Oh Christ, the King, forsake the world and every form. Amen. We come now to the reading of God's holy word, Hosea chapter two. We'll read from verse 14 to verse 23. That's page 954. Most of the pew Bibles stands at the beginning of what we sometimes call the minor prophets. Sometimes of old was called the book of the 12. Perhaps they called it the book of the 12 because they could fit on a single scroll. Hosea being the longest. Isaiah chapter 2, we'll read verses 14 to 23. Let us hear the good news of God's word. Therefore, behold, I will allure her and bring her into the wilderness and speak tenderly to her. And there I will give her her vineyards, and make the valley of Achor a door of hope. And there she shall answer as in the days of her use, as at the time when she came out of the land of Egypt. And in that day declares the Lord, you will call me my husband, and no longer will you call me my Baal, for I will remove the names of the Baals from her mouth, and they shall be remembered by name no more. and I will make for them a covenant on that day with the beasts of the field, the birds of the heavens, and the creeping things of the ground, and I will abolish the bow, the sword, and war from the land, and I will make you lie down in safety, and I will betroth you to me forever. I will betroth you to me in righteousness and in justice, in steadfast love and in mercy. I will betroth you to me in faithfulness, and you shall know the Lord. And in that day I will answer, declares the Lord, I will answer the heavens, and they shall answer the earth, and the earth shall answer the grain, the wine, and the oil, and they shall answer Jezreel, and I will sow her for myself in the land, and I will have mercy on no mercy, and I will say to not my people, you are my people, and he shall say, you are my God. So far the reading of God's Holy Word. Let us turn then to the Canons of Dort, Head 5, Articles 9 and 10. That is page 280 in the Forms and Prayers book. Lord willing, we will have this week and one more week in the Canons of Dort. maybe two if we look at the conclusions. Articles 9 and 10. Article 9 is not too long. Let us read that one together. Article 9, the assurance of this preservation Concerning this preservation of those chosen to salvation, and concerning the perseverance of true believers in faith, believers themselves can and do become assured in accordance with the measure of their faith, by which they firmly believe that they are and always will remain true and living members of the Church, and that they have the forgiveness of sins and eternal life. I shall read Article 10 concerning the ground of this assurance. Accordingly, this assurance does not derive from some private revelation beyond or outside the Word. but from faith in the promises of God which he has very plentifully revealed in his word for our comfort, from the testimony of the Holy Spirit testifying with our spirit that we are God's children and heirs. Romans 8, 16-17. And finally, from a serious and holy pursuit of a clear conscience and of good works. And if God's chosen ones in this world did not have this well-founded comfort that the victory will be theirs and this reliable guarantee of eternal glory, they would be, of all people, most miserable. Dear congregation of our Lord Jesus Christ, is it possible for someone to be married and to not know that they are married? Hardly, hardly possible. The basic answer is no, if you are married, you know that you are married. Perhaps two examples I could think of. We actually have an example of this one in scripture. Song of Songs, chapter three. A wife has a nightmare that her husband has left her, that she has been abandoned. She, in that sense, forgets that she is married, forgets that her husband is near to her. Might be one example. Another sad example would be one which we are seeing more and more. That would be dementia. And that would be when those who grow in years reach a point where their mind is broken and they can even forget that they are married. They can even forget their spouse. But basically, basically, if a person is married, they know that they are married. It's almost a ridiculous question. I'm married, of course I know that I'm married. It is meant to be the most intimate relationship on earth, established from the garden itself, and it is not only a picture but also a reality of the relationship which God makes with his people. And this is what we see in Hosea chapter 2. The people who know that they should be married to God in this spiritual sense have broken the marriage. They have chased false gods in an adulterous manner. They have forsaken their true spouse, God, who is Himself always faithful. But the faithfulness of God goes to another level, because He takes back this adulterous bride, and as it is, renews, remakes the marriage again. and brings his people to himself. The faithfulness of God goes to another level, and he shows his faithfulness in the midst of the unfaithfulness of his people, for God is the perfect and pure husband of his people. And we'll consider this truth tonight, looking at the choice, and then this point will very much run into the second point, the change, And then third, that there is a community. This is, we might say, an individual illustration. Marriage is one man, one woman. The two shall become one flesh, but with a communal reality. It's a communal reality. God calls his people his bride. So what is, first point, the choice the choice and this is the reality which the canons bring us back to again and again. We are the chosen elect people of God. We see it again in the first sentence of article 9 concerning this preservation of those chosen to salvation concerning the perseverance of true believers in faith. It is God's choice. It is God's doing. This is what regeneration is. So we looked at rejection of errors 1 and 2 last week, which speak a little bit about this. We can look also at rejection of errors 8 on page 284. And so the error is there are those who teach that it is not absurd that a person after losing his former regeneration should once again, indeed quite often, be reborn. While we have a picture of God calling those who are unfaithful back to himself, what is salvation rooted on? And so the correction, as it were, to the error and rejection of error eight says this, by this teaching they deny the imperishable nature of God's seed by which we are born again. And teach that which is contrary to the testimony of the Apostle Paul who says that we are born again not of perishable seed, but of imperishable. This is God's doing, God's choosing. And so the canons return to this basic fact again and again. And we see this in Hosea chapter 2. It is not because of the people's faithfulness. Verses 1 to 13 describe starkly, graphically, the unfaithfulness, the unrighteousness, the adultery of the people of God. And verses 16 and 17 make it clear. God is gonna have them come back to say, my husband and no longer call me my Baal. This is what the people are doing. They are calling Baal. They are calling the God of their age, their God, their comfort. It is not because of man's faithfulness. It is not because of man's choosing. Man's choosing is is Baal, it's the god of the age, whatever that Baal is. And there were many Baals in the ancient world. In that sense, they all had their own little different version of Baal. So what is today? We see many different versions of Baal. When we We have this tendency to call out, to focus on the bales of our age. This is where man is, but where is the choice made? Where is the marriage made? It is God's choice. It is His faithfulness. Verse 20, I will betroth you to me in faithfulness. Whose faithfulness? God's faithfulness, His steadfast love. I will do it. Between verses 19 and 20, that's the language three times. I will betroth, I will betroth, I will betroth. So again, the certainty is not based on our merits or our strengths, but God's undeserved mercy. And that comes from article eight. Does that sound familiar with some of the things that Kenneth of Dort have said before? Well, yes it does. We must return to this because this is where the certainty of this preservation comes from. Not our merits, God's undeserved mercy. How are we betrothed? I will betroth, I will betroth, I will betroth you to me in faithfulness. Notice then also the rich theological terms in verses 19 and 20. This is not some like wishy-washy romance soap opera. This is a marriage in what? This is a marriage in rich theological terms which are describing this marriage. So we see in verses 19 and 20. righteousness, justice, steadfast love, mercy, faithfulness. They're just coming out one after another. This is not, you know, there are sparks that flew and there is chemistry. This is heavy theological language which comes with the, I will be true, I will be true, I will be true. You see, theology and rich theological terms, these things are not enemies to our comfort. They are the driving force of our comfort. They are the words which God uses to show us the comfort which we must have, to show us what He is doing, who He is. Theology, rich theological terms, the driving force of our comfort, to better understand God, who He is, what He has done, to be better equipped to lean on Jesus, to find comfort in Him. So it is the choice, it is God's choice. And God is doing this for an unfaithful people. So as we come into our second point, as we transition towards the change, let us hear Calvin's summary of what's going on here in Hosea chapter two. When a woman returns to her husband, Calvin says, it is a great thing in the husband to forgive her and to not upbraid her with the former base conduct. She's coming to him changed, and he's forgetting then the past. But God goes further than this, for he espouses to himself, he betroths to himself, he makes himself a bride, he makes for himself a people infamous through many disgraceful acts, and having abolished their sins, he contracts, as it were, a new marriage, joins them to himself again. This is God's choice, and it leads into and shows us that there is a change. There is very clearly a change going on here in Hosea 2. God is the one driving it. It's his choice, which is the driving force behind it, but there is very clearly a change going on here. We see this perhaps most clearly in verse 23. I will have mercy on no mercy. I will say to not my people, you are my people. There's a very change in who they are. And then what shall they say? You are my God. Their very word changes. This is what we see going on also in verse 16. They will call God my husband and not my Baal. There will be a change. There's a change in how they are called. There's a change in how they act and what they know. They will now call upon God. They will now know Him. The end of verse 20. And again, The change in man is not what drives the comfort, but it comes along with it, necessarily. Now look at Article 10, in the middle of Article 10. And finally, from a serious and holy pursuit of a clear conscience and of good works. You see, being changed and now pursuing God as one who desires holiness, who is now pursuing good works, that's not the first basis of our assurance, but it's not as if it has nothing to do with our assurance. God has made the choice, God has brought us to himself, and there now is a change in who we are, in what we are called, and in what we know, and in what we do. We see this clearly in the New Testament. 1 John chapter 2 and 3, we'll pick a couple of verses out of 1 John. If we were to say perhaps what is the chapter on comfort in scripture, we might say the magazine of Christian comfort, Romans 8. If we were to say what is the book on Christian comfort in the New Testament, well that's 1 John. 1st John which is written for this purpose 1st John 5 verse 13 I write these things to you who believe in the name of the Son of God that you may know that you have eternal life So when we know, when we believe, when we repent and believe, when God has called us to Himself, there will be evidences of these things. 1 John 2, verse 3, and by this we know that we have come to know Him if we keep His commandments. See, it's not where it starts, but we are brought to this point. 1 John 3 beginning at verse 16 says it this way, by this we know love that he laid down his life for us and we ought to lay down our lives for the brothers. But if anyone has the world's goods and sees his brother in need yet closes his heart against him, how does God's love abide in him? Little children, let us not love in word or talk but in deed and in truth. Of course, the context is not in word or talk only. It's not as if 1 John is against those things. But when we are called, when we are changed, it will include even this, the change of our very actions. And so in a supplementary way, and finally, the language there in Article 10, even doing the good works of God is a part of our assurance in that way. We are a changed people, changed in our very name, changed in how we now live. We are now those who know the Lord. I will betroth you to me in faithfulness. Hosea 2.20, and you shall know the Lord. Again, this is so much different from anything wishy-washy or soap-hoppery. This is well-founded. This is reliable, known, trustworthy. This is part of our change. And this is the language at the end of Article 10. Well-founded comfort that the victory will be theirs. That's what the chosen ones in God have. There is surely a change. Not only this, there's also a community. There's also a community. Psalm 116, which we read for our call to worship, is just one example of so, so many in the Psalms and throughout Scripture, but the Psalms have been described as if If scripture is a garden and it's got different rows with different plants, different genres, so you've got one row which is the letters and they speak to us in this way and you've got another row which is like revelation and apocalypse and Daniel and it speaks to us in this way, well, different things can be put in these different categories, perhaps, but then the Psalms, it's like it's the whole garden. So we have Psalms that go through all of history. We have Psalms which speak about the law. We have Psalms which speak about who God is. The Psalms are kind of the whole garden in one. And the Psalms say again and again, this is not personal. There are Psalms which bounce back and forth between the I and the we. And there are Psalms which again and again use this kind of language which we heard for our call to worship. I will pay my vows to the Lord. Well, there's an I, there's something personal in the presence of all his people. Turn to any page in the Psalms, you see something like this almost. Just like the Psalms speak about creation all the time. They speak about this I and this we all the time. God calls us to Himself. There is certainly something individual about that, but He calls a people to Himself. This is part of the essential truths which we confess when we say the Apostles' Creed. I believe in the forgiveness of sins. I believe in the communion of the saints. God calls and chooses a community of which individuals are a part. It's an individual illustration. Marriage is very personal, one-to-one, and we can think of it in that way. God calls me His own. But it's in this communal sense. It has individual realities. It's an individual illustration in the sense that the two shall become one flesh, but it's a community. The word for you in Hosea 2.20 is actually in the singular, but in the context, it's the singular describing the people. I will make for them, and they will no longer, that's very much the people of God. I will say to not my people, you are my people, verse 23. We cannot be Lone Ranger Christians. Scripture says this to us again and again and again. In this way and in that way. In this book and in that book. In this chapter and in that chapter. It has to be personal. It has to be that I will pay my vows. But where are you paying your vows? In the presence of all Your people. Such an individualistic age. Perhaps there have been people who have heard the word of God for the first time and they needed to hear an emphasis on the individual. There have been people groups that have been very communal in the history of the world. Very communal. That's not the culture that we live in now. So perhaps we need to hear that communal even emphasized again and again as a reminder that we're not, the individualistic emphasis of our age are wrong. We are called to be part of a community. God's people is a group. God's people is a people, are a people. And so, the end of Article 9 speaks about this, both this plural and individual, by which they firmly believe that they are and always will remain true and living members of the Church, and that they have the forgiveness of sins and eternal life. God's bride is a people. God's bride is, Ephesians chapter 5, the church. So it's a community. Now are there those within this community who who doubt what God has done, who individually can doubt these great promises. Well, yes, believers themselves can and do become assured, but this accordance is with the measure, the middle of article nine, of their faith. And so we might think of Hebrews chapter five. The author of Hebrews says something about how they have been taught much, they should know these things, but they do not perfectly. Despite having heard much, despite being at the point where they should themselves be be teachers they need someone yet to teach them even the basic principles the oracles of God they need milk and not spiritual food and so then there's this contrast between and children who live on milk and the mature who should have solid food and this is just one of the ways scripture reminds us that we are not always We're not always in the same place. The measure of our faith can vary for all kinds of different reasons. It's like there are a couple different reasons that a person can even forget that they're married. There are things which can bring doubt. Immaturity is one of them. Great seasons of difficulty, nightmares, like that bride in Song of Songs 3. They can bring doubt. There are doubts concerning this assurance, Article 11. Scripture testifies that believers have to contend in this life with various doubts of the flesh and that under severe temptation they do not always experience this full assurance. of faith with certainty of perseverance. But God, the Father of all comfort, does not let them be tempted beyond what they can bear, but with the temptation He always provides a way of escape. And also, by the way, as a reminder, people of God, that yes, we've kind of zoomed in on the image of marriage by turning to Hosea 2, but yes, we know this is not the only image. This is not the only reality which can describe our assurance. God is our father. We are his children. God has given us an heir. God is the great shepherd. We are his sheep. God is the perfect, pure, faithful husband. We are his bride. promises which are given plentifully, plentifully revealed at the beginning of Article 10. I might add this, the promises are revealed plentifully in different places, in number, there's more than just one image, and when they are revealed, they are revealed plainly. Certainly, Hosea 2 reveals plainly that God is the perfect husband who calls the bride to himself. We have these promises plentifully. We have them plainly. So, remember this, people of God. Ponder then these promises. Hold on to them. Repent and believe in this God. not in any of the bales, but in this true God, in this faithful husband. And sometimes when we have spiritual amnesia, or when we have bad dreams, like the Shulamite woman in Song of Songs 3, through these trials, may we even then not totally forget that we belong to God. Remember when the Shulamite woman awakes, she sees that she does still have a husband. When the nightmare is over, you remember that you were married all the while. During the nightmare you forgot, but the reality never changed. Just your perception of it, when you were going through the nightmare. just like the person with amnesia is still married. They can still celebrate a marriage anniversary, even though they don't know what's going on. We can doubt the reality, but when standing forgiven, when we have been chosen by God, the reality does not change. Only our perception of it can vary. This is who God is. He is the perfect, the pure, the faithful husband. Amen. Let us pray. Lord, our Lord, in our waverings, show us your faithfulness. In our wanderings, show us your steadfastness. And bring us to you, draw us to you closely as a faithful husband closely draws his wife. Make us to know salvation. in Jesus Christ to know this salvation. In Jesus name, amen. People of God, our song of application number 296. Let's stand to sing number 296. ♪ Hail, all ye saints of holy sight ♪ ♪ We should see and feel afar ♪ The light in Judah shining ♪ Now David, son of Jacob's race ♪ My bridegroom and my king of grace ♪ For thee my heart is high-kneed Holy, holy, great and glorious, Thou victorious Prince of Graces, filling all the heavenly places. You circle by the old sun high, ♪ Upon His helpless creature ♪ ♪ The whole creation tended low ♪ ♪ But God Himself, in the Lord ♪ ♪ Assumed our very nature ♪ ♪ In thy salvation ♪ Hear, O hear our supplication ♪ Come richly to my waiting heart ♪ O Thou my God, make to impart ♪ The grace of love undying my life my life's ♪ From thy favor resting never ♪ ♪ Till I rest in thee forever ♪ ♪ Almighty Father in thy Son ♪ ♪ It's lovely heirloom crown ♪ world's foundation. The sun hath made a friend of me, and when in spirit him I see, my joy and tribulation that liveth to be given life forever, nothing he from him can sever. Rejoice, ye heavens, our earthly pride, sinners fill the sky, for this is incarnation. Incarnate God, Lord, for Thy power, bright, on, bright, on, great Conqueror, to all know Thy salvation. Amen. Alleluia, alleluia, praise be given evermore on earth and heaven. Amen. People of God, it's time now for our evening gifts offerings. This evening, that's for the general fund. Following that, the benediction and then doxology number 563. so If you would stand, if able, let us receive God's parting blessing. The Lord bless you and keep you. The Lord make his face to shine upon you and be gracious to you. The Lord lift up his countenance upon you and give you peace. Amen. The grace of Christ our Savior and the Father's boundless love, with the Holy Spirit's favor, rest upon us from above. Thus may we abide in union with each other, and the Lord, and possess in sweet communion joys which earth cannot afford. Amen. of of of of of you.