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PROPHESIES IN THE CAPTIVITY

 

PROPHECIES IN 5TH YEAR OF CAPTIVITY-

592 BC-CHAPTERS 1-7

Chapter 1: Ezekiel’s mission opens in the fifth year of his captivity with the vision of the Cherubim and glory of God: the most spectacular and detailed revelation of divine manifestation in all Scripture. Nothing approaches it for splendor except the closing chapters of Revelation: the New Jerusalem, the Lamb’s Bride, and the dwelling of God with man-to all of which it is closely related. It is a picture of the New Creation of Deity, and thus counterbalances Genesis 1, and parallels the first chapters of John’s Gospel and First Epistle.

It was fitting and merciful that such a picture should be revealed at such a time. Though perhaps little understood, to the faithful it would be an assurance that the glory, though departing, was not forgetful of the true seed of Abraham. The four-fold Cherubim of Glory-the Living Creature-is a pictorial representation of the Redeemed of God in their glorified state: resplendent in divine power and wisdom, and vibrant with ceaseless activity and joy. This is the Yahweh-Elohim manifestation: He Who Shall Be Mighty Ones. This vision also closely parallels Revelation 1-John’s Son of Man, Multitudinous Christ, symbol.

Chapter 2: In the midst of the vision, Ezekiel is addressed. He is called to his mission, and warned that he will be among briars, thorns, and scorpions. Clearly the “good figs” were a small minority, even of those carried away, but there would always be a faithful few.

Chapter 3: He was told from the beginning Israel would not hear. Like Jeremiah, his mission was doomed to failure before it began. And yet, in a larger sense, it was a complete and eternal success, as shall all the works be of those who work with God. None can ever fail who by faith and wisdom, drop everything in this life, and give all their efforts to making themselves part of the Cherubim of Glory. It demands full time.

A short time before Ezekiel’s ministry began, Jeremiah had written to the exiles (Jer. 29) telling them the captivity would be seventy years long, and to settle constructively in Babylon, and not believe the false prophets promising an early return. This laid the foundation for Ezekiel’s work.

Doubtless he would describe the vision of the Cherubim to those who had ears to hear, for he was a prophet to them, and its purpose was comfort and encouragement. But his first specific message was-

Chapter 4: The enacted parable of the siege. He is to draw the city of Jerusalem on a tile, and lay siege to it. Then he is to lay bound on his left side three hundred ninety days, and on his right side forty days. These, he is told, are the years of the iniquity of Israel and Judah.

The three hundred ninety clearly refers back to the years since the division of the Kingdom at the beginning of Rehobo-am’s reign. The forty appears to be the previous period, from the fourth of Solomon, when the Temple was begun, to the fourth of Rehoboam, when Judah turned aside from God, or perhaps it was the whole of Solomon’s reign. The general application is clear: three hundred ninety plus forty years of wickedness to be atoned for by desolation.

Now Jeremiah says the captivity should be for seventy years; and Leviticus 26:43 says the land shall “enjoy her sabbaths” while she lieth desolate. It is a remarkable fact that the sabbath years in four hundred thirty years come to exactly seventy. It is all the more remarkable because it means adding two irregular fractions. One year in seven were to be sabbaths of rest for the land (Lev. 25:4), plus one year in every fifty, the jubilee (Lev. 25:11).

One-seventh of 430=61.4; 1/50 of 430=8.6; 61.4+8.6=70 years.

And carrying the four hundred thirty forward from the carrying-away period, 606-586 BC, comes just to the period of re-establishing of independence under the Maccabees, 176-156 BC. In fact, the year of the Maccabean revolt (168 BC) was just four hundred thirty years from the year of Ezekiel’s captivity (597 BC): the year he dates everything in his book by.

Chapter 5: Another enacted parable of judgment. Ezekiel is to shave off his hair and beard with a sword (Revised Version is clearer: Authorised Version has “razor”). It would be all his hair and beard, to fit the symbol, and it would be a matter of personal shame and embarrassment (and doubtless ridicule) to Ezekiel, just as Isaiah’s going “naked and barefoot” (20:2) would be. They typified the nation’s shame and degradation. Shaving the head was a sign of mourning (Deut. 21:12; Job 1:20; Isa. 15:2, etc.), but it also implied a process of cleansing from defilement (Lev. 14:8).

The hair represents the people of Jerusalem: its living glory and ornament. One-third he burns: those who died by famine and pestilence in the city in the siege. One-third he smites with the sword: those killed in the taking of the city. One-third he scatters to the winds: those who survived and were driven away captive. A few of these last he puts in a fold in his garment, for protection and preservation: those assembled under Gedaliah. But these are taken out again and burned, for Gedaliah was slain and the survivors killed and scattered.

Chapter 6: The mountains of Israel shall be desolate. Between this prophecy and that of chapter 36-the repopulation of these same mountains-is twenty-five centuries of weary retribution because Israel was unfaithful.

Chapter 7: The end is come! God would bring the worst of the heathen upon them, because of their disobedience and worldliness.

PROPHECIES IN THE 6TH YEAR OF CAPTIVITY-

591 BC-CHAPTERS 8-19

In chapters 8-11 Ezekiel is taken in vision to the Temple at Jerusalem.

Chapter 8: The vile abominations and corruptions that have taken the place of the true, appointed worship of God. This vision is dated just three years before Nebuchadnezzar’s final siege of the city. These are the conditions that make its destruction inevitable.

Chapter 9: The destruction of Jerusalem symbolically begins: six men with slaughter-weapons come from the north. Six is the number of man. There were six generals of the Babylonian army (Jer. 39:3). Ezekiel’s six men were God’s supervising angels, and their slaughter-weapons were the Babylonian generals and their armies.

The six are directed by a seventh man in linen with an inkhorn, who puts a mark on all in the city who mourn for the abominations being committed. Then the six are directed to slay all the rest.

We cannot take from this the absolute guarantee that everyone who died in this siege was wicked, and everyone who lived was righteous, for the record shows differently. But it does comfortingly manifest God’s complete control and supervision of every detail. God watches and marks every one. There are no mistakes; no oversights. All sin will be punished: all righteousness at last rewarded.

Chapter 10: In the midst of the judgment, the glorious Cherubim-the Redeemed-of chapter 1 appear again. This may seem out of place, but it is not. The Cherubim are the end-product of all God’s works. As a purpose and a conception, they are always present: always in the background. All things are for their sakes (2 Cor. 4:15). Their presence gives purpose and meaning, and even hope, to these terrible times, assuring that all is working together for eventual, eternal good for those who love and serve God-the Cherubim of Glory being prepared.

In chapter 9: verse 3, the Shekinah-Glory of God’s presence begins to leave the doomed Temple. In chapter 10: verse 18 it departs further, completely leaving the Temple and going to the Cherubim. The Cherubim are the eternal reality of the divine purpose. The Mosaic Temple was but a temporary manifestation of that reality. The Cherubim were originally in the Tabernacle and the Temple because God’s purpose was for the time being centered in those buildings. But because of the continual accumulation of wickedness, the Glory was being taken away.

And it did not return, even when Israel returned, and the nation was re-established, and the Temple rebuilt. The Law continued another six hundred years, but it was an empty form. The living heart was gone. There was no Priest with Urim and Thummim. It was just a marking time until Christ should come. We shall see this aspect again in chapter 21.

Chapter 11: Further abominations revealed, and further judgments, but there is promise (vs. 17-20) of eventual regathering and purification. Then (v. 21-23) the Glory completely departs-and the vision ends.

Chapter 12: The carrying away enacted, and the attempt of Zedekiah to flee in the night from the victorious Babylonians. But he should be caught and taken in chains to Babylon: but still he should not see Babylon. We know the terrible way that puzzle was solved.

Chapter 13 is against the false prophets and lying diviners. “Peace!”-and there is no peace. The tottery wall whitewashed to make it look strong.

Chapter 14: The elders come to Ezekiel, pretending to seek God, but not with a complete heart for Him alone, which He demands. They served Him superficially, but they had idols of self-will in their hearts, to do with their time and wealth as they wished. Noah, Daniel and Job together-men of outstanding righteousness-couldn’t save the land now.

Chapter 15: The barren, leafy, self-luxuriating Vine. Nothing is more useless. Ordinary trees are at least good for wood and construction if they have no fruit, but a fruitless vine is good for nothing but a brief fire.

So with God’s people. They do not help the world’s work. They are called to be separate from that. They are God’s Vine, designed only for spiritual fruit. They are useless for the world’s ordinary building. If they do not fulfil their one purpose-fruit to God and light to the world-they are parasites: of less value to God than the people of the world.

Chapter 16: A long, detailed allegory portraying Israel as a cast-off, abandoned baby girl, whom God rescued and nourished, and showered love upon, and raised to adulthood, and at last made His wife.

But she turned from all His love and kindness, to friendship and corruption with the world and His enemies, in spite of all His patience and entreaties, and repeated forgivenesses. But still at last, after long and bitter separation and tribulation, He will receive her back to Him.

How little did the Jews of Jerusalem realize that within three years, all that seemed so permanent would be destroyed, and they would have begun their long dark centuries of endless, restless wandering.

Chapter 17: The riddle of the foreign eagles and the Israel cedar. The top twig Jehoiachin plucked off, and carried off by the Babylon-eagle; and Zedekiah set up in his place. The warning is against Zedekiah’s treachery and folly in rebelling against Babylon and plotting with the Egypt-eagle.

Then again the bright ray at the end: using the same figure of tree and twig, the glorious Kingdom of Christ is promised. Even in their direst portends, the prophets never go far without promise of blessing.

Chapter 18 deals with divine principles of justice. Israel complained they were being punished for their fathers’ sins, and they could quote certain statements of God Himself that seemed to support them, as that He was destroying Jerusalem because of the blood that Manasseh had shed fifty years before (2 Kgs. 24:3); and that He would-

The answer is two-fold. First, the nation was being judged as a nation because it continued such sins as Manasseh’s. A nation is like an individual. If it continues to sin, it is finally punished for all its past sins. If it repents, those past sins will be forgotten. Similarly, the rest of the quotation about the “sins of the fathers” changes it from injustice to mercy and patience: it is the “third and fourth generation of them that hate Me” that at last receives God’s deferred wrath.

Second, national judgments were one thing, and the just suffered in them like the unjust. But in the ultimate eternal judgment-which is the only one that really matters-each individual stands alone, and is rewarded or punished according to his own record.

A righteous Jeremiah or Ezekiel may necessarily suffer in the general calamities with the wicked nation he ministered to, but that was just a passing aspect of the development and training for God’s eternal glory. We-

and that tribulation will be doubly welcomed and accepted with joyful patience, if it is incurred in ministering to God’s people.

Chapter 19: The Judah-lioness and her cubs. A lamentation for Jehoahaz and Jehoiachin, Judah’s last two home-appointed rulers, trapped and carried away. A warning to then-reigning Zedekiah, Babylon’s appointee.

PROPHECIES IN 7TH YEAR OF CAPTIVITY-

590 BC-CHAPTERS 20-23

Chapter 20 catalogs Israel’s long, continuous history of disobedience, right from the beginning; leading at last to this casting off of the Kingdom. In Jerusalem, Jeremiah was saying the same to them (32:30-31)-

Ezekiel (vs. 33-38) adds important details of the final regathering we don’t get elsewhere. God will gather the Jews out of the nations, but no rebels shall enter the land. Somewhere in between they are assembled and the wicked are purged out. Probably but a small remnant will actually reach the land. The purging process could take many years.

Chapters 21-23 are the final culminating indictment of wicked Israel, in seven distinct sections, each beginning-

The terrible sword of the Lord has been drawn, and it cannot be re-sheathed. It must now do its work relentlessly unto the end. As God said at the same time to Jeremiah: “Pray not for this people” (Jer. 7:16; 11:14; 14:11).

Chapter 21: The king of Babylon stands at the crossroads, casting lots on whom he should attack, and the lot fell on Jerusalem. Then follow those well-known words of doom to both Zedekiah and the nation (v. 25)-

“Crown” of verse 26 is the royal crown, but “diadem” is the word used only and always for the High Priest’s mitre. Christ is the Heir of both the throne and the highpriesthood. Both are now suspended until he comes.

This is important. There was a restoration under Cyrus, but it was just an empty shell, like the Ark-less Tabernacle in the days of Saul. God was with them in a degree, and required the Temple to be rebuilt, as we see from the prophecies of Haggai in the days of Zerubbabel.

But it was never again the same. The Shekinah-glory never returned to the golden cherubim above the Mercyseat. There never arose a High Priest with Urim and Thummim. The “tabernacle of David” remained fallen; though the nation must continue as such in some form till the true Heir to both crown and mitre should come and be presented to them.

These verses are another interesting link in the chain of evidence showing Christ to be the Heir of both the Kingship and the Priesthood.

Chapter 22: “Judge the bloody city!”-priests, prince, prophets and people all alike in wickedness and abominations.

Chapter 23: The climax of condemnation. The two lewd women: Aholah (Israel) and Aholibah (Judah). “Aholah” means Her Own Tabernacle. That was the ten-tribed Israel and their manmade worship. “Aholibah” means My Tabernacle Is in Her: Judah, supposed seat of true divine worship.

The whole chapter is the presentation of their relationships with the world under the vivid and striking figure of sexual corruption and abomination. This is how God views any mixture of His holy separated people with the dead and corrupt world that knows Him not. It is the same vital lesson that James emphasizes in the same bold figure-

Friendship with the world is so easy and so seemingly pleasant and harmless, but let us never forget that it is not so to God. In His sight,

and any relationship with it and its institutions that is not necessary and in the service of God is utter abomination in His sight.

Let us ever bear Ezekiel 23 in mind. We, if we really are God’s people, are the only living (it is a very high calling), and all the rest of the world are dead-all outside the covenant-relationship, no matter how close to us in the flesh. And contact is defiling, unless it be contact whose motive, like Christ, is to give the leper cleansing (Matt. 8:3) and the dead life (Lk. 7:14).

Chapter 24: We now have reached the end. The chapter begins-

The final siege had begun. In the parable of verses 3-14, the city is the caldron, the people are the flesh in it, and the roaring fire shall burn, not only until the contents are destroyed, but until the caldron itself is utterly melted and disappears, for there is no other way to cleanse its corruption. What God cannot cleanse, He must destroy.

And now, simply to enforce the lesson on wicked Israel, a terrible thing happens to Ezekiel. God suddenly-and without warning, without any time for preparation or farewells-tells him (v. 16) that his wife, the desire of his eyes, his most precious treasure, will die that day.

And all that day while he is expecting it, and all the next day after it has happened, he must not pause in his duties, but go right ahead with his work for God, and give absolutely no sign of grief or mourning.

And he simply says, “I did as I was commanded.” Was ever man more bitterly tried? It is one of those things which natural man finds so hard to understand of the ways of God, for His thoughts are so much higher than man’s. God’s thoughts are on eternal good. Man’s are so limited to the passing present.

Both Ezekiel’s mortal life and his wife’s were at best but brief flashes in the broad sweep of history. Parting must come, sooner or later, in the deepest and sweetest of human relationships. But if they are for God’s Kingdom, then the brief separation is nothing: just a merciful taking away from the evil to come-

If they are not for God’s Kingdom, then their present life is utterly meaningless and purposeless anyway, like the passing buzz of an insect.

Obedience: that is all that mattered, or had any meaning and purpose.

The lesson was to shock and awake wicked Israel, and we can only hope some were saved by it. God would take away everything they considered precious and worthwhile, and they would be in such misery and distress that they would be unable to mourn or weep. How often has that been repeated in their long sad history!

They asked what it all meant-and he explained it to them. Then his mouth was closed, and his testimony to them was cut off-completely silenced for three years, all through the siege and beyond, until the news of the city’s destruction reached them in Babylon.

So ends the first half of the book.

* * *

The next eight chapters (25-32) are prophecies of punishments on Israel’s enemies. Seven people are mentioned, but five of them just briefly: Ammon, Moab, Edom and Philistia in chapter 25; Sidon a few verses in chapter 28. The bulk of the eight chapters concerns only two: Tyre and Egypt: three chapters for Tyre (26-28) and four for Egypt (29-32).

PROPHECIES (against Tyre) IN 11th YEAR OF CAPTIVITY-586 BC-CHAPTERS 26-28

Chapter 26: Because Tyre rejoiced against Jerusalem, she should be leveled to the ground and scraped clean, like the top of a rock (Tyre=“Rock”). Tyre was on an island stronghold, boasting in her insular security, as Britain did for many centuries.

Chapter 27: A detailed and interesting catalog of the goods wherein she traded with all the earth, accurately naming and identifying the products of many geographical localities: all sound fact and history. But, like modern Babylon-papal Rome-all was to be cast into the sea.

Why so much about Tyre, of whom we hear relatively little in the history of Israel? We have no record of them fighting Israel: relations were usually very friendly. The answer is that there are several factors that brought special judgment on Tyre: pride, responsibility, corruption, vindictiveness, and religious presumption.

God hates pride. Whatever is exalted must be brought to shame, that man may learn wisdom. Tyre was very proud and prosperous, the great central world mart of nations. It claimed, with a certain amount of truth, that-

Tyre was more responsible than most nations, because of its close contact and relationship with Israel. In the days of David and Solomon it was highly privileged to be a key factor in the building of God’s Temple, as to both material and workmanship. There appears evidence that its religious beliefs were influenced by Israel: at least it was very intimately exposed to the Law of God. Its king Hiram, the “lover of David,” speaks with a reverence for Yahweh indicating intelligent belief.

But later, through Ahab and Jezebel, it became a source of dreadful corruption and abomination, enforced from the throne and threatening to obliterate the worship of God. This was the great issue and showdown that Elijah forced at Carmel: Tyre’s Baal or Israel’s Yahweh.

Chapter 28: The prince (king) of Tyre says-“I am a god: I sit in the seat of God” (v. 2).

Most oriental monarchs made such claims; but this chapter seems to intimate-with its reference to cherubs, and Eden, and the precious stones of his garments (like the High Priest’s breastplate) that the king of Tyre came much closer and more wickedly to aping the true God and His worship (with which he would be familiar).

Israel was being destroyed. Tyre was prosperous, seemingly secure in its island bastion and with its strong fleets, from Babylon’s power. Tyre seems to have been trading on and abusing the privilege of its close relationship to Israel and Israel’s God and claiming to be the inheritor of now-rejected Israel’s blessings and position. This would give more force and meaning to the very unusual language of chapter 28. Certainly she rejoiced vindictively at Israel’s fall, seeing therein the removal of a rival-

It is clear from the history that the rivalry was both commercial and religious. For her arrogance, she was to be completely obliterated. She was destroyed several times, and she lost her world prominence, and commercial power and wealth, but it was many centuries before the prophecies of her permanent destruction were completely fulfilled.

PROPHECIES (against Egypt) IN 10th, 11th, 12th

and 27th YEARS-CHAPTERS 29-32

Chapters 29-32 contain the judgments on Egypt. These prophecies began in the tenth year, about the time Hophra, king of Egypt, was marching to the relief of Israel. He forced Nebuchadnezzar to raise the siege of Jerusalem, but was soon driven back to Egypt and did not try again.

Chapter 29: After two thousand previous years of prominent world power, Egypt should become a base nation, and not lift itself again.

Chapter 30: The rivers (canals) should be dry, the land waste, the cities desolate, the idols destroyed: no more a prince of Egypt. (Isa. 19 adds other details: papyrus and linen to cease; land to be ruled by strangers).

Chapter 31: As Assyria fell, suddenly crushed from mighty power to utter powerlessness, so Egypt should be brought down.

Chapter 32: A lamentation for Egypt: her heaven darkened; her sun obscured. She shall make her grave with the mighty who had gone before.

These prophecies have been fulfilled: overall, and in remarkable detail. This exact time, under Nebuchadnezzar, was the turning point for Egypt. She plunged down, never to rise. None of her ancient great cities remain: the present large cities have all been built by foreigners. Papyrus, which supplied the world’s paper for over three thousand years, down to the tenth century AD, and was Egypt’s chief article of commerce, no longer even exists there. For centuries it was world renowned for the exquisite fineness of its linen. Samples have been found of finer weave than anything produced today. All that vanished under God’s judgments, though some of it took many centuries.

But, like Israel, there was to be a latter-day restoration. Though still a very weak and inconsequential country, dependent on foreign help, as the prophecy requires, Egypt has, within our own times-the “Latter Days”-like Israel achieved independence for the first time in two thousand years.

PROPHECIES IN 12th YEAR OF CAPTIVITY-

585 BC-CHAPTERS 33-39

Chapter 33: Now, for the final sixteen chapters, Ezekiel turns back to Israel. God says to him (v. 2),

His long silence toward them, which began when the siege of Jerusalem started, is to be ended. This was the occasion of the news arriving of the city’s fall:

Verses 31-32 present much food for thought and self-examination-

We tend to picture Israel as openly rejecting God and neglecting His services, but this clearly was not the case. They made every pretence and profession and appearance of obedience and acceptance. They went through all the motions and fulfilled all the outward forms.

They just didn’t bother to give Him their lives, or to let His service interfere with their own desires and interests. They were wonderful Sunday morning believers, and maybe even Sunday evening and mid-week class attenders (translating it into our own terms), and they no doubt spoke up loyally for God against the heathen.

It was just in strict obedience to His commands that they fell short, and for which they were so terribly punished. When He said, Keep separate, they didn’t. When He said, Don’t marry into the world, they did. When He said, Give Me your whole life and service, they wouldn’t. Isaiah and Jeremiah record the same divine complaint-

But in Ezekiel’s message, God is about finished with judgment and condemnation. Jerusalem has been destroyed, and the land desolated. Instead of the captives going home, as the false prophets had promised, thousands more are being driven off into captivity, in herds like cattle.

It looked like the end of everything, but Ezekiel’s message hereafter is full of marvelous revelation, promise and hope.

Chapter 34: He has just a few more words of condemnation first (1-10), not against the people, but against the wicked rulers who exploited them for their own profit, and simply as an introduction to the promise of a perfectly just, righteous, and loving Ruler to come (23-29)-

Chapter 35: The judgment of Mt. Seir, or Edom. This seems out of place. Why is it not in the previous section: the proph-ecies against the heathen? This is something different and deeper. This is the ancient enmity between flesh and spirit.

Truly, the natural Edom is involved, but only as the foundation of the spiritual type and lesson that is carried through into the Millennium, for it is millennial things that Ezekiel is dealing with now-

Isaiah says the same thing (34:5-10)-

It is from Bozrah in Edom that Christ comes with dyed garments. Here is the first encounter with the arch-enemy of the last days. It is very fitting, then, that as a solemn memorial for the instruction of mankind, that first battlefield should be preserved through the Millennium in the state of desolation, like the memorial Gehenna of Isaiah’s last verse.

Chapter 36 is a comforting message of rebirth and rebuilding of the land in peopled fruitfulness and prosperity. Several times we are told that this time it is for ever-no more to suffer any sorrow or oppression.

Verse 22 begins an important message that makes it clear natural Israel is the subject, and that these things cannot be “spiritualized” away-

This is clearly the same people who were scattered: national Israel. Spiritual Israel cannot be so addressed. Then note the order of events-

This does not contradict the purging out of the rebels before Israel is taken into the land (ch. 20). Many will be regathered, as today, in blindness and by apparent natural means. And purging out the rebels will still leave Israel as a nation with much cleansing to do, in national mourning, and submission to their rejected Messiah (Zech. 12:10-14; 13:6-9).

Chapter 37: The Valley of Dry Bones: Israel’s national rebirth. What generation has ever been so privileged as ours: to see age-old prophecy of the Last Days so dramatically fulfilled and confirmed before our eyes? We dare not allow our awe and wonder to be dulled by the now familiarity of these stupendous events. Remember fifty years ago, when we excitedly counted the Jews going back one by one? This long-foretold rebirth is one of the greatest witnesses God has ever given.

Chapters 38-39 tell the familiar story of the descent and destruction of Gog, to manifest God’s glory and power to all the earth. Not only is the rebirth of Israel a guarantee of the fulfillment of this next step, but we actually see Gog himself devoting all his resources to building the greatest military and naval power the world has ever known, and openly and avowedly dedicated to bringing the earth under his system.

And even further: his enmity is specifically and especially directed toward that one little land: that little Mordecai who dares oppose him. And with him in enmity stand the red-handed papal power, and Libya and Ethiopia and Assyria, just as prophecy requires. When a recent Pope visited the Middle East, he fawned effusively on the Arabs who want to destroy Israel, but he walked gingerly around the borders of Israel as if he were walking around a deep black hole.

The glorious consummation is described at the end of chapter 39-

This ended Ezekiel’s message to them in the twelfth year of the captivity, when the news of the city’s destruction had come, and all present hope had been utterly destroyed.

PROPHECIES IN 25th YEAR OF CAPTIVITY-

572 BC-CHAPTERS 40-49

Chapters 40-48 came thirteen years later, in the twenty-fifth year of captivity. Ezekiel was now fifty, if the “thirtieth year” of chapter1: verse1 is his age, as seems likely. He has now been prophesying for twenty years. God had said through him-

Isaiah had said that the “mountain of the Lord’s House” should be established at Jerusalem, and all nations should go there to learn God’s ways (2:2-3), and that there should be a “House of Prayer for all nations” (56:7).

And Zechariah was later to say, when the captives returned under Zerubbabel, that the nations should go up yearly to worship the Lord and keep the Feast of Tabernacles at Jerusalem (14:16).

In his final chapters, Ezekiel is shown a huge building-a Temple-that had the appearance of the “frame of a city,” in the midst of a “Holy Oblation” of land about forty-five miles square in the midst of Palestine.

To this huge structure-apparently a magnificent open framework of masonry and arches densely covered by living greenery, and in the open center of which is a great elevated Altar-Ezekiel sees (43:2) God’s glory returning, and :

And to him God said (v. 7)-

The whole purpose is summed up in 44:23-

This is the whole purpose of life and learning. There is unclean, and death; and there is clean, and life. True knowledge consists of knowing the difference; true wisdom consists of choosing the clean. Everything falls into one category or the other.

God tells Ezekiel to show Israel the pattern of the House, that they may be ashamed of their iniquities (43:10). How would it make them ashamed? How would it make us ashamed?

By its glory and greatness and goodness. It is a beautiful center of goodness and joy and mercy and forgiveness, and of learning to choose the good and eschew the evil. It is a glorious provision and manifestation of God’s love and care for Israel and the world. It is such a wonderful contrast to man’s present evil condition and ways.

It is the heart of the Divine Promise and Purpose from the beginning that-

And-

The old Temple was gone. It had been desecrated beyond the possibility of redemption. It had been filled with blood and corruption.

But in a new day to come, there would be a new House of Prayer, far more spacious and splendid, not just for Israel but for the whole world-the center of an earth at rest in holiness and peace.

And, best of all, the name of the City from that day and forward shall be “THE LORD IS THERE.”

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