Ezekiel Chapter 3-4 Lecture
Notes
Transcript
Introduction
Introduction
Last week’s review covered the vision of Ezekiel. It is as if the Spirit wished to communicate to us the necessity of vision before one assumes responsibility. Seeing God is so important to the one who must hear Him and speak on His behalf.
Explanation of The Passage: Ezekiel 3-4
Explanation of The Passage: Ezekiel 3-4
Ezekiel 3:1-2: Three Imperative Commands
In the first verse there are three imperative commands:
Eat
Go
Speak
Many people have gone and have spoken before eating. This is a tragic mistake—one for which we have paid dearly for. For, the power is not in the going and speaking. Rather, the power is in the eating! When one eats the roll that God has given, they are able to speak what God desires them to speak. I would imagine that God is asking the world that is so busy with planning trips to go and do wonderful things; arranging engagements to speak—how much have you ate. For, surely, God will not judge this generation for their lack of going and speaking, but for their lack of eating.
Ezekiel 3:3: The Distinction Between the Stomach and the Belly
The commandment to “feed your stomach and fill your belly...” may seem redundant. However, it is actually two distinct commandments. The stomach is the initial place to which food is placed after consumption. The belly is the overall or collective inner system. It is the organ of generations, or what I consider the organ of many functions. This organ is the source of procreation and the storage room for all things that enters the stomach for the purpose of making later use for it.
God is saying that which He gives to eat does not sit in your belly as non-nutritious foods tend to do. Rather, it nourishes and creates a source of well-being for all who are commissioned to serve the purposes of God.
Ezekiel 3:4-9: The Rebellious House of Israel
The word house refers to the clan or tribe of Israel in general. They are referred to as a household rather than a nation. The phrase leads into the next point concerning their traditional inheritance. For the sake of their tribal makeup, they are people of unintelligible language. This reference speaks to the fact that the things said by the prophet would, otherwise, be “deep” to others. However, Israel was given the covenant and the law as a revelation from God.
Interestingly, God says that Ezekiel would have gone to others they would have listened. However, Israel will not listen because they are hardheaded and hardhearted.
Hardheaded- This word depicts one who’s forehead is hard. More importantly it describes a look that the Israelites carried in response to the things God said. They are stubborn and incapable of change.
Hardhearted- Stubborn and unyielding heart. The heart is understood as a center of a person’s thoughts (mind), voilition, emotions, and knowledge of right from wrong (conscience).
God tells Ezekiel, He will make him just as hard and unyielding as they are (Ezekiel 3:8-9).
God always calls a rebellious man to speak against a rebellious house. God wants a man that will be just as defiant to the purposes of the enemy as those rebellious ones are to the will of God.
Ezekiel 3:10-11: Three Additional Imperative Commands
1. Listen to the words of God.
2. Take the words of God to heart.
3. Go to the people who are exiled.
Ezekiel 3:12-15: God Takes Ezekiel Away
God takes Ezekiel away to the exiles. The Spirit lifts him and then takes him. It has been assumed that this was a sort of a dream or vision. However, the point is to demonstrate the fact that the Ezekiel was taken in an abnormal and revelatory manner.
Ezekiel describes himself as being bitter or severely grief or regretful. He had what he calls an angry spirit, which is to say a spirit of rage and fury. His reaction to what he say left him stunned for seven days.
When you are the Lord’s prophet, this sort of experience will become normal. You will have struggles with things that God reveals that will have you completely stunned by and appalled. In many cases these moments will serve as the motivation for your passion. It will be from the experiences and visual of all that is seen through the spirit that one develops the passion and the burden for those things that God will have him to speak towards.
Too many so called prophets are too satisfied with how things are to be prophets. There’s a blatant acceptance of things that should be the cause of disgust. May the Lord burden us so we cannot move for “seven” days…cannot worship for seven days; preach or sing for seven days. May the Lord so burden us until all we can do is sit in disgust.
Ezekiel 3:16-27: The Call To Be a Watchman
The term watchman is a military word. Watchmen were what is called “sentinels.”
The sentinel goes to an elevated location (the roof of a city gate, or a wall or a tower) to (a) observe the surrounding area and (b) report important occurrences, e.g., the approach of enemies or messengers (2 S. 18:24–27; 2 K. 9:17–20). (Steins, G. (2003). צָעַק and צָפָה. In G. J. Botterweck, H. Ringgren, & H.-J. Fabry (Eds.), & D. W. Stott (Trans.), Theological Dictionary of the Old Testament (Revised Edition, Vol. 12, p. 431). William B. Eerdmans Publishing Company.) Watchmen would also sound an alarm in times of danger by blowing the sophar.
The use of the sophar would signal deadly danger. Therefore, the use of the word watchman in reference to Ezekiel signals that Israel is in terrible trouble. Consequently, Ezekiel carries the same consequence for not warning those that are under the sort of spiritual or covenantal death.
The consequences of the the watchman is so drastic, because Israel is in a terrible state of grave danger. Ezekiel spoke because he had to speak. It is as if there’s an impending tragedy on the horizon that can only be prevented by one’s obedience to the warning of God.
Responsibilities of the Watchman:
Hear (vs. 16).
Give warning (vs. 16).
The difficult thing about Ezekiel’s ministry may be found in Ezekiel 3:22-27. There’s a tremendous amount of preparation given to Ezekiel, because of the audience he will have to face. A ministry of honesty is greatly dependent on one’s ability to resist the rebellion of the audience. That is, many have resorted to dishonest messages and false reports, because of the resistance of the people. May God prepare us so we can deliver honest messages during times of revolt.
Now, this leads us to understand the responsibility of those who will hear the voice of the prophet. For, yes, it is the prophet’s responsibility to speak the word. Yet, it is also the responsibility of the hearer to hear those words. Therefore, the spokesman receives a harsh consequence for not speaking and the hearer receives a harsh consequence for not hearing.
We should pay grave attention to the responsibility of the hearer. Hearers should, quite frankly, demand a message that will lead to their salvation. They must see the hearing of the word as a life or death matter. It must become the means by which they find the ability to be preserved during times of great tragedy. Until this becomes the hearer’s reality, superficial prophecy will always have a place in our world and society.
Why was Ezekiel muted?
Old Testament 3:16-27: Ezekiel the Watchman
Ezekiel’s experience is comparable to that described in Akkadian incantation texts, which speak of being “touched by a god” and struck dumb. This material would have been familiar to the prophet and provided him with an excellent parallel to the nature of his prophetic state rather than a physical diagnosis. The sense of paralysis (cf. 4:8) and the inability to speak were well-known symptoms of supernatural overpowerment in the ancient world. Incantations sought to impose such conditions, and demonic oppression was characterized by them. In one piece of Babylonian wisdom literature (Ludlul Bel Nemeqi), an individual who cannot understand why he is suffering describes his condition as including his lips being struck dumb and his arms and legs being stiff and paralyzed. His suffering is all attributed to the “heavy hand of Marduk.”
Ezekiel 4: The Message of the Siege
The message of the seige is actually covered from Ezekiel 4-11. Block gives the following summary:
The Book of Ezekiel, Chapters 1–24 II. Signs and Visions of Woe for Israel/Judah (4:1–11:25)
∙ Messages of doom for the city and land (chs. 4–7)
∙ Messages of doom for the temple (chs. 8–11)
∙ Assorted messages of doom (12:1–24:14)
∙ Final sign of doom (24:15–27)
The first message Ezekiel receives is one concerning the seige of Israel, which is indicative of the times in which Ezekiel prophesied. Right here, there’s a serious parallel to the destruction of Jerusalem in A.D. 70.
The word seige is particularly useful to understanding what this experience would be like. To siege means to overcome walls of protection. Now, how is this possible? With God as Israel’s protector, how could He be overcome? He couldn’t. Rather, He withdrew His protection and allowed Israel’s enemies to capture the city.
Ezekiel 4:5 gives a very incredible indication of how long Israel’s captivity would be. 430 days/ 430 years. This captivity was spoken of by Moses in Deuteronomy 28:47-57
47 Because you didn’t serve the Lord your God with joy and a cheerful heart, even though you had an abundance of everything,
48 you will serve your enemies that the Lord will send against you, in famine, thirst, nakedness, and a lack of everything. He will place an iron yoke on your neck until he has destroyed you.
49 The Lord will bring a nation from far away, from the ends of the earth, to swoop down on you like an eagle, a nation whose language you won’t understand,
50 a ruthless nation, showing no respect for the old and not sparing the young.
51 They will eat the offspring of your livestock and your land’s produce until you are destroyed. They will leave you no grain, new wine, fresh oil, young of your herds, or newborn of your flocks until they cause you to perish.
52 They will besiege you within all your city gates until your high and fortified walls, that you trust in, come down throughout your land. They will besiege you within all your city gates throughout the land the Lord your God has given you.
53 “You will eat your offspring, the flesh of your sons and daughters the Lord your God has given you during the siege and hardship your enemy imposes on you.
54 The most sensitive and refined man among you will look grudgingly at his brother, the wife he embraces, and the rest of his children,
55 refusing to share with any of them his children’s flesh that he will eat because he has nothing left during the siege and hardship your enemy imposes on you in all your towns.
56 The most sensitive and refined woman among you, who would not venture to set the sole of her foot on the ground because of her refinement and sensitivity, will begrudge the husband she embraces, her son, and her daughter,
57 the afterbirth that comes out from between her legs and the children she bears, because she will secretly eat them for lack of anything else during the siege and hardship your enemy imposes on you within your city gates.
The interesting parallel we can draw from this is the fact that Israel is being exiled. Exile is what happens when an individual(s) become removed from the protection and providence of God. Siege is a major component of Israel’s history in both the Old Testament and New Testament. We’ve seen it in the Old Testament through Moses’ writing in Deuteronomy 28. However, Jesus uses the same literature as well.
41 As he approached and saw the city, he wept for it,
42 saying, “If you knew this day what would bring peace—but now it is hidden from your eyes.
43 For the days will come on you when your enemies will build a barricade around you, surround you, and hem you in on every side.
44 They will crush you and your children among you to the ground, and they will not leave one stone on another in your midst, because you did not recognize the time when God visited you.”
20 “When you see Jerusalem surrounded by armies, then recognize that its desolation has come near.
21 Then those in Judea must flee to the mountains. Those inside the city must leave it, and those who are in the country must not enter it,
22 because these are days of vengeance to fulfill all the things that are written.
23 Woe to pregnant women and nursing mothers in those days, for there will be great distress in the land and wrath against this people.
24 They will be killed by the sword and be led captive into all the nations, and Jerusalem will be trampled by the Gentiles until the times of the Gentiles are fulfilled.
The experience is most seen in Ezekiel 4:9-17, which describes the experience of a siege.
Siege Diet
Rationed food (eight ounces of food)
Set times to eat
Basic meals.
Old Testament 4:1-5:17: Sign-Act Prophecies of Coming Destruction
4:9. ingredients of bread. The items listed here from which Ezekiel is to make his loaf of bread include some common grains (durum wheat, barley and emmer wheat). These grains were part of the diet of all the peoples of the ancient Near East, and there are cognate words in Akkadian and Ugaritic for each of them. Millet is a summer grain. The unusual items in this recipe are beans and lentils. While these vegetables were used for soups and occasionally ground up and mixed with wheat to make a crude bread, that would have been unusual. D. Block suggests plausibly that Ezekiel’s mixture is symbolic of a siege bread made from whatever could be scraped from the bottom of all of the food bins.
4:10. amount of food. The fact that Ezekiel’s food has to be weighed out and eaten at a particular time signals that this is the hard rationing that would have been necessary during a siege. Twenty shekels would be equivalent to eight ounces of food. That amount of calories would keep him alive, but it would also significantly weaken him. The weakness of a starvation diet mirrors conditions in Jerusalem.
4:11. amount of water. Water rationing would also be necessary during the siege, since the people would be dependent on the supply in cisterns (see the comment on Jer 38:6) and the pool deriving from the Siloam tunnel. Ezekiel’s ration is one-sixth of a hin or two-thirds of a quart per day. The extremely hot conditions during the summer and fall of 588 would have severely taxed the besieged people of Jerusalem. Such a small water ration would have further contributed to their misery.
1 He said to me, “Son of man, eat what you find here. Eat this scroll, then go and speak to the house of Israel.”
2 So I opened my mouth, and he fed me the scroll.
3 “Son of man,” he said to me, “feed your stomach and fill your belly with this scroll I am giving you.” So I ate it, and it was as sweet as honey in my mouth.
4 Then he said to me, “Son of man, go to the house of Israel and speak my words to them.
5 For you are not being sent to a people of unintelligible speech or a difficult language but to the house of Israel—
6 not to the many peoples of unintelligible speech or a difficult language, whose words you cannot understand. No doubt, if I sent you to them, they would listen to you.
7 But the house of Israel will not want to listen to you because they do not want to listen to me. For the whole house of Israel is hardheaded and hardhearted.
8 Look, I have made your face as hard as their faces and your forehead as hard as their foreheads.
9 I have made your forehead like a diamond, harder than flint. Don’t be afraid of them or discouraged by the look on their faces, though they are a rebellious house.”
10 Next he said to me, “Son of man, listen carefully to all my words that I speak to you and take them to heart.
11 Go to your people, the exiles, and speak to them. Tell them, ‘This is what the Lord God says,’ whether they listen or refuse to listen.”
12 The Spirit then lifted me up, and I heard a loud rumbling sound behind me—bless the glory of the Lord in his place!—
13 with the sound of the living creatures’ wings brushing against each other and the sound of the wheels beside them, a loud rumbling sound.
14 The Spirit lifted me up and took me away. I left in bitterness and in an angry spirit, and the Lord’s hand was on me powerfully.
15 I came to the exiles at Tel-abib, who were living by the Chebar Canal, and I sat there among them stunned for seven days.
16 Now at the end of seven days the word of the Lord came to me:
17 “Son of man, I have made you a watchman over the house of Israel. When you hear a word from my mouth, give them a warning from me.
18 If I say to the wicked person, ‘You will surely die,’ but you do not warn him—you don’t speak out to warn him about his wicked way in order to save his life—that wicked person will die for his iniquity. Yet I will hold you responsible for his blood.
19 But if you warn a wicked person and he does not turn from his wickedness or his wicked way, he will die for his iniquity, but you will have rescued yourself.
20 Now if a righteous person turns from his righteousness and acts unjustly, and I put a stumbling block in front of him, he will die. If you did not warn him, he will die because of his sin, and the righteous acts he did will not be remembered. Yet I will hold you responsible for his blood.
21 But if you warn the righteous person that he should not sin, and he does not sin, he will indeed live because he listened to your warning, and you will have rescued yourself.”
22 The hand of the Lord was on me there, and he said to me, “Get up, go out to the plain, and I will speak with you there.”
23 So I got up and went out to the plain. The Lord’s glory was present there, like the glory I had seen by the Chebar Canal, and I fell facedown.
24 The Spirit entered me and set me on my feet. He spoke with me and said, “Go, shut yourself inside your house.
25 As for you, son of man, they will put ropes on you and bind you with them so you cannot go out among them.
26 I will make your tongue stick to the roof of your mouth, and you will be mute and unable to be a mediator for them, for they are a rebellious house.
27 But when I speak with you, I will open your mouth, and you will say to them, ‘This is what the Lord God says.’ Let the one who listens, listen, and let the one who refuses, refuse—for they are a rebellious house.
1 “Now you, son of man, take a brick, set it in front of you, and draw the city of Jerusalem on it.
2 Then lay siege against it: Construct a siege wall, build a ramp, pitch military camps, and place battering rams against it on all sides.
3 Take an iron plate and set it up as an iron wall between yourself and the city. Face it so that it is under siege, and besiege it. This will be a sign for the house of Israel.
4 “Then lie down on your left side and place the iniquity of the house of Israel on it. You will bear their iniquity for the number of days you lie on your side.
5 For I have assigned you the years of their iniquity according to the number of days you lie down, 390 days; so you will bear the iniquity of the house of Israel.
6 When you have completed these days, lie down again, but on your right side, and bear the iniquity of the house of Judah. I have assigned you forty days, a day for each year.
7 Face the siege of Jerusalem with your arm bared, and prophesy against it.
8 Be aware that I will put cords on you so you cannot turn from side to side until you have finished the days of your siege.
9 “Also take wheat, barley, beans, lentils, millet, and spelt. Put them in a single container and make them into bread for yourself. You are to eat it during the number of days you lie on your side, 390 days.
10 The food you eat each day will weigh eight ounces; you will eat it at set times.
11 You will also drink a ration of water, a sixth of a gallon, which you will drink at set times.
12 You will eat it as you would a barley cake and bake it over dried human excrement in their sight.”
13 The Lord said, “This is how the Israelites will eat their bread—ceremonially unclean—among the nations where I will banish them.”
14 But I said, “Oh, Lord God, I have never been defiled. From my youth until now I have not eaten anything that died naturally or was mauled by wild beasts. And impure meat has never entered my mouth.”
15 He replied to me, “Look, I will let you use cow dung instead of human excrement, and you can make your bread over that.”
16 He said to me, “Son of man, I am going to cut off the supply of bread in Jerusalem. They will anxiously eat food they have weighed out and in dread drink rationed water
17 for lack of bread and water. Everyone will be devastated and waste away because of their iniquity.