Hosea - The Unfaithful Bride

We are looking at the Minor Prophets,

These are prophets who Usually only had one or two main messages that were recorded for us.

Often times each has their own main theme

Yet they all focus on the Justice of God - punishing sinners, But Even moreso his Mercy, should people repent.

And Many of them look ahead to a time when God brings redemption and salvation to the entire world.

Today we are looking at Hosea

Now Hosea is a long book by Minor Prophets standards,

so we wont go over all of it,

But Hosea has a unique way of sharing his message,

God turns Hosea’s life into a metaphore of God’s love for us.

Hosea 1:1–3 ESV

The word of the Lord that came to Hosea, the son of Beeri, in the days of Uzziah, Jotham, Ahaz, and Hezekiah, kings of Judah, and in the days of Jeroboam the son of Joash, king of Israel. When the Lord first spoke through Hosea, the Lord said to Hosea, “Go, take to yourself a wife of whoredom and have children of whoredom, for the land commits great whoredom by forsaking the Lord.” So he went and took Gomer, the daughter of Diblaim, and she conceived and bore him a son.

God wants to Illustrate through Hosea his love for the People of Israel, but Israel is unfaithful, worshiping other Gods,

So God tells Hosea to marry a prostitute, Gomer,

Now at this time ISrael and Judah are seperate kingdoms

and Judah occassionally turned back to Serve the Lord, but Israel has consitently been unfaithful.

Hosea 1:4–9 ESV

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. And on that day I will break the bow of Israel in the Valley of Jezreel.” 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. But I will have mercy on the house of Judah, and I will save them by the Lord their God. I will not save them by bow or by sword or by war or by horses or by horsemen.” 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.”

Hosea has three children with Gomer, the first is Jezreel, named after the city and valley of Jezreel, where Wars have been fought,

And God tells Israel that Judgment upon Israel at the valley of Jezreel.

Then He has a Daughter, Lo-Ruhamah - No Mercy,

Because he will not have mercy on ISrael, they have been unfaithful and so now even repentence will not spare them from Judgement

But Judah has a chance to repent and have mercy.

Then He has anther son called Lo Ammi - Not my people,

Because Israel has been so unfaithful, that they are no longer God’s people

Now Because Gomer is a prostitute, it is unclear if Lo-Ruhama and Lo-Ami are Hosea’s children, as though she has been so unfaithful, that these are not his children.

Hosea 1:10–2:1 ESV

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.” And the children of Judah and the children of Israel shall be gathered together, and they shall appoint for themselves one head. And they shall go up from the land, for great shall be the day of Jezreel. Say to your brothers, “You are my people,” and to your sisters, “You have received mercy.”

Yet as soon as all of this is said, Judgement is Coming, repentance wont help, the People of Israel are no Longer God’s people

God Says he will bring them back, and they will be his people again

And where they were once broken in the valley of Jezreel, they will be reunited.

Now Israel was defeated by the Assyrian Empire, Whom Jonah spoke against at Nineveh shortly after this, they were destroyed in battle, then they assyrians took the people and scattered them, all across their empire, separating families and people.

So this happened, But God is still faithful to the people of Israel, an he is still gathering them back.

What follows here is a large poetic statement of God’s judgment against the unfaithfulness of Israel, and it is vivid in its description of a husband exposing his wife as unfaithful, to the point where I am not even comfortable preaching it out loud.

and It ends like this:

Hosea 2:13–23 ESV

And I will punish her for the feast days of the Baals when she burned offerings to them and adorned herself with her ring and jewelry, and went after her lovers and forgot me, declares the Lord. “Therefore, behold, I will allure her, and bring her into the wilderness, and speak tenderly to her. And there I will give her her vineyards and make the Valley of Achor a door of hope. And there she shall answer as in the days of her youth, as at the time when she came out of the land of Egypt. “And in that day, declares the Lord, you will call me ‘My Husband,’ and no longer will you call me ‘My Baal.’ For I will remove the names of the Baals from her mouth, and they shall be remembered by name no more. And I will make for them a covenant on that day with the beasts of the field, the birds of the heavens, and the creeping things of the ground. And I will abolish the bow, the sword, and war from the land, and I will make you lie down in safety. And I will betroth you to me forever. I will betroth you to me in righteousness and in justice, in steadfast love and in mercy. I will betroth you to me in faithfulness. And you shall know the Lord. “And in that day I will answer, declares the Lord, I will answer the heavens, and they shall answer the earth, and the earth shall answer the grain, the wine, and the oil, and they shall answer Jezreel, and I will sow her for myself in the land. And I will have mercy on No Mercy, and I will say to Not My People, ‘You are my people’; and he shall say, ‘You are my God.’ ”

God promises that even after the terrible judgement on Israel, because of their unfaithfulness, He will still redeem them, and reestablish his covenant with them, and we get this almost beautiful wedding imagery - much of which has been adapted to Jesus and the Church,

But beyond that he also will bring in the people who are not the true Children of Israel,

the Not my people becoming My people.

I wonder if this is some of the first hints of God bringing others to faith in him.

Hosea 3 ESV

And the Lord said to me, “Go again, love a woman who is loved by another man and is an adulteress, even as the Lord loves the children of Israel, though they turn to other gods and love cakes of raisins.” So I bought her for fifteen shekels of silver and a homer and a lethech of barley. And I said to her, “You must dwell as mine for many days. You shall not play the whore, or belong to another man; so will I also be to you.” For the children of Israel shall dwell many days without king or prince, without sacrifice or pillar, without ephod or household gods. Afterward the children of Israel shall return and seek the Lord their God, and David their king, and they shall come in fear to the Lord and to his goodness in the latter days.

God tells Hosea to go find his unfaithful wife, and to marry her again.

after she has been unfaithful to him, borne him children by other men,

after God has talked about the Judgement he is going to pour out on Israel his unfaithful bride

And after God has talked about redeeming Israel again after the judgement.

Now he tells Hosea to go back and re-marry Gomer.

If Hosea’s life is a Metaphor for God’s love for Israel, why does God wait to tell hosea to take Gomer back until He has Already revealed that he will redeem Israel again?

why Not tell Hosea to bring Gomer back as a lesson for How God still loves Israel even after everything?

Because Church: God wants our lives to reflect his Love.

God was planning on forgiving Israel, so he expects Hosea to Forgive Gomer

So God expects us to show that sort of love to those around us.

And this isn’t easy! its not supposed to be easy.

Hosea had all the evidence he needed to take Gomer out into the Street and have her stoned,

She was an adulteress! She was Unfaithful to him

At the very least he had the right to divorce her,

Even Jesus admitted that unfaithfulness in marriage was grounds for divorce,

And yet God tells him to forgive her, and more than that to remarry her, and Hosea does.

Because God forgives, so he calls his people to forgive.

Now that is just the first 3 chapters of Hosea,

the rest of the book is a long prophectic judgement against Ephraim (the capital of the Nation of Israel) and Judah

TO give you an idea of What Israel was doing:

Hosea 4:1–2 ESV

Hear the word of the Lord, O children of Israel, for the Lord has a controversy with the inhabitants of the land. There is no faithfulness or steadfast love, and no knowledge of God in the land; there is swearing, lying, murder, stealing, and committing adultery; they break all bounds, and bloodshed follows bloodshed.

No Fiathfulness, no love, no knowledge of God, Swearing, Lying, Murder, stealing, adultery, pushing and breaking moral boundaries and bloodshed.

Church if that does not describe parts of America I do not know what does.

So the warnings that Hosea gives Israel because of these sin and shortcomings, maybe we should pay attention less we end up in a similar situation.

In Fact Hosea calls Israel to come back to the Lord

Hosea 6:1–2 ESV

“Come, let us return to the Lord; for he has torn us, that he may heal us; he has struck us down, and he will bind us up. After two days he will revive us; on the third day he will raise us up, that we may live before him.

Even in the midst of God’s judgement Hosea tells Israel to return to the Lord, and in doing so he points to the ressurection of Jesus, the ultimate act of overcoming the evil of the world

After two days we will be revived, on the third day he will raise us up.

Church that is Jesus!

So we have this warning from 2700 years ago, that God will judge evildoers, and those who reject him, but if we hold onto Jesus, God will bring us through his judgement.

See what happened Church is that While God did judge the kingdom of Israel by the assyrians, and he is slowly restoring them, and will restore them, he has actually made a way to skip his judement entirely, and that is by pouring out his judgement on the only person who was ever truely faithful, his son, Jesus.

and becuase Jesus took the weight of God’s judgement,

so now we who follow Jesus need not be judged,

And God can accept us, though we were unfaithful, like Hosea accepted his wife Gomer,

and we who were not going to receive mercy, have recieved the mercy of Jesus

and we who were not God’s people, have become his people.