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Hosea 14:2-4
New Catholic Bible
Hosea 14:2-4
New Catholic Bible
Come Back, O Israel, and I Will Love You[a]
2 Return, O Israel, to the Lord, your God;
your iniquity has been the cause of your downfall.
3 Prepare in advance what you want to say,
and return to the Lord.
Say to him, “Take away all guilt
and give us what is good,
so that we may present as offerings
the bullocks from our stalls.
4 Assyria will not save us,
nor shall we mount horses of war.
We shall never again say ‘Our god’
to the work of our hands,
for in you the fatherless find compassion.”
Footnotes
- Hosea 14:2 No matter how somber this tableau appears to be, the threats cannot be the last word of humans to God since they are not the last words of God himself. Hosea wishes to prepare his people for conversion. Now he announces a kind of liturgy of repentance. God responds with a grand promise of grace. He desires the profound return of his people, ties of true and loyal love. He wants people to uproot sin, idolatry, and self-sufficiency; the last word will remain about salvation. After such sadness, what a moving promise!
