Montgomery County sentinel. [volume] (Rockville, Md.) 1855-1974, 1950-05-04

the impression that Z
no other man could
have said this as
we'll as he; what he D'' Hole""
says is distilled from his own ex-
perience; he is not only a voice, he
is a heart. and you hear the mans
'heart-beats all through his words.
Now Hosea was this kind of prophet.
You might say that his experience
was the text of all his sermons.
And SO They Were Married
THE STORY of Hosea is in chap
! tiers 1-3. Experts in Old Testa-
ment study have never quite agreed
as to the meaning of the story. How
ever, the Interpretation which is Of
fered here is the one now held by
the majority of scholars.) II is the
story of Hosea'S marriage to girl
named Conner. If it was normal
marriage, he loved her with all his
heart, and his hopes for the future
were as bright as any young BRIDE
groom's could be. In time they had
a little boy named Jezreel.
Then came the second child,
q girl named Lo-Ruhamah. In
Hebrew, that name means mo
Mercy" What name for q lit
tie girl! But is II possible that
Hosea named her for her moth
er-not for her mothers name
but for her mothers character?
At all events, things were not
well In that home; indeed, 1t
soon ceased to be a home. For
when the third child was born,
: Hosea gave the boy the dread
I full name Of Lo-Ammi, No-Child-
of-Mine. ~atIf
! There was no use in pretending
any more. The home had collapsed,
happiness had fled. No experience
man can have is more bitter than
this, to know that the one great love
Of his life has been given to the
wrong woman But Conner vanished.
leaving Hosea as such a woman
would, to care for the three mother
less children. ffiffi}HIlfIi8lf Il
Home Again }i |5.i ,8lfl lt5ili
HoW MANY MONTHS or years
- later it was we do not know.
But one day, in the slave market,
Hosea saw a woman for sale. The
price was low Gas slaves went in
those days.; evidently few buyers
were expected. A half-price slave
would not attract attention from
most men, but Hosea looked twice
J. Yes, it was his Conner! Where
she had been, who had abused her,
made her slave, how many times
she had been sold and resold, no
one knows. But there she was.
Hosea might easily have stood
and laughed bitterly in her bedrag-
gled face. 1t serves her right, he
might have thought. The way of the
transgressor is hard, she made her
bed and now she can lie in it. JUS
tice has been done. / am avenged.
And with a parting curse he might
have gone his way.
Somehow beneath all the
shame and establishment, be-
meath the bitterness and the
pain, still the old love was burn
ing bright. Paying the small
price asked, he took Conner
home again. Love had conquered
evil.
Long before Christianity, Hosea
did that rarely Christian thing, he
did good to one who had done him
harm. Conner was unloving, unlov-
able; yet he loved her in spite Of all.
Sermons From the Heart
This BITTER EXPERIENCE God
i turned into a blessing, for Hosea
and for his nation and for US. In
our study next week we shall see
more Of what God taught Hosea
through these experiences.
But the first thing Hosea
learned was that the experience
was a lesson, Gods lesson. He
could even look back on the
tragedy Of his marriage and
see that God was leading him
all along, from the very first.
God knew what sort Of woman
Conner was and would be, yet
J he wished Hosea to marry her.
God intended that he should 60
through just those years.
Without the tragedy, he could not
have arrived at the truth. His SER
mons thenceforth came from the
depths of his heart. Hosea, like all
the prophets. denounced sin; like
all the prophets, he could see the
fatal effects of sin on his nation.
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