Good Morning Yamon Ki Yesepar and Nevim Arith Hayomim:
Hosea 11:7 “And my people are bent to backsliding from me though they call them to the most high, none at all will exalt him.”
The syntax at the end of this verse is highly disputed. The KJV and other translations will render this as the people will not exalt God. However, on the other side, the NIV as well as some other translations will render this as God who will not exalt the people.
Now I know our eternal state does not depend upon how this verse is rendered. If man does not exalt God or God does not exalt man if they backslide doesn’t make a whole lot of difference when we look at the whole picture. After all both are right. Man does not exalt God when he is backslidden and God can not exalt man in a backslidden state. I can see this going either way grammatically, but I choose to side with the KJV that when man is in a backslidden state he will not exalt God.
For one thing, what’s the big deal if God exalts you or not? But it is a big deal if we do not exalt God. The word exalt in Hebrew is “rum” which means “to be high” or “to exalt.” However, to narrow this down, this is an exaltation of rank or pride. It could mean that one who is backslidden can be held in high esteem or high rank with God. It could also mean that God can not take pride in him. If a man is in a backslidden state, it won’t matter too much to him if God holds him in high regard or not because he is not really thinking about his relationship with God.
If the KJV is correct and this references the backslidden as not hold God in high esteem or showing pride in him, it would make more sense to me, at lest to me personally as I am on this journey to discover God’s heart.
I remember as a five year old child having to walk many miles to afternoon kindergarten (that is, of course, kindergarten miles, it was really only one block). One afternoon I was late and the doors were already closed. Of course they were very heavy doors, much too heavy for my kindergarten arms to open them. I remember being in a state of panic. I had heard from my older brother that my teacher would “kill” anyone that was late and of course I didn’t want to be killed. Since I could not get into the building, not that I really knew what to do once I got into the building, I did the only thing I could do and that was to walk back home. I remember reaching my home and finding the doors locked, my mother apparently was using this opportunity of public babysitting to get some shopping done. So I stood outside the door and did the only thing a self respecting five year old facing “getting killed” by his teacher would do, I began to cry.
About this time my father, who was a milk man, drove up in his truck. He did not even bother to park the truck but when he saw me, he stopped the truck and leaving it in the middle of the street, he jogged up to me. I remember he asked; “What’s wrong?” In tears I sobbed: “I’m late, late for school, my teacher is going to kill me.” My dad did not say a word, he just took me by the hand and put me in the milk truck and drove that block to the school. Boy, how I wished my kindergarten friends could see me in my dad’s milk truck. I felt so proud of him. When we arrived at the school my father again took me by the hand and led me up to that heavy door. He was strong enough to open that door. I remember as we entered thinking how quiet it was in the halls. I was not afraid because I was with my father. He led me to my kindergarten room and took off my coat and my kindergarten teacher, saying not a word; she would not dare because my father was there, led me to the circle the rest of the class had formed for some game and without a word let me join in. I noticed my father say a couple words to the teacher who just nodded her head. I assume he was telling the teacher not the “kill” me. Then my father left, but I was just beaming. I had been brought to class by my father and everyone got to see this big strong man that I called “dad.”
I know my father took great joy in the fact that I was proud of him. As a child and all the way up to the time he passed onto to heaven, I also sought to make him proud of me. We wanted and desired to be proud of each other. If God is created in our image, would He not want to be proud of us just as we are proud of Him. You think he doesn’t enjoy being the hero, comforting us when he finds us afraid, alone and crying? Doesn’t he just enjoy opening that door that we can not open, taking us by the hand and protecting us from the terrors of the empty corridors? And does he not just love to intercede on our behalf and tell the enemy not to “kill us?”
God not only desires that we be proud of Him, but He also desires to be proud of us. Yet, when we backslid, neither of us can be proud of the other. You see, the word in Hebrew for “backslid” is “shuv” in it’s root form. It means “to return” or “withdraw,” and it also means to restore. Actually, the word has it’s origins in breathing. When you breath you let air in and then you let air out. This idea of backsliding is to one moment trust in God and the next to not trust in him. It is like in James 1:6 where we are taught that we can not expect anything from God if we are driven like the sea. When we go through a period of testing it is like one moment we are trusting God, praising Him, then the next moment we are worried and fretting. This is “shuv” which is rendered in the KJV as backsliding. By going back and forth in our trust for him we show that we are not proud of Him and we question His love for us. When we go through a difficult time and find it hard to trust God, what we are telling Him is “You don’t really love me.” “If you really loved me, you would…” Did you ever hear those words from someone you loved? It really stings does it not? You could say it wounds your heart. Yet, when some thing does not go the way we want and we question if God is really there to protect us, we are saying: “You don’t love me, if you loved me you would let me stay and not face that big bad teacher who wants to kill me.” Can you imagine how we must wound the heart of God when we accuse Him of not loving us?
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