HOSEA 14
One striking feature of this book is the way touching words of grace are found in the midst of scathing exposures of the state of the people. This prophet is most severe in his denunciation of their unfaithfulness, but none appeals more sweetly or powerfully to the hearts of God’s people in the way of grace. “Yet I am Jehovah thy God from the land of Egypt, and thou hast known no God but me; and there is no saviour beside me. I knew thee in the wilderness, in the land of drought”, chapter 13: 4, 5. Notwithstanding the departure and idolatry of His people, Jehovah remained what He was. Their destruction was that they were against Him who was their help. Though long centuries of evil on their part had elapsed, He was still Jehovah their God. And so it is now.
At the beginning of our dispensation the Father was revealed in the Son, redemption was wrought by divine love through the death and blood-shedding of Christ, so that believers might have a wholly new place before God as in Christ, and the Holy Spirit [p. 19] might be given to them, and they might be in the place of sons for God’s delight. We know that at the beginning Romans 5 and 8 described the enjoyed portion of saints, not to speak of being risen with Christ as in Colossians, or seated in heavenly places in Him according to Ephesians. And the Lord’s commandment in relation to Christian fellowship and divine assembly order is found in 1 Corinthians. If we consider these things we shall be compelled to admit that there has been very great departure. But it is certain that God has not departed from His original thoughts, so that to return to Him involves returning to what is in His mind and heart, and it is open to all His people to do so. We may return not only to individual blessing, but to the truth and order and privilege of the assembly.
“O Israel, return unto Jehovah thy God; for thou hast fallen by thine iniquity”, verse 1. “Iniquity” is departure from God, and from what is in His mind and heart, but He says, “return”. He even puts words in our mouths to make it as easy as possible for us to approach Him in a suitable way. He is as ready to forgive the iniquity of the Christian profession as He was to forgive that of Israel. “Take with you words, and turn to Jehovah; say unto him, Forgive all iniquity, and receive us graciously; so will we render the calves of our lips”, verse 2. To turn away from God and become self-indulgent and idolatrous is a terrible thing. It is more dreadful now than it was in Hosea’s day, because the light in which God is revealed is so much greater now. But every form of iniquity, whether it be worldliness, or self-righteousness, or trusting the human mind in the things of God, or following the traditions of men, or sectarianism, can be forgiven. He teaches His people to say, “Forgive all iniquity, and receive us graciously”. He will most assuredly do so for all who turn to Him. He has but one way of receiving those who turn to Him, whether they be new converts from the world, or old wanderers from His ways, and that is in the acceptance of Christ. He has no second or third class reception for anybody; He receives in the very best style if He receives at all. And He receives in view of there being offering service. The remarkable expression, “the calves of our lips”, gives us distinctly the thought of spiritual sacrifices, not literal calves or bullocks now, but appreciation of the preciousness of Christ voiced before God in the praises of our lips. We are received as accepted in Him, and thus liberated to speak of Him to God with great delight. We then renounce everything that has formerly been a snare — the human mind, natural [p. 20] strength, and everything that has been of ourselves (verse 3). Indeed, it is as consciously bereft of human support or counsel that we find mercy in the blessed God.
“I will heal their backsliding”, suggests that there is not a scar left. The younger son came into his father’s house without a trace of the far country, or of his former history, left upon him. The father covering him with kisses is the New Testament equivalent to “I will love them freely”. If He receives us in Christ, and as Christ, how could it be otherwise? “Thou hast loved them as thou hast loved me”. John 17: 23.
“I will be as the dew unto Israel”, verse 5. This is the manner of God’s acting to those whom He receives and loves. He becomes, in the gift of His Spirit, a power of refreshment that causes what is of Himself to spring forth in life, so that “he shall blossom as the lily, and cast forth his roots as Lebanon”. How wondrous that the beauty of the lily should appear instead of all that had been so offensive in Israel as seen in this book! As we give place to the Spirit He will bring out His beautiful fruit in us. We shall come out as “harmless and simple, irreproachable children of God in the midst of a crooked and perverted generation; among whom ye appear as lights in the world, holding forth the word of life”, Philippians 2:15.
Lebanon is mentioned three times in verses 5 - 7; first in regard to stability, then as to smell, and finally, “the renown thereof shall be as the wine of Lebanon”. Lebanon seems to speak of what is most goodly and desirable; “that goodly mountain, and Lebanon”, Deuteronomy 3: 25. “His bearing as Lebanon” (Song of Songs 5: 15), is evidently intended to suggest what is most excellent. The effect of Jehovah’s being “as the dew unto Israel” is that Israel comes to the surpassing excellence of what is in His thought for her. The epistle to the Ephesians describes our “Lebanon”; it is well that we should be “rooted and founded in love” according to that epistle, and that we should take on the smell of that heavenly region. It suggests the fragrant odour, the indescribable influence, that emanates from truly spiritual persons. It is well, too, that we should covet the “renown” of having a joy that is far, far above all the joys of earth.
“His beauty shall be as the olive-tree” intimates that as “a fellow-partaker of the root and of the fatness of the olive-tree” of promise he abides in the goodness of God (see Romans 11), and thus becomes truly spiritual. All is summed up in this, “They [p. 21] shall return and sit under his shadow”, verse 7. The blessed God would being us to restfulness as under the sense of all that He is for us, all that He delights to be for us, at a time when we need His protecting shadow. It supposes that there are influences which, like a scorching sun, would tend to wither us up. But as under His shadow we do not wither. “They shall revive as corn, and blossom as the vine”. We do not often get within three verses such an accumulation of beautiful and varied symbols, and they are all combined here to bring out what recovering grace can do for the people of God even when they have gone to the utmost limit of departure and unfaithfulness. Israel will yet be the subject of this grace; it is ours at the very end of the church’s sorrowful history to be the subjects of it now.
It is as experiencing this blessed recovering grace that Ephraim says, “What have I to do any more with idols?” How can one go on with idols if God has shown us such grace? And when we take this ground He has pleasure in noticing it. “I answer him, and I will observe him” is God recognising the movement which His own grace has brought about. He always loves to acknowledge, and often in a public way, those who return to Him in a time of general departure. It pleases Him that the recovered soul should be conscious of how he is now approved of God. “I am like a green fir-tree” is Ephraim in the happy consciousness that, as the fruit of recovering grace, he is in the freshness and verdure of life. It is impossible that hearts that have long wandered should be recovered to God without being blessedly conscious of it. There is no self-deception in this; it is God-given joy. And God confirms it by saying, “From me is thy fruit found”. The very essence of the joy of recovery, and of the consciousness of being received by Him and being now fruitful for Him, is the deep sense that it is God Himself who has brought it all about. When this point is reached, deliverance is fully known in the affections. Wifely affections towards Christ are liberated, and the sons of God are happy in the place His love has given them.
“Who is wise, and he shall understand these things? intelligent and he shall know them? For the ways of Jehovah are right, and the just shall walk in them; but the transgressors shall fall therein”. God’s ways of recovery at the present time are a joy to those who walk in them, but to those who do not appreciate them they only become a stumbling block.