Hos 11:8-11 | KingComments | STEP | are like a window through which we can look into the heart of God. We can see that there is a future restoration for His people. After the announcement of the judgment, which must come, it is as if God wants to prevent the thought from coming to an end with His people. With Admah and Zeboiim it is. Those cities no longer exist. At the same time as the turning upside-down of Sodom and Gomorrah, they disappeared from the face of the earth. God has threatened to treat His people like Sodom, Gomorrah, Admah and Zeboiim ( ). The reminder of what He had to do with those cities causes great inner turmoil with God. “My heart is turned over within Me” means that His heart resists, it ‘takes a different direction’, it ‘changes its mind’. God repents the evil He intends to do to them. This is only possible because God foresees that His people will repent (cf. ; ). His compassion, which is kindled fully and not just a little, is a guarantee that the people will be freed from the misery into which they have fallen through their own guilt. This is always the case with Him in relation to man and His people. With Him is always present what is appropriate for the situation, both the feelings of love and compassion and the power to act. The question “how can I give you up, … surrender you?”, did not occur to God when He gave up His Son on the cross, when He did not spare Him. From that giving up and surrendering His Son comes a new and miraculous ‘How?’ in view of us: “He who did not spare His own Son, but delivered Him over for us all, how will He not also with Him freely give us all things?” ( ).

‏ Hosea 11:8-11

How Can I …?

Hos 11:8-11 are like a window through which we can look into the heart of God. We can see that there is a future restoration for His people. After the announcement of the judgment, which must come, it is as if God wants to prevent the thought from coming to an end with His people.

With Admah and Zeboiim it is. Those cities no longer exist. At the same time as the turning upside-down of Sodom and Gomorrah, they disappeared from the face of the earth. God has threatened to treat His people like Sodom, Gomorrah, Admah and Zeboiim (Deu 29:23).

The reminder of what He had to do with those cities causes great inner turmoil with God. “My heart is turned over within Me” means that His heart resists, it ‘takes a different direction’, it ‘changes its mind’. God repents the evil He intends to do to them. This is only possible because God foresees that His people will repent (cf. Jdg 10:16; Jer 31:20).

His compassion, which is kindled fully and not just a little, is a guarantee that the people will be freed from the misery into which they have fallen through their own guilt. This is always the case with Him in relation to man and His people. With Him is always present what is appropriate for the situation, both the feelings of love and compassion and the power to act.

The question “how can I give you up, … surrender you?”, did not occur to God when He gave up His Son on the cross, when He did not spare Him. From that giving up and surrendering His Son comes a new and miraculous ‘How?’ in view of us: “He who did not spare His own Son, but delivered Him over for us all, how will He not also with Him freely give us all things?” (Rom 8:32).

God Is God and Not Man

In this verse we find the answer to the ‘how?’ of Hos 11:8 and the reason why He does not execute His burning wrath and does not destroy Ephraim further. This answer is: He is “God and not man, the Holy One in your midst”. When a man is harmed by what has been done to God, this man reacts very differently from God. Man inflames in anger and pays back the evil that has been done to him. God acts very differently. He will let the announced punishment come over Israel, but will not destroy His people completely like He did with Admah and Zeboiim, cities that lie forever under the curse of God’s wrath.

That Israel will not be under the curse forever is because God has found a solution that no man can think of. The fact that He is God and not man also means that in His sovereignty He completely ignores man. His ways far exceed those of sinful man. God’s solution does full justice to His righteousness and holiness, but also to His plans of love with His chosen people. That solution is found in the Person and work of Christ.

In Christ on the cross, full justice is done to God’s righteousness and holiness. There, God has judged the sins of everyone who confesses them sincerely before Him. Also, Israel will in the future repent of the sins committed. Based on the work of Christ, they too may know that their sins have been forgiven. That is why also God’s love becomes visible in Christ. When the sins have been borne by His Son and thereby removed, the way is free to carry out His plans of love.

Israel will eventually be able to enjoy all the blessings promised by God, while God as “the Holy One” will dwell in their midst. He will not come to the city to destroy it. That God does not let His wrath burn permanently is because the Lord Jesus has been in God’s wrath.

Roaring like a lion

What a change! Here we no longer have what we found in Hos 11:7, a “turning from Me”, but a “walk after the LORD”. This will happen in the future. On the basis of that fact and what has been explained in the previous section, the people will enter the millennial realm of peace and enjoy the blessing.

There is always a blessing attached to following the Lord, also for us who live now. When Peter asks the Lord Jesus a question about the reward for following Him, He answers with a remark about the future and the present (Mt 19:28-29). In Hosea it is about “the regeneration” the Lord Jesus speaks about. By this is meant the future realm of peace when everything in creation will be new.

Just before that, He will not roar against His people for the purpose of tearing them apart (Hos 5:14), but against the nations that have subdued His people. He will then openly act as a Protector for His people. He will do so on the day He will appear as the Lion from the tribe of Judah. Earlier, He is a lion who tore them apart, now He is a lion who roars to call them back to Himself. He will bring Israel back from exile.

It is also possible that we should see this “roaring like a lion” in the political upheavals and events that precede salvation. The voice of God will be recognizable to God’s people in what will take place in the political field at that time.

Finally at Home

The speed and certainty with which the scattered of Israel will return to the land at the call of the LORD is compared to flying like birds and especially doves (cf. Isa 60:8). Egypt is the south, Assyria the northeast. Both countries are mentioned as countries of exile, but also as a symbol of the many nations to which Israel is scattered. The fact that they “tremble” probably has to do with the fact that they are impressed by the majesty of the LORD.

Once they have arrived in the land, He will make them live in their homes. That will be their permanent abode. They will never be driven out again. This promise is reinforced by the “speaks the LORD”. If He has said it, who will be able to change that?