There some lessons we learn in life that are easy and quick to learn.  For the most part you only have to touch a hot stove once to get the point.  It might be a painful lesson but you learn the lesson real quick to never do that again.  Some are a lot harder to learn, despite numerous chances to get the hint on what to do or not to do.   That is the case with the lessons God will teach Israel thru the profit Hosea.  

God had reached the end of His immense patience with he chosen people of Israel. They had repeatedly over and over broke every last of one of God's top 10 rules for man.   How quick they were to forget all the wonderful things God did for them each and every day.  When they were obedient they lived in peace and prosperity.  But inevitably they would, as man still does to this day, slide into fat, dumb, and happy territory.  Satan is the mayor of fat, dumb, and happy territory. God decided he would try to reach his chosen people by holding a unique mirror up to the people of the land.  He would use the marriage and family relationships of his profit Hosea. 

God instructed Hosea to marry  a woman who God told him would be promiscuous and have children with her.  Can you imagine being on the receiving end of those instructions?  You want me to what Lord?  Wouldn't you look behind you and hope he was talking to someone else?  But when God says my ways are above yours and my thoughts are about yours He means it.  

 

Isaiah 55:9

“As the heavens are higher than the earth,
so are my ways higher than your ways
and my thoughts than your thoughts."

 

 

God wanted his beloved profit to allow his future pain and humiliation to be out front and public.  He wanted the profit to serve as a giant mirror to show the nation the error of their ways and warn of the punishment to come.  He wanted him in the midlist of his pain to plead with the nation to stop being promiscuous and flirting with other Gods.  He wanted his profit to show the people the parallel between Hosea and Gomer (his wife) and God and his chosen people.  To return to the one true God, the God of Abraham, Isaack, and Jacob.  All the while knowing it may be falling on deaf ears and that piper will be paid for services rendered.   

 

Here's a very good sermon on Hosea from Pastor Skip Heitzig;

http://skipheitzig.com/teachings_view.asp?ServiceID=4016&q=high