Bible Commentaries
Hosea 7

Verse 8

THE UNTURNED CAKE

‘Ephraim is a cake not turned.’

Hosea 7:8

Scripture is less a book for the schools than for the home. It is more colloquial than scientific; its terms are less technical than popular; and its figures are less ornate than homely and expressive.

We have an example here. ‘Ephraim is a cake not turned’ is a voice for the million. The character represented in this figure is legible to all. As the cake not turned is a compound not equable, as it is both underdone and overdone, clammy in part and blistered in part, so it denotes a type of character at once distempered and untempered, a character that lacks unity, that is spoiled by defect and damaged by excess, an inconsistent whole upon which, whichever way you view it, the result is marred.

I. The grounds of this impeachment.—Note a few of the more important.

(1) The first we see in the eighth verse taken as a whole: Ephraim has missed the grand practical design of religion, which is entire separation unto God.

There are many unturned cakes to-day from the same cause—many persons who seek, like Ephraim, to combine in themselves contradictory qualities.

(2) A second ground for this impeachment is seen in the indisposition of Ephraim to look to God, to call upon Him, to count on Him as the grand unit of power against the enemy. There is a vein of extreme pathos in Jehovah’s plaint, Hosea 7:7, ‘There is none among them that calleth upon Me’; and in Hosea 7:11 He adds, ‘They call to Egypt; they go to Assyria.’ These Ephraimites kept their religion for ceremonies and state occasions; it was not an everyday working religion. It was to them a kind of etiquette; it was not to them a practical stay and support. They had a notional knowledge of God, but they did not seek after an experimental knowledge of Him.

The man to whom God is a notion, even though it be a venerated notion and not a practical resource, is the same, an unturned cake. We are not to be unmanned by trouble; still less are we to make an arm of flesh our trust. No; we are to turn the cake. We are to meet emergency by trust, and danger by faith.

(3) Another ground of Ephraim’s impeachment was pride. We see this in Hosea 7:10: ‘The pride of Israel testifieth to His face.’ Now, pride is always a one-sided and, therefore, spiritually false thing. Pride is based on fleshly comparison. No one could be proud who saw himself in the Divine light.

(4) A still further ground of Ephraim’s impeachment lay in their licentious and inordinate use of temporal things. Heated by wine, they were carried, in various directions, into intemperate excess. There is no harm that you take your dinner with a relish, that you enjoy what God gives. But if in these outward things your soul’s essential gratification is found, then you are an unturned cake. There is a possibility of ruining the cake through self-indulgence. If Paul stood in awe of such a catastrophe, no less should we. Cultivate delight in the Lord, that sordid appetite may be kept in check with inflexible rein.

II. The teachings that underlie Ephraim’s impeachment.—These teachings strongly emphasise:—

(1) The need of a proper balance of character.

(2) Once more, the teachings in question strongly emphasise the need of a proper balance of truth.

(3) In conclusion, the general drift of the whole subject suggests to our mind the need of a correspondence between what Christ has done for us and what He is doing in us by His Spirit. To be well baked we need the Cross of Christ translated into experience.

Illustration

‘It is the specimen of many. Into one side of him the penetrating leaven, the transforming fire, has not carried the force of grace. As an old Puritan puts it: “Their cake is dough: it will never serve for bread at God’s board.” ’

Verse 9

UNCONSCIOUS DEGENERATION

( For the New Year)

‘Gray hairs are here and there upon him, yet he knoweth not.’

Hosea 7:9

The first Sunday of another year.—A new year with new possibilities. Let us pause beside the milestone, and turn our thoughts inward; cast up our life’s accounts and balances, and see how they stand with God. We have been taking stock in business, remembering our friends, forming plans and purposes for a new year. Let us take stock of our character. Other things we must some day leave behind; our characters we must take with us. How, then, do they stand? Are they stronger, or are there signs of deterioration, grey hairs here and there upon them, though we know it not?

I. First of all, let us note this: most religious deterioration is unconscious deterioration.—It takes years for a lava stream to change from a fiery torrent into the hard blocks which we cannot cut with steel. So with character. Our strength does not slip away in a night; we do not wake up to find it gone. It ebbs away so gradually that we scarcely know it is going. We scarcely see the coming of the grey hairs. Or look at it in another way. The fear for the members of a Confirmation Class is not lest we should become prodigal sons, claiming our portion, and slipping off to the far country. The fear is rather lest in the stress of business, the whirl of life, we unconsciously deteriorate; not so much the deliberate choice of evil, as this: “While thy servant was busy here and there it was gone!” This is the danger, a gradual but unconscious religious weakening and degeneration. And all the forces of modern life make for this unconscious weakening; the stress of life, the difficulty of Christian fellowship, or of getting into the desert place with Jesus.

II. Nothing is more common than this unconscious degeneration.—Our fathers talked much of backsliding. The word has gone out. There is not much backsliding among our members in the old sense. Our position prevents us. Our duties to our family, church, etc., prevent us. But there is nothing to prevent and ban unconscious degeneration. The world will never know—at least, we think so,—if we have less joy in prayer, less diligence in the study of the Bible, less enthusiasm, if Christ’s presence is more nebulous, if the witness of the Spirit less vivid. And so the unconscious degeneration goes on, grey hairs here and there upon us, and, alas! we know it not.

III. How are we to know whether there is degeneration?—If there is no advance, then we may be certain there is degeneration, though unconscious. In the world of life there is no such thing as balance. Whatever ceases to progress drops back. Illustrations from your garden, business, etc., will occur to all. So with the character. There is no possible balance and standstill. When progress ceases degeneration begins.

IV. This, therefore, is the question to ask ourselves this new year: are we progressing?—If no growth, then the grey hairs are here and there. Where there is no development there must be degeneration, however unconscious; and the very unconsciousness of it one of its dangers. Let us, therefore examine ourselves, and in that spirit enter once more into our solemn covenant with God.