Hosea Chapters 9-10 01/18/2026

Podcast

Morning Talk: chuck smith, jr.

Do not rejoice, O Israel,
No exulting like the peoples
For you went whoring from your God,
you loved a whore’s pay
on every new grain threshing floor.
Threshing floor and winepress know them not,
and new wine shall deny them.
They shall not dwell in the land of the LORD,
and Ephraim shall go back to Egypt,
and in Assyria eat unclean things.
They shall pour no wine libation to the LORD,
and their sacrifices shall not please Him.
Like mourners’ bread it shall be to them,
all who eat it become unclean.
For their food is for their gullet,
it shall not enter the house of the LORD.
What will you do for the appointed day,
for the day of the LORD’s festival? Hosea 9:1-5

Intro: As we make our way back into Hosea this morning,

Let’s remember the passion running through the entire book
– it isn’t what we’re likely to feel when reading the bare words
• what it sounds like, is the ranting of an enraged deity
◦ but that is not the correct tone of voice
• if God were like one of the pagan deities of mid mid-east or Greece,
◦ he wouldn’t bother to rage at his rebellious people,
◦ he would just annihilate them
– this prophetic book, in fact, is the message of a wounded lover
• a husband who’s been disrespected, betrayed, and discarded
◦ yet for all that, he continues to try to reason with his wife
◦ he is not ready to give up, and he will not let Israel go
• so, we are not hearing the voice of anger, but of heartbreak

If we have any hope of understanding Hosea,
– we have to realize that its language and references,
• are take from Israel’s history revealed in the Hebrew Scriptures
• namely, historical events, place names, and religious practices

The party is over

In 1929, Franklin Roosevelt’s campaign song was “Happy Days are Here Again”
– it was meant to stir up hope at beginning of the Great Depression
• Hosea’s song moves in the opposite direction
◦ some of Israel’s religious festivals coincided with harvests
◦ worshipers came to give thanks, and then it was “party time”
• but it would no longer be that for Israel, “Do not rejoice, O Israel”
◦ they sacrificed offerings to pagan gods on threshing floors
◦ from now on they would be estranged from threshing floor and winepress
(that is, from the bountiful harvests they once enjoyed)
– here we come to first of two memorable symbols of doom
• in the past, decisive judgments had occurred on threshing floors
◦ that sad story of Uzzah (who was struck dead because he steadied ark) happened at the threshing floor of Nacon (2 Sam. 6:6)
◦ the punishment for David’s sin was halted over the threshing floor of Ornan (1 Chron. 21:15)
◦ King Ahab and King Jeroboam met to join forces against the Syrians, and this detail is made specific:
“Now the king of Israel and Jehoshaphat the king of Judah were sitting on their thrones . . . at the threshing floor of the entrance of the gate of Samaria” (1 Ki. 22:10)
◦ nations waging war on Judah (Micah 4:11-13)
◦ and then, into the New Testament, the message of John the Baptist
“he who comes after me is mightier than I . . . . His winnowing fork is in his hand, and he will clear his threshing floor and gather his wheat into the barn, but the chaff he will burn with unquenchable fire” (Mt. 3:11-12)
• Israel can no longer pretend that their festival was a true worship event
◦ v. 4, their libations would be rejected and their food at their feasts deemed “unclean”

Hosea signals a scene change: “For, look”
For, look, they go off from destruction.
Egypt gathers them in,
Memphis buries them.
The treasure house for their silver
the thistle shall inherit,
the thorn is in their tent.
The days of reckoning have arrived
the days of retribution have arrived.
Israel shall know it.
The prophet is witless,
the man of spirit is crazed
by all you crimes
all your hate.
The lookout of Ephraim,
the prophet with my God—
a snare is laid in all his ways,
hate in the house of his God.
They have acted most ruinously
as in the days of Gibeah,
He shall recall their crime,
make a reckoning for their offense.
Like grapes in the wilderness
I found Israel.
Like the first fruit on the fig tree when it appears
I saw your fathers.
Yet they came to Baal Peor
and devoted themselves to a shameful god
and became vile things like what they loved Hosea 9:6-10

Instead of running off to their festivals, they will be running from destruction
[side note: a great deal of Hebrew poetry involves “parallelism” in which two and sometimes three lines are used to make a point. Some times both lines make the same point using different words. Other times they make the same point, but with the order of the words reversed in the second line. Then there are stanzas where the second line heightens or intensifies the first line. And so on and on. In this instance, the first line of verse 6 gives Egypt as the general destination of people when driven from Israel. The second line provides details that are more specific; namely, they will arrive in the city of Memphis and there they will be “buried.”]
• what happens to their treasures and homes
◦ the thistle will inherits their silver and thorns will occupy their tents
◦ the ominous sound of the next lines say it all:
“The days of reckoning have arrived.
Israel shall know it”
– what about the prophets, like Hosea? Aren’t people listening to them?
• God’s prophets have been sidelined – they were bewildered by Israel’s response
◦ not only Israel “crimes,” but also their hate (twice) against the prophets, or God, or both
• you know the saying, “Don’t kill the messenger”
◦ that was Israel’s characteristic reaction to the prophets
◦ rather than take warning, they attacked God’s lookout
(or “watchman”–the prophet doing guard duty; cf. Ezekiel 33)

Hosea compares Israel’s current behavior to their past failures
“They have acted most ruinously
as in the days of Gibeah”
– one of Israel’s most heinous crimes occurred in days of the Judges
• a Levite sought lodging in Gibeah; a city belonging to tribe of Benjamin
◦ locals surrounded the house the Levite entered, intending to humiliate him
Robert Alter reminds us that those locals of Gibeah “gang-raped” his concubine “to death”
◦ the eleven other tribes were outraged and wound up decimating tribe of Benjamin
• this event left a terrible stain that was never washed from Israel’s memory
◦ but even now, their present behavior was just as “ruinous”
I wonder if many Christians in the U.S. realize how harmful sin is
“Righteousness exalts a nation,
but sin is a reproach to any people” (Pr. 14:34)

A besides Gibeah, God provides a second example of Israel’s unfaithfulness
Like grapes in the wilderness
I found Israel.
Like the first fruit on the fig tree when it appears
I saw your fathers.
Yet they came to Baal Peor
– at any time, grapes and ripe figs in the wilderness would be a welcome discovery
• but Israel soon disappointed the Lord
◦ they were still in the desert when they received an invitation from Moab to join their worship of their God in a “pagan orgy” (Alter)
• this compromise resulted in a profound consequence
they “became vile things like what they loved”
◦ it is human nature for us to become like our gods

What Hosea predicts next is extinction of the nation
Ephraim—their glory shall fly off like a bird,
from birth and from the womb and from conception.
For should they raise sons,
I would bereave them of humankind,
for woe to them indeed
when I swerve from them.
Ephraim as I saw him—
a palm frond planted in a meadow.
But Ephraim brings out his sons to the slayer.
Give them, LORD,
what should you give?
Give them a miscarrying womb
and shriveled breasts.
All the evil at Gilgal
for there did I hate them.
For the evil of their deeds
I will banish them from My house.
I will no longer love them.
All their nobles are knaves.
Ephraim is stricken,
their root is dry,
they cannot make fruit.
Even when they give birth
I will put to death the precious ones of their womb.
My God shall reject them,
for they did not heed him,
and they shall be wanderers among the nations Hosea 9:11-16

How would Israel die off?
– by not having children and losing the children they did have
• Hosea traces their barrenness backwards: there would be:
◦ no live births, and nothing proceed from the womb, and that would be because there would be no conception
• any sons they did raise, they would lose to warfare
“woe to them indeed
when I swerve away from them” –that is, “abandon them”
◦ note the metaphor “a palm frond planted in a meadow”; which we would expect to thrive
◦ but instead, the people of Ephraim led their sons of to be killed by an invading army
– what could God give them to finish to make sure any live birth would not survive?
“a miscarrying womb
and shriveled breasts”
• verse 15 contains two strong statements, and we need to pay attention to both:
All their evil at Gilgal,
for there did I hate them . . . .
I will no longer love them
• as sad as everything God has already pronounced, so is the last line of the chapter
“and they shall be wanderers among the nations”
◦ they would lose their national identity, their culture, and their very ethnicity

Israel didn’t know how to respond to God’s goodness
A blighted vine is Israel,
his fruit is just the same .
When his fruit was abundant,
he made abundant altars.
When it was good in his land,
they made goodly cult-pillars.
Their heart is divided—
now they bear guilt.
He shall break the back of their altars,
ravage their cultic pillars.
For now they say,
“We have no king,
for we have not feared the LORD,
and a king—what can he do to us?”
They have spoken words,
empty oaths,
sealed a pact,
and justice blooms like poison weeds
in the furrows of the field.
The calf of Beth-Aven they fear,
the dwellers of Samaria.
For his people mourn for it,
and his priests for it.
They wail over their glory,
for it has departed from them.
It, too, shall be brought to Assyria,
a tribute to King Jareb.
Samaria shall be destroyed and her king,
like foam upon the water.
And the high places of Aven are ravaged,
the offense of Israel.
Thorn and thistle shall spring up
upon their altars.
And they shall say to the mountains, “Cover us,”
and to the hills, “Fall upon us” Hosea 10:1-8

The more they prospered, the more they produced pagan objects
“their heart is divided” – between God and Mammon
“No one can serve two masters, for either he will hate the one and love the other, or he will be devoted to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve God and money” (Matt. 6:24)
– in verse 1, Israel was constructing altars and cult-pillars
• and in verse 2, God is breaking their altars and ravaging their cult-pillars
– think about this: materialism is a pagan religion
• and in the U.S., it is the greatest rival to Christianity
◦ it is materialism that starves the poor,
◦ and drives away the refugee, and defends the miser
• when God blesses us, it is our privilege to give back and to share
◦ there have been few times when anyone has show as much gratitude that I’ve given them as a homeless person to whom I handed a few dollars

In the previous chapter, God made a reference to the “evil at Gilgal”
– that could refer to at least two events that took place there
• one, was when Israel first asked for a king
◦ when Samuel complained about that, God told him:
“Obey the voice of the people in all that they say to you, for they have not rejected you, but they have rejected me from being king over them” (1 Sam. 8:7)
• sometimes God provided Judah with a king to improve their lives
◦ but by this time, Israel had given up on their kings
◦ if they no longer respected Yahweh, why respect a king?
– meanwhile, everyone was trying to rip off everyone else
• swearing empty promises and signing bogus contracts
• if they were to receive “justice,” it would affect them like a “poisonous weed”

From the days of Gibeah Israel offended,
there they took their stand.
“War will not overtake them in Gibeah
against the wrongdoers.”
As I wish will I harness them
and peoples shall gather against them
as they are harnessed to their two shafts.
And Ephraim is a trained calf
that loves to thresh,
and I passed over its goodly neck,
yoked Ephraim[,
that he would plow,] Judah[,]
that Jacob[,] would harrow.
Sow for yourselves in righteousness,
reap in faithfulness.
Till for yourselves tilled ground
and it is time to seek the LORD
until He comes and teaches you righteousness.
You have plowed wickedness,
wrongdoing you reap.
You have eaten denial’s fruit
for you have trusted in your own way,
in all your warriors.
And the clamor shall rise in your people
and all your fortresses will be ravaged
like Shalmaneser’s ravaging
at Beth-Arbel on the day of battle—
mothers with children were ripped apart.
Thus is it done to you, Bethel,
because of your utter evil.
At daybreak the king of Israel
will indeed be destroyed Hosea 10:9-15

I mentioned earlier, two memorable symbols of doom
– the second one is in verse 8, “thorns and thistles”
• as early as Genesis 3, and much later retrieved by Isaiah, “thorns and thistles” are connected to the suffering people face for disregarding and disobeying God
• entire cities went to ruin and became overgrown by thorns and thistles
– to prevent or counteract this, they’re advised to
Sow for yourselves in righteousness,
reap in faithfulness.
Till for yourselves tilled ground
and it is time to seek the LORD
until He comes and teaches you righteousness
• but they had done the opposite, “You have plowed wickedness”
• and they had “trusted” in their own way

Conclusion: There’s enough negativity in these chapters to be exhausting

At least that is one way we can respond to these hard condemnations
But there’s another way to respond, and it is expressed in a poem by George Matheson:
O love that will not let me go,
I rest my weary soul in thee;
I give thee back the life I owe,
That in thine ocean depths its flow
May richer, fuller be.
If we can hear God tell us again and again,
“I love you, I will not let you go”–then we’ve truly caught God’s message through Hosea
And with that, we will have the motivation and determination
to love him back
with all our heart, and strength, and mind