Hosea 11

In one of Scripture’s most moving passages, God speaks as a tender father: “When Israel was a child, I loved him, and out of Egypt I called my son.” Though His child has turned away, God’s heart recoils within Him — “How can I give you up, O Ephraim?... My compassion grows warm and tender” — and He will not execute His full wrath, for “I am God and not a man, the Holy One in your midst.”