Apply Within

Bob Davis: The minute that you get away from God's word, you are doomed. The minute that I get away from His word, I'm doomed. I'm going to fall for something stupid, I'm going to start hearing voices, and those voices are going to tell me to build a temple, to have people drink Kool-Aid, and I'm going to say it's got to be God. You watch. We see it every day.

Guest (Male): Welcome to Apply Within, a verse-by-verse study of the word of God with Pastor Bob Davis of North Central Chapel. We invite you to join with us as we, by the power of God's Holy Spirit, apply His word within our own hearts as we study line upon line, precept upon precept, verse by verse through the Bible. Join with us as we study through the Old Testament book of Hosea. Here's Pastor Bob.

Bob Davis: In Hosea, he's now going to preach. He says this in chapter four, verse one: "Hear the word of the Lord, you children of Israel, for the Lord has a controversy with the inhabitants of the land, because there is no truth, nor mercy, nor knowledge of God in the land." I don't like what my wife did. So, you guys listen up when I tell you that the Lord has a quarrel with you. The Lord has, what's the old term, a bone to pick with you. The Lord's got a problem with you. He's not real happy, a dispute with you.

Now, this is to the entire nation of Israel, the Northern Kingdom, ten tribes. Out of his heartbreaking experience that happened in his own home, he comes out, and you can believe that he was probably a little emotional. You can picture John the Baptist. People thought he was nuts. I mean, he's been living out in the wilderness eating bugs. How are you going to feel when he's preaching and you come out dressed in beautiful gowns? He's going to say, "You! You need..." You can imagine there's a little bit of emotion to it.

The Lord has a quarrel with you. Why? Because there is no truth among you. There is no mercy anymore among you, and no knowledge of God in the land. None left, none. Of all the ten tribes of the Northern Kingdom, there was none of that left. Where did it go? Little by little, step by step, inch by inch, it went away. They didn't just dive off that cliff. They found a way to climb down, and they slowly went into that kind of condition.

Now notice, everyone, no mercy, no truth, no knowledge of the Lord in the entire land, all of the Northern Kingdom. Notice that there was still a whole lot of religion. True, they were still worshipping. They would have also said they're following God. They were worshipping all sorts of things. They had pictures of Jesus on their wall, I'm sure. They wore crosses, they had bumper stickers on their camels or whatever they drove, and I'm sure that they all looked pretty holy. They had little upside-down Darwin fishes. They had all that.

But there was no heart left. No truth, no mercy, no real knowledge of God, but they were very religious. Would you like to take a look around the United States of America when you get a few minutes? No mercy, no truth, no knowledge of God, but a church on every stinking corner. Some of those churches, you go down south and some of those things look like temples, those big, huge things. No knowledge of the Lord, no mercy, no truth, but there's everything else. A form of godliness, the Bible says, "having a form of godliness but denying the power thereof." It's not real.

That's what was going on in Israel. That's what's going on in America today. We're in trouble. We might as well admit it. You take a look at what's happening on our streets, at the attitude of the people, and you see that we could learn from the days of Israel, from the days of Hosea. Verse two says, "by swearing and lying and killing and stealing and committing adultery, they break out and blood touches blood." Swearing, that didn't mean they were using bad language, foul language, which I'm sure they probably were. What he means there is literally cursing, or calling down a curse on others.

You know, "I curse you in the name of the Lord. You've cheated me, so I curse a pox upon you." That's what he would mean by swearing or cursing. Lying, pretty easy to understand. Killing, pretty easy to understand. Stealing, easy. Sexual sin, committing adultery. And "blood touches blood," that means it was even going on within families. That there was sexual sin, that there was stealing and killing and lying and swearing or cursing. Blood touches blood, even within related families, related people, husbands and wives, children and parents, aunts and uncles, and so forth, families.

And as we read through this, think about us. Think about America. "Therefore shall the land mourn, and everyone that dwelleth therein shall languish with the beasts of the field, with the fowls of heaven. Yea, the fishes of the sea also will be taken away," or also shall be taken away. Therefore, when you see "therefore," you look and see what it's there for, right? So, what do we read? By swearing and lying and killing and stealing and committing sexual sin, adultery, they break out, blood touches blood. Because of that, and there's no mercy, and there's no truth, and there's no knowledge, because of that, the land shall mourn.

Do you think we're mourning some today because we're acting like Israel acted? We're doing the same thing. Do you think we're going to see some of the same problems that they ran into? I think you'll be surprised that, yes, we will, certainly we will. The land itself will be in trouble. God's judgment for turning our backs on Him, just as Israel is judged for turning their backs on Him, the land is in trouble. Some of you may not remember the days when there was always extra food, grain. There used to be days when we had all sorts of that. Those days are gone.

We don't have all sorts of that anymore. We're even starting to run low ourselves. The rest of the world has run low a long time ago. What's going on? Of course, you know the government's paying farmers to do this and paying farmers not to do that, and there is all this amazing explanation. But everybody's forgetting the one thing that really counts. What's going on? What's happening in this nation? It's starting to unravel. What's happening? We've turned our backs on God. We've become a non-Christian nation, a nation that does not care about God.

I understand that the Muslim religion is the fastest-growing religion, one of the fastest-growing religions in the world and one of the fastest-growing in the United States of America. I heard somebody say it the other day, it was kind of funny. He was defending the Muslims because of their violence, and he said, "In America, 99% of all Muslims are peace-loving people." I understand that there's about near one million Muslims. Okay, can somebody do that math for me? How many does that leave if you take 99% of those?

About 10,000? If they're all nuts, 99% is not a great thing because if 1% are loonies, we'd be in real big trouble, huh? Even if it's 10,000, even if the number came down to only 100, would you want those 100 loonies visiting the stores that you visit with the possible suicide bombing threats that we've got here today? You can see that this nation is falling apart. We don't want to profile people. God forbid that we would do that because the only people so far that have done major damage have been young Muslim men. But God forbid that we would profile them because if we did, that would hurt somebody's feelings.

There was a time when people thought logically here in this country, and they don't anymore. That's part, just part of the judgment. Judgment's not finished yet, but that's part of what's going on in this country. "Therefore the land shall mourn." The country will be in trouble. Look at verse four: "Yet let no man strive nor reprove another, for thy people are as they that strive with the priests." That means, let's put that in American, that means simply this: that the people would not listen to the authority that God had set up.

They would argue with the priests. And of course, we learn that the priests had gone bad as well. The priesthood was going bad. They were molesting children. They were having sex with the temple prostitutes. These are the priests from the temple of the living God in that area. These are the priests called to serve the Lord full-time, and they were having illegitimate children, and they were selling drugs, and it became a mess. Now you take a look at our country, and what do we see? We don't see anything different.

The clergy—what an ugly word, clergy—it sounds like a movie. The clergy are stealing, they're cheating, they're having sexual encounters with most anything that wiggles, random. And these are full-time servants of the living God who will receive a greater judgment when they stand before the King. Just like these priests, the place is a mess. Israel's a mess. God says, "You're such a mess, I'm not going to let you stay in it." They're going to be captured and destroyed and taken out. Remember the Assyrians are coming.

Verse five: "Therefore"—there we see it again—"you shall fall in the day, and the prophet also shall fall with you in the night, and I will destroy your mother." Who would be their mother? Israel. That would be the land, your mother, the nation itself along with notice the false prophets and everyone else with them. False prophets, and we have them. Oh, we're loaded with them here in America. They're rich. False prophets never get away with it. They never get away with it.

So, their lifestyle can be rich and famous, but they don't always get away with it. Trouble's coming. Judgment is coming. That's what He says. The nation itself will be taken away and destroyed, all the false prophets along with everybody else with them. Verse six, a very well-known, often-quoted verse out of scripture: "My people are destroyed for lack of knowledge. Because you have rejected knowledge, I will also reject you. I will also reject you, that you shall be no priest to Me. Seeing thou hast forgotten the law of thy God, I will also forget thy children."

That's pretty serious, I'd say. My people are destroyed. Now, "destroyed" is complete, okay? My people are destroyed for lack of knowledge. Lack of knowledge of God and His word is what He's talking about. Not their ABCs, or their mathematics, or maybe their anthropology, or their composition 101. No, He's talking about lack of knowledge of Him and His word. Take a look around this country. There is a lack of knowledge of God, and there is a lack of the knowledge of God's word, even inside the church.

People do not know God's word. They don't know it, they don't want to read it, they don't want to take the time to study it. Our feelings get in the way. We don't have the time nor the inclination to really get into the Bible. Hopefully, someone will do it for us. Hopefully, someone will take—we'll pay them to do it. So, we have professional clergy and they're paid to do our work for us. The trouble is, even if they're memorizing, we can't remember. So, we're not paying them enough, or either we fire them and get another one, or we dump that church and go find another church that's better because "I'm not being fed."

Somebody said that to me one time, "I'm not being fed." I said, "You have a Bible?" "Yeah." "Well, then eat." Of course, they went to another church. What are you going to do? Got to love them. I mean, that's what God says. He'd beat me up if I don't, so you have to love them. Starve then. They had a lack of knowledge of God's word. What has God said? Do you know what God has said? What has God commanded them? They've forgotten it from Deuteronomy. They're doing just the opposite of what He asked them to do, what He told them to do, but they've forgotten it, they don't know.

What has God promised them? They've forgotten it, they don't know. You see, the people are being destroyed for their lack of knowledge. That's happening today. So, I hope you read your Bible. I hope you study your Bible. I hope you become a man or woman of the Word, that you listen, that you learn, that you let God teach you. The Holy Spirit will teach you. People say, "I read and I don't understand it." Keep reading it. You will understand. Keep reading it, and ask God, "Show me what this means."

He might just pull out a little thing and draw it on a board, I mean, who knows? You'll see. God will teach you. The minute that you get away from God's word, you are doomed. The minute that I get away from His word, I'm doomed. I'm going to fall for something stupid, I'm going to start hearing voices, and those voices are going to tell me to build a temple, to have people drink Kool-Aid, and I'm going to say it's got to be God. You watch. We see it every day in the papers, we read about it in the cults, because people don't—we laugh.

Didn't they know what God said? No, the answer is no, they didn't know what God said. As a matter of fact, they did not know. The church, what's the church doing? Doing everything it can to read every book on the Christian life. *How to Get Along with Your Wife*. Great book, I'm sure. If it hasn't been written, write it, you'll sell it. Some fool will buy it. *How to Get Along with Your Husband*. No woman would buy that. *How to Get Along with Your Teacher*. *How to Get Along with Your Children*. *How to Get Along with Your Parents*.

Check the Christian—do you think I'm joking? Go to a Christian bookstore besides ours. We don't carry that stuff. But go. It'll tell you how to understand what somebody's thinking, which is impossible. You'll read books of—go ahead, read them. That's what the Christian church is doing. Read all the fiction novels you can and learn how it's all going to end. Read all the self-help books, how to fix your own life. "I fixed it, Lord, and there's extra parts, just like usual."

You can attend all the conferences that you can afford. I know among pastors, there was a conference every month. You could go to one every month. Go to a pastor's conference. You don't have to have any kind of credentials, just have the money and you can go to any pastor's conference. Just pay your money and go in. And you can go every month, twelve months out of the year, without fail. And you can go to any part of the country you want. Go to Florida, you can go over to Europe, you can go wherever you really feel like you just want to go. You can go. There's a conference for you.

You can go to seminars. Those are a little shorter, maybe they're one day, half day. Go to those, oh yeah. Whatever you think your problem really is, there's a seminar to help you fix it, whatever it is. Is your marriage shaky? There's a seminar for that. Is your brain—does it not remember? There's a memory workshop. You can learn how to remember. Like I've got the opposite problem: I can't forget things. So, there's a workshop to teach you how to forget things. I forget what it is, so...

You know, that's us. We laugh because we know that's the truth. That's us. Because the calls come in and people say, "My marriage is hurting. Can you recommend a good book? How about First Peter?" "No, I'm serious. We're hurting, man. We're about to divorce, and you're here joking." "Okay, how about First John? All right, is there someone I could talk to?" "Yeah, we got a guy. He's outside working on the car. Talk to him. I'm sure there's a good book for you." That's us. You think I'm joking? That's what we've become.

In every area of our life, that's what we've become. What did it do to Israel? Verse six says, "My people are destroyed for lack of knowledge." I'm doomed if I get out of the Word of God. I think you are, too. I think we are, too. The church itself will be in trouble as it continues to leave the Bible behind, which is what it's doing. And there's a statement in here that is really kind of good news, but it sounds like bad news. He says, "I will also reject you because you've rejected knowledge, that you shall be no priest to Me."

He's talking to the entire nation. That's kind of good news, by the way. Notice that God still intends that the entire nation of Israel eventually will be priests. And they will be, according to scripture, when Jesus Christ returns. They will serve Him coming up during the Millennium. And He says this powerful statement for God—and He's got the power to do this—"I will forget you."