As we make our way back into Hosea this morning,

Let’s remember the passion running through the entire book
- it isn’t what we’re likely to feel when reading the bare words
• what it sounds like, is the ranting of an enraged deity
◦ but that is not the correct tone of voice
• if God were like one of the pagan deities of mid mid-east or Greece,
◦ he wouldn’t bother to rage at his rebellious people,
◦ he would just annihilate them
- this prophetic book, in fact, is the message of a wounded lover
• a husband who’s been disrespected, betrayed, and discarded
◦ yet for all that, he continues to try to reason with his wife
◦ he is not ready to give up, and he will not let Israel go
• so, we are not hearing the voice of anger, but of heartbreak