There’s a prophet in the Bible that married a prostitute. God spoke to Him directly and said marry a prostitute, because the people are acting like whores departing from the Lord.
Don’t believe me?
“The beginning of the word of the Lord by Hosea. And the Lord said to Hosea, Go, take unto thee a wife of whoredoms and children of whoredoms: for the land hath committed great whoredom, departing from the Lord.”
Hosea 1:2 KJV
Why in the world would God do that?
"Then said the Lord unto me, Go yet, love a woman beloved of her friend, yet an adulteress, according to the love of the Lord toward the children of Israel, who look to other gods, and love flagons of wine."
Hosea 3:1 KJV
To provide a real time example of God's love for His people.
Let me explain, a prostitute with a husband under Biblical principles sounds oxymoronic because a prostitute by definition has to have customers. If she stopped taking customers she wouldn't be considered a prostitute, right? So Gomer (Hosea's wife) was unfaithful.
It is in the human sin nature to walk away from God. We stray from God and serve other gods when we put anything before our relationship with Him. Whenever we make the conscious or even unconscious decision to do something outside of God and His instructions we are worshipping an idol.
We are being unfaithful.
In modern vernacular we may not build physical golden images to bow down to instead of praying to God, but we may seek counsel in secular wisdom or Horoscopes instead of going to God.
We have made that thing our god when we prefer to seek comfort, wisdom, or counsel in things that are not scripture or the Holy Spirit.
Nothing brings you closer to God, but God, His Word and His counsel. To believe and function in any other knowledge is to be deceived.
Yet even in this, God still loves us. He still displays His power and His authority around us to demonstrate who He is. He reminds us of His grace and His love. He is merciful to us while we are even willingly and purposefully disobedient.
To use the analogy of prostitute is intentional and poignant because it describes the nature of the disobedience/unfaithfulness of God's people. We often seek out those things that would lead us away from God, and yet God patiently loves us, waiting for us to come back to Him.
Can you imagine?
It can be hard for us to love people when we see that they are capable of hurting us, of crossing lines that we have drawn to protect ourselves and our hearts. We tend to keep people out as a safety mechanism against any potential harm. It feels natural and second nature to want to preserve and protect our hearts. So when reading to story of Hosea of Gomer, it is hard to understand why God would tell the prophet to put his heart in the line of fire.
God chose Hosea to go through this so that He could provide a demonstration of unconditional love unprecedented and longsuffering.
I can not tell a lie the story of Hosea and Gomer gives me Job vibes. It’s a story of suffering in a man chosen by God to suffer for the benefit of those who would hear the story. It’s one of those Biblical happenings where I have to learn the lesson God is teaching and ask Him for understanding about the why of it. But I would be silly to dismiss the principle of the matter.
God loves us, like no one on this earth will love us. He goes out of His way to display that love. He takes our indifference, impatience, our complete utter disregard for Him, His Word and His will for us and He loves us anyway. He strengthens us, He comforts us, He provides for us even when we are ungrateful, unkind and unloving towards Him. His love conquers all.
We don’t deserve Him and He gives us everything.
Why wouldn’t I love and serve a God like that?
