The Book Of Hosea. Day 28, Fruit Produced By The Wrong Methods

Before we begin today's study I'd like to apologize for how sporadic the posts have been for the last week. Last week was a difficult week at my house and several things happened that threw off the morning schedule here, plus I was sick for a few days and had to spend one morning getting a prescription for antibiotics before work and leaving early to go get them. Morning is the only time of day when I generally have peaceful, uninterrupted, clear-minded time to work on the Bible study. Hopefully this week's schedule will be back to normal! 

We are moving on into Chapter 10 and in it we learn that the very prosperity the people enjoyed is what they allowed to get between themselves and God. Prosperity was a blessing the Lord promised them for obedience and in the nation's early days in the promised land this is why they enjoyed so many wonderful things---because they were faithful to the Lord. But after the northern kingdom split away from the tribes of Judah and Benjamin, they fell into more and more idolatry and fell into many other types of sin as a result of that idolatry. They began adding to their prosperity by employing wicked methods to get what they wanted.

In this world there is a type of prosperity that can be gained by our own sinful methods. Many people have become rich through sin. They've defrauded others to make their money. They've preyed on the poor and charged exorbitant interest rates. They've become famous and wealthy by creating sinful music, sinful movies, or sinful photographs. They've engaged in the drug trade. They've owned and operated gambling establishments. They've owned and operated clubs where people can get drunk while viewing unclothed women dancers. These are just a few examples of all sorts of ways in which people have gained wealth for themselves while breaking the laws of God and while exploiting their fellow man. By Hosea's day, the prosperity the people are enjoying is not that which the Lord pours out for obedience; it's the prosperity of sin and lawlessness. There is no true, soul-deep satisfaction in that type of prosperity but it's often the case that a person will engage in even more sin in order to try to fill up the emptiness. Prosperity that we gain by our own methods comes between us and the Lord and eventually He must remove the prosperity in order to get our attention.

The Lord says, "Israel was a spreading vine; he brought forth fruit for himself. As his fruit increased, he built more altars; as his land prospered, he adorned his sacred stones." (Hosea 10:1) It was the Lord who led Israel out of Egypt with great signs and wonders, who miraculously provided for Israel for forty years in the wilderness, who powerfully drove out the pagan tribes of Canaan and planted Israel in their place. It was the Lord who gave them a land flowing with milk and honey. Yet many forsook Him and began bowing to idols, crediting the idols with their prosperity. Because they credited the idols with their prosperity, they served idols more and more in hopes that the gods of the heathen nations would bless them more and more. But it was never these gods who did anything for them at all. No god ever spoke to them except the Lord. No god ever blessed them except the Lord. No god ever could do anything for them since there is no God except the Lord. As the Lord said to the people through the prophet Isaiah, "Before Me no god was formed, nor will there be one after Me. I, even I, am the Lord, and apart from Me there is no savior. I have revealed and saved and proclaimed---I, and not some foreign god among you...I am the first and I am the last; apart from Me there is no God." (Isaiah 43:10b-12a, 44:6b) 

References to fruitful spreading trees or fruitful spreading vines are usually good things when the references are being made to the blessings given in return for faithfulness. But in our text today the fruit is bad. The nation has obtained prosperity through unrighteous means---by carnal human methods---rather than through obedience to the Lord. This type of prosperity is as impermanent and unsatisfying as overripe or rotten fruit. It is not good fruit, but bad. And what do we do with rotten fruit? We throw it out, which is exactly what the Lord is going to do soon with the northern kingdom. He is going to allow the people to be cast out of the land by an enemy invader.

The Lord is a good father and like any good father He wants to see His children producing good fruit. Just as eating fresh fruit is good for our human bodies, producing good spiritual fruit is good for our souls. But just as eating rotten fruit will make our physical bodies sick, producing sinful fruit makes our souls sick. The Lord is going to allow those who have clung to idols to be taken to foreign lands where idols are everywhere. In other words, He's going to make them sick of idols. He's going to make them so sick of useless idolatry that they will see the light---His light---and give their hearts back to Him.