Hosea 10:9-12

A checkered picture.

These verses exhibit the continuance in sin and its consequences, chastisement and its lessons, change of circumstances and its bitter experiences, the call to repentance and the blessed promises to the penitent.

I. CONTINUANCE IN SIN . Israel had corrupted themselves as in the days of Gibeah ( Hosea 9:9 ), and, as we are told in Hosea 10:9 , had sinned from the days of Gibeah.

1. Grievous as their sin had been at first, it was greatly aggravated by being long continued. Age after age sin had run its course; one generation after another had helped to fill up the cup of iniquity until it had become brimful. A heathen complains of successive generations thus corrupting themselves, each outstripping that which preceded in iniquity: "What is there wasting time does not impair? The age of our parents, worse than our grandsires, has borne us yet more wicked, who in our turn are destined to beget a progeny more sinful still."

2. This continuance in sin shall be attended by dreadful consequences some day. This is a legitimate inference, whatever view we take of this difficult ninth verse. Whether the meaning be that the Israelites stood their ground, and did not perish though twice defeated by the men of Benjamin, and that with a loss of forty thousand slain; and that, though spared, their destruction as dreadful as deserved shall overtake them now, and that without any possibility of escape, and when it does come it shall be found all the more dreadful from having been delayed in its course; or whether the sense is that Israel, as if forsaken of God and alienated from his favor (possibly implied by the change from the second to the third person), have stood, that is, persisted in their sin as there and then so ever since; shall not the battle overtake such incorrigible offenders; persevering so long in sin like the men of Gibeah, can they expect to escape the war that of old did all but exterminate the transgressors? Or whether the sense be that the Benjamites, then an integral part of Israel, stood by the Gibeahites, defending, and so virtually abetting them in their iniquity, that the battle in Gibeah might not overtake those vile delinquents, and that Israel, resembling the Benjamites in spirit, have sinned ever since, aiding, abetting, and taking part in similar or greater atrocities and abominations. They are then left to infer that a day of reckoning still more terrible was to be expected by them.

II. CHASTISEMENT AND ITS LESSONS . In the case of Israel, they were not left merely to infer the approach of chastisement, they were positively assured of it.

1. Men are forewarned that they may be forearmed. God had exercised much long-suffering and forbearance, but his goodness failed to lead them to repentance. They had abused his patience, and now his purpose is to chastise; but even in chastising them he is exercising mercy in order to prevent final and inevitable ruin. He had rejoiced over them to do them good; he now takes pleasure in correcting them—it is his desire. The nature of the chastisement with which Israel is to be visited closely resembles that which had been inflicted on the Benjamites.

2. The reference to that transaction may have suggested to the prophet his description of the coming chastisement. The tribes of Israel banded themselves against Benjamin in the battle of Gibeah; so the peoples, the Assyrians and their allies, would be gathered against Israel. Kimchi has well expressed the cause of the chastisement by representing God as saying, "According to my good will and pleasure will I chastise them; because they do not receive chastisement from me by my prophets who rebuke them in my Name, I will chastise them by the hands of the peoples which shall be gathered against them."

3. When men refuse to be God's freemen, and prefer continuing to be servants of sin, they are preparing themselves to be the bondmen of their enemies. The allusion in the last clause of Hosea 10:10 is obscure, and yet the general sense is tolerably plain. Much depends on the one word variously rendered "eyes," "furrows," "habitations," or "sins." The figure may be taken from two oxen abreast in a yoke, plowing together side by side in two adjacent furrows; and it may indicate the combination of the Israelites to ward off the threatened danger, but to no purpose, since Jehovah had decreed their chastisement, and, in case it failed, their destruction; or the two divisions of Israel and Judah, and their respective places of habitation; or the two places of idolatrous worship, Dan and Bethel; or their two cohabitations with God and idols; or their two transgressions, which appears the preferable sense. Whichever of these we adopt, the idea of binding, that is, of thraldom or captivity, remains the same.

4. There are two kinds of service and two claimants for the soul of man: there is the service of sin, and the wages of that service is death; there is the service of God, and the fruit of that service is unto holiness, and the end everlasting life. Satan claims us, but he is a usurper; besides, he is the worst of all masters—keeping his servants in bondage, working them to death, and at last paying them with damnation. God claims us. His claim is just; he is the rightful Proprietor; he made us, and not we ourselves. His claim is, in fact, threefold—creation, preservation, and redemption. We cannot serve two masters; we cannot obey both; and we may not attempt the unholy compromise made by the peoples brought from the regions of Assyria and planted in the lands of the dispossessed Israelites, who worshipped the Lord and served their own gods. To be the slaves of Satan or the freemen of Jehovah, that is the question; the bondage of sin or the freedom of righteousness is the alternative. There must be decision in the matter. Let our determination be like Joshua's, that whatever others do, we will serve the Lord.

III. CHANGE OF CIRCUMSTANCES AND BITTER EXPERIENCES . When Israel had, by idolatry and other sins, bound themselves for slavery, like oxen laboring in the yoke up and down the furrows of the field, the change came. Ephraim had been treated gently and trained indulgently; their yoke had been an easy one, and their burden a light one; but they did not value their privileges, nor know the day of their merciful visitation. They had been in easy circumstances; the lines had fallen to them in pleasant places; they had long enjoyed privileges and advantages of no ordinary kind. But times are now changed, and that change, the bitter fruit of their own doings, was sad as it was sudden. A yoke is now put on the neck, a rider on the back, and drudgery becomes the lot of the once fair and delicate heifer. Subjection and slavery to foreigners, with hardships great and many, and such as they had never experienced before, now awaited Ephraim; while Judah too would come in for share of the punishment, as they had had part in the sin; and thus at last Jacob, that is, both kingdoms, the northern and the southern, having thrown off the yoke of Jehovah, fall each in turn under the galling yoke of Assyrian and Chaldean conqueror. Let men beware of exchanging the pleasant service of the Savior for the painful drudgery of Satan!

IV. THE CALL TO REPENTANCE AND ITS BLESSED PROSPECTS . The severity of the foregoing threatenings is alleviated by the present call to reformation and repentance, with the accompanying promises.

1. A seed-time of righteousness must precede a reaping-time of mercy. The figures are still borrowed from husbandry; and thus every action is represented as seed sown, and every good work is seed sown in righteousness. The rule of righteousness is the Law of God, and the directions of that rule include our duty both to God and man. To sow in righteousness, therefore, is to discharge the duties of righteousness, comprehending piety towards God, justice and charity towards man, together with propriety of personal conduct.

2. The seed sown shall come up one day. If we sow tares, they will come up; if we sow wheat, it will come up. The seed of righteousness is called by the psalmist precious seed. It is not in the power of man to cause a single seed to germinate and spring up; but God in his justice will bring up the bad seed for punishment, and in his mercy the good seed for reward.

3. There is a correspondence between the seed-time and the harvest. If men sow to the flesh, they shall reap corruption; if to the Spirit, they shall reap life everlasting. As we sow we reap, and what we sow we reap. Our reaping shall be according to the measure of God's mercy. Not a reward of merit, but of mercy; not a recompense of desert, but of grace. Men often sow in tears, but if the seed be that of righteousness, and the sowing after the right method and with the right motive, they shall reap in joy. "Blessed," says the saintly Burroughs, "are those who have sown much for God in their lifetime! Oh, the glorious harvest that these shall have! The very angels shall help them to take in their harvest at the great day; and they need not take thought for barns—the very heavens shall be their barns. And oh, the joy that there shall be in that harvest! The angels will help to sing the harvest-song that they shall sing who have been sowers in righteousness."

4. Reformation is the effect and evidence-of repentance. If reformation be genuine, repentance must go before; a change of life that is real and permanent must be preceded by a change of heart. Thus, in order to sow in righteousness, the fallow ground must be broken up. If the seed is to take root in the soil, grow up and yield an abundant increase at the time of harvest, the soil must be carefully prepared. The plowing, though mentioned after the sowing, must precede it, otherwise the seed of truth will be lost or choked by the weeds of sin. Dropping the figure, or realizing the fact set forth by it, we must break up the fallow ground of the heart. The weeds and thorns and thistles that overspread it in its natural state must be rooted out; the evil passions, corrupt affections, and hateful lusts must be eradicated; the heart itself must be broken and contrite on account of sin; the spirit must be subdued by a sense of sin; shame and sorrow must penetrate the soul because of sin; like land long untilled, and so hard and difficult to plough, the hard heart must be broken with contrition and softened, and the stubborn will subdued. Thus, too, the field that had lain fallow after a first plowing must be broken up anew and made to shine (as the original word, from נוּר , according to Gesenius and Ewald, signifies), and prepared for future and abundant fruitfulness.

5. The exhortation is enforced by two arguments—the past loss of time, and prospective spiritual prosperity.

6. Righteousness, like the rain, descends from above; for "every good gift and every perfect gift cometh down from above, even from the Father of lights, with whom there is no variableness, neither shadow of turning." He will bestow it in great abundance, for he will rain it upon us; sending down, not merely a few drops, but a plentiful rain and copious showers. The righteousness so abundantly vouchsafed includes his righteous fulfillment of his promises; the righteousness, moreover, that is witnessed both by the Law and the prophets—righteousness reckoned to us for justification, and righteousness wrought in us for sanctification. The effect of this righteousness is blessed and beneficent. As the natural seeds sown in the soil of the earth which has been ploughed and prepared for them require, besides, the rain of heaven to make them bud and bring forth the blade, the ear, and the full corn in the ear; so the spiritual seeds that men sow in righteousness require the rain of righteousness and the rich blessing of heaven to fructify and refresh.