Hosea
A Vision of the Cross
Setting: The prophet Hosea is the author of the book. He was one of the prophets of the northern 10 tribes of Israel. He prophesied over a period of 60 years, during the same period of time that Isaiah and Micah prophesied in Judah. Commerce and foreign conquest filled the country with wealth and luxury. The form of worship went on, but the hearts of the people had departed from the Lord. Because of Hosea’s experience with an unfaithful wife he was prepared as perhaps no other prophet was to understand God’s love for unfaithful Israel, and to plead for her return.
• Hosea
o He was subjected to perhaps the greatest humiliation of all the prophets except for maybe Jeremiah.
• Relation of Hosea’s Personal Life to Israel’s National & Spiritual Life
o God Commands Hosea
(1:2) “Go, take a wife of whoredoms……for the land hath committed great whoredom, departing from the Lord.”
o God was about to take the marriage of Hosea and Gomer and show all of Israel the adultery that it had committed unto the Lord
• The Lord had commanded them with the very first commandment in Exodus 20:3 “Thou shalt have no other gods before me.”
• Then in the very next verse God told them (v.4) “Thou shalt not make unto thee any graven image”
o But instead of being obedient and loyal to the one true and living God that had brought them out of the land of Egypt they chose Idolatry and a spirit of rebellion. So once again God has to deal with them.
Hosea is obedient to the Lord
• Takes a wife named Gomer
Hosea’s experience with an immoral wife, whom he loved with all his heart, was a drama enacted before the eyes of all Israel picturing their unfaithfulness to God.
This experience also prepared Hosea to understand God’s attitude toward backslidden Israel, upon whom He had lavished His love, and to declare God’s message to the people.
Hosea’s children were even symbolic
o 1st was a son called Jezreel
JEZREEL [JEZ reel] (God scatters) — the name of two people, two cities, and a valley or plain in the Old Testament:
1. A man of the tribe of Judah (1 Chr. 4:3).
2. A symbolic name given by the prophet Hosea to his oldest son (Hos. 1:4). The name Jezreel signified the great slaughter that God would bring on the house of Jehu because of the violent acts he had committed (2 Kings 9).
(1:4) “For I will avenge the blood of Jezreel upon the house of Jehu."
• Jehu slayed all the house of Ahab. 2Kings 10:10-11
• Although He had executed this judgment, and broken down many altars of Baal, Jehu fell into sin, and judgment came upon his house. 2 Kings 10:28-29
• Hosea (1:5) the Lord said “I will break the bow of Israel in the valley of Jezreel.”
o Jezreel was where the Assyrian army overcame the Israelites
o 2nd was a daughter called Loruhamah
Meaning “no mercy”
• 1:6b “I will no more have mercy upon the house of Israel; but I will utterly take them away.”
• This was a symbol that God was going to lift mercy from Israel, no longer protecting her from her enemies.
o 3rd was a son called Loammi
Meaning “Not my people”
• 1:9b “For ye are not my people, and I will not be your God.”
• Promise of Preservation
o In the 10th verse God promises to preserve them in spite of the fact that they must be punished.
The Jews exist today in greater numbers than ever, in spite of the way they have been persecuted.
o “And it shall come to pass that in the place…it is said unto them, Ye are not my people, there it shall be said unto them, Ye are sons of the Living God.”
22 What if God, willing to shew his wrath, and to make his power known, endured with much longsuffering the vessels of wrath fitted to destruction: 23 And that he might make known the riches of his glory on the vessels of mercy, which he had afore prepared unto glory, 24 Even us, whom he hath called, not of the Jews only, but also of the Gentiles?
25 As he saith also in Osee, I will call them my people, which were not my people; and her beloved, which was not beloved. 26 And it shall come to pass, that in the place where it was said unto them, Ye are not my people; there shall they be called the children of the living God. 27 Esaias also crieth concerning Israel, Though the number of the children of Israel be as the sand of the sea, a remnant shall be saved: 28 For he will finish the work, and cut it short in righteousness: because a short work will the Lord make upon the earth. 29 And as Esaias said before, Except the Lord of Sabaoth had left us a seed, we had been as Sodoma, and been made like unto Gomorrha.
30 What shall we say then? That the Gentiles, which followed not after righteousness, have attained to righteousness, even the righteousness which is of faith. 31 But Israel, which followed after the law of righteousness, hath not attained to the law of righteousness. 32 Wherefore? Because they sought it not by faith, but as it were by the works of the law. For they stumbled at that stumblingstone; 33 As it is written, Behold, I lay in Sion a stumblingstone and rock of offence: and whosoever believeth on him shall not be ashamed.
• Hosea’s wife seeks other lover’s
o Chapter 2 (v.5)
She wanted bread, wool, flax etc. disdaining the simple life of the prophet
• (disdaining) ….to regret or treat with haughty contempt; despise.
• This typified Israel forsaking the Lord because of greed for wealth
o Jeremiah 3:20 “Surely as a wife treacherously departeth from her husband, so have ye dealt treacherously with me, O house of Israel.”
• This is also a message to the church
o The church which is the bride of Christ is also warned not allow the cares of life to allure their hearts away from Him
• James 4:4
4 Ye adulterers and adulteresses, know ye not that the friendship of the world is enmity with God? whosoever therefore will be a friend of the world is the enemy of God.
• Hosea buys back his wife from slavery
o Instead of gaining the lover she desires, she has to sell herself as a slave.
o Hosea does not cease to love her
In spite of her shameful conduct
Neither had God ceased to love Israel
• A vision of the cross
o He was willing to buy us back with His blood
The Death, Burial, and Resurrection Portrayed
A Vision of His Death
• Hosea rebukes them for lack of mercy, truth, or knowledge of God
o Chapter 4 (v.6)
“My people are destroyed for the lack of knowledge”
o The people’s greed for wealth led them to disobey God’s laws……in regard to…….
Having mercy on widows
And also led to stealing
o Sacrifices continued …..but no real worship
God says through the prophet
• Chapter 6 (v.6) “For I desired mercy, and not sacrifice; and the knowledge of God more than burnt offerings.”
A form of religion went on, but the priesthood became corrupt.
• This is a picture of a lot of churches today
o 2 Timothy 3:5
“Having a form of Godliness, but denying the power thereof.”
• Judgment pronounced for those sins
o Chapter 4 (v.3)
3 Therefore shall the land mourn, and every one that dwelleth therein shall languish, with the beasts of the field, and with the fowls of heaven; yea, the fishes of the sea also shall be taken away.
• Languish……To be weak; to be sick
o The people, as well as the beast of the field, will LANGUISH until Israel returns to the Lord.
o There final judgment in HOSEA 8:8 & 9:17 is the dispersion among the nations
• The prophet pleads for repentance
o A Vision of Burial
In Hosea 10:1the Prophet depicts Israel as an EMPTY VINE
• 1 Israel is an empty vine, he bringeth forth fruit unto himself: according to the multitude of his fruit he hath increased the altars; according to the goodness of his land they have made goodly images.
Jesus said in John chapter 15
• 1 I am the true vine, and my Father is the husbandman. 2 Every branch in me that beareth not fruit he taketh away: and every branch that beareth fruit, he purgeth it, that it may bring forth more fruit. 3 Now ye are clean through the word which I have spoken unto you.
Jesus shows us here the similarity between His life and the nation of Israel. As the True Vine, Jesus, through death became an Empty Vine as His flesh lay in the tomb.
David also describes Israel as the vine which the Lord brought out of Egypt. Ps. 80:8-14
• The prophet prays for the vine “Return, O God of Hosts, look down from heaven, and behold, and visit this vine.”
• The prophet was speaking out of brokenness
o Not only was the prophet pleading with the people to repent but pleading with God for the forgiveness of a nation
• The prophet pleads for repentance among the people (10:12)
o 12 Sow to yourselves in righteousness, reap in mercy; break up your fallow ground: for it is time to seek the LORD, till he come and rain righteousness upon you.
• Promise of Restoration Chapters 13 & 14, and Hosea 6:1-3
o A vision of resurrection
o Hosea 6:2 we read “After TWO DAYS will he revive us; in the THIRD DAY he will raise us up, and we shall live in his sight.”
For nearly 2000 years or (2 days) Israel has been a scattered people.
• But, in the third day, the millennial day they will be raised up, and live in his sight.
o They are spoken of as being the “graveyard of the nations”
o But Ezekiel sees the dry bones come to life again
o Then the promise land will really and truly be the promised land for all nations
