Commentary - Hosea 7:13-16

Bird's-eye view

In this brief but potent section of Hosea, the Lord, through His prophet, brings a blistering indictment against Ephraim. The core of the charge is a radical disconnect between their outward religious performance and the inward reality of their hearts. They are a people who have fled from their only source of life and salvation, and in their flight, they have become thoroughly dishonest. God pronounces a woe upon them, not as a petulant outburst, but as a statement of grim reality. Their rebellion is not a simple misstep; it is a calculated transgression against a God who had already redeemed them. Their cries are not genuine repentance but the howling of cornered animals, concerned only with their material comfort. God's discipline, intended to strengthen, has been met with further evil scheming. The passage culminates in the memorable image of the "deceitful bow," a perfect metaphor for a people who aim at everything but God and consequently hit nothing of value. Their end is destruction and mockery, a public testimony to the folly of spurning the grace of a holy God.

This passage is a stark reminder that God is not interested in the mere forms of religion. He detests the lie, especially the lie that is dressed up in pious language. Israel's problem was not a lack of religious activity but a complete absence of heart-level submission to God. They wanted God's blessings without God Himself. They wanted the grain and new wine, but not the Lord of the harvest. This is the perennial temptation of every generation of God's people, and the warning here is sharp. A church that turns from God to chase after political solutions or material prosperity becomes a deceitful bow, useless in the service of the King and destined for judgment.

Outline

Commentary

Hosea 7:13

Woe to them, for they have fled from Me! Destruction is theirs, for they have transgressed against Me! And I would redeem them, but they speak lies against Me.

The passage opens with a solemn pronouncement of doom. The word "Woe" is not an expression of divine temper; it is a formal declaration of coming calamity, a funeral dirge sung over a people who are spiritually dead and soon to be physically undone. The reason is stated plainly: "they have fled from Me!" This is the root of all their subsequent sins. They have run away from the only one who is their life and their protector. Like Jonah fleeing to Tarshish, they think they can escape the presence of the Lord, which is to say, they want to escape His authority. But to flee from God is to flee from reality itself, and the only thing you can run into is destruction.

The Lord equates this flight with transgression. To transgress is to step over a line, to violate a known boundary. God had established a covenant with Israel. He had set the terms. Their flight was a deliberate rebellion against their covenant Lord. This is not an accidental wandering; it is a willful desertion. And so, destruction is not just a punishment; it is the natural consequence of their choice. They have chosen the path that leads off a cliff, and God is simply announcing where the path goes.

The most tragic part of this verse is the last clause. "And I would redeem them, but they speak lies against Me." Here is the beating heart of the gospel, offered and spurned. God's disposition toward His covenant people is one of redemption. He is the God who brought them out of Egypt. His desire is to save. The door to mercy is open. But their path is blocked by their own lies. What are these lies? They are the lies of self-justification. The lies of idolatry, pretending that a calf made of gold can do what Yahweh does. They are the lies of political expediency, trusting in alliances with Egypt or Assyria instead of God. They lie about their own condition, pretending to be righteous while their hearts are far from Him. They lie about God, portraying Him as a demanding tyrant from whom they must flee, rather than a loving Father who desires their good. Redemption is available, but it cannot be received by liars who refuse to call their sin what it is.

Hosea 7:14

And they do not cry out to Me in their heart When they wail on their beds; For the sake of grain and new wine they gather together as sojourners; They depart from Me.

This verse dissects their hypocrisy with surgical precision. God is not fooled by the outward show of distress. There is plenty of noise, plenty of "wailing on their beds." This is the cry of pain, not the cry of repentance. It is the howl of an animal caught in a trap. When the consequences of their sin catch up to them, when the economy tanks and the enemy is at the gates, they cry out. But God, who sees the heart, declares that their cry does not come from the heart. It is a performance for the ears of men, or perhaps a desperate attempt to manipulate God into fixing their circumstances without demanding a change in their character.

Their true motivation is exposed. "For the sake of grain and new wine they gather together." Their religious assemblies are driven by materialism. They want the blessings of the covenant without the Lord of the covenant. They treat God like a cosmic vending machine. If they put in enough wailing and sacrifices, perhaps God will dispense the grain and new wine they crave. This is the essence of all paganism. It is a transactional religion, where the goal is to get the gods to give you what you want. True worship, in stark contrast, is about giving God what He is due, which is everything.

The final phrase is a damning summary: "They depart from Me." Even in their supposed religious gatherings, in their wailing and their fasting, the trajectory of their lives is away from God. Every step they take, even the ones that look religious, is a step further into the darkness because their hearts are aimed in the wrong direction. They are like a man rowing with all his might toward a waterfall, congratulating himself on his effort.

Hosea 7:15

Although I disciplined and strengthened their arms, Yet they devise evil against Me.

Here we see the grace of God being turned into an occasion for sin. God's dealings with Israel were twofold. He disciplined them, and He strengthened them. Both actions were intended for their good. Divine discipline is the chastisement of a loving Father, designed to correct and restore (Heb. 12:6). When enemies threatened, God strengthened their arms, giving them victory and security. He was their trainer, their protector, their provider.

But their response to this grace is perverse. "Yet they devise evil against Me." The very strength that God gave them, they now use to rebel against Him. The security He provided becomes the platform from which they launch their idolatrous schemes. This is a profound picture of human depravity. We take the good gifts of God, intelligence, strength, resources, life itself, and we weaponize them in our rebellion against the Giver. It is the ultimate ingratitude. God gives them the strength to draw a bow, and they turn and aim their arrows at Him.

Hosea 7:16

They turn, but not upward; They are like a deceitful bow; Their princes will fall by the sword Because of the indignation of their tongue. This will be their scoffing in the land of Egypt.

The chapter concludes with a series of vivid images that summarize Israel's condition and fate. "They turn, but not upward." There is movement, there is activity, there is even a kind of turning. But it is not repentance. Repentance is a turning upward, to the Most High. Their turning is a lateral move. They turn from one idol to another. They turn from an alliance with Egypt to an alliance with Assyria. They are constantly turning, constantly seeking a new solution, but they refuse to look up to the only one who can save them. It is the motion of a frantic, lost people.

This leads to the central metaphor: "They are like a deceitful bow." A deceitful, or slack, bow is useless. It looks like a weapon, it has the form of a weapon, but when the time for action comes, it fails. The arrow does not fly true. It misses the mark entirely. This is Israel. They have the outward form of God's people. They have the temple, the sacrifices, the law. But they are spiritually slack. There is no tension, no power. When God calls on them to be His arrow in the world, to fly true to His target, they fail. They cannot be trusted. A deceitful bow is a profound liability in the hands of an archer, and God will not use it.

The consequences fall first on the leaders. "Their princes will fall by the sword." Leadership always bears a heavier responsibility. The princes were leading the people in this rebellion, and they will be the first to face the judgment. The reason for their fall is specified as "the indignation of their tongue." Their words were arrogant, boastful, and full of lies against God. They spoke proudly of their own strength and their clever political maneuvers. God will bring them down for their verbal rebellion.

The final humiliation is to be mocked by the very people they trusted. "This will be their scoffing in the land of Egypt." They ran to Egypt for help, and now their downfall will be a source of entertainment for the Egyptians. This is the ultimate political irony. The nation that rejects God to find security in the world will find that the world despises them for their weakness. To be a laughingstock in Egypt is to have hit rock bottom. They fled from the God who redeems, only to be derided by the nation from which He had redeemed them in the first place. The wages of sin is not just death, but utter humiliation.

Application

The warnings in this passage are not confined to ancient Israel. The temptation to be a "deceitful bow" is ever-present in the Church. We are tempted to have the form of Christianity without the power. We can have our services, our programs, our budgets, and our buildings, but if our hearts are not turned upward to the Most High, we are useless in His hands.

We must examine our own cries to God. When we are in distress, do we wail on our beds for relief, or do we cry from the heart for repentance? Is our religion motivated by a desire for "grain and new wine", health, wealth, and comfort, or by a desire for God Himself? God will not be mocked. He knows the difference between the cry of a broken heart and the whine of a spoiled child.

Finally, we must recognize that all our strength comes from God. Every talent, every opportunity, every breath is a gift. The great sin is to take that strength and use it to devise evil, to build our own kingdoms in opposition to His. The only proper response to God's grace is to turn, truly turn, upward to Him. We must ask Him to make us taut bows, arrows that fly true to His mark, for His glory. Anything less is to invite destruction and to become a scoffing in the land of our spiritual Egypt.