Daily Posts

Egypt was such an important figure to Israel and Judah throughout their history that its downfall couldn’t help but have a huge impact on them. Although Tyre wasn’t as important to them personally, it was such an important figure on the world scene that its downfall was also important. That is why God’s message to His people included so much about Tyre and Egypt.

If God was interested in what went on then at the national level, He is concerned about world events today as well. Note for what He punished nations then: for their attitudes and actions against His people, for their brutality, for their pride. Do you see nations demonstrating the same today? If their actions arouse fear in you, take comfort that God is still in control. One of the points He is making in foretelling the destruction and lamenting the nations is that just as His astonishing actions then, unbelievable until they were actually accomplished, have demonstrated His power to judge, He continues to possess the power – and use it – to judge nations. As I have stated before, the obscurity of these nations to us makes their destruction seem of little importance. That very obscurity should strengthen the impact of this message to us, that these then-powerful nations have been so reduced or eliminated by God’s judgment that their one-time influence and power are unknown to us. Ezekiel’s readers would have been amazed to see Egypt’s and Tyre’s places in the world today. Hopefully this reminder allows us to rest in faith in Him when world events feel threatening to us.

Admittedly, God’s people suffered judgment along with the nations. The goal was always for their refinement and ultimate restoration. If we must suffer as His Old Testament people did, we can trust God to work the same in us, if we let Him. How much better refinement and relationship with God is, than continuing comfortably in the course that leads to the day we face Jesus and hear, “Depart from me; I never knew you.” Can we choose to trust God enough to say, “Even so, Lord, refine if refining is needed”?

God used base language to describe His people’s behavior, so that these passages are embarrassing to read. Do you get the idea that God was deeply disgusted with His people’s behavior and characters? As I have said previously, His people likely were surprised to hear His viewpoint of them; after all, they were practicing worship. Further, the prophets were whitewashing their deeds with false prophecies, so that they were confirmed in their belief that they weren’t doing anything wrong. God simply couldn’t get through to them any other way how He felt about what they were doing and what it revealed about their characters. Do God’s New Testament people disgust Him the way His Old Testament people did? How would we know, if the example we’re given in today’s reading suggests that perhaps we could be deceiving ourselves and whitewashing our own and each other’s disgusting sin?

God promised they would suffer the consequences of their forgetting Him, and of all the behaviors and indulged desires that had led up to their forgetting Him. Those consequences were going to reduce, humiliate and destroy them completely. In the face of those consequences, they would have no courage to stand and would lose their strength. These words on the page represent great suffering for those human beings, people just like us who felt the same feelings we feel. Can you get a sense of the agony they suffered? I will remind you again, the awfulness of the punishment demonstrates the awfulness of the sin.

But in those consequences they would know God as sovereign Lord. It’s not clear whether the knowing would be a delight or fearsome prospect to them. The Bible teaches that one day every knee will bow in submission to God’s sovereign lordship over us. Whether we face that prospect with delight or dismay depends on whether we know God as He intends us to know Him. In that day all deception, whitewashing and falsehood will be swept aside.

The example given us in today’s reading reminds us that we are prone to forgetting God, while refusing to believe that we have done so. This is a sobering reminder, given that Jesus equated eternal life with knowing God intimately. We don’t dare treat this reminder lightly; we need to use it as an opportunity to talk to God about where we stand in our relationships with Him. He will tell us if we ask in humility, ready to accept the truth He reveals and respond accordingly. If we don’t ask, or if we are not prepared to respond, He probably won’t reveal the truth to us. How will you treat this reminder?

In their time of crisis, the elders of Judah came to Ezekiel to inquire of God. God refused them. That doesn’t seem very welcoming of a God who speaks much about wanting to restore His people, does it? The problem was, they weren’t coming to Him for reconciliation, but to fulfill their requests. They weren’t seeking Him, but His advice. But He didn’t want to be sought only for what He could reveal; He wanted sought to be known by them.

God had brought them to this point of exile, loss, defeat, humiliation, and disappointed hopes, so that they would turn to Him. He longed to know them in the way He created man to know Him and fellowship with Him. These people turned to Him in their suffering all right, but not in the way or for the reason He wanted them to turn to Him. He wanted them to know Him; they wanted answers to their questions – and by implication, they wanted favorable answers, answers that would make them happy, because this is what they had gotten from the so-called prophets and so they had come to expect that of a prophet. As if their desires and the words they influenced the false prophets to say could manipulate God into doing what they wanted Him to do. They didn’t want to know God at all; rather, they wanted to do all they could do to see their desires fulfilled.

If God’s ultimate correction tactic failed to correct, what was God to do? Would He finally give up on His people? If He gave up on His people, what would happen to mankind, who so desperately needed the Savior He promised to send through them?

He was not going to give up on His people, but since He couldn’t do anything with that generation, He was going to destroy them. It wasn’t going to be business as usual with them.

The challenge for us in today’s reading is whether we are like His Old Covenant people who ended up destroyed. Do we seek God for what He can do for us, or for the sake of knowing Him? Do we think we can manipulate God? Do we try?

God is so far beyond what we could imagine; He exceeds our imaginations. Why would we try to manipulate Him into doing what we want Him to do? Why wouldn’t we wait with eager anticipation to see the great things unfold that He wants to do? Why wouldn’t we seek to know more of what this great God is like, seek to know Him, when this is what He wants from us?

The Jews considered God unjust because He was holding people accountable for their own choices. There is nothing unjust about that, so why were they calling Him unjust? As Solomon said, “There’s nothing new under the sun,” and people are still calling justice harsh when it’s meted out against them. They still want a free ride, hoping to get to Heaven on the merits of someone with whom they are closely associated rather than suffering the consequences of their own poor choices. God is still the scapegoat when catastrophe happens.

The people were calling God unjust, but that didn’t make it true, any more than what people say today about God is true just because they say so.

God said He would hold people accountable for their own choices. In Malachi He says that He never changes. Do you suppose He is still holding people accountable for their choices? Is He holding you accountable for your choices? Do you welcome that, or does the prospect frighten you? Whether you find mercy or death depends on how you choose.

God compared His people unfavorably to the very standard of wickedness, Sodom. Sodom was so infamously corrupt that we have words in our vocabulary today, words that describe despised practices, that derive from its name. God’s people, good as they were (!), wouldn’t even mention Sodom. As wicked as those people were, God said His people were more wicked. Jesus preached about something similar in the Sermon on the Mount, admonishing His listeners to get the beams out of their own eyes before attending to the splinter in someone else’s eye. Apparently that kind of pride is a common human condition. As such, we need to examine ourselves regularly to keep ourselves clean in that area. He called Sodom Judah’s sister, indicating that they are related – Judah had no reason for her pride because she was like Sodom. Are you proud of the fact that you are better than someone you disdain? But for the grace of God, you could be in a similar situation to that person. Rather than indulge in pride, we need to be humbled by remembering what we would be apart from God’s grace, compassionately pray for those people whom we are not like, and praise and thank God for His wonderful grace that makes a difference.

God used virtually every pronouncement of judgment to speak of the restoration He longed for. He describes it in this reading as breaking off “a tender sprig from the topmost shoots” of one of those valuable cedars and planting it on a high place in the Promised Land. Are you a tender sprig, tender of heart, readily humbling yourself before God? Or are you a hardened branch, set in your ways, convinced of your rightness, too brittle to bow before God in humility? Are you willing to be set apart in a high place, or are you too entangled in the forest below to remain on the heights? The few He will choose for a remnant (remember those few hairs Ezekiel was instructed to tuck away in a safe place?) will be tender and planted on the heights. Will that be you?

Consider what God’s Old Testament people were doing that made Him bring judgment. What would those things look like if they were going on today? The false prophets’ false visions might look like a Christian sharing “godly” advice from his own head, as if he were sharing Scriptural truth; or a pastor preaching a sermon from sermons.com rather than seeking what God wants him to say to his people. What kind of walls do we build that other Christians whitewash for us; or what kind of walls have others built that we whitewash? Ideas like, “God wants me to be happy,” or “God wants me to prosper financially,” or “I can engage in this and not get drawn into the world,” or “I can neglect doing this and remain firm in my faith in and love for God….” Have we set our affections on things other than what God has for us, and expect Him to bless our pursuit of those things? Do we think we are saved from judgment because of our association with someone, or someone’s ideas and practices? God’s Old Testament people are examples to us, given to warn us to be careful so that we don’t fall. From what of these examples in today’s reading do you need to take warning?

The vision that Ezekiel has of the nation’s leaders in Jerusalem took place before the fall of Jerusalem, while King Zedekiah ruled, in case you are confused about the time. Recall that the books of Ezekiel and Jeremiah overlap. The prophecy he speaks in chapter 12 about the prince refers to King Zedekiah. Recall that those under siege in Jerusalem did break through the wall of the city and flee, but Zedekiah was caught by the Babylonians. He was indeed taken to Babylon but didn’t see it because they put out his eyes before sending him on his way.

Chapters 10 and 11 are very sad chapters: Ezekiel describes God’s glory leaving the Temple and leaving the city of Jerusalem, and no one there even noticed. Remember that the people still living in Jerusalem felt very safe because they were certain that God would never allow the destruction of His temple for His name’s sake and because His glory dwelled there. They failed to miss His glory when it left, were unaware that their hope was gone.

Compare the departing of God’s glory with His filling the Temple in I Kings 8:1 – 9:9. Do you suppose that He would leave again, if He did then? Would His people be aware that He had departed?

We may not feel like we are filled with His glory as His New Testament dwelling place on earth, but His word teaches us that His Spirit is in us if we know Him (I Corinthians 3:16). Notice all that Ezekiel saw in this vision: this was going on while the people going about their business in the Temple were  unaware of it. What do you suppose is going on around us that we are not aware of?

We of course don’t know the names of the men Ezekiel mentioned he saw in Jerusalem, but they would have been well-known to his audience in Babylon. The hearers probably were incredulous that such men were doing such things. What would people who know you say if they could witness what goes on behind closed doors? It’s going to be scandalous unless God does the transforming work He promised again in chapter 11 verses 19 and 20. Do you need to confess anything to God and ask for Him to do that transforming work in you? Or is praise a more appropriate response to the warning given by the examples in today’s reading?

God’s ordering Ezekiel to shave his head and beard were a big deal. The Law forbade men to cut their beards and hair. That had become such a part of their culture that men were never neatly trimmed and certainly not clean-shaven. Recall from II Samuel 10 the humiliation of the men of King David’s delegation to Ammon who were shorn by the Ammonites. This was a time when men of all the area cultures spent a lot of time and effort grooming their hair, as evidenced by the carvings of men with curled hair and beards. Given all of this, why would God have Ezekiel cut off his hair? I believe it accomplished a number of purposes. It was a dramatic attention-getter. It conveyed the humiliation of the nation in their judgment. It demonstrated that God didn’t impose the destruction lightly.

A third of his people dead by famine or plague, a third dead by sword and left to rot, a third scattered to the wind to be pursued with drawn sword. That’s a lot of suffering. Don’t think by His tone that God didn’t care, for He doubtless cared very much. If He allowed His reputation to be diminished with the defeat of His people and destruction of the temple that bore His name, He was willing to suffer loss to correct them with the promised judgment. He demonstrated that willingness further when He came to earth bodily and suffered great torment and humiliation. As much suffering as the object lesson of Ezekiel’s hair represented for the people, God suffered as well. Contemplate that. Almighty God suffers with the sin of His creation, when He could simply reject them. Does that amaze you? Tell Him so! Run to Him in grateful love!

In case you missed it in today’s reading, Ezekiel was carried by God to Jerusalem to witness the sin going on there. His question to the prophet, “Is it a trivial matter?” indicates that the people he saw considered their sin a trivial matter. God didn’t consider it trivial. Is there anything in your life or character that you and God see differently? The example of God’s people given to us in today’s reading encourages us to ask God that question. Listen for His response – expect it with the intention of responding to make any correction indicated when He does. Don’t treat as trivial what He reveals.

In the judgement these Old Testament people suffered for the sin they considered trivial, they ended up moaning in caves because of their sin. One day everyone who persists in seeing his actions and character differently than God sees them, will no longer be able to deny the truth. Why not acknowledge the truth now, make it right with God and seek His help to be saved from sin, rather than wait until judgment leaves you moaning about your sin and the plight to which it has led?

Ezekiel was a Jewish exile, taken to Babylon in the second deportation with King Jehoiachin. (Refer to Day 224, August 12^th for a brief summary of the history of the exile, if you need a refresher.) If he had not been exiled, he would have been a priest. As it turned out, he ministered in a very different way than he planned, speaking God’s word to the Jewish exiles in Babylon. His ministry to the Jews in Babylon overlapped Jeremiah’s service in Jerusalem. The two prophets spoke a consistent message, even though they were a great geographic distance apart. Ezekiel is probably the more enjoyable book of the two because it uses a lot of drama.

The drama starts in the fourth verse of the first chapter, with Ezekiel’s description of “the appearance of the likeness of the glory of the Lord.” He doesn’t say it was the glory of the Lord, but the appearance of the likeness. Analysis of what he saw is beyond the scope of this blog; what is pertinent is that God’s glory is beyond what we can imagine. As a priest Ezekiel was educated, but he obviously struggled to find a way to describe what he saw. God’s glory is beyond man’s ability to describe because we describe by making connections to things that we know, and God is so far beyond us that we have nothing in our experience to use as a reference. That’s what the term “holy” means – “other.” Although what Ezekiel described sounds monstrous, it was obviously overwhelming, because he fell face-down when he saw it and had to be stood back on his feet, and was rendered speechless for seven days. Take a few minutes to contemplate Ezekiel’s description and his response to what he saw. We may have only a limited understanding of what God is like, but we should be moved to praise at each glimpse we have of Him. Can you offer praise to Him for who He is, revealed in a small way in this passage?

The drama continues with God’s instruction to Ezekiel to act out the siege of Jerusalem. Poor Ezekiel! God took away his ability to speak except when God wanted him to speak, and He used his actions – very uncomfortable actions – to speak in what would have been a powerful way to some, but ridiculous to others. Notice what God said about Ezekiel’s audience: “Whoever will listen let him listen, and whoever will refuse let him refuse.” It wasn’t that God didn’t care about their heeding His words; He obviously did care if He continued to speak to a rebellious people. Rather, He didn’t force Himself on them. He is the same way today. Are we willing listeners? Are you a willing listener? Think about a listener’s behavior; do you behave like a listener? A study of the word used in that verse reveals that in the original Hebrew the word “listen” connoted not simply to hear, but also to give attention, to respond, and to obey. Do you behave like a listener? Why not ask God what He thinks of your listening?