Hosea

So its been a while since i've posted. ive been super busy with all my really sweet nursing classes, making new friends, and just getting myself organized again. I'm a creature of habit and in order for me to feel calm, i must have my environment juuuust so. So thats what i've been up too.
This summer i did a lot of reading from the Message just cause i like it, its easy to read and i get distracted a lot less easily!

Anyway- this past week I've been reading Hosea and its a book i really really love. I seem to love odd books like Habakkuk but maybe its just because i've never paid attention to them before so they are all kind of "new". (how sad is that considering my lifetime as a christian?!)

Reading Hosea showed me how I'm just like Israel and Ephraim. I know the God who saves me, who protects me, who guides me, but sometimes its just a major hassle to follow him! And when i'm feeling the major hassle feelings, i stray. I look to myself and other things to meet my needs. I distort my concept of God into someone (and often times just something..) to be there only when i actually need real help. But all those little times throughout the day-during those little details- i "forget" who i serve, and go my own way. More like I make a conscious decision to stray and have an afterthought of "maybe i should repent for that".

Jesus can't just be a higher power for me. I think thats what Israel thought him to be. Just this power that you can call on that will swoop down on you when you dial 911, and that floats away as soon as the problem is solved.

How selfish! How selfish for me to think that the God who created me, knitted me together, loved me into being, shouldn't be a part of my daily life. I'm not a 'sunday' christian but sometimes i find myself being a "8am-11:34 am" christian with a major or minor slip at 11:35.

I have this roommate who seems like she litterally breathes love for Jesus. She's in NO way ashamed of her faith and she actually consciously lives that way, breathing love for jesus (not to mention love for others). Thats what i want to be like.

God in Hosea wtih Israel is like God being pissed off at me, for doing dumb stuff, for NOT doing some stuff, for being lazy, for being embarrased, for being tired, for being fake. But here's be beauty...Here's the BEST PART EVER!

He won't desert me. Sure he's mad for a while, but he wants a relationship with me. and he wants me to want to have a relationship with me. And he's going to allure me, speak tenderly to me and lead me to the desert.(vs.14) Cause God knows that its in my dryness that i hear him. Its the desert that i'm receptive.

And its my fault that its not like that all the time. But.....http://www.bible.org/page.php?page_id=967 says " In our ugliness, God doesn't beat us. He entices us with what we deeply want. He knows we thirst and He offers living water. He knows we feel ugly and want to be enjoyed and He offers perfect love. He knows we want to be perfectly accepted, and He perfectly accepts us. What we deeply long for can only be met in God."

He waits for me. Thats the best part.