Misplaced Trust

Listen Online:

Transcript:

Well, tonight from Hosea chapter 8, I have planned to speak to you all on the subject of misplaced trust. And I’ve got it all neatly outlined and such, but it seems like we’ve already had a message tonight in songs and testimony. So I don’t know that I’ll stick real closely to an outline tonight. We may just go through the text and see quickly what the Lord has to share with us.

But as I was looking over this again, I’m reminded of a story that came up this morning in our Sunday school class downstairs, where Jesus told the parable of the rich man who had so much grain and produce that his barns couldn’t hold it all, and he was so consumed by the desire for more and to gather more to himself, so focused on what he was building that he didn’t really give any care or attention to his soul. And when he realized his barns couldn’t hold all the goods he had, he said, I’ll tear these down and I’ll build bigger barns. Which I’ve always thought it was kind of wasteful to tear down the ones you’ve got.

Just build some more. But I’ll build bigger barns to hold even more stuff. Because having stores of grain and produce in those days meant security.

Just like a full bank account or a full pantry mean to us today. And yet for all his planning with his goods, he was told, I believe God told him, And thou fool, tonight your soul will be required of you. And he put way too much trust in his things.

Put too much trust in what this world had to offer. And many people around us are putting too much trust in the wrong things. Even sometimes we as Christians get sidetracked into putting our trust in the wrong things, in things, or in people.

And as I talk to you tonight about misplaced trust, and talk about not putting our trust in anybody or anything but God, I don’t mean that you shouldn’t trust other people. I mean, until they give you a reason not to. It’s usually a good policy.

I hope when I teach that you’ll trust what I say. Trust but verify. Verify according to God’s word.

We should be able to trust one another. We should be able to trust our brothers and sisters in the church. We should be able to trust our spouses.

We should be able to trust our family. But it’s not the same as putting our trust in God. We put our trust in the sense of hoping for eternity, of hoping for fulfillment in this life.

we put our trust in other things that are not able to fulfill the role that only God can, as far as fulfilling us in this life, protecting us in this life, and giving us eternal life when we leave this life. This is not a new problem that people put trust in the wrong things because Israel and Judah did the same thing in the book of Hosea. In chapter 8 and starting in verse 8, it says, Israel is swallowed up.

Now shall they be among the Gentiles as a vessel wherein is no pleasure. And if you remember back two weeks ago, We ended up in verse 7 where God said there would be consequences for their actions. He said in verse 7, They’ve sown the wind, and they shall reap the whirlwind.

It hath no stalk. The bud shall yield no meal. There weren’t going to be plants around to give them grain, literally or figuratively. What plants there would be would yield no meal. And if there was, by chance, any yield to the plants, then it would be swallowed up.

And then he says Israel in the passage, in the verse where we started tonight, Israel is swallowed up. Not just Israel’s goods, not just the food and the security and all the things that they put their trust in. Not only were those things swallowed up, but Israel as a whole was swallowed up because of their disobedience to God, because of their trusting in other things, as we’ll see tonight.

Now shall they be among the Gentiles as a vessel wherein is no pleasure. And that word pleasure can also mean value. So they would be to the Gentile nations around them as a worthless thing.

And Israel, part of their problem was that they had courted the favor of the nations around them instead of courting God’s favor and thinking, okay, we can ally with them, we can intermarry with them, and they’ll regard us as a friend, they’ll regard us as an ally, they’ll look at us as a valuable partner. And God said, as soon as I remove my hand of protection and blessing from you, you’re going to be to them like a worthless thing, a worthless vessel. I’m sure we all have in our houses those things that used to be valuable and now are just cast aside.

I’ve taken spoons and cookware and things, I mean, not pots, but bowls and spoons and other utensils that we used to use to eat off of. That’s pretty valuable, isn’t it? Something to eat off of.

When it comes to mealtime, you want to be prepared. And I’ve taken those and now I use a few bowls, I have a bowl, I have a cup, I have a rubber spatula from the kitchen that I use now when I change the water in the turtle tank. And we don’t eat off those anymore.

No matter how many times you bleach them, or run them through the dishwasher. We just don’t eat off those anymore. And so consequently it doesn’t matter where they end up.

We toss them in the garage. They’ve become a worthless thing, a thing in which there’s not really any value. That’s what Israel would be to the Gentile countries around them.

And Israel had spent all their time and all their trust building up alliances, building up relationships with the countries around them when they should have been working on their relationship with God. And God said, for all your work, thinking these other countries were going to value you, you’re going to be something that they just toss aside, throw away, completely worthless. to them.

For they are gone up to Assyria, a wild donkey alone by himself. And yes, I did change a word there. Somebody asked me before about changing words in the scriptures.

I said, even if it is in the Bible, I’m not comfortable saying that word. As a donkey alone by himself, Ephraim hath hired lovers. So they’d gone up to the king of Assyria.

When God said, I will protect you, Israel did not trust God, and Israel tried to go and make an alliance with the king of Assyria. The problem was the king of Assyria wanted payment. So you’re not so much an ally as you are a vassal. You’re not a partner, you’re a servant.

And they got into trouble at times when they’re allying with Egypt, they’re allying with Assyria, and they’re making these payments, and then another king comes along and says, you know, we’re not supposed to be doing this, and stops the payment. Well, then Egypt and Assyria get mad, and there’s trouble. And so for them to go up to the king of Assyria is like to approach this wild donkey alone by himself.

And the picture there from what I’ve read is these wild donkeys, says alone by himself, meaning he’s the only male in the herd, and he’s got all the females in the herd, and he won’t let any other male approach as though he’s the equal. And when they try to, he reacts violently. So the idea is going up to the king of Assyria and trying to be his equal, he’s going to beat you down. He’s going to tear you up.

And Ephraim, Ephraim speaking of Israel again, all these people love Ephraim because he’s paying them to. All these people, all these other countries love Israel because they’re paying them to love them. By the way, didn’t our parents teach us early on, if people are your friends just because you’ve got stuff and money, they’re probably not really your friends?

That was apparently a lesson that a lot of countries haven’t learned. Yea, though they have hired, yea, though they have hired among the nations, now will I gather them, and they shall sorrow a little for the burden of the king of princes. They hired allies, they hired protection, and yet God was going to gather these countries against Israel.

Because Ephraim hath made many altars to sin, altars shall be unto him to sin. This is a little bit of a confusing verse to me, but everything I’ve read on it, everything I’ve studied out, indicates that God is saying here, because Ephraim has built altars, he’s built these pagan altars, he’s built idols to, or he’s built altars to idols, and he’s been worshiping everything but the one true God. God says, okay, he is tied to this sin now.

And so the very thing that they were trusting in, these idols became kind of a stone tied around their neck. Okay, if you want these idols to be your God, that’s fine. You go with them and see how well they can protect you.

I have written to him the great things of my law, but they were counted as a strange thing. And the first thought that occurs to me there is Israel didn’t realize how blessed it was that out of all the countries of the earth, God chose Israel. God chose Israel to be the ones that he revealed his word to.

God chose Israel to have a special covenant relationship with. God chose Israel to be the ones that he would show the light and show the right way to walk. And I think how foolish it is to squander the fact that God has revealed that until I realize we do the very same thing.

God has revealed even more of his word and even more of himself to us in the New Testament, and a lot of times we don’t pay it any more heed. I don’t mean necessarily us in this room, although I’m sure there are times when we don’t pay the Bible the heed that we ought to, but as a nation in general, a supposedly Christian nation, I laugh every time I hear the statistic that 84% or 80% or 78% somewhere in that area of this country is Christian. That just sounds like a punchline to me.

That God has revealed even more of himself to us than he did to Israel, and yet we squander it. God’s written to us and to them the great things of his law that they were counted as a strange thing. They looked at it like it was a foreign entity.

I say a lot of times to my wife, and I said such and such, and they looked at me like I just landed my spacecraft in their yard. I used to say that a lot when I was teaching high school. Tell the kids, okay, pick out the adverbs from the sentence, and they just look, like I said, look at me like I just landed my spacecraft in their yard.

That’s what I’m talking about, completely foreign. Kid asked me one time, what’s the difference? Mr.

Byrns, what’s an adverb? And I said it was the difference between being in high school and being in high school indefinitely. Some of you got that.

Thank you. They didn’t get that. And they didn’t understand, and they looked at me like I was from Mars.

It’s unfortunate. Well, folks, it’s even more unfortunate when God reveals himself to us, and we look at the great truth of his word as though it’s something from Mars. What am I supposed to do with that?

Why would I want that? Get that off my lawn. I’ve written to him the great things of my law, but they were counted as a strange thing.

They sacrifice flesh for the sacrifices of mine offerings and eat it, but the Lord accepteth them not. They were still going through the motions. Outwardly, they were a very righteous people because they were still doing what God asked them to do.

They were still going through the motions of the sacrifices and the sin offerings and the burnt offerings, and they were doing all these things, but they’d left off a very important commandment, thou shalt have no other gods before me, and also thou shalt not make unto thee any graven images. I was reading today where somebody, this afternoon where somebody was commenting on how foolish he thought the Ten Commandments were and called God a childlike entity, that he was so jealous that you can’t play with anybody but me. I thought, well, it’s not jealousy and it’s not childlike when you’re deserving of that reverence.

There’s a very important distinction between God and a spoiled child. God is deserving of what he demands. Outwardly, they were going through the motions that said, but the Lord accepted them not because their hearts weren’t in it and God knew full well.

And the evidence of that was very clear in the fact that they were sacrificing to these other gods as well. Now will he remember their iniquity and visit their sins. They shall return to Egypt.

Did it literally mean the land of Egypt? No. But just as they were in bondage in Egypt, they were about to be in bondage to the Assyrians, and to the Babylonians, and to the Persians, to the Greeks, to the Romans.

They were about to be in bondage. And quite honestly, the bondage lasted until 1948. They were in Egypt a long time.

For Israel hath forgotten his maker. It’s a scathing indictment. Not only of them, but of us.

They’ve forgotten their maker and buildeth temples. So they were hard at work building religious things. They were hard at work building religious empires.

We’re hard at work building churches and building ministries and building any number of things. But folks, if a heart for God is not at the center of it, it’s just idle work. They were building their country.

Judah hath multiplied fenced cities. These fenced cities were, not every city in that day had a wall around it. The important ones did.

What it means when it says they were building fenced cities, they were building big, impressive cities that were designed to show how strong they were, designed to show how prosperous they were. And so while they’ve forgotten their maker, they’re carrying out the religious activities, and they’re showing how strong and how prosperous they were, and no doubt they’re trusting in their religious activities that it’ll get them somewhere with God. No doubt they’re trusting in their building projects, their economy, their military, and all these things that they’re going to be protected because of them.

And God says, but I will send a fire upon his cities, and it shall devour the palaces thereof. He’d send a fire on those very cities that they were putting their attention into, their resources, and their trust. And it said the fire would devour the palaces. That means nobody, nobody was above the judgment of God when God judged them for having forgotten their maker.

Now, I’ve got several points that I could give you tonight, but I’m not going to. The point I want to make from this passage tonight is I believe the point this passage makes, that it is wrong, it is reckless, it is dangerous, it’s foolish to put our trust in anything but the living God. As I said earlier, that doesn’t mean we shouldn’t trust one another.

I’m not saying that somebody says good morning and you have to say prove it, otherwise you’re not trusting God. There may be some mornings when you want to tell them to prove it because you’re just having that kind of a day. I’m not talking about not trusting one another.

I’m not talking about not planning for the future. But folks, if my trust and your trust are in the bank account, then I’m going to be all right because I’ve got X number of dollars down at the bank. Folks, we’d be surprised at how quickly that could go.

I’m going to be all right because I’m a strong man and I’ve got my health. Well, we’d be surprised. By the way, I’m not all that strong.

I’m just speaking hypothetically. we’d be surprised at how quickly that strength and that health could go. I’ve heard many people express their surprise at how quickly they’ve grown from being young to being older.

And that youth goes that we trust in. Kind of felt that way this morning. Brother Jack said, hello, young man.

I said, I’m glad to hear you say that because I don’t feel young this morning. Our strength goes. Our youth goes.

Our health goes. Our money goes. Folks, sometimes our family goes and our relationship goes.

Relationships go. We can trust in other people and they can fail us. They can let us down, and they can let us down hard.

We can trust that we’re going to be all right because the economy is basically sound, depending on your definition of sound. Folks, the dollar could bottom out tomorrow, and then where are we going to be if we’re trusting in the dollar? The trucks could break down for Walmart and other grocery stores, and where would we be?

If our trust is in the economy, that we’re going to be all right because the economy is strong and we’re the U. S. , and nothing can hurt us, folks, we’re putting our trust in the wrong place.

If our trust is in our military, as good a job as they do, Folks, I’m not anti-military, but Israel and Judah had a strong military too, and all it took was God removing his hand of protection from them. When it comes to our protection, when it comes to our fulfillment in life, we can’t put our trust in anything but God, because there’s nothing besides our maker who can fulfill us and can protect us in this cruel world. And when it comes to our eternity, as I said, they were going through the religious rituals, they were still going through the sacrifices, and they were building temples, and they were doing all these things, and I’m sure they thought that it was going to get them somewhere with God.

Folks, our idle religious work, our empty religious work, does not cut any ice with the maker of the universe if our heart is far from him. The problem with humankind is that our hearts collectively have always been far from God. And tonight I want to make the point as we prepare to close that if we’re trusting in anything but God and his grace to be of any benefit in eternity, we are sorely mistaken.

We are sorely mistaken. If tonight we’re trusting in how many times we’ve come to church, Well, surely God will take notice of that. If we’re trusting in the money that we give to the poor, if we’re trusting in the fact that we live basically good moral lives, we help people, we’re nice to animals, you wouldn’t believe some of the things that I’ve heard when asking people, why should God let you into heaven?

If we’re trusting in anything, if we’re trusting in our own effort, if we’re trusting in our connection to a church or to a family member who was a godly person, if we are trusting in anything but the living God, our trust is misplaced. And when it comes to eternity, that has disastrous consequences. Because just as nobody was above escaping the judgment of God when he judged Israel, not one of us is above escaping, or not one of us is above the judgment of God when it comes to our sin.

Not one of us is worthy of escaping the judgment of God. And yet God in his judgment, God in his justice, his punishment of sin, he has every right to punish sin. He has every right to punish sin with consigning us to hell for all eternity.

Even if I just stole something once, yes, because it’s not the gravity of the sin, it’s not the size of the sin, it’s the fact that we have transgressed the law of an infinitely holy God. And it demands an infinite penalty. And yet Jesus Christ took our sins on himself on the cross, and he paid the infinite penalty.

And he bore all the punishment that was due for us. And tonight, if any of you, I know most of you have heard me say this over and over, but I want to say it again. If any of you tonight are trusting in anything other than God and His grace, His kindness, that He is willing to forgive us because of what Jesus Christ did and only because of what Jesus Christ did, if you’re trusting in your goodness, if you’re trusting in your giving, if you’re trusting in your family connections or your membership at a church, if you’re trusting in anything other than what Jesus Christ did and God’s free gift, folks, your trust is misplaced.

And I invite you tonight to put your trust in the right place, To put your trust in Jesus Christ, say, how do I do that? Folks, it is as simple as recognizing we’re not as good as we think we are. As a matter of fact, we are all sinners deserving of God’s condemnation.

And when we are willing to admit that fact and trust that Jesus Christ and Him alone had the righteousness and the power to pay for our sins on our behalf and trust Him to do that and ask God’s forgiveness because of what Jesus Christ did, the Bible calls that faith. It says, by grace, by God’s free gift, we’re saved through faith. Not of yourselves, it is the gift of God, not by works, lest any man should boast. Tonight, if you’re willing to admit your sin, trust Christ to have paid the penalty for your sin and ask God’s forgiveness.

He’s ready to hear and ready to forgive.