Ezekiel 24–25

Ezekiel 24, which is where we're going to start off tonight. And by the way, Ezekiel 24 puts us right at the midway point in the Book of Ezekiel. How do you like that? So we finally reached the halfway point. Let's ask the Lord's guidance. Father, we thank you so much for the ministry of your Word. We thank you God, for the ministry of your Spirit who makes the Word come alive in our lives and we thank you, Lord, that you are faithful to speak to us from the scriptures. Lord, this is your Word, this is in the Old Testament, in the Bible, it's here for a reason and we Lord, we believe that you want us to understand it. Not only that, but we believe that as we do lay hold of these things, it will give us a more rounded picture of who you are and what you desire to say to us about who you are and how you work among mankind. So be with us we pray, in Jesus precious name, amen. I know that there's a lot of people who struggle, frankly going through the Old Testament. The Old Testament can be very challenging to study through. And I had a gentleman write to me recently who got together with another guy who apparently were of some of the same thought processes related to the Old Testament. And they postulated that maybe there were two gods; one from the old one from the new. Because they felt that the characterization of God that is given in the scripture is so different between the Old Testament and the New Testament. And by the way, this is not an old or excuse me, a new idea. I think it was in the first or second century, somebody came up or postulated this idea and it was considered, you know, to be heretical back then and it's, of course, heretical today. But can I just tell you, I'll tell you what I said to the guy that wrote to me because he gave me several examples from the Old Testament of harshness. And you know, you don't have to go very far to find that, you know, go to the Book of Leviticus and you find harshness. Things were dealt with sometimes in a rather harsh or what we consider to be a harsh sort of a way. And he gave me several examples in his note and then kind of said, why, why this, why that? And one of the things that we forget when we're reading through the Bible is one very important insight, and that is that, God chose Israel as a nation to dwell in the midst of, okay. He didn't do that with the United States of America or any other country back then, or any other country today. He chose Israel to dwell in their midst and so one of the things He wanted to communicate to Israel in no uncertain terms was his holiness. And what we interpret as strictness, maybe even harshness related to the handling of certain things is in fact God communicating His utter holiness alongside man's utter depravity. And that's not an easy thing for us to understand, it's not an easy thing for us to even stomach because it continually reminds us, we don't measure up and that's not something we like to think about. I think that's one of the reasons why people have a struggle some time with the Old Testament because it's a constant reminder, we don't measure up. And so God had to institute this really fairly grotesque, bloody, sacrificial system to remind us of how troublesome our sins were, are. How much trouble we have to go through, actually, ultimately, He had to go through, in order to atone for those sins and how much of a big, fat, bloody mess the whole thing is. We forget that

We forget that we cannot stand before a holy God, we cannot. You know, you and I cannot stand before God's holiness. We're going to have new bodies to do that or get rid of the ones that we have at the very least right here. These bodies right here cannot stand before a Holy God, we forget that and that's what God was communicating in the Old Testament over and over and over again. And that's why it appears harsh, but it seems harsh to us because we forget the depth of our sin and we forget the height of His holiness. We forget those things very easily and we live in a world that is overwhelmed with unrighteousness and impurity, and evil frankly, and we've gotten accustomed to it, right? To the point where we don't think it weird, we don't think it's strange. The things that go on in our everyday world that grieve God on a daily basis. So anyway, this plays into a little bit of what we're, well, a little bit, a lot a bit of what we're dealing with here in Ezekiel from the standpoint that God is now judging the sin of Israel, this nation. But not just this nation, He's going to judge the other nations around them and we're going to see some of those prophecies tonight as well. But chapter 24 that we're looking at here first tonight, is made up of 2 separate prophetic messages that God gave to Ezekiel to give to give to those who were living already in exile. I want to remind you of the fact that Ezekiel is already in exile, the rest of the nation is not yet, but they are about to go into exile. And these words, although they are directed to the believer or the Jews rather in exile, they are about what God is doing in Jerusalem and the reasons. This chapter is really all about illustrating for you and me, the reason why this judgment is coming once again. But I want you to notice in verse 1, there's a timing element, or I should say a dating element that is given in the first verse. It says,

(ESV) So this is the day, God tells Ezekiel to record this day because it is a day that will become of enormous importance for the nation of Israel henceforth and we know about those things, don't we? We understand those things. Here in the United States of America, we have just recently observed the 20th anniversary of 9/11 and that too is a day that forever changed our nation. And we remember that day, that it's not a day we're going to forget anytime soon. Same here with what is happening in Israel. And the Lord goes on in verse 3, telling Ezekiel to, “And utter a parable…” And so we're having, we know exactly what we're going to hear here in these next verses, it's a story type metaphoric parable. He says,

To seethe, means to simmer over time. So, you know, by the way, we're not exactly sure if Ezekiel simply told this story as a parable, or if he acted it out. More than likely, he acted it out because that's the way Ezekiel's life was, it was an example. He acted out many things that were given in picture form to give a message to the people of Israel who were in exile there. But what we're talking about in this metaphor obviously, is God telling them, He's about to turn up the heat and they will all be thrown into this cauldron of judgment. In verse 6, He says,

Let me stop you there because this takes a little bit of Old Testament understanding to get what is being said here. You might recall in Leviticus that it was required of the Jews that whenever they killed an animal for food, they were to drain the blood, of course, before they ate any of the meat, but they were also to cover the blood. They were to not just leave it on the ground, they were to cover it. And when it was uncovered, it polluted the ground by being uncovered and it therefore incurred God's wrath. So here the Lord you'll notice, is not only accusing Jerusalem of shedding blood, but also leaving it uncovered. And this is probably more of a picture of just their sins being out in the open, uncovered, and so forth. And so God goes on to say in verse 8,

In other words, their sins are uncovered, they will be left uncovered, they are not going to be atoned for. They're going to be out in the open and they're going to be judged. Verse 9,

Do you see what the Lord is saying here what this metaphoric picture is? So after the pot is emptied, He says that it will be heated and burned in order to remove the uncleanness from the inside of the pot. And what God is promising to do here, is He's promising to purge Jerusalem of her sin.

And of course, not just the city, but the people. And we've talked about the fact that the sin of idolatry was in fact purged from the nation of Israel after their time, 70 years of exile in the Persian kingdom. So God is basically saying here, Jerusalem is the pot, I'm going to empty it and then I'm going to purge it of all of its uncleanness. Verse 13, “On account of your unclean lewdness, because I would have cleansed you and you were not cleansed from your uncleanness, you shall not be cleansed anymore till I have satisfied my fury upon you.” God says, I would have forgiven you, I would have atoned for your sin if you had turned to me, but you didn't and so now it's not going to be covered any longer. “14 I am the Lord. I have spoken; it shall come to pass; I will do it. I will not go back; I will not spare; I will not relent; according to your ways and your deeds you will be judged, declares the Lord God.” And wow, that's just one really kind of fairly long verse for God to emphasize that it is firm, it is according to His will and it will in fact happen. Now, verses 15 through the end is the second word from the Lord to Ezekiel in this chapter. And this is an interesting and also at the same time challenging prophecy where again Ezekiel is an example to the people, but this is an interesting example. It involves the death of his wife, who Ezekiel obviously loved very much and so this is rather poignant. But in verse 15, it says, “The word of the Lord came to me: 16 “Son of man, behold, I am about to take the delight of your eyes away from you at a stroke; yet you shall not mourn or weep, nor shall your tears run down. 17 Sigh, but not aloud; make no mourning for the dead. Bind on your turban, and put your shoes on your feet; do not cover your lips, nor eat the bread of men.”” And that's hard to understand for us; the last statement about covering your lips. You think to yourself, why would God tell him not to cover his lips or eat the bread of men? And the NIV actually does a really good job of interpreting this for us. The NIV says, “do not cover the lower part of your face” which is a customary thing during a time of mourning. And the NIV goes on to say, “or eat the customary food of mourners” and that's what it's talking about. In other words, what God is saying to Ezekiel is, don't go through the regular customary ways of mourning for someone who has died and we're going to find out why in just a bit. But Ezekiel here, this had to have been incredibly hard because Ezekiel is told here that God is going to take the life of his wife, she will die and he was not to show any outward signs of grieving.

And we don't know, by the way, if Ezekiel's wife had been sick for a time, it's doubtful because she was probably fairly young. Ezekiel would have been about 35 years old at this time, so his wife was no doubt younger than that. And so we kind of doubt that she was sick unto death, she just was taken. So Ezekiel goes on in verse 18 to say, “So I spoke to the people in the morning, and at evening my wife died. And on the next morning I did as I was commanded.” In other words, he showed no grief or any kind of customary form of mourning for the death of his wife. Verse 19, “And the people said to me, (and this is very interesting) “Will you not tell us what these things mean for us, that you are acting thus?”” So you can tell by that statement that the people had come to the place of understanding that Ezekiel was an example. Metaphorically, symbolically, that God was speaking to them through the events of Ezekiel's life and the way he dealt with those events. And so they come to him, and it's, I don't know if it kind of shows their own selfishness, but here's a man whose wife has just passed, and they're coming and saying, what does this mean for us? What is God saying to us, you know, about this situation that you've just gone through,” and so forth. And then He says in verse 20, “Then I said to them, “The word of the Lord came to me: 21 ‘Say to the house of Israel, Thus says the Lord God: Behold, I will profane my sanctuary,’ …” And you probably know that the word profane means to desecrate or to violate. And this is, this would have meant something to the Jews because they believed that Jerusalem would never be overtaken because the temple was in Jerusalem. And since God's presence was promised in the temple, although they'd gotten far away from God and their devotion to Him, they still had this crazy belief that God would never allow anything to happen to the temple, never. And so the city of Jerusalem is safe, to say nothing of the temple, of course, nothing would ever happen to the temple. What is God saying through Ezekiel? I'm going to allow my temple to be profane. Actually, they have already profaned it, they have profaned it. Now God says, I will profane it. In other words, I'm going to let Gentiles come in and destroy it. And He said, and notice what He goes on to say. He says, “20…: Behold, I will profane my sanctuary, the pride of your power, the delight (and this is interesting, this is where it connects to Ezekiel's wife, the delight) of your eyes, and the yearning of your soul, and your sons and your daughters whom you left behind shall fall by the sword.”

Do you see the picture? See the picture that Ezekiel is portraying to them? His wife was the delight of his eyes and she was taken from him. And God said, the temple is the delight of the eyes of the Jews and I will take it away. And so this is the picture. You know, I was studying, I don't know if Sue remembers me saying this today, but I was going through this passage and studying it out and Sue was working at the table and I got up, headed toward the kitchen to get something and I just said, man, am I glad I'm not Ezekiel. Just, you know, this whole idea of your life being this picture and these painful pictures nonetheless. So anyway, it's just incredible. Verse 22, “And you shall do (and this is Ezekiel now talking to the people. And you shall do) as I have done; you shall not cover your lips, (in other words, they will not go through those typical customary forms of mourning) nor eat the bread of men. (meaning the bread of the food of the mourner) 23 Your turbans shall be on your heads…” They used to take off their turbans and they'd put like ashes or dirt on their head during a time of mourning and the signs of grief. And he says, you’re not going to do any of those things, your turbans in fact will stay on your heads, you won't take your shoes off even. To go barefoot was another sign of grief and mourning. “23…and your shoes (are going to stay) on your feet; you shall not mourn or weep, but you shall rot away in your iniquities and groan to one another.” In other words, what Ezekiel is telling the people through the Lord, is that they are about to become so overwhelmed by this news that comes to them about the fall of Jerusalem and the destruction of the temple that they aren't going to be able to observe any of their normal mourning rituals. Mourning, M-O-U-R-N-I-N-G. None of the usual practices, none of the traditions that they would use when they would mourn and grieve and cry out. And let me tell you something, the Jews were good at mourning. I mean, they were good at it. They even, in that culture, the louder you mourned for the loss of a loved one or something precious, the more honor you gave to that thing, right? That's why they would hire mourners to come to their home. If you had enough money, you would do that for a loved one because you loved this friend this family member so much, you would hire or pay for mourners to come to your home and wail. You remember that's what was happening at Jairus's daughter when she passed away at his house. When Jesus got there with Jairus, it says that the mourners were carrying on and carrying on. (Mark 5:38) And Jesus spoke to them and said, why are you wailing and mourning? She's not dead, she's just asleep. (Matthew 5:39) And it says they laughed at Him. (Matthew 5:40) And that's why they could switch from wailing to laughing so quickly, they were hired to do it, they weren't really sad, you know? They were putting on a show. Well, the Jews didn't always put on a show, many of times, the mourning was very real. But in this case there this news would become so overwhelming that they would not mourn in those ways. In other words, they would be too horrified even to cry out or to grieve. Verse 24, “Thus shall Ezekiel be to you a sign; according to all that he has done you shall do. When this comes, then you will know that I am the Lord God.’ 25 “As for you, son of man, (now the Lord speaking to Ezekiel personally) surely on the day when I take from them their stronghold, their joy and glory, the delight of their eyes and their soul's desire, and also their sons and daughters, 26 on that day a fugitive (your bible may say, he who escapes if you have an NASB) will come to you to report to you the news. 27 On that day (verse 27) your mouth will be opened to the fugitive, …”” And so what we learn from that is that apparently God had told Ezekiel after giving them this message, he was to stay silent until the day that Jerusalem fell. And then when they received the news, He says, you will “27 …be no longer mute. (your mouth will be opened and He says,) So you will be a sign to them, and they will know that I am the Lord.” So chapter 24 pretty amazing. So remember that date that it starts with is the day that Nebuchadnezzar, his armies began to lay siege to the city of Jerusalem, that was the beginning of the end. It took some time before the city actually fell, but that was the day the siege began. So chapter 25 now. Beginning with chapter 25 and going all the way through chapter 28, which we're not going to get through tonight. In fact, chapter 25 is going to be the last chapter we're going to deal with this evening. But through 28, the Lord is going to give various prophecies or oracles, if you will, concerning Israel's neighbors and it's going to begin in this chapter with the Ammonites. We're going to also see a short prophecy to the Moabites, to the Edomites, to the Philistines. And then after this chapter, which we'll do next week, 3 chapters are going to be dedicated to one particular area, and that is Tyre and Sidon, and it's mostly Tyre. And I wanted to take those chapters all together and I'll just tell you briefly why. God is going to give a prophecy to Tyre, just like He's going to do in this chapter, to these other various neighboring nations. But the prophecy to Tyre is going to take on a significant and different meaning. Because when we get to chapter 28, we're going to see a parallel prophecy. God will have been speaking to Tyre, then to the king of Tyre, and then in chapter 28, He's going to talk to the king of Tyre, but it's going to morph into a prophetic word, insight, if you will, related to Lucifer, literally Satan. We're going to read about the fall of Satan, we're going to read about what caused that fall. And it is a parallel prophecy because the king of Tyre became a type and a shadow of Lucifer himself. And I wanted to take time next week to really go through those chapters so we can consume them and we didn't have to do it too quickly. But we're going to start here or I should say end here tonight with chapter 25 and with these various oracles that are given. First, we're going to deal with an oracle to the Ammonites and let me give you a little quick background before we read this, because sometimes that gives a little more emphasis to what's being said. When God, you'll remember that when God determined to destroy Sodom and Gomorrah during the time of Abraham, Abraham's nephew, Lot, was living in the city of Sodom at the time and God wanted to spare Lot. In fact, He did spare him along with 2 of his daughters, well, his wife too, but his wife kind of forfeited her life. But Lot and his daughters made it out of the city before God destroyed, not just the city, but the region. It was Sodom, Gomorrah and the surrounding villages. And they made their way up into the hills where they were living for a short period of time. But during that time, Lot's daughters gave in to fear and the fear was that they would never marry and they would never be able to preserve their family line by bearing children. And so what that did is that motivated these women to do something quite evil. They each became pregnant through an incestuous relationship with their father when they got him liquored up. And each of the daughters bore children that were actually fathered by their father, it was a terrible thing. But the younger daughter bore a son and named him Ben-Ammi and that child became the father, if you will, of the Ammonites. So now you know about them. You'll remember perhaps also that during the time of Moses when the people of Israel left Egypt, the Ammonites refused to help Israel in any way. And they actually incurred the Lord's wrath or judgment because of that attitude, it came down upon their heads. But when they finally went into the land, the Lord gave instructions concerning the Ammonites, do you remember that? It's in the book of Deuteronomy, let me show you this on the screen from Deuteronomy chapter 2. It says, Deuteronomy 2:18-19 (ESV)

So during this time, God said that they were not to encroach upon any of their land. Now, eventually the Ammonites were judged and destroyed and however many were left were eventually absorbed into the Arab peoples. The Ammonite people in that specific sense, don't exist except that they have been absorbed into the Arab peoples. However, there is a land that still goes after their name to this day. So anyway, knowing what we now know about the Ammonites we'll read down through verse 7, beginning at verse 1.

Quite a word given to the Ammonites, is it not? Next, beginning in verse 8, the Lord addresses the nation of Moab. Now, the people of Moab are the descendants of the other daughter of Lot who had a child through her own father. She named the child Moab and the people of this nation are now the descendants of that child. This covers, verses 8 through 11,

8 “Thus says the Lord God: Because Moab and Seir said, ‘Behold, the house of Judah is like all the other nations,’ 9 therefore I will lay open the flank of Moab from the cities, from its cities on its frontier, (and then He names some of them) the glory of the country, Beth-jeshimoth, Baal-meon, and Kiriathaim.” And those are cities of Moab and the Lord is saying, because you said, concerning Israel, they're like all the other nations. In other words, they were ignoring and rejecting and even denying the special relationship that God had with Israel, that's what they were doing, they were ignoring it. They were saying, there's nothing special, there's nothing special about Israel. Even though they knew better. God says; therefore, I will bring judgment. And He says in verse 10 and 11, “I will give it along with the Ammonites to the people of the East as a possession, that the Ammonites may be remembered no more among the nations, 11 and I will execute judgments upon Moab. Then they will know that I am the Lord.” Now, verses 12, 13 and 14 is an oracle against the Edomites and you'll remember that the Edomites were descendants of Edom, also known as Esau, the twin brother of Jacob, the sons of Isaac and Rebekah. So you can see that the Edomites are very closely related to the Israelites. 12 “Thus says the Lord God: Because Edom acted revengefully against the house of Judah and has grievously offended in taking vengeance on them, 13 therefore thus says the Lord God, I will stretch out my hand against Edom and cut off from it man and beast. And I will make it desolate; from Teman even to Dedan they shall fall by the sword. 14 And I will lay my vengeance upon Edom by the hand of my people Israel, and they shall do in Edom according to my anger and according to my wrath, and they shall know my vengeance, declares the Lord God.” Isn't that interesting? He says, by the hand of Israel, this judgment is going to be played out. And there are many… you know. So of course, that brings up the question, well, when did that happen? Well, actually, it's not recorded necessarily in our Bible, but many people believe that this prophecy wasn't fulfilled until that time period between the Old Testament and the New Testament, which we call the intertestamental period, during the time of the Maccabees. You might remember there are actually a couple of extra biblical books called First and Second Maccabees, which are an interesting read for historical purposes. But the Maccabees were the followers of a man by the name of Judas Maccabeus and it was during that time that the Maccabees rose up and actually defeated the Moabites in that intertestamental period. It was about 400 years between the end of the Old Testament and the beginning of the new. And they brought the Moabites into subjection, and it is believed that is when this prophecy finally reached its fulfillment. And so finally here in this chapter, chapter 25, verse 15 through the end of the chapter, God is going to speak an oracle against the Philistines and of course, the land of Philistia. And by the way, the Philistines are very interesting people, they've left a lot of archeological evidence of their origins. It is believed according to what we have found that the Philistines actually started in the southern part of Greece. I say started, originated, perhaps in the southern region of Greece. Moved to Crete and then finally made their way down to what we call today the Gaza Strip, which was in David's time called Philistia or the Land of the Philistines, and that's where they made their end. So this is a word that is given to these people. Verse 15,

So the Lord ends this chapter by saying that like the Ammonites, the Philistines and the Moabites and the Edomites would eventually be completely destroyed. We believe that the Philistines were, whatever was left of them, were assimilated into Canaanite culture and disappeared from history altogether. They did however, leave the name, I believe it's the Greek version of Philistia. I believe that's what it is, it is Palestine, so they left their name as a legacy over that entire land. So anyway, that's where we're going to end tonight at the end of verse or chapter 25, and we're going to pick it up and we're going to do our best to get through 3 chapters next week, covering all those prophecies related to Tyre, the king of Tyre and then that dual prophecy that is given concerning the enemy. So, should be interesting, stay tuned, let's pray. Father, you are a God of righteousness and purity and holiness and I pray, Father, we would never forget it. The angels can never forget it. We're told that they are constantly crying, Holy is the Lord God Almighty and Lord, I know that when we see you face to face one day, we will fall on our faces and cry, Holy, Holy. And we will cast our crowns before your throne, for you are the one true God. Pure and holy in all of your ways. And you are a righteous God and you cannot abide sin. And we're so thankful tonight that you dealt with sin through Jesus Christ our Lord. You bore our sin, you literally poured out your wrath upon sinful man, by pouring out that wrath upon your Son. Your only Son who came in the image of sinful man and bore that wrath on our behalf. And I am so thankful, Lord, that it is finished. I repeat of course, those wonderful words you cried from the cross when you declared that the payment had been made and it had been made in full, and now there is nothing left remaining to pay, for it has been paid. And we thank you Father for that and all the implications that go with it. We thank you and praise you for who you are. We thank you for this study tonight and the things that we've learned, and may it, Lord, increase our understanding and knowledge of You. In Jesus' precious name we pray, amen.