January 29, 2023
Please use the comment section on this page to share insights from today’s reading OR your own personal Bible reading.
Reading along with us in Ezekiel? Here’s today’s reading:
Ezekiel 20 (NIV)
Rebellious Israel Purged
1 In the seventh year, in the fifth month on the tenth day, some of the elders of Israel came to inquire of the Lord, and they sat down in front of me.
God through Ezekiel recounts Israel’s history of disobedience despite God’s constant provision. The times they chose to follow their own path and where that led. The times where God stood by and allowed their sin to happen as a reminder of the end result of those choices. But He always shows mercy, He always allows them the opportunity to turn and repent and He is there.
We certainly can’t blame God for not listening to these elders after the people of Israel had not listened to Him time and time again. A history of their interaction seems fitting as God shows them what He had done for them, how much He cared and all the directions He gave and they just did what they wanted. They couldn’t even get a day of rest right! It is interesting how often He mentions their breaking the Sabbath, God’s desire to not profane His name and His concern for what foreign nations where internalizing from His actions towards the Jews. It is interesting to think that His concern was to save the foreign nations by revealing the truth of who He was, yet the Jews turned to the foreign nations to follow their gods. It is really silly to think that that could happen and yet for God to say effectively, why should I bother directing you now makes sense. And yet part of His revelation is how He will do that. He will restore. He will return them to the land and establish them as His people once again. How great and gracious is our God!
Ezekiel 20
Ezekiel 20
God recalls all the chances he gave them. and each time they chose their idols and the sinful life.
Reflection on Titus 2:11-12 – God’s grace that brings us salvation teaches us to renounce ungodly living and helps us to live godly lives not so much based on the law, but based in God’s goodness.
Ezekiel 20
“And ye shall know that I am the Lord, when I shall bring you into the land of Israel, into the country for the which I lifted up mine hand to give it to your fathers.
And there shall ye remember your ways, and all your doings, wherein ye have been defiled; and ye shall lothe yourselves in your own sight for all your evils that ye have committed.
And ye shall know that I am the Lord when I have wrought with you for my name’s sake, not according to your wicked ways, nor according to your corrupt doings, O ye house of Israel, saith the Lord God.”
The Lord will bring the people back and they will see all of the evil that they committed against the Lord. I think of the conviction of the Holy Spirit when we recognize our own sin and repent. I feel like we do not grieve the evil that is plaguing our once Christian nation, a nation whose founders made a covenant with God.