Sermon Tone Analysis

Ezekiel 4-24

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I.     Introduction

            We knew a girl who had been told by her parents that she could not use the truck.

Her parents had taken the car and were gone for a few days.

She decided to disobey her parents and went to her boyfriends place.

When they were driving on a country road, she lost control of the truck, rolled a few times and was severely injured.

They took her to the hospital and she was in a coma for a few weeks before she died.

Ananias and Sapphira came to Peter and offered a gift to God.

They pretended that it was the whole amount of the gift, but they had kept some of it back for themselves.

They didn’t need to offer the whole amount, but they were posturing as if they were more generous than they were.

They both died on the spot for ignoring the Holy Spirit.

These are two instances in which the consequences of sin were immediate and severe.

All of us have sinned.

We have deceived others, we have taken something that wasn’t ours and we have gotten away with it.

We did not immediately die for our wrongdoing.

Because this has happened, not just once but numerous times, we may get the idea that sin isn’t that serious and we will not have to suffer the consequences of our sin.

Nothing could be further from the truth.

The Bible says in Numbers 23:23, “you may be sure that your sin will find you out.”

Last week I indicated that we would be looking at Ezekiel 4-24.

If you took the time to read these chapters, you will have read some very disturbing stuff.

These chapters contain vivid images, explicit sexual images and deeply disturbing events.

Israel had gone many years in which they had ignored God.

Prophet after prophet had warned them.

God often intervened with gracious redemption, but still they ignored the sin in their midst.

Until now.

These chapters portray an event so difficult that they can no longer ignore their sin.

They are being severely punished for their sin.

Ezekiel explains what is happening to them and invites the appropriate response.

I would rather not preach this stuff, because it is difficult, but it is important.

Romans 15:4 says, “For everything that was written in the past was written to teach us, so that through endurance and the encouragement of the Scriptures we might have hope.”

Therefore there are important lessons for us in these chapters as well.

As we discover these lessons, we will also learn about that time in history and the context in which Ezekiel was writing, which is important for understanding what God is saying in whole book of Ezekiel.

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II.

I Am About To Desecrate The Delight Of Your Eyes

In Ezekiel 1:2 we read that Ezekiel began his prophecy in “the fifth year of the exile of King Jehoiachin.”

Then in Ezekiel 24:1 we read that this chapter was written “In the ninth year, in the tenth month on the tenth day.”

So what we find is that these things were written over a 5 year period.

What was happening and what was Ezekiel writing about?

I would like to give you a little outline of the history of God’s people which brings us to this point in that history.

The people of Israel left Egypt and came into the promised land.

After they had been there for a while, they wanted a king and God appointed Saul as king, but he was not a man after God’s heart.

David, the second king, was and in his reign, the golden era of Israel began.

His son Solomon inherited the largest extent of the kingdom of Israel that there had ever been and was also very wealthy.

It was during this time that God’s people prospered and things were going very well.

But Solomon married women of other nations and they began to influence him negatively and after he died, the kingdom of Israel was divided because of his sin.

The ten northern tribes, which from this time on were known as Israel, broke away from the two southern tribes, known as Judah.

Throughout the books of Kings and Chronicles, these two nations are described in parallel histories and the stories are somewhat similar.

One king is a wicked king and leads the people away from God.

Another king is righteous and leads the people back to God.

The people descend in a spiral away from God and the Northern tribes, or Israel are worse than the southern tribes.

God sent many prophets to warn them of their evil, but they did not change.

Finally, the sin of the northern ten tribes was so bad that God sent the Assyrian armies to destroy them and take the kingdom away from them.

This happened in 722 BC.

Although not without sin, Jerusalem and Judah were not as bad and so they continued as God’s people.

They were not faithful to God and although once again God sent many prophets to them, they did not change.

Their wickedness increased and God warned that what had happened to Israel would also happen to Judah.

In 597 BC it began to happen.

By this time, Assyria was no longer the world power it had been.

The Babylonians had become the world power and Nebuchadnezzar was the king of Babylon.

He came to Jerusalem, attacked it, defeated it and took the king, Jehoiachin captive (1:2).

Many others were also taken captive at the time, among them, Daniel and Ezekiel.

Those who were captured were taken to Babylon and lived there.

This is where Ezekiel was writing from as we read in Ezekiel 1:3 – “by the Kebar River in the land of the Babylonians.”

Many other Jews remained in Jerusalem and Nebuchadnezzar appointed kings to rule for him in Jerusalem.

The last of those kings was Zedekiah.

He was not a king who wanted what God wanted.

He rebelled against God, and he also rebelled against Nebuchadnezzar.

In 587 BC, ten years after the first time, Nebuchadnezzar returned to Jerusalem.

This time he took Zedekiah captive and destroyed the city, knocking down the walls and taking apart the temple.

He also killed many of the people in the region.

Ezekiel 1-24 are written in this period of time from Babylon.

The Jewish people who were in Babylon were wondering what was going on.

They were asking questions and God, through Ezekiel, was answering those questions.

They were asking: How should we view our captivity?

Should we seek to get back to Jerusalem – the promised land, God’s favoured place?

Should we revolt here in Babylon against the king of Babylon?

One writer explains, “although Ezekiel speaks mainly of Jerusalem, he addresses the concerns of the elders and the exiled community.

The elders once were leaders of that city and are presently wondering how they might act now for the best interests of Jerusalem and of their Lord.”

The style with which Ezekiel often writes is street theatre.

Some of you may remember the time when Nikita Krushchev was Prime Minister of the Soviet Union.

At a meeting of the UN, he took off his shoe and banged it on the table in protest.

He was using a graphic image, which we have not forgotten, to make a point.

Ezekiel does much the same thing.

He does drama and acts things out in order to make a point.

He also has discussions with the elders, who are in exile, in order to explain God’s truth to them.

Please turn to 4:1- 3. Read this text.

One commentator says, “One may imagine that the exiles expected Ezekiel to preach his first sermon on the Lord’s war against Babylon.

Instead, as the first stage in this drama, he is to portray the Lord’s war against Jerusalem.”

The iron plate is a flat griddle used in baking.

Placed between Ezekiel and the map, it signifies that the Lord is blockaded from the city.

It is a sign of judgement to come.

Now please turn to Ezekiel 5:8.

Read this verse.

Once again, we find that God is against Jerusalem.

In  Ezekiel 8-11 another disturbing message is given.

Please follow along in your Bibles as we discover this terrible thing that is happening.

Please look at Ezekiel 9:3, “Now the glory of the God of Israel went up from above the cherubim, where it had been and moved to the threshold of the temple.”

Then look at Ezekiel 10:18,19.

First of all in 18a we read, “Then the glory of the Lord departed from over the threshold of the temple…” Further on in 19b we continue, “They stopped at the entrance to the east gate of the Lord’s house…” Then in 11:23 we read, “The glory of the Lord went up from within the city and stopped above the mountains east of it…”

Ever since the exodus out of Egypt, God had been with his people.