Today’s passage: Hosea 8

Helpful thoughts:

• The golden calves were set up for worship in the northern kingdom of Israel at it’s very beginning (1 Kings 12:25-33) to prevent the people from returning to Jerusalem.
• Israel had been set apart as God’s chosen people.  They were to proclaim the glory of God to the nations.  Instead, they were “swallowed up” or assimilated into the way of the rest of the nations and therefore became useless.  They were unable to point people to God because they chose to abandon Him, living like the rest of the world.
• The very Word of God would have been considered as foreign to the people of Israel.

Questions to consider:

1. Why should Israel’s continued desire to identify as the children of God (Or God’s chosen people), even though they knew very little to nothing of God, alarm us?  Could there be people today who associate their nationality or their experience around church with their standing with God even if they have not repented and believed in the Gospel of Jesus Christ?
2. Israel desired to use God (and false idols) to accomplish things for them.  How did they turn their relationship with God upside down?  Why is it so important to understand Christ’s place of preeminence (He is the potter, we are the clay)?
3. Is ignorance really bliss?  If we are ignorant of the Scriptures, are we really better off?  Why is it so important to continue studying the Word of God?  In what ways are you thankful for the things that you have learned and applied from God’s Word?

Today’s passage: Hosea 7

Helpful thoughts:

• God sees sinfulness all around Israel, even to the point of the royalty inviting more “mockers” in (Verse 5).
  • Israel has become characterized by sin.
  • Even as they see themselves struggle or suffer, they continue to head straight into their sin.
• It is possible to cry about hardships (To feel sorry or to be saddened by consequences) without any true repentance (Verse 14).
  • Verse 16 – They return…but not to the the Most High God.  They are like a bow that doesn’t shoot the arrow where it was directed.

Question to consider:

1. What did Israel do in response to their hardships in ways that might have looked like religion or change, but wasn’t?
2. Why would anyone be willing to go so far as to cut themselves for a false god instead of worshiping the true God?  What is it that they would want to keep, that they would be unwilling to give up, in order to serve the one true God?
3. What would genuine repentance look like? (2 Corinthians 7:10-12)

Today’s passage: Hosea 6

Helpful thoughts:

• Verses 1-3 assures Israel of the Lord’s mercy and faithfulness.
• Verse 4 compares Israel’s love to a brief morning fog.
• Israel thought they could sacrifice some animals to appease God while they remained in their sin.  God wants sincerity of heart, mercy and love.
  • 1 Samuel 16:7 – For the Lord sees not as man sees: man looks on the outward appearance, but the Lord looks on the heart.
  • Micah 6:8 – He has told you, O man, what is good; and what does the Lord require of you but to do justice, and to love kindness, and to walk humbly with your God?

Questions to consider:

1. How were Israel’s and God’s faithfulness compared and contrasted in this chapter?  What is God’s faithfulness based on?  Does His character change or ebb and flow based on the conditions of people?  Who are the ones who are changing?
2. In what ways would you identify with Israel’s morning fog metaphor?  Why is it right for us to be thankful for God’s steadfast mercy?
3. Can you be religious without being godly?  What makes a person godly?  What are the characteristics of a person who is close to God/who fears God/who is growing in Christ-likeness?  How might this description be different than the description of a person who would call themselves religious?

Today’s passage: Hosea 5

Helpful thoughts:

• Matthew 6:24 – 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.
  • Israel could not commit acts of sin in their idolatry and worship God at the same time.
  • Israel had no right to complain to God when judgment came, as if He had not met their standard.  This is pride.
• Repentance includes confession (admitting/acknowledging the wrong I have done) and turning (I no longer am doing the wrong and am instead now doing the right)
  • Israel and Judah needed to confess their sinfulness.
  • Israel and Judah needed to seek the face of God alone (Not God AND the false gods together).

Questions to consider:

1. When someone believes that God didn’t do for them what He should have done, where does that belief come from?  Who is in charge of the relationship in that situation?
2. When someone wants things in this life (Possessions, health, fame, etc.) more than they want the Lord Himself, how will they treat God?  What will they do if they believe something/someone else will help them get what they want?
3. Why is it so important to know who God is from His Word?  What will we do to Christianity if we treat God like He is our genie and teach others to do so as well?  How does that compare to the Gospel?  Can you treat God like a genie and truly worship Him at the same time?

Today’s passage: Hosea 4

Helpful thoughts:

• There was much sin with which the Israelites were rightly accused.  The Lord pointed out the origin of it all:
  • Verse 1 – There is no faithfulness or steadfast love, and no knowledge of God in the land.
  • Verse 6 – My people are destroyed for lack of knowledge; because you have rejected knowledge, I reject you from being a priest to me.  And since you have forgotten the law of your God, I will also forget your children.
  • Verse 14 – A people without understanding will come to ruin.
• Romans 12:1-2 – I appeal to you therefore, brothers, by the mercies of God, to present your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and acceptable to God, which is your spiritual worship.  Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewal of your mind, that by testing you may discern what is the will of God, what is good and acceptable and perfect.
• Ephesians 4:17-24 – Now this I say and testify in the Lord, that you must no longer walk as the Gentiles do, in the futility of their minds. They are darkened in their understanding, alienated from the life of God because of the ignorance that is in them, due to their hardness of heart. They have become callous and have given themselves up to sensuality, greedy to practice every kind of impurity. But that is not the way you learned Christ!— assuming that you have heard about him and were taught in him, as the truth is in Jesus, to put off your old self, which belongs to your former manner of life and is corrupt through deceitful desires, and to be renewed in the spirit of your minds, and to put on the new self, created after the likeness of God in true righteousness and holiness.

Questions to consider:

1. What role does biblical instruction and knowledge play in your spiritual growth?
2. What are some reasons why people do not get biblical instruction and knowledge (Both from within their own desires and also from others)?  Why do some people never pursue knowledge and instruction?  Why do some people have a hard time finding it even if they want it?
3. What are the consequences of ignorance?  How would the consequences vary for the person who does not believe and for the person who is a Christian but has not been discipled/taught biblically?

Today’s passage: Hosea 3

Helpful thoughts:

• God commands Hosea to go buy Gomer back.
  • Gomer is redeemed from her adultery.
  • Gomer’s adultery did not give her an identity (She was “Hosea’s wife”), it took her identity away (“A woman”).
    • Israel were “My people” and had become “Not my people”.
• It is believed the raisin cakes were part of the erotic, pagan worship going on at the time.
• Romans 5:8 – But God shows his love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us.
• Since the actual King David was dead by the time of this prophecy, the throne of David is what the people would be looking for…this is their Messiah.

Questions to consider:

1. Which person in this chapter are we to most accurately associate with?  (Hints: It’s not God…and it’s not Hosea.)
2. What has been the path of Gomer in this book?  What was she doing in the beginning?  What did she do after she bore their children?  What has now happened to her which brought her back into relationship with Hosea?  How many parallels can you find in the history of Israel?
3. How would this chain of events be troubling or frustrating from Gomer’s perspective?  If she does not want to repent, what would she be thinking?  Why is repentance necessary for conversion?

Today’s passage: Hosea 2:14-23

Helpful thoughts:

• The Lord will draw Israel into the wilderness and there draw her to Himself.
  • See Revelation 12:6.
• Jezreel means, “God will sow”.
• God’s attributes on display as He redeems Israel in the end times:
  • Righteousness
  • Justice
  • Steadfast Love
  • Mercy
  • Faithfulness

Questions to consider:

1. How will God accomplish this change in Israel in that day? (Jeremiah 31:31-34, Ezekiel 36:26-27)
2. Who will be the one who makes all wars and fighting cease (Verse 18)?
3. How is it possible for God to show Israel (And you!) mercy while remaining righteous and just?  (Romans 3:21-26)

Today’s passage: Hosea 2:1-13

Helpful thoughts:

• Israel’s worship of other gods is compared to the acts of adultery and prostitution.
• Israel used the resources God had provided to ask false gods to give them more resources…
• The motivation for Israel’s adultery was their own gain.  Israel wanted to be “paid” for their adultery.  They committed “acts of worship” to these false gods in order to get produce, a good harvest, etc.

Questions to consider:

1. If an Israelite thought they were God’s people solely because they were Israelites, how would this passage correct them?  What has God called the children of this “mother” to do?
2. What would it look like for the land (The fertility that would have been sought in idolatry) to be “stripped naked”?  What was God using as a consequence for Israel?  And, what would happen when Israel was conquered?  Who would then enjoy the land’s produce?
3. What would repentance have looked like for Israel?  What was wrong in their thinking and desires that resulted in these actions?

Today’s passage: Hosea 1

Helpful thoughts:

• The timing given for Hosea’s prophetic ministry means he lived to see the fulfillment of the northern kingdom’s end as the city Samaria and Israel (The northern kingdom) fell in 722 B.C.
• In Hosea’s marriage to Gomer, Hosea is used to picture the Lord and Gomer represents Israel.
  • Israel’s forefather (Abraham) had been saved from his and his peoples’ idolatrous past.
  • Israel went back to idolatry even after God brought them out of their bondage in Egypt and into the Promised Land.
• In the midst of these prophesied judgments, God commits to keeping His promises (Verse 10).

Questions to consider:

1. What does the potential shock of Gomer’s past make us think concerning her marriage to Hosea?  How does the comparison of our condition in our sin before we became members of the Bride of Christ cause us to rethink that shock?  Or in other words, how might it be good for us to be a little shocked that God would love us this way?
2. Who was behind the estrangement between Israel and her God?  Who was behind the mercy and grace shown that allowed the Jewish people to have a future and be called the children of the living God?
3. Where does salvation come from?  Why would our bows and swords and efforts always fall short?  Who deserves all honor, glory and praise?