Hosea begins with a love story; a painful, personal love story, the prophet’s very own. Hosea had married a woman who acted like a prostitute. Yet the more she went out on him, the more Hosea loved her. He gave her everything a good wife deserved: his love, his home, his name, his reputation. She responded by sleeping around with other men. He warned her, he pleaded with her, he punished her. She humiliated him until he wanted to cry, yet still he clung to her. Why did Hosea begin with his personal life? Because God had expressly told him to relate it to another, more tragic love story: the painful love of God for his people. God could have simply declared, “Israel is like a wife to me, an adulterous wife.†Instead, he used Hosea to act out the treachery in real life and to show in living color… read more
prophet
This is my classmate Katya who is an Orthodox Christian from Russia. Katya has an amazing voice—the best I have ever heard in real life. She can sings anything from a deep voice like Louis Armstrong in What a Wonderful World to an angelic choir voice which she does regularly at her church. She has an excellent control over her vocals even though she has never taken any singing lessons! Her voice is a true gift from God because she is a very, very talented singer and it is true joy listening to her sing. The godly women in the Bible are amazing. Just few weeks ago I was thinking about Hanna, the prophet Samuel’s mother. The Bible says in 1 Samuel 1:10-11, “And she was in bitterness of soul, and prayed to the LORD and wept in anguish. Then she made a vow and said, “O LORD of hosts,… read more