Notes of an Address to the Y.W.C.A. at Swansea

Hosea iii. 1-3. One of the most precious double promises of the Bible. Is it for lis? See who it is for — if we answer to the description. The question need never be, are we

enough, but are we bad enough, for claiming the promise.

I. Our personal position.

1. Beloved, yet faithless. (Isa. lxiii. 7-10.) The love of the Lord (Mai. i. 2; 1 John iv. 10; Jer. xxxi. 3; John xiii. j). “Yet” ;erous, and He knew it (Isa. xlviii. 8). ‘’Who look to other gods” (Isa. xxvi. 13). Who “love flagons of wine,” i.e. earthly joys; craving, etc. Guilty under the first command (Matt xxii. 37). Does this describe us? or do we remember His love “more than wine” (Cant. I. 4)?

2. “Bought” (ver. 2). “So I bought her,” because no other way would do. The faithless one must be made His own by right. (1 Cor. vi. 19, 20.) “Redeemed with the precious blood of Christ” (1 Pet. 1. 19). There is the force of the “so,” by Thine agony and bloody, sweat, by Thy cross and passion (Isa. liii. 3); so He bought her.

Another view of “so” is just contrary to what we should have expected, “let him alone (Hos. iv. 17). “And I said after she had done all these things, Turn thou unto me” (Jer. iii. 7).

“Bought her to Me.” Boaz purchased Ruth to be His wife (Ruth iv. 8, 10); only money there, here blood. What intensity of desire is implied! How Jesus must have zvanied us. “In His love and in His pity He redeemed.”

II. The Lord’s personal covenant with us.

1. “Thou shalt abide for Me.” “Shalt “has a fourfold meaning: (1) Purpose (Ps. iv. 3: 2 Tim. iv. 18; Isa. xliii. 21; Rom. xi. 4). Now: “seemeth it but a small thing unto you, that the God of Israel hath separated you from the congregation of Israel, to bring you near to Himself?” (Num. xvi. 9.) (2) Command. “Shalt” “for” “in” “with me.” (3) Promise (Ps. xc. 1). Shall abide; compare “ye shall abide in Him” (1 John ii. 27). Christ undertakes our part, because we cannot (Zech. ix. 7). And the new covenant was established (Heb. viii. 8-10). Won’t you trust Him to do this (Isa. xxxviii. 14)? 1(4) Resolve (Ps. lxxx. 17, 18, with Jude 24).

“Many days”; compare Matt, xxviii. 20, i.e. “all the days,” and Exod. xxi. 6.

“So will I also be for thee.” In the past (Gal. ii. 20), but see the present-, e.g. a mother “lives for” her child, thinking, caring, watching, providing, managing, directing, cherisheth. “So will I also be for thee,” in every detail; e.g. Rom. viii. 31, Ps. lvi. 9.

Who then is willing to enter this full, blessed, complete covenant? Personal, “with me” (2 Sam. xxiii. 5; Eccles. iii. 14), Now, “come,” etc. (Jer. 1. 5.)

“If you are not for Him, you are against” (Luke xi. 23,) your side against God, God’s side “against thee” (Ezek. xxxv. 3). But take a contrasted glimpse; if you are willing to be “for Him” you have the King’s own answer, now, “Behold, I am for you” (Ezek. xxxvi. 9; Hos. ii. 19, 20; Isa. xliv. 5).