Category: Ezekiel

Reading

Audio, Visual

SAA Notes

Coming judgment brings a responsibility to those who know to warn others to turn to the Lord from our own bent ways. Ezekiel excites sympathy from the exiles for those remaining in Jerusalem. Jerusalemites looked down on the exiles as God’s rejects.

SJA Notes

* Dear Father God in Heaven, please show us Your word today.

“Whenever you hear a word from my mouth, you shall give them warning from me.”

God calls Ezekiel to warn both the believer and the unbeliever alike.

The unbeliever needs a warning that asks them to make sense of death, to not die in sin/wickedness.

The believer needs a warning that exhorts and convicts and encourages them not to sin.

These are warnings for us, both to take ourselves and to deliver as the Lord gives us opportunity.

Those around us who do not know the Lord – They need a warning. They need a solution for death that makes sense!

For our believing brothers and sisters, those we love and care for, those who care for us – We are able to as the situation calls deliver warnings to escape the stumbling blocks that can loom so large.

And flip the coin. _We_ will have stumbling blocks.

We can be encouraged to heed the warning of scripture, and to take the warning however the Lord chooses it to be delivered – Let us listen and humbly let the warning arrest our steps, aright our paths, point us again to Jesus.

*  Sovereign Lord,

Your word is clear to both believer and unbeliever.

Please save our unbelieving friends and family. Let Your Spirit rush over the place, calling the lost to repentance.

And please may we heed the warning delivered to us. Please write Your word on our hearts that we might not sin against You!

Amen.

Reading

Audio, Visual

SAA Notes

In 1975, God used these verses to call me to the ministry of Word and sacrament – to my own people. Ezekiel was sent to his own people surviving in exile. Why would this be a hard ministry?

SJA Notes

* Dear God, thank You for Your word to us today. Please write it on our hearts.

“And you, son of man, be not afraid of them, nor be afraid of their words, though briers and thorns are with you and you sit on scorpions.”

God knows the truth of His people. He clearly states a number of times to Ezekiel that they are a rebellious people, stubborn hearts.

Ezekiel was called to preach God’s word to Israel in exile.

He had to combat much adversity, thorns and scorpions, hard heads and stubborn hearts.

In Joshua, one of the very early books in the bible, chapter 1 we read Joshua’s words to Israel,

“Be strong and courageous. Do not be frightened, and do not be dismayed, for the LORD your God is with you wherever you go.”

What faced Ezekiel faces us today.

We will face hard heads and stubborn hearts.

How can we deal with the fear, with the briers and thorns and scorpions?

Our God is with us.

God calls each of us as He called Ezekiel, setting us to ministry across the full gamut of life.

How can we grapple with such a calling?

Our God is with us!

That is the wonderful message for us all. For Ezekiel in exile in Babylon. For the Israelites as they went into the promised land with Joshua leading them. For us today as we walk this narrow road.

Our God is with us!

And as is always true, we are led to our Lord Jesus!

He is Immanuel, God with us – At His birth the angels sang and the shepherds praised His Name.

How can we face the calling God has for us?

Our God is with us!

* Gracious Father,

Thank You that You called Ezekiel into a specific ministry to Israel in exile.

Thank You that You call us all into specific and intentional ministries, to preach Your word in thought, word and deed wherever You place us.

Thank You that You are with us, Immanuel – Hallelujah, what a Saviour!

Amen.

Reading

Audio, Visual

SAA Notes

Ezekiel stirs us with powerful word pictures. His vision of the Lord is one source of John’s vision of Christ in Revelation 1. Sense the Majesty and the Glory of God our Father.

SJA Notes

* Mighty God, please shine Your light into our hearts today as we come to Your word.

“And above the expanse over their heads was the likeness of a throne, in appearance like sapphire; and seated above the likeness of a throne was a likeness with a human appearance.”

What a strange way to begin a book!

Visions of lightning and fire, four living creatures, wheels for the creatures.

Ezekiel was someone living in Babylon, not long after the final exile of Judah undertaken by King Nebuchadnezzar.

You can imagine he would have been struggling with their place, probably reading some of what Jeremiah had written – The command to work for the welfare/good of the city they were living in.

And into this environment the Lord places His hand upon Ezekiel.

THE HAND OF THE LORD WAS UPON EZEKIEL.

This experience is not something you can brush aside, not something to make light of.

The last segment of the vision describes one on the throne with a human appearance, gleaming like metal, appearance of fire, brightness all around.

We can see Ezekiel completely and totally overwhelmed in the presence of this being.

Who is this person?

The first chapter of Revelation tells us, it is Jesus!

And so Ezekiel’s response is a question for us to wrestle with.

When confronted with the true reality of who Jesus is, what is our response?

Do we respond as Ezekiel did when we are faced with the awesome and terrible reality of who Jesus is?

Have we ever faced up to that reality?

What else have we to do then, but to understand who Jesus is – He is the crux and the pivot, the corner and the cap -stone.

He is the good news that all of God’s word points us to today!

* Father God,

Please help us to see Jesus today, and onwards, as we continue to walk through Your word.

Day by day please grow us in our understanding of the King of Kings.

Refine us each day, that we would further and deeper know that Jesus, God the Son, is the way, the truth and the life – That no-one comes to You, God the Father, but through Him.

Amen.