Sorry we're little late getting started. We had too much eating to do, is the problem. Eating and fellowship and having a good time here tonight. But we do have to get into Bible study here pretty quick. That's what you came for, isn't it? And so we will head that way in just a moment. But we do pray for John's sister in law Patsy down in is she in the hospital in Hobbs or Lovington? Who's there for observation. But anyway, I'm not feeling too good. And of course, John's brother, lots of prayer needs there as well. But anyway, we pray for her. And TV good Soul in Atlanta is one of our online watchers. He has a cornea transplant tomorrow and so we'll pray for him. That's just amazing that you can do a cornea transplant. Pray for TV tomorrow. And Karen what's his full name? Karen Thomas Hill is the week old baby tomorrow. Stephen, Mariana's new grandson, number grandchild number five. We rejoice in that. And Mariana, of course, they're spoiling him already, right? Yes. Or are you spoiled getting to stay home? No. Okay. It's the other way around. Okay. I thought so. Glad to have our friends from Waco, Texas back with us here tonight with Warren and Linda. We don't let any guests get by without getting embarrassed. And the job is you have to stand and introduce yourself, so go for it. Basil and Margaret Thompson. You do live in Waco, right? I was thinking so. But of course there's Crawford and all those other places you'll hang out around there. Okay, Woodway, the suburb of Waco. Yes. So that means probably we do not have a pin in our map for Wood way. I think we have Waco, but we probably don't have Woodway, so I'll be sure to give you one of those before you leave. Anyway, Bethel, Marcus, thanks for being back with us here again. They were here, I don't know, a year or so ago and blessing to have you back with that. How about we have a word of prayer and get started in some Bible study tonight? What, are you all back row Baptist tonight? Everybody seems to be like way back there. Yeah, that's right, you don't get any closer than that. And you're in the front row tonight. The front row of the people, the village section. Anyway, let's have a word of prayer. Heavenly Father, thank you for the good fellowship we've had tonight and for the blessings that are ours. We thank you for this new grandson, dear Heavenly Father, and pray that you bless him in every way and give him strength and integrity and masculinity that our society needs today, and family that loves and cares for him and a protection from danger and disease. And we're grateful for his grandparents here, and we just pray also for Patsy in the hospital in Lovington and ask that you give her some comfort tonight as well as her husband and grandkids family, children and family, and that they would be encouraged and doctors would discover what the issues are and that good days would lie ahead. And for TB tomorrow, as he has this cornea transplant, we ask your watch care over him as well. Thank you for the miracle of medicine and the medical world in cases like this. And we're grateful that this is being resolved. And we just pray that tonight in our Bible study, you would guide us as well as we walk through and learn this ancient prophecy in Jesus name. Amen. Well, last week we started Hosea, rightly? Divided and verse by verse, and we got through Hosea, chapter one, verse nine. That was the introduction to what I call the dysfunctional family of Hosea and the instruction to go and choose a wife of Horedom. Remember that I gave the rather unconventional, I suppose, unconventional interpretation that she might not have been a harlot, she may have just been an idolater, which really all of the Northern Kingdom at that time was. And so Hoardem there is used in the case of idolatry. And I built the case for that last week. You can go back to session one if you're not so convinced, but just in case I meet Gomer someday. I don't want to be the one that said, you know, what everyone's saying about you, but not me, not me. I just think you're an idolater if it gets any better. So anyway, we looked at that. I think there's a lot of symbolism, a ton of symbolism in this beginning even with the name Hosea. Remember, Hoshia is how you pronounce it in Hebrew, which is the same root as yeshua, Joshua. And of course, getting into Greek, it gets Jesus. And then every one of the names and we spent time on that last week, every one of the names really gets into wow. There's a lot of symbolism here that I think the way I closed out last week, to say if you read verses one through nine as a Hebrew, you would be saying this story is not really about a fella and his wife and their three kids. This is about something else. As a matter of fact, you would say it is the most blunt way to tell us we're in big trouble that you could ever come up with. So just all sorts of stuff in verses one through nine. Well, tonight we're going to pick up in verse ten, jose, chapter one, verse ten. And as the mind goes, I noticed that on your outline there in that black bar, I wrote Hebrews, chapter one versus ten and eleven. But that should be Hosea, chapter one versus ten and eleven. But you know, an H is an H. They're kind of the same, right? They both start with an H and have an S in them. Therefore they're the same. Okay? They're not let's be persnickety. That's a whole different book, but we'll go to Jose, chapter one, verses ten and eleven. Now remember, I'll bring up the scripture right here, but remember that there really wasn't any good news whatsoever in verses one through nine. It ends in just utterly destitute way in a manner of tremendous warning. But then something very interesting happens in verse ten, and that is that verses ten and eleven really are unbelievably positive, especially after this unbelievably negative coded message comes through in verses one through nine. Now all of a sudden it just totally shifts gears. I should mention, by the way, that Hosea chapter one, verse ten in our English Bibles is always Hosea, chapter two, verse one in Hebrew Bibles. Most of the places in the Hebrew Scripture the Jewish people adopted later on, none of them were born with chapters and verses. But most of the Jewish people and Jewish books of the Bible adopted the same chapters and verses that we have kind of did that out of. It was convenient and so out of convenience they did it. But there were a few places where the rabbi said, we're not doing that. It's so obvious in the text that it doesn't belong here, that we're not going to put it there. This is one of those places and you really can't understand because Hosea, chapter one, verse ten does completely turn, it completely changes. Furthermore, Hosea, chapter one, verse ten really seems to be the introduction. Verses ten and eleven seem to be the introduction to what happens in all of chapter two. And we'll start chapter two tonight. We won't finish chapter two, but they all seem to go together. Chapter two is a poem, or a song, if you will. It's written in Hebrew poetry. Anyway, in chapters 110 and eleven seemed to be the introduction to this and the way it turns. There's one further thing, and that is in the Hebrew text that is used really throughout the Jewish world and the Christian world we call the Masoretic text. They give in the text itself a space. Asked at the end of the line when we're switching gears, they didn't put chapters and numbers, but they gave us a blank space there. And every Hebrew scroll that you pick up at the end of verse ten, it would have this gap there that says in the Hebrew text, it's time to change subjects here. That's what we're doing. And indeed it does change subjects. And so Hebrews chapter one, hosea, chapter one, verse ten says that the number of the children we should start right there. I didn't get very far, did I? Yet? So all of this bad news, but let me change gears here yet the number of the children of Israel shall be as the sand of the sea, which cannot be measured nor numbered, and okay, let's stop right there. The number of who? The children of Israel. I take this very unique approach that the children of Israel happen to be the children of Israel. That's who they are. The children of Israel are the children of Israel. I don't think we're the children of Israel. I think they're the children of Israel. And so this is prophetic about the children of Israel. The children of Israel shall be as the sand of the sea, which cannot be measured or numbered. Well, just last Sunday, we were studying in the life of Abraham in chapter 13. Remember when Lot finally says, sayanara, I'm out of here? Then God comes and visits with Abram and says to him, hey, go out, look at the stars. And he speaks of the stars of the sky. Now, this speaks of the sand of the sea in Genesis 13. It speaks of the stars in the sky. And it was only Sunday. Do you remember? That's what I thought. The dust of the earth is actually what Genesis 13 says. When you get to Genesis 32, it repeats that several times, that promise of an uncountable number. And in Genesis chapter 32, it actually uses these words the sand of the sea. So here, the children of Abraham, they shall be or the children of Israel, as the group came to be called, shall be as the sand of the sea, which cannot be measured nor numbered. And it shall come to pass in that place where it was said unto them excuse me, there we go. Where it was said unto them, ye are not my people. There it shall be said unto them, ye are the sons of the living God. Okay, let's see here. They will be like the sand of the sea, which cannot be numbered during that day. Anybody can guess here. Remember, Jose is talking to the northern kingdom of Israel, which is ten tribes versus the southern Kingdom, which is two tribes. But even if you want to put all twelve of them together, does anyone want to venture that during those days they numbered more than the sand of the sea? They didn't. It was a good guess. No, there wasn't that many of them. In fact, probably they were woefully outnumbered by their enemies, the Assyrians. They certainly hadn't ever come to be like the sand of the sea, which cannot be measured or numbered. So then, between that point and let's call this, I don't know, 720 BC. All the way up to today, 2022. I had to think about that for a moment. What year are we in? 2022 Ad. So you've got what, 2700 years? During that 2700 years, at what period were the children of Israel like the sand of the sea that cannot be measured nor numbered? Never. Today, there are about maybe, I'm going to say, 7 million Jews in Israel, and probably another 7 million Jews scattered throughout the world. So 14 million, 14 million is hard to count, but it's like half of California, not really all that many on a worldwide scale. And certainly doesn't get anywhere near like the sand of the sea, which cannot be measured nor numbered. So I believe that this is a prophecy that is yet future. I would say millennial, even beyond in the coming messianic kingdom. There's a time when this will come about. It's not now. I think what has happened in Christian theology is the preachers have come along and said, well, the nation of Israel is not like the sand of the sea that cannot be measured nor numbered. Therefore it must not be about the children of Israel and it must be about us, because we, the Church, are so many that it cannot be measured or numbered. Unless, of course, you go to measure or number it and then all of a sudden you find out we can kind of figure out about how many of us there are. We'll come real close, about as close as I suppose the margin of error of counting Christians in the world is not much different than the margin of error of counting Jews in the world. So it doesn't describe us either as the body of Christ. So I don't understand sort of the switcheroo that, oh, we're bigger than they are and so this must be talking about them. We're kind of like the sands of the sea. Have you ever been in a place that didn't have very many Christians? I just wanted to check to see if you knew where you were. Yeah, you had been in a place that doesn't have very many Christians and as a matter of fact, there's a lot of places in the world that don't have very many Christians. And as a matter of fact, we're kind of outnumbered. I mean, if you take Christianity and it's brought us, since we're still outnumbered by those who aren't Christians. So this doesn't describe Christianity, it doesn't describe Judaism. I think we just have to take it as it was a prophecy in Hosea, chapter one, verse ten, it is a prophecy here today in 2022, it is still a prophecy. Now, he says they are going to come to that point and I don't know how the Lord is going to do that, but I trust that he will do that. The closest thing I can find in the scripture that gives me some encouragement that the Lord is able to carry out this particular promise. I kind of believe he can fulfill whatever promises he wants. But this particular promise does have to do with the number of descendants. And the passage that encourages me most is Exodus, chapter one. Remember that chapter? That's the chapter in which the text goes something like now the children of Israel were having lots of babies. In fact, they were having more babies than rabbits have babies. As a matter of fact, they were having so many babies that midwives couldn't even keep up. They couldn't even get there while you were having babies. In fact, they were having so many babies, people just stopped for 15 minutes to have their baby and then got back onto work and got ready for the next baby, baby, baby, baby, baby. It was a baby boom in Exodus chapter one. Now, that was a paraphrase, but you can go read Exodus Chapter One, and that's what it says. So God can kind of do it again here in bringing all that about and in bringing unbelievable numbers to the nation of Israel, and that's what brought about the slavery of the nation of Israel. They said, the Pharaoh said, oh, wow, this baby boom, they are going to overtake us if we're not careful. So a prophecy yet fulfilled. Okay, that in the place where it is said unto them, ye are not my people. Now, does that ring a bell from last week? Not my people. Ye are not my people. If we were to say that in Hebrew, does anyone want to guess how we would say it? How about low AMI? Lo AMI. Remember that from last week. Lo means not. AMI means my people. So here it's translated. And it's translated because obviously it was not a proper name here, whereas earlier he said, I want you to name your boy Lo Amiople here, if you were reading, it says in the place where it was said, Lomi, but we translate that you are not my people, there it shall be said. Oh, let me stop. I didn't get I'm having a hard time reading the verse without comment. If it was said unto who? Them. You are not my people. Loa me. But wait a minute, I thought Loami was one guy. Wouldn't it be said unto him, Lo AMI? That is just another bit of evidence that this thing is full of allegorian symbolism, that if you take Loa me solely as one baby boy, then this whole thing doesn't really make sense. If you take Loa me as representative of the people of Israel becoming not my people, then this makes sense. So in the place where it said, you are not my people, there it shall be said unto them, ye are the sons of the living God. Now, that's quite an improvement, isn't it? From not my people to the sons of the living God. Now, let's stop right here. I started to say, let's read verse eleven and put it together. Of course, again, the Christian interpretation of this says the Jewish people are going to become not my people, and we the Christian people, are going to become the sons of God. To do that, you have to do some switcheroo here. You have to make us the children of Israel, as the beginning of the verse says. And you have to make us somehow like the sands of the sea in terms of number. And you have to say, Hosea really is a book about us, not about Israel. And then if you do that, you'll want to pick and choose because you don't want to put any of the curses on us. We just want the blessings on us. And so you start to take this kind of cafeteria approach. I think it's best to leave Hosea as a message to the Jewish nation. And then what this prophesies, and obviously there's a little knowledge of some other scripture coming into this, what I'm about to say, but what this prophesies is that the nation of Israel is going to have a time period of being not my people, but it shall come to pass in that place where you are not my people, you shall be the children of God. That is to say, God was working with Israel. God, the day will come as prophesied here when God will not work with Israel, and then the day will come when God will work with Israel. Now, I happen to think we're in the time when God is not working with Israel. There's neither Jew nor Gentile in this day in which we live. And so we're kind of in the place where Israel is lo AMI, but it shall be said unto them, ye are the sons of the living God. Now, I'm always, especially when it's in the Old Testament, I'm interested to find out what is the Jewish interpretation of a verse like this. I know the Christian interpretation is often it's a prophecy about us. Well, clearly the Jewish people are not going to say, I think this is a prophecy about the Church. So what do they say? Here's what the Chabad website says on this under Rashi's commentary for you. You are not my people, and I will not be yours. I will show myself as though I am not yours. And you shall be exiled among the nations. And even there you shall multiply and grow. And there you shall lay it on your heart to return to me. As it is said through Moses. And you shall lay it on your heart among all the nations where he has exiled you. Et cetera. And the Lord God shall return your captivity. Okay? That's the Jewish interpretation, which basically is what I have said, that Israel is going to be scattered. They're not going to be my people, god is not going to deal with them. But someday God is going to lay it on their heart to come back, to return to Him, to be his, and they will become his people once again. So even the Jewish interpreters have taken this verse to say, hey, there's a time we're going to be set aside and not be his people. And I suspect that if we were to talk to the rabbi, any Conservative rabbi would say, yeah, we're in the Loami period right now because we're scattered all over the earth. Now, when you get into verse eleven, it adds to this just a little bit when it says, then shall the children of Judah and the children of Israel be gathered together and appoint themselves one head, and they shall come up out of the land, for great shall be the days of Jezreel. Okay, then that is in this day when you weren't my people, but you will be my people. Then shall the children of Israel excuse me, children of Judah and the children of Israel be gathered together. Now, remember, in the historical context right now, in the book of Hosea, the children of Israel and the children of Judah were separated from one another. The Northern Kingdom. The Southern Kingdom? Northern kingdom was the kingdom of Israel. I heard you thinking, and the Southern Kingdom was that of Judah. So here is the prophecy. The children of Judah and the children of Israel will be gathered together. Will be gathered together. Okay. It's going to come back together. This is one of the reasons I don't really like to talk about the lost ten tribes. We use that phrase a lot of times. The lost ten tribes, they can't be totally lost, because someday they're going, israel, house of Israel and House of Judah are going to come together, and there are going to be one. So lost, I think, would not be the right word. Scattered would be a good word. The capital was lost, the government was lost, no doubt, but there it is. Now, let me address something here that might be controversial among a few of my friends. I don't think any of you here will kick me out of the synagogue for it, but Israel gathered together today. Is this a prophecy of today, let's say late 18 hundreds? You had the beginning of the Zionist movement. The Zionist movement was all of Jews moving back and having a homeland and Judah and Israel gathered together. Well, in one sense, they are gathered together in Israel. They've had their own nation since 1948, and they have grown immensely since 1948, from about 2 million to about 7 million. Okay, that's immensely maybe, I guess. But in terms of their Judaism, I am not convinced that the regathering of Israel we have seen in the last, I'll say 100 years, the regathering of Israel in the last 100 years is the fulfillment of this prophecy. I have no doubt that this prophecy is going to be fulfilled even in that location. But is this regathering of Israel the same one? My answer is I'll tell you later. I'll tell you later if it's the same one, because I don't know exactly what the course of human events is going to do out there. But I will add one thing. I have read some in the Bible that talks about an Antichrist, and those of you who are in Judea, flee to the mountains, get out of there. And then I've talked about it the last days. They're gathered together as far as the east is from the west, the four corners of the earth. They're gathered, I think that final gathering is actually the one that is talked about here. Now, could this be part of it? Maybe not, but I'm not so sure. I would take the strong approach that says 1948, Israel is a fulfillment of prophecy. Now, at one point I would have done that, but I'm not so sure I would today. And I happen to be glad that the Jewish people have a homeland. I think it's the best thing for the world and for the Jewish people. I think Israel is the best thing for the Middle East that has ever come to the Middle East, and as really the best friend we have in the world, honestly, that's going to stick by us. But all of that, is this really a fulfillment of prophecy? We could argue the point, but definitely the time will come when when is the children of Judah and the children of Israel be gathered together and appoint themselves one head. Now, if you're just curious as to whether the modern state of Israel is the fulfillment of prophecy, how many elections have they had in the last 24 months? I lost count. But they just kept having election over and over again because they couldn't as a nation figure out who they wanted to lead them. Imagine that. So there will come the time when they will appoint themselves one head. Does that sound kind of messianic, that the Jewish people will come and say, you are our Messiah, you're the one? You can tie that in with a number of other scriptures. Unfortunately, we won't take the time to do it tonight. But you can tie that into other scriptures and you see that very clearly. The scripture talks about in harmony in all of the prophets, pretty much in harmony, say in the last days, Israel is going to be regathered. Israel will, to use Zechariah's word, mourn him whom they have pierced. I wonder who that is? And appoint him their leader. As a matter of fact, I think when this happens, when Israel appoints themselves one head as their Messiah, that's when their Messiah returns from the right hand of the Father and comes to be their King, and they his people. And I get that from Matthew, chapter 23, verse 39, where Jesus says, you'll not see me again, you'll not see me henceforth till you say, blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord. When they turn to Jesus and say, you are our one head. You are the one who comes in the name of the Lord. Then he will show up and say, Here I am. So they will be gathered together, they will appoint one head again, very much a picture of the end days. And they shall come up out of the land, for great shall be the day of Jezreel. Now they shall come up out of the land I take that. As they shall come up out of the land that they've been scattered from. It has to do with the regathering here. So they're going to come up out of from all over the earth. They're going to be gathered together. And great shall be the day of Jesriel. Maybe this is talking about the boy Jesreel, but the boy Jesreel really, as we talked about last week, is probably a picture of future Israel, as all three of the children are. Maybe this is talking about, let's see, maybe we should say this is not a proper noun. This actually should be translated like lomi earlier. And if we translate Jesreal, it is how did I put it? Got god plants. Yeah, the L on the end right there, those last two letters, e L. Those are there we go. That l is God. Yesre. Is to plant. Yes, reel god plants. So maybe you should take it. They come up out of the land. Great is the day in which God plants. Maybe you should take that whole thing and say, hey, the harvest is finally going to come. They are literally, literally, I meant that figuratively. As you plant something and then what happens? It comes up out of the land, it comes up out of the ground. They really are going to come back to life. Or come to life and bear fruit. And great shall be the day of Jesria. There's one third possibility. So great shall be the day of Jesria. One is it's talking about the sun and everything he symbolizes. Two is it should be translated and it's talking figuratively about the great harvest that shall come among the Jewish people. The third is that maybe you could take it as the place Jesriel, because we had the place last week also the valley of Jesriel. Remember that? And we talked about how the valley of Jesriel is the same valley that today we call Armageddon, the valley of Armageddon. And so it could be saying, hey, at the battle of Armageddon, great shall be the day. That's when you're going to see the Lord, israel is going to turn to the Lord. So three ways you could take it. My guess is you probably would do best to take it all three ways and then say that way I can't be wrong. Unless we find out it's a fourth way, in which case we're wrong. But let's then move into chapter two, verse one, as it is in our English Bibles, and I have called this on the outline, god's Poetic Condemnation of Israel. That sounds nice, doesn't it? It is a poem. You can't really see it here on this screen. But if you in most of your Bibles, if you look at chapter two, you'll find that it is laid out on the page different than Jose chapter one. Jose chapter one is just block style hosea. Chapter two is let's call it poetic style. And that is helpful when it's laid out on the page that way. I. Think because at least you know it's poetry. And when you know it's poetry, you begin to think in the poetic genre, and you say, okay, there's probably something in here that is going to be symbolic. And probably if I could read Hebrew, I would be able to see some rhythm and some rhyme and some cadence and some balancing out. Roses are red, violets are blue, sugary sweet, I don't know about you. And you get all that cadence, rhyme, balance, symmetry, all the things that come in poetry. You would get that. Now, I think that you would agree with me that poetry communicates more loudly than prose. The reason it communicates more loudly is because it not only has words, but it also has sound and rhythm. It's a full sensory experience to read a poem, right? So here in verse two, chapter two, you get to this poem. It says, Say ye unto your brethren, AMI, and to your sisters ruhama. It's a nice way to start a poem, isn't it? Say ye unto your brethren, AMI. Does anybody remember what AMI means? My people? Here, it's interesting. It doesn't say lo AMI. It says AMI. Remember, the low is the negative not so instead of Say to your brethren, you're not my people, he says, Say to your brethren, my people, and say to your sisters, Ruhama. Do you remember what the sister's name was? Lo. Ruhama. Ruhama is we talked a little bit more about it in session one. You can go back to that. But ruhama is mercy or compassion. Kindness, motherly, tenderness, all that kind of stuff put together. We use the word mercy. So loruhama is no mercy. I'm not going to have mercy on you. So here he begins the poma. Say you to your brethren, my people, and to your sisters Ruhama. But this is not going to be a comforting poem. I'll warn you from that. There's going to be so much more as they plead with their mother. We'll talk about that in just a moment. You know, I think that this word right here is very helpful. Say ye. How many people are included in ye? A bunch, actually. More than one. That's all we can get from you is more than one. It's plural. Ye is a plural word. He doesn't use the singular, which in King James would be say thou? Sayest thou. I believe it would be if I have my suffixes and pronouns right. But he doesn't sayest thou. He says, say ye. That means this is the command to a group. This is one of those areas in which I think, you know, I like the King James for a number of reasons, but this is one of the areas that I would say if you look in any of your modern translations, including the new King James, you can't tell who's supposed to say this because it just says, Say to your brethren. Well, you could in English say to your brethren. I would probably think, oh, he's telling Jes real. Say to your brethren and to your sisters. But Jezreel is one guy, and he's not saying it to Jezreal. He's saying it or might think, well, maybe he's saying it to Hosea. I probably would discount that, because AMI and low AMI and low Rohama were not his brother and sister, that was his children. So I'd probably put hosea out anyway. But maybe it's hosea. Who is this? I think that here, God comes into this word almost to Israel and says, hey, Israel, let's take Jesu as a figure of Israel. And he says, hey, Israel, altogether represented in jazz real. God plants you. I want you to say to your brothers, you're my people, to your sisters, I have mercy. That's how I want to start the prayer now, or the poem here. Now, the problem is, it goes on and it begins to come together and says, hey, AMI Ruhama, you got problems. Verse two. The children then are to plead with your mother. Now, this kind of sounds like Hosea talking, right? Hey, say to your brother AMI, say to your sister Rouhama, plead with your mother. Well, nobody says plead with your mother, really, except, I don't know, your father. Go ask your mother. Plead with your mother. Plead with your mother. Plead for she is not my wife, neither am I her husband. Stop right there. Plead needs to be taken in its Hebrew sense and in the older English, plead actually aligned with this. Today. When you think of the word plead, you might think of what? Begging? Yeah, beg with beg to your mother. Beg. But this Hebrew word does not take the idea of beg. As a matter of fact, if you look up in the Oxford English Dictionary, I know you all have one. If you look up in the Oxford English Dictionary is that real big one that was in the library at school. Remember, if you look up the word plead, the very first definition says contend against. Contend against. Argue against. Basically, as it's used right here, the word means, let's say go up against. Go up against your mother. Now, this is not going to end well in the divorce court, is it? Go up against your mother. Go up against her is what he says. Plead with your mother. On the outline. By the way, I've given you at least one cross reference. You can look, that particular Hebrew word is used, I think, 77 times in the Old Testament. It's very easy to go back and see what it means. And it is very much an argue against or go up against the mother. And so God wants the nation, god's speaking through Hosea, wants the nation, his children to plead with your mother. Plead for. She is not my wife, neither am I her husband. This is like a certificate of divorce coming out as the dad calls the children in and says, let me tell you something, your mother and I are parting ways. And she is wrong. She is dead wrong. She's not my wife. I'm not her husband. Now, the wording of that does speak in such a sense that it is more of a I don't even know my terminology here, fortunately, a rid of divorce than it is a divorce that has been has been settled. So basically, if I can interpret this, and I think I'm doing correctly here, she is not my wife wife, neither am I her husband. That's the intent. That's what God hosea says. This is what's happening. We're ending this thing right here. Let her therefore put away her hordeoms out of her sight and her adulteries from between her breasts. Now, this is you go up and you tell Mama, mama, it is time for you to start acting like a good Christian woman. Dad's going to leave you if you don't change your behavior. So that's the instruction that is given, speaking in very blunt words. In fact, we get a little more blunt when we get into verse three. Lest I strip her naked, and set her as in the day that she was born, and make her as a wilderness, and set her like dry land and slay her with thirst. This is obviously one upset husband, right? And as he comes in here, the threat to Gomer is given out with no holding back whatsoever as he speaks again, so bluntly and again, do you really think this is about Hosea and Gomer? No, this has got to be about God in Israel. And God's saying, hey, we're headed to the divorce court here and if things don't change, here's what's going to happen? And this speaks in real anger. Wouldn't you agree with me on that? That is one angry husband. Can we put it this way? God is not being very Christian. Well, I think we can understand. God can be however God wants to be, right? And so he comes in this, again, poetic manner, and he really does put it so bluntly here, lest I strip her naked. That is used a number of times in the Scripture, always as a picture of judgment. And we can half picture that. I don't know, let's use the term tar and feather. That's the public humiliation kind of thing. But if you go to the Middle East, the public humiliation is to be strip naked, run through the streets. And so it's kind of the same thinking that would go through there and we won't go there. But Ezekiel chapter 16 is an interesting passage to read because it reads much the same, but especially when you get to the end here. Let's see. Set her as in the day that she was born. Okay, well, naked came out into the world, naked I shall return, right? So naked is the day she was born. In Ezekiel 16, the Lord talks about, hey, I found you. And the description there is given. You were a naked baby out in the field that had been left there to die. You had bugs all over you, you were covered with dirt. Everyone was just walking by. Nobody cared about you. And I came and I rescued you and then I raised you. You became a beautiful woman, you became my wife and gives that picture. And now sending her back, make her as a wilderness, set her as a dry land, slay her with thirst is the word that's given. Let's have one more verse and we'll stop right here. And I will not have mercy upon her children, for they be the children of whoredoms. Now here, how does verse four go with verse one? Verse one says, savior brother and my people, you've got mercy by verse four. I'll not have mercy upon her children, for they be the children of whoredoms. They will earlier again, just back up a couple of verses and there it is. Plead with your mother. How do you go from your mother to their mother? Sounds to me like you got different kids. The idea is that Gomer married to Hosea, they have three children, but then Gomer also out and about, has some other children. And this is the condemnation against Gomer's idolatry and all that it produces. So he's not going to cast out to get back down to verse four. I will not have mercy loruhama upon her children, for they be the children of whoredoms. But there I'm talking about someone else because Lordama Ruhama, I will have mercy. I already said that in verse one. And that is like stopping in the midst of a poem. But there's 21 verses to go, so we better stop in the midst of a poem and end it right there. And next week we'll pick up in the middle of this poem verse five. For their mother has played the harlot, she that conceived them shamefully. Again, she that conceived them talking to the children. Verse one, I want you to say to your brother's sister, but here it's them, another set of children. So back to what I said last week. I think hosea represents God. Goma represents faithless. Israel the three children represent a coming prophetic generation of Israel that has really, to this point, not been fulfilled. And then there are other children of faithless Israel that meeting with the same condemnation as their mother to come about this all given allegorically and poetically and becomes interesting stuff. And chapters one, two and three are along these lines. When we get to chapter four, it's going to change a little bit and not speak so allegorically from there on. But we'll change at that. You know, there's a lot of prophets that had some allegorical imagery in their messages. Jeremiah, remember when he made the bread cooked on dung? It was an image. Remember when he made the stone of jerusalem, and he was supposed to this is Ezekiel, I think he made this picture of Jerusalem and he was supposed to throw spitwoods on it all day long. It's a little modernized version, but basically all these pictures that were given. Remember, Isaiah was supposed to run around naked for three years. All sorts of imagery that's given, and I think we've got that here as well. And next time we'll pick up on it. I'll get there eventually, maybe I won't. There we go. We'll start there next week. Let me leave this in order to prayer. Heavenly Father grateful again for your word. This is an intriguing portion of your Word. No doubt that Heavenly Father is obviously prophetic. And we struggle sometimes. Know exactly what the prophecy is and what the symbolism is. And we'll struggle. Hopefully faithfully. To do that with the inside of the word of God. And that as we do that. It would give us some insight even not only into the world today. But into the world that is yet to come as the plan of God comes out and into fruition. For the gathering tonight here. We're grateful and pray that you'd give us safety as we go from here. For those who have joined us online, that you would encourage them as they go about their lives throughout the rest of this week as well. In Jesus name, amen. Sunday, 945. We'll go back to our Hermeneutics class. 1045, we'll go back to Abraham, and we're going to look at Genesis 14, the battle of the Five Kings, the First World War. We'll check it out. God bless you. You are dismissed.