It has come to my attention that something excites me that possibly doesn’t excite others in the same way.

Last week the text that I preached from was 1 Pet 2:1-12. There was one verse I didn’t spend much time at all on, verse 10:

you are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people for his own possession, that you may proclaim the excellencies of him who called you out of darkness into his marvelous light. Once you were not a people, but now you are God’s people; once you had not received mercy, but now you have received mercy.

I thought it an interesting verse about how we are now God’s people and we have received mercy. Cool! But then during the week I started reading Hosea. In the book Hosea goes and gets a wife who is a prostitute (trying explaining the reasoning behind that to your pastor!) and they had three children.

So he went and took Gomer, the daughter of Diblaim, and she conceived and bore him a son. And the Lord said to him, Call his name Jezreel, for in just a little while I will punish the house of Jehu for the blood of Jezreel, and I will put an end to the kingdom of the house of Israel. … She conceived again and bore a daughter. And the Lord said to him, Call her name No Mercy, for I will no more have mercy on the house of Israel, to forgive them at all. … When she had weaned No Mercy, she conceived and bore a son. And the Lord said, Call his name Not My People, for you are not my people, and I am not your God.

Now to me that is pretty amazing. When I saw the link between this is knocked me back (and I confess I just say another link as I was writing this). God has rejected Israel as His, He declares they are no longer His people and will not know His mercy. Now as Peter writes he links back to this declaring that now we are accepted by God, we are His people and we can (and have) received His mercy!

I love the links.