Hosea 8-11

There is nothing particularly new mentioned in these chapters that were not already said before. However, unlike ch. 4-7 that appear as a collection of prophecies (without much explanation), these chapter provide a great deal more clarity about what was happening in Israel.

1.         Read all four chapters on your own and determine what are the main types of Israel's sin that are mentioned the passage.

a.         Broken law (Hosea 8:1,12,9:17)

b.         No knowledge of God (Hosea 8:2-3)

c.         Leadership issues (Hosea 8:4, 9:15)

d.         Idolatry (Hosea 8:4-6,11,9:1,10,10:1-2,5-6,11:2)

e.         Sell out to other nations (Hosea 8:8-10)

f.          Relying on man's strength (Hosea 8:14,10:13)

g.         Broken relationships between people (Hosea 9:9,10:4)

It is interesting to note that this provides a nice summary of the earlier chapters.

2.         What calf is mentioned in Hosea 8:5 and Hosea 10:5?

This seems to be a reference to

1 Kings 12:26-33 (NIV)

This reference makes it much clearer what kind of idolatry people were practicing, why the leadership as well as priesthood has been accused, why the sinning was confined to Israel (at least for some time) and only later moved to Judah, why Bethel was a place for sinning (it is there that one of the calves was placed). Israel was supposed to worship in one place (later turned out to be a Jerusalem):

Deuteronomy 12:1-14 (NIV)

However, as made clear in the reference to Baal Peor (Hosea 9:10), in addition to top-down idolatry there was also a bottom-up one, originating from people mixing with other nations.

3.         How can we summarize the Israel's problems in just one line?

Israel did not worship God properly.

a.         They tried to worship him in their own way and in their own place, rather that according to God's commands

b.         They worshiped him alongside other Gods (violating the first commandment!)

c.         They worshipped him while violating last six commandments, such as mercy and justice.

d.         All this happened because they did not know or understand God.

The Hebrew word for worship means to bow down. The original English word was something like "worthship" - an act of assigning ultimate importance to something. It seems that we are born with a desire to worship. The gift offerings were first mentioned in Genesis 4 (Cain and Abel), burn offering first done by Noah (Genesis 8:20). Note that God did not ask them to make these sacrifices - they were natural.

Yet, as Israel has shown, one can worship God wrongly.

4.         Application. What is the right way to worship God for Christians?

After the sacrifice of Jesus, there is no longer need to atone for our sins - he died for them all. So, instead of carnal sacrifices we are to offer so-called "spiritual sacrifices" 1 Pet. 2:5; cf. Jn. 4:23-24; Rom. 12:1; Phil. 3:3, sacrifice of praise Heb. 13:15-16, monetary gifts Phil. 4:18, consecration of the whole life to God.

Yet this is still very vague.

One reason that the NT is unclear about how to do worship is because any clear regulation could become a stumbling block to some culture. So we are left to interpret it with all the wisdom we have, in the context of our own culture. Yet, there are several important components that must be present in the "true" worship, no matter which culture it is in.

In order not to worship God along other Gods, we need to have a deeper understanding of what worship is. We can learn a lot about worship from the way we worthship other things rather than God. Assume you have something of seemingly no value (e.g. old jewelry) and suddenly found out it was made by a famous master and now costs millions. What's going to happen? Well, you whole attitude toward it will change. You will begin to admire it, think how you can use money, no longer causal with it - buy a strong box. If it needs to be repaired to enhance its value, you would do it even if it costs a few thousands dollars. What has just happened? You were led into a worship.

Applying the same dynamic to God, we need to assign him not just a high value - the ultimate value. And we don't just invest a lot - we invest everything.

In order to avoid repeating the mistakes of worshipping God while violating his commands we must make it clear to ourselves that God does not need our worship. God seeks worshippers not because he needs it but because we need it. God cannot go hungry or thirsty, he can live and achieve his goals without our money or our service. By worshipping God as an outflow of assigning him ultimate worth, we greatly extend our pleasure of knowing him and glorify him at the same time:

Psalm 50:9-15 (NIV)

God also gave us a strict commandment about locality of the worship. But it is not a geographical location. The only right worship is through Jesus. That's why Jesus says in

John 4:23-24 (NIV)

The time here is Jesus' hour - the time of his death.

After the death and resurrection of Jesus, he became the new "spiritual" temple. Worship is no longer confined to place and time, but must be done in spirit and in truth.