Marry Whom?

Scripture Reading: Hosea 1

I recall vividly a conversation I had with a young man after I had just preached on the first few verses of Hosea chapter one. He caught me in the aisle between the pews as I was making my way toward the back of the church. He is a good young man. Smart. Loves Jesus. His father was a pastor. He knows the Bible. He disagreed with my interpretation of Hosea’s marriage to Gomer. That is understandable.

There is a divide among biblical scholars and students about whether or not Gomer was a sexually immoral person before her marriage to Hosea. Some say she was. Others believe she became sexually immoral only after the marriage. Those who contend she wasn’t a prostitute before her marriage to Hosea base their argument on the idea that God wouldn’t command Hosea to marry someone who had that kind of moral baggage.

That is, in my opinion, a weak argument. The text clearly says she was a “wife of whoredom.” More importantly, the analogy that was being drawn was between Hosea/the Lord, and Gomer/Israel. Abraham, you might remember, was called out of pagan idolatry to serve the living God. In other words, God’s wife (Israel) became His bride out of whoredom (idolatry).

What I appreciated about this young man’s response was the way he felt scandalized by my interpretation. “You can’t believe a holy God would not only allow such a thing but also command it, would you?” Yes, I do believe that. Because that is what God has done in bringing us into the church, which is the bride of Christ.

Christ’s bride is made up of former spiritual whores. Does that word shock you? Does it offend? Does it scandalize? If you feel a little of that – good. It might help you understand a little better where the scribes and Pharisees of Jesus’ day were coming from and how they felt when they watched Jesus sit down for lunch with sinners. It was how Hosea’s parents might have felt when he took Gomer’s hand in marriage.

After you get over the scandal part of it, I hope you will try to grasp the monumental grace of what this act pictures for us. Christ wasn’t taking a beautiful bride; He is making one. He isn’t getting a pure, chaste virgin; He is creating one. When Christ saved you, He wasn’t noticing all of your good points and virtues and calculating that they would outweigh the negatives. He was doing what Hosea did.

That is grace. Let it scandalize you for a moment. Then let it amaze you forever.

Photo by Jeremy Wong Weddings on Unsplash