He says, "What can I do with you, Ephraim? What can I do with you, Judah? Your love is like the morning mist, like the early dew that disappears." (Hosea 6:4) I grew up in a rural area in the heart of Appalachia and it was a common expression there to say that the morning mist would "burn off" soon. Many summer days began with the mountains and the skies completely obscured by mist but, knowing that a hot and sunny day was forecast, we would plan accordingly because we knew the mist would "burn off" soon and wouldn't hamper our plans. Surface faithfulness is the type of faithfulness that "burns off" when the going gets tough---and sometimes it only has to get a little tough to burn it off. It's easy to sing the Lord's praises when everything about our day is going the way we want it to go. That doesn't prove much about our depth of faith. But if we can sing His praises on a day fraught with one inconvenience after another, that demonstrates a faith that's more than surface-deep. And if we can sing His praises when more difficult hardships are in our lives, that's a faith with very deep roots.
Because a large number of the people only gave the Lord lip-service and cared nothing for Him in their hearts, they began to do wicked things. They began to oppress their fellow man. They began to serve heathen gods. Time and time again the Lord sent prophets to warn them of the wrath to come if they did not repent. "Therefore I cut you in pieces with My prophets, I killed you with the words of My mouth---then My judgments go forth like the sun." (Hosea 6:5) The word of God is sometimes referred to as a sword in the Bible. It cuts straight to the heart and reveals what is there. It tries and condemns the guilty.
As we've already learned in our study of the prophets and as we will learn as we continue studying the prophets, a great deal of injustice is taking place in the land. Judges are accepting bribes to rule against the poor and defenseless. Widows and orphans are being disenfranchised. Peaceful, hardworking foreigners in their midst are being mistreated and discriminated against. Highway robbery is taking place and all sort of lawlessness and lewdness abounds in the land. In view of all this inhumanity and depravity, what difference does it make if people are giving lip-service to the Lord and observing holy days and times of sacrifice? It makes no difference at all what the mouth speaks or what the hands do if the heart is far from the Lord, so He says, "For I desire mercy, not sacrifice, and acknowledgment of God rather than burnt offerings." (Hosea 6:6)
"As at Adam, they have broken the covenant; they were unfaithful to Me there. Gilead is a city of evildoers, stained with footprints of blood. As marauders lie in ambush for a victim, so do bands of priests; they murder on the road to Shechem, carrying out their wicked schemes. I have seen a horrible thing in Israel: There Ephraim is given to prostitution, Israel is defiled." (Hosea 6:7-10) Verse 7 might be more accurately rendered as, "Like Adam, they have broken the covenant," but scholars cannot be certain that is what is meant here. But to be sure, Adam broke the covenant with the Lord and every person after him has sinned.
The Lord Jesus compared hypocrisy to cleaning the outside of a cup while leaving the inside full of filth. (Matthew 23:25) God the Father is saying the same type of thing in today's passage of Hosea. Those whose faith is only surface deep are cleaning the outside of the cup while inside---in their hearts---there is all manner of wickedness.
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