Sermon by Samaroo Sookraj
TEXT: HOS 14:4 Hos 14:4 I will heal their backsliding, I will love them freely: for mine anger is turned away from him.
SUB: BACKSLIDING, ITS HEALING, ITS BASIS FOR HEALING.
Intro: 1) Adam Clarke in his Comm. on the Bible says about chap 14
"By the terrible denunciation of vengeance which concludes the preceding chapter, the prophet is led to exhort Israel to repentance, furnishing them with a beautiful form of prayer, very suitable to the occasion. Upon which God, ever ready to pardon the penitent but these promises are confined to those who may bring forth the fruits of righteousness, and the wicked are declared to have no share in them," This was directed to Israel as a nation but on a more personal basis, we can accept it as to ourselves as members of the Lord's church.
2) The subject is needful.
a. Present Christianity a counterfeit substitute.
b. The apparent complacency about it.
1. BACKSLIDING.
A. Its definition.
a. Webster: The act of apostatizing from faith or practice; a falling insensibly from religion into sin or idolatry.
b. Leaving a point of spirituality for a lesser point of spirituality.
c. A downhill departure.
B. Backsliding in the Pew
a. A walking away from your first love. Rev: 2:4.
b. A turning away from God. 1Ki 11:9 And the LORD was angry with Solomon, because his heart was turned from the LORD God of Israel, which had appeared unto him twice,
i) To turn away from implies to turn towards something new. What keeps you from serving the Lord as you should?
1. Self-will?
2. Materialism?
3. The god of recreation?
4. Form of religion?
C. Backsliding in the pulpit
a. It's a departing from the simplicity of the gospel.
1. Many preachers of today are proclaiming a gospel that places man as an autonomous being. Not a creature.
2. Man then becomes a god unto himself as he is in complete control of his destiny.
3. A failure to seek the Holy Spirit's guidance in studying the Word.
4. Turning the eyes of those in the pews upon the one who occupies the pulpit rather than upon the Lord Jesus Christ. Joh 3:30 He must increase, but I must decrease.
11. ITS RESULTS. To every action there is a reaction.
A. On a personal basis.
1. Commitment to God is then is neglected, resulting in failure for personal growth.
a. Through failing to study.
b. Failure to pray effectively.
c. This results in a weakened faith and sometimes even a destroyed testimony.
B. Collectively as a church. The progress and peacefulness of the church is hindered
a. Through lack of presence at church thereby hindering the spiritual progress of the church as this body of the Lord Jesus Christ.
b. Through failure to pay tithes and offerings thereby hindering the material and financial comfort that the Lord intends for His church.
c. Through failure to witness thereby hindering the physical growth of the church in direct disobedience of the Great Commission given to the church of the Lord Jesus Christ.
d. Through a loss of testimony as a powerful battalion in the army of the Lord.
111. HEALING FOR BACKSLIDING God says I will heal their backsliding
A. The inference is that it is an existing situation.
1. Revealed through our personal conduct and our attitude towards spiritual things.
2. Revealed through our cool acceptance of modern teachings and practices that has no exegetically based scriptural support, but rather based on eisegesis.
B. God is saying, " I will heal their backsliding." This is a promise! 2Co 1:20 For all the promises of God in him are yea, and in him Amen, unto the glory of God by us.
C. He says, " I will love them freely" of this Spurgeon, says
The sense hinges upon the word "freely." This is the glorious, the suitable, the divine way by which love streams from heaven to earth, a spontaneous love flowing forth to those who neither deserved it, purchased it, nor sought after it. It is, indeed, the only way in which God can love such as we are. The text is a deathblow to all sorts of fitness: "I will love them freely." Now, if there were any fitness necessary in us, then he would not love us freely, at least, this would be a mitigation and a drawback to the freeness of it. But it stands, "I will love you freely."
D. His anger is turned away. In support of Him saying, "I will love you freely," His anger is turned away from us.
Conc. 1) God has stated a case in which we are accused of backsliding.
2) The evidence is clear that we are backslidden.
3) His mercy promises healing through his merciful grace.
APP: if unsaved then there is no accusation of backsliding; instead there is a proclamation of condemnation as you stand beneath the wrath of God when he pronounces the sentence of doom for the impenitent sinner bound for hell.
If saved, then the loving admonition is to be restored once more into the first-love relationship, which we have previously left.
In contrast to the loving promise to heal, God says, "But the transgressors shall fall therein" Adam Clarke says of this Howsoever good they might have been before, if they do not consider the necessity of depending upon God; of receiving all their light, life, power, and love from him; ever evidencing that faith which worketh by love; maintaining an obedient conduct, and having respect to all God's precepts; they shall fall, even in the "way of righteousness." When still using the Divine ordinances, and associating with God's people, they shall perish from the way; and be like Ephraim, who once "spoke trembling," and "was exalted in Israel," who was "God's beloved son," and "called out of Egypt;" yet, by "offending in Baal," giving way to "the idols of his heart," fell from God, fell into the hands of his enemies, and became a wretched thrall in a heathen land.
