January 27, 2023
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Reading along with us in Ezekiel? Here’s today’s reading:
Ezekiel 18 (NIV)
The One Who Sins Will Die
1 The word of the Lord came to me: 2 “What do you people mean by quoting this proverb about the land of Israel:
“ ‘The parents eat sour grapes,
and the children’s teeth are set on edge’?
3 “As surely as I live, declares the Sovereign Lord, you will no longer quote this proverb in Israel............Continue Reading
It’s pretty clear as God reacts to this false proverb that the people embrace regarding Him being unjust in His punishments, that God looks to us individually for our own choices and deals with us accordingly. Like he reminded us in previous chapters we are not saved by default or proximity to our loved ones but by our own choice to believe and follow Him.
God takes no pleasure in the punishment and desires each of us individually to come to Him and He makes clear no one is ever too far from Him to return again.
The Lord said Israel was no longer to quote proverbs re father and sons. He lets them know that father and son belong to him and the soul that sins will die. He made it clear what they were to do and not do.
God explained in detail how a Righteous father will not die. If his son sins and turns away from righteousness he will die. Each generation is responsible for its own soul if it lives or dies. .. He also gives the hope to the sinner that if he turns his life around and starts living the way he should, he will not die. Same if he was righteous and turns to sin and turns away from God he will die..
I love that he says Stop your sinning and get a new Heart and a new Spirit. He tells them he does not enjoy the death of anyone. REPENT AND LIVE! applies to us all now!
It is important to remember that the repentance that is part of salvation is repentance towards Christ in what we know and believe Him to be and what He accomplished and not what most people understand to be repentance toward sins.
Ezekiel 18
God here reinforces the reality that we all stand and fall on our own choices. Each person and each generation needs to be careful of the choices they make because they will be held accountable for them and no one can save or condemn another by their choices. We can be comforted that the question that will face us isn’t so much about sin but about Jesus and whether we accepted the salvation offered through Him. Now our life will and should change but that change doesn’t bring about our salvation but is that which flows from it. And once we are saved through the blood of Jesus, we can never lose it. It is interesting though to see Ezekiel delineate 3 times these sins that people in his examples either didn’t do or did. It is an indication of those things that God cared most about and better defines some of those detestable practices that He has mentioned several times in the last several chapters. And it isn’t surprising that God, after drawing a clear line of what He wants from the Jews, that He let’s know He doesn’t like to bring destruction on people….but the choice is theirs to make….repent and live!
Ezekiel 18
Thank you Pastor Peter for explaining what salvation through Christ Jesus means for Christians. It is important for me to be reminded of this while I am reading the OT.
Ezekiel 18
Yet saith the house of Israel, The way of the Lord is not equal. O house of Israel, are not my ways equal? are not your ways unequal?
30 Therefore I will judge you, O house of Israel, every one according to his ways, saith the Lord God. Repent, and turn yourselves from all your transgressions; so iniquity shall not be your ruin.
31 Cast away from you all your transgressions, whereby ye have transgressed; and make you a new heart and a new spirit: for why will ye die, O house of Israel?
32 For I have no pleasure in the death of him that dieth, saith the Lord God: wherefore turn yourselves, and live ye.