CRITICAL NOTES.
Hosea 11:12. Ephraim] is charged with lying and deceit again. Jud. ruleth] not without God, as Ephraim, but by a legitimate succession of kings and priests, and was outwardly faithful by maintaining the worship of God. Saints] The priests and Levites, fathers and prophets, who kept the worship of God pure and holy: others, with God, the Most Holy One. God will never be without witnesses in the direst age and the darkest nation.
THE TRUE AND THE FALSE WORSHIPPER.—Hosea 11:12
The prophet makes another charge against Israel. Lying and deceit are applied to their idolatrous worship and hypocritical pretences. Ephraim compassed, surrounded God with lies; but Judah maintained the worship of God, and walked after the example of godly priests and forefathers. The words distinguish the true from the false worshipper.
I. The false worshipper. He draws near to God with his people, and honours God with the lip, but his worship is all pretence and hypocrisy.
1. He lies to God in worship. Israel lied in setting up and honouring the golden calves. All their prayers, repentance, and sacrifices were lies. When the heart is not right with God, when worship is mere formality and custom, then all prayers, offerings, and professions are lies and deceit. All half-heartedness and unbelief, all counterfeits in religion, are falsehoods to besiege God and deceive men.
2. He lies to God in daily life. He surrounds God in manifold, not isolated acts. Lying is a general custom with him. He keeps up religious forms and assumptions, lives a moral life outwardly, and “fills up some radical defect with some shallow pretence.” But he professes and does not practise; has the form without the power of godliness; and “seems a saint, when most he plays the devil.” All his life is a disguise. He is darkness disguised in garments of light; the devil’s servant dressed in Christ’s livery; falsehood practised “under saintly show.” Thus men worship God in lies, transact business and deceive their fellow-men with fair promises and pretences.
O hypocrite, thy boldness strikes at heaven,
And makes its fervid saints appear impostors.
II. The true worshipper.
1. He is acceptable to God. God looks for attachment and fidelity in his people. He is their true and rightful Lord, and will bless all who honour him. Some are accused by conscience, and condemned by God for deceit and hypocrisy; others are commended and blessed in their approaches to him. Their prayers are heard, their gifts accepted, and their sacrifices are well-pleasing to God.
2. He walks in the steps of good men. Judah was “faithful with the saints.” If we take the margin, he was faithful with God, the Holy One; far from false and fraudulent dealings by which Ephraim circumvented God. Or take saints as describing the priests and Levites, the fathers and prophets, who handed down and defended the pure worship of God. They did not set at nought, but followed good examples. We should be loyal to the kings and faithful to the priests whom God has appointed to rule over us. We should hold to the principles and walk in the steps of God’s people, the good old way in which our forefathers walked before us. “Whose faith follow, considering the end of their conversation.”
3. He is dignified by ruling with God. “Judah yet ruleth with God.” Obedience to God’s people is co-operation with God’s work. Ephraim sought to rule without God, and cast off the worship of God. But to submit to God is to conquer; to serve God is to reign over sin and the world, the flesh and the devil. In persevering prayer we have power with God; in holy, consistent life we prevail with men; and in God’s service we have true liberty, real dignity, and everlasting dominion. “The saints of the Most High shall take the kingdom, and possess the kingdom for ever, even for ever and ever.”
ILLUSTRATIONS TO CHAPTER 11
Hosea 11:12. The hypocrite.
His virtues being overdone, his face
Too grave, his prayers too long, his charities
Too pompously attended, and his speech
Larded too frequently, and out of time,
With serious phraseology—were rents
That in his garments opened in spite of him,
Through which the well-accustomed eye could see
The rottenness of his heart [Pollok].