ASK ROGER and BRIE
What does prostitution have to do with God’s love?
Dear Roger and Brie,
So, God told Hosea to marry a prostitute? WHAT?!? How is that supposed to teach us anything? Isn’t prostitution a huge, ugly sin?
Please help me understand,
Lila
The reality of sex trafficking in our community and culture shatters my heart daily.
I (Brie) spend a great deal of time interviewing survivors and sharing their stories in order to help raise funds for the ministries that care for these precious young women and children. You can’t imagine the horrors they endure. The deliberate, systematic breaking down of their minds and bodies leaves them in pieces.
Thank God for the rescuers. For the trauma counselors. And for the unconditional love of Jesus Christ, revealed in the lives of all who step in to help.
Every day I see the broken redeemed by God’s unrelenting love and grace. Far too many are so damaged that they struggle to accept love. They can’t imagine that they have worth, which is so far from the truth! It takes months of consistent acceptance to overcome those walls … but God is infinitely patient.
WHAT?!? MEET HOSEA AND THE PROSTITUTE
The Book of Hosea has taught me more about the broken hearts and minds of victims and survivors than anything else. It’s also an allegory of the relationship between us and our Savior that stops me in my tracks every time.
He loves. We run. He loves. We lash out. He loves. We fight. AND HE LOVES.
Take a look at Hosea 1:2-3 with me:
When the Lord began to speak through Hosea, the Lord said to him, “Go, marry a promiscuous woman and have children with her, for like an adulterous wife this land is guilty of unfaithfulness to the Lord.”
God says, “Hosea, my prophet, go marry a prostitute.”
A what? A woman that his culture deemed unclean? What would that mean for his ministry? Would he be fully discredited? What about the children they would have? Would they be ostracized?
It must have taken everything Hosea had to obey God. But I think it’s really interesting that the name “Hosea” means “salvation,” don’t you? God knew what He was going to ask of Hosea before he was even born.
My Dad, Roger Barrier, said that “A man usually finds his earthly heaven or hell in the woman that he marries.” In Gomer, Hosea found his hell.
WHEN LOVE IS REJECTED
We can read a lot between the lines of Hosea’s book.
They had a child together, but then one day, Hosea came home from a trip and overheard some gossip in the marketplace. He couldn’t believe the words he was hearing!
Hosea discovered that Gomer had squandered his love away with other men.
She conceived and gave birth to a daughter, and God told Hosea to name her “Lo-Ruhamah,” which means “not loved.” She wasn’t Hosea’s child.
Months passed, and another child arrived.
God told Hosea to name his baby son “Lo-Ammi,” which means “not my people.” He wasn’t Hosea’s child either.
Imagine the pain Hosea felt. He must have wanted to run, to cast away Gomer and wallow in his agony … and then she was gone.
He became both father and mother to all three children. And it’s hard to believe, but rather than badmouthing Gomer all over town, Hosea prayed for her safe return.
I can’t tell you that I understand how Hosea was able to forgive like that. Personally, I experienced a betrayal that deep, and it’s taken more than a decade to recover and forgive—even though that person never asked for forgiveness.
Hurt that deep leaves scars.
YOU CAN’T RUN FROM GOD’S LOVE
But God gives us an indelible picture of His unconditional love when Hosea heard that Gomer had been sold into slavery by the man who seduced her away. She fell for a deceiver and ended up in bondage both literally and figuratively.
One time, Dad described that scene for me. He said, “God spoke, ‘Hosea, true love keeps on doing the duties of love even if the one for whom we do them doesn’t deserve it. True love never stops. GO GET HER.’”
Hosea 3:1-3 reads,
The Lord said to me, “Go, show your love to your wife again, though she is loved by another man and is an adulteress. Love her as the Lord loves the Israelites, though they turn to other gods and love the sacred raisin cakes.”
So, I bought her for fifteen shekels of silver and about a homer and a lethek of barley. Then I told her, “You are to live with me many days; you must not be a prostitute or be intimate with any man, and I will behave the same way toward you.”
Hosea began to search the slave markets, one by one, looking for Gomer. And through day after day of searching, Hosea began to realize how much God loved His people, Israel. They had gone chasing after other gods, but God still loved them and wanted them back.
All that love? Unconditional love?
Don’t miss this. Hosea still put his heart on the line when he found Gomer. She had every opportunity to reject him. She couldn’t know that he was there to rescue her—after her choices, she very well could have expected retribution.
When he found Gomer, she was broken. Stoop-shouldered and gaunt. Marked by sin and shame. But when the auctioneer cried, “What am I bid for Gomer?” Hosea didn’t hesitate for a moment. He bid an enormous price.
The audience gasped! They called him a fool for paying such a price for a scrap of broken humanity. But all Hosea saw was his wife—the one he loved with all his heart.
Even when humankind resisted the love of God and turned from Him in cool contempt, God didn’t utterly cast us off. In mercy, He refused to throw us away.
God went to the slave market and bought us back from the captivity of sin. But the purchase price was nothing less than the life and blood of His Son, Jesus.
GOD LOVES ME THAT MUCH?
That love—that unfathomable, unconditional love—is the same love God has for you and me.
Sometimes, I have a really difficult time accepting His love. I know I sin. I know I’m broken and damaged. I know I don’t always trust God. I simply don’t feel worthy.
BUT the Savior. BUT His patience. BUT His unrelenting pursuit.
At the end of His book, Hosea’s message changed. He used to preach about the wrath and judgment of God. Then, after his journey with Gomer, he began to see a God of love:
Return, O Israel, to the Lord your God,
For you have stumbled because of your iniquity.
Take words with you and return to the Lord. …
I will heal their apostasy,
I will love them freely,
For My anger has turned away from them. (Hosea 14:1-2, 4)
God’s love transforms our hearts and lives when we experience it. Period. That’s why I love working with trafficking survivors the most. When they truly recognize and feel His unconditional love, they begin to heal. Their trauma ceases to define them. They become new in Christ.
Lila,
I want you to know that love. You will never be the same!
Love, Brie