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How do the many facets of God’s love on display in Hosea strike us?  Are we tempted to bristle when we see that God’s love is not won by or contingent upon anything special within us?  How about when God’s love demands correction and, at times, severe correction?  Do our sensibilities have room for the love of God which places demands for obedience on His people?  Further, do we see the faithful, enduring, and relational aspects of God’s love not only with Israel in the midst of their unfaithfulness, but in the midst of ours as well?

God’s love is perfect and more fully-orbed than we can ever fully wrap our minds around.  As we see in Hosea and in our passage in particular, God expresses His love in both tender and severe senses alike.  In a culture that is filled with a version of love that is expected to both “sweep me off my feet” and “love me for exactly who I am” (and with zero perceived need to change), it can be difficult to grapple with aspects of God’s love that our culture would quickly dismiss as outright unloving. 

But does the Creator God who is love (1 Jn. 4:8) have the right to define and express love as it truly is?

Though God has helped my appreciation for His gracious initiating love to grow over time, I still find temptations within me toward wanting there to be something inherently special about me that drew and won God’s love.  I can also find myself in seasons of needing God’s disciplining and correcting love, but instead despising it (Prov. 3:11) and only wishing it for people that I think need it more than I do.  Often, I can even let my experiences, and perception of my experiences, be the lens through which I see God’s love instead of trusting what He Himself has revealed and perfectly demonstrated.

Maybe you resonate with some of my wrestlings. Maybe there are other ways you tend to grapple with aspects of God’s love.  Together, may we:

  • Humbly recognize that God’s love toward us is not based on anything outside of Him and His perfect grace
  • Truly take God at His Word and believe all of what He has revealed about His love
  • Respond to God in loving obedience and submission to His commands