eXXit mobile index: Today's title Today's passage Today's questions Today's practical help eXXit study index Want to Become a Christian?

Thrilling the Heart of God mobile index

Today's Three-minute Bible Study
Print, Study and Apply

Title: Thrilling the Heart of God ------------------- Date: 9/6/2002
Keyword: "emotions"
Welcome to eXXit, the web site designed to help you stand strong in the face of sexual temptation.

Passage: Hosea 11:8* mobile index

How can I give you up, O Ephraim?

How can I surrender you, O Israel?

How can I make you like Admah?

How can I treat you like Zeboiim?

My heart is turned over within Me,

All My compassions are kindled.

Questions mobile index

1. This verse form Hosea describes God’s self-talk? What does it appear He is contemplating?

 

2. Judging by this one verse, what emotions does it appear that God is experiencing?

 

Practical help mobile index

What a powerful verse! In the passage in Hosea in which it occurs, God has been rehearsing the themes of His people’s sin. He is laying out a case against them because of their immorality and their idolatry. He even says, earlier in the book that He is going to "cut them off." He is going to deliver Israel to her enemies because of her sins.

Then, in a shocking display of divine vulnerability in chapter 11, God exposes His emotions to us. He sounds just like a caring parent who has to consider drastic discipline against a wayward child. The parent’s heart is so bound up with the child that he or she can scarcely imagine bringing hard consequences on the child. The mom or the dad has an internal wrestling match, trying to decide which way to go — discipline or not.

Can’t you hear the same struggle going on inside God in Hosea 11:8? He loves His people with all His great heart, but knows that their sin merits discipline. He even knows that such discipline is the only remedy for the people’s rebellious spirit. But He is torn — He doesn’t want to inflict suffering on the people He loves.

There is something compelling about this vision of God’s heart for His people that can actually be THE factor that pushes us over the edge toward a life of purity and away from porn.

Specifically, when we sin — through viewing porn or in any other way violating God’s desires for us — we impact Almighty God. It is not that we thwart His plan, nor is it that God is emotionally needy. But if Hosea 11:8 teaches us anything, it teaches us that our behavior touches the heart of God, for good or ill.

Instead of grieving God’s heart through continued involvement with the fleeting pleasures associated with pornography (see Ephesians 4:30), we can each determine to thrill His heart (see 2 Corinthians 5:9; Ephesians 5:10; Colossians 1:10; 1 Thessalonians 4:1; Hebrews 11:5-6; 13:21; 1 John 3:22 [Click here to look these up on-line]) with our eager pursuit of purity as we seek to honor Him in all we do.

eXXit homepage
Index of three-minute studies
Copyright 2002 by eXXit
*"Scripture taken from the NEW AMERICAN STANDARD BIBLE®, © Copyright The Lockman Foundation 1960, 1962, 1963, 1968, 1971, 1972, 1973, 1975, 1977, 1995. Used by permission."