Exclusive: Go again, Love ( a monologue for Hosea)
Posted on Sunday, June 19 @ 22:08:36 PDT by Jeff Carter |
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by Jeff Carter
I fell in love with a hooker, she laughed in my face
So seriously I took her, I was a disgrace
I was out of line I was out of place
Out of time to save face
See the open mouth of my suitcase saying leave this place
Leave without a trace
Leave without a trace
Leave without a trace
(Soul Aslum - Without A Trace)
There she was impenitent, unapologetic, with that pout and her eyes those damn fluttering eyelashes. She knew. Oh she knew. And she knew that I knew but she didn’t care. And, strangely, neither did I.
Our relationship, such as it was, was strained from the beginning. I’m sure you’ve heard the talk, you know her history; the gossips around the well and at the city gates spoke of nothing else. ‘She such and such…’ they would say, and ‘He’s ruined his life’ they said. Perhaps it might appear that I’ve ruined my life, but you must understand that my life isn’t my own to ruin. I married Gomer, despite her past, and knowing full well that her prostitution would continue, because the Lord Yahweh commanded me to marry her. “Go; take for yourself a promiscuous wife and children of promiscuity, for the land has been promiscuous away from Yahweh.”
Following his instructions, I married Gomer bat-Diblaim, but don’t cloud your mind with Romantic notions. I didn’t love her. Not then. I married her but she was unclean, polluted, befouled by her lovers and her idolatry. At our wedding we sang the traditional song of marriage from the Song of Solomon with the final refrain: For love is as strong as Death, passion as relentless as Sheol. The flash of it is a fire, a flam of Yahweh himself. Love no flood can quench, no torrents can drown.Though at that time I couldn't understand how these words related to our marriage.
I took her to my home and set her up as my wife. It was strange at first, we had so many differences to overcome – her coarse language and casual blasphemies were shocking to me, and my adherence to Yahweh discomforted her. When the children came it seemed to both settle things – and at the same time made them worse. There was a sense of family, a real family. There were even moments of happiness and joy. Of course, the names were an issue. Jezreel – named for both the bounty of God’s provision and for the slaughter in the valley of Jezreel. Gomer never understood the ambivalence of meanings. Our daughter, Lo-Ruhama was so named because pity was necessary but there would be none. She was, as we all were, “not pitied” by Yahweh. And Lo-Ammi was our youngest boy – even I had trouble with this name, but when the Lord speaks you listen and you obey. We were Lo-Ammi and so my son was also “not my people.”
Gomer took the negative and ominous names as indicative of my feelings for her – and perhaps, to some degree they were. But I had no designs to leave her. I knew that I could have – and should have by all torah. Gradually she began to return to her former lifestyle. She snuck away to meet with her former lovers. At first she tried to hide it but casually dropped all pretense of faithfulness. Her adultery was brazen. I caught her a number of times, returning late at night – stinking of cheap wine and even cheaper perfume; the stench of her lovers still clinging to her.
Eventually I had enough. “She is not my wife, and I am not her husband!” It’s not that I divorced her. It’s not that I disavowed our covenant bonds. It was she who destroyed our union by her actions. I had warned her. I had pleaded with her. I had threatened and cajoled. I had promised to provide for all of her needs and to give her numerous good gifts. I had given ultimatums but to no avail. She continued to play the whore, and eventually I had enough. I put her out. I thought that would be the end. No one could blame me for it. The torah was on my side. And though I could have called for her execution; I couldn’t bring myself to do it. All I wanted was for her to just go away.
But then Lord Yahweh spoke to me again. Go again, love a woman who loves another man, an adulteress, and lover her as Yahweh loves the Israelites although they turn to other gods and love raisin cakes. Go again… Love. Love! How could I love her? She had shamed me, disgraced me. She had embarrassed me and defiled our home. How could I love her? But there it was, the command from God to love her. I certainly didn’t feel love. The emotion wasn’t there. Like I said, don’t cloud your mind with sentimental Romantic ideas here. Go again, love a woman who loves another man, an adulteress, and love her as Yahweh loves the Israelites although they turn to other gods.
All this time I had missed the metaphor. God had set it up so that my life, and Gomer’s and Jezreel, Lo-Ruhama and Lo-Ammi too, all of us were a part of a living metaphor of God’s love for our people. God had said to us, I shall betroth myself to you in loyalty… I shall respond to the heavens and they shall respond to the earth and the earth will respond to the grand, the new wine and oil, and they will respond to Jezreel. I shall sow her in the country to be mine, I shall take pity on LoRuhama (the unpitied one), I shall tell Lo-Ammi (who was not my people), “You are my people,” and they will say, “You are my God.”
And so I went to find her. It hadn’t been but a couple of months that I had put her out of our home, but in that time she had put herself in debt. She batted her eyelashes and put on her pout, as if to flirt her way back. She knew that I knew about her adultery and she didn’t care, and strangely neither did I. I would love her. I would pay her debt. I would take her back to my house again because I loved her. I loved her, and there is always an ‘again’ with love.
When we arrived back at the house Gomer headed straight for the door, almost as if nothing had happened. A small crowd had gathered there to gawk and to stare at us. I grabbed Gomer gently by the wrist to prevent her from entering the house and I said to her, “You will have to spend a long time waiting for me without playing the whore and without giving yourself to any man, and I will behave the same way towards you.”
I wanted her to understand the relationship we were establishing. It had to be unadulterated. “You will have to spend a long time waiting for me without playing the whore and without giving yourself to any man, and I will behave the same way towards you.” As I spoke these words to Gomer, I could here some in the crowd behind us chuckle; they were amused at our tawdry romance. So I turned to them, because they needed to understand as well. For the Israelites will have to spend a long time without king or leader, without sacrifice or sacred pillar, without ephod or household gods; but after that, the Israelites will return and seek Yahweh their God and David their King, and turn trembling to Yahweh for his bounty in the final days.
Suddenly I understood. The nation would spend a long time separated from Yahweh God before coming back to him, to seek him and His Messiah, the descendant of David. Visions of destruction and exile flashed in my head, and I knew what horrors were coming – but also what mercy and love.
Love. How strange. Love for such a rebellious nation. Love for such a disobedient people. Go again, Yahweh God had told me, “Love a woman who loves another man, an adulteress and love her as Yahweh loves Israel although they turn to other gods.”
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Jeff Carter is a columnist for PlanetPreterist.com. Jeff is an officer in the Salvation Army, working as an Administrator of the Social Services and Pastor of the Church.
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