Hosea 9:1-9

1Israel, do not rejoice jubilantly as the nations do, for you have acted promiscuously, leaving your God. You love the wages of a prostitute on every grain-threshing floor.

2Threshing floor and wine vat will not sustain them, and the new wine will fail them.

3They will not stay in the land of the Lord. Instead, Ephraim will return to Egypt, and they will eat unclean food in Assyria.

4They will not pour out their wine offerings to the Lord, and their sacrifices will not please him. Their food will be like the bread of mourners; all who eat it become defiled. For their bread will be for their appetites alone; it will not enter the house of the Lord.

5What will you do on a festival day, on the day of the Lord’s feast?

6For even if they flee from devastation, Egypt will gather them, and Memphis will bury them. Thistles will take possession of their precious silver; thorns will invade their tents.

7The days of punishment have come; the days of retribution have come. Let Israel recognize it! The prophet is a fool, and the inspired man is insane, because of the magnitude of your iniquity and hostility.

8Ephraim’s watchman is with my God. Yet the prophet encounters a bird trap on all his pathways. Hostility is in the house of his God!

9They have deeply corrupted themselves as in the days of Gibeah. He will remember their iniquity; he will punish their sins.