H
O S E A
CHAP. VII.
In
this chapter we have, I. A general charge drawn up against
Israel
for those high crimes and misdemeanours by
which they had obstructed the course of God's favours to them, ver. 1, 2. II.
A particular accusation, 1. Of the court--the king, princes, and judges, ver.
3-7. 2. Of the country. Ephraim is here charged with conforming to the nations
(ver. 8), senselessness and stupidity under the judgments of God (ver. 9-11),
ingratitude to God for his mercies (ver. 13), incorrigibleness under his
judgments (ver. 14), contempt of God (ver. 15), and hypocrisy in their
pretences to return to him, ver. 16. They are also threatened with a severe
chastisement, which shall humble them (ver. 12), and, if that prevail not,
then with an utter destruction (ver. 13), particularly their princes, ver. 16.
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Charge
Drawn up against Israel; The Crimes of the Princes.
B. C. 750.
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1 When I would have healed Israel, then the
iniquity of Ephraim was discovered, and the wickedness of Samaria: for they
commit falsehood; and the thief cometh in, and the troop of robbers
spoileth without. 2 And they consider not in their hearts that
I remember all their wickedness: now their own doings have beset them about;
they are before my face. 3 They make the king glad with their
wickedness, and the princes with their lies. 4 They are all
adulterers, as an oven heated by the baker, who ceaseth from raising
after he hath kneaded the dough, until it be leavened. 5 In the
day of our king the princes have made him sick with bottles of wine; he
stretched out his hand with scorners. 6 For they have made ready
their heart like an oven, whiles they lie in wait: their baker sleepeth all
the night; in the morning it burneth as a flaming fire. 7 They are
all hot as an oven, and have devoured their judges; all their kings are
fallen: there is none among them that calleth unto me.
Some take away the last words of the foregoing chapter, and make them the
beginning of this: "When I returned, or would have returned,
the captivity of my people, when I was about to come towards them in ways
of mercy, even when I would have healed Israel, then the iniquity of
Ephraim (the country and common people) was discovered, and the
wickedness of Samaria, the court and the chief city." Now, in these
verses, we may observe,
I. A general idea given of the present state of Israel, v. 1, 2. See
how the case now stood with them.
1. God graciously designed to do well for them: I would have healed Israel.
Israel were sick and wounded; their disease was dangerous and malignant, and
likely to be fatal, Isa. i. 6. But God offered to be their physician, to
undertake the cure, and there was balm in Gilead sufficient to recover the
health of the daughter of his people; their case was bad, but it was not
desperate, nay, it was hopeful, when God would have healed Israel. (1.)
He would have reformed them, would have separated between them and their sins,
would have purged out the corruptions that were among them, by his laws and
prophets. (2.) He would have delivered them out of their troubles, and
restored to them their peace and prosperity. Several healing attempts were
made, and their declining state seemed sometimes to be in a hopeful way of
recovery; but their own folly put them back again. Note, If sinful miserable
souls be not healed and helped, but perish in their sin and misery, they
cannot lay the blame on God, for he both could and would have healed them;
he offered to take the ruin under his hand. And there are some special seasons
when God manifests his readiness to heal a distempered church and nation, now
and then a hopeful crisis, which, if carefully watched and improved, might,
even when the case is very bad, turn the scale for life and health.
2. They stood in their own light and put a bar in their own door. When God would
have healed them, when they bade fair for reformation and peace, then
their iniquity was discovered and their wickedness, which
stopped that current of God's favours, and undid all again. (1.) Then,
when their case came to be examined and enquired into, in order to their cure,
that wickedness which had been concealed and palliated was found out;
not that it was ever hid from God, but he speaks after the manner of men; as a
surgeon, when he probes a wound in order to the cure of it and finds that it
touches the vitals and is incurable, goes no further in his endeavour to cure
it, so, when God came down to see the case of Israel (as the expression
is, Gen. xviii. 21), with kind intentions towards them, he found their
wickedness so very flagrant, and them so hardened in it, so impudent and
impenitent, that he could not in honour show them the favour he designed them.
Note, Sinners are not healed because they would not be healed. Christ would
have gathered them, and they would not. (2.) Then, when some
endeavours were used to reform and reclaim them, that wickedness which had
been restrained and kept under broke out; and from God's steps towards
the healing of them they took occasion to be so much the more provoking. When
endeavours were used to reform them vice grew more impetuous, more outrageous,
and swelled so much the higher, as a stream when it is damned up. When they
began to prosper they grew more proud, wanton, and secure, and so stopped the
progress of their cure. Note, It is sin that turns away good things from us
when they are coming towards us; and it is the folly and ruin of multitudes
that, when God would do well for them, they do ill for themselves. And what
was it that did them this mischief? In one word, they commit falsehood;
they worship idols (so some), defraud one another (so others), or, rather,
they dissemble with God in their professions of repentance and regard to him.
They say that they are desirous to be healed by him, and, in order to that,
willing to be ruled by him; but they lie unto him with their mouth and
flatter him with their tongue.
3. A practical disbelief of God's omniscience and government was at the bottom
of all their wickedness (v. 2): "They consider not in their
hearts, they never say it to their own hearts, never think of this, that
I remember all their wickedness." As if God could not see it, though
he is all eye, or did not heed it, though his name is Jealous, or had
forgotten it, though he is an eternal mind that can never be unmindful, or
would not reckon for it, though he is the Judge of heaven and earth.
This is the sinner's atheism; as good say that there is no God as say
that he is either ignorant or forgetful, that there is none that judges in
the earth as that he remembers not the things he is to give judgment upon.
It is a high affront they put upon God; it is a damning cheat they put upon
themselves; they say, The Lord shall not see, Ps. xciv. 7. They cannot
but know that God remembers all their works; they have been told it
many a time; nay, if you ask them, they cannot but own it, and yet they do not
consider it; they do not think of it when they should, and with
application to themselves and their own works, else they would not, they durst
not, do as they do. But the time will come when those who thus deceive
themselves shall be undeceived: "Now their own doings have beset them
about, that is, they have come at length to such a pitch of wickedness
that their sins appear on every side of them; all their neighbours see how bad
they are, and can they think that God does not see it?" Or, rather,
"The punishment of their doings besets them about; they are surrounded
and embarrassed with troubles, so that they cannot get out, by which it
appears that the sins they smart for are before my face, not only that
I have seen them, but that I am displeased at them;" for, till God by
pardoning our sins has cast them behind his back, they are still before his
face. Note, Sooner or later, God will convince those who do not now consider
it that he remembers all their works.
4. God had begun to contend with them by his judgments, in earnest of what was
further coming: The thief comes in, and the troop of robbers spoils
without. Some take this as an instance of their wickedness, that they
robbed and spoiled one another. Nec hospes ab hospite tutus--The host and
the guest stand in fear of each other. It seems rather to be a punishment
of their sin; they were infested with secret thieves among themselves, that
robbed their houses and shops and picked their pockets, and troops of
robbers, foreign invaders, that with open violence spoiled abroad;
so far was Israel from being healed that they had fresh wounds given them
daily by robbers and spoilers; and all this the effect of sin, all to punish
them for robbing God, Isa. xlii. 24; Mal. iii. 8, 11.
II. A particular account of the sins of the court, of the king and princes,
and those about them, and the tokens of God's displeasure that they were under
for them.
1. Their king and princes were pleased with the wickedness and profaneness of
their subjects, who were emboldened thereby to be so much them ore wicked (v.
3): They make the king and princes glad with their wickedness. It
pleased them to see the people conform to their wicked laws and examples, in
the worship of their idols, and other instances of impiety and immorality, and
to hear them flatter and applaud them in their wicked ways. When Herod saw
that his wickedness pleased the people he proceeded further in it, much more
will the people do so when they see that it pleases the prince, Acts xii. 3.
Particularly, they made them glad with their lies, with the lying
praises with which they crowned the favourites of the prince and the lying
calumnies and censures with which they blackened those whom they knew the
princes had a dislike to. Those who show themselves pleased with slanders and
ill-natured stories shall never want those about them who will fill their ears
with such stories. Prov. xxix. 12, If a ruler hearken to lies, all his
servants are wicked, and will make him glad with their lies.
2. Drunkenness and revelling abound much at the court, v. 5. The day
of our king was a merry day with them, either his birth-day or his
inauguration-day, of which it is probable that they had an anniversary
observation, or perhaps it was some holiday of his appointing, which was
therefore called his day; on that day the princes met to drink the
king's health, and got him among them, to be merry, and made him sick with
bottles of wine. It should seem the king did not ordinarily drink to
excess, but he was not upon a high day brought to it by the artifices of the
princes, tempted by the goodness of the wine, the gaiety of the company, or
the healths they urged; and so little was he used to it that it made him
sick; and it is justly charged as a crime, as crimen læsæ
majestatis--treason, upon those who thus imposed upon him and made him
sick; nor would it serve for an excuse that it was the day of their
king, but was rather an aggravation of the crime, that, whey they
pretended to do him honour, they dishonoured him to the highest degree. If it
is a great affront and injury to a common person to make him drunk, and there
is a woe to those that do it (Hab. ii. 15), much more to a crowned head; for
the greater any man's dignity is the greater disgrace it is to him to be
drunk. It is not for kings, O Lemuel! it is not for kings, to drink wine,
Prov. xxxi. 4, 5. See what a prejudice the sin of drunkenness is to a man, to
a king. (1.) In his health; it made him sick. It is a force upon
nature; and strange it is by what charms men, otherwise rational enough, can
be drawn to that which besides the offence it gives to God, and the damage it
does to their spiritual and eternal welfare, is a present disorder and
distemper to their own bodies. (2.) In his honour; for, when he was thus
intoxicated, he stretched out his hand with scorners; then he that was
entrusted with the government of a kingdom lost the government of himself, and
so far forgot, [1.] The dignity of a king that he made himself familiar with
players and buffoons, and those whose company was a scandal. [2.] The duty of
a king that he joined in confederacy with atheists, and the profane scoffers
at religion, whom he ought to have silenced and put to shame; he sat in the
seat of the scornful, of those that had arrived at the highest pitch of
impiety; he struck in with them, said as they said, did as they did, and
exerted his power, and stretched forth the hand of his government, in
concurrence with them. Goodness and good men are often made the song of the
drunkards (Ps. lxix. 12; xxxv. 16); but woe unto thee, O land! when
thy king is such a child as to stretch forth his hand with those
that make them so, Eccl. x. 16.
3. Adultery and uncleanness prevailed much among the courtiers. This is spoken
of v. 4, 6, 7, and the charge of drunkenness comes in in the midst of
this article; for wine is oil to the fire of lust, Prov. xxiii. 33. Those that
are inflamed with fleshly lusts, that are adulterers (v. 4), are
here again and again compared to an oven heated by the baker (v. 4): They
have made ready their heart like an oven (v. 6); they are all
hot as an oven, v. 7. Note, (1.) An unclean heart is like an oven
heated; and the unclean lusts and affections of it are as the fuel that makes
it hot. It is an inward fire, it keeps the heat within itself; so adulterers
and fornicators secretly burn in lust, as the expression is, Rom. i.
27. The heat of the oven is an intense heat, especially as it is here
described; he that heats it stirs up the fire, and ceases not from
raising it up, till the bread is ready to be put in, being kneaded
and leavened, all which only signifies that they are like an oven when
it is at the hottest; nay, when it is too hot for the baker (so the
learned Dr. Pocock), when it is hotter than he would have it, so that
the raiser up of the fire ceases as long as while the dough that is kneaded is
in the fermenting, that the heat may abate a little. Thus fiery hot are the
lusts of an unclean heart. (2.) The unclean wait for an opportunity to compass
their wicked desires; having made ready their heart like an oven, they lie in
wait to catch their prey. The eye of the adulterer waits for the twilight,
Job xxiv. 15. Their baker sleeps all the night, but in the morning it burns
as a flaming fire. As the baker, having kindled a fire in his oven and
laid sufficient fuel to it, goes to bed, and sleeps all night, and in the
morning finds his oven well heated, and ready for his purpose, so these wicked
people, when they have laid some wicked plot, and formed a design for the
gratifying of some covetous, ambitious, revengeful, or unclean lusts, have
their hearts so fully set in them to do evil that, though they may stifle them
for a while, yet the fire of corrupt affections is still glowing within, and,
as soon as ever there is an opportunity for it, their purposes which they have
compassed and imagined break out into overt acts, as a fire flames out when it
has vent given it. Thus they are all hot as an oven. Note, Lust in the
heart is like fire in an oven, puts it into a heat; but the day is coming when
those who thus make themselves like a fiery oven with their own vile
affections, if that fire be not extinguished by divine grace, shall be made as
a fiery oven by divine wrath (Ps. xxi. 9), when the day comes that
shall burn as an oven, Mal. iv. 1.
4. They resist the proper methods of reformation and redress: They have
devoured their judges, those few good judges that were among them, that
would have put out these fires with which they were heated; they fell foul
upon them, and would not suffer them to do justice, but were ready to stone
them, and perhaps did so; or, as some think, they provoked God to deprive them
of the blessing of magistracy and to leave all in confusion: All their
kings have fallen one after another, and their families with them,
which could not but put the kingdom into confusion, crumble it into contending
parties, and occasion a great deal of bloodshed. There are heart-burnings
among them; they are hot as an oven with rage and malice at one
another, and this occasions the devouring of their judges, the falling
of their kings. For the transgressions of a land many are the princes
thereof, Prov. xxviii. 2. But in the midst of all this trouble and
disorder there is none among them that calls unto God, that sees his
hand stretched out against them in these judgments, and deprecates the strokes
of it, none, or next to none, that stir up themselves to take hold on God, Isa.
lxiv. 7. Note, Those are not only heated with sin, but hardened in sin, that
continue to live without prayer even when they are in trouble and distress.
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The
Crimes of the People; Infatuation of Ephraim; Ephraim's Obstinate
Rebellion; Ephraim's Hypocrisy.
B. C. 750.
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8 Ephraim, he hath mixed himself among the
people; Ephraim is a cake not turned. 9 Strangers have devoured
his strength, and he knoweth it not: yea, gray hairs are here and there
upon him, yet he knoweth not. 10 And the pride of Israel
testifieth to his face: and they do not return to the LORD
their God, nor seek him for all this. 11 Ephraim also is like a
silly dove without heart: they call to Egypt, they go to Assyria.
12 When they shall go, I will spread my net upon them; I will bring them down
as the fowls of the heaven; I will chastise them, as their congregation hath
heard. 13 Woe unto them! for they have fled from me: destruction
unto them! because they have transgressed against me: though I have redeemed
them, yet they have spoken lies against me. 14 And they have not
cried unto me with their heart, when they howled upon their beds: they
assemble themselves for corn and wine, and they rebel against me.
15 Though I have bound and strengthened their arms, yet do they imagine
mischief against me. 16 They return, but not to the most
High: they are like a deceitful bow: their princes shall fall by the sword for
the rage of their tongue: this shall be their derision in the land of
Egypt.
Having seen how vicious and corrupt the court was, we now come to enquire how
it is with the country, and we find that to be no better; and no marvel if the
distemper that has so seized the head affect the whole body, so that there is no
soundness in it; the iniquity of Ephraim is discovered, as well as the
sin of Samaria, of the people as well as the princes, of which here are
divers instances.
I. They were not peculiar and entire for God, as they should have been, v.
8. 1. They did not distinguish themselves from the heathen, as God had
distinguished them: Ephraim, he has mingled himself among the people,
has associated with them, and conformed himself to them, and has in a manner
confounded himself with them and lost his character among them. God had said, The
people shall dwell alone; but they mingled themselves with the heathen
and learned their works, Ps. xvi. 35. They went up and down among the
heathen, to beg help of one of them against another (so some); whereas, if
they had kept close to God, they would not have needed the help of any of
them. 2. They were not entirely devoted to God: Ephraim is a cake not
turned, and so is burnt on one side and dough on the other side, but good
for nothing on either side. As in Ahab's time, so now, they halted between
God and Baal; sometimes they seemed zealous for God, but at other times as
hot for Baal. Note, It is sad to think how many, who, after a sort, profess
religion, are made up of contraries and inconsistencies, as a cake not
turned, a constant self-contradiction, and always in one extreme or the
other.
II. They were strangely insensible of the judgments of God, which they were
under, and which threatened their ruin, v. 9. Observe, 1. The condition
they were in. God was not to them, in his judgments, as a moth and as rottenness;
they were silently and slowly drawing towards the ruin of their state partly
by the encroachments of foreigners upon them: Strangers have devoured his
strength, and eaten him up; they have wasted his wealth and treasure,
lessened his numbers, and consumed the fruits of the earth. Some devoured them
by open wars (as 2 Kings xiii. 7, when the king of Syria made them like the
dust by threshing), others by pretending treaties of peace and amity, in
which they extorted abundance of wealth from them, and made them pay dearly
for that which did them no good, but which afterwards they paid more dearly
for, as 2 Kings xvi. 9. This Ephraim got by mingling with the heathen, and
suffering them to mingle with him; they devoured that which he rested upon and
supported himself with. Note, Those that make not God their strength (Ps. lii.
7) make that their strength which will soon be devoured by strangers. They
were thus reduced partly by their own mal-administrations among themselves: Yea,
gray hairs are here and there upon him (are sprinkled upon him, so
the word is), that is, the sad symptoms of a decaying declining state, which
is waxing old and ready to vanish away, and the effects of
trouble and vexation. Cura facit canos--Care turns gray. The almond-tree
does not as yet flourish, but it begins to turn colour, which speaks
aloud to him that the evil days are coming, and the years of which
he shall say, I have no pleasure in them, Eccl. xii. 1, 5. 2. Their
regardlessness of these warnings: He knows it not; he is not aware of
the hand of God gone out against him; it is lifted up, but he will not see,
Isa. xxvi. 11. He does not know how near his ruin is, and takes no care to
prevent it. Note, Stupidity under less judgments is a presage of greater
coming.
III. They went on frowardly in their wicked ways, and were not reclaimed by
the rebukes they were under (v. 10): The pride of Israel still testifies
to his face, as it had done before (ch. v. 5); under humbling
providences their hearts were still unhumbled, their lusts unmortified; and it
is through the pride of their countenance that they will not seek
after God (Ps. x. 4); they do not return to the Lord their God by
repentance and reformation, nor do they seek him by faith and prayer for
all this; though they suffer for going astray from him, though it can
never be well with them till they come back to him, and though they have in
vain sought to others for relief, yet they think not of applying to God.
IV. They were infatuated in their counsels, and took very wrong methods when
they were in distress (v. 11, 12): Ephraim is like a silly dove
without heart. To be harmless as a dove, without gall, and not to hurt or
injure others, is commendable; but to be sottish as a dove, without heart,
that knows not how to defend herself and provide for her own safety, is a
shame.
1. The silliness of this dove is, (1.) That she laments not the loss of her
young that are taken from her, but will make her nest again in the same place;
so they have their people carried away by the enemy, and are not affected with
it, but continue their dealings with those that deal barbarously with them.
(2.) That she is easily enticed by the bait into the net, and has no heart,
no understanding, to discern her danger, as many other fowls do, Prov. i. 17.
She hastes to the snare, and knows not that it is for her life (Prov.
vii. 23); so they were drawn into leagues with neighbouring nations that were
their ruin. (3.) That, when she is frightened, she has not courage to stay in
the dove-house, where she is safe, and under the careful protection of her
owner, but flutters and hovers, seeking shelter first in one place, then in
another, and thereby exposes herself so much the more; so this people, when
they were in distress, sought not to God, did not fly like the doves to
their windows where they might have been secured from all the birds of
prey that struck at them, but threw themselves out of God's protection, and
then called to Egypt to help them, and went in all haste to Assyria,
to seek for that aid in vain which they might, by repentance and prayer, have
found nearer home, in their God. Note, It is a silly senseless thing for those
who have a God in heaven to trust to creatures for the refuge and relief which
are to be had in him only; and those that do so are a people of no
understanding, they are without heart. Now,
2. See what becomes of this silly dove (v. 12): When they
shall go to Egypt and Assyria, I will spread my net upon them.
Note, Those that will not abide by the mercy of God must expect to be pursued
by the justice of God. Here, (1.) They are ensnared: "I will spread my
net upon them, bring them into straits, that they may see their folly and
think of returning." Note, It is common for those that go away from God
to find snares where they expected shelters. (2.) They are humbled; they soar
upward, proud of their foreign alliances and confiding in them; but I will
bring them down, let them fly ever so high, as the fowls of heaven,
that are shot flying. Note, God can and will bring those down that exalt
themselves as the eagle, Obad. 3, 4. (3.) They are made to smart for their
folly: I will chastise them. Note, The disappointments we meet with in
the creature, when we put a confidence in it, are a necessary chastisement, or
discipline, that we may learn to be wiser another time. (4.) In all this the
scripture is fulfilled. It is as their congregation has heard; they
have been many a time told by the word of God, read, and preached, and sung,
in their religious assemblies, that "vain is the help of man, that
in the son of man there is no help; they have heard both from the law
and from the prophets what judgments God would bring upon them for their
wickedness; and as they have heard now they shall see, they
shall feel." Note, It concerns us to take notice of the word of God which
we hear from time to time in the congregation, and to be governed by
it, for we must shortly be judged by it; and it will justify God in the
condemnation of sinners, and aggravate it to them, that they have had plain
public warning given them of it; it is what their congregation has heard many
a time, but they would not take warning. "Son, remember thou wast
told what would come of it; and now thou seest they were not vain words."
See Zech. i. 6.
V. They revolted from God and rebelled against him, notwithstanding the
various methods he took to retain them in their allegiance, v. 13-15.
Here observe,
1. How kindly and tenderly God had dealt with them, as a gracious sovereign
towards a people dear unto him, and whose prosperity he had much at heart. He
had redeemed them (v. 13), brought them, at first, out of the
land of Egypt, and, since, delivered them out of many a distress. He had bound
and strengthened their arms, v. 15. When their power was weakened,
like an arm broken or out of joint, God set it again, and bound it, as a
surgeon does a broken bone, to make it knit. God had given Israel victories
over the Syrians (2 Kings xiii. 16, 17), had restored their coast (2
Kings xiv. 25, 26), had girded them with strength for battle.
"Though I have chastened them" (so the margin reads it),
"sometimes corrected them for their faults and thereby taught them, at
other times strengthened their arms and relieved them, though I have
used both fair means and foul to work upon them, it was all to no purpose;
they were mercy-proof and judgment-proof."
2. How impudent their conduct had been towards him notwithstanding, which is
described here for the conviction and humiliation of all those who have gone
on in any way of wickedness, that they may see how exceedingly sinful their
sin is, how heinous, how the God of heaven interprets it, how he resents it.
(1.) He had courted them to him, and taken them into covenant with himself;
but they fled from him, as if he had been their dangerous enemy who had
always approved himself their faithful friend. They wandered from him, as the
silly dove from her nest, for those who forsake God will find no rest nor
settlement in the creature, but wander endlessly. They fled from God when they
forsook the worship of him, and ran away from his service, and withdrew
themselves from their allegiance to him. (2.) He had given them his laws,
which were all holy, just, and good, by which he designed to keep them in the
right way; but they transgressed against him; they sinned with a high
hand and a stiff neck, wilfully and presumptuously (so the words signifies);
they broke through the fence of the divine law, and therein thwarted the
design of the divine love. (3.) He had made known his truths to them, and
given them all possible proofs of the sincerity of his good-will to them; and
yet they spoke lies against him. They set up false gods in competition
with him; they denied his providence and power; thus they belied the Lord,
Jer. v. 12. They rejected his messages sent them by his prophets, and said
that they should have peace, though they went on in sin, directly against what
he said. In their hypocritical professions of religion, shows of devotion, and
promises of amendment, they lied to the Lord, which he took as lying against
him. (4.) He was their rightful Lord and King, and had always ruled in Jacob
with equity, and for the public good; and yet they rebelled against him,
v. 14. They not only went off from him, but took up arms against him,
would have deposed him if they could and set up another. (5.) He designed well
for them, but they imagined mischief against him, v. 15. Sin is
a mischievous thin; it is mischief against God, for it is treason against his
crown and dignity; not that the sinners can do any thing to hurt their Creator
(as one of the ancients observes on these words), but what they can they
do; and it is so much the worse when it is not done by surprise, or
through inadvertency, but designedly and with contrivance. The Jews have a
saying, which Dr. Pocock quotes here, The thoughts of transgression are
worse than the transgression. The designing of mischief is doing it, in
God's account. Compassing and imagining the death of the king is
treason by our law. Those that imagine an evil thing, though it prove a vain
thing (Ps. ii. 1), will be reckoned with for the imagination.
3. How they shall be punished for this (v. 13): Woe unto them! for
they have fled from me. Note, Those who flee from God have woes sent after
them, and are, without doubt, in a woeful case. The wrath of God is revealed
from heaven against them; the word of God says, Woe to them! And
observe what follows immediately, Destruction unto them! Note, The woes
of God's word have real effects; destruction makes them good. The judgments of
his hand shall verify the judgments of his mouth. Those whom he curses, and
pronounces woeful, they are cursed, they are woeful indeed.
VI. Their shows of devotion and reformation were but shows, and in them they
did but mock God.
1. They pretended devotion, but it was not sincere, v. 14. When the
hand of God had gone forth against them they made some sort of application to
him. When he slew them, then they sought him. Lord, in trouble have they
visited thee. But it was all in hypocrisy. (1.) When they were under
personal troubles, and called upon God in secret, they were not sincere in
that: They have not cried unto me with their heart, when they howled upon
their beds. When they were chastened with pain upon their beds, and
the multitude of their bones with strong pains, perhaps ill of the
wounds they received in war, they cried, and groaned, and complained in the
forms of devotion, and, it may be, they used many good words, proper enough
for the circumstances they were in; they cried, God help us, and, Lord,
look upon us. But they did not cry with their heart, and therefore
God reckons it as no crying to him. Moses is said to cry unto God when
he spoke not a word, only his heart prayed with faith and fervency, Exod. xiv.
15. These made a great noise, and said a great deal, and yet did not cry to
God, because their hearts were not right with him, not subjected to
his will, devoted to his honour, nor employed in his service. To pray is to lift
up the soul to God, this is the essence of prayer. If this be not done, words,
though ever so well chosen, are but wind; but, if it be, it is an
acceptable prayer, though the groanings cannot be uttered. Note, Those
do not pray to God at all that do not pray in the spirit. Nay, God is
so far from approving their prayer and accepting it that he calls it howling.
Some think it intimates the noisiness of their prayers (they cried to
God as they used to cry to Baal, when they thought he must be awakened), or
the brutish violent passions which they vented in their prayers; they snarled
at the stone, and howled under the whip, but regarded not the hand. Or it
denotes that their hypocritical prayers were so far from being pleasing to God
that they were offensive to him; he was angry at their prayers. The songs
of the temple shall be howlings, Amos viii. 3. God will be so far from
pitying them that he will justly laugh at their calamity, who have so
often laughed at his authority. (2.) When they were under public troubles, and
met together to implore God's favour, in that also they were hypocritical;
they assembled themselves, for fashion-sake, because it was usual to call
a solemn assembly in times of general mourning, Zeph. ii. 1. But it was
only to pray for corn and wine that they came together, which were the
things they wanted, and feared being deprived of by the want of rain, the
judgment they now laboured under. They did not pray for the favour or grace of
God, that God would give them repentance, pardon their sins, and turn away his
wrath, but only that he would not take away from them their corn and wine.
Note, Carnal hearts, in their prayers to God, covet temporal mercies only, and
dread and deprecate no other but temporal judgments, for they have no sense of
any other.
2. They pretended reformation, but neither was that sincere, v. 16.
Here is, (1.) The sin of Israel: They return, that is, they make as if
they would return; they pretend to repent and amend their doings, but they
make nothing of it; they do not come home to God nor return to their
allegiance, whereas God says (Jer. iv. 1), If thou wilt return, O Israel!
return to me; do not only turn towards me, but return to me.
This dissimulation of theirs makes them like a deceitful bow, which
looks as if it were fit for business, and is bent and drawn accordingly, but,
when strength comes to be laid to it, either the bow or the string breaks, and
the arrow, instead of flying to the mark, drops at the archer's foot. Such
were their essays towards repentance and reformation. (2.) The sin of the
princes of Israel. That which is charged upon them is the rage of their
tongue, quarrelling with God and his providence and with all about them
when they are crossed. Princes think they may say what they will, and that it
is their prerogative to huff and bluster, to curse and rail, and to call names
at their pleasure, but let them know there is a God above them that will call
them to an account for the rage of their tongues and make their own
tongues to fall upon them. (3.) The punishment of Israel and their princes
for their sin. As for the princes, they shall fall by the sword either
of their enemies or of their own people, some by one and some by the other;
and this shall be their derision, this is that for which they shall be
derided in the land of Egypt, when they flee to the Egyptians for
succour, v. 11. Their sin and punishment shall make them a
laughing-stock to all about them. Note, Those that are treacherous and
deceitful in their dealings with God, and passionate and outrageous in their
conduct towards men, will justly be made a derision to their neighbours, for
they make themselves ridiculous.
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