Whores and hope.

Is that too shocking a title?
Maybe...
But Hosea is, in many ways, a shocking book.  First, there's the fact that Hosea is told to marry a prostitute and then go and fetch her back after she's run off with other blokes.
Then more shockingly, there's the revelation that this is just a picture of what God does for us.  "The love that was asked of him (Hosea) would be heroic - but that was the point, for it was to be God's love in miniature."
I really enjoyed this commentary.  It's pretty much in layman's terms - it doesn't dwell on the Greek or Hebrew (though explains bits where needed).  It's also written by someone who clearly loves Hosea (the book, not the bloke).  Obviously, this review kind of looks at the commentary, but also looks at Hosea itself!
There can't be many more powerful pictures of what God does for us.  This is an account of the sustained pursuit God makes, using both carrot and stick to draw His people back.  Kidner says, "...there is nothing arbitrary in His judgments, excessive though they will often seem to us, and as uninhibited as [they are]", but then points to, "the deep reluctance of God to resort to judgment".
He talks of compassion without compromise; the cycle of grace, disgrace, grace abounding; religion which permeates everything except the conscience

Of course, Hosea is not just the story of a man, nor the story of God and the Israelites - it is fundamentally our story too.  We benefit from the grace that abounds in the face of our disgrace.  We prostitute ourselves to the world and its meagre offerings, and yet are still gathered back to God by His judgment and grace.  He fiercely guards his glory, and therefore no compromise is made, and yet still he draws us back to Himself.
Verses like 11:8 are haunting in their revelation of God's heart - "How can I give you up, O Ephraim?  How can I hand you over, O Israel?"

I could say so much more, partly because I fell in love with Hosea itself as I read.  The call, of course, is not just to fall in love with God's message, but to fall in love with God.

A wonderful commentary, on a fabulous book.

Wayne Grudem's Systematic Theology

Ok, I'll 'fess up and say I haven't read it all. Only the introduction and the chapter on angels (trying to deal with spiritual warfare at the moment!). But it's really good. It's not like mega-complex or anything, and is goes through Biblical texts pretty thoroughly (systematically, in fact!) It's only about £21 on Amazon too, which is a pretty good deal. Am going to tackle the bit on 'Satan and Demons' tonight (for the same reason as 'Angels') and will take it from there.
The intro was really clear and set out the case for what the book's trying to do. The stuff on Angels didn't have that much I didn't know in it I guess, but it was useful to have it all brought together and particularly to have the Bible passages behind what we believe :)

You might see it says 'over 250,000 copies in print' at the top. Well, mine says, 'over 300,000 copies in print' so I'm obviously not the only one who's bought it recently.