Beckett: God’s Word is His Bond

“If we are faithless, He remains faithful, for He cannot deny Himself” (2 Timothy 2:13).

Nothing illustrates this surpassing love of God more than the Book of Hosea. The Lord commanded the prophet to marry a prostitute as an image of His love for unfaithful Israel. The prostitute would be an unfaithful spouse to Hosea while Hosea himself remained faithful, and their children would be named “No Mercy” (Lo-ruhama) and “Not My People” (Lo-ammi) to illustrate God’s disposition toward Israel (Hosea 1:2-9). Israel has been an unfaithful wife to Yahweh; His children are disobedient disappointments.

But then God says, “Yet the number of the children of Israel shall be like the sand of the sea, which cannot be measured or numbered. And in the place where it was said to them, ‘You are not My people,’ it shall be said to them, ‘Children of the living God.’ …Say to your brothers, ‘You are My people,’ and to your sisters, ‘You have received mercy'” (1:10; 2:1).

Despite Israel’s faithlessness, God remained faithful. Although they deserved no mercy and to be disinherited, God continues to show mercy and keeps His children.

Just so, when you are faithless, God remains faithful. Whenever you mess up, God will always show you mercy; He will never disown you. Should you disown God and squander the inheritance He has given you in reckless living, if you return to Him He will treat you as the prodigal son who once was as good as dead but now is alive, restoring His inheritance to you (Luke 15:11-32).

God is omnipotent—He is all-powerful. Yet there is one thing God cannot do: He cannot deny Himself. That is, when He makes a promise, He never goes back on it. He has His self-command, “Comfort, comfort My people, says your God. Speak tenderly to Jerusalem, and cry to her that her warfare is ended, that her iniquity is pardoned” (Isaiah 40:1). The Faithful One died and rose for you, that you might be found faithful—justified—on the Day of His coming through Jesus Christ our Lord.