Peter, Are You Serious? Hosea? (1)

In this series, we’re testing Peter’s claim that all the prophets spoke about his days, his generation. According to the inmillennial prophetic model, these were the “last days” of the Mosaic age.¹ In previous posts, we verified that  Moses, Samuel, Obadiah, Joel, Amos, and Jonah did so, following the chronological order Peter (and Jesus) suggested (Acts 3:24; Luke 24:25).

Now we turn to Hosea,² Israel’s “deathbed” prophet. He was the last to finish his prophetic ministry before the northern kingdom “died” at the hands of the Assyrians (about 722 BC). His book is the second longest of the so-called minor prophets, just behind Zechariah. He gives a series of woes against Israel, followed by promises of her future restoration. The New Testament refers to this restoration as “the time of reformation” (Heb 9:10). 

I want to show how Hosea spoke of Peter’s (and Christ’s) generation through three relationships: with his children, his wife, and his nation. In this post, we’ll consider his children.

Hosea’s Children and Judgment

God put Hosea in one of history’s most memorable marriages: “Go, take yourself a wife of harlotry and children of harlotry.” He had a typological reason: “For the land has committed great harlotry by departing from the LORD” (Hos 1:2). Gomer, the harlot-wife, represented Israel’s unfaithfulness to her husband. After their marriage, Hosea would tell her what God had said to His wife: “Return, backsliding Israel … for I am married to you” (Jer 3:12, 14).

God said “the land” had committed adultery. The land, of course, stands for the people who live there. It was holy because the Lord put His name there and dwelled there with His chosen people in a covenant relationship. When the people sinned, the land sinned.

The Scriptures use this harlot-land imagery from beginning to end. When the Lord gave Moses the witness song for Israel’s latter days, He said, “Behold, you will rest with your fathers; and this people will rise and play the harlot with the gods of the foreigners of the land, where they go to be among them, and they will forsake Me and break My covenant which I have made with them” (Deut 31:16; cf. Deut 31:29).

The Apostle John uses this imagery at the close of the Bible. During Israel’s “latter days,” the saints in heaven sang the Song of Moses as God judged Israel and destroyed her temple (Rev 15:3; cf. Matt 24:1–3). An angel uses the same imagery as Hosea: “Come, I will show you the judgment of the great harlot” (Rev 17:1), meaning Jerusalem, who killed God’s prophets in the land (or earth³) (Rev 17:2, 5–6; 18:23–24; cf. Luke 13:33). 

Hosea’s children by Gomer would show God’s coming judgment of His unfaithful wife. The first one was a son named Jezreel, which means “scattered” (Hos 1:4). In the Bible, scattering is a sign of God’s displeasure because people lose the interpersonal relationships that make life enjoyable. They can no longer worship God in a congregation. We will see the reverse of this scattering below.

God describes the timing of this scattering with precision. The dispersion of Israel (i.e., the ten northern tribes) would be “in a little while” (Hos 1:4). God gave this prophecy near the end of Jeroboam’s reign, and within a few years, the Assyrians arrived to take Israel captive. Judah, however, continued for seven more centuries until God scattered them by the Romans.

Hosea’s second child was a daughter named Loruhamah, which means “not having obtained mercy” (Hos 1:6). God again says this near-term removal of mercy would pertain to Israel. He would take them away but says, “I will have mercy on the house of Judah, will save them by the LORD their God, and will not save them by bow, nor by sword or battle, by horses or horsemen” (Hos 1:7). Again, we will glimpse how He would save them below.

The third child was another son named Loammi, meaning “not my people” (Hos 1:9). The consequence is that God would not be their God.  

These three children describe the ultimate relationship between God and “Israel after the flesh” (1 Cor 10:18)—Paul’s name for the nation, as defined in the Mosaic age. They would be scattered from God, without mercy, and, in the ultimate sense, no longer be the people of God. 

These results came for Israel in Hosea’s generation; for Judah, they came in what Peter called “these days” (Acts 3:24).  

Hosea’s Children and Restoration

God would reverse these judgments through Israel as defined in Christ (cf. Rom 2:28–29), a definition that would include people who were not Jews according to the flesh (Hos 1:10–2:1). 

We know this restoration occurred in Peter’s generation because the Apostle Paul quotes Hosea 1:10 to defend God calling the Gentiles into a covenant relationship:

He says also in Hosea: “I will call them My people, who were not My people, and her beloved, who was not beloved. And it shall come to pass in the place where it was said to them, ‘You are not My people,’ there they shall be called sons of the living God.” (Rom 9:25–26)

Hosea said God would reverse the Jezreel scattering curse: “Then the children of Judah and the children of Israel shall be gathered together, and appoint for themselves one head” (Hos 1:11a). In Peter’s day, the true Israel appointed for themselves the Lord Jesus Christ as their Head. Of course, God established Christ as Head (Eph 1:21–22), but we agree with His choice. Unanimously. Not a single dissenting vote!

The Scriptures often refer to this gathering during the messianic age. Jacob said, “The sceptre shall not depart from Judah, nor a lawgiver from between his feet, until Shiloh come; and unto him shall the gathering of the people be” (Gen 49:10). Jesus said the gathering would happen after the temple’s fall (Matt 24:31). Paul encouraged the churches based on it (2 Thess 2:1).

The gathering would include Israel coming “up out of the land” (Hos 1:11b). Israel after the flesh had polluted the land. Israel after the Spirit would live in a better environment. John Gill says “out of the land” means

out of their earthly state, from the graves of sin, leaving their earthly affections, and becoming spiritual and heavenly-minded; willing to quit all that is dear unto them, even the country in which they were born and long lived, to follow Christ their Head and King.⁴

In the messianic-age restoration in which we live, Loammi has become Ammi: every person in Christ belongs to the people of God. Loruhamah has become Ruhamah: God has shown mercy by glorifying His people through their Lord and Savior (Hos 2:1; cf. Rom 8:28–29).

Conclusion

Hosea spoke about Peter’s generation in multiple ways. His wife and children were types or pictures of God’s judgment of Israel after the flesh. Through inverse typology, they also showed how God would ultimately bless His people through Christ. 

In addition, the prophet spoke in explicit terms. God would gather the Gentiles into His people. This people, both Jew and Gentile, would be under one Head in a land far better than the one Israel after the flesh had polluted.

1. Please consider becoming familiar with the inmillennial view of prophecy. You can read a summary version here or tackle the full book-length version here. The title of the book—Inmillennialism: Redefining the Last Days—hints at the reason for my suggestion. This model says the “last days” are identical to Peter’s “these days”; both terms refer to the “last days” of the Mosaic age. This perspective will shed light on the prophets as we work through them.
   Also, consider watching the sermon I preached related to this material at Hopewell Primitive Baptist Church in Opelika, AL, on July 23, 2023. You can watch it here.
2. The image in this post is Profeta Osea by Moretto (ca.1521–24). It is in the public domain.
3. The Greek and Hebrew words can mean either land or earth.
4. John Gill, An Exposition of the Old and New Testaments, 9 vols. (1809–10; repr., Paris, AR: The Baptist Standard Bearer, 1989), 6:380.