Hos 7:6 | KingComments | STEP | The phrase “their anger smolders” can also be translated as “their baker sleeps” (cf. ). In this verse we can then see the following picture: the ‘oven’ is the plotting, the ‘heart’ is the dough or the bread, the ‘baker’ is the passion of idolatry and of evil lusts. In the ‘baker’ we can also see the conscience of man. Their conscience sleeps; they follow their own will and imagination. Their hearts are on fire because of their passions. An unclean heart is like a heated oven, and its unclean lusts and desires are like the fuel that makes the fire hot. Paul uses the same imaginative language when he describes the lewd lusts to which people surrender who do not care about God and His Word ( ). The natural feelings are killed when one no longer takes into account what God has said and one simply follows one’s own lusts. Conscience has been given to man by God after and as a result of the fall in sin. It is a ‘warning mechanism’. This means that the conscience only gives a signal when we think of and do something that is not right. We can ease our conscience by constantly coming up with arguments to make the wrong thing we did not seem so bad after all. If we repeat this often enough, the conscience will eventually no longer respond if something is done that is contrary to God’s Word. The conscience becomes numb, it is as if it is asleep. But lust does not sleep. It burns constantly like an oven.

‏ Hosea 7:6

Conscience and Lust

The phrase “their anger smolders” can also be translated as “their baker sleeps” (cf. Hos 7:4). In this verse we can then see the following picture: the ‘oven’ is the plotting, the ‘heart’ is the dough or the bread, the ‘baker’ is the passion of idolatry and of evil lusts. In the ‘baker’ we can also see the conscience of man. Their conscience sleeps; they follow their own will and imagination. Their hearts are on fire because of their passions. An unclean heart is like a heated oven, and its unclean lusts and desires are like the fuel that makes the fire hot.

Paul uses the same imaginative language when he describes the lewd lusts to which people surrender who do not care about God and His Word (Rom 1:27). The natural feelings are killed when one no longer takes into account what God has said and one simply follows one’s own lusts.

Conscience has been given to man by God after and as a result of the fall in sin. It is a ‘warning mechanism’. This means that the conscience only gives a signal when we think of and do something that is not right. We can ease our conscience by constantly coming up with arguments to make the wrong thing we did not seem so bad after all. If we repeat this often enough, the conscience will eventually no longer respond if something is done that is contrary to God’s Word. The conscience becomes numb, it is as if it is asleep. But lust does not sleep. It burns constantly like an oven.