Two words that matter

It’s always good to read to the end of the Book… (Hosea 14:1-8)

Posted on November 21, 2019 Updated on November 21, 2019

I remember encountering the short story genre in senior school with Jeffrey Archer’s, “A Twist in the Tale”. You needed to read to the end of each story to work out what the whole story was about.

Hosea is something like that. If you had stopped reading Hosea a few chapters back, you might have reached an inaccurate, premature conclusion about God.

You might have felt that the God portrayed in these pages of this prophetic book seems too far removed from the God on the pages of the New Testament.

But Hosea 14, however, is a clear demonstration of the fact that God has never changed and never will (Malachi 3:6). The God of Scripture has always been the God of grace.

Hosea 14 begins with the frequent OT refrain; “Return, O Israel, to the LORD your God” (Hosea 14:1). God’s harsh words through the prophet have been justified at every point, and yet the heart of God is that His people would recognise their sin and repent, that they would repent and return to God.

God, through the prophet, invites Israel to ask God to forgive them, ‘to take away all iniquity’ (Hosea 14:2). God appeals to Israel to say to God;

• Assyria (humankind) will not save us (vs3)
• Abandon faith in false gods and human-made idols (vs3)
• Say that you will never bow down to these idols again (vs3)
• Say that in God alone will we find mercy (vs3)

And then God will respond saying;

• ‘I will heal you of your faithlessness my love will know no bounds for my anger will be gone forever’ (Hosea 14:4 in the NLT)
• I will refresh Israel like a refreshing dew from heaven causing flowers and fruitfulness (vs5)
• I will be like shade to Israel, and so Israel will flourish again like the vine I originally intended it to be (vs7)
• ‘O Israel, stay away from idols! I am the one who answers your prayers and cares for you.’ (Hosea 14:8 in NLT)

The question is, will we repent, will we stop our sinful ways and love and worship God only? Only we can respond to God’s invitation – I urge you to respond and to keep responding to God daily.