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The prophet Hosea speaks so very profoundly that it is laborious work
to penetrate his meaning. But, according to promise, we must insert
something from his book. He says, "And it shall come to pass that
in the place where it was said unto them, Ye are not my people, there
they shall be called the sons of the living God." Even the apostles
understood this as a prophetic testimony of the calling of the nations
who did not formerly belong to God; and because this same people of
the Gentiles is itself spiritually among the children of Abraham, and
for that reason is rightly called Israel, therefore he goes on to
say, "And the children of Judah and the children of Israel shall be
gathered together in one, and shall appoint themselves one headship,
and shall ascend from the earth." We should but weaken the savor of
this prophetic oracle if we set ourselves to expound it. Let the
reader but call to mind that cornerstone and those two walls of
partition, the one of the Jews, the other of the Gentiles, and he
will recognize them, the one under the term sons of Judah, the other
as sons of Israel, supporting themselves by one and the same
headship, and ascending from the earth. But that those carnal
Israelites who are sow unwilling to believe in Christ shall afterward
believe, that is, their children shall (for they themselves, of
course, shall go to their own place by dying), this same prophet
testifies, saying, "For the children of Israel shall abide many
days without a king, without a prince, without a sacrifice, without
an altar, without a priesthood, without manifestations." Who does
not see that the Jews are now thus? But let us hear what he adds:
"And afterward shall the children of Israel return, and seek the
Lord their God, and David their king, and shall be amazed at the
Lord and at His goodness in the latter days." Nothing is clearer
than this prophecy, in which by David, as distinguished by the title
of king, Christ is to be understood, "who is made," as the apostle
says, "of the seed of David according to the flesh." This prophet
has also foretold the resurrection of Christ on the third day, as it
behoved to be foretold, with prophetic loftiness, when he says, "He
will heal us after two days, and in the third day we shall rise
again." In agreement with this the apostle says to us, "If ye be
risen with Christ, seek those things which are above." Amos also
prophesies thus concerning such things: "Prepare thee, that thou
mayst invoke thy God, O Israel; for lo, I am binding the
thunder, and creating the spirit, and announcing to men their
Christ." And in another place he says, "In that day will I raise
up the tabernacle of David that is fallen, and build up the breaches
thereof: and I will raise up his ruins, and will build them up again
as in the days of old: that the residue of men may inquire for me, and
all the nations upon whom my name is invoked, saith the Lord that
doeth this."
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