Quiet Time With Him

A DIVIDED HEART

Scripture Reading: Hosea 10:2

"Their heart is divided; now shall they be found faulty...." cf., Hebrews 8:8 "for finding fault with them, he saith, Behold, the days come, saith the Lord, when I will make a New Covenant with the house of Israel...."

What was Israel's divided heart? It was that they were not true to God's Law but broke it in idolatry! They went whoring after other Gods. They forsook the God of Israel and were continually showing their breach of the Covenant of the Law. God in His long-suffering allowed Israel again and again to manifest their failure under that First Covenant because He was proving them to be in need of a Savior, who would mediate a better Covenant.

Finally in Acts 7:53, the dispensation of Law came to a dramatic close as Stephen, full of the Holy Spirit, declared to Israel "who have received the Law by the disposition of angels, and have not kept it!" Thus it is here, dispensationally speak­ing, "...that where sin abounded [under the Law] GRACE superabounded" (Romans 5:20). Yes, indeed, God found fault with them in their divided heart, but that just showed them to be sinners like all the rest of us!

God has effectively shown all (Jew and Greek) under sin that He might have mercy upon all (Romans 11:32). What is this mercy? "Christ died for our sins ... was buried ...and rose again the third day..." (I Corinthians 15:3, 4). "Christ hath redeemed us from the curse of the Law, being made a curse for us..." (Galatians 3:13). "Therefore we conclude that a man is justified [declared righteous] by faith apart from the deeds of the Law" (Romans 3:28). "Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and thou shalt be saved..." (Acts 16:31).

DONALD A. WEBB
(From Amazing Grace, October 2004)

Next time (the Lord willing) we will talk about a divided heart as it relates to our personal walk.

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