#1231 Hosea 3 Love an Adulteress

 

And the Lord said to me, “Go again, love a woman who is loved by another man and is an adulteress, even as the Lord loves the children of Israel, though they turn to other gods and love cakes of raisins.” 2 So I bought her for fifteen shekels of silver and a homer and a lethech of barley. 3 And I said to her, “You must dwell as mine for many days. You shall not play the whore, or belong to another man; so will I also be to you.” 4 For the children of Israel shall dwell many days without king or prince, without sacrifice or pillar, without ephod or household gods. 5 Afterward the children of Israel shall return and seek the Lord their God, and David their king, and they shall come in fear to the Lord and to his goodness in the latter days. Hosea 3 ESV

Hosea 3 Redeem your wife

Go again - Hosea has been separated from his wife because of infidelity, and she has become a slave to the manner of her sin. The "go again" takes us back to Hosea 1 when God first tells Hosea to marry her, she has broken that covenant, and what a striking comparison.

2When the LORD first spoke through Hosea, He told him, “Go, take a prostitute as your wife and have children of adultery, because this land is flagrantly prostituting itself by departing from the LORD.” 3So Hosea went and married Gomer daughter of Diblaim, and she conceived and bore him a son.… Hosea 1: 2-3

…7So Moses went back and summoned the elders of the people and set before them all these words that the LORD had commanded him. 8And all the people answered together, “We will do everything that the LORD has spoken.” So Moses brought their words back to the LORD. 9The LORD said to Moses, “Behold, I will come to you in a dense cloud, so that the people will hear when I speak with you, and they will always put their trust in you.” And Moses relayed to the LORD what the people had said.… Exodus 19: 7-9

Love a woman - Some argue that it is not Gomer since it says, "a woman", but I disagree since the meaning is easily resolved within the first two chapters. For Hosea this is Gomer and their relationship represents God's relationship to unfaithful Israel. She, like Israel, is called simply a woman, since she has not been a wife in spirit and truth. Note that God is also commanding him to love her, as He does not see love as a matter of feelings that come and go, but a matter of the will, which must be called forth by God and empowered by the Holy Spirit. Hosea has done nothing wrong in putting her away, but God is showing him and us by him, the reality of God's own love toward us, in that while we were sinners Christ died for us. Love is a choice, and if we cannot commit to it then we need repent, and ask for a heart of flesh, for our will to be in God's will, to His honor and glory.

1“Say of your brothers, ‘My people,’ and of your sisters, ‘My loved one.’ 2Rebuke your mother, rebuke her, for she is not My wife, and I am not her husband. Let her remove the adultery from her face and the unfaithfulness from between her breasts.… Hosea 2: 1-2

…7“Why then,” they asked, “did Moses order a man to give his wife a certificate of divorce and send her away?” 8Jesus replied, “Moses permitted you to divorce your wives because of your hardness of heart; but it was not this way from the beginning. 9Now I tell you that whoever divorces his wife, except for sexual immorality, and marries another woman, commits adultery.”… Matthew 19: 7-9

Even as the Lord loves the children of Israel - The simple meaning of this exercise, and now we must ask ourselves, did anyone ever need a different sort of love? Were my sins ever so small that I did not need to be redeemed? Israel chased other gods, idols, a form of adultery to the true God, a breaking of the covenant, and so He shall put her a way for a time. If you have been reading my blog then we just finished Daniel, which time period starts the time of the gentiles. Now Christ has to come and die for a people that are slow to recognize Him. We love Him because He first loved us, and it is a wonder that He loved any of us. The more I see of myself, and reflect honestly on my condition, the more dumbfounded I am that God would choose me, and the more patience I have for others.

…10He was in the world, and though the world was made through Him, the world did not recognize Him. 11He came to His own, and His own did not receive Him. 12But to all who did receive Him, to those who believed in His name, He gave the right to become children of God—… John 1: 10-12

Love cakes of raisins - It wasn't the food itself, for it is not what goes into a man that defiles him, but rather it is the heart behind it all. This was apparently part of a pagan worship, like we see in Jeremiah, where the Jews attached themselves to goddess worship, thinking that she, the goddess, was making them prosperous in business and comfort, like those that would pray for winning lottery numbers. They attributed their times of plenty to the goddess and made her cakes, having the children and the fathers also participate. It is not only the Jews, but such apostasy entered the church as well, and formed a cult called Roman Catholicism, which also worships and prays to the goddess, calling her Mary, though the mother of Jesus cannot hear them. 

16 “As for you, do not pray for this people, or lift up a cry or prayer for them, and do not intercede with me, for I will not hear you. 17 Do you not see what they are doing in the cities of Judah and in the streets of Jerusalem? 18 The children gather wood, the fathers kindle fire, and the women knead dough, to make cakes for the queen of heaven. And they pour out drink offerings to other gods, to provoke me to anger. 19 Is it I whom they provoke? declares the Lord. Is it not themselves, to their own shame? 20 Therefore thus says the Lord God: Behold, my anger and my wrath will be poured out on this place, upon man and beast, upon the trees of the field and the fruit of the ground; it will burn and not be quenched.” Jeremiah 7: 16-20

So I bought her for 15 shekels of silver, a homer, and a lethech of barley - This may in fact be the equivalent of 30 pieces of silver, the price of a slave, or some less. Commentators look at this different ways, that when she was separated from Hosea she came into the hands of another man, like a pimp or lover, and Hosea purchases his own wife back from him, as God redeemed Israel from Egypt, yet there He made Egypt the ransom for Israel. Another way is that Hosea pays her to come home, offering forgiveness and removing the excuse of some survival need. 

ii. Boice takes bought her for myself to mean that Gomer was sold as a slave and Hosea bought her out of her slavery. This is possible, but not necessary. It seems more natural to regard the payment as “buying her out of prostitution.”

b. You shall stay with me many days: The point of paying Gomer wasn’t just to get her to give up her trade as a prostitute. It was to bring her into relationship with Hosea, her husband. Relationship and living together was the goal. - Enduring Word

She shall also have a homer and a half of barley, for bread-corn, and that is all she must expect till she be sufficiently humbled, and, by a competent time of trial, satisfactory proof given that she is indeed reformed. Let her be made sensible that it is not for her own merit that her husband makes court to her; it is but a lame price that he values her at. The price of a servant was thirty shekels, Ex. 21:32. This was but half so much; yet let her know that it is more than she is worth. God had given Egypt for Israel's ransom once, so precious were they then in his sight, and so honourable, Isa. 43:3, 4. But now that they have gone a whoring from him he will give but fifteen pieces of silver for them, so much have they lost in their value by their iniquity. Note, Those whom God designs honour and comfort for he first makes sensible of their own worthlessness, and brings them to acknowledge, with the prodigal, I am no more worthy to be called thy son. - Matthew Henry

You must dwell as mine for many days - She has enough food and money to sustain her, yet she is to be refined in this, to abstain not only from others but also from Hosea, as the one loves and builds back trust, and the other believes that love is there and possible. She must come to desire moving from object to being one with her husband and knowing that she is made in the image of God. The technically unworthy must find themselves worthy by faith in the unmerited love of the other. 

For the children of Israel - This is humbling for Israel to read, for hardness of heart would have her stoned, but never see Gomer as myself. 

Without king or prince - Israel will lose her self government, the north to Assyria, Judah's day would be to Babylon. The time of the gentiles will continue till the end of the age. 

Without sacrifice or pillar - The usual rites of relationship, the religious practices between the people and the true God, that which they had turned into a token that God hated, that would cease for a time, and even later it would be without the Shekinah glory. They had to put away their idolatry, be broken over it, tear down their high places. Yet, without the temple of God, without the altar, Daniel still prayed, still meditated on God's word, even in a strange land. 

…20Will not the Day of the LORD be darkness and not light, even gloom with no brightness in it? 21“I hate, I despise your feasts! I cannot stand the stench of your solemn assemblies. 22Even though you offer Me burnt offerings and grain offerings, I will not accept them; for your peace offerings of fattened cattle I will have no regard.… Amos 5: 20-22

…21The troops took sheep and cattle from the plunder, the best of the things devoted to destruction, in order to sacrifice them to the LORD your God at Gilgal.” 22But Samuel declared: “Does the LORD delight in burnt offerings and sacrifices as much as in obedience to His voice? Behold, obedience is better than sacrifice, and attentiveness is better than the fat of rams. 23For rebellion is like the sin of divination, and arrogance is like the wickedness of idolatry. Because you have rejected the word of the LORD, He has rejected you as king.”… 1 Samuel 15: 21-23

Without ephod or household gods - Without priest which were tied to the temple for their was no temple, and without household gods, for these they should never have had.

…8You shall not make for yourself an idol in the form of anything in the heavens above, on the earth below, or in the waters beneath. 9You shall not bow down to them or worship them; for I, the LORD your God, am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers on their children to the third and fourth generations of those who hate Me, 10but showing loving devotion to a thousand generations of those who love Me and keep My commandments.… Deuteronomy 5: 8-10

…2So Jacob told his household and all who were with him, “Get rid of the foreign gods that are among you. Purify yourselves and change your garments. 3Then let us arise and go to Bethel. I will build an altar there to God, who answered me in my day of distress. He has been with me wherever I have gone.” 4So they gave Jacob all their foreign gods and all their earrings, and Jacob buried them under the oak near Shechem.… Genesis 35: 2-4

The children of Israel shall return and seek the Lord their God - Jesus says, I am the way, the truth and the life, no man comes to the Father but by Me.

10Then I will pour out on the house of David and on the people of Jerusalem a spirit of grace and prayer, and they will look on Me, the One they have pierced. They will mourn for Him as one mourns for an only child, and grieve bitterly for Him as one grieves for a firstborn son. 11On that day the wailing in Jerusalem will be as great as the wailing of Hadad-rimmon in the plain of Megiddo.… Zechariah 12: 10-11

David their king - This goes back to the Davidic covenant, where Messiah is promised from his line. This is a reference to the Son of David, who is Jesus Christ. Israel finds itself in Him, redemption and then righteous rule during the Millennial kingdom which comes at the end of the latter days.

2 Samuel 7

…3Incline your ear and come to Me; listen, so that your soul may live. I will make with you an everlasting covenant—My loving devotion promised to David. 4Behold, I have made him a witness to the nations, a leader and commander of the peoples. 5Surely you will summon a nation you do not know, and nations who do not know you will run to you. For the LORD your God, the Holy One of Israel, has bestowed glory on you.”… Isaiah 55: 3-5

…9Judah is a young lion—my son, you return from the prey. Like a lion he crouches and lies down; like a lioness, who dares to rouse him? 10The scepter will not depart from Judah, nor the staff from between his feet, until Shiloh comes and the allegiance of the nations is his. 11He ties his donkey to the vine, his colt to the choicest branch. He washes his garments in wine, his robes in the blood of grapes.… Genesis 49: 9-11