Day 240 – Reading Ezekiel 5 – 8

Read today’s Scriptures … ANYWHERE you find yourself this summer. Stay in the WORD!

Ezekiel 5.

Ezekiel – at God’s instruction – is to now shave off his hair and beard (a disgrace to a Jew) WITH A BATTLE SWORD! Whoa! Then he is to weigh it and divide it into three parts.  One third is to be burned in the fire, another part would be chopped with the sword, and the last third would be scattered to the wind. 

These actions were to represent: FIRE – plague and famine, SWORD – killed outright by the enemy, and WIND – being scattered throughout the nations. (And with this group, the LORD would also send a sword to slash some. 

Ezekiel was also to keep out a small part and put it in his pocket. And even from this small part, he was to throw a few into the fire to be burned. 

It sounds confusing, but these were to be the destinies of the horribly sinful people of the holy God.  The extent of Israel’s sins was:  rejecting God’s rules and statutes, doing wickedness MORE than the other nations. They had not even acted according to the laws of the nations around them!  AND, they had DEFILED GOD’S SANCTUARY with all their detestable things and abominations. 

“Therefore, I will withdraw (from them). My eye will not spare. I will have no pity. I will vent my fury upon them and satisfy myself. 

“And they shall KNOW that I am the LORD”

• “I will bring more and more famine upon you and break your supply of bread.
• I will send famine and wild beasts against you, and they will rob you of your children.
• Pestilence and blood shall pass through you, and I will bring the sword upon you.
• I AM the LORD; I have spoken.”

. Ezekiel 6.

Again, the Word of the LORD came to Ezekiel. “Son of man, set your face toward the mountains of Israel and prophesy against them.” 

And God went on to tell of his “curses” against the altars, pillars, and the high places where His people had worshiped other gods. 

• He would lay their dead bodies before the idols, and scatter their bones around their altars. 
• All the high places will be ruined; the altars wasted, the idols broken and destroyed, the incense altars cut down, and all their works wiped out.

“And they shall KNOW that I am the LORD”

When the few that survive and are scattered to other nations remember how their God was “broken over their whoring hearts, they will be loathsome in their own sight for the evils that they committed. 

“And they shall KNOW that I am the LORD”

“The house of Israel shall fall by the sword, by famine, and by pestilence. He who is FAR OFF shall die of pestilence, and he who is NEAR shall fall by the sword, and he who is LEFT and PRESERVED shall die of famine.  In this way, I will send my fury upon them!”

“And they shall KNOW that I am the LORD”

“When their slain shall lie among their idols and around their altars, wherever they offered pleasing aromas to all their idols, I will stretch out my hand against them and make the land desolate.”

“And they shall KNOW that I am the LORD”

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Ezekiel 7.

Again the word of the LORD came to the prophet, and he wrote it down. 

• “Thus says the Lord GOD to the land of Israel.
• An end! The end has come upon the four corners of the land. NOW the end is upon you, and I will send my anger against you,
• I will judge you according to your ways, and I will punish you for all your abominations.”

“And you shall KNOW that I am the LORD”

• Disaster after disaster!
• Behold, it comes. An end has come, the end has come; it has awakened against you.
• Behold, it comes.
• Your doom has come to you, O inhabitant of the land.
• I will punish you according to your ways, while your abominations are in your midst.”

“And you shall KNOW that I am the LORD”

• “Your doom has come; the rod has blossomed; pride has budded. Violence has grown up into a rod of wickedness. 
• None shall remain, not their abundance, not their wealth, not their preeminence.  My wrath is upon all their multitude.
• The sword is without; pestilence and famine are within.
• They cast their silver into the streets; their gold is like an unclean thing. Their silver and gold are not able to deliver them on the Day of Wrath.
• They will seek peace, but there shall be none. 
• They seek a vision from the prophet, while the law perishes from the priests. 
• I will judge them….

“And they shall KNOW that I am the LORD”

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Ezekiel 8.

Then one day, 18 months later, while Ezekiel was sitting in his house talking with the elders of Judah, the hand of the Lord God fell upon him.  He looked, and there was that appearance of God, brilliant, gleaming like metal, bright. 

God’s hand reached out and took Ezekiel by the hair. (Had it grown back in?)  And the Spirit lifted him up between earth and heaven and brought him in visions of God to Jerusalem, to the court before the Temple.

“Son of man, look toward the north. Do you see what they are doing, the great abominations that Israel is committing here, to drive me far from MY SANCTUARY?

Ezekiel looked and, north of the altar gate, in the entrance, was a great pagan idol, with the people sacrificing and worshiping it.

At God’s word, Ezekiel then dug through a portion of the wall into the court and, at God’s direction, saw engraved on the inside wall all around every form of creeping things, loathsome beasts, and idols.   And worst of all, the 70 elders of Israel stood before them with censers, and a cloud of incense went up.

God then took Ezekiel to the entrance gate of the Temple. There, he saw women weeping before the idol Tammuz.

• Next, in the inner court of the Temple, between the porch and the altar was THE CROWNING INSULT TO GOD!  There, 25 men, with their backs to the Temple of God, where His Presence dwelt, were facing the east and worshiping THE SUN.

“Have you seen this, O son of man?

Therefore, I will act in wrath.

Though they cry in my ears with a loud voice, I WILL NOT HEAR THEM.

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Ezekiel, who was preparing to be a priest, would have been horrified too, at this sight. 

(As for us, for me, how horrified am I to hear the Name of God or Jesus insulted?  When I see pagan centers of worship, how affronted am I for my Lord?   O LORD God, forgive us, forgive me. Turn my heart my face, and my adoration towards YOU alone!!)