Leave them alone!
“Ephraim is joined to idols: let him alone.” ( Hosea 4:17 ) The Lord is long-suffering, and those who speak in His name should be also. There do come times, however, when further witness becomes useless or even harmful, or when continued interaction merely invites contamination with ungodliness. In such cases, we must simply leave such people alone, following them with prayer and trusting God alone to deal with them. Such was the 10-tribe nation of Israel , led by the tribe of Ephraim , just before God sent them into Assyrian captivity . God, through the prophet Hosea, told Judah henceforth to let them alone—they were hopelessly given over to pagan evolutionist idolatry. The words “joined to” in today’s verse mean literally “under the spell of.” The Lord Jesus used similarly harsh language in reference to the hypocritical Pharisees of His own day: “Let them alone: they be blind leaders of the blind. And if the blind lead the blind, both shall fall into the ditch” ( Matthew 15:1