The Great Reversal: From 'No People' to 'Sons of God' Text: Hosea 1:10-11
Introduction: The Grammar of Grace
The book of Hosea begins with a domestic tragedy that is a public parable. God commands his prophet to marry a prostitute, a woman named Gomer, and to have children with her. This is not a divine endorsement of sin; it is a divine illustration of it. Gomer's infidelity to Hosea is a living, breathing portrait of Israel's spiritual adultery against Yahweh. The names of the children are not sentimental nursery names; they are sermon points, divine graffiti written on human lives. The first son is Jezreel, "God will scatter," a name of judgment. The daughter is Lo-Ruhamah, "No Mercy." And the second son is Lo-Ammi, "Not My People."
Imagine the weight of that. God, in covenant with Israel, looks at His people and says, through the name of this child, "You are not mine." This is the language of covenantal divorce. It is the final, devastating verdict. Israel has chased after other lovers, the Baals and the idols of the nations, and God has declared the union void. This is the blackest of backgrounds. The judgment is absolute, the rejection is total. This is where our text begins, immediately after the pronouncement of "Lo-Ammi."
But with God, the final word in judgment is never the final word. Just when the darkness is absolute, God strikes a match. Our passage today is a staggering, breathtaking reversal. It is a gospel explosion in the heart of the Old Testament. It shows us that God's grace operates with a logic that confounds all human expectation. He does not simply rewind the tape and undo the curse. He takes the very instruments of judgment and transforms them into instruments of a greater glory. He takes the names of wrath and rewrites them as names of adoption. This is not just about the future of ethnic Israel. As the apostle Paul will later show us, this is about us. This is the story of how God takes rebels and adulterers from every tribe and tongue and makes them His children.
The Text
Yet the number of the sons of Israel Will be like the sand of the sea, Which cannot be measured or numbered; And it will be that in the place Where it is said to them, “You are not My people,” It will be said to them, “You are the sons of the living God.” And the sons of Judah and the sons of Israel will be gathered together, And they will set for themselves one head, And they will go up from the land, For great will be the day of Jezreel.
(Hosea 1:10-11 LSB)
From Remnant to Innumerable Host (v. 10a)
The prophecy begins with a glorious "Yet." This is one of the great hinges of Scripture, where the door of judgment slams shut and the gates of grace swing wide open.
"Yet the number of the sons of Israel Will be like the sand of the sea, Which cannot be measured or numbered..." (Hosea 1:10a)
Just verses before, God was promising to scatter and decimate. Now, He reaches back into the bedrock of His covenant promises to Abraham. In Genesis 22, God promised Abraham that his offspring would be as the stars of the heaven and as the sand which is upon the seashore. At a moment when Israel's very existence is threatened by their sin, God reaffirms His foundational, unconditional promise. This is crucial. God's covenant faithfulness is not dependent on Israel's faithfulness. If it were, the covenant would have been shattered a thousand times over. God's promises are grounded in His own character, not our performance.
But who are these "sons of Israel"? The New Testament teaches us to read this with gospel lenses. The Apostle Paul is explicit: the true Israel, the true offspring of Abraham, is not defined by ethnic lineage but by faith in the Messiah, Jesus Christ (Galatians 3:29). This promise, therefore, is not about a future explosion in the Jewish birthrate. It is about the explosion of the gospel into the Gentile world. Paul quotes this very section of Hosea in Romans 9 to prove that God's plan all along was to call a people for Himself "not from the Jews only, but also from the Gentiles." The sand of the sea is the great, multi-ethnic, global family of God, the Church of Jesus Christ, drawn from every nation, tribe, and tongue.
This is a postmillennial promise. This is not a picture of a tiny, huddled remnant barely surviving until the rapture. This is a picture of worldwide gospel victory. The kingdom of God will grow from a mustard seed into a great tree. The knowledge of the Lord will cover the earth as the waters cover the sea. And the people of God will be an innumerable host, a vast and sprawling civilization of the redeemed.
The Reversal of the Curse (v. 10b)
The second half of the verse makes the reversal even more explicit and personal.
"...And it will be that in the place Where it is said to them, 'You are not My people,' It will be said to them, 'You are the sons of the living God.'" (Hosea 1:10b)
This is the heart of the gospel. The very place of our rejection becomes the very place of our adoption. The place of our shame becomes the place of our glory. Where the gavel of the law fell and pronounced us "Lo-Ammi," "Not My People," the proclamation of the gospel rings out, declaring us to be "sons of the living God."
Notice the upgrade. They were not simply restored to being "My people." The new status is far higher than the old one. They are called "sons of the living God." This is the language of intimacy, of family, of inheritance. In the Old Covenant, the average Israelite had a relationship with God that was mediated through priests and sacrifices; it was a relationship of a servant to a master. But in the New Covenant, through faith in Christ, we are brought into the inner circle. We are given the Spirit of adoption, by whom we cry out, "Abba, Father" (Romans 8:15). We are no longer servants, but sons. And if sons, then heirs, heirs of God and fellow heirs with Christ.
This is what happens in evangelism. We go to the places of alienation, the spiritual wilderness where people are living as "Not My People," and we declare to them the good news. We say, "Because of the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus Christ, you who were far off can be brought near. You who were enemies can be adopted as sons." The living God, not a dead idol, is building a living family.
Reunification Under One Head (v. 11a)
The prophecy then turns to the practical, political, and spiritual outworking of this great restoration.
"And the sons of Judah and the sons of Israel will be gathered together, And they will set for themselves one head..." (Hosea 1:11a)
At the time of Hosea, the people of God were a broken home. After the reign of Solomon, the kingdom had split in two: Israel in the north (the ten tribes) and Judah in the south (Judah and Benjamin). They were rivals, often at war with one another. This division was a constant source of weakness and a picture of their spiritual disunity. God's promise here is to heal that breach. He will gather them together.
And how will this reunification happen? "They will set for themselves one head." Who is this one head? There can be no doubt that this is a Messianic prophecy. This is the Lord Jesus Christ. He is the one who breaks down the dividing wall of hostility (Ephesians 2:14). The division between Israel and Judah was just one manifestation of the enmity that sin introduces. The ultimate division is between Jew and Gentile. But in Christ, that division is obliterated. He gathers into one body all the children of God. There is no longer Jew or Greek, slave or free, male or female, for all are one in Christ Jesus.
Christ is the head of the Church, His body. He is the singular King, the one Shepherd for the one flock. Any unity that is not unity under the headship of Jesus Christ is a false unity. Political schemes, ecumenical councils, and interfaith dialogues cannot heal the divisions of mankind. Only submission to our one true Head can do that. And as we submit to Him, we find we are united to everyone else who is also submitted to Him.
The New Exodus and the Great Day (v. 11b)
The prophecy concludes with a picture of a new exodus and the redefinition of a day of judgment into a day of glory.
"...And they will go up from the land, For great will be the day of Jezreel." (Hosea 1:11b)
They will "go up from the land." This is exodus language. Just as God brought His people up from the land of Egypt, He will perform a new, greater exodus. This is not a geographical journey, but a spiritual one. It is the great exodus from the land of bondage to sin and death into the glorious freedom of the children of God. It is the pilgrimage of the redeemed, leaving the city of destruction and marching toward the celestial city.
And the climax is this stunning phrase: "For great will be the day of Jezreel." Remember, Jezreel was the name of judgment. It meant "God scatters." It was a name that evoked the bloody purge of the house of Ahab by Jehu in the valley of Jezreel. It was a name of terror and doom. But here, in this economy of grace, God takes the very name of the curse and transforms it. The word Jezreel is related to the Hebrew word for "to sow" or "to plant." So, "God scatters" is now redeemed to mean "God sows."
The day of scattering becomes the day of planting. The death of the old apostate Israel is the planting of the seed that will become the new, global Israel. Jesus Himself uses this metaphor: "Unless a grain of wheat falls into the earth and dies, it remains alone; but if it dies, it bears much fruit" (John 12:24). The death of Christ in judgment was the ultimate "day of Jezreel," the ultimate scattering. But through His resurrection, that scattering became the great sowing of the gospel throughout the world. The day of Jezreel is the day of the victory of the gospel. It is a great day, a day of triumph, a day of glorious harvest.
Conclusion: Living as Sons
This passage is a compact summary of the entire story of redemption. It moves from covenant curse to covenant blessing, from rejection to adoption, from division to unity, and from scattering to sowing.
This is our story. By nature, we are all children of Lo-Ammi. We were strangers to the covenants of promise, having no hope and without God in the world. We lived in the place of rejection. But God, in His great mercy, did not leave us there. In that very place, He sent His Son, the one Head, to gather us to Himself.
Through faith in Him, we have been renamed. Our name is no longer "Not My People." Our name is "sons of the living God." This is not just a future hope; it is a present reality. And it must change how we live. We are not to live as orphans, scrambling for security and significance. We are to live as sons, secure in our Father's love, confident in our inheritance, and joyfully obedient to our one Head. We are to be about the business of the great day of Jezreel, the great sowing of the gospel, knowing that our King is making all things new, and His people will one day be as the sand of the sea.