Hosea 14:2 Study Bible: Take words with you, and return to the LORD. Tell him, "Forgive all our sins, and accept that which is good, and we will offer the fruit of our lips.

◄ Hosea 14:2 ►

Bring your confessions and return to the LORD. Say to Him: "Take away all our iniquity and receive us graciously, that we may present the fruit of our lips.

Study Bible

Bring your confessions
The Hebrew word for "confessions" here is "dabar," which can mean words, speech, or matter. In the context of Hosea, it emphasizes the importance of verbal acknowledgment of sin. This act of bringing confessions is not merely a ritualistic practice but a heartfelt return to God, acknowledging one's sins and seeking His mercy. Historically, the Israelites were often called to repentance through the prophets, and this phrase underscores the necessity of sincere repentance as a precursor to divine forgiveness.

and return to the LORD
The Hebrew word "shuv" is used for "return," which implies a turning back or a restoration. This is a central theme in Hosea, where the prophet calls Israel to return to their covenant relationship with God. The historical context is significant here, as Israel had strayed into idolatry and moral decay. The call to return is both a plea and a promise that God is willing to restore those who genuinely seek Him.

Say to Him
This phrase indicates a direct communication with God, highlighting the personal nature of repentance. It is not enough to feel remorse; one must articulate it to God. This reflects the biblical principle that God desires a relationship with His people, one that involves honest and open communication.

'Forgive all our iniquity
The word "forgive" in Hebrew is "nasa," which means to lift, carry, or take away. This imagery is powerful, suggesting that God is willing to lift the burden of sin from His people. "Iniquity" refers to moral perversity or sin, and the plea for forgiveness acknowledges the depth of human sinfulness. In the conservative Christian perspective, this foreshadows the ultimate forgiveness offered through Christ's atoning sacrifice.

and receive us graciously
The Hebrew word for "graciously" is "tov," meaning good or pleasing. This request is for God to accept His people not based on their merit but on His goodness and grace. It reflects the biblical truth that salvation and acceptance by God are acts of divine grace, not human effort. Historically, this would have been a radical departure from the works-based righteousness prevalent in many ancient religions.

that we may offer the fruit of our lips
The "fruit of our lips" is a metaphor for praise and thanksgiving. In Hebrew, "peri" means fruit, and it signifies the natural outcome of a life transformed by God's grace. This phrase suggests that true repentance and forgiveness lead to a life of worship and gratitude. In the broader scriptural context, it aligns with the New Testament teaching that believers are to offer sacrifices of praise to God (Hebrews 13:15).

Persons / Places / Events

1. Hosea
A prophet in the Northern Kingdom of Israel, whose ministry focused on calling Israel to repentance and illustrating God's steadfast love despite Israel's unfaithfulness.

2. Israel
The Northern Kingdom, often depicted as unfaithful to God, engaging in idolatry and breaking the covenant with Yahweh.

3. The LORD (Yahweh)
The covenant God of Israel, who calls His people to repentance and offers forgiveness and restoration.

Teaching Points

The Call to Repentance
Hosea 14:2 emphasizes the importance of returning to God with sincere confession. True repentance involves acknowledging our sins and seeking God's forgiveness.

The Power of Confession
The Hebrew word for "confessions" (devarim) implies speaking words that reflect a genuine heart change. Confession is not just about words but about a transformation of the heart.

God's Readiness to Forgive
The verse assures us of God's willingness to forgive our iniquities. This reflects His character as merciful and gracious, always ready to restore those who return to Him.

The Fruit of Our Lips
The phrase "fruit of our lips" suggests that our words of praise and thanksgiving are offerings to God. Our verbal expressions should reflect our inner transformation and gratitude for His grace.

Living Out Repentance
Repentance should lead to a change in behavior. As we confess and receive forgiveness, we are called to live in a way that honors God, producing good fruit in our lives.

Bible Study Questions

1. How does Hosea 14:2 illustrate the process of repentance, and what steps can we take to ensure our repentance is genuine?

2. In what ways can we "repay with the fruit of our lips" in our daily lives, and how does this connect to Hebrews 13:15?

3. Reflect on a time when you experienced God's forgiveness. How did it change your relationship with Him and your actions?

4. How does the concept of confession in Hosea 14:2 compare to David's expression of repentance in Psalm 51:17?

5. What practical steps can we take to ensure that our words and actions align with the repentance and forgiveness we receive from God?

Connections to Other Scriptures

Isaiah 55:7
This verse also calls for the wicked to forsake their ways and return to the LORD, promising mercy and abundant pardon, echoing the theme of repentance and forgiveness.

Hebrews 13:15
This verse speaks of offering a sacrifice of praise, the fruit of lips that openly profess His name, connecting to the idea of "the fruit of our lips" in Hosea 14:2.

Psalm 51:17
David's psalm of repentance highlights a broken and contrite heart, which God will not despise, aligning with the call for sincere confession in Hosea 14:2.

Sermons

A Form of Prayer for Backsliders	Samuel Eyles Pierce.	Hosea 14:2
A Living Sacrifice	Joseph Parker, D. D.	Hosea 14:2
An Exhortation to Repentance	S. Knight, M. A.	Hosea 14:2
How to Return to God	W. Hay Aitken, M. A.	Hosea 14:2
Israel Exhorted to Return unto the Lord	C. Simeon, M. A.	Hosea 14:2
Israel Exhorted to Return unto the Lord	Sketches of Four Hundred Sermons	Hosea 14:2
Israel's Petition in Time of Trouble	Edward Reynolds.	Hosea 14:2
Repentance or Reformation	Homilist	Hosea 14:2
So Will We Render the Calves of Our Lips	Sunday in Church	Hosea 14:2
The Iniquity of the People	Joseph Parker, D. D.	Hosea 14:2
The Need for Expression is Words		Hosea 14:2
The Penitent Returning to God	J. W. Cunningham.	Hosea 14:2
The Prophet's Call to Repentance	Moses Margoliouth.	Hosea 14:2
Total Repentance	E. B. Pusey, D. D.	Hosea 14:2
Turning to God in Prayer	Dr. Thorpe.	Hosea 14:2
Counsels to the Sinful	J.R. Thomson	Hosea 14:1, 2
God's Message to the Prodigal	A. Rowland	Hosea 14:1, 2
Return to God: its Beginnings	C. Jerdan	Hosea 14:1-3
The Prayer of the Penitent	J. Orr	Hosea 14:1-3
Repentance, or Reformation	D. Thomas	Hosea 14:1-7
The Supplication and the Vow	J.R. Thomson	Hosea 14:2, 3

People

Ashur, Hosea

Places

Assyria, Lebanon, Samaria

Topics

Accept, Bullocks, Bulls, Calves, Forgive, Forgiveness, Fruit, Graciously, Iniquity, Lips, Offer, Offering, Payment, Present, Receive, Render, Return, Sins, Turn, Wrongdoing

Dictionary of Bible Themes

Hosea 14:2

6667 grace, in OT

Hosea 14:1-2

     2425   gospel, requirements
     6195   impenitence, results
     6733   repentance, nature of
     7233   Israel, northern kingdom

Hosea 14:1-4

6688 mercy, demonstration of God's
8330 receptiveness

Hosea 14:1-8

4824 famine, spiritual

Library

December 4. "From Me is Thy Fruit Found" (Hos. xiv. 8).
"From me is thy fruit found" (Hos. xiv. 8). Nothing keeps us from advancement more than ruts and drifts, and wheel-tracks into which our chariots roll and then move on in the narrow line with unchanging monotony, currents in life's stream on which we are borne in the old direction until the law of habit almost makes advance impossible. The true remedy for this is to commence at nothing; taking Christ afresh to be the Alpha and Omega for a deeper, higher, Divine experience, waiting even for His conception …
Rev. A. B. Simpson—Days of Heaven Upon Earth

A Colloquy Between a Penitent and God
'A voice was heard upon the high places, weeping and supplications of the children of Israel: for they have perverted their way, and they have forgotten the Lord their God. Return, ye backsliding children, and I will heal your backslidings. Behold, we come unto Thee; for Thou art the Lord our God.'---JER. iii. 21, 22. We have here a brief dramatic dialogue. First is heard a voice from the bare heights, the sobs and cries of penitence, produced by the prophet's earnest remonstrance. The penitent …
Alexander Maclaren—Expositions of Holy Scripture

Israel Returning
'O Israel, return unto the Lord thy God; for thou hast fallen by thine iniquity. 2. Take with you words, and turn to the Lord: say unto Him, Take away all iniquity, and receive us graciously: so will we render the calves of our lips. 3. Asshur shall not save us; we will not ride upon horses: neither will we say any more to the work of our hands, Ye are our gods: for in thee the fatherless findeth mercy. 4. I will heal their backsliding, I will love them freely: for mine anger is turned away from …
Alexander Maclaren—Expositions of Holy Scripture

The Dew and the Plants
'I will be as the dew unto Israel: he shall grow as the lily, and cast forth his roots as Lebanon. 6. His branches shall spread, and his beauty shall be as the olive-tree ...'--Hosea xiv. 5, 6. Like his brethren, Hosea was a poet as well as a prophet. His little prophecy is full of similes and illustrations drawn from natural objects; scarcely any of them from cities or from the ways of men; almost all of them from Nature, as seen in the open country, which he evidently loved, and where he had looked …
Alexander Maclaren—Expositions of Holy Scripture

Fresh Supplies of Power.
"As the Dew." There is another very important bit needed to complete the circle of truth we are going over together in these quiet talks. Namely, the daily life after the act of surrender and all that comes with that act. The steady pull day by day. After the eagle-flight up into highest air, and the hundred yards dash, or even the mile run, comes the steady, steady walking mile after mile. The real test of life is here. And the highest victories are here, too. I recall the remark made by a friend …
S.D. Gordon—Quiet Talks on Power

Where to Find Fruit
According to Master Trapp, some read this passage, "In me is thy fruit ready." Certain it is that at all times, whenever we approach to God, we shall find in him a ready supply for every lack. The best of trees have fruit on them only at appointed seasons. Who is so unreasonable as to look for fruit upon the peach or the plum at this season of the year? No drooping boughs beckon us to partake of their ripening crops, for Winter's cold still nips the buds. But our God hath fruit at all times: the …
Charles Haddon Spurgeon—Spurgeon's Sermons Volume 10: 1864

The Joyous Return
"When God's right arm is bared for war, And thunders clothe his cloudy car." e'en then he stays his uplifted hand, reins in the steeds of vengeance, and holds communion with grace; "for his mercy endureth for ever," and "judgment is his strange work." To use another figure: the whole book of Hosea is like a great trial wherein witnesses have appeared against the accused, and the arguments and excuses of the guilty have been answered and baffled. All has been heard for them, and much, very much against …
Charles Haddon Spurgeon—Spurgeon's Sermons Volume 37: 1891

The Great Change
"Ephraim shall say, What have I to do any more with idols? I have heard him, and observed him: I am like a green fir tree. From me is thy fruit found."--Hosea 14:8. THIS PASSAGE IS in very vivid contrast to what Ephraim had previously said, as it is recorded in the early part of Hosea's prophecy. If you turn to the second chapter, and the fifth verse, you will find this same Ephraim saying, "I will go after my lovers, that give me my bread and my water, my wool and my flax, mine oil and my drink." …
Charles Haddon Spurgeon—Spurgeon's Sermons Volume 42: 1896

Grace Abounding
Since the word "freely" is the very key-note of the text, we must observe its common meaning among men. We use the word "freely" for that which is given without money and without price. It is opposed to all idea of bargaining, to all acceptance of an equivalent, or that which might be construed into an equivalent. A man is said to give freely when he bestows his charity on applicants simply on the ground of their poverty, hoping for nothing again. A man distributes freely when, without asking any …
Charles Haddon Spurgeon—Spurgeon's Sermons Volume 9: 1863

6Th Day. Restoring Grace.
"He is Faithful that Promised." "I will heal their backsliding."--HOSEA xiv. 4. Restoring Grace. Wandering again! And has He not left me to perish? Stumbling and straying on the dark mountains, away from the Shepherd's eye and the Shepherd's fold, shall He not leave the erring wanderer to the fruit of his own ways, and his truant heart to go hopelessly onward in its career of guilty estrangement? "My thoughts," says God, "are not as your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways." Man would say, "Go, …
John Ross Macduff—The Faithful Promiser

Sermon for the Fourth Sunday after Epiphany
(From the Gospel for the day; and from Hosea xiv. 1, 2.) Of the great wonders which God has wrought, and still works for us Christian men; wherefore it is just and reasonable that we should turn unto Him and follow Him, and whereby we may discern between true and false conversion. Matt. viii. 23.--"Jesus went into a ship, and His disciples followed Him." And Hosea xiv. 1, 2.--"O Israel, return unto the Lord thy God; take with you words, and turn to the Lord." WE read in the Gospel for this day that …
Susannah Winkworth—The History and Life of the Reverend Doctor John Tauler

Backsliding.
"I will heal their backsliding; I will love them freely: for Mine anger is turned away."--Hosea xiv. 4. There are two kinds of backsliders. Some have never been converted: they have gone through the form of joining a Christian community and claim to be backsliders; but they never have, if I may use the expression, "slid forward." They may talk of backsliding; but they have never really been born again. They need to be treated differently from real back-sliders--those who have been born of the incorruptible …
Dwight L. Moody—The Way to God and How to Find It

The Poetical Books (Including Also Ecclesiastes and Canticles).
1. The Hebrews reckon but three books as poetical, namely: Job, Psalms, and Proverbs, which are distinguished from the rest by a stricter rhythm--the rhythm not of feet, but of clauses (see below, No. 3)--and a peculiar system of accentuation. It is obvious to every reader that the poetry of the Old Testament, in the usual sense of the word, is not restricted to these three books. But they are called poetical in a special and technical sense. In any natural classification of the books of the …
E. P. Barrows—Companion to the Bible

A Prayer when one Begins to be Sick.
O most righteous Judge, yet in Jesus Christ my gracious Father! I, wretched sinner, do here return unto thee, though driven with pain and sickness, like the prodigal child with want and hunger. I acknowledge that this sickness and pain comes not by blind chance or fortune, but by thy divine providence and special appointment. It is the stroke of thy heavy hand, which my sins have justly deserved; and the things that I feared are now fallen upon me (Job iii. 25.) Yet do I well perceive that in wrath …
Lewis Bayly—The Practice of Piety

Growth in Grace
'But grow in grace.' 2 Pet 3:38. True grace is progressive, of a spreading and growing nature. It is with grace as with light; first, there is the crepusculum, or daybreak; then it shines brighter to the full meridian. A good Christian is like the crocodile. Quamdiu vivet crescit; he has never done growing. The saints are not only compared to stars for their light, but to trees for their growth. Isa 61:1, and Hos 14:4. A good Christian is not like Hezekiah's sun that went backwards, nor Joshua's …
Thomas Watson—A Body of Divinity

The Covenant of Grace
Q-20: DID GOD LEAVE ALL MANKIND TO PERISH 1N THE ESTATE OF SIN AND MISERY? A: No! He entered into a covenant of grace to deliver the elect out of that state, and to bring them into a state of grace by a Redeemer. 'I will make an everlasting covenant with you.' Isa 55:5. Man being by his fall plunged into a labyrinth of misery, and having no way left to recover himself, God was pleased to enter into a new covenant with him, and to restore him to life by a Redeemer. The great proposition I shall go …
Thomas Watson—A Body of Divinity

Prayer.
CHARACTERISTICS OF PRAYER. WHAT is prayer? A sincere, sensible, affectionate pouring out of the soul to God, through Christ, in the strength and assistance of the Spirit, for such things as God hath promised. The best prayers have often more groans than words. Alas, how few there be in the world whose heart and mouth in prayer shall go together. Dost thou, when thou askest for the Spirit, or faith, or love to God, to holiness, to saints, to the word, and the like, ask for them with love to them, …
John Bunyan—The Riches of Bunyan

"He is the Rock, his Work is Perfect, for all his Ways are Judgment, a God of Truth, and Without Iniquity, Just and Right is He.
Deut. xxxii. 4, 5.--"He is the Rock, his work is perfect, for all his ways are judgment, a God of truth, and without iniquity, just and right is he. They have corrupted themselves, their spot is not the spot of his children," &c. There are none can behold their own vileness as it is, but in the sight of God's glorious holiness. Sin is darkness, and neither sees itself, nor any thing else, therefore must his light shine to discover this darkness. If we abide within ourselves, and men like ourselves, …
Hugh Binning—The Works of the Rev. Hugh Binning

Religion Pleasant to the Religious.
"O taste and see how gracious the Lord is; blessed is the man that trusteth in Him."--Psalm xxxiv. 8. You see by these words what love Almighty God has towards us, and what claims He has upon our love. He is the Most High, and All-Holy. He inhabiteth eternity: we are but worms compared with Him. He would not be less happy though He had never created us; He would not be less happy though we were all blotted out again from creation. But He is the God of love; He brought us all into existence, …
John Henry Newman—Parochial and Plain Sermons, Vol. VII

The Beginning of Justification. In what Sense Progressive.
1. Men either idolatrous, profane, hypocritical, or regenerate. 1. Idolaters void of righteousness, full of unrighteousness, and hence in the sight of God altogether wretched and undone. 2. Still a great difference in the characters of men. This difference manifested. 1. In the gifts of God. 2. In the distinction between honorable and base. 3. In the blessings of he present life. 3. All human virtue, how praiseworthy soever it may appear, is corrupted. 1. By impurity of heart. 2. By the absence of …
John Calvin—The Institutes of the Christian Religion

The Tests of Love to God
LET us test ourselves impartially whether we are in the number of those that love God. For the deciding of this, as our love will be best seen by the fruits of it, I shall lay down fourteen signs, or fruits, of love to God, and it concerns us to search carefully whether any of these fruits grow in our garden. 1. The first fruit of love is the musing of the mind upon God. He who is in love, his thoughts are ever upon the object. He who loves God is ravished and transported with the contemplation of …
Thomas Watson—A Divine Cordial

They Shall be Called the Children of God
They shall be called the children of God. Matthew 5:9 In these words the glorious privilege of the saints is set down. Those who have made their peace with God and labour to make peace among brethren, this is the great honour conferred upon them, They shall be called the children of God'. They shall be (called)', that is, they shall be so reputed and esteemed of God. God never miscalls anything. He does not call them children which are no children. Thou shalt be called the prophet of the Highest' …
Thomas Watson—The Beatitudes: An Exposition of Matthew 5:1-12

The Best Things Work for Good to the Godly
WE shall consider, first, what things work for good to the godly; and here we shall show that both the best things and the worst things work for their good. We begin with the best things. 1. God's attributes work for good to the godly. (1). God's power works for good. It is a glorious power (Col. i. 11), and it is engaged for the good of the elect. God's power works for good, in supporting us in trouble. "Underneath are the everlasting arms" (Deut. xxxiii. 27). What upheld Daniel in the lion's den? …
Thomas Watson—A Divine Cordial

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