The cooking metaphor is interesting in chapter seven. The oven (Israel) is too hot and burns rather than cooks. Israel is a “cake not turned,” like a hot cake cooked only on one side – not fit for consumption.
Who will help God’s people?
The people first depend on international alliances (chapter 5). They offer insincere repentance (chapter 6) and conduct assassination attempts (6:8ff) to get rid of bad leaders. These efforts at self-deliverance have even been conducted by religious leaders – the priests (5:1 & 6:9). But the nation continues down its spiraling path to ruin.
God taught them better, but they have turned against the Lord and will not even ask Him for help (7:16). When a person, or a people, stubbornly continue on a course that yields one failure after another, they deserve the ridicule thrown at them by observers.
Think about your life. Where are you? Are you in a good place or a bad place? Why are you there? If a bad place, but you think it is all the fault of others, you might ask yourself how long you have been in that bad place, and how often you have been there. And then you might consider that your place is due to your own ineptitude, and perhaps, an unwillingness to yield to the will of God.
Despite the stupidity of Israel, God still longs to restore them – as He does you and me, if we would only admit our deficiencies and weaknesses and come to Him for help.