Hosea;The Heartache of God...wedding parables pt 5

https://billrandles.wordpress.com/2018/05/07/hosea-the-heartache-of-god-wedding-parables-pt-5/ ^ | 05-07-18 | Bill Randles

[pastorbillrandles]

The word of the Lord that came unto Hosea, the son of Beeri, in the days of Uzziah, Jotham, Ahaz, and Hezekiah, kings of Judah, and in the days of Jeroboam the son of Joash, king of Israel. The beginning of the word of the Lord by Hosea. And the Lord said to Hosea, Go, take unto thee a wife of whoredoms and children of whoredoms: for the land hath committed great whoredom, departing from the Lord. So he went and took Gomer the daughter of Diblaim; which conceived, and bare him a son.( Hosea 1:1-3)

Some of the Prophets of the Bible spoke for God in sermons, predictions,lamentations and other oral methods of communication. Other Prophets were called to literally live out their burden, their lives were object lessons;Jeremiah had to walk to Babylon and bury his loincloth, Isaiah had to go naked, Ezekiel had to lay on his side for so many days, and to cut his hair and divide it into three piles.

All of this activity portrayed the situation between God and his people, or coming judgments. Their lives became object lessons.

Perhaps most striking was the call upon Hosea the prophet to marry a harlot Gomer.

Hosea was to lavish her with gifts, luxuries, clothes and special delicacies as any loving husband would do for the woman He loved. But she was a harlot and not a loving wife, so she ran after other lovers and gave them credit for the things Hosea had provided for her.

For she did not know that I gave her corn, and wine, and oil, and multiplied her silver and gold, which they prepared for Baal. Therefore will I return, and take away my corn in the time thereof, and my wine in the season thereof, and will recover my wool and my flax given to cover her nakedness. And now will I discover her lewdness in the sight of her lovers, and none shall deliver her out of mine hand. I will also cause all her mirth to cease, her feast days, her new moons, and her sabbaths, and all her solemn feasts. And I will destroy her vines and her fig trees, whereof she hath said, These are my rewards that my lovers have given me: and I will make them a forest, and the beasts of the field shall eat them. (Hosea 2:8-12)

This was a perfect, living example of what Israel had done with her God. He had wooed her, delivered her, and loaded her with gifts and privileges, but in a short time, she would go after the abominable Baal, and giver her worship (affection,intimay) to Baal and Ashteroth,even going so far as o crediting Baal for the good things God had provide her.

Gomer bore the Prophet two children, whose names were prophetically given, Jezreel, LoRuhama . Jezreel was so named because it means “Scattered of the LORD”. The ten tribes of Israel would be scattered soon, and cease to be a nation. Loruhama means “Not my people” because the prophecy of Moses was about to be fulfilled,

They have moved me to jealousy with that which is not God; they have provoked me to anger with their vanities: and I will move them to jealousy with those which are not a people; I will provoke them to anger with a foolish nation.(Deuteronomy 32:31)

But Hosea predicted that the names of the children would be changed again, from Jezreel to Ammi, which means “My People” and from LoRuhama to Ruhama which means “Finding mercy”. The children of the harlot will come into adoption and mercy, Israel shall one day be saved.

Say ye unto your brethren, Ammi; and to your sisters, Ruhamah. Plead with your mother, plead: for she is not my wife, neither am I her husband: let her therefore put away her whoredoms out of her sight, and her adulteries from between her breasts; Lest I strip her naked, and set her as in the day that she was born, and make her as a wilderness, and set her like a dry land, and slay her with thirst. And I will not have mercy upon her children; for they be the children of whoredoms. For their mother hath played the harlot: she that conceived them hath done shamefully: for she said, I will go after my lovers, that give me my bread and my water, my wool and my flax, mine oil and my drink.(Hosea 2:1-5)

Gomer is a total harlot, completely sold out to the pursuit of her lovers.

Israel, the wife of Jahweh, has played the harlot, she pursues her false Gods, and alliances of protection with Pagan nations, and has departed from God.

Much of the church, the espouses “Bride of Christ” is playing the harlot, she seeks ecumenical unity with Antichristian religions such as ISlam, she indulges in Bhuddism, eastern religion, and even the occult! She has been given many blessings and privileges, but she forgets God, and seeks the world. She indulges in politics as well, and allow secularistic teachings and philosophies. This is spiritual adultery.

But the lover of men’s souls doesn’t give up on any of us. He has a program of correction to wean us from our spiritual adultery,

Therefore, behold, I will hedge up thy way with thorns, and make a wall, that she shall not find her paths. And she shall follow after her lovers, but she shall not overtake them; and she shall seek them, but shall not find them: then shall she say, I will go and return to my first husband; for then was it better with me than now.(Hosea 2:6-7)

He will take away the comforts and gifts which he once lavished us with, and He will take us out to the wilderness and woo us out there. Hosea literally had to go to a slave market and to redeem his wayward wife there, to take her home again.

And I will destroy her vines and her fig trees, whereof she hath said, These are my rewards that my lovers have given me: and I will make them a forest, and the beasts of the field shall eat them. And I will visit upon her the days of Baalim, wherein she burned incense to them, and she decked herself with her earrings and her jewels, and she went after her lovers, and forgat me, saith the Lord. Therefore, behold, I will allure her, and bring her into the wilderness, and speak comfortably unto her.(Hosea 2:12-14)

The wedding parable of Hosea is being lived out by Israel, who has gone away into Captivity from 70ad until this day, far from God, persecuted, despised , rejected and driven out, and heading for her final conflict and deliverance. But God is in her troubles, He is separating her from all of her false lovers, to reveal himself as he true husband and friend. In the wilderness He will come to her, and speak comfortably to her.

[sauropod]

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