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Summary

Hosea 10:1–4 – Empty vine and false oaths

What happens: Israel is a luxuriant vine that multiplies fruit, but the more they prosper, the more they build altars. Their heart is divided, so they face guilt. God will break down their altars. Their words are empty, and their covenants are lies; judgment springs up like poisonous weeds.

What it means: Prosperity tests loyalty to God. A divided heart cannot sustain true worship or truth telling. God’s justice pulls up deceit by the roots.

Hosea 10:5–8 – Calf shame and ruined high places

What happens: The people fear for the calf of Beth-aven, and its priests mourn when it is carried away to Assyria. The king and the people are ashamed. High places are destroyed, thorns cover their altars, and they cry to mountains and hills to cover them.

What it means: What we worship will either save us or shame us. God exposes false gods and false hopes. Collapse of idols shows that only the Lord is worthy.

Hosea 10:9–10 – Gibeah remembered, discipline gathered

What happens: Israel persists in sin from the days of Gibeah. God declares He will bind them for their double guilt and gather nations against them for discipline.

What it means: Unrepented history does not fade with time. God is righteous and uses even nations to correct His people. He aims to end entrenched evil.

Hosea 10:11–12 – Call to sow righteousness

What happens: God speaks of Ephraim under the yoke and Judah plowing. He calls them to sow righteousness, reap steadfast love, and break up fallow ground. It is time to seek the Lord until He comes and rains righteousness.

What it means: Repentance is active, not passive. God invites return through obedience and promises refreshing grace. The holy God loves to send life when people seek Him.

Hosea 10:13–15 – Harvest of iniquity and the fall of the king

What happens: They have plowed wickedness and reaped injustice. They trusted in their own way and in many warriors. A storm shatters their strongholds; as at Beth-arbel, terror strikes. The king of Israel perishes at dawn.

What it means: Self-reliance reaps ruin. God’s justice breaks proud defenses. Human power cannot stand against the Lord who judges sin.

Application

  • Use seasons of success to deepen obedience, not to build new idols.
  • Break up hard places in your heart and seek the Lord now.
  • Replace self-reliance with trust and prayerful action.
  • Expect God to send renewing rain when you sow righteousness.

Bible

1Israel is an empty vine, he bringeth forth fruit unto himself: according to the multitude of his fruit he hath increased the altars; according to the goodness of his land they have made goodly images.

2Their heart is divided; now shall they be found faulty: he shall break down their altars, he shall spoil their images.

3For now they shall say, We have no king, because we feared not the LORD; what then should a king do to us?

4They have spoken words, swearing falsely in making a covenant: thus judgment springeth up as hemlock in the furrows of the field.

5The inhabitants of Samaria shall fear because of the calves of Bethaven: for the people thereof shall mourn over it, and the priests thereof that rejoiced on it, for the glory thereof, because it is departed from it.

6It shall be also carried unto Assyria for a present to king Jareb: Ephraim shall receive shame, and Israel shall be ashamed of his own counsel.

7As for Samaria, her king is cut off as the foam upon the water.

8The high places also of Aven, the sin of Israel, shall be destroyed: the thorn and the thistle shall come up on their altars; and they shall say to the mountains, Cover us; and to the hills, Fall on us.

9O Israel, thou hast sinned from the days of Gibeah: there they stood: the battle in Gibeah against the children of iniquity did not overtake them.

10It is in my desire that I should chastise them; and the people shall be gathered against them, when they shall bind themselves in their two furrows.

11And Ephraim is as an heifer that is taught, and loveth to tread out the corn; but I passed over upon her fair neck: I will make Ephraim to ride; Judah shall plow, and Jacob shall break his clods.

12Sow to yourselves in righteousness, reap in mercy; break up your fallow ground: for it is time to seek the LORD, till he come and rain righteousness upon you.

13Ye have plowed wickedness, ye have reaped iniquity; ye have eaten the fruit of lies: because thou didst trust in thy way, in the multitude of thy mighty men.

14Therefore shall a tumult arise among thy people, and all thy fortresses shall be spoiled, as Shalman spoiled Betharbel in the day of battle: the mother was dashed in pieces upon her children.

15So shall Bethel do unto you because of your great wickedness: in a morning shall the king of Israel utterly be cut off.

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