Hosea 14:4-6

PEACE REMAINSLAVED

TEXT: Hosea 14:4-6

4

I will heal their backsliding, I will love them freely; for mine anger is turned away from him.

5

I will be as the dew unto Israel; he shall blossom as the lily, and cast forth his roots as Lebanon.

6

His branches shall spread, and his beauty shall be as the olive-tree, and his smell as Lebanon.

QUERIES

a.

How will God heal their backsliding?

b.

What do the figurative pictures of Israel as certain trees represent?

PARAPHRASE

I will cure you of your faithlessness and fickleness and I will love you freely and in spite of what you have been for when you have repented, confessed and renounced your sins, My wrath will have been turned away from you. I will nourish you and give you fruitfulness, stability, beauty, and purity like the refreshing dew nourishes and gives all these things to the lilies, the cedars of Lebanon and the olive trees.

SUMMARY

When God's people shall have humbled themselves and turned to Him in penitent thanksgiving, He will shower them with His love and blessings.

COMMENT

Hosea 14:4 I WILL HEAL THEIR BACKSLIDING, I WILL LOVE THEM FREELY. The Hebrew word translated freely here would be more literally, impelled. G. Campbell Morgan puts it, Freely means of My own will and My own heart, quite independently of them or of their deserts. I will not love them in response to their love. I will love them in spite of their rebellion. I will love them because I cannot help loving them. That is God. And it is because of that deep thing in the nature of God that He first said, -I will heal their backsliding,-' I will cure the malady of their apostasy.

It is this free love of God (which can only be appropriated by them when they have put themselves in a position to receive it by repenting) which will cure their backsliding. He does not mean that He will merely heal the wounds they have received in judgment for their apostasy. He is going to cure them of the very root cause of apostasyfaithlessness, fickleness and unbelief. And how is He going to do this? We are told in the next verses.

Hosea 14:5-6 I WILL BE AS THE DEW. HE. AS THE LILY. CAST FORTH HIS ROOTS. BRANCHES. SPREAD. BEAUTY. AS THE OLIVE-TREE. Earlier the prophet has used dew to describe the fickleness of Israel's love toward God, as the morning dew that goeth early away, (Hosea 6:4). There dew represented the evanescent nature of their love toward God, Now dew represents the nourishment the everlasting God is able to provide. Because God is as the dew to Israel, he shall blossom as the lily. The lily stands for beauty and purity. God's covenant people, under the dew-like nourishment of God shall be characterized by their beauty and purity. Not only beauty, not only purity, but stabilitycast forth his roots is synonymous with the stability of the majestic cedars of Lebanon. The branches spreading symbolize magnificence or greatness. The ever-green olive tree symbolizes perpetuity or eternality. Notice the symbolism of it all. Beauty, purity, strength, stedfastness (faithfulness), eternality; and then look at the nation as it was, ugly, impure, deformed, weak and vacillatingwithered with the east wind of God's judgment and bearing no fruit.

This, of course, cannot be applied in any ultimate sense to the restoration of the Jews in the days of Ezra and Zerubbabel, for the subsequent history of the Jews does not bear this description out. It is very evidently Hosea's way of expressing God's promise to fulfill the covenant He made with Abraham and Abraham's spiritual posterity (Christians). It is evident that Hosea 14 is entirely Messianic in its terminus ad quern (end), It is a prophecy describing the spiritual inheritance that is to come to the Church and this may be clearly seen by comparing the glorious future of Zion (the Church) as Isaiah describes it in Isaiah Chapter s 60-66. Read especially Isaiah 60:13; Isaiah 60:21; Isaiah 61:1-4; Isaiah 62:1-5; Isaiah 65:17-25, as Isaiah also uses the figures of beautifully fruitful trees to depict the future of God's covenant people. There can be no doubt that Isaiah is speaking of Christ and His Church for Jesus applies at least one of these sections to Himself in Luke 4:16 ff! God, through Christ, has purified a people unto Himself. God, through Christ, has given beauty, strength, faith, steadfastness and eternal life to His covenant people! God, through Christ, has healed His people!

QUIZ

1.

How will God heal the backsliding of His people?

2.

What does freely mean when speaking of God's love?

3.

How is God to be as the dew unto Israel?

4.

Explain what the different figures of flowers and trees mean.

5.

Is this a Messianic prophecy and is it fulfilled in the Church today? Why?