The Message (MSG)

They Wouldn’t Recognize God If They Saw Him

1-2 “Listen to this, priests!

Attention, people of Israel!

Royal family—all ears!

You’re in charge of justice around here.

But what have you done? Exploited people at Mizpah,

ripped them off on Tabor,

Victimized them at Shittim.

I’m going to punish the lot of you.

3-4 “I know you, Ephraim, inside and out.

Yes, Israel, I see right through you!

Ephraim, you’ve played your sex-and-religion games long enough.

All Israel is thoroughly polluted.

They couldn’t turn to God if they wanted to.

Their evil life is a bad habit.

Every breath they take is a whore’s breath.

They wouldn’t recognizeGodif they saw me.

5-7 “Bloated by arrogance, big as a house,

they’re a public disgrace,

The lot of them—Israel, Ephraim, Judah—

lurching and weaving down their guilty streets.

When they decide to get their lives together

and go off looking forGodonce again,

They’ll find it’s too late.

I,God, will be long gone.

They’ve played fast and loose with me for too long,

filling the country with their bastard offspring.

A plague of locusts will

devastate their violated land.

8-9 “Blow the ram’s horn shofar in Gibeah,

the bugle in Ramah!

Signal the invasion of Sin City!

Scare the daylights out of Benjamin!

Ephraim will be left wasted,

a lifeless moonscape.

I’m telling it straight, the unvarnished truth,

to the tribes of Israel.

10 “Israel’s rulers are crooks and thieves,

cheating the people of their land,

And I’m angry, good and angry.

Every inch of their bodies is going to feel my anger.

11-12 “Brutal Ephraim is himself brutalized—

a taste of his own medicine!

He was so determined

to do it his own worthless way.

Therefore I’m pus to Ephraim,

dry rot in the house of Judah.

13 “When Ephraim saw he was sick

and Judah saw his pus-filled sores,

Ephraim went running to Assyria,

went for help to the big king.

But he can’t heal you.

He can’t cure your oozing sores.

14-15 “I’m a grizzly charging Ephraim,

a grizzly with cubs charging Judah.

I’ll rip them to pieces—yes, I will!

No one can stop me now.

I’ll drag them off.

No one can help them.

Then I’ll go back to where I came from

until they come to their senses.

When they finally hit rock bottom,

maybe they’ll come looking for me.”

—https://d1b84921e69nmq.cloudfront.net/85/32k/HOS/5-9a740018f2b8bc29645c1f8e0ef3ec50.mp3?version_id=97—

Gangs of Priests Assaulting Worshipers

1-3 “Come on, let’s go back toGod.

He hurt us, but he’ll heal us.

He hit us hard,

but he’ll put us right again.

In a couple of days we’ll feel better.

By the third day he’ll have made us brand-new,

Alive and on our feet,

fit to face him.

We’re ready to studyGod,

eager for God-knowledge.

As sure as dawn breaks,

so sure is his daily arrival.

He comes as rain comes,

as spring rain refreshing the ground.”

4-7 “What am I to do with you, Ephraim?

What do I make of you, Judah?

Your declarations of love last no longer

than morning mist and predawn dew.

That’s why I use prophets to shake you to attention,

why my words cut you to the quick:

To wake you up to my judgment

blazing like light.

I’m after love that lasts, not more religion.

I want you to knowGod, not go to more prayer meetings.

You broke the covenant—just like Adam!

You broke faith with me—ungrateful wretches!

8-9 “Gilead has become Crime City—

blood on the sidewalks, blood on the streets.

It used to be robbers who mugged pedestrians.

Now it’s gangs of priests

Assaulting worshipers on their way to Shechem.

Nothing is sacred to them.

10 “I saw a shocking thing in the country of Israel:

Ephraim worshiping in a religious whorehouse,

and Israel in the mud right there with him.

11 “You’re as bad as the worst of them, Judah.

You’ve been sowing wild oats. Now it’s harvest time.”

—https://d1b84921e69nmq.cloudfront.net/85/32k/HOS/6-7ae85709d155d006c3f8f240e475c32c.mp3?version_id=97—

Despite All the Signs, Israel Ignores God

1-2 “Every time I gave Israel a fresh start,

wiped the slate clean and got them going again,

Ephraim soon filled the slate with new sins,

the treachery of Samaria written out in bold print.

Two-faced and double-tongued,

they steal you blind, pick you clean.

It never crosses their mind

that I keep account of their every crime.

They’re mud-spattered head to toe with the residue of sin.

I see who they are and what they’ve done.

3-7 “They entertain the king with their evil circus,

delight the princes with their acrobatic lies.

They’re a bunch of overheated adulterers,

like an oven that holds its heat

From the kneading of the dough

to the rising of the bread.

On the royal holiday the princes get drunk

on wine and the frenzy of the mocking mob.

They’re like wood stoves,

red-hot with lust.

Through the night their passion is banked;

in the morning it blazes up, flames hungrily licking.

Murderous and volcanic,

they incinerate their rulers.

Their kings fall one by one,

and no one pays any attention to me.

8-10 “Ephraim mingles with the pagans, dissipating himself.

Ephraim is half-baked.

Strangers suck him dry

but he doesn’t even notice.

His hair has turned gray—

he doesn’t notice.

Bloated by arrogance, big as a house,

Israel’s a public disgrace.

Israel lumbers along oblivious toGod,

despite all the signs, ignoringGod.

11-16 “Ephraim is bird-brained,

mindless, clueless,

First chirping after Egypt,

then fluttering after Assyria.

I’ll throw my net over them. I’ll clip their wings.

I’ll teach them to mind me!

Doom! They’ve run away from home.

Now they’rereallyin trouble! They’vedefiedme.

And I’m supposed to help them

while they feed me a line of lies?

Instead of crying out to me in heartfelt prayer,

they whoop it up in bed with their whores,

Gash themselves bloody in their sex-and-religion orgies,

but turn their backs on me.

I’m the one who gave them good minds and healthy bodies,

and how am I repaid? With evil scheming!

They turn, but not to me—

turn here, then there, like a weather vane.

Their rulers will be cut down, murdered—

just deserts for their mocking blasphemies.

And the final sentence?

Ridicule in the court of world opinion.”

—https://d1b84921e69nmq.cloudfront.net/85/32k/HOS/7-4cf1a6d40f3ef77519a9ea4dd4cb8347.mp3?version_id=97—

Altars for Sinning

1-3 “Blow the trumpet! Sound the alarm!

Vultures are circling over God’s people

Who have broken my covenant

and defied my revelation.

Predictably, Israel cries out, ‘My God! We know you!’

But they don’t act like it.

Israel will have nothing to do with what’s good,

and now the enemy is after them.

4-10 “They crown kings, but without asking me.

They set up princes but don’t let me in on it.

Instead, they make idols, using silver and gold,

idols that will be their ruin.

Throw that gold calf-god on the trash heap, Samaria!

I’m seething with anger against that rubbish!

How long before they shape up?

And they’re Israelites!

A sculptor made that thing—

it’s not God.

That Samaritan calf

will be broken to bits.

Look at them! Planting wind-seeds,

they’ll harvest tornadoes.

Wheat with no head

produces no flour.

And even if it did,

strangers would gulp it down.

Israel is swallowed up and spit out.

Among the pagans they’re a piece of junk.

They trotted off to Assyria:

Why, even wild donkeys stick to their own kind,

but donkey-Ephraim goes out andpaysto get lovers.

Now, because of their whoring life among the pagans,

I’m going to gather them together and confront them.

They’re going to reap the consequences soon,

feel what it’s like to be oppressed by the big king.

11-14 “Ephraim has built a lot of altars,

and then uses them for sinning.

Can you believe it? Altars for sinning!

I write out my revelation for them in detail

and they pretend they can’t read it.

They offer sacrifices to me

and then they feast on the meat.

Godis not pleased!

I’m fed up—I’ll keep remembering their guilt.

I’ll punish their sins

and send them back to Egypt.

Israel has forgotten his Maker

and gotten busy making palaces.

Judah has gone in for a lot of fortress cities.

I’m sending fire on their cities

to burn down their fortifications.”

—https://d1b84921e69nmq.cloudfront.net/85/32k/HOS/8-b3bfafe83d666b1485f51bdffc696e89.mp3?version_id=97—

Starved for God

1-6 Don’t waste your life in wild orgies, Israel.

Don’t party away your life with the heathen.

You walk away from your God at the drop of a hat

and like a whore sell yourself promiscuously

at every sex-and-religion party on the street.

All that party food won’t fill you up.

You’ll end up hungrier than ever.

At this rate you’ll not last long inGod’s land:

Some of you are going to end up bankrupt in Egypt.

Some of you will be disillusioned in Assyria.

As refugees in Egypt and Assyria,

you won’t have much chance to worshipGod—

Sentenced to rations of bread and water,

and your souls polluted by the spirit-dirty air.

You’ll be starved forGod,

exiled fromGod’s own country.

Will you be homesick for the old Holy Days?

Will you miss festival worship ofGod?

Be warned! When you escape from the frying pan of disaster,

you’ll fall into the fire of Egypt.

Egypt will give you a fine funeral!

What use will all your god-inspired silver be then

as you eke out a living in a field of weeds?

7-9 Time’s up. Doom’s at the doorstep.

It’s payday!

Did Israel bluster, “The prophet is crazy!

The ‘man of the Spirit’ is nuts!”?

Think again. Because of your great guilt,

you’re in big trouble.

The prophet is looking out for Ephraim,

working under God’s orders.

But everyone is trying to trip him up.

He’s hated right in God’s house, of all places.

The people are going from bad to worse,

rivaling that ancient and unspeakable crime at Gibeah.

God’s keeping track of their guilt.

He’ll make them pay for their sins.

They Took to Sin Like a Pig to Filth

10-13 “Long ago when I came upon Israel,

it was like finding grapes out in the desert.

When I found your ancestors, it was like finding

a fig tree bearing fruit for the first time.

But when they arrived at Baal-peor, that pagan shrine,

they took to sin like a pig to filth,

wallowing in the mud with their newfound friends.

Ephraim is fickle and scattered, like a flock of blackbirds,

their beauty dissipated in confusion and clamor,

Frenetic and noisy, frigid and barren,

and nothing to show for it—neither conception nor childbirth.

Even if they did give birth, I’d declare them

unfit parents and take away their children!

Yes indeed—a black day for them

when I turn my back and walk off!

I see Ephraim letting his children run wild.

He might just as well take them and kill them outright!”

14 Give it to them,God! But what?

Give them a dried-up womb and shriveled breasts.

15-16 “All their evil came out into the open

at the pagan shrine at Gilgal. Oh, how I hated them there!

Because of their evil practices,

I’ll kick them off my land.

I’m wasting no more love on them.

Their leaders are a bunch of rebellious adolescents.

Ephraim is hit hard—

roots withered, no more fruit.

Even if by some miracle they had children,

the dear babies wouldn’t live—I’d make sure of that!”

17 My God has washed his hands of them.

They wouldn’t listen.

They’re doomed to be wanderers,

vagabonds among the godless nations.

—https://d1b84921e69nmq.cloudfront.net/85/32k/HOS/9-1551f6ea9f0a138eaedc807eecd46eee.mp3?version_id=97—

You Thought You Could Do It All on Your Own

1-2 Israel was once a lush vine,

bountiful in grapes.

The more lavish the harvest,

the more promiscuous the worship.

The more money they got,

the more they squandered on gods-in-their-own-image.

Their sweet smiles are sheer lies.

They’re guilty as sin.

God will smash their worship shrines,

pulverize their god-images.

3-4 They go around saying,

“Who needs a king?

We couldn’t care less aboutGod,

so why bother with a king?

What difference would he make?”

They talk big,

lie through their teeth,

make deals.

But their high-sounding words

turn out to be empty words, litter in the gutters.

5-6 The people of Samaria travel over to Crime City

to worship the golden calf-god.

They go all out, prancing and hollering,

taken in by their showmen priests.

They act so important around the calf-god,

but are oblivious to the sham, the shame.

They have plans to take it to Assyria,

present it as a gift to the great king.

And so Ephraim makes a fool of himself,

disgraces Israel with his stupid idols.

7-8 Samaria is history. Its king

is a dead branch floating down the river.

Israel’s favorite sin centers

will all be torn down.

Thistles and crabgrass

will decorate their ruined altars.

Then they’ll say to the mountains, “Bury us!”

and to the hills, “Fall on us!”

9-10 You got your start in sin at Gibeah—

that ancient, unspeakable, shocking sin—

And you’ve been at it ever since.

And Gibeah will mark the end of it

in a war to end all the sinning.

I’ll come to teach them a lesson.

Nations will gang up on them,

Making them learn the hard way

the sum of Gibeah plus Gibeah.

11-15 Ephraim was a trained heifer

that loved to thresh.

Passing by and seeing her strong, sleek neck,

I wanted to harness Ephraim,

Put Ephraim to work in the fields—

Judah plowing, Jacob harrowing:

Sow righteousness,

reap love.

It’s time to till the ready earth,

it’s time to dig in withGod,

Until he arrives

with righteousness ripe for harvest.

But instead you plowed wicked ways,

reaped a crop of evil and ate a salad of lies.

You thought you could do it all on your own,

flush with weapons and manpower.

But the volcano of war will erupt among your people.

All your defense posts will be leveled

As viciously as king Shalman

leveled the town of Beth-arba,

When mothers and their babies

were smashed on the rocks.

That’s what’s ahead for you, you so-called people of God,

because of your off-the-charts evil.

Some morning you’re going to wake up

and find Israel, king and kingdom, a blank—nothing.

—https://d1b84921e69nmq.cloudfront.net/85/32k/HOS/10-b69686e7c6bfd82695ec35cebc66c494.mp3?version_id=97—

Israel Played at Religion with Toy Gods

1-9 “When Israel was only a child, I loved him.

I called out, ‘My son!’—called him out of Egypt.

But when others called him,

he ran off and left me.

He worshiped the popular sex gods,

he played at religion with toy gods.

Still, I stuck with him. I led Ephraim.

I rescued him from human bondage,

But he never acknowledged my help,

never admitted that I was the one pulling his wagon,

That I lifted him, like a baby, to my cheek,

that I bent down to feed him.

Now he wants to gobackto Egypt or go over to Assyria—

anything but return to me!

That’s why his cities are unsafe—the murder rate skyrockets

and every plan to improve things falls to pieces.

My people are hell-bent on leaving me.

They pray to god Baal for help.

He doesn’t lift a finger to help them.

But how can I give up on you, Ephraim?

How can I turn you loose, Israel?

How can I leave you to be ruined like Admah,

devastated like luckless Zeboim?

I can’t bear to even think such thoughts.

My insides churn in protest.

And so I’m not going to act on my anger.

I’m not going to destroy Ephraim.

And why? Because I am God and not a human.

I’m The Holy One and I’m here—in your very midst.

10-12 “The people will end up followingGod.

I will roar like a lion—

Oh, how I’ll roar!

My frightened children will come running from the west.

Like frightened birds they’ll come from Egypt,

from Assyria like scared doves.

I’ll move them back into their homes.”

God’s Word!

Soul-Destroying Lies

Ephraim tells lies right and left.

Not a word of Israel can be trusted.

Judah, meanwhile, is no better,

addicted to cheap gods.

—https://d1b84921e69nmq.cloudfront.net/85/32k/HOS/11-f86cf3395b3400888dcef9fef81cba90.mp3?version_id=97—

1-5 Ephraim, obsessed with god-fantasies,

chases ghosts and phantoms.

He tells lies nonstop,

soul-destroying lies.

Both Ephraim and Judah made deals with Assyria

and tried to get an inside track with Egypt.

Godis bringing charges against Israel.

Jacob’s children are hauled into court to be punished.

In the womb, that heel, Jacob, got the best of his brother.

When he grew up, he tried to get the best ofGod.

ButGodwould not be bested.

Godbested him.

Brought to his knees,

Jacob wept and prayed.

Godfound him at Bethel.

That’s where he spoke with him.

GodisGod-of-the-Angel-Armies,

God-Revealed,God-Known.

6 What are you waiting for? Return to your God!

Commit yourself in love, in justice!

Wait for your God,

and don’t give up on him—ever!

7-8 The businessmen engage in wholesale fraud.

They love to rip people off!

Ephraim boasted, “Look, I’m rich!

I’ve made it big!

And look how well I’ve covered my tracks:

not a hint of fraud, not a sign of sin!”

9-11 “But not so fast! I’mGod,yourGod!

Your God from the days in Egypt!

I’m going to put you back to living in tents,

as in the old days when you worshiped in the wilderness.

I speak through the prophets

to give clear pictures of the way things are.

Using prophets, I tell revealing stories.

I show Gilead rampant with religious scandal

and Gilgal teeming with empty-headed religion.

I expose their worship centers as

stinking piles of garbage in their gardens.”

12-14 Are you going to repeat the life of your ancestor Jacob?

He ran off guilty to Aram,

Then sold his soul to get ahead,

and made it big through treachery and deceit.

Your real identity is formed through God-sent prophets,

who led you out of Egypt and served as faithful pastors.

As it is, Ephraim has continually

and inexcusably insulted God.

Now he has to pay for his life-destroying ways.

His Master will do to him whathehas done.

—https://d1b84921e69nmq.cloudfront.net/85/32k/HOS/12-c9ee25a6a52bd550ac02d23daecbd0a7.mp3?version_id=97—

Religion Customized to Taste

1-3 God once let loose against Ephraim

a terrifying sentence against Israel:

Caught and convicted

in the lewd sex-worship of Baal—they died!

And now they’re back in the sin business again,

manufacturing god-images they can use,

Religion customized to taste. Professionals see to it:

Anything you want in a god you can get.

Can you believe it? They sacrifice live babies to these dead gods—

kill living babies and kiss golden calves!

And now there’s nothing left to these people:

hollow men, desiccated women,

Like scraps of paper blown down the street,

like smoke in a gusty wind.

4-6 “I’m still yourGod,

the God who saved you out of Egypt.

I’m the only real God you’ve ever known.

I’m the one and only God who delivers.

I took care of you during the wilderness hard times,

those years when you had nothing.

I took care of you, took care of all your needs,

gave you everything you needed.

You were spoiled. You thought you didn’t need me.

You forgot me.

7-12 “I’ll charge them like a lion,

like a leopard stalking in the brush.

I’ll jump them like a sow grizzly robbed of her cubs.

I’ll rip out their guts.

Coyotes will make a meal of them.

Crows will clean their bones.

I’m going to destroy you, Israel.

Who is going to stop me?

Where is your trusty king you thought would save you?

Where are all the local leaders you wanted so badly?

All these rulers you insisted on having,

demanding, ‘Give me a king! Give me leaders!’?

Well, long ago I gave you a king, but I wasn’t happy about it.

Now, fed up, I’ve gotten rid of him.

I have a detailed record of your infidelities—

Ephraim’s sin documented and stored in a safe-deposit box.

13-15 “When birth pangs signaled it was time to be born,

Ephraim was too stupid to come out of the womb.

When the passage into life opened up,

he didn’t show.

Shall I intervene and pull them into life?

Shall I snatch them from a certain death?

Who is afraid of you, Death?

Who cares about your threats, Tomb?

In the end I’m abolishing regret,

banishing sorrow,

Even though Ephraim ran wild,

the black sheep of the family.

15-16 “God’s tornado is on its way,

roaring out of the desert.

It will devastate the country,

leaving a trail of ruin and wreckage.

The cities will be gutted,

dear possessions gone for good.

Now Samaria has to face the charges

because she has rebelled against her God:

Her people will be killed, babies smashed on the rocks,

pregnant women ripped open.”

—https://d1b84921e69nmq.cloudfront.net/85/32k/HOS/13-4acc4d688e0b67c8feeb773bde0784c2.mp3?version_id=97—

Come Back! Return to Your God!

1-3 O Israel, come back! Return to yourGod!

You’re down but you’re not out.

Prepare your confession

and come back toGod.

Pray to him, “Take away our sin,

accept our confession.

Receive as restitution

our repentant prayers.

Assyria won’t save us;

horses won’t get us where we want to go.

We’ll never again say ‘our god’

to something we’ve made or made up.

You’re our last hope. Is it not true

that in you the orphan finds mercy?”

4-8 “I will heal their waywardness.

I will love them lavishly. My anger is played out.

I will make a fresh start with Israel.

He’ll burst into bloom like a crocus in the spring.

He’ll put down deep oak tree roots,

he’ll become a forest of oaks!

He’ll become splendid—like a giant sequoia,

his fragrance like a grove of cedars!

Those who live near him will be blessed by him,

be blessed and prosper like golden grain.

Everyone will be talking about them,

spreading their fame as the vintage children of God.

Ephraim is finished with gods that are no-gods.

From now on I’m the one who answers and satisfies him.

I am like a luxuriant fruit tree.

Everything you need is to be found in me.”

9 If you want to live well,

make sure you understand all of this.

If you know what’s good for you,

you’ll learn this inside and out.

God’s paths get you where you want to go.

Right-living people walk them easily;

wrong-living people are always tripping and stumbling.

—https://d1b84921e69nmq.cloudfront.net/85/32k/HOS/14-9b1beb07a762b5d10fefad7b5e09bcc5.mp3?version_id=97—