Hosea 5:15-8:14
Dear RTB’ers,
Hosea, continued. I quoted today’s first verse yesterday: I will return again to My place, until they acknowledge their guilt and seek My face, and in their distress earnestly seek Me. (5:15) So naturally the first thing the Israelites do today is to seek Him: “Come, let’s return to the LORD. For He has torn us, but He will heal us; He has wounded us, but He will bandage us.” (6:1) But God is not listening to their superficial repentance: “For your loyalty is like a morning cloud, and like the dew which goes away early.” (6:4b) And He continues like that for these three chapters! “But they do not consider that I remember all their evil.” (7:2) “I would redeem them, but they speak lies against Me. They do not cry to Me from the heart…” (7:13b-14a). “I have spurned your calf, O Samaria … a craftsman made it; it is not God.” (8:5a, 6a) “As for My sacrificial offerings, they sacrifice meat and eat it, but the Lord does not accept them.” (8:13a)
A bit of their then-current history… Israel was in serious trouble from their neighbors. Recall John’s comment from a few days ago, his “Tips on the Prophets”, about the hostility from their surrounding nations. So their first reaction is a political alliance, to look for help from the south (Egypt) or the north (Assyria) instead of seriously seeking the Lord: “Ephraim is like a dove, silly and without sense, calling to Egypt, going to Assyria.” (v. 7:11)
All this is thousands of years ago?? But it sounds so familiar…!!
Blessings!
See also: June 7 (2028) / Hosea 5:8-9:17
Your comments are so true, Fred! Their repentance is not a deep yearning for God, just for the blessings of God’s favor… I chuckled at the first half of Hosea 7:14 — “They do not cry out to me from their hearts but wail on their beds …” because it reminded me of when my children were punished and sent to their room for time out; they would cry loudly to get my attention, but they weren’t really sorry about what they did. They just wanted their punishment to be over more quickly! Israel is doing the same thing.
Also, I realized for the first time that the context of Hosea 6:3 is completely different from what I thought. It is such a beautiful passage of confidence in the Lord’s goodness. I never knew that in the context of verse 3, God is describing their short-lived “returning” to him when they were really just being like my kids!