Hosea 14:1-6

A Plea to Return to the Lord

1 ¹Return, O Israel, to the LORD your God, for ²you have stumbled because of your iniquity.

2 Take with you words and return to the LORD; say to him, "Take away all iniquity; accept ³what is good, and we will pay with bulls ⁴the vows^[a] of our lips.

3 ⁵Assyria shall not save us; ⁶we will not ride on horses; and ⁷we will say no more, 'Our God,' to the work of our hands. ⁸In you the orphan finds mercy."

4 I ⁹will heal their apostasy; ¹⁰I will love them freely, for my anger has turned from them.

5 ¹¹I will be like the dew to Israel; ¹²he shall blossom like the lily; he shall take root like the trees ¹³of Lebanon;

6 his shoots shall spread out; his beauty shall be ¹⁴like the olive, and his fragrance like Lebanon.

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Hosea 14:1-6 Meaning and Commentary

INTRODUCTION TO HOSEA 14

This chapter concludes the book, with gracious promises to repenting sinners, to returning backsliders. It begins with an exhortation to Israel to return to the Lord, seeing he was their God, and they had fallen by sin from prosperity into adversity, temporal and spiritual, Ho 14:1; and they are directed what to say to the Lord, upon their return to him, both by way of petition, and of promise and of resolution how to behave for the future, encouraged by his grace and mercy, Ho 14:2,3; and they are told what the Lord, by way of answer, would say to them, Ho 14:4; and what he would be to them; and what blessings of grace he would bestow on them; and in what flourishing and fruitful circumstances they should be, Ho 14:5-8; and the chapter ends with a character of such that attend to and understand those things; and with a recommendation of the ways of the Lord, which are differently regarded by men, Ho 14:9.

Taken from John Gill's Exposition of the Bible

Cross References 14

1. Hosea 6:1; Hosea 12:6; [Hosea 3:5]
2. [Hosea 13:9]
3. [Hosea 5:15]
4. Hebrews 13:15; [Psalms 50:13, 14; Psalms 69:30, 31]
5. Hosea 5:13
6. [Isaiah 30:16; Isaiah 31:1]
7. [ver. 8]
8. See Psalms 10:14
9. Jeremiah 3:22; [Hosea 6:1]
10. [Hosea 11:1]
11. [Hosea 6:3]
12. Isaiah 27:6
13. [Psalms 92:12; Isaiah 35:2]
14. Psalms 52:8

Footnotes 1

[a]. Septuagint, Syriac pay the fruit

The English Standard Version is published with the permission of Good News Publishers.