Hosea 5:4 They do not direct their deeds toward turning to their God, For the spirit of harlotry is in their midst, And they do not know the Lord.

Hosea’s word for Israel and Judah from God was quite strong but needed to be said. Israel and Judah had continued to turn away from God for far too long and everything they did did not indicate any remorse or turning back to Him.

If we have done wrong but we recognise the fact and approach God with a contrite heart, He will accept our apology and forgive us; but continued turning away from Him will not lead to forgiveness.

God wants everyone to be able to accept forgiveness! We are the ones who have to do something about it so we can accept His forgiveness.

John 7:34 You will seek Me and not find Me, and where I am you cannot come.

When Jesus was speaking to the Pharisees He told them they would continue to seek Him (the Messiah) and they would not be able to find Him. This intimates they would continue looking for a Messiah having missed the point that He is our Messiah and He has already come.

Many times in our lives we do not believe what we see because we either expect more or we want more, or in this case they wanted something different!

Jesus Christ has already come to save us from our sins and He has already shed the blood He promised and has already paid the debt in full.

Believe and trust in Him.

Proverbs 1:23 Turn at my rebuke; Surely I will pour out my spirit on you; I will make my words known to you.

When God tells us we are doing something wrong we have got to listen to Him! He is the one who does know what is best for us!

Being bullish about listening to God is not going to help us though because God requires we listen and act upon what He instructs us to do.

If we open our hearts to what He has to say we will gain a whole lot more from His instruction than if we just do it.

And when we do listen we must listen properly because going off on a tangent because we don’t listen properly is not going to help us.