SPIRITUAL DIARY FOR
4/12/2015 9:39 AM
My Worship Time Focus: God’s Indictment against His People
Bible Reading & Meditation Reference: Ezekiel
36:16-23
Message
of the verses: In today’s SD from
Ezekiel we will look at the first sub-point that comes from the second main
point in our outline which is entitled “Regeneration: the people cleansed” and this covers Ezekiel
36:16-38. In his introduction to this
section Dr. Wiersbe wrote “The Jewish people forgot that the land belonged to
the Lord, for He said ‘The land is Mine (Lev. 25:23). In fact, the whole earth belongs to the Lord
(Ex. 19:5; Ps. 24:1), and we have no right to abuse the natural resources He
shares with us”
God indictment against His people
(Ezekiel 36:16-23): “16 Then the word of
the LORD came to me saying, 17 "Son of man, when the house of Israel was
living in their own land, they
defiled it by their ways and their deeds; their way before Me was like the uncleanness
of a woman in her impurity. 18 “Therefore I poured out My wrath on them for the
blood which they had shed on the land, because they had defiled it with their
idols. 19 “Also I scattered them among the nations and they were dispersed
throughout the lands. According to their ways and their deeds I judged them. 20
“When they came to the
nations where they went, they profaned My holy name, because it was said of
them, ’These are the people of the LORD; yet they have come out of His land.’
21“But I had concern for My holy name, which the house of Israel had profaned
among the nations where they went. 22 “Therefore say to the house of Israel, ’Thus says the Lord GOD,
"It is not for your
sake, O house of Israel, that I am about to act, but for My holy name, which
you have profaned among the nations where you went. 23 “I will vindicate the holiness of
My great name which has been profaned among the nations, which you have
profaned in their midst. Then
the nations will know that I am the LORD," declares the Lord GOD,
"when I prove Myself holy among you in their sight.”
4/12/2015 9:58 AM 4/12/2015 8:12 PM
As we begin to look at these verses
we find that Israel was guilty of two sins which Ezekiel speaks of in this
section. The first sin comes in verses
16-19 and as we look at them we find that Israel was polluting the land: “they defiled it by their ways and their deeds; their way before Me was
like the uncleanness of a woman in her impurity.” I would say that this is a pretty strong
statement made by the Lord. Ezekiel goes
on to say that they were polluting the land by worshiping idols. Israel was suppose to go into the Promised
Land and clear out the inhabitants of the land, which they failed to do, and
then while they were doing this they were not to follow the practices that
these Canaanites were following. However
that is exactly what they were doing.
This began back when Baalam was suppose to curse Israel before they had
even made it to the Promised Land, but God would not allow him to do this so
what he did was get the heathen women to go and seduce the men in the Israeli
camp which then caused them to begin to worship idols and when they got into
the land they did not drive out the Canaanites and the ones that were left are
the ones that Israel followed. Paul
writes the following in “1Co 15:33 Do
not be deceived: "Bad company corrupts good morals."” God finally was feed up with Israel’s sin and
so the Babylonians came and destroyed their city and their temple and took them
off to Babylon to be exiles as we have been seeing in our study of
Ezekiel. Dr. Wiersbe writes: “In our contemporary world, we wonder how
much land is being polluted by the destruction of innocent babies, the murders
of innocent people, including children in school, and the general disregard for
both the laws of man and the law of God.”
We are fast approaching 60 million abortions in this land and that is a
lot of blood that has been shed, and so one wonders how long it will be before
the Lord judges us in a harsh way.
As we look at verses 20-23 we will
see the second sin that Israel committed and that was profaning God’s name
before the Gentiles. “When they came to the nations
where they went, they profaned My holy name, because it was said of them, ’These
are the people of the LORD; yet they have come out of His land.’” I have mentioned in other SD’s that one of
the attributes of God is that He is a jealous God, and I have also mentioned that
this is unlike a person being jealous of another person, but God is perfect and
His name is very important to Him as we see Scriptures like this and He will
not put up with people profaning His Holy Name for long. We have already mentioned that Israel was
following the pagan ways and surely the pagans did not lift up the name of the
Lord, and one of the reasons was that Israel was suppose to tell them about the
Lord so they would get to know Him, but they did not. Dr. Wiersbe writes “Five times in this
paragraph we’re told that the Jews profaned the name of God before the pagans
before whom they had been sent to be a light (Isa.42:6; 49:6). In spite of their disobedience, what as
opportunity the Lord gave the Jews to introduce the Gentiles to the true and
living God!” In our study of the 7th
chapter of Revelation we mentioned that by the grace of God Israel will get
another chance in the Tribulation period.
Now as Ezekiel looked at the Jews
there in Babylon as exiles they did not have a temple to worship in nor a city
to build another temple in and so they were not in a good position to worship
the Lord. Now if memory serves me
correctly I believe that while they were in captivity I when the Synagogues
began, and they continue to this day for Israel still does not have a temple
since 70 AD when Titus and his Roman Legions destroyed the temple.
Dr. Wiersbe concludes this portion
of his commentary with the following words:
“The Lord promises to change the people only because He desires to
sanctify and glorify His great name (36:22).
In the last days, when the Lord gathers His people back to their land,
everything the Lord will do for them will be because of His grace and not
because they deserve it. God didn’t give
them the land because of their righteousness (Deut. 9:6), and He won’t restore
the land because of anything good they have done. God in His grace gives us what we don’t
deserve, and in His mercy He doesn’t give us what we do deserve! All that we have in Christ comes from God’s
grace (Ep. 1:7; 2:8-10) and was designed for God’s glory (1:6, 11, 14).”
So we are off and running on this
portion of Ezekiel and I hope all are learning and enjoying this portion of Ezekiel.
4/12/2015
8:45 PM
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