Friday, November 21, 2014

Ezekiel's Second Spoken Message PT-1A (Ezekiel 7:1-9)


SPIRITUAL DIARY FOR 11/21/2014 9:40 AM

My Worship Time                                          Focus:  Ezekiel’s Second Spoken Sermon PT-1A

Bible Reading & Meditation                                     Reference:  Ezekiel 7:1-9

            Message of the verses:  “1 Moreover, the word of the LORD came to me saying, 2  "And you, son of man, thus says the Lord GOD to the land of Israel, ’An end! The end is coming on the four corners of the land. 3 ’Now the end is upon you, and I will send My anger against you; I will judge you according to your ways and bring all your abominations upon you. 4  ’For My eye will have no pity on you, nor will I spare you, but I will bring your ways upon you, and your abominations will be among you; then you will know that I am the LORD!’ 5 “Thus says the Lord GOD, ’A disaster, unique disaster, behold it is coming! 6 ’An end is coming; the end has come! It has awakened against you; behold, it has come! 7 ’Your doom has come to you, O inhabitant of the land. The time has come, the day is near-tumult rather than joyful shouting on the mountains. 8 ’Now I will shortly pour out My wrath on you and spend My anger against you; judge you according to your ways and bring on you all your abominations. 9 ’My eye will show no pity nor will I spare. I will repay you according to your ways, while your abominations are in your midst; then you will know that I, the LORD, do the smiting.”

            As I look over these verses again I see a sort of parallel with what the Lord says to Abraham in Genesis chapter fifteen.  Genesis fifteen is a part of the Abrahamic covenant that God made with Abraham, along with what He told Abraham in Genesis 12:1-3, and as God makes this covenant with Abraham He has Abraham line up animals which are cut in half and then the Lord made His covenant with Abraham.  God told Abraham what would happen to his descendants that they would end up going to Egypt for four hundred years and then the Lord would bring them back to the Promised Land where Abraham was at that time.  Now here is the verse that makes me think of what God was going to do with His people at the time Ezekiel was writing this chapter:  “"Then in the fourth generation they will return here, for the iniquity of the Amorite is not yet complete."”  I have mentioned this in earlier SD’s that it seems to me that God has a cup in heaven that He puts His wrath and when it is full He will bring judgment upon that nation or even a person, and it seems to me that His cup of wrath for Judah was full and so He had to act.  We went over this a bit when looking at Steward Briscoe’s quote in yesterday’s SD.  At any rate the end was coming for Judah as God was about to bring judgment on them by using the Babylonians and we read two times in this passage that they will  know that “I am Lord.”  In the book of Philippians chapter two we read that there will come a time when everyone will know this same thing:  “9 For this reason also, God highly exalted Him, and bestowed on Him the name which is above every name, 10 so that at the name of Jesus EVERY KNEE WILL BOW, of those who are in heaven and on earth and under the earth, 11 and that every tongue will confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.

            Now we remember that God told Ezekiel that he was a watchman, and was to warn Judah what was going to happen to them and Dr. Wiersbe points out “It is come!’ at least nine times in verses 1-12.  He was a faithful watchman, warning the people that the Babylonian army was coming from the north to invade the land, rob it, and ruin it.”  We have spoken earlier about Ezekiel as a watchman and even had a quote from Steward Briscoe explaining what this has to do with believers today.

            Spiritual meaning for my life today:  I mentioned in a SD at the end of October how I planned to have a Bible study on the end times inviting people in our neighborhood by letter to come to this study and then to my great disappointment no one showed up.  I was trying to be a faithful watchman to my neighbors, but at that time it did not word out.  I still desire to have a Bible study with my neighbor across the street, something I have wanted to do for almost a year and have not got it done.  I desire to be a faithful watchman to him and pray that the Lord will allow me that opportunity to do so.

My Steps of Faith for Today:  Continue to trust the Lord to work in my neighbor’s life that he would want to study about the end times with me.

Memory verses for the week:  2 Peter 1:1.

1 Simon Peter, a bond-servant and apostle of Jesus Christ, to those who have received a faith of the same kind as ours, by the righteous of our God and Savior, Jesus Christ:

Answer to yesterday’s Bible question:  “Jerusalem” (Luke 4:9).

Today’s Bible question:  “Who was the first murderer?”

Answer in our next SD

11/21/2014 10:10 AM

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