with penitent hearts and steadfast faith to embrace and hold fas...

We keep bringing in mechanics when what we need are gardeners.

By failing to come to grips with how cultural dysfunctions deeply impact the health of the church, our leaders will continue to fail to discern an essential reality concerning the nature of change: Cu...

Ron Roheiser points out three images for retreat used in Scripture that meet us in our yearning; all of them apply in different ways at different times.  ● There is the lonely place to which Jesus ...

Gracious God, your love is greater than anything we can imagine. Yet, we are quick to run to other loves and forget about you. Forgive us for turning away from you. Help us to remember your relentless...