Day 147 of 365

¹I saw the Lord standing beside the altar, and he said, "Strike the tops of the pillars, that the thresholds may shake; and break them in pieces on the head of all of them; and I will kill the last of them with the sword: there shall not one of them flee away, and there shall not one of them escape.

²Though they dig into Sheol, there my hand will take them; and though they climb up to heaven, there I will bring them down.

³Though they hide themselves in the top of Carmel, I will search and take them out there; and though they be hid from my sight in the bottom of the sea, there I will command the serpent, and it will bite them.

⁴Though they go into captivity before their enemies, there I will command the sword, and it will kill them. I will set my eyes on them for evil, and not for good.

⁵For the Lord, the Lord of hosts, is he who touches the land and it melts, and all who dwell in it will mourn; and it will rise up wholly like the River, and will sink again, like the River of Egypt.

⁶It is he who builds his chambers in the heavens, and has founded his vault on the earth; he who calls for the waters of the sea, and pours them out on the surface of the earth; the Lord is his name.

⁷Are you not like the children of the Ethiopians to me, children of Israel?" says the Lord. "Haven't I brought up Israel out of the land of Egypt, and the Philistines from Caphtor, and the Syrians from Kir?

⁸Behold, the eyes of the Lord God are on the sinful kingdom, and I will destroy it from off the surface of the earth; except that I will not utterly destroy the house of Jacob," says the Lord.

⁹"For, behold, I will command, and I will sift the house of Israel among all the nations, as grain is sifted in a sieve, yet not the least kernel will fall on the earth.

¹⁰All the sinners of my people will die by the sword, who say, 'Evil won't overtake nor meet us.'

¹¹In that day I will raise up the tent of David who is fallen, and close up its breaches, and I will raise up its ruins, and I will build it as in the days of old;

¹²that they may possess the remnant of Edom, and all the nations who are called by my name," says the Lord who does this.

¹³"Behold, the days come," says the Lord, "that the plowman shall overtake the reaper, and the one treading grapes him who sows seed; and sweet wine will drip from the mountains, and flow from the hills.

¹⁴I will bring my people Israel back from captivity, and they will rebuild the ruined cities, and inhabit them; and they will plant vineyards, and drink wine from them. They shall also make gardens, and eat the fruit of them.

¹⁵I will plant them on their land, and they will no more be plucked up out of their land which I have given them," says the Lord your God.

¹The word of the Lord that came to Hosea the son of Beeri, in the days of Uzziah, Jotham, Ahaz, and Hezekiah, kings of Judah, and in the days of Jeroboam the son of Joash, king of Israel.

²When the Lord spoke at the first by Hosea, the Lord said to Hosea, "Go, take for yourself a wife of prostitution and children of unfaithfulness; for the land commits great adultery, forsaking the Lord."

³So he went and took Gomer the daughter of Diblaim; and she conceived, and bore him a son.

⁴The Lord said to him, "Call his name Jezreel; for yet a little while, and I will avenge the blood of Jezreel on the house of Jehu, and will cause the kingdom of the house of Israel to cease.

⁵It will happen in that day that I will break the bow of Israel in the valley of Jezreel."

⁶She conceived again, and bore a daughter. Then he said to him, "Call her name Lo-Ruhamah; for I will no longer have mercy on the house of Israel, that I should in any way pardon them.

⁷But I will have mercy on the house of Judah, and will save them by the Lord their God, and will not save them by bow, sword, battle, horses, or horsemen."

⁸Now when she had weaned Lo-Ruhamah, she conceived, and bore a son.

⁹He said, "Call his name Lo-Ammi; for you are not my people, and I will not be yours.

¹⁰Yet the number of the children of Israel will be as the sand of the sea, which can't be measured nor numbered; and it will come to pass that, in the place where it was said to them, 'You are not my people,' they will be called 'sons of the living God.'

¹¹The children of Judah and the children of Israel will be gathered together, and they will appoint themselves one head, and will go up from the land; for great will be the day of Jezreel.

¹"Say to your brothers, 'My people!' and to your sisters, 'My loved one!'

²Contend with your mother! Contend, for she is not my wife, neither am I her husband; and let her put away her prostitution from her face, and her adulteries from between her breasts;

³Lest I strip her naked, and make her bare as in the day that she was born, and make her like a wilderness, and set her like a dry land, and kill her with thirst.

⁴Indeed, on her children I will have no mercy; for they are children of unfaithfulness;

⁵For their mother has played the prostitute. She who conceived them has done shamefully; for she said, 'I will go after my lovers, who give me my bread and my water, my wool and my flax, my oil and my drink.'

⁶Therefore, behold, I will hedge up your way with thorns, and I will build a wall against her, that she can't find her way.

⁷She will follow after her lovers, but she won't overtake them; and she will seek them, but won't find them. Then she will say, 'I will go and return to my first husband; for then was it better with me than now.'

⁸For she did not know that I gave her the grain, the new wine, and the oil, and multiplied to her silver and gold, which they used for Baal.

⁹Therefore I will take back my grain in its time, and my new wine in its season, and will pluck away my wool and my flax which should have covered her nakedness.

¹⁰Now I will uncover her lewdness in the sight of her lovers, and no one will deliver her out of my hand.

¹¹I will also cause all her celebrations to cease: her feasts, her new moons, her Sabbaths, and all her solemn assemblies.

¹²I will lay waste her vines and her fig trees, about which she has said, 'These are my wages that my lovers have given me; and I will make them a forest,' and the animals of the field shall eat them.

¹³I will visit on her the days of the Baals, to which she burned incense, when she decked herself with her earrings and her jewels, and went after her lovers, and forgot me," says the Lord.

¹⁴"Therefore, behold, I will allure her, and bring her into the wilderness, and speak tenderly to her.

¹⁵I will give her vineyards from there, and the valley of Achor for a door of hope; and she will respond there, as in the days of her youth, and as in the day when she came up out of the land of Egypt.

¹⁶It will be in that day," says the Lord, "that you will call me 'my husband,' and no longer call me 'my master.'

¹⁷For I will take away the names of the Baals out of her mouth, and they will no longer be mentioned by name.

¹⁸In that day I will make a covenant for them with the animals of the field, and with the birds of the sky, and with the creeping things of the ground. I will break the bow, the sword, and the battle out of the land, and will make them lie down safely.

¹⁹I will betroth you to me forever. Yes, I will betroth you to me in righteousness, in justice, in loving kindness, and in compassion.

²⁰I will even betroth you to me in faithfulness; and you shall know the Lord.

²¹It will happen in that day, I will respond," says the Lord, "I will respond to the heavens, and they will respond to the earth;

²²and the earth will respond to the grain, and the new wine, and the oil; and they will respond to Jezreel.

²³I will sow her to me in the earth; and I will have mercy on her who had not obtained mercy; and I will tell those who were not my people, 'You are my people;' and they will say, 'My God!'"

¹The Lord said to me, "Go again, love a woman loved by another, and an adulteress, even as the Lord loves the children of Israel, though they turn to other gods, and love cakes of raisins."

²So I bought her for myself for fifteen pieces of silver and a homer and a half of barley.

³I said to her, "You shall stay with me many days. You shall not play the prostitute, and you shall not be with any other man. I will also be so toward you."

⁴For the children of Israel shall abide many days without king, and without prince, and without sacrifice, and without sacred stone, and without ephod or idols.

⁵Afterward the children of Israel shall return, and seek the Lord their God, and David their king, and shall come with trembling to the Lord and to his blessings in the last days.