Hosea 2:16-23 (New International Version)
16 "In that day," declares the LORD, "you will call me 'my husband'; you will no longer call me 'my master. 17 I will remove the names of the Baals from her lips; no longer will their names be invoked. 18 In that day I will make a covenant for them with the beasts of the field and the birds of the air and the creatures that move along the ground. Bow and sword and battle I will abolish from the land, so that all may lie down in safety. 19 I will betroth you to me forever; I will betroth you in righteousness and justice, in love and compassion. 20 I will betroth you in faithfulness, and you will acknowledge the LORD. 21 "In that day I will respond," declares the LORD— "I will respond to the skies, and they will respond to the earth; 22 and the earth will respond to the grain, the new wine and oil, and they will respond to Jezreel. 23 I will plant her for myself in the land; I will show my love to the one I called 'Not my loved one. I will say to those called 'Not my people, 'You are my people'; and they will say, 'You are my God.' "

The Buffet Approach to Faith

For all of my father’s working life he was a labourer, usually as a carpenter on a construction site or refurbishing a Dominion Store, or, just before his retirement in the A & P warehouse just off the 427. I assume, then, my father heard his fair share of expletives and curses.
But around the house, it was my mother who set the tone and the closest I have ever heard my mother come to a four-letter-word is “dash.” When my grandmother lived with my parents, the word “bloody” was used on a regular basis because my grandmother spent her formative years in England and to refer to something as a “bloody mess” was as normal to her as breathing.
This is not to portray me as a 100% pure-mouthed pastor. My tongue may not slide into a curse as easily as some do, but it happens. It is true to say, though, that some words still grate in my hearing because I grew up understanding they were words one did not say in polite company. For example, I cannot tell you when it was I first read the prophet Hosea, but it surprised me to find the word whore in the text. I can recall thinking, “What’s that word doing in the Bible?” I associated the word whore with the gutter language of the ball diamond and rink. Which leads me to suggest we may find the central image of this book to be odd at the very least and perhaps even offensive. The image is introduced in the second verse of the book. When the Lord first spoke through Hosea, the Lord said to Hosea, “Go take for yourself a wife of whoredom and have children of whoredom, for the land commits great whoredom by forsaking the Lord” (Hosea 1:2).
There are two ways in which you may find this image odd or offensive. The whole idea of the prophet being called to a relationship with a promiscuous partner may offend. But I suspect where the text will make us squirm is in the suggestion that human beings can be promiscuous practitioners of religion.

The Mandarin restaurant chain has opened a new location at the 407 and the Ninth Line, about ten minutes from where we live. These are popular restaurants because they serve North American style Chinese food and because it’s a buffet. You can take a bit of this and a whole bunch of that, create your own feast. In the world of faith, this buffet approach is known by the 25¢ word, syncretism. I am reminded of a woman named Sheila, written about by Robert Bellah in his book Habits of the Heart. She described her faith as being a bit from here and a little from there—“Sheilaism” she called it. Prepare to be offended: God calls it promiscuity.
Please turn in the Bible to the prophesy of Hosea, to our text in chapter two. It can be found on page 835 of the Bibles in the pews. The verses will also come up on the screen as we look at them. I chose to look at these particular verses because the prophet speaks the word of God using a pun, which we, of course, miss in the translation. On that day, says the Lord, you will call me, “My husband,” and no longer will you call me, “My Baal.”
Let’s try to imagine it this way. My grandfather lived in the village of Clarkes Beach in Newfoundland. He and my grandmother bought their groceries at Bartlett’s General Store. That’s a fact. My grandfather was completely faithful to that store.
Let’s imagine that we could transport my grandfather through time to Ontario. I suspect of the two of those the time travel would be the easier. That Bill Norman never had any desire to visit the mainland. But we’ll pretend we got him to our home in Markham, got a car for him and told him he could shop wherever he wanted. “There is a very good corner grocery store within walking distance,” we would tell him, “but you may want to see what everyone else is offering.” And grandfather would discover there’s a Loblaws and a Longos, a No Frills and a Sobeys, there’s even a place called Village Grocer, the Unionville version of Pusateri’s. He had been faithful to one store in Clarkes Beach,but here the others offered so much.
The ancient world knew absolutely nothing of the concepts of sacred and secular. Religion was a part of everyday and every place. When the nation of Israel came into Palestine no one would question that they brought the worship of a particular god with them. What was resisted was the idea that this God demanded that he alone be worshipped. And the people of God said to themselves and one another, “Why should we limit ourselves to the selection offered by the corner store when the variety of a religious feast is offered to us?” Here is something to note: they did not get rid of the God who revealed himself to Moses at the burning bush. They did not get rid of the God who had brought them out of Egypt. They welcomed this God to the buffet. God says, “No longer will you call me, “My Baal.” You see the word Baal in its singular form refers to a specific Canaanite God. In its plural form Baal refers to the many and different idols the nations around Israel used to represent the whole buffet of gods they worshipped. The God of heaven and earth was thought of as one of many, as part of the buffet.

This was going to change! Here is where the play on words is found. Remember we are talking about the ancient world, a patriarchal world in which no one but the rich had any real rights and women had no rights at all. In this world there were two words to refer to one’s husband. One of them is a title of affection. It refers to the love that is the foundation of any true relationship. That word is pronounced “ishi.” The other word which can also be translated master or lord emphasized the husband’s legal position in this culture. That word is pronounced “bali,” and comes from the same root as word Baal.
This is what God says to his people. “I am doing something new. I am going to take this whole business of bali and baal and replace it with a covenant characterized by the love and affection and inward bond of ishi. My people will be promiscuous no longer in their faith. Where there was no pity, there will be pity. Where there was no identity, you will be my faithful partner.”

God is never content to let his people play fast and lose with their affections. We still think of it as a buffet approach to faith. Let me say it again, God calls it promiscuity. This is seen whenever the people of God fail to give God the loyalty that God defines as necessary.
I fussed for a couple of hours on the day I wrote this sermon, not having a clear idea how to present this part of it. I went back to the text several times, reading verses 18 and 19 over and over. I will make for you a covenant on that day with the wild animals, the birds of the air, 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 take you for my wife forever; I will take you for my wife in righteousness and in justice, in steadfast love, and in mercy.
Look at those verses for thirty seconds. Does anything jump out at you? Take thirty more seconds and tell your neighbour what you found. Here’s what I saw. I saw the word covenant first. Then I saw those things in nature which threaten humankind. Then I saw the ways in which humans threaten and destroy one another. Then I saw that this relationship would be characterized by the attributes of God that define how the whole of life is to be lived.
It seems to me then the question we must deal with from this text is where and how have we partitioned our lives in order to keep God where we want him. That’s another part of the buffet approach. You have your hot table over here, salads there, soups and rolls in another spot, and, of course, desserts and ice cream centrally located.
What jumped out at me in our text is that God counts it as faithless promiscuity when he is not permitted to be a part of every day in the lives of his people. The vision of this covenant is comprehensive. It is not worth God’s time and energy to be relegated to a small section of life designated as religious. God expects to be involved in our relationships. God expects to be involved in our finances. God expects to be involved in our health. God expects to be involved in our career.
Friends I want to call us to a renewed commitment to our God today. After we have sung our next song we are going to receive the bread and cup of the Lord’s Supper. Sometimes meals can be hurried gulps of fast food. But sometimes a meal can be an expression of intimacy, or relationship. That’s what this is. When you eat the bread, when you drink from the cup, remember you are eating at the invitation of the one who loves you so much he wants to be your one and only Saviour.