The Writings of Hosea

Sometimes God asks people to do strange things.  This is the story of Hosea.  God needs His people to know how much He loves them.  Sometimes a story is better than a speech.  So God tells Hosea to marry a woman named Gomer who had an impure past and after they are married, Gomer continues to be with other men. Experiencing the hurt from Gomer’s betrayal, Hosea is beginning to understand the hurt that God experiences when His nation betrays Him.

But God also wants Israel to know of His love, even with the betrayal.  So God instructs Hosea to go and buy back Gomer.  Hosea has done no wrong but he will pay the price to be reconciled with his wife. This is a picture of God’s love. God has done no wrong but He will pay the price, through Christ, to be reconciled to His people. 

Words are powerful, and the prophet Hosea was a master at using that power to pass on the prophetic messages he received from God.  Hosea was a passionate and emotional person and throughout this book of mostly poetry you can sense that you are hearing straight from Hosea’s heart. It is easy to imagine that Hosea wept many times when writing this book.  Hosea uses words beautifully and as you read the book look out for the expert way he uses comparisons to other things to help us understand his message. When he compares Israel to “a stubborn cow” or to “half baked bread” it is easy to get a picture of what he means. 

Hosea clearly explains how the people of Israel have behaved like an unfaithful wife or rebellious child. They have turned from their faith in God by worshipping gods from neighbouring countries.  They have given credit to these false gods for their blessings. They have made deals with other countries for help rather than relying on God.  How could these people, who God had raised as his own children now turn their backs on him? How could they reduce their glorious God to the level of just another wooden idol or gold statue? Not only were these actions deeply offensive to God who had been their strength and provider, they had led to a level of wickedness that simply could not go unpunished. Like a human parent experiencing the pain of a rebellious child, God shows a similar range of emotions. He is angry, disappointed and frustrated and there will be consequences for Israel’s sins.  But these consequences are not the end, because like a good parent, God wants the best for his children and wants to be united with them.  God has a plan and Hosea prophesies about a coming king – someone who will heal, revive and restore. 

The book of Hosea covers around 25 years of his work as a teacher, preacher and prophet to the people of the northern kingdom of Israel.  This period of time also covers the sad final years of the northern kingdom of Israel until it was overthrown by the Assyrian empire – an event which Hosea prophesies about in detail in the book. 

The book of Hosea teaches us the deeply personal way that God seeks a relationship with us. He wants us to go beyond just knowledge about him into deep relationship – the sort of relationship we might have with our closest friends, our children, our husband or our wife.  In a relationship such as this there is intimacy and gratitude, things that Israel had turned away from and forgotten.  

As Hosea makes clear, if we are willing to show our faithfulness to God, he will forgive us and make us flourish. The last verse of Hosea encourages us to consider our ways – will we choose obedience and relationship with God or will we choose to rebel and stumble?