I taught Ephraim to walk,
Taking them by their arms;
But they did not know that I healed them.
I drew them with gentle cords,
With bands of love,
And I was to them as those who take the yoke from their neck.
I stooped and fed them.
He shall not return to the land of Egypt
But the Assyrian shall be his king,
Because they refused to repent.
(Vv3-5) NKJV
In the final four chapters of Hosea the prophet brings us back to how much God loves us. I like to imagine Hosea penning these words or speaking them in the temple. I can picture him practically weeping because he intimately knows how hard it is to love someone that has betrayed your love.
Wasn't it our Abba Father who taught us how to walk as he stood above holding both our hands? How often has He healed us and we didn't even see it? Hasn't He led us with a gentle cord, our "boundaries" falling in "pleasant places" (Ps 16:6)? Hosea had a picture of what it felt like to stoop down and feed someone broken by their own sin, reaping what they had sown, but loved relentlessly.
Of course we know that discipline is a part of love; "the Lord disciplines those he loves, and he punishes everyone he accepts as a son" (Heb 12:6). And in 722 B.C. the Northern Kingdom, which Hosea referred to as Ephraim (its largest and central tribe), would fall to an Assyrian king.
Men we have the capacity and the call to love like God loves. Challenge yourself to show the gentle compassion that taught you how to walk and fed you in your lowest times. And yes we are "but dust" and we will make mistakes, but we can choose to live in humble repentance. I want my life to be a picture of the blessing of obedience rather than the chastening of love.
Jason Ouellette
