Africa Study Bible Sampler - Flipbook - Page 56
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O Israel, I will wipe the many names of
Baal from your lips,
and you will never mention them again.
18 On that day I will make a covenant
with all the wild animals and the birds
of the sky
and the animals that move along the
ground
so they will not harm you.
I will remove all weapons of war from
the land,
all swords and bows,
so you can live unafraid
in peace and safety.
17
2:18
Lev 26:5-6
Job 5:23
Isa 2:4
Ezek 34:25;
39:1-10
2:20
Jer 31:34
Hos 6:6; 13:4
2:21
Zech 8:12
H O S E A 2 : 2 1
I will make you my wife for ever,
showing you righteousness and justice,
unfailing love and compassion.
20 I will be faithful to you and make you
mine,
and you will finally know me as the
Lord.
19
21
“In that day, I will answer,”
says the Lord.
“I will answer the sky as it pleads for
clouds.
And the sky will answer the earth with
rain.
Lea r n
Love
“Dear friends, let us continue to love one another, for love God our Father. Yet God does love us. And his love compels him
comes from God. Anyone who loves is a child of God and knows to serve rather than mistreat, abuse, or manipulate us (Mark
God. But anyone who does not love does not know God, for 10:46). God has the power and authority to take, but instead
God is love” (1 John 4:7-8). Genuine love is our greatest tool he gives and serves. This is amazing!
for evangelism and impacting society.
Living out God’s love in our own lives means that we love
Here in Hosea 3:1, we see the depth of God’s love. The Lord unconditionally. We must love other people no matter what
sent Hosea to love his wife again, even though she committed they do. People made in God’s image are his special creations
adultery. “This will illustrate that the Lord still loves Israel, and should not need to earn our love. We must freely give love
even though the people have turned to other gods and love without an ulterior motive or expecting anything in return, as
to worship them.”
God does.
God’s love for us challenges us to love him and love others.
Love must cross boundaries. We need to love those people
Christ said that the two greatest commandments are to love who are difficult for us to love. Jesus told Jews that they should
God and to love others. If we love rightly, we will have kept love Samaritans—their enemies (Luke 6:27-29, 32-35). We
God’s standards and morals (Matthew 22:36-40). To live out must love the tribe next door that always fights against us. This
and demonstrate God’s love, though, we must overcome incor- requires a commitment to choose to love. Our love will grow if
rect understandings of what love is. We must truly understand we make a daily decision to focus on the Bible’s teaching about
God’s love for this world and for us.
love and to live it out. God the Father loved us so much that
There are elements in our cultures that make it difficult for he chose to send his Son, and the Son chose to love us and
us to understand biblical love. Traditional African religion offered live among us in order to save us from our rebellion against
sacrifices to appease ancestors or spirits in order to receive a God. This is how God loved the world: “He gave his one and
blessing or maintain peace. This system can distort our view of only Son, so that everyone who believes in him will not perish
love. God’s love is given freely. Although God is pleased with our but have eternal life” (John 3:16).
worship and good works, we cannot appease him or earn his
In 1 Corinthians 13, Paul shares this concept of love that
love by our actions (Romans 5:5-10; 8:35-39; James 1:17). even the greatest acts of sacrifice are empty without love. This
Tribal deities also distort our understanding of love. Each chapter also describes the true characteristics and nature
tribe claims its own deity. It was believed that a tribe’s gods of love. We are commanded to have love in our hearts for
fight for, provide for, and bless only that tribe. In fact, these God and others. If we do not have this heartfelt love, we can
gods may try to curse people from a different tribe. The idea encourage our love to grow by understanding and caring for
that the God of the Bible loves us seems normal. However, the needs, hurts, and struggles of another person made in
to those who have been reared with tribal gods, it may seem God’s image. We can also pray that God will help us see the
strange to think that God’s love also crosses tribal borders. other person as God does.
Can God love me and love the tribe of my enemy? The answer
We may think the church’s job is to defend and prove our
is that God loves all tribes and nations. “God loved the world faith through our words, but the Bible is clear that we prove
so much that he gave his one and only Son” (John 3:16). His our faith by how we love others. As 1 John clearly teaches
love does not discriminate. He loves “us,” and he loves “them.” us, this is especially true for those inside God’s family. People
We also easily misunderstand God’s love because of the are drawn to the people of God when they see how well we
difficulties that arise in our relationships with authorities—gov- love one another. One of the greatest ways to evangelise our
ernment officials, chiefs, pastors, teachers, and our fathers. We community is for people to be able to look at Christians and
sometimes see leaders who manipulate, lie, steal, cheat, abuse, think to themselves, “They treat one another as family. They
and require bribes in exchange for helping others. Fathers must really know the love of God. I want to be a part of that.”
are often absent or take family resources to gratify their own
Note that Christian love is sacrificial. God’s love for us has
desires instead of helping the family. It has been said that always been self-giving (Galatians 1:4). Let us love people so
Chief Rumanyika of western Tanzania would spear the foot of much that we give of our time, our resources, and our skills
a villager whenever he addressed his people. People who see to help them.
examples such as these find it difficult to believe in the love of