Will History Repeat Itself?

Is your nation experiencing these same conditions? If so, will you heed the warnings?

Guess which nation I’m describing:

• It enjoys great physical prosperity.
• It enjoys an increasingly immoral lifestyle: Adultery is rampant; homosexuality is vaunted; young and old frequently change sexual partners. “Sexual freedom” is the order of the day.
• Alcohol abuse is widespread.
• Dirty money commonly buys corrupt governmental candidates and officers.
• The judicial system often pursues particular agendas rather than true justice.
• Crime is a growing problem; theft and murder are common events.

What’s your guess? Modern America? Great Britain? Australia? South Africa?

Good guesses, but I’m thinking of the ancient nation of Israel about 2,750 years ago. Ancient Israelites of the time would be morally “at home” in our present age. God sent the prophet Hosea to warn the nation of impending doom if it didn’t repent and change.

A failed and miserable society

Hosea started his work during the reign of the last powerful king of Israel, Jeroboam II. It was a time of wealth, ease and great international influence. But consider how Hosea described the situation:

• “Gilead [a major city in Israel] is a city of evildoers and defiled with blood. As bands of robbers lie in wait for a man, so the company of priests [moral leaders] murder on the way to Shechem [both Gilead and Shechem were supposed to be cities of refuge!]; surely they commit lewdness. I have seen a horrible thing in the house of Israel: there is the harlotry of Ephraim; Israel is defiled” (Hosea 6:8-10).
• “They are all adulterers. … In the day of our king, princes have made him sick, inflamed with wine; he stretched out his hand with scoffers” (Hosea 7:4-5).
• “I have written for him [Ephraim, the main tribe of Israel] the great things of My law [the Ten Commandments, for example], but they were considered a strange thing” (Hosea 8:12).

What a revolting description of a failed and miserable society: corruption and shame in high places, dishonesty, violence, immorality of all sorts, compromised religion and rejection of God and His law. Sounds pretty “modern,” doesn’t it? The more things change, the more they stay the same.

A warning of a “marriage” on the rocks

God sent Hosea to warn Israel that if the nation didn’t change its ways, God would withdraw His blessings and protection. In their symbolic marriage relationship, Israel was acting like an adulterous and rebellious wife, and God would throw her out of His house:

“I will drive them from My house; I will love them no more. All their princes are rebellious” (Hosea 9:15).

Modern parallels

As I watch the news, I often think of the parallels with ancient Israel. There is so much corruption and immorality in our English-speaking nations, it’s hard to decide which examples to select. Government officials, even at the highest levels, are so corrupt they end up in prison—the ones who get caught, that is.

• We just learned that the second former Illinois governor in a row is going to prison for gross corruption.
• A New York congressman recently resigned in disgrace for sending lewd photos of himself to young women he didn’t even know.
• And New York has just legalized homosexual “marriage,” which is being hailed in the press as wonderful “progress.”
• Nearly 40 percent of babies in the U.S. are born out of wedlock. The figure is expected to soon be 75 percent in some parts of Britain!

Will we listen to the warnings?

Sadly, in spite of repeated warnings, Israel didn’t listen. Thirty years after the death of Jeroboam, the cruel armies of Assyria destroyed the once-mighty armies of Israel and carried the surviving citizens off to generations of slavery.

God doesn’t change. Nations that are faithful to Him and His laws are blessed. Those that are unfaithful are not. Nations having a special relationship with God are held especially accountable since they are to be examples.

Americans have long believed their nation has a special relationship with God. It was founded by Christian pilgrims, who wanted the new nation to be (quoting Jesus) “a city that is set on a hill”—a shining example of Christianity.

This phrase from Governor John Winthrop’s famous sermon of 1630 (given prior to landing in New England) has been quoted by American presidents, including John Kennedy and Ronald Reagan, and used to be required reading for all educated Americans. It states in part: “For we must consider that we shall be as a city upon a hill. The eyes of all people are upon us. So that if we shall deal falsely with our God in this work we have undertaken, and so cause Him to withdraw His present help from us, we shall be made a story and a by-word through the world.”

If we don’t change our national direction, we shall truly become a byword, a striking example of a great fall. The parallels with ancient Israel are striking. May we learn the lesson of Hosea’s time before it’s too late.

For more about where America’s greatness has come from, see “How the Blessings of Abraham Came to America.” And to see where God’s plan goes from here, see our booklet The Mystery of the Kingdom.

Joel Meeker is a pastor and writer. He and his wife, Marjolaine, and two adult daughters live in Cincinnati, Ohio.