Hosea 8 Bible Reading and Daily Devotionals

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Max Lucado Daily: Don’t Settle for Anything Less

God rewards those who seek Him. Not those who seek doctrine or religion or systems or creeds. Many settle for these lesser passions, but the reward goes to those who settle for nothing less than Jesus himself!

And what is the reward?  What awaits those who seek Jesus?  Nothing short of the heart of Jesus. Paul says in 2nd Corinthians 3:18, “And as the Spirit of the Lord works within us, we become more and more like Him.”

Can you think of a greater gift than to be like Jesus? Christ felt no guilt; God wants to banish yours. Jesus had no bad habits; God wants to remove yours. Jesus had no fear of death; God wants you to be fearless. Jesus had kindness for the diseased and mercy for the rebellious and courage for the challenges.

God wants you to have the same!

From Just Like Jesus

Hosea 8

Israel to Reap the Whirlwind

8 “Put the trumpet to your lips!
    An eagle is over the house of the Lord
because the people have broken my covenant
    and rebelled against my law.
2 Israel cries out to me,
    ‘Our God, we acknowledge you!’
3 But Israel has rejected what is good;
    an enemy will pursue him.
4 They set up kings without my consent;
    they choose princes without my approval.
With their silver and gold
    they make idols for themselves
    to their own destruction.
5 Samaria, throw out your calf-idol!
    My anger burns against them.
How long will they be incapable of purity?
6     They are from Israel!
This calf—a metalworker has made it;
    it is not God.
It will be broken in pieces,
    that calf of Samaria.
7 “They sow the wind
    and reap the whirlwind.
The stalk has no head;
    it will produce no flour.
Were it to yield grain,
    foreigners would swallow it up.
8 Israel is swallowed up;
    now she is among the nations
    like something no one wants.
9 For they have gone up to Assyria
    like a wild donkey wandering alone.
    Ephraim has sold herself to lovers.
10 Although they have sold themselves among the nations,
    I will now gather them together.
They will begin to waste away
    under the oppression of the mighty king.
11 “Though Ephraim built many altars for sin offerings,
    these have become altars for sinning.
12 I wrote for them the many things of my law,
    but they regarded them as something foreign.
13 Though they offer sacrifices as gifts to me,
    and though they eat the meat,
    the Lord is not pleased with them.
Now he will remember their wickedness
    and punish their sins:
    They will return to Egypt.
14 Israel has forgotten their Maker
    and built palaces;
    Judah has fortified many towns.
But I will send fire on their cities
    that will consume their fortresses.”


Our Daily Bread reading and devotion

Read: Exodus 6:1-8

New International Version (NIV)
6 Then the Lord said to Moses, “Now you will see what I will do to Pharaoh: Because of my mighty hand he will let them go; because of my mighty hand he will drive them out of his country.”

2 God also said to Moses, “I am the Lord. 3 I appeared to Abraham, to Isaac and to Jacob as God Almighty,[a] but by my name the Lord[b] I did not make myself fully known to them. 4 I also established my covenant with them to give them the land of Canaan, where they resided as foreigners. 5 Moreover, I have heard the groaning of the Israelites, whom the Egyptians are enslaving, and I have remembered my covenant.

6 “Therefore, say to the Israelites: ‘I am the Lord, and I will bring you out from under the yoke of the Egyptians. I will free you from being slaves to them, and I will redeem you with an outstretched arm and with mighty acts of judgment. 7 I will take you as my own people, and I will be your God. Then you will know that I am the Lord your God, who brought you out from under the yoke of the Egyptians. 8 And I will bring you to the land I swore with uplifted hand to give to Abraham, to Isaac and to Jacob. I will give it to you as a possession. I am the Lord.’”

God’s Strong Arm

May 17, 2013 — by Anne Cetas

I will redeem you with an outstretched arm. —Exodus 6:6

My friend Joann had a strong desire to become a concert pianist and to travel and perform as either a soloist or as a piano accompanist. While majoring in piano performance in college, she developed tendinitis in her right arm, and it became too weak to perform the solo recital that was required. She graduated with a degree in music history and literature instead.

She knew Jesus as her Savior, but she had been rebelling against Him for several years. Then through further difficult circumstances, she sensed the Lord reaching out to her, and she turned back to Him. Eventually her arm grew stronger, and her dream of traveling and performing came about. She says, “Now I could play to God’s glory instead of my own. His outstretched arm restored my spiritual life and the strength in my arm to enable me to serve Him with the gift He gave me.”

The Lord promised Moses that His outstretched arm would rescue the Israelites from bondage in Egypt (Ex. 6:6). He kept that promise even though His often-rebellious people doubted (14:30-31). God’s mighty arm is outstretched for us as well. No matter the outcome of our situation, He can be trusted to bring about His will for each of His children. We can depend on God’s strong arm.

What a fellowship, what a joy divine,
Leaning on the everlasting arms;
O how bright the path grows from day to day,
Leaning on the everlasting arms. —Hoffman
With God’s strength behind you and His arms beneath you, you can face whatever lies ahead of you.


My Utmost for His Highest, by Oswald Chambers
May 17, 2013

His Ascension and Our Access

It came to pass, while He blessed them, that He was parted from them and carried up into heaven —Luke 24:51

We have no experiences in our lives that correspond to the events in our Lord’s life after the transfiguration. From that moment forward His life was altogether substitutionary. Up to the time of the transfiguration, He had exhibited the normal, perfect life of a man. But from the transfiguration forward— Gethsemane, the Cross, the resurrection— everything is unfamiliar to us. His Cross is the door by which every member of the human race can enter into the life of God; by His resurrection He has the right to give eternal life to anyone, and by His ascension our Lord entered heaven, keeping the door open for humanity.

The transfiguration was completed on the Mount of Ascension. If Jesus had gone to heaven directly from the Mount of Transfiguration, He would have gone alone. He would have been nothing more to us than a glorious Figure. But He turned His back on the glory, and came down from the mountain to identify Himself with fallen humanity.

The ascension is the complete fulfillment of the transfiguration. Our Lord returned to His original glory, but not simply as the Son of God— He returned to His father as the Son of Man as well. There is now freedom of access for anyone straight to the very throne of God because of the ascension of the Son of Man. As the Son of Man, Jesus Christ deliberately limited His omnipotence, omnipresence, and omniscience. But now they are His in absolute, full power. As the Son of Man, Jesus Christ now has all the power at the throne of God. From His ascension forward He is the King of kings and Lord of lords.


A Word with You, by Ron Hutchcraft

Treating the Real Problem - #6875

Friday, May 17, 2013

I think something is wrong with my nose! Every couple of months it develops this tender spot on the inside, and that's fine - only I know that. But when the outside starts to swell and turns to some not so beautiful shades of red, well, then everybody else knows. Those are the days I'm glad I'm on the radio instead of television. So it seems like a few days a year I get to look like Rudolph, whether it's Christmas or not. I went to the doctor with this, and I said, "Doctor, this is ugly. What will I do?" He said, "Well, you know, there might be an infection in there." This is probably more information than you want, but I'm going somewhere so stick with me. Well, he prescribed the appropriate antibiotic. Sure enough, if I take that antibiotic when that first tenderness starts to come along, it stops the flare-up. What you can see on the outside, though, isn't the real problem.

I'm Ron Hutchcraft and I want to have A Word With You today about "Treating the Real Problem."

Our word for today from the Word of God comes from John chapter 4, and I'm going to be reading verses 13 and 14. You might remember that John 4 deals with Jesus meeting at a well with a very immoral woman from a Samaritan village. She has come to draw water that day, she's had several husbands; she is now living with a guy. And the fact that she has to come for her water at noon...well, see, all the other women come early in the morning when it's cool. She comes with this heavy water pot at noontime, probably indicating she was not really the best company everybody wanted to be with. She had to kind of hang out alone. She was not respected in her community. I can only imagine the names they called her in that village.

Well, here's how Jesus handles the situation. "Everyone," He says, "who drinks this water will be thirsty again, but whoever drinks the water I give him will never thirst. Indeed, the water I give him will become in him a spring of water welling up to eternal life." He promises here an eternal spiritual fulfillment. "The woman said to Him, 'Sir, give me this water so that I won't get thirsty again."

This woman's merry-go-round of short-lived relationships with men was a symptom of a deep soul thirst. Until that thirst was quenched by spiritual peace, she'd keep going to one relationship well after another. Now, our Lord models here an important principle in dealing with people's problems. Look beyond the deeds - her immorality, to the needs - the emptiness inside.

You may have someone in your life whose actions are a deep concern to you right now, maybe even an aggravation. There's a tendency to look at that family member, or that friend, or that coworker, or a person at church and say, "Problem!" But if you look through Jesus' eyes you know what you'll say? "Need!" You realize the deeds won't change until the needs are met. Is that person acting out some deep wounds from years ago or a need for approval, maybe just a very frightened insecurity? Maybe they're trying to fill a hole left by someone whose love they needed but they never got, or that they lost, or they were betrayed. Behind the actions is the wound.

If you'll look for the need, you can become part of God's answer instead of somebody who just wounds them some more. That doesn't mean you don't address the problem; you don't address the deeds. Jesus did. He dealt with the problem of the men in her life. But first you move in with the love of Christ and apply some healing to the wounds inside.

What you see on the outside? That's probably not the real problem. Don't attack the deeds; go after the needs. Don't attack the flare-up on the surface; treat the infection that's on the inside.