Hosea certainly delivered a stinging message from God to the priests of the day. Spiritual leadership is a serious responsibility. No wonder the priests relished the sins of the people. The more the people sinned, the more sin offerings were brought to the priests. The priests were getting “fat” off the sins of the people.

“…my people are destroyed from lack of knowledge.”
“…a people without understanding will come to ruin!”
If spiritual leaders don’t speak against a sin, the people think its okay. And then what happens?

“A spirit of prostitution…” – selling out to the ways of the world.  Also a spirit of defiance - taking the selfish way and not listening to God.

"They are unfaithful to the Lord; they give birth to illegitimate children."  
The illegitimate children can be likened to false doctrine and perverted religion. 

"Ephraim turned to Assyria"  
The Assyrians were their enemies.  We, as a church and nation, turn to our enemies for help when we turn to the secular instead of the spiritual.

"Then I will go back to my place until they admit their guilt."   

How prophetic is that for us today?  God will remove His hand of protection unless we repent as a nation, as a church, and as individuals. 

And we have yet another example of His mercy, grace and love.
“I long to redeem them…”

How He longs to redeem us! He longs so much that He sent His Son. In these last days, are there people to whom we should witness? Do we feel an evangelistic urgency to “snatch others from the fire” (Jude 1:23a).

Hos 9:5  

What will you do on the day of your appointed feasts, on the festival days of the LORD?  

Indeed, what will we do on God's Holy Days?  Will we honor and remember Jesus' fulfillment of them?  Or will we continue in the pagan practices that have infiltrated our churches and replaced the God-ordained Holy Days?  

Hosea 4 mentions the Israelites being stubborn like a stubborn heifer. And then we have this contrast with lambs in a meadow. Are we any different now? Don't we want to go our own way like a stubborn heifer? Shouldn't we be more like the lambs in a meadow and follow the shepherd?