Chapter 9: Thirty Pieces of Silver

Hosea went. He did not send a servant. He went himself.

In ancient Israel, slaves were sold in public. The person being sold stood and waited for someone to claim them — no different from livestock. They had no voice. No choice.

Hosea arrived and found her.

Whatever Gomer had once been — the woman he married, the mother of his children — was hard to see now. The years of wandering, the betrayals, the fall into bondage had left their mark. She stood among the other slaves with nothing. No one coming for her.

Except him.

Hosea paid fifteen shekels of silver and a homer and a half of barley. Silver and grain, scraped together. He did not have enough silver, so he brought what he could in grain to cover the rest. Everything he had. The total came to roughly thirty shekels — the value placed on a slave under the law of Moses. Centuries later, another man would be betrayed for the exact same price. (Hosea 3:2)

Hosea paid. Gomer was his.

She looked up and saw the face of the man she had abandoned. She expected anger. She expected judgment.

HOSEA“You are to stay with me. You will not go back to that life. And I will wait for you.”

She did not deserve this and she knew it. But he was there. He took her hand. And he led her home.