Hosea 7

We pretend to hear what God says, and our mind is quite upon another thing. We present God with our bodies, but do not give him our hearts (Hosea 7:11). This hypocrisy God complains of (Isaiah 29:13): This people draw near me with their mouth, and with their lips do honor me, bu…

Adultery is the reigning sin of the times. (Hosea 7:4) They are all adulterers, as an oven heated by the baker. The time of King Henry the 8th was called the Golden Age, but this may be called the unclean age, wherein whore-hunting is common.

God may remove the golden candlestick from us as he did from the churches of Asia. We have many sad symptoms, gray hairs are here and there upon us (Hosea 7:9), therefore let us lay hold upon the present season; they that sleep in seedtime will beg in harvest. 8. If you would go…

When the Devil's darts are most fiery, a saint's love to God is most fervent. 3. By temptation God tries our courage (Hosea 7:11): Ephraim is a silly dove without a heart. So it may be said of many, they are excordes, without a heart — they have no heart to resist a temptation,…

The sacrifice of the wicked is an abomination to the Lord, but the prayer of the upright is his delight. A sinner's praying is howling (Hosea 7:14), but the prayer of a righteous man is music in God's ears (Song of Solomon 2:14). Let me hear your voice for sweet is your voice.

Is there any of you, but in sickness, or under some other sad cross, or at a Communion, you have had your own convictions, challenges, and frights about your soul's estate? and yet you have smothered, extinguished, and put them out again. A seventh ground or cause (which is as l…

And Jehoshaphat (2 Chronicles 20:12): O our God, will you not judge them? In prayer consider what claim and interest you have to God, if you be a son, and he a Father: Bastards cannot pray; strangers without the Covenant, and Heathen, having no right to God as their God and Fath…

In fact, did you not do it to yourselves? (Hosea 7:14) They have not cried to me with their heart, when they howled upon their beds. Did you desire in your prayers to bring in any service to God, to tend to his honor and glory?

The Body of one that was born a perfect Child, may fail of exact Proportion through Distemper, and the Weakness and Wounds of some of its Members; yet the Disproportion is in no Measure like that of those that are born Monsters. It is with Hypocrites, as it was with Ephraim of o…

The Prophet Hosea reproves the like. Strangers (says he) have devoured his strength and he knows it not, indeed gray hairs are here and there upon him and he knows it not (Hosea 7:9). That is, he is in an afflicted, in a declining condition, and yet he lays it not to heart.

This God will make them sensible of. Though I have redeemed them, says God, yet they have spoken lyes against me, Hosea 7:15. So Chap.

This shows what a believer should be, and who deserves this name. The condition of this Dove is, that she is in the clefts of the rocks, and in the secret places of the stairs: It is ordinary for doves to hide themselves in rocks, or holes in walls of houses; And this similitude…

3. For him, holds out, 1. The procuring cause of this trouble, that it was for wronging of Christ, and the slighting of so kind a husband and friend, that stounded her at the heart above all, as (Zechariah 12:10), They shall look on him whom they have pierced, and mourn for him.…

First, there is a jocular lie; a lie framed to excite mirth and laughter, and deceive the hearer, only to please and divert him. This, though it may seem very harmless, to deceive men into mirth and recreation; yet truth is such an awful and severe thing, that it ought not to be…

This may be one sin that has brought down such fearful judgments upon the city; we read of twenty and four thousand men that fell in one day by the plague, for the sin of fornication (Numbers 15:9), and have not many thousand inhabitants and habitations of London fallen for this…

Wells without Water, that do but cheat the thirsty Traveller, 2 Peter 2. 13. A deceitful Bow, that appears good, but fails the Archer, Psalm 78. 57. Hosea 7. 16. Mr. Stoddard, in his Appeal to the learned, from Time to Time supposes all visible Saints who are not truly pious, to…

Secondly, it should teach the godly to be accurate in their way: you live amongst those that will observe you, and cast filth on your faces, take heed you give no just occasion; it is enough we shall suffer without any just cause, let us take heed they take no filth out of our o…

We read 2 Kings 2:23 when Elisha went to Bethel, there came forth little children out of the city and mocked him, and said unto him, Go up you bald head, go up you bald head; that is observable, they came out of Bethel, which was that idolatrous city in Israel, where the Calf of…

The business in hand being to awake the whole man unto a consideration of the state and condition wherein he is, that he might be brought home to God; instead hereof, he sets himself to mortify the sin that galls him; which is a pure issue of self-love, to be freed from his trou…

Many carry themselves well in one condition, but quite miscarry in another. As Ephraim was as a cake not turned, baked on the one side (Hosea 7:8), quite dough on the other. Or as it is said of Joab (1 Kings 2:28), he turned after Adonijah, though he turned not after Absalom.

The reasons why we are to mingle praises and thanksgiving with our requests, are these; 1. Because this complies more with the great end of worship; which is not so much the relief of man, as the honor of God; therefore we should not only intend the supply of our necessities, fo…

The obtaining of natural good is put in the last place. And therefore when our thoughts only run upon temporal felicity, and outward supplies, it is not prayer, but a brutish cry: (Hosea 7:14) They howl upon their beds for corn, wine and oil. Beasts are sensible of their pain, a…

The sin of Iudah is written with a Pen of Iron and the Point of a Diamond. God scores down every act of Oppression, Bribery, Uncleanness, Hosea 7:2. They consider not in their Heart, that I remember all their wickedness.

Of all by-ends this is the worst and basest — Jesus Christ is scarcely loved for Jesus's sake. Yet further, those that prayed to God for corn, wine, and oil, and did not seek his favor and grace in the first place — see what the Lord says of them (Hosea 7:14): "They have not cri…

When we come to God we are earnest for other things. Hosea 7:14: They howl upon their beds for corn and wine. If anything be sought from God above God, more than God, and not for God, it is but a brutish cry.

So (Ezekiel 24:12). She has wearied herself with lies, and her scum went not forth out of her, speaking of her promises, when the pot was over the fire there seemed to be offers to throw off the scum, but she has wearied herself with lies. And in this sense it is said (Hosea 7:1…

Now the reasons of this: They which have their hearts set upon holiness, must have delight. A man whose heart is set upon earthly things will come and howl for corn, wine, and oil, outward enjoyments (Hosea 7). And a man that makes a loose profession of religion would fain be fe…

They consider not that they do evil. So (Hosea 7:2), they consider not in their hearts, that I remember all their wickedness. That which we consider, is always before us; but that which we consider not, is forgotten, laid by, and the notions which we have about them are as it we…

The one makes way for the other. God is resolved to govern the world by this rule, therefore he does authorize it, own it by the dispensations of his providence; accordingly the world learns to reverence it; (Hosea 7:12) I will chastise them as their congregation has heard. God'…

Is it God himself? To seek to God and not for God, is but a carnal design upon God (Hosea 7:14), They howl upon their beds for corn, and wine, and oil. They are but brutish desires that terminate in other things, that are carried out more after them, than God's favor and grace:…

Every man prays according to the sense that he has, according to that which he counts his misery. He that has a sense of no other calamity but to be poor, scorned, or exposed to contempt, or the absence of the creature, prays accordingly, sometimes he howls like a dog in pain, o…

2. You will provoke God to use a rougher dispensation, when the persuasions of the Word, and the strivings of the Spirit cannot bring you to repentance. They will not be won by arguments; God teaches them by blows, as Gideon did the men of Succoth by briers and thorns: therefore…

1. Your own faith will be confirmed by it, when you see that God is as good as his word, and bestows upon us the utmost that any promise of his gives us to hope for: it is dictum factum with God, he is no more liberal in word than in deed. Look as it confirms our faith in the tr…

I know how to be abased, and how to abound — everywhere, and in all things I am instructed. Unless the Lord guide us, we shall be as Ephraim was, a cake not turned (Hosea 7:8), baked but on one side, quite dough and raw on the other side — failing in the next condition, though p…

So (Romans 1:18) you have this general a little more specified, God has not only taken notice of the first Table, but of the second: The wrath of God is revealed from heaven, not only against all ungodliness, but unrighteousness of men, etc. God from heaven has owned both Tables…

First, When reformation is rejected, and corruptions are settling again upon their own base. (Hosea 7:1) When I would have healed Israel, then the iniquity of Ephraim was discovered, etc. (Ezekiel 24:13) In your filthiness is lewdness, because I have purged you, and you were not…

2 Sinners are not only like to beasts in the general, but they are like the worst of beasts, such as in Scripture are called evil and hurtful beasts: sinners are not likened to the dove or the sheep, the harmless creatures, but to lions, tigers, boars and bears, etc. the ill-nat…

2 Another, and no less misery hereupon is, that God hears not his prayers, as it follows in that aforementioned text (Isaiah 59:2), and so it attends the hiding of God's face (Isaiah 1:15). God is a God hearing prayers, but sin shuts out our shouting, and the prayers of the wick…

In the ground from which they arise; that inquiry which comes in truth from a heart genuinely broken, it issues from the filth and poison of his sin, which puts the thoughts of a sinner beyond his compass, as not able to conceive, and the heart beyond his hopes, as not able to u…

The prayer of God's children is as sweet to him as music. A wicked man's prayer is as the howling of a dog (Hosea 7:14). The prayer of the saints is as the singing of a bird; the finger of God's Spirit touching the strings of their hearts, they make melody to the Lord.

And when you commest and prayest earnestly, when some great crosse is on you, in some great exigent, in the day of death, in the time of your sicknesse; know, that though you pray neuer so feruently, although you adde fasting to quicken it, yet it is doubtful whether it bee acce…

(2) We take not heed to the young births of the heart; with the concurrence of the mind, fancy and imagination, there are multitudes of forgeries, clay-pots, and imaginations framed, as a potter devises vessels of earth of many quantities, figures, shapes, great, small, narrow,…

To lose the Gospel, were far worse than to have our City Charter taken from us. Gray hairs are here and there, (Hosea 7:9). I will not say the Sun of the Gospel is set in England, but I am sure it is under a cloud.

The repenting Prodigal did not only leave his Harlots, but did arise and go to his Father. It was Gods complaint, (Hosea 7:16). They return, but not to the most High.

10. A spiritual prayer is, when we have spiritual ends in prayer: There is a vast difference between a spiritual prayer, and a carnal desire; the ends of a Hypocrite are secular and carnal; he looks asquint in prayer; it is not the sense of his spiritual wants that moves him, bu…

How many are of a dull, lukewarm temper, zealous for their own secular interest, but have no zeal for the things of heaven; hot in their own cause, but cool in God's. The Lord does most abominate lukewarm professors, I had almost said, he is sick of them, Revelation 3:15: I woul…

Men may be mighty Earnest and Intent in their minds, in praying for a Dear Relation, or for Deliverance from Eminent Troubles, or Imminent Dangers; and yet all this Fervour arise from the vehement Actings of Natural Affections about the things prayed for, excited in an especial…

First, the designs and true aims of men's hearts in duty will tell them what they are. A hypocrite aims low (Hosea 7:14): 'They have not cried unto me with their heart when they howled upon their beds; they assembled themselves for corn and wine, and they rebel against me.' It i…

Take a natural man, and tell him that if ever he be saved, it is by Christ's blood; tell him how much he has sinned against the blood of Christ, and the spirit of grace, the Sacraments, the chastisements, the mercies of God, this no more sinks into him, than rain into the nether…

Their prayers and solemn meetings — hateful, loathsome, impious (Isaiah 1:13-15). For either they are but the howlings of [reconstructed: af]flicted men, that cry out for pain, but not out of love (Hosea 7:14), or the babbling of careless and secure men, that cry Lord, Lord, and…