How shall I give thee up, Ephraim?
God’s feeling in the face of man’s obstinacy
Many have been the ways adopted by God to communicate His thoughts and reveal His will to the human race. But in all, Divine truths were always represented in a manner most adapted to the constitution of the human mind. Three things suggested by the passage.
I. Man is able to resist God in the dispensations of his mercy. The supposition that man is governed by some Divine fate, that he is a passive being, destitute of a capacity to act in any way besides in accordance with the Divine will, has arisen partly from three sources.
1. Unacquaintance with the nature of the human will Man is so constituted as to be able to exercise authority not only over his own feelings, actions, and character, but also over the heart itself; he can regulate his disposition, so as to turn his whole soul to be a sanctuary to particular objects. Three reasons for this view.
(1) Mankind in general believe that they are free--at liberty to choose any course of action they please.
(2) Our own consciousness. We are conscious that our actual volitions are such and only such as we please to put forth.
(3) Our moral nature implies the same truth.
2. Unacquaintance with God’s moral government--confounding the natural with the moral. God does not rule man with an irresistible force, but with motives of gentleness and love.
3. Misinterpretation of some particular portions of the Word of God.
II. That man’s resistance renders it necessary, on God’s part, to give him up.
1. The most applicable means is insufficient for recovering him.
2. The only means is insufficient to recover him.
III. There is an infinite, compassionate reluctance on God’s part to give up man.
1. The relation that exists between God and man renders Him reluctant to give him up. One is a father, the other is a child.
2. God’s knowledge of man renders Him reluctant to give him up.
3. God’s dealings towards man prove that He is infinite in mercy, reluctant to give him up. The most illustrious display of Divine mercy was the sending of God’s only begotten Son into the world. This mercy was displayed also in sending the Holy Spirit. Then if God feels so intensely for those who are strangers and aliens from Him, ought not the same compassionate feeling to characterise His Church universally? And if we are free agents, having control over our dispositions and actions, or endowed with capacity to choose the right and reject the wrong; and if we are the objects of Divine pity, is it not our most incumbent duty to pity ourselves by receiving God’s mercy, and obeying His commandments? (J. A. Morris.)
Justice and mercy in the heart of God
The Bible is pre-eminently an anthropomorphetic book. That is, it represents God through man’s emotions, modes of thought and actions. It is in the character of a father that these verses present Him to our notice. No human character can give a full or perfect revelation of Him. Yet it is only through human love, human faithfulness, human justice, that we can gain any conception of the love, faithfulness, and justice of the Eternal.
I. Mercy and justice as co-existing in the heart of the eternal. To give up to ruin, to deliver to destruction is the demand of justice. “Mine heart is turned within Me, My repentings are kindled together.” This is the voice of mercy. What is justice? It is that sentiment which demands that every one should have his due. What is mercy? A disposition to overlook injuries and to treat things better than they deserve. These two must never be regarded as elements essential]y distinct, they are branches from the same root, streams from the same fountain. Both are but modifications of love. Justice is but love standing up sternly against the wrong, mercy is but love bending in tenderness over the helpless and the suffering. In the heart of God this love assumes two phases or manifestations.
1. Material nature shows that there is the stern and mild in God.
2. Providence shows that there is the stern and the mild in God. The heavy afflictions that befall nations, families, and individuals, reveal His sternness; the health and the joy that gladden life reveal His mercy.
3. The spiritual constitution of man shows that there is the stern and the mild in God. In the human soul there is an instinct to revenge the wrong, often stern, inexorable, and heartless. There is also an instinct of tenderness and compassion. These came from the great Father.
II. Mercy and justice as excited by man in the heart of the Father.
1. The moral wickedness of Ephraim evoked His justice. Human wickedness is always stirring, so to say, the justice of the Infinite heart.
2. The filial suffering of Ephraim evoked His mercy. God calls Ephraim His son, and Ephraim was in suffering, and hence His compassion was turned.
III. Mercy struggling against justice in the heart of the Great Father. Even as the human father finds a struggle between what justice requires, and mercy pleads for, in dealing with his wilful son.
IV. Mercy triumphing over justice in the heart of the Great Father.
1. Mercy has so triumphed in the perpetuation of the race.
2. In the experience of every living man.
3. In the redemptive mission of Christ.
How comes it to pass that mercy thus triumphs? Here is the answer: “For I am God, and not man.” (Homilist.)
Divine forbearance towards sinners
The long-suffering of God, His patience toward sinners, His unwillingness to punish, His readiness to pardon, form conspicuous parts of the Divine character, as set forth to our view in the sacred writings. The text describes a strong and tender struggle in the mind of God between the opposite and contending claims of justice and mercy: and in the end represents the latter as prevailing, mercy rejoicing against judgment. We are not indeed to suppose that a struggle ever really takes place in the Divine Mind. He does but speak to us after the manner of men. Ephraim had done everything to provoke the Lord to anger. Forgetful of all that He had wrought for them, and of all which they owed to Him, they had left His service, renounced His worship, and had given themselves up to the most shameful idolatries. Mercies and judgments had been employed to reclaim them, but in vain. And now, what could be expected but that they should be dealt with according to their deserts? But no--such is the sovereignty of Divine mercy, that instead God says, “How shall I give thee up, Ephraim?” Attend--
1. To the debate which is represented between justice and mercy.
2. The determination of the debate. After a long struggle mercy prevails.
3. The ground and reason of this determination: “For I am God, and not man.” He who is God, and not man, alone could overcome the difficulty.
Draw some profitable reflections.
1. How exactly does the view here given of the Divine mercy and forbearance, in this particular instance, agree with the general representations of them in Scripture. Illustrate times before Flood. Israel in wilderness. The spiritual redemption of man.
2. How greatly do these views increase and aggravate the sinfulness of sin. Sin is rebellion against a just and rightful Sovereign. It is robbery committed against a good and a gracious Master. It is ingratitude to a most kind and bountiful Friend and Benefactor. Sin is despite done to the richest mercy and tenderest compassion. If God were not so very merciful, sin would not be so exceeding sinful. How great must be the guilt of those who disregard the mercy offered in the Gospel I
3. What great encouragement does the subject give to every humbled and penitent sinner! Such are apt to be full of doubts and fears. They cry for mercy, but cannot believe that they shall find it. Was God so unwilling to give up even penitent Ephraim? And will He be unwilling to receive and pardon penitent offenders? Surely He feels for you the tenderest pity. He will meet you with loving-kindness. (E. Cooper.)
The Holy One
The holiness of God is at once a ground why He punishes iniquity, and yet does not punish to the full extent of the sin. Truth and faithfulness are part of the holiness of God. He will keep His covenant. But the unholy cannot profit by the promises of the All-Holy. (E. B. Pusey, D. D.)
How shall I give thee up, Ephraim
There is nothing more inspiring in human history than the long, hard struggle of the Lord against the proclivities of the Jewish people. How this struggle of evil against God arose, what are the conditions of the Divine and the creature nature which render it possible, and render it possible that it should be prolonged, we may never be able to settle. But the fact of the struggle is clear as the sunlight. We are resisting God’s will; we make life a ceaseless struggle against His will. God has created free men; all the burden of their activity, all the possibilities of their development He accepted ill the hour in which He created them free. He parted as it were with a power, a power to rule all things by His decree. A free spirit cannot be ruled by a decree. There is a new sphere of existence created, in which God’s Spirit, in communion with free spirits, alone has power to sustain His sway. And this Spirit may be grieved, wounded, resisted even unto death. “Ephraim is joined to idols: let him alone,” may proclaim that the resources of the Divine patience and love are exhausted. And yet, was that sentence final? Certainly, in Hosea’s time, Divine patience was not exhausted. Is it even exhausted yet? The answer is found by considering, with some fulness of detail, the history of the long-suffering of God with His ancient Church. (Baldwin Brown, B. A.)
God’s dealing with sin and sinners
It is important that we acquire and cherish right views of the character of God, and the modes of His dealing with the children of men. We cannot fully comprehend the Divine Being. It may happen that the aspect which is most attractive is just that which we most fail to see. Revelation makes known to us that He is not regardless and indifferent to what takes place on earth, and not unmindful of the welfare of the beings His hands have made. He is the Father of our spirits. We read of God as a God of justice, and we are in danger of thinking of justice as unallied with and untempered by mercy. But He is also merciful. He delighteth in mercy. The aspect of God, brought before us in this text, is that of God reluctant to inflict deserved punishment, suffering deep, disquietude and longing because of the waywardness and sinfulness of men. Man s alienation and rebellion causes grief and regret to God.
I. God’s back wardness to punish sin. The very strength of God’s love for His creatures kindles His indignation against that which works their ruin, whilst regard for His own character and government necessitates the punishment of the ungodly and impenitent. One great difference between God’s anger and man’s is this,--whilst man’s anger is soon kindled, God is “slow to anger, and of great mercy.”
II. God’s yearning disquiet for the salvation of men. Of this the words of the text are an earnest expression. (Joseph Shillito.)
God unwilling to abandon the sinner
The making of His creatures happy, according to their capacities of happiness, is highly pleasing to God. The Divine nature is all love and benignity. The sun and light may be as soon separated as God and goodness, the Deity and loving-kindness. If He withdraws His favour from any people, it is all along of themselves, not the least defect of goodness in Him. It is wholly owing to their rendering themselves unmeet to be any longer partakers of His grace and favour. God is always inclined to do good to His creatures, but He is often under the necessity of being very severe. Still, He ever designeth a general good in the judgments He executeth. Men’s learning of righteousness is God’s designs in His judgments. Then God inflicts His judgments, not out of free choice, but from constraint, and with a kind of unwilling willingness. In the text we see that, highly as they had incensed the great God against them, He nevertheless makes good, when one would least expect He would, that saying of the son of Sirach, “As is His majesty, so is His mercy.” In the text He seems to say, “How can I find in My heart to be as bad as My word in executing such fearful threatenings?” Nothing less than apparent necessity can prevail with the infinitely good God to make His creatures miserable; and this further appears by the following considerations.
1. God’s earnest and most pathetical exciting of sinners to turn and repent, that iniquity may not be their ruin, is of itself sufficient to assure us hereof.
2. ‘Tis God’s ordinary method to give warning to sinners before He strikes. He wants reformation and repentance to stay His hand and prevent the blow. Illustrate by the warning of Noah’s ark, and the warnings sent by the prophets, etc. Signs of the times are God’s warnings nowadays.
3. It is God’s usual course to try a wicked people with lighter judgments first, before He brings the heaviest upon them.
4. When God determined to pour down the vials of His vengeance upon a wicked people, He sometimes plainly intimated that He did it not, until their wickedness was come up to such a height as did necessarily call for them.
5. It is likewise apparent that God Almighty is most backward to the destroying of a wicked people, or putting them into miserable circumstances until necessitated, in that He hath again and again declared His being diverted from so doing by such motives as one would think could have but very little influence upon such a Being as He is, or rather none at all. The following are some of these motives.
(1) A mere partial humiliation, one far short of true repentance, as in the case of Ahab and Rehoboam.
(2) The prayers of a few good people. As in Moses’ intercessions.
(3) The advantages taken by God’s enemies from His destruction of His people (Deuteronomy 32:27). Learn from this what strange folly, or even desperate madness, doth lodge in the hearts of sinful men. Will sinners still persevere in this their madness? (E. Fowler, D. D.)
The Gospel in Hosea
Hosea appears again and again to contradict himself. In one line he is denouncing a ruinous and final doom; in the next, with a voice that breaks with tenderness, he is promising a day of golden restoration. Does it not sound like a feeble absurdity to say that both sets of declarations can be fulfilled? Yet fulfilled in some ideal way I believe they are. Surely the prophet recognised that there were positive contradictions in life,--life and death, light and darkness, blessing and’ cursing, the flame of wrath and the dew of blessing; and leaving these contradictions as he found them, he yet believed that God is a God of love, that mercy shall somehow or somewhere triumph over justice, that God will smite sin, and yet will spare. Hosea’s was a real and not a sham message, and it was a message full of comfort; and still more full of comfort was the reason, “for I am God, and not man.” The deepest consolation of life lies in this, God and not man is the judge. God is the Father of the prodigal. Christ was the friend of publicans and sinners; and in the revelation of God throughout all the Scripture, as in the words of Christ, we find always side by side with the awful certainty of retribution, the unquenchable beams of love and hope. But Hosea had learned his lesson, as so many are forced to learn it, in sorrow and anguish. He tells us his secret in the first three Chapter s. These explain the varying of emotions in almost every verse of the prophecy; and they also explaln why this prophet seems to see more deeply than all others into the heart of the love of God. The sorrows of life come to us all though they seem to come in different measure; but the point for us to observe is how differently they affect the wise and the foolish The holy submissiveness of Hosea’s life taught him the one great lesson without which he would never have become a prophet at all. This lesson, -- If the love of man, the love of a husband for a wife, of a father for his child can be so deep, how unfathomable, how eternal must be the love of God! To what sunless depths, to what unfathomed caverns can the ray of that light penetrate I In this is a message of hope for individual souls. (Dean Farrar.)
Moderation in Divine judgments
1. God’s mercy interposing on the behalf of sinners doth produce not only good wishes but real effects to them.
2. God’s mercy towards His sinful people, doth not see it fit to keep off all effects of His displeasure, or leave them altogether unpunished.
3. When a sinful people are under saddest temporal judgments, yet so long as they are in the land of the living, they are bound to reckon that their condition might have been worse if all God’s just displeasure were let out.
4. The Lord’s moderating of deserved judgments, if it were but to preserve a people from being utterly consumed, is a great proof of God’s mercy, and ought to be acknowledged as such.
5. It is the great mercy and advantage of the Lord’s sinful people that they have to do with God, not with man, in their miscarriages. (George Hutcheson.)
A father’s solicitude for the erring
A number of years ago, before any railway came into Chicago, they used to bring in the grain from the Western prairies in waggons for hundreds of miles, so as to have it shipped off by the lakes. There was a father who had a large farm out there, and who used to preach the Gospel as well as attend to his farm. One day, when church business engaged him, he sent his son to Chicago with grain. He waited and waited for his boy to return, but he did not come home. At last he could wait no longer, so he saddled his horse and rode to the place where his son had sold the grain. He found that he had been there and got the money for the grain. Then he began to fear that his boy had been murdered and robbed. At last, with the aid of a detective, he tracked him to a gambling den, where he found that he had gambled away the whole of his money. In hopes of winning it back again he had then sold the team and lost that money too. He had fallen among thieves, and, like the man who was going to Jericho, they stripped him, and then cared no more about him. What could he do? He was ashamed to go home and meet his father, and he fled. The father knew what it all meant. He knew that the boy thought he would be very angry with him. He was grieved to think that his boy should have such feelings toward him. That is just exactly like the sinner. He thinks, because he has sinned, God will have nothing to do with him. But what did that father do? Did he say, “Let the boy go”? No; he went after him. He arranged his business, and started after the boy. He went from town to town, from city to city. He would get the ministers to let him preach, and at the close he would tell his story. “I have got a boy who is a wanderer on the face of the earth somewhere.” He would describe his boy, and say: “If you ever hear of him, or see him, will you not write to me?” At last he found that he had gone to California, thousands of miles away. Did that father even then say, “Let him go”? No; off he went to the Pacific coast, seeking his boy. He went to San Francisco, and advertised in the newspapers that he would preach at such a church on such a day. When he had preached he told his story, in the hope that the boy might have seen the advertisement, and come to the church. When he had done, away under the gallery there was a young man, who waited until the audience had gone out; then he came towards the pulpit. The father looked, and saw it was his son, and he ran to him, and pressed him to his bosom. The boy wanted to confess what he had done, but not a word would the father hear. He forgave him freely, and took him to his home once more. Oh, prodigal, you may be wandering on the dark mountains of sin, but God wants you to come home! The devil has been telling you lies about God; you think He will not receive you back. I tell you He will welcome you this minute if you will come. Say “I will arise, and go to my Father.” There is not one whom Jesus has not sought far longer than that father. There has not been a day since you left Him but tie has followed you. I do not care what the past has been, or how black your life, He will receive you back. Arise, then, O backslider, and come home once more to your Father’s house. (D. L. Moody.)