Hosea 12:11

I hate those who regard lying vanities, but I trust in Yahweh.

They won’t dwell in Yahweh’s land; but Ephraim will return to Egypt, and they will eat unclean food in Assyria.

Elijah was a man with a nature like ours, and he prayed earnestly that it might not rain, and it didn’t rain on the earth for three years and six months.

You shall surely destroy all the places in which the nations that you shall dispossess served their gods: on the high mountains, and on the hills, and under every green tree.

They rejected his statutes, and his covenant that he made with their fathers, and his testimonies which he testified to them; and they followed vanity, and became vain, and followed the nations that were around them, concerning whom Yahweh had commanded them that they should not do like them.

Behold, he withholds the waters, and they dry up. Again, he sends them out, and they overturn the earth.

Don’t let kindness and truth forsake you. Bind them around your neck. Write them on the tablet of your heart.

“For my people have committed two evils: they have forsaken me, the spring of living waters, and cut out cisterns for themselves: broken cisterns that can’t hold water.

Those who swear by the sin of Samaria, and say, ‘As your god, Dan, lives;’ and, ‘As the way of Beersheba lives;’ they will fall, and never rise up again.”

He will go before him in the spirit and power of Elijah, ‘to turn the hearts of the fathers to the children,’ and the disobedient to the wisdom of the just; to prepare a people prepared for the Lord.”

They have moved me to jealousy with that which is not God. They have provoked me to anger with their vanities. I will move them to jealousy with those who are not a people. I will provoke them to anger with a foolish nation.

He will say, “Where are their gods, the rock in which they took refuge;

Don’t turn away to go after vain things which can’t profit or deliver, for they are vain.

She said, “As Yahweh your God lives, I don’t have a cake, but a handful of meal in a jar, and a little oil in a jar. Behold, I am gathering two sticks, that I may go in and bake it for me and my son, that we may eat it, and die.”

After many days, Yahweh’s word came to Elijah, in the third year, saying, “Go, show yourself to Ahab; and I will send rain on the earth.”

Micaiah said, “As Yahweh lives, what Yahweh says to me, that I will speak.”

But Yahweh’s angel said to Elijah the Tishbite, “Arise, go up to meet the messengers of the king of Samaria, and tell them, ‘Is it because there is no God in Israel, that you go to inquire of Baal Zebub, the god of Ekron?

Elisha said, “As Yahweh of Armies lives, before whom I stand, surely, were it not that I respect the presence of Jehoshaphat the king of Judah, I would not look toward you, nor see you.

So they feared Yahweh, and also made from among themselves priests of the high places for themselves, who sacrificed for them in the houses of the high places.

He struck the Philistines to Gaza and its borders, from the tower of the watchmen to the fortified city.

Haven’t you driven out the priests of Yahweh, the sons of Aaron, and the Levites, and made priests for yourselves according to the ways of the peoples of other lands? Whoever comes to consecrate himself with a young bull and seven rams may be a priest of those who are no gods.

In the first year of his reign, in the first month, he opened the doors of Yahweh’s house, and repaired them.

Moreover have we prepared and sanctified all the vessels which king Ahaz threw away in his reign, when he was unfaithful. Behold, they are before Yahweh’s altar.”

They arose and took away the altars that were in Jerusalem, and they took away all the altars for incense and threw them into the brook Kidron.

Behold, you are nothing, and your work is nothing. He who chooses you is an abomination.

“Assemble yourselves and come. Draw near together, you who have escaped from the nations. Those have no knowledge who carry the wood of their engraved image, and pray to a god that can’t save.

Yahweh of Armies, the God of Israel says: “Add your burnt offerings to your sacrifices and eat meat.

Yahweh says to this people, “Even so they have loved to wander. They have not restrained their feet. Therefore Yahweh does not accept them. Now he will remember their iniquity, and punish them for their sins.”

For my people have forgotten me. They have burned incense to false gods. They have been made to stumble in their ways, in the ancient paths, to walk in byways, in a way not built up,

“ ‘ “But you trusted in your beauty, and played the prostitute because of your renown, and poured out your prostitution on everyone who passed by. It was his.

“Though you, Israel, play the prostitute, yet don’t let Judah offend; and don’t come to Gilgal, neither go up to Beth Aven, nor swear, ‘As Yahweh lives.’

The rebels are deep in slaughter; but I discipline all of them.

Gilead is a city of those who work iniquity; it is stained with blood.

Because Ephraim has multiplied altars for sinning, they became for him altars for sinning.

They won’t pour out wine offerings to Yahweh, neither will they be pleasing to him. Their sacrifices will be to them like the bread of mourners; all who eat of it will be polluted; for their bread will be for their appetite. It will not come into Yahweh’s house.

For, behold, they have gone away from destruction. Egypt will gather them up. Memphis will bury them. Nettles will possess their pleasant things of silver. Thorns will be in their tents.

Yahweh has sworn by the pride of Jacob, “Surely I will never forget any of their works.

But truly I tell you, there were many widows in Israel in the days of Elijah, when the sky was shut up three years and six months, when a great famine came over all the land.

being revealed that you are a letter of Christ, served by us, written not with ink, but with the Spirit of the living God; not in tablets of stone, but in tablets that are hearts of flesh.

I am Yahweh your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, that you should not be their slaves. I have broken the bars of your yoke, and made you walk upright.

Balak did as Balaam had spoken; and Balak and Balaam offered on every altar a bull and a ram.

At that time Yahweh set apart the tribe of Levi to bear the ark of Yahweh’s covenant, to stand before Yahweh to minister to him, and to bless in his name, to this day.

Yahweh will bring you into Egypt again with ships, by the way of which I told to you that you would never see it again. There you will offer yourselves to your enemies for male and female slaves, and nobody will buy you.

Go and cry to the gods which you have chosen. Let them save you in the time of your distress!”

For the saying which he cried by Yahweh’s word against the altar in Bethel, and against all the houses of the high places which are in the cities of Samaria, will surely happen.”

Also they have shut up the doors of the porch, and put out the lamps, and have not burned incense nor offered burnt offerings in the holy place to the God of Israel.

Bind them on your fingers. Write them on the tablet of your heart.

Your princes are rebellious and companions of thieves. Everyone loves bribes and follows after rewards. They don’t defend the fatherless, neither does the cause of the widow come to them.

“They say, ‘If a man puts away his wife, and she goes from him, and becomes another man’s, should he return to her again?’ Wouldn’t that land be greatly polluted? But you have played the prostitute with many lovers; yet return again to me,” says Yahweh.

“You shall say this to them: ‘The gods that have not made the heavens and the earth will perish from the earth, and from under the heavens.’ ”

Every man has become brutish and without knowledge. Every goldsmith is disappointed by his engraved image; for his molten image is falsehood, and there is no breath in them.

Are there any among the vanities of the nations that can cause rain? Or can the sky give showers? Aren’t you he, Yahweh our God? Therefore we will wait for you; for you have made all these things.

Even their children remember their altars and their Asherah poles by the green trees on the high hills.

They are vanity, a work of delusion. In the time of their visitation, they will perish.

You will know that I am Yahweh, when their slain men are among their idols around their altars, on every high hill, on all the tops of the mountains, under every green tree, and under every thick oak, the places where they offered pleasant aroma to all their idols.

“that you have built for yourselves a vaulted place, and have made yourselves a lofty place in every street.

“ ‘As for you, house of Israel, the Lord Yahweh says: “Go, everyone serve his idols, and hereafter also, if you will not listen to me; but you shall no more profane my holy name with your gifts and with your idols.

It will no longer be the confidence of the house of Israel, bringing iniquity to memory, when they turn to look after them. Then they will know that I am the Lord Yahweh.” ’ ”

The days of visitation have come. The days of reckoning have come. Israel will consider the prophet to be a fool, and the man who is inspired to be insane, because of the abundance of your sins, and because your hostility is great.

They have deeply corrupted themselves, as in the days of Gibeah. He will remember their iniquity. He will punish them for their sins.

“All their wickedness is in Gilgal; for there I hated them. Because of the wickedness of their deeds I will drive them out of my house! I will love them no more. All their princes are rebels.

“What value does the engraved image have, that its maker has engraved it; the molten image, even the teacher of lies, that he who fashions its form trusts in it, to make mute idols?

These have the power to shut up the sky, that it may not rain during the days of their prophecy. They have power over the waters, to turn them into blood, and to strike the earth with every plague, as often as they desire.

Then Jephthah gathered together all the men of Gilead, and fought with Ephraim. The men of Gilead struck Ephraim, because they said, “You are fugitives of Ephraim, you Gileadites, in the middle of Ephraim, and in the middle of Manasseh.”

Though they say, ‘As Yahweh lives,’ surely they swear falsely.”

“Blow the cornet in Gibeah, and the trumpet in Ramah! Sound a battle cry at Beth Aven, behind you, Benjamin!

Israel is a luxuriant vine that produces his fruit. According to the abundance of his fruit he has multiplied his altars. As their land has prospered, they have adorned their sacred stones.

The inhabitants of Samaria will be in terror for the calves of Beth Aven; for its people will mourn over it, Along with its priests who rejoiced over it, for its glory, because it has departed from it.

He took him into the field of Zophim, to the top of Pisgah, and built seven altars, and offered up a bull and a ram on every altar.

He made houses of high places, and made priests from among all the people, who were not of the sons of Levi.

Elijah the Tishbite, who was one of the settlers of Gilead, said to Ahab, “As Yahweh, the God of Israel, lives, before whom I stand, there shall not be dew nor rain these years, but according to my word.”

The children of Israel secretly did things that were not right against Yahweh their God; and they built high places for themselves in all their cities, from the tower of the watchmen to the fortified city;

Ahaz gathered together the vessels of God’s house, and cut the vessels of God’s house in pieces, and shut up the doors of Yahweh’s house; and he made himself altars in every corner of Jerusalem.

Their land also is full of idols. They worship the work of their own hands, that which their own fingers have made.

“For long ago I broke off your yoke, and burst your bonds. You said, ‘I will not serve;’ for on every high hill and under every green tree you bowed yourself, playing the prostitute.

“But where are your gods that you have made for yourselves? Let them arise, if they can save you in the time of your trouble; for you have as many gods as you have towns, O Judah.

But they are together brutish and foolish, instructed by idols! It is just wood.

They are vanity, a work of delusion. In the time of their visitation they will perish.

For according to the number of your cities are your gods, Judah; and according to the number of the streets of Jerusalem have you set up altars to the shameful thing, even altars to burn incense to Baal.’

“The sin of Judah is written with a pen of iron, and with the point of a diamond. It is engraved on the tablet of their heart, and on the horns of your altars.

in that you build your vaulted place at the head of every way, and make your lofty place in every street, and have not been as a prostitute, in that you scorn pay.

As for the sacrifices of my offerings, they sacrifice meat and eat it; But Yahweh doesn’t accept them. Now he will remember their iniquity, and punish their sins. They will return to Egypt.

“Go to Bethel, and sin; to Gilgal, and sin more. Bring your sacrifices every morning, your tithes every three days,

but don’t seek Bethel, nor enter into Gilgal, and don’t pass to Beersheba: for Gilgal shall surely go into captivity, and Bethel shall come to nothing.

Those who regard lying vanities forsake their own mercy.