Hosea 2:14

"Therefore, behold, I will allure her, and bring her into the wilderness, and speak comfortably unto her."

God's continued initiative in winning a bride from reluctant humanity is stated here. However, commentators have usually misunderstood this as "the beginning of the lasting reconciliation."[39] The "her" of this verse is not the brazen whore who forgot God, crucified the Christ, and claimed Caesar alone as their "god." No indeed! It is not a reconciliation with "her" that is indicated here; because the language passes almost imperceptibly into a theater of far greater dimensions. The old "her" is still in it to be sure, but only in the person of that spiritual remnant, the righteous seed, who were the true children of Abraham, as distinguished from those "sons of the devil" rebuked by Jesus Christ (John 8:44). It is of that "her," the future bride of Jesus Christ, that God was speaking here. Like the old Israel, she too is in "the wilderness of her probation"; and, in this, is seen the applicability of the passage to both Israels. That it is the new Israel with whom a new marriage covenant will be consummated becomes undeniably certain in the giving of a different name to the new bride in Hosea 2:22, below. A failure to discern this results in some fantastic conclusions. "Unlike the old conditional covenant of Sinai, the new covenant will be unconditional!"[40] Such a view is contrary to every word of the New Testament. Salvation is not, never was, nor can it ever be unconditional. To interpret this chapter as if God finally decided to take the whore back, sins and all, and utterly without the fulfillment of any condition upon her part, is nothing but a stupendous misreading of what this prophecy says.

"I will allure her ..." Myers pointed out that the word "allure" in this passage "is rich with meaning."[41] "The wilderness sojourn here is not literal,"[42] despite the fact of its being founded upon the literal experience of the old Israel who escaped from Egyptian slavery by crossing the Red Sea into the wilderness. Just as the old Israel had been "wooed" or "allured" by the promise of a land of their own, in the same manner the new bride will be enticed by visions of a glorious promised land with God in heaven forever. The allurement of mankind by such glorious promises is a valid segment of the Christian appeal. Harley noted the further analogy in the truth that Israel's slavery in the days of Hosea was not literal, as it had been in Egypt, but spiritual through their having fallen into idolatry. Their delivery from that would also be spiritual, by their redemption in Christ Jesus. Polkinghorne observed that the marriage motif, beginning here with courtship, "leads on to marriage (Hosea 2:19ff), which is consummated in fruitfulness (Hosea 2:21ff)."[43]