Hosea Chapter 8
Commentary by Ron Beckham
Verse 1. "Put the trumpet to your lips! Like an
eagle the enemy comes against the house of the Lord, because they have
transgressed My covenant and rebelled against My law.
The trumpet was the call to war. A battle was soon coming to the
10-northern tribes, which was called the nation of Israel. A rabbit does
not fare well in relation to an eagle, for the bird swoops with talons
outstretched, and the bunny’s time suddenly runs out! The "eagle" in
this verse is the Lord’s judgment upon them, and the outward
manifestation of that judgment would be the nation Assyria.
God had made a "deal" (a covenant, a contract, a Law) with Israel.
They were to be His people and He was to be their God. Simple,
straightforward, and if you think about it, remarkably the same as the
covenant with God’s Church. Jesus, the Son, died in your place and you
live because of Him. Your life is not your own. Trust in Him, be His
people, and receive Him as your God. Israel broke this covenant with
God, and we must be careful to not do the same.
Verse 2. "They cry out to Me, ‘My God, we of Israel know You!’"
Jesus was very clear about the subject matter of this verse. He said,
"Many will say to Me in that day, ‘Lord, Lord, have we not prophesied in
Your Name, cast out demons, and done many wonders in Your Name?’ And
then I will declare to them, ‘I never knew you;
depart from Me, you who practice lawlessness’" (Matthew 7:22-23).
As to the years I was away from the Lord, I have wondered if I would
have gone to heaven if I had died during that time? The answer is, I do
not know for sure what would have happened, but I did not die, and He
brought me back. Israel would claim they "knew" God, and many make that
claim, but what is important, God knew their hearts and saw their works.
If you’re not sure about your place with Him, fall to your knees and
TRUST in Him right now.
Verse 3. "Israel has rejected the good; the enemy will pursue him."
It’s amazing how quick people are in life, to cast off the good, and
choose the wrong path. There is only one way, one Good Way, and His Name
is Jesus Christ (John 14:6). He IS "the way".
Have you noticed how self-destructive people are? The nicest-seeming
people, and he becomes an alcoholic and she runs off with another man.
And once you choose the wrong "way", the
enemy will pursue you, and try to make sure you never come back. But
Jesus Christ will pursue you, also. As He said in Luke 15:4, He will
travel "into the wilderness, and go after the one
which is lost," until He finds them. That was my experience. I
could no longer stand being in the "wilderness" of life, and He used the
written Word of God to bring me home.
Verse 4. "They have set up kings, but not by Me; they have appointed
princes, but I did not know it. With their silver and gold they have
made idols for themselves, that they might be cut off."
We understand the concept of "self-destructive" behavior, because we
see it all around. Those who smoke, literally take death into
themselves, as do the ones who need alcohol and other drugs. We prefer
soft breads and pastries, instead of the whole grains which act as a
protection from cancer. Pornography is another self-inflicted wound,
which destroys the soul. We seem to have no end of these self-willed
actions, which lead to the ruin of the man or woman who acts in such a
manner.
We were created to act in concert with the Will of God, and to refuse
His Will, is the ultimate act of self-destruction. In this verse, we see
people who appointed political leaders who were not selected by God, and
they performed religious acts which were not created by Him. To behave
in such a manner, is to risk being "cut off", not only as individuals,
but also as a Church, and as a nation. Israel strayed from God, and at
an appointed time, they were destroyed. We should be warned by what
happened to them.
Verse 5. "He has rejected your calf, O Samaria, saying, ‘My anger
burns against them!" How long will they be incapable of innocence?’"
God’s holy anger burned against the nation Israel. God said, through
the prophet Hosea, that He REJECTED their false worship (the idols of
verse 4, and especially the despicable golden "calf" of verses 5 and 6).
God’s commandments to them were simple, as they are for you and me. It’s
all summed up that we are to love God and love one another (Matthew
22:37-40). Do you love God, when you act in ways that are in opposition
to His Will? Do you love people, when you mislead them with a false
philosophy of life, which excludes the Living Christ, revealed in His
Holy Scriptures? Of course, you don’t.
Our job, as is intimated by the phrase, "How long will they be
incapable of innocence?" is to enter the innocence offered in Christ
Jesus. Mary Magdalene (she’s in the Gospels) is the classic example of
someone who utterly lost her innocence, and then regained the innocence
of heart offered in our Lord. This is partly what is meant by His phrase
"born again" in John 3:7. That which we
lost, is made NEW - in Him.
Verse 6. "For from Israel is even this! A craftsman made it, so it is
not God; surely the calf of Samaria will be broken to pieces."
"Even this!" refers to the idols they created, such as the "Calf of
Samaria," which led so many astray. They substituted pieces of metal and
stone for God’s love. Do we not do the same, when we substitute
formalism, or "correctness" for His love? He wants our hearts! He wants
your love, for Him and also for His people (and all too often, we offer
Him mere outward obedience, in return for His love).
If you are in Christ, you are GIFTED by the Holy Spirit of God. You
are not your own, you are Christ’s, and you have been EQUIPPED to serve
Him. When we offer Him outward obedience and formalism, in exchange for
His love, we become like those who embraced that golden calf. The
doctrinal positions we are so quick to use against each other, were
created by THEOLOGIANS – religious craftsmen. And if our need to be
"right" exceeds our need to love, our religious system(s) will be broken
into pieces.
Verse 7. "For they sow the wind and they reap the whirlwind. The
standing grain has no heads; it yields no grain. Should it yield,
strangers would swallow it up."
The imagery is like placing one of those little windmills into your
garden as a decoration and somehow it generates enough wind to start a
tornado, and then it destroys your home. This is like the little sins we
allow in our lives. A little flirtation – "No one will notice and it’s
fun!" But soon the unthinkable happens, and lives are destroyed by your
actions. God WILL judge sin, and the time to stop is before it starts.
The "strangers" of this verse are the Assyrians, who would take away the
people of Israel.
The stalks of grain would grow in their fields, but the wheat would
be missing! The fruit of the grain is the whole point – a planted field
of wheat with no resulting grain is simply a field of large weeds. No
one would want it. Such it was with the people Israel, and such it is
with the Church. We often have the appearance of verdant fields of
"grain", but if we don’t bear God’s "fruit" in the lives of people, we
are just weeds, in danger of being uprooted by the True Owner of the
field.
Verse 8. "Israel is swallowed up; they are now among the nations like
a vessel in which no one delights."
We were created to be USEFUL in the kingdom of God. To be "swallowed
up" is to be dead (as in swallowed by a lion or a shark), therefore
becoming useless to ourselves and everybody else. We are made ALIVE in
Christ Jesus. That is the imagery used in Ephesians 2:1, where Paul
states "you he made ALIVE, who were DEAD in trespasses and sins." Our
little sins grow, we become useless, the sins grow more, and they will
kill us, unless we turn to the Lord. When we do, we LIVE in Him.
I have a beautiful cup, nicer-looking than any I have owned, and I
would love to drink from it, except that it has become badly cracked
inside. You can actually see the fired clay material through the cracks.
It was heated in the microwave, and somehow the clay of the cup couldn’t
stand the heat. I would love to delight in that cup and use it all the
time but I cannot do so, for that cup has become ruined. So it is with
those who persist in sin. They become like cracked vessels; useless to
our Lord.
Verse 9. "For they have gone up to Assyria, like a wild donkey all
alone; Ephraim has hired lovers."
Everywhere, it seems, we see people attracted to the wrong lovers.
Caught in the need to be loved, people make terribly wrong choices, and
damage many lives. Israel made a lot of wrong choices, and became like a
wild, lonely donkey, braying to the Assyrian Empire in the east. God
intends we will look to HIM, as our Advisor and as our Love. He wants to
give us everything, and all too often people turn ANYWHERE, except to
Him.
When we don’t pray, but instead ask the advice of people, we become
fools. Businesses hire advisors and consultants, and in reality the
leaders of those businesses should give the glory to God and turn to
Him. Religions should have more than just programs. Nations should pray
collectively about policy decisions, but instead make clever treaties
with those who will eventually betray us. We buy friends and lovers,
when instead we should receive God’s wonderful free Gift (the Lord,
Jesus Christ).
Verse 10. "Even though they hire allies among the nations, now I will
gather them up; and they will begin to diminish because of the burden of
the king of princes."
This verse is strongly reminiscent of Ezekiel 16:37 – "I will gather
all your lovers with whom you took pleasure, all those you loved, and
all those you hated; I will gather them from all around against you and
will uncover your nakedness to them, that they may see all your
nakedness." Israel was attempting to make treaties with the nations
around them, but God viewed this as adultery at the national and
spiritual level, for He viewed Himself as the rightful "Husband" of that
nation. They should have turned to Him – He had that right, just as He
has that right in relation to you and me.
Where it says "they will begin to diminish because of the burden" the
New King James version says "they shall sorrow a little, because of the
burden" but "burden" has a footnote, & suggests the word actually should
be "oracle" or "proclamation." With that perspective, the whole verse
would be something like this: "I (God) will gather against you the
nations you’ve been making treaties with, and maybe you’ll become
worried and start to listen to the prophets I am sending to you."
Verse 11. "Since Ephraim has multiplied altars for sin, they have
become altars of sinning for him."
We become what we do. The tribe of Ephraim, who descended from that
good man Joseph, seems to 1) have taken the position of leadership in
the northern nation of Israel, 2) have fallen badly into sin, and 3) and
were leading the rest of the nation straight into deep trouble. They
took the ideas of false "gods" from the nations around them and built
altars to such things, all over the nation Israel.
Idols are described so eloquently in Psalm 115:5-8 – "they have
mouths but do not speak, eyes they have but do not see; they have ears
but they do not hear; noses they have but they do not smell; they have
hands, but they do not handle; feet but they do not walk… Those who make
them are like them; so is everyone who trusts in them." The imagery is
that the things we idolize really can’t really help us – and we become
like them, in that, because of our idolatry, we become insensible to the
will and love of God.
Verse 12. "Though I wrote for him ten thousand precepts of My law,
they are regarded as a strange thing."
Recently, there was considerable furor in the United States, about a
judge who had posted the Ten Commandments in his courtroom. In another
instance, the Ten Commandments were placed on the wall of a school
hallway; and the feeling was - they shouldn't be posted there. The
commandments of God were given so we might be delivered from sin. The
way it is supposed to work is that the commandments will convict us of
our sin, and we will turn to Christ for redemption. These decrees were
designed to help us, and yet, the efforts to ban them from our land, are
intense and persistent. We have an enemy who does not like them.
The Commandments of God are regarded as a "strange thing" here, just
as they were in Israel. If God "sat down" and wrote 10,000 commandments,
especially for us, they would be regarded as not only strange, but also
embarrassing to most of the people in this land. Paul, who had God's
perspective on the Law, said "The mind set on the flesh is hostile
toward God, for it does not subject itself to the Law of God, for it is
not even able to do so" (Romans 8:7). We think ourselves "smart" when we
set ourselves "free" from His restraints, but we actually just reveal
how helpless, needy and greedy we really are.
Verse 13. "As for My sacrificial gifts, they sacrifice the flesh and
eat it, but the Lord has taken no delight in them. Now He will remember
their iniquity, and punish them for their sins; they will return to
Egypt."
When I taught the Book of Leviticus, years ago, we were surprised,
for the more we got into it, the more clear it was that the sacrifices
described in that Book, pointed to Christ and what He did for you and
me. God created the sacrificial system and did it for a great purpose:
that we might see, in those deaths, our need for a Redeemer. We sinned,
the sentence of death is upon us, and Jesus Christ would be the
Substitute that would die in our place. We have no deliverance from the
slavery of sin except in Him, who died for you and for me.
The priests of Israel followed the rules outwardly, and were thought
of as "faithful" men. Those priests were supposed to be sustained by
eating portions of the animals sacrificed - that was how they lived. Our
religious acts, like theirs, only have purpose when they are pleasing to
the Lord. This is a serious concern, because most people are incurably
religious – but the question is: Does our religion please God? The Lord
was so displeased with Israel, that they would be sent back into the
slavery of Egypt (some of them - others to Assyria). To be free, we must
trust in Christ – there is no other way.
Verse 14. "For Israel has forgotten his Maker and built palaces; and
Judah has multiplied fortified cities, but I will send a fire on its
cities that it may consume its palatial dwellings."
Israel built "temples" (or "palaces", depending on your translation),
and forgot "his" God. This is reminiscent of the "religiously correct"
Church at Ephesus (Revelation 2:1 & forward). They were doctrinally
correct, but Jesus warned them, "you have left your first love"
(Revelation 2:4). Israel was very busy and thorough in relation to their
religious acts, but our efforts, even our correctness in relation to
religion is not enough – we must love God, our Maker, and trust in the
Christ who died for our sins.
Judah, the "Israel" to the south, was making a similar mistake, but
where Israel was emphasizing self-protection through religious effort at
that time, Judah was stressing self-protection by the building of
fortified cities. Many feel they must have just the right investments,
the perfect IRA, the exact insurance for every possible need – but it is
not enough to protect ourselves, we must love and trust the God who made
us. Of Jesus Christ, we learn, "all things were made through Him, and
without Him, nothing was made that was made" (John 1:3). Our Creator was
the very One who died for you and me, and He is the Savior we have
needed, all this time.
Ron Beckham, Senior Pastor
Friday Study Ministries, Inc. (The First Church on the Internet)
www.fridaystudy.org
Ron@fridaystudy.org
