Heirs to the Kingdom Ezekiel and Daniel Transcript Heirs to the Kingdom, welcome back to your lessons on the prophets. Today we look at the prophet Ezekiel. Ezekiel means "God is strong," and it is a fitting name for a prophet stuck in exile but believing in God s power to redeem. Unlike Jeremiah who prophesied before and after the exile, Ezekiel prophesies exclusively while a captive in Babylonia. You should be well aware of the history at this point that led the Southern Kingdom of Judah into exile. You will remember that the exile did not happen all at once but was accomplished in waves leading up to the final complete and thorough destruction of Jerusalem in 586 BCE. At this time King Zedekiah was blinded and hauled off to Babylon to live the rest of his life as a prisoner. Before that however Judah suffered a similar attack in 597 BCE and the then King Jehoiachin was taken into Babylonian captivity along with 10,000 other Judeans. It was the first exile that brought Ezekiel to Babylonia to live in a Jewish colony along the Chebar river. Here s a little bit of background information on the person of Ezekiel before we talk about the contents of his book. What do we know about Ezekiel? Well everything we do know about him we learn about only from the book that bears his name. He is not mentioned in the historical books at all. We do know however, according to Ezekiel 24 that he was married. Unfortunately his wife dies, and God uses the occasion of his wife's death as a prophetic lesson, commanding Ezekiel not to mourn at his wife s passing, just as the people are not to mourn for the destruction of Jerusalem. We also know, according to Ezekiel 3 that he lived in his own home and seemed, along with the rest of the exiles, to live a rather free existence as a conquered person in a foreign land. We also know from the very first verses of the book that Ezekiel was born into a priestly family (much like our good friend Jeremiah). Like Jeremiah he saw things that others could not. When others believed then that the exile would be over in a jiffy, Ezekiel said, Hold up! It s going to be a while. Later, when the people became pessimistic about their circumstance and believed they were going to live forever in the clutches of the Babylonians Ezekiel said, Cheer up! God is going to make things right again. Now Ezekiel was 25 years old when he was exiled to Babylonia in 597 BCE and he was 30 years old when he began his prophetic ministry in 592 BCE according to Ezekiel chapter 1. The last dated oracle in Ezekiel s book is from the 27 th year of the exile meaning that Ezekiel prophesied from 592 until 570 BCE, for more than 20 years. The first six years of Ezekiel s prophetic ministry then, from 592 until 586 BCE happened before the final fall of Jerusalem. It was during this time that Ezekiel quelled the optimism of the people and he instructed them to settle in for an extended period of time in the foreign land of Babylonia. After 586, when the people heard that the great city of Jerusalem was destroyed and the mighty temple of YHWH was leveled then the people s pessimism settled in and it was then that Ezekiel proclaimed a message of hope.
Now, let s spend some time with the content of the book. Ezekiel opens in rather unusual way with a very strange vision. Ezekiel is said to be hanging out with the exiles along the river Kebar when he sees the likeness of the glory of God. This likeness came in the form of a strange scene in the sky. With strange creatures and strange metal objects with wheels spinning inside of wheels and bright flashing lights. Now this rather strange sight is a VERY important beginning to Ezekiel s prophesy, because it is said to be the appearance of the likeness of the glory of the Lord. Now why is this significant? Well, because, where is Ezekiel? Or better yet, where is he not? He s not in the Jerusalem, in the temple, in the Holy of Holies, where the Ark of the Covenant was. Which was covered, you will remember, by the mercy seat on which appeared the glory of the Lord. No, Ezekiel is said twice in the text, to be in Babylonia among the exiles along the river chebar. So right away, Ezekiel says something very important, God has followed the exiles. He is a God who moves. His existence then is not tied to the temple, which will soon be destroyed, and is not tied to the city of Jerusalem which will suffer the same fate. He is with his people no matter where they are. Now after this vision the book of Ezekiel begins in much the same way that Jeremiah does with a description of the call of prophet. You will remember that in Jeremiah s case when the word of the Lord came to him Jeremiah needed reassurance. So God touched the lips of Jeremiah putting his very words into Jeremiah s mouth. A similar story is told about Ezekiel. He is called by God and told upfront that his job is impossible! He is going to deliver a message to a people that will not listen no matter what he does. Can you imagine that? That s like being told your job is to fill up a bucket with water by using an eye dropper. Unfortunately the bucket has a whole in the bottom of it the size of a baseball. So you never you get any water in the bucket that actually stays there. That s enough to get you discouraged. But God does not leave Ezekiel entirely on his own. He provides Ezekiel with two things. The first is a special edible scroll written on both sides with words of sorrow, lament, and woe. These are the words of God that the prophet will bring to the people. God commands Ezekiel to eat this scroll, which he does. Interestingly, even though the scroll is full of words of sorrow, woe, and lament, the scroll tastes sweet like honey perhaps a foreshadowing of God s redemption. The second thing that God does for Ezekiel is make his forehead harder than flint. In other words he fortifies Ezekiel s resolve. God knows that Ezekiel will be butting his head against a stump (figuratively I mean) in prophesying to the people. So God gives him a head hard enough to take the beating. Very considerate of God don t you think? Now Ezekiel is a very strange prophet. Perhaps, again, because he had an impossible job. So Ezekiel comes up, with God s help, with an unusual method of getting his point across. This method is called sign acts. They are prophetic signs that are acted out. Let me a share a couple of them with you. The first is found in Ezekiel chapter four. Here God instructs the prophet to take a clay tablet and draw the city of Jerusalem on it. Well, that sounds simple enough. But then God continues once you ve done that I want you to lay siege to it and erect siege works against it, and build a ramp to get over the city walls, and
set up camps around it, and find some miniature battering rams. Have fun with it. Give them a good show! And once you ve done all that I tell you what I m going to do I m going to tie you up with a bunch of ropes and I want you to lay down next to the clay tablet signifying the sins of Israel and Judah. Start with your left side the sins of Israel and stay there for 390 days. Once your done that flip yourself over and lie down for another 40 days for the sins of Judah. Now while your doing this you re going to need something to eat, so get your bread mix ready and bake it so you have some food. But don t just bake it with any fuel. I want you to use human excrement (by that I mean human poo) as fuel for the fire. Thankfully Ezekiel objected to this last request oh no God, I ve never defiled my lips with anything unclean! God then has mercy on Ezekiel. Okay, Okay. no human excrement. I get it just use cow manure instead. Ewww! Now God instructed Ezekiel to do all of this to show that Jerusalem was not going to be spared that it too would fall. The second sign act immediately follows in chapter 5. After the clay tablet city has been laid siege to Ezekiel is to take a sharp sword and use it as a razor and cut the hair on his head and beard off. With a scale he is to measure his hair into thirds. One third he is to burn inside the city. One third he is to chop to bits with his sword outside the city. And one third he is to scatter in the wind. This was to show the fate of the people some would die in the fires inside the city, some would die by the sword outside the city, and some would be scattered into exile. As you can imagine these sign acts gained a lot of attention, and through them the word of the Lord was brought to a people that were not willing to listen to it any other way. Whether they accepted the word they heard or not was another matter, but they certainly couldn t ignore it. But as we said, Ezekiel is not all about gloom and doom. After Babylon falls Ezekiel s tone will change, much like Jeremiah s book of consolation. You remember that in Jeremiah s book of consolation is found the famous passage about the new covenant--the day will surely comes says the Lord when I will make a new covenant no longer will the laws be written in stone, but I will write them on the hearts I will be their God and they will be my people. Well Ezekiel has a sister passage to this notice how similar it sounds, it is found in Ezekiel 36:26-28, I will give you a new heart and put a new spirit in you; I will remove from you your heart of stone and give you a heart of flesh. And I will put my Spirit in your and move you to follow my decrees and be careful to keep my laws. You will live in the land I gave your forefathers; you will be my people and I will be your God. This is the same promise as given by Jeremiah, just expressed with different words. It is the promise of hope, renewal, and redemption. This where Ezekiel turns, after the people have become pessimistic about their future. God will make everything right again! Oddly, this message, like the opposite message of God s judgment, did not go over well. After the destruction of Jerusalem the people lost all hope. They became fatalistic. This is the way its always been. We ll never be able to put our faith in God. We will always fail. God s going to make everything right again? How can this be?! The people complain, We are horrible people, destined to make horrible mistakes, just like our
parents before us, and their parents before them. We will always fail we re destined to fail. Sadly, many people today live their lives with similar drivers. They believe too that they are destined for failure, they ve always been losers and always will be losers. Ezekiel fights against this deterministic and fatalistic attitude in a rather famous passage in chapter 18. Suppose there is a righteous man, begins Ezekiel. He does everything right! Keeps all the commandments. Now suppose he has a violent son who sheds blood, and oppresses the poor, and defiles his neighbor s wife. Will such a son live just because his father is just? Surely not, says Ezekiel, because he has done these bad things, he will be put to death and his blood will be on his own head. But suppose this evil son also has a son. And this new son sees all the sins his father committed, and he determines not to do any of them, but to live in the way of his grandfather loving justice and righteousness. Will such a son live even though his father is evil? Yes, says Ezekiel, he will not die for his father s sins; he will surely live. The soul who sins is the one who will die. The son will not share in the guilt of the father, nor will the father share in the guilt of the son. The righteousness of the righteous will be credited to him and the wickedness of the wicked will be charged against him. Now these words from Ezekiel 18 are hugely important. They allowed the people to imagine themselves as the good son who saw the sins of the father but chose not to practice them. In the same way, even today, we can choose a different life, a better life, than that which came before us. Or we can choose a worse life. We are each responsible. Here is one last scene from the book of Ezekiel. This one found in chapter 37. This is, perhaps, the most famous passage in the entire book of Ezekiel. Here Ezekiel describes a valley full of dry dead bones. These bones have been shattered, shriveled, and strewn across the valley floor. The bones are not joined in corpses or even skeletons; they lie in piles of broken fragments. God asks Ezekiel if it is possible for these bones to come together again, and Ezekiel admits that only God knows the answer to the question. God tells Ezekiel to prophesy to the bones that they will live again. When Ezekiel speaks, a wind comes forth (the same word in Hebrew as spirit) and begins to stir the bones. As the wind grows, the bones begin to shudder and then to jump into the air. Lifted by the wind, the bones spin in flight and strike each other, sticking together to form whole bones and eventually skeletons. Then muscle and tissue begin to grow on the skeletons of the dead soldiers, to form whole bodies. With another word of prophecy, the wind becomes breath and enters into the army, bringing the bodies to life. Here we are at the end of Ezekiel's long life of head-butting-a-stump-prophecy and God shows Ezekiel that his prophetic words have had an effect. The points of the vision is that God intends to restore the Judeans back to life by the prophetic word even if they now feel as though they are a valley of dry dead bones. God can bring life from death. The rest of the book of Ezekiel then describes a vision of a new temple perfectly restored. The temple that Ezekiel describes is a focus of hope for the people. They will once again reclaim that which was lost, of this they had God s promise, delivered from the mouth of his servant Ezekiel.
Okay Heirs, that s all for today, next week we will look at the prophet Daniel. Thank you for your attention. Let us close in prayer. Father God, in our times of exile and judgment help us to know that a change in our lives is possible. We can make right decisions, even if once we made wrong ones. Help us to know that you can take our old dead lives and make them new and alive again. Amen.