Scriptures

New American Standard Bible (NASB)

Hosea 12
⁶ Therefore, return to your God, Observe kindness and justice, And wait for your God continually.
⁷ A merchant, in whose hands are false balances, He loves to oppress.
⁸ And Ephraim said, "Surely I have become rich, I have found wealth for myself; In all my labors they will find in me No iniquity, which would be sin."
⁹ But I have been the Lord your God since the land of Egypt; I will make you live in tents again, As in the days of the appointed festival.
¹⁰ I have also spoken to the prophets, And I gave numerous visions, And through the prophets I gave parables.
¹¹ Is there iniquity in Gilead? Surely they are worthless. In Gilgal they sacrifice bulls, Yes, their altars are like the stone heaps Beside the furrows of the field.
¹² Now Jacob fled to the land of Aram, And Israel worked for a wife, And for a wife he kept sheep.
¹³ But by a prophet the Lord brought Israel from Egypt, And by a prophet he was kept.
¹⁴ Ephraim has provoked to bitter anger; So his Lord will leave his bloodguilt on him And bring back his reproach to him.
Hosea 13
¹ When Ephraim spoke, there was trembling. He exalted himself in Israel, But through Baal he did wrong and died.
² And now they sin more and more, And make for themselves molten images, Idols skillfully made from their silver, All of them the work of craftsmen. They say of them, "Let the men who sacrifice kiss the calves!"