"When the LORD first spoke through Hosea, the LORD said to Hosea, "Go take to yourself a wife of whoredom and have children of whoredom, for the land commits great whoredom by forsaking the LORD."
"She conceived again and bore a daughter. And the LORD said to him, "Call her name No Mercy, for I will no more have mercy on the house of Israel, to forgive them at all"
"When she had weaned No Mercy, she conceived and bore a son. And the LORD said, "Call his name Not My People, for you are not my people, and I am not your God."
Hosea 1:2, 6, 8
The Lord commands Hosea to marry a prostitute to demonstrate the covenant God has made with an unfaithful nation, a nation that, despite God's goodness and grace, has run to false gods of wood and stone, has chased after foreign peoples and unholy customs.
He then tells Hosea to name his children symbolically as well. The second child was named No Mercy. We often forget we serve a holy God. A just God. A God who can do no wrong and will not stand to be connected with evil. The only reasonable reaction from a holy God to an unholy people is to give no mercy. God gave the Israelites (and us) this warning in Deuteronomy 8:
1“The whole commandment that I command you today you shall be careful to do, that you may live and multiply, and go in and possess the land that the Lord swore to give to your fathers... 11 “Take care lest you forget the Lord your God by not keeping his commandments and his rules and his statutes, which I command you today, 12 lest, when you have eaten and are full and have built good houses and live in them, 13 and when your herds and flocks multiply and your silver and gold is multiplied and all that you have is multiplied, 14 then your heart be lifted up, and you forget the Lord your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of slavery, 15 who led you through the great and terrifying wilderness, with its fiery serpents and scorpions and thirsty ground where there was no water, who brought you water out of the flinty rock, 16 who fed you in the wilderness with manna that your fathers did not know, that he might humble you and test you, to do you good in the end. 17 Beware lest you say in your heart, ‘My power and the might of my hand have gotten me this wealth.’ 18 You shall remember the Lord your God, for it is he who gives you power to get wealth, that he may confirm his covenant that he swore to your fathers, as it is this day. 19 And if you forget the Lord your God and go after other gods and serve them and worship them, I solemnly warn you today that you shall surely perish. 20 Like the nations that the Lord makes to perish before you, so shall you perish, because you would not obey the voice of the Lord your God.
Deuteronomy 8: 1, 11-20
This, sadly, is exactly what they did. The Lord caused them to prosper materially, to take possession of the promised land, to dispossess other people, to experience His favor and presence. And they forgot God. They intermarried with those of other faiths, worshipped foreign gods, and corrupted the temple of the Lord. They were not careful to keep God's commands. So just as He said He would, God pronounced their judgement, "No Mercy".
But that's not all. Hosea's third child was named "Not My People". God disowned them. Read what God had previously called them:
6 “For you are a people holy to the Lord your God. The Lord your God has chosen you to be a people for his treasured possession, out of all the peoples who are on the face of the earth. 7 It was not because you were more in number than any other people that the Lord set his love on you and chose you, for you were the fewest of all peoples, 8 but it is because the Lord loves you and is keeping the oath that he swore to your fathers, that the Lord has brought you out with a mighty hand and redeemed you from the house of slavery, from the hand of Pharaoh king of Egypt. 9 Know therefore that the Lord your God is God, the faithful God who keeps covenant and steadfast love with those who love him and keep his commandments, to a thousand generations, 10 and repays to their face those who hate him, by destroying them. He will not be slack with one who hates him. He will repay him to his face. 11 You shall therefore be careful to do the commandment and the statutes and the rules that I command you today.
Deuteronomy 7:6-11
Being God's chosen people gave them worth. They are nothing without God possessing them. That is what set them apart. Without God, they are just like all the other peoples on the face of the earth doomed to perish, due to their unholiness.
But. Yet. The most beautiful words, when faced with the verdicts due to us.
"But I will have mercy on the house of Judah, and I will save them by the LORD their God. I will not save them by bow or by sword or by war or by horses or by horsemen." 1:7
"Yet the number of the children of Israel shall be like the sand of the sea, which cannot be measured or numbered. And in the place where it was said to them, "You are not my people," it shall be said to them, "Children of the living God." And the children of Judah and the children of Israel shall be gathered together, and they shall appoint for themselves one head." 1:10-11
What? God will have mercy? God will save them? And not by any common, earthly way. God will save them by a miraculous way that no one expected. God prophesies that He will claim them again. They will be "Children of the living God." They shall be unified and follow one leader - Christ.
"Therefore remember that... you were at that time separated from Christ, alienated from the commonwealth of Israel and strangers to the covenants of promise, having no hope and without God in the world. But now in Christ Jesus you who were once far off have been brought near by the blood of Christ... For through him we both have access in one Spirit to the Father. So then you are no longer strangers and aliens, but you are fellow citizens with the saints and members of the household of God"
Ephesians 2:11-13, 18-19
Christ is literally the only way we can be accepted by God. We just keep sinning. We are faithfully unfaithful. The only way a holy and just God can call us "Children" is by a payment that appeases His wrath and pays our sin debt.
Outside of Christ, we get No Mercy and we are Not His People. We have no life. See 1 John 5:11-12.
This is what our collective faithlessness deserves, what my faithlessness deserves - No Mercy, to be disowned and discarded. To be abandoned.
This is what must be overcome to give mercy. Mercy costs.
In chapter 2 of Hosea, we see how God disciplines Israel for their unfaithfulness. And similarly how God disciplines us. God calls out to us to turn away from sin and turn to Him before He gives consequences for our actions.
Mercy.
We keep trying to run after worthless things. We seek death and destruction. I will go after my lovers. But God blocks us - hedge up her way... so that she cannot find her paths.
Mercy.
God reminds us of His love and goodness. I will go and return to my first husband, for it was better for me then than now.
Mercy.
And she did not know that it was I... Israel was using God's gifts to worship false gods, thanking objects for what God had given. Instead of seeing God's goodness and running back to God in thanksgiving, the material blessings and the deception they were in made them run to the false gods more. How do we do that now?
~ God blesses us with money and we work harder and longer to make more, serving the money/work gods rather than thanking and trusting God for provision.
~ God gives us a good friendship with someone of the opposite sex and we idolize the person and put our hope in a future relationship, instead of thanking God for the companionship and experiences that should point back to Him.
We should always know that it was God who (fill in the blank). It is always God. He sovereignly and mercifully gives every good gift.
Then God disciplines because He is just and we are due our wages. And also because He doesn't want us to easily forget where our sin leads us. He wants us to know that apart from Him we can do nothing and we are walking to our demise. We experience His discipline that wakes us up to the truth, peels back the deception that makes us believe there is life apart from God.
Mercy. Painful Mercy.
Types of discipline seen in this chapter: removal of provision and gifts, shame and embarrassment, abandonment, depression, lasting joy removed, sources of security taken away, punishment
God loves us too much to let us stray too long and stay in our sin.
Mercy.
Therefore. The punishment is meant to bring Israel (us) to repentance. God wants restoration and reunion. In all my failed pursuits, I am always reminded that God is faithful, God is there, and God is enough. He forces me back to Him, back to love and life. I will allure her, and speak tenderly to her.
God gives good gifts. God makes us fruitful. God turns curses into hope, mourning into gladness, depression into joy!
Mercy!
God welcomes us back in. God forgives us. God claims us - call me "My Husband". And He does it all.
For I will - And I will - And I will - And I will - I will - I will. He says it 12 times from verse 17 - 23.
He brings us back. He names us as His. He renews our minds and desires. He makes a covenant with us. He brings peace and safety. He marries us, does all the pursuing and the wooing. He makes us righteous. He commits for forever. He gives us mercy.
Mercy!
And I will make you lie down in safety.
And I will betroth you to me forever.
I will betroth you to me in righteousness and in justice, in steadfast love and in mercy.
I will betroth you to me in faithfulness.
And you shall know the Lord.
And I will have mercy on No Mercy
and I will say to Not My People, "You are my people";
and he shall say, "You are my God."
Hosea 2:18b-20, 23
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