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56 lines
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<title>Blue Letter Bible: Text Commentaries</title>
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<h2><a onclick="return mV('Hsa', 14, 'all');">Hsa 14</a> - Real Wisdom Turns Israel back to the <span class="c6">Lord</span></h2>
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<p><i><span>“This is a wonderful chapter to be at the end of such a book. I had never expected from such a prickly shrub to gather so fair a flower, so sweet a fruit; but so it is: where sin abounded, grace doth much more abound. No chapter in the Bible can be more rich in mercy than this last of Hosea; and yet no chapter in the Bible might, in the natural order of things, have been more terrible in judgment. Where we looked for the blackness of darkness, behold a noontide of light!” </span></i><span>(Charles Spurgeon)</span></p>
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<p>A. Israel’s repentance and God’s response.</p>
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<p class="c1">1. (<a onclick="return mV('Hsa', 14, '1-3');">1-3</a>) What Israel should say in their repentance.</p>
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<p class="c2"><span>O Israel, return to the <span class="c6">Lord</span> your God, for you have stumbled because of your iniquity; take words with you, and return to the <span class="c6">Lord</span>. Say to Him, “Take away all iniquity; receive <i>us </i>graciously, for we will offer the sacrifices of our lips. Assyria shall not save us, we will not ride on horses, nor will we say anymore to the work of our hands, <i>‘You are </i>our gods.’ for in You the fatherless finds mercy.”</span></p>
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<p class="c4">a. <b><span class="c3">Take words with you, and return to the <span class="c6">Lord</span></span></b>: In returning to the Lord, Israel must come on God’s terms, not their own. God says, “When you return to Me, <b><span class="c3">take words with you</span></b>. I want you to return to Me not with a silent feeling in your heart, but with proper words of repentance and trust in Me.”</p>
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<p class="c5">i. When we come before the <span class="c6">Lord</span>, it is essential to <b><span class="c3">take words with you</span></b>. There is a place for sharing the inarticulate feelings of the heart with God, but that is not the essence of fellowship and prayer with Him. The worship of God is intelligent, and God made us able to communicate ideas and feelings with words. It isn’t enough to sit before the <span class="c6">Lord</span> and feel love towards Him. Instead, <b><span class="c3">take words with you</span></b> - <i>tell God that you love Him</i>. It isn’t enough to feel repentance before the <span class="c6">Lord</span>. Instead, <b><span class="c3">take words with you</span></b> and <i>tell God you repent before Him</i>.</p>
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<p class="c5">ii. This is the same idea that Paul expressed in <a onclick="return mV('Rom', 10, '8-10');">Rom 10:8-10</a>: <i><span>But what does it say? “The word is near you, in your mouth and in your heart” (that is, the word of faith which we preach): that if you confess with your mouth the Lord Jesus and believe in your heart that God has raised Him from the dead, you will be saved. For with the heart one believes unto righteousness, and with the mouth confession is made unto salvation</span></i><span>. God commands us to communicate with Him in <b><span class="c3">words</span></b></span>, not only ideas or feelings.</p>
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<p class="c5">iii. What words do we take with us? Take the words God gives you in His Word! When we communicate to God in the words and ideas of Scripture, we find an articulate and effective voice before God.</p>
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<p class="c4">b. <b><span class="c3">Take away all iniquity; receive us graciously</span></b><span>: When we return to the <span class="c6">Lord</span>, taking words with us, we must first come humbly. We recognize our sin and our total dependence on the grace of God.</span></p>
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<p class="c4"><span>c. Literally, <a onclick="return mV('Hsa', 14, 2);">Hsa 14:2</a> says <i>for we will offer the calves of our lips</i></span>. Since bull calves were often brought for sacrifice, the translators felt justified in putting it <b><span class="c3">for we will offer the sacrifices of our lips</span></b>. However, the more literal rendering shows just how plainly our words of praise, worship, confession, petition, or intercession can be a sacrifice before God.</p>
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<p class="c4"><span>d. </span><b><span class="c3">Assyria shall not save us, we will not ride on horses, nor will we say anymore to the work of our hands, “You are our gods”</span></b><span>: When we return to the <span class="c6">Lord</span>, taking words with us, we come renouncing our dependence on all other things. We recognize that the <span class="c6">Lord</span> and the <span class="c6">Lord</span> alone can make the difference in our life.</span></p>
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<p class="c4">e. <b><span class="c3">For in You the fatherless finds mercy</span></b>: <span>When we return to the <span class="c6">Lord</span>, taking words with us, we come declaring His greatness. We tell of what a great and merciful God we have.</span></p>
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<p class="c1">2. (<a onclick="return mV('Hsa', 14, '4-7');">4-7</a>) God promises to restore a repentant Israel.</p>
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<p class="c2"><span>“I will heal their backsliding, I will love them freely, for My anger has turned away from him. I will be like the dew to Israel; he shall grow like the lily, and lengthen his roots like Lebanon. His branches shall spread; his beauty shall be like an olive tree, and his fragrance like Lebanon. Those who dwell under his shadow shall return; they shall be revived <i>like </i>grain, and grow like a vine. Their scent <i>shall be </i>like the wine of Lebanon.”</span></p>
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<p class="c4">a. <b><span class="c3">I will heal their backsliding</span></b>: God saw that Israel was bent on backsliding from Him (<a onclick="return mV('Hsa', 11, 7);">Hsa 11:7</a>), but He promises to heal the backsliding of a repentant Israel. He does it not because Israel now deserves it, but because it is in His nature to <b><span class="c3">love them freely</span></b>.</p>
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<p class="c5">i. The word is <i>compassionate</i>:<b><span class="c3"> I will heal their backsliding</span></b>. This shows God looks on our <b><span class="c3">backsliding</span></b> more like a <i>disease</i> than a <i>crime</i>. He does not say, “I will pardon their backsliding.” It is “<span>as though he said, ‘My poor people, I do remember that they are but dust; they are liable to a thousand temptations through the fall, and they soon go astray; but I will not treat them as though they were rebels, I will look upon them as patients, and they shall look upon me as a physician.’” (Spurgeon)</span></p>
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<p class="c5">ii. The word is certain: <b><span class="c3">I will heal their backsliding</span></b>. Not “I might heal” or “I could heal” or “I can try to heal,” but <b><span class="c3">I will heal their backsliding</span></b>. Come to God for healing of your backsliding, and He <b><span class="c3">will</span></b> do it! God is too great a physician to allow any patient to leave His office without being healed.</p>
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<p class="c5">iii. The word is <i>personal</i>: <b><span class="c3">I will heal their backsliding</span></b>. He speaks to His people, and addresses them personally. We have to come to the Great Physician and say, “Heal <i>my</i> backsliding. I want to be the ‘<b><span class="c3">their</span></b>.’” To get the healing, you have to count yourself among the backsliders.</p>
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<p class="c5">iv. Are you backsliding? The signs may not be so obvious to others. When you see a tree broken over in a windstorm, it’s easy to think that it was the wind. If you look closer, you will often see that insects have been at work a long time on the tree, making it weaker and weaker. It really wasn’t the wind that did it - other trees around it withstood the wind. It was the slow decline of strength, as insects nibbled away month after month.</p>
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<p class="c4">b. This passage shows us what is restored when we return to the <span class="c6">Lord</span>.</p><ul class="c6"><li>Growth is restored (<b><span class="c3">He shall grow</span></b>)</li><li>Beauty is restored (<b><span class="c3">He shall grow like the lily</span></b>)</li><li>Strength is restored (<b><span class="c3">lengthen his roots like Lebanon</span></b>)</li><li>Value is restored (<b><span class="c3">His beauty shall be like an olive tree</span></b>)</li><li>Delight is restored (<b><span class="c3">His fragrance like Lebanon</span></b>)</li><li>Abundance is restored (<b><span class="c3">revived like grain . . . grow like the vine . . . scent shall be like the wine of Lebanon</span></b>)</li></ul>
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<p class="c4">c. <b><span class="c3">His branches will spread</span></b>: When God restores Israel, he will be a blessing to others, not blessed only unto himself.</p>
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<p>B. A new Israel.</p>
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<p class="c1">1. (<a onclick="return mV('Hsa', 14, 8);">8</a>) Renewed Israel is free from idols.</p>
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<p class="c2"><span>“Ephraim <i>shall say, </i>‘What have I to do anymore with idols?’ I have heard and observed him. I <i>am </i>like a green cypress tree; your fruit is found in Me.”</span></p>
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<p class="c4">a. <b><span class="c3">What have I to do anymore with idols?</span></b> When God’s people are healed from backsliding, they focus on the <span class="c6">Lord</span> Himself and not on any kind of idol.</p>
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<p class="c4">b. <b><span class="c3">Your fruit is found in Me</span></b>: At one time, Israel thought they might find fruit in themselves or in the idols of the nations. Now, healed of their backsliding, they find their fruit only in God.</p>
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<p class="c5">i. <b><span class="c3">Your fruit is found in Me</span></b> can have two ideas, equally true. First, we find the fruit to nourish our soul in God, and God alone. Second, we find the fruit that we are to bear unto the world in God, and God alone.</p>
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<p class="c1">2. (<a onclick="return mV('Hsa', 14, 9);">9</a>) Renewed Israel walks in wisdom.</p>
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<p class="c2"><span>Who <i>is </i>wise? Let him understand these things. <i>Who is </i>prudent? Let him know them. For the ways of the <span class="c6">Lord</span> <i>are </i>right; the righteous walk in them, but transgressors stumble in them.</span></p>
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<p class="c4">a. <b><span class="c3">Who is wise?</span></b> The wise man will see the message throughout the Book of Hosea. He will understand that in His mercy, God offers a wonderful opportunity for repentance and restoration, and it is dangerous and foolish to neglect that invitation.</p>
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<p class="c4">b. <b><span class="c3">The ways of the <span class="c6">Lord</span> are right</span></b>: Even in the midst of promised judgment, the wise and understanding man sees that <b><span class="c3">the ways of the <span class="c6">Lord</span> are right</span></b>, and that ever announcement of judgment is an invitation to repentance.</p>
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<p class="c5">i. “In beauty of expression these final words of Hosea rank with the memorable chapters of the OT. Like the rainbow after a storm, they promise Israel’s final restoration. Here is the full flowering of God’s unfailing love for his faithless people, the triumph of his grace, the assurance of his healing - all described in imagery that reveals the loving heart of God.” (Wood)</p>
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