Monday, August 29: Ezekiel 16-17 by Pamela

Today's passage from the Bible In a Year Reading Plan is Ezekiel 16-17

The thing that stood out for me from today's readings was the very last line:

 I am the Lord; I have spoken, and I will do it.” (ESV)

“‘I, the Lord, have spoken, and I will do what I said!’” (NLT)

I, God, said it—and I did it.’” (Message)

There are two ways to take this:

1. God will always keep his promises and if He said it, it will come to pass.

2. God will always place judgement on those who disregard his word, and there will be consequences.

Today's reading is focused on the later. The judgement and punishment of people who turn from God and His commandments.

This commentary says:

Still God is justifying himself in the desolations he is about to bring upon Jerusalem; and very largely, in this chapter, he shows the prophet, and orders him to show the people, that he did but punish them as their sins deserved. In the foregoing chapter he had compared Jerusalem to an unfruitful vine, that was fit for nothing but the fire; in this chapter he compares it to an adulteress, that, in justice, ought to be abandoned and exposed, and he must therefore show the people their abominations, that they might see how little reason they had to complain of the judgments they were under. In this long discourse are set forth,

• I. The despicable and deplorable beginnings of that church and nation (v. 3-5).
• II. The many honours and favours God had bestowed upon them (v. 6-14).
• III. Their treacherous and ungrateful departures from him to the services and worship of idols, here represented by the most impudent whoredom (v. 15-34).
• IV. A threatening of terrible destroying judgments, which God would bring upon them for this sin (v. 35-43).
• V. An aggravation both of their sin and of their punishment, by comparison with Sodom and Samaria (v. 44-59).
• VI. A promise of mercy in the close, which God would show to a penitent remnant (v. 60-63). And this is designed for admonition to us.

We can take comfort in knowing God's word is truth. His promises are true. Also, His wrath for our disobedience is true. We cannot run from God and our actions contrary to His desire are not without consequence. We may possibly be able to avoid consequences on earth as we see people living in sin flourishing in the eyes of the world but consequences in eternity last forever.

However, we are not without hope. Even in the depths of sin, in a hole that seems too deep to get out of, God can and will retrieve us--if we desire that. There is always hope even in the darkest sin.

This commentary illustrates that:

God was, in the foregoing chapter, reckoning with the people of Judah, and bringing ruin upon them for their treachery in breaking covenant with him; in this chapter he is reckoning with the king of Judah for his treachery in breaking covenant with the king of Babylon; for when God came to contend with them he found many grounds of his controversy. The thing was now in doing: Zedekiah was practising with the king of Egypt underhand for assistance in a treacherous project he had formed to shake off the yoke of the king of Babylon, and violate the homage and fealty he had sworn to him. For this God by the prophet here,

• I. Threatens the ruin of him and his kingdom, by a parable of two eagles and a vine (v. 1-10), and the explanation of that parable (v. 11-21). But, in the close,
• II. He promises hereafter to raise the royal family of Judah again, the house of David, in the Messiah and his kingdom (v. 22-24).

Even the sinfulness of these people, and the punishment they deserved from their sinfulness, Jesus would be born from this legacy. There is hope in the hopeless. There is hope for redemption from the brokenness. We are redeemed through Christ who knows our sin and conquered it.

God said it and He did it.

Amen.

Tomorrow's Bible In a Year Passage: Ezekiel 18-19