Hosea 11:8 - Meaning and Application

In these verses we see God’s remarkable reluctance to destroy Israel (Hosea 11:8, Hosea 11:9). He says, “How can I give you up?” Notice here God’s gracious inner debate about Israel’s case, a debate between justice and mercy, with mercy clearly winning. We should stand in awe of this, for it shows the greatness of God’s goodness.

This does not mean God is unstable or unsure, as we often are. He is always of one mind and never confused. These are human-style expressions, meant to show both how badly Israel deserved severe judgment and how God’s grace would still be shown in sparing them. The link with what came before is striking: Israel was bent on turning away from God, and though they were called to him, they would not honor him (Hosea 11:7). One might expect the next words to be, “Now I am determined to destroy them and never show mercy again.” But mercy is so free and so sovereign that the very next thought is, “How can I give you up?”

Think first about what justice suggests here. Ephraim, meaning the northern kingdom of Israel, deserved to be given up like a stubborn son who is disinherited, or a hopeless patient who is no longer treated. They deserved to be handed over to ruin. They were fit to be delivered to the enemy like a lamb to a lion, torn apart. They deserved to be made like Admah and Zeboim, two cities destroyed with Sodom and Gomorrah by fire and sulfur from heaven, and to suffer the curse spoken in the law, where the land becomes like the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah, Admah and Zeboim (Deuteronomy 29:23). Israel and Ephraim deserved this abandonment, and God would do them no wrong if he dealt with them that way.

Then consider mercy’s answer: “How can I do it?” It is like a loving father speaking to himself about a wayward son. “How can I cast him off? He is my son, even if he is stubborn. How can I bear to do it?” In the same way, God says, “Ephraim has been a dear son, a pleasant child. How can I do it?” He is ready for ruin, and judgment is waiting to seize him, but God hesitates. They have been a people near to me, and there is still some good among them. They are children of the covenant. If they are ruined, the enemy will boast. Perhaps they will still repent and change. So how can I give them up?

This shows that the God of heaven is slow to anger, and he is especially unwilling to hand over to total destruction a people who have stood in a special relation to him. When he speaks of such severe action, mercy rises within him. “My heart turns within me,” he says, as people say when they cannot bear to do what lies against their feelings. God speaks as if he feels a strong struggle of compassion for Israel: “My heart is stirred,” and “my compassion grows warm and tender” (Lamentations 1:20). “My heart is changed within me” means much the same. His deep mercy moves toward them, and he grieves over their sin and misery (Judges 10:16). Compare also Jeremiah 31:20: “Since I spoke against him, I still remember him, and my heart yearns for him.”

When God gave up his own Son as a sacrifice for sin and a Savior for sinners, he did not say, “How can I give him up?” He did not spare his own Son. It pleased the Lord to crush him, and because he did not spare him, he can spare us. But this is the language of his patience while mercy’s day still lasts. When people have sinned away that patience, and the great day of wrath comes, then no such hesitation is shown. Then he says, “I will laugh at your calamity.”

After the struggle, mercy wins. Judgment is not canceled, but it is held back and softened (Hosea 11:9). God says he will not carry out the full force of his anger. They will not go unpunished, but the sentence will be less severe than they deserve. He will show that he is truly angry, but not forever angry. They will be corrected, but not destroyed. “I will not again destroy Ephraim” means the punishments already given will not be repeated in full, nor carried as far as their sins deserve. It is like soldiers who plunder a city once and do not return to strip it bare again. He also says, “I will not enter the city,” meaning he will not come into Samaria, or any of their cities, as an enemy to utterly destroy them and leave them desolate, as he did with Admah and Zeboim.

The reason for this is, “For I am God and not man, the Holy One in your midst” (Hosea 11:9). To strengthen their hope for mercy, they must remember what he is in himself. He is God, not man, in pardoning sin and sparing sinners. If they had offended a man like themselves, he would not have borne it. Human anger often overwhelms human compassion. But God is not like that. He rules his anger, while anger often rules people.

If an earthly ruler faced such a struggle between justice and mercy, he might not know how to settle it. But God, who is not man, knows how to preserve the honor of justice and still show mercy. The compassion of people is small compared with the tender mercy of our God. His thoughts and ways in receiving repentant sinners are as far above ours as the heavens are above the earth (Isaiah 55:9). It is a great comfort to remember that he is God and not man.

He is also the Holy One. One might think that would be a reason to reject such a provoking people. Yet God knows how to forgive and spare poor sinners in a way that does not shame his holiness, but honors it. He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins, and when he does, he shows his righteousness, because Christ has already purchased that pardon and God has promised it.

He is the Holy One in the midst of his people. His holiness is for the good of his church, and even in this sinful and fallen land and time there were some who gave thanks when they remembered his holiness. He had also called them all to be holy as he is (Leviticus 19:2). As long as we have the Holy One in our midst, we are safe and well. But woe to us if he leaves us. Those who yield to his influence may take comfort in his holiness.

Here we see God’s great willingness to do good for Israel. He will also prepare them to receive the good he plans to give them (Hosea 11:10, Hosea 11:11): “They shall walk after the Lord.” This matches the promise in Hosea 3:5, “They shall return and seek the Lord their God.” It speaks first of the ten tribes, and it was partly fulfilled when some of them returned with the two tribes in Ezra’s time. But it was fulfilled more fully in spiritual Israel, the gospel church, gathered and united through Christ’s gospel.

The ancient Jews understood this as pointing to the Messiah. Dr. Pocock, a learned writer, thought it foretold Christ coming to preach the gospel to the scattered children of Israel, meaning the children of God scattered abroad. Notice how they were called and gathered: “The Lord shall roar like a lion.” The Chaldee says that the word of the Lord will be like a roaring lion. Christ is called the Lion of the tribe of Judah, and at the start of the gospel, his voice was like one crying in the wilderness. When Christ cried out with a loud voice, it was like a lion roaring (Revelation 10:3). The gospel voice was heard far away, like a lion’s roar, and it was a powerful call. See Joel 3:16.

Notice also what this call would do in them, like the fear a lion’s roar puts into the beasts of the forest: “When he shall roar, then the children shall tremble.” See Amos 3:8, “The lion has roared. The Lord God has spoken. Who will not fear?” This was fulfilled when people heard the gospel, trembled, were amazed, and asked, “What shall we do?” It was fulfilled when they were driven to work out their salvation and to worship God with fear and trembling. “The children shall tremble from the west.” The scattered Jews had been carried east to Assyria and Babylon, and some returned from the east. So this seems to point especially to the calling of the Gentiles, who lived west of Canaan, since the gospel spread that way in a special sense. They would move and come with trembling, with care and urgency, from the west, from the nations in that direction, to the mountain of the Lord (Isaiah 2:3), to gospel Jerusalem, after hearing the gospel alarm. Paul speaks of mighty signs and wonders through the preaching of the gospel from Jerusalem round about to Illyricum (Romans 15:19). Then the children trembled from the west.

Since Israel according to the flesh was scattered in Egypt and Assyria, the promise adds that they will be effectually called from there (Hosea 11:11): “They shall come trembling, like a bird, out of Egypt, and like a dove out of the land of Assyria.” A dove is known for swift and steady flight, especially when it returns to her windows. That image fits the gathering of Jews and Gentiles into the church, as in Isaiah 60:8. Wherever the people belong to the election of grace, meaning those God has chosen in his mercy, whether east, west, north, or south, they will hear the joyful sound and be moved by it. Those in Egypt and Assyria will come together. People who were far apart will meet in Christ and be joined into one church. The joining of Egypt and Assyria was also foretold in Isaiah 19:23.

Being stirred by fear, they will flee to the ark. “They shall walk after the Lord,” or, as the Chaldee says, after the service of the Lord. They will take the Lord Christ as their leader and commander. They will enlist under him as the captain of their salvation, and they will yield themselves to the Spirit’s guidance through the word. They will leave all to follow Christ, as true disciples do. Our holy trembling at Christ’s word draws us to him, it does not drive us away. When he roars like a lion, slaves tremble and run from him, but children tremble and run to him.

What welcome will they receive when they return? “I will place them in their houses” (Hosea 11:11). All who come when the gospel calls will have a place and a name in the gospel church, in the local churches that are their homes, where they belong. They will dwell in God and be at home in him, safe and at rest, like a person in his own house. They will have many rooms, for there are many in our Father’s house. They will also have a place in his tabernacle on earth and his temple in heaven, in everlasting dwellings, which may be called their houses, since that is the portion they will stand in at the end of the days.

Then comes a sad complaint about Ephraim and Israel’s treachery, which may also show that the promises above belong not to Israel after the flesh, but to spiritual Israel. For this Ephraim, this Israel, surrounds God with lies and deceit. All their service to him, even when they pretended to come around his altar, was fake and hypocritical. When they came with prayers and praises, each one bringing a request, they lied with their mouths and flattered him with their tongues. Their words sounded fair, but their hearts were foul. If it were possible, they would have deceived God himself. Their promises and professions were all a cheat, yet with these they thought they could surround God, as if to keep him among them and stop him from leaving.

By contrast, there is a pleasant praise of Judah’s honesty, which they kept hold of. This also makes Ephraim’s unfaithfulness look worse, and it helps explain why God had mercy ready for Judah that he did not have for Israel (Hosea 1:6, Hosea 1:7). Judah still rules with God and is faithful with the saints, or with the Most Holy. Judah rules with God, meaning he serves God. God’s service is not only true freedom, it is also honor and dominion. Judah rules, and so do Judah’s princes and leaders, when they rule with God and use their power for him, for his honor, and for the support of his cause. Those rule with God who rule in the fear of God (2 Samuel 23:3). That is their honor, and God will praise them, as he does Judah here. Judah is Israel, a prince with God.

He is also faithful with the holy God, staying close to his worship and to his saints, walking in the steps of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. They walk in the way of good people, and those who do that rule with God. They have strong standing in heaven. Judah still did this, though the words also hint that a time would come when Judah too would rebel and decline. When we see many who surround God with lies and deceit, it can comfort us to remember that God has his remnant, those who cling to him with purpose of heart and are faithful to his saints. For those who are faithful until death, a crown of life is kept, while hypocrites and all liars will have their place without.