Today, I am reading and commenting on  Ezekiel 32-33.

Many of us have been made watchmen by God.  He has called on us to warn those around us that God will judge the wicked, both among the living and the dead.  I am called out by that every year when I read this passage, but this year I felt a need to emphasize something in that part of the passage which I don’t remember noticing before.  Ezekiel addressed those among his audience who were weighed down with guilt.  God gave him a message to those who recognized their sinfulness and felt that they had no hope because their sin was so great.  God gives us this message, no matter how great our sin, if we turn to Him and allow Him to turn us from our sin, He will give us life.  God does not take pleasure in the death of the wicked.  He desires that all turn to Him and accept the righteousness which He offers.

I use the daily Bible reading schedule from “The Bible.net” for my daily Bible reading.

Today, I am reading and commenting on  Ezekiel 27-28.

God had established Tyre as a place with great potential and given them skill in commerce, but they took credit for their success and considered themselves gods.  So, God humbled them and brought them low.  In the same way, God will bring down any nation which begins to believe it cannot be defeated no matter what it does.  Ezekiel goes on to warn Sidon that it too would face destruction.   Ezekiel concludes this portion of his prophecies by telling us that these nations (those from yesterday as well as Tyre and Sidon) will face God’s judgement because of their hostility to Israel in order to demonstrate to Israel that God is their God.

I use the daily Bible reading schedule from “The Bible.net” for my daily Bible reading.

Today, I am reading and commenting on  Ezekiel 24-26.

God gives Ezekiel a prophecy where He compares Jerusalem to a cooking pot.  In the prophecy God calls for filling the pot with the best cuts of meat and boiling them all together.  The point of this prophecy being that God’s judgement, unlike man’s, will not favor the rich and powerful, or politically connected, over the poor and powerless.  When God brings judgement He will treat rich and poor equally, the only distinction He will make is between the righteous and the unrighteous.  And I want to note that while this passage does not make this point, the righteous are those who repent and throw themselves on God’s mercy.

I use the daily Bible reading schedule from “The Bible.net” for my daily Bible reading.

Today, I am reading and commenting on  Ezekiel 22-23.

Ezekiel lays out the reasons that God will destroy Jerusalem.  He lays out how the political leaders have shed blood to advance their interests.  While it became culturally acceptable to treat parents with contempt, oppress foreigners, mistreat orphans and widows, despise the Holy, behave in all sorts of sexually inappropriate ways, profit off of the poor, and extort unjust gains.  Ezekiel goes on to describe how the religious leaders fail to distinguish between the holy and the common and teach that there is no difference between the clean and the unclean.  How can the people be expected to honor God when those who claim to speak on His behalf fail to distinguish between good and evil?

I was going to write about a news story I recently read which illustrates the ways in which political and religious leaders profit off of the poor while claiming to speak on their behalf, but decided that would distract from my point.  Reading this passage and seeing how it applies to our society today makes it look like we are doomed, like God’s judgement will inescapably fall on us.  However, there is one other thing in this passage.  Ezekiel tells us that God looked in Jerusalem for people to repair the wall against unrighteousness, for people to stand in the gaps while it was being repaired.  And He did not find them.  Well, He is looking for such people today in our society.  Will you work to repair the wall? Will you stand in the gaps in the wall?  Or will you just put whitewash on it to cover up that it is about to collapse?

I use the daily Bible reading schedule from “The Bible.net” for my daily Bible reading.

Today, I am reading and commenting on  Ezekiel 20-21.

When some elders of Israel came to Ezekiel to inquire of the Lord, God told Ezekiel that He would not allow them to inquire of Him.  God then reminds them of the sin and rebelliousness of their ancestors, culminating by asking them, rhetorically, if they will defile themselves in the way that their ancestors did.  In particular God points out that they defile themselves by sacrificing their children.  Now to me, the context seems to suggest that those to whom Ezekiel was speaking did not consider themselves to be worshiping idols.  In the same way, most of those in our society today who are sacrificing children for their ideals do not consider themselves to be worshiping idols, especially those who consider themselves Christians.  So, let us examine our lives for the ways in which we defile ourselves by making offerings to other gods.  Perhaps we do not sacrifice our children, or even encourage others to sacrifice theirs, but what other acts do we commit which indicate our true loyalty lies with something other than God?

God told the Israelite elders who consulted Ezekiel that He would deal with them for His name’s sake and not according to their evil ways and corrupt practices.  I believe that He will do the same for those today who truly seek to be His people and in that day, we will loathe ourselves for the evil we have committed.

I use the daily Bible reading schedule from “The Bible.net” for my daily Bible reading.

Today, I am reading and commenting on  Ezekiel 17-19.

Today’s passage begins with an allegorical parable (are there any other kind?) about Judah’s last king.  He then explains the meaning of the parable.  Ezekiel explains that if King Zedekiah had honored his oath to the king of Babylon, God would have caused him to prosper.  However, because Zedekiah broke the covenant which he made with the king of Babylon, God will allow him to die in Babylon without an heir.  Extending the allegory, Ezekiel says that God will  take a shoot from the same stock which Babylon had selected a plant a tree which would tower over the earth.  This is clearly a prophecy about God’s Messiah offering hope for those about to see the destruction of Jerusalem.

I use the daily Bible reading schedule from “The Bible.net” for my daily Bible reading.

Today, I am reading and commenting on  Ezekiel 13-15.

Ezekiel starts today’s passage with a prophecy against those who preach, but do not have, or even seek, a message from God.  He compares them to people who coat a wall with whitewash rather than repair the damage.  When he makes this prophecy he refers to those who speak in platitudes instead of speaking the hard words with which God condemns sin.  We have similar people today, people who are busy telling people that God blesses their sins rather than calling them to change their ways.  He goes on to condemn those who seek to profit from speaking spiritual messages which they have created out of their own imagination.  Finally, Ezekiel condemns those who have created their own idols within themselves, but then seek guidance from those to whom God speaks.  So, rather than look to “prophets” who will tell us that everything is OK, let us turn from whatever idols get between us and God and renounce the detestable practices we have fallen into.  Seek to rebuild the wall of righteousness which protects the land, starting with yourself.  Just as I need to start with myself.

I use the daily Bible reading schedule from “The Bible.net” for my daily Bible reading.

Today, I am reading and commenting on  Ezekiel 9-12.

In yesterday’s passage, Ezekiel prophesied about the corrupt practices of the people and leaders still living in Jerusalem and how those practices would lead to the destruction of Jerusalem.  Today, Ezekiel goes into more detail about that destruction.  Ezekiel describes how God ordered six “men” to execute judgement upon the people in Jerusalem.  God ordered them to kill without pity or compassion.  However, God sent ahead of them a “man” ordered to mark those who lamented and grieved over the detestable things being done in Jerusalem.  Those ordered to kill were also ordered to pass by those so marked.  I want you to notice that those who were marked for protection were not marked in advance.  They were not those who had at some point lamented and grieved over the sins being carried out.  They were those who were actively doing so when God’s judgement was carried out.  So, let us grieve and lament about the detestable things being done in our society today.

I use the daily Bible reading schedule from “The Bible.net” for my daily Bible reading.