Hosea 3:1

“Then the Lord said to me, ‘Go again, love a woman who is loved by a lover and is committing adultery, just like the love of the Lord for the children of Israel, who look to other gods and love the raisin cakes of the pagans.’”

• God tells Hosea to take his wife back from adultery and compares it to His love of Israel.
• The Jewish people in those days repeatedly turned to sin and idolatry, preferring the luxury and temporary comfort of worshiping other gods. They had forgotten about the real miracles and salvation that only God Almighty can provide: forgotten their freedom from slavery under Egypt. God did the work for them to save them, and all Israel had to do was walk in faith, which they failed to do time and time again.
• Today, if you accept Jesus into your heart, you become a child of Israel; of light; of God. Without Him, your spirit remains dead and you remain a child of wrath and sin. You are a slave to sin without His saving grace.
• Their preference for the luxuries of paganism is just like when the newly freed Israeli left Egypt and found the desert to be, well… desolate. They wanted to go back and enjoy the leeks and cucumbers of their captors, forgetting that they had been freed from literal, abusive and forceful slavery! They started worshiping a golden calf that they had made with their own hands, rather than the God that freed them! Yet even through the consequences, the Lord provided manna and quail for them and stayed beside them through the difficulties. He fulfilled His promise by remaining faithful to them.

God is telling Hosea this, and is telling him to forgive Gomer for her adultery. Imagine Hosea’s confusion and likely anger at hearing God order him to do this! Forgiveness for something like that was a foreign concept for most people, and even to this day, not many will return and forgive their adulterous husband or wife. But this one act has represented so much for a couple millennia after!

Hosea 3:2-4

“So I bought her for myself for fifteen shekels of silver, and one and one-half homers of barley. And I said to her, ‘You shall stay with me many days; you shall not play the harlot, nor shall you have a man — so, too will I be toward you. ‘For the children of Israel shall abide many days without king or prince, without sacrifice or sacred pillar without ephod or teraphim.’”

• Israel still has no king and they will not accept Jesus (their long awaited Messiah) as their leader. They remain ruler-less and without hope. Every sacrifice of animals they have done for the sake of the Lord’s forgiveness have been pointless because they won’t accept the sacrifice the true king made for them.
• If you accept Jesus: Yeshua, the Christ(the anointed one), you are led by the true King of Israel, the one that God Himself put into place.
• God — the Word put Himself in place as King because He is worthy. The King said He will forgive His bride for her harlotry, so we are forgiven as long as we fully submit.

Obedience mattered more to Hosea than his pride, so he accepts his wife back. He freed her from her sinful life and gave her home and children back. Back then, adultery was punished with death, so his generosity, ordered by the Lord reflects on our God’s grace that He has shown to His chosen people.

Hosea 3:5

“Afterward the children of Israel shall return and seek the Lord their God and David their King. They shall fear the Lord and His goodness in the latter days.”

• When God sent Jesus to redeem us, He gave us a King David, as He is a descendant of David, making Him the rightful heir to the throne.
• Children of Israel, of God, understand His might and fear His wrath. We see the beauty too, we see His love, even though it’s hard to understand it. The King loves us… a comforting thought.
• Fear of the Lord does not mean being scared of Him. He does not want us to have a terror of Him, we are meant to have respect for His power and might, to have reverence for His holiness. We are worshiping creations, whether we worship Him as He expects, or something else, we are constantly living in worship. Our fear of the Lord is an awe for His greatness and immense respect.
• Many immediately after Jesus died began turning to Him. For thousands of years, millions have turned to Him and began living with a new vision, awakened to the truth of this life.

Hosea 4:1-2

“Hear the word of the Lord, you children of Israel, for the Lord brings a charge against the inhabitants of the land: ‘There is no truth or mercy or knowledge of God in the land. By swearing and lying, killing and stealing and committing adultery, they break all restraint, with bloodshed upon bloodshed.’”

• God convicts Israel of its sins.
• They haven’t heeded His warnings for longer than a generation, returning to sin and continuing the cycle.
• Imagine the Lord’s grief to see His creation repeatedly turn their backs on Him. They suffer the consequences of their actions and He witnesses every individual over every generation repeat the mistakes of their ancestors.
• Psalm 95:7-11 states: “For He is our God, and we are the people of His pasture, and the sheep of His hand. Today if you will hear His voice: ‘Do not harden your hearts, as in the rebellion, as in the day of trial in the wilderness, when your fathers tested Me; They tried Me, though they saw My work. For forty years I was grieved with that generation, and said, ‘It is a people who go astray and they do not know My ways.’ So I swore in My wrath, ‘They shall not enter My rest.’”

As we are without our submission, we are poisoned in the Lord’s sight. We are still held captive by sin, and to a holy, righteous God we are immoral and stained. He can wash our stains clean if we surrender to His will, and accept His Son who was sacrificed for our salvation. We cannot enter His rest and His presence without this cleansing. We cannot deserve it of our own accord, because if it were up to us, then bad people who believe they’re good would enter heaven, and sin would not be vanquished. Darkness cannot enter the light.

Hosea 4:3

“Therefore the land will mourn; and everyone who dwells there will waste away with the beasts of the field and the birds of the air; even the fish of the sea will be taken away.”

• There must be consequences for doing wrong and no matter how harsh people may think they are, God has the ultimate judgement of the standard.
• All have sinned and their refusal to see it has angered the Lord. In them repeating the sins committed throughout history, regardless of the deeds He had fulfilled for them, they proved their unfaithfulness.

At this time in history, because of their iniquity, a terrible drought fell on the land, just as the Lord had predicted in Deuteronomy. The people fell and died alongside the animals, parched to desperation.

Hosea 4:4-5

“Now let no man contend, or rebuke another; for your people are like those who contend with the priest. Therefore you shall stumble in the day; the prophet also shall stumble with you in the night; and I will destroy your mother.’”

• All arguments and accusations are pointless as all at this time have committed great sin, they all had done something to anger the Lord.
• All sin is first and foremost against God, so everything you do wrong in His sights are against Him.
• We cannot judge others for their sins because we are just as much of sinners as they are. If we are to rebuke them, we should turn the mirror on ourselves because we likely do the same sin as the one we are judging.

In relation to this quote: at this time that I had been writing this post, the Lord has been strongly pushing this lesson on me. He repetitively has brought me verses all throughout John, Romans, Psalm, and Hosea telling me not to judge others harshly and when it is okay to discern right from wrong. He has brought many circumstances in my life in the few weeks before posting this that have taught me that lesson. I am grateful to be hearing from Him, even if not audibly. The Lord is truly great!

Hosea 4:9

“And it shall be: like people, like priest us the same. So I will punish them for their ways, and reward them for their deeds.”

• The people act this way and so is the priest, committing sin and not speaking out against the people’s actions for their sin. He is not teaching or obeying the law with discipline, so they are all sinners.
• The priest has proven to be unauthoritative in those days, so he has been demoted by God.
• Rather than worshiping the Creator of the universe, the people chose idols. Rather than the One who freed them from slavery and led them through the untameable wilderness, they chose terebinths.
• They must greatly grieve the Lord, even to this day with as much rebellion that continues.

Hosea 4:16

“For Israel is stubborn like a stubborn calf; Now the Lord will let them forage like a lamb in open country.”

• God let Israel be taken over by its enemies and cast the people into the wilderness and other surrounding lands with the gentiles.
• They refused to love Him and respect His law, so they have to suffer the consequences to learn the lesson.

God is never not present. He can see all things simultaneously as He is omnipotent. He knew each of these people’s hearts then and can now, and can see every bit of immorality living within humanity. If He, as an all knowing God could see the past, present, and every potential future of every person; He deems them deserving of punishment, then as Creator, He has every right to determine. That does not make Him devoid of love, in fact it reflects on how magnanimous His love is because He is willing to discipline and humble His people for humanity’s greater good. He can manage doing the difficult things for us. Thank God for His willingness to be everything we need!

Thanks for reading this study! As I keep figuring out my formatting, I hope to make this blog appear more professional. I appreciate your patience and your engagement! If you have any critiques, or testimonies, please put them in the comments below, or you can DM my Instagram! God bless you and I hope you have a great day!