Hosea 9:10-17 [NLT]
June 19, 2013
Oak Park Baptist Church – Wed Bible Study Series
Hosea Bible Study
A Study of the Minor Prophets Hosea (750-725 BC)
HOSEA to Israel (Northern Kingdom)
What we have learned so far is that the nation of Israel has been rebellious and stubborn about serving/obeying God.
They have rebelled to the point where God is ready to discipline them and thru the prophet Hosea He has proclaimed what His judgment is going to be total destruction of the nation and its inhabitants taken into captivity as well.
God’s desire is NOT judgment, but He seeks repentance and reconciliation from the people… His desire is that they turn FROM the false gods they have come to worship and turn BACK to Him as their God.
He has promised to NOT go thru with the destruction if they would but turn back to Him, but understands that their hearts are NOT focused on turning to Him, but on their own selfish desires!
As we look at ch8 tonight we are going to find that this is yet another divine complaint from God against the people of Israel… God’s focus of blame is on the religious and secular leaders BUT His judgment is prophesied to fall on ALL the people.
Here in ch8 we find God upset that Israel is NOT willing to submit to Him as their God and protector… His complaint is about Israel believing that they were secure in their ownself!
READ VERSES HERE… Reading from NLT
10The Lord says, “O Israel, when I first found you, it was like finding fresh grapes in the desert. When I saw your ancestors, it was like seeing the first ripe figs of the season. But then they deserted me for Baal-peor, giving themselves to that shameful idol. Soon they became vile, as vile as the god they worshiped.
Here we find God expressing His sadness about the nation of Israel (Northern & Southern Kingdoms… to God they were still ONE nation)
They had abandoned the God of their deliverance and had turned to a false God in Ba’al! Ba’al was a Canaanite god and was supposedly a god of fertility… for the people, for the land and for their livestock…
But we find here in this verse where the nation took a wrong turn at a place called Ba’al-peor when they took Ba’al as their god. [read Num 25:1-8 from screen]
This was a vile and disgusting choice in God’s eyes and He knew that the people would soon be just as vile and disgusting in their lives as this choice had been…
How often as parents did we tell our children that the choices they were making would lead to trouble and they would ridicule our advice… and when their choices led them to the trouble we had predicted they look at us and ask ‘how did you know’… WE know because we had also traveled this road! God knew because God knows all…
This verse begins a section of dire consequences being laid out by God to the nation because of their choice to abandon God and choose Ba’al…
11The glory of Israel will fly away like a bird, for your children will not be born or grow in the womb or even be conceived.
12Even if you do have children who grow up, I will take them from you. It will be a terrible day when I turn away and leave you alone.
Have you ever tried to catch a chicken? I can remember when I was young we had chicken houses and after they would come to collect the chickens for the processing plant, there would always be 12-15 chickens that eluded them… they would leave them for us to catch!
A chicken can take flight for a short time and cover a short distance, but mainly they run… and they are really quick! I can remember how HARD it was to catch them!
In our verse tonight we see Hosea saying, “…the glory of Israel will fly away like a bird…” If a chicken that cannot fly can successfully elude humans for a period of time, think about a graceful bird that can take flight and soar up to the sky!
The nation believed its glory would not be taken away… that it BELONGED to them! However, God is telling them that the glory HE had given them would be gone as quickly as a bird taking flight and soaring away in the sky… and just like they could not catch a bird and stop it from flying away… they could not stop their glory as a nation from being stripped away!
God tells them how this is going to happen by pointing out that future generations would NOT survive. You won’t conceive or give birth… a nation that does not procreate will fall into ruin and this is what God is saying!
God had promised famine which would bring about conditions that would lead to women NOT being able to become pregnant… BUT even if they were to become pregnant, it was useless because God was going to discipline them by taking their children from them… this would indicate an exile of sorts!
Finally in these 2 verses we find that God reveals that there is going to come a day when Israel finally realizes that the glory of God has departed from their nation and that they were alone with their chosen god Ba’al and that day would be a terrifying day because they would realize that God had departed!
When we turn our backs on God and turn to our own vices and desires, God is not pleased. God is going to discipline His children and there is going to come a time when all the things we have turned to… all the things we have placed in front of God… that all these things are empty and hollow and carry NO eternal significance… and we will be left hollow and alone!
When left to our own desires this will ALWAYS be our destination, but the wonderful promise of Jesus Christ is consistent with God’s promise to Hosea about the nation of Israel… if they would repent and confess their sin and acknowledge Him as their God, he would heal them and turn from His discipline!
Jesus has shown that He will not stand for disobedience and will discipline His followers… but Jesus will also forgive the repentant heart and will NEVER leave nor forsake those whom have rec’d Him as Savior!
13I have watched Israel become as beautiful as Tyre. But now Israel will bring out her children for slaughter.” 14O Lord, what should I request for your people? I will ask for wombs that don’t give birth and breasts that give no milk.
Verse 13 reveals the deceptive nature of sin… For a season, when we take our own path and do our own thing, we are pleased and all things SEEM well and look good in our eyes!
Hosea said that Israel had become as beautiful as Tyre… Tyre was a coastal city that had begun to BOOM in this time, but it was also a place of great spiritual darkness… From the outside it looked beautiful to the traveler, but on the inside it was rotting from sinful and godless behavior!
Israel had chosen to abandon God and worship Ba’al and what this verse tells us is that things MAY seem like they are going well, but in reality what is happening is that the current leadership is trading their own pleasures for the lives of their future… the lives of their children.
In other words, we can do what we want now; we won’t have to pay for it, who cares who comes after us… and what happens to them!
Hosea sees the calamity that lay just on the horizon for the nation and he tells God that it would be his wish that NO children would have to face what the nation is going to have to face… He wishes that NO woman would give birth to children so that they will not have to suffer because of the sins of the religious leaders of his day!
15The Lord says, “All their wickedness began at Gilgal; there I began to hate them. I will drive them from my land because of their evil actions. I will love them no more because all their leaders are rebels.
Gilgal seems to be the linchpin… the turning place for the nation of Israel.
When they came out of Egypt and crossed the Jordan, Gilgal is where they camped…and this is where the nation began their worship of God in the Promised Land. This is where the covenant ceremonies were re-established…
Gilgal was also the place where Saul was anointed King… but it was also the place where God forsook Saul for David because of Saul’s disobedience and unfaithfulness…
I believe the imagery of Saul losing the favor of God at Gilgal is a vivid picture of what Hosea is attempting to paint for the nation of Israel… basically what he is saying is that as the spirit of the Lord left Saul at Gilgal… the spirit of the Lord will LEAVE the nation of Israel, if they did not repent and change their ways… “not my people” is what God said earlier in this book!
16The people of Israel are struck down. Their roots are dried up, and they will bear no more fruit. And if they give birth, I will slaughter their beloved children.” 17My God will reject the people of Israel because they will not listen or obey. They will be wanderers, homeless among the nations.
You have placed your faith and trust in Ba’al who is supposed to be a god of fertility and you call in him for fertility in your lives, in the lives of your animals AND for the crops of your fields… BUT he will not answer!
All 10 of the plagues of Egypt were plagues that overcame an Egyptian deity or god… here God was pronouncing a plague of INFERTILITY to prove to the nation that Ba’al was not worthy to be worshipped but that he was all powerful and He would prove his Sovereign nature!
He will not only reject them as His people but the shame will fall on them will be tremendous… they will be wanderers and homeless…
Here is the thing… after the exile, the people were allowed to return, but the kingdom was NEVER restored and in fact, until the United Nations ‘restored’ the nation of Israel after WWII in 1948… the Jews had been a people without a homeland!
I believe that they should have a homeland, but the main reason that they have not been fully restored is because God did not restore them… but man did and the nation has never truly repented!
Still to this day… they are estranged from God! They reject His son as Lord and they have emptied their customs and traditions with meaningless repetition.
I am NOT against Israel, in fact I am a firm supporter of Israel, but this does not mean I believe they are in the right all the time because I believe JUST LIKE AMERICA they have abandoned God in much if not all of public life!
Hosea warned the nation NOT to continue down this path and they refused! The judgment promised earlier in the book of Hosea was to become a reality!
If they would turn… God would relent, BUT only when they were willing to repent and turn back TO God!
