Hosea

The fourteen chapters of Hosea comprise one of the stranger books of the Bible. Why would God command His prophet Hosea to “marry a promiscuous woman and have children with her” (Hosea 1:2)? The answer comes in the first chapter: “for like an adulterous wife this land is guilty of unfaithfulness to the Lord” (v. 2). God intended Hosea’s publicly disastrous marriage to be a vivid depiction to the people of what they were doing to Him by engaging in obscene idolatry. He said of them, “She will chase after her lovers” (2:7). Yet God would bring the people back from exile. Hosea 3 anticipates a day when Israel “will return and seek the Lord their God and David their king. They will come trembling to the Lord and to his blessings in the last days” (v. 5). God will always love them, as Hosea loved his wife.

Tim Gustafson