Let whoever is wise understand these things, and whoever is insightful recognize them. For the ways of the LORD are right, and the righteous walk in them, but the rebellious stumble in them. Hosea 14:9 HCSB
The book of Hosea is one that I haven’t studied much. As I read through it, I found it to be depressing. It begins with God telling His prophet Hosea to marry a promiscuous woman. In Hosea 1:7 God tells Hosea to go and marry a promiscuous wife and have children of promiscuity, for the land is committing blatant acts of promiscuity by abandoning the LORD. Doesn’t make you feel all warm and fuzzy inside, does it? But Hosea was obedient and did what God instructed him to do.
Can you imagine your friend wanting to set you up on a blind date? The first thing they tell you about this person is that they are incapable of being faithful. Now for most people, this would be a deal breaker. If you have ever been in a relationship with someone who is unfaithful, then you certainly don’t want to repeat that. But, even after Hosea’s promiscuous wife leaves Hosea to be with other men, God encourages him to go get her and to love her. After a time of separation there is restoration and redemption. The theme of Hosea is God’s steadfast love for Israel despite her unfaithfulness. Hosea married Gomer only to discover that she was unfaithful. There was a separation, but Hosea’s love persisted and eventually there was reconciliation.
It’s easy to read the book of Hosea and think how horrible Gomer, the harlot, is. It’s easy to degrade her and think bad of her. But it’s not so easy to accept that we are her. Anytime we are unfaithful to our loving, merciful God, we are much like Gomer. Anytime we choose our flesh over obeying God we are unfaithful to Him. That’s a hard pill to swallow isn’t it? We like to think that we are not so bad. We like to think that our sins are small and insignificant. But, my friend, sin is sin. There is no little sin and there is no big sin. Of course, we tend to categorize them. We like to look at what many call a “little” white lie as not being a big sin. We look at that as something that God will just overlook and give us a pass on. But then we look at murder or the molestation of a child and we get all irate about that. In 1 Corinthians 6:9-10 Paul lumps verbal abusiveness with the sins of homosexuality and adultery when he tells us not to be deceived that these people will not inherit God’s kingdom. Quite simply put, either we are faithful or we are not.
I would like for you to take a moment to think about something. If you love someone, I mean really love someone, you want to do things that make them happy. You don’t want to do things that disappoint them, right? So how much do you love God? Do you have a superficial love for him where you do what is right when in the light, but not so good in darkness? Are you completely faithful? Would you want a spouse that is faithful when you are around, but not so trustworthy while you two are apart?
We serve a faithful God. He is full of love and mercy. But he expects faithfulness in return. Hosea 14 is the last chapter in the book of Hosea. It ends with a plea for Israel to return to God, to repent and be restored and to accept what is good. There is nothing better than God’s love. We have a choice. We can accept it or we can reject it. If we accept it and remain faithful, we too can be forgiven and restored.
The book of Hosea ends by saying whoever is wise understand these things and whoever is insightful recognize them. The righteous will be faithful, they will walk in God’s ways, which is the right way. There are no gray areas, just right and wrong. Those who rebel against God and are unfaithful will suffer God’s wrath and the consequences and will stumble. I pray today that we will all choose the right way, because when we choose the wrong way we are being rebellious. We are literally cutting our nose off to spite our face, as my grandmother used to say. Nothing good can come of that.
Have a great day!