You Are What You Love

Hosea 9:10-17
Luke 8:1-15
It is difficult to imagine harsher language than that contained in our reading from Hosea today. For their idolatry and disobedience to God the people will suffer greatly, says the prophet, and in profoundly disturbing ways. But there is one phrase in particular that intersects with the gospel reading from Luke. The people, says Hosea, “became detestable like the thing they loved” (Hosea 9:10). The “thing” is this case is the fertility god Baal, which is “shameful” in the eyes of God (v. 10).

Our reading from Luke is the familiar parable of the sower and the seeds, which compares different types of faith with the ways in which seeds either grow or die. “As for what fell among the thorns,” says Jesus, “these are the ones who hear; but as they go on their way they are choked by the cares and riches and pleasures of life, and their fruit does not mature” (Luke 8:14). Jesus does not make the connection explicit, but he might as well have added, “they became detestable like the thing they loved.” God’s desire for God’s people, in the words of Jesus, is to “hear the word, hold it fast in an honest and good heart, and bear fruit with patient endurance” (v. 15). But all too often God’s people show no patience, no endurance, and therefore produce no good fruit. Instead they are attracted by “shameful things”, or by “the cares and riches and pleasures of life.”

We are familiar with the expression “you are what you eat.” Both Hosea and Jesus remind us that, likewise, we are (or we are like) what we love. So where is our attention? What are we attracted to? And what motivates our actions in the world? Are we drawn to the things of God and God’s will to bear good fruit with patient endurance? Or do we prefer the cares and riches and pleasures of life? This really is a serious concern because it demonstrates who we are as well as whose we are. If “we are (or are like) what we love” then certainly our focus should be on God.

Prayer: Lord, forgive us when we are distracted by the things of this world and fail to respond to your word and your will. Amen.