1The Lord talked to the prophet Hosea, son of Beeri. It was the time when 4 kings ruled in Judah, one king after the other. They were Uzziah, Jotham, Ahaz and Hezekiah. At that time Jeroboam was the king_of_Israel. He was the son of Jehoash.
You are not my people anymore
2The Lord started to talk to Hosea and He said: ‘You must get married to a prostitute and have children with her. Your wife will be unfaithful to you, because all the people in the land are also unfaithful to the Lord.’
3Hosea went and he got married to Gomer. Gomer was the daughter of Diblaim. Gomer became pregnant and she had a son for Hosea.
4The Lord said to Hosea: ‘You must give your son the name of Jezreel because the time is near when I am going to punish the descendants of King Jehu. I will punish them, because they have killed a lot of people in the town of Jezreel. I will take away their king and the land_of_Israel will no longer have a king.
5On that day I will call enemies to come and make war_against Israel and they will defeat the Israelites in the Jezreel Valley.’
6Gomer became pregnant again and she had a daughter. The Lord said: ‘You must give her the name of Lo-Ruhamah, because I will never show love to the people of Israel again. No, I will take them away from their land. Yes, I am going to do it.
7But I will show love to the people of Judah. I am the Lord their God and I will save them. I will not do it with weapons and war, or with soldiers on horses.’
8Gomer's daughter, Lo-Ruhamah, grew up and later she did not drink milk from her mother anymore. Gomer then became pregnant again and she had another son. 9The Lord said: ‘You must name this son Lo-Ammi, because you are not my people anymore and I am not your God anymore.’
You are my people
10‘But after many years
the Israelites will be as many as the grains of sand of the sea.
No one will be able to count them
or to measure how big the nation is.
Before, I said to them:
“You are not my people.”
But on that day people will say to them:
“You are the children of the living God.”
11Then the people of Judah
and the people of Israel
will come together and
they will become one nation again.
They will choose a leader
and they will take back their land.
Yes, on that day important things will happen in Jezreel.’
