Hosea: I will

I have only just begun delving into the deep water of the book of Hosea and already I am struck by the emphasis’ in the language. Themes are poignant and several.

First are the more obvious: Gods holy jealousy for his unfaithful people; the picture Hosea’s life is of the suffering for Israel’s sake God is willingly enduring; and the impending judgement to purify to himself a holy people. All of which I’m sure we will get deeper into in the coming weeks.

The theme that is standing out most strikingly to me right now is what has been repeated 23 times in only the first two chapters. I WILL. There is an undeniable emphasis on God’s work. The things he will do, and the strong fact that HE is the one doing it! So many times God repeats through Hosea that he is the one to save, or to judge; to bless or to remove the blessing. Not the Baals that they chose to be their gods. Not their mechanisms of war that they trusted in. Not the nations around them that would ultimately be the vessels of their destruction .

So what are our Baals? What are the things that we trust in instead of the hand of the Lord? What are the things we fear, as if he was powerless before them?

While there is a foreboding in the phrase “I will” in Hosea, there is also a hope. There is a choice to be made. To turn from the Baals and false gods to him. There is a “not yet” in the “I will”. Unfortunately not one that Israel heeded, but that’s a choice we still have to make. Have we made the decision to love and glorify him or not? This is the most important decision our lives.