With Sin we Don't Win

Hosea 9:1–3 (ESV) Rejoice not, O Israel! Exult not like the peoples; for you have played the whore, forsaking your God. You have loved a prostitute’s wages on all threshing floors. 2 Threshing floor and wine vat shall not feed them, and the new wine shall fail them. 3 They shall not remain in the land of the LORD, but Ephraim shall return to Egypt, and they shall eat unclean food in Assyria.

Israel thought they could succeed like the other nations, worshipping the gods of fertility and winning at life, becoming rich. God said no. They had a larger purpose to fulfill for the world. They were the nation that brought an end to the silliness of idolatry and false gods. 

The problem is that they would have to learn this purpose the hard way, by experiencing the devastating consequences of idolatry, rather than the delight it offered. 

Israel, in following the nations around them, became blind and deaf to the Word of God. 

Hosea 9:7 (ESV) The days of punishment have come; the days of recompense have come; Israel shall know it. The prophet is a fool; the man of the spirit is mad, because of your great iniquity and great hatred.

The nation had become so hardened by sin that they considered God's messengers fools. God has another phrase in mind regarding His messenger:

Hosea 9:8 (ESV) The prophet is the watchman of Ephraim with my God; yet a fowler’s snare is on all his ways, and hatred in the house of his God.

The prophet was not crazy, the prophet was God's agent of truth, a tool of God's work to turn them back from sin. They would not listen. 

The men of God were usually derided and scorned in their generation. Even our Lord was accused of being demon-possessed, a Samaritan, a blasphemer, and an illegitimate Son. 

Truth-tellers are rarely esteemed in their own generation. History has to prove them right. 

The pain Israel would need to experience is highlighted in verses 11 and 12:

Hosea 9:11–12 (ESV) Ephraim’s glory shall fly away like a bird— no birth, no pregnancy, no conception! 12 Even if they bring up children, I will bereave them till none is left. Woe to them when I depart from them!

They will not reproduce. And even if they do, their children will not survive. 

Finally, we come to a difficult prayer from the prophet regarding these people.

Hosea 9:14–15 (ESV) Give them, O LORD— what will you give? Give them a miscarrying womb and dry breasts. 15 Every evil of theirs is in Gilgal; there I began to hate them. Because of the wickedness of their deeds I will drive them out of my house. I will love them no more; all their princes are rebels.

We struggle with these texts because we do not fully understand the holiness of God. The Lord hates wickedness because wickedness hurts people, and in this passage, children most of all. The idolatry of Israel brought a stench to the nostrils of the Lord. 

Hosea 9:16 (ESV) Ephraim is stricken; their root is dried up; they shall bear no fruit. Even though they give birth, I will put their beloved children to death.

Will God kill children? Is this not sweet mercy that the children are spared the exile and terrible times to come? The problem we have with scripture stems from a blindness we have toward eternity. If God has to bring severe chastisement upon us to spare us from everlasting darkness, it is sweet mercy. And God's love for His people refuses to let them go along on their own terms. 

It's a difficult chapter for sure. But it should remind us how much more difficult life is when we forsake the one who gave it to us.