Fulfill the Prophets (Ezekiel)
Knowing Jesus Through the Old Testament • Sermon • Submitted • Presented • 45:14
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17 “Do not think that I have come to abolish the Law or the Prophets; I have not come to abolish them but to fulfill them. 18 For truly, I say to you, until heaven and earth pass away, not an iota, not a dot, will pass from the Law until all is accomplished.
The prophets are distinct from the Law
Joshua, Judges, Samuel, Kings, Prophets (minus Lamentations and Daniel)
Like the Law, the Prophets looked to an end - they were waiting to be fulfilled/completed
The prophets, as a whole, condemn Israel’s failure to keep God’s covenant
That was noted in the purpose of the law
The blessings of God were not flowing through Israel as intended
So God promised to discipline his people through the exile
But we also read of hope after the judgment - the God would breathe new life into his people and recreate them into something good
This hope is what Jesus came to fulfill
The Hope of Ezekiel
The Hope of Ezekiel
16 The word of the Lord came to me: 17 “Son of man, when the house of Israel lived in their own land, they defiled it by their ways and their deeds. Their ways before me were like the uncleanness of a woman in her menstrual impurity. 18 So I poured out my wrath upon them for the blood that they had shed in the land, for the idols with which they had defiled it. 19 I scattered them among the nations, and they were dispersed through the countries. In accordance with their ways and their deeds I judged them.
This is a familiar story
Which sins specifically does God note?
Through their unclean ways and deeds
Shedding blood
Idolatry
Psalm 106:35-39 lists the same sins
35 but they mixed with the nations
and learned to do as they did.
36 They served their idols,
which became a snare to them.
37 They sacrificed their sons
and their daughters to the demons;
38 they poured out innocent blood,
the blood of their sons and daughters,
whom they sacrificed to the idols of Canaan,
and the land was polluted with blood.
39 Thus they became unclean by their acts,
and played the whore in their deeds.
Attributes it to mixing with the nations
Far from being holy they were just like the other nations
God pours out his wrath
Because of the blood they spilt, he will return their own blood on them
Because they abandon God he shows them what life is really like without his presence
They are scattered throughout the nations - Exile
Why do you think God chooses exile as his form of discipline?
There are lots of ways to discipline a kid for slamming the door
God is reversing the blessings and taking away the promises
Promised land is cursed with famine and then taken away
Israel’s king is subject to the Babylonian king
Fruitful nation is decimated as Rachel weeps for her children
Israel doesn’t get the lesson
20 But when they came to the nations, wherever they came, they profaned my holy name, in that people said of them, ‘These are the people of the Lord, and yet they had to go out of his land.’
What does it mean to profane God’s name?
Is not saying OMG
Not cursing and using four-letter expletives
The opposite of holy - common. God is just like any other god.
Israel does not see the exile as discipline for their own sin. Instead, they see the exile as God’s weakness and failure.
The defeat of a nation was viewed as a defeat of their god
He’s no stronger than any of the other gods
It’s what Moses worried would happen if Israel perished in the wilderness
16 ‘It is because the Lord was not able to bring this people into the land that he swore to give to them that he has killed them in the wilderness.’
He’s not faithful to his promises
12 Why should the Egyptians say, ‘With evil intent did he bring them out, to kill them in the mountains and to consume them from the face of the earth’? Turn from your burning anger and relent from this disaster against your people.
Israel is not bringing anybody closer to God - they’re driving them away from him
Connect: Helping or Hindering God’s Mission?
Connect: Helping or Hindering God’s Mission?
Do you think it’s easy for us to profane God’s name today?
Through our complaining: This is how your God treat you?
Through our conduct: This is a Christian?
God’s Concern For His Name
God’s Concern For His Name
21 But I had concern for my holy name, which the house of Israel had profaned among the nations to which they came.
22 “Therefore say to the house of Israel, Thus says the Lord God: It is not for your sake, O house of Israel, that I am about to act, but for the sake of my holy name, which you have profaned among the nations to which you came. 23 And I will vindicate the holiness of my great name, which has been profaned among the nations, and which you have profaned among them. And the nations will know that I am the Lord, declares the Lord God, when through you I vindicate my holiness before their eyes.
God is concerned
Translated pity elsewhere
Something God said he would not show to Israel elsewhere in Ezekiel
If Israel isn’t going to show God accurately to the nations - he will
Is God an egomaniac? Doing this only out of concern for his reputation?
What is God’s name and reputation?
6 The Lord passed before him and proclaimed, “The Lord, the Lord, a God merciful and gracious, slow to anger, and abounding in steadfast love and faithfulness, 7 keeping steadfast love for thousands, forgiving iniquity and transgression and sin, but who will by no means clear the guilty, visiting the iniquity of the fathers on the children and the children’s children, to the third and the fourth generation.”
God’s reputation is worth caring about
Do we really want to slander the loving Father who saves us from death and wants to be unified with us in his loving relationship?
His ego is not self-serving. He defends it so he can save others
We can see this in how God defends his name
Restoration
Restoration
Rather than vindicating his name in other ways:
Annihilate Babylon
Show his strength through crushing people
Instead God allures his people - creating something good out of what is really bad
24 I will take you from the nations and gather you from all the countries and bring you into your own land.
God scattered Israel and now gathers them back
Throughout Ezekiel it’s described as a new exodus
He will show himself as faithful - He promised Abraham the land and they’re going to get it back
70 years after Jerusalem’s fall they are back in the land
25 I will sprinkle clean water on you, and you shall be clean from all your uncleannesses, and from all your idols I will cleanse you.
God will cleanse them from the blood and idols they were defiled with
Sinful acts made you unclean - outside the community of Israel
Being made clean involved washing and offering sacrifice
We go to extreme lengths to keep ourselves clean - but this isn’t something we can wash ourselves of
2 Wash me thoroughly from my iniquity,
and cleanse me from my sin!
7 Purge me with hyssop, and I shall be clean;
wash me, and I shall be whiter than snow.
Israel is going to be allowed in the presence of God again
26 And I will give you a new heart, and a new spirit I will put within you. And I will remove the heart of stone from your flesh and give you a heart of flesh.
A new heart
Not emotions - but the will and desire of a person
This is building on the promises in Deuteronomy
Israel is promised restoration...
10 when you obey the voice of the Lord your God, to keep his commandments and his statutes that are written in this Book of the Law, when you turn to the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul.
Because Israel didn’t have the heart to obey God he would give them one
6 And the Lord your God will circumcise your heart and the heart of your offspring, so that you will love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul, that you may live.
Their stubbornness would be fixed and lead to obedience
27 And I will put my Spirit within you, and cause you to walk in my statutes and be careful to obey my rules.
God’s Spirit
There’s too much to talk about with the Spirit
It’s an agent of creation
2 The earth was without form and void, and darkness was over the face of the deep. And the Spirit of God was hovering over the face of the waters.
It empowers people like the builders of the tabernacle and the Judges
It transforms people like Saul
6 Then the Spirit of the Lord will rush upon you, and you will prophesy with them and be turned into another man.
It gives life (Ezk 37)
It is the presence of God with his people
It is an intimate way of being with God - not just at the temple
It’s immediate cause - it will make us like God as we obey him
Returning to Eden
Returning to Eden
29 And I will deliver you from all your uncleannesses. And I will summon the grain and make it abundant and lay no famine upon you. 30 I will make the fruit of the tree and the increase of the field abundant, that you may never again suffer the disgrace of famine among the nations. 31 Then you will remember your evil ways, and your deeds that were not good, and you will loathe yourselves for your iniquities and your abominations. 32 It is not for your sake that I will act, declares the Lord God; let that be known to you. Be ashamed and confounded for your ways, O house of Israel.
33 “Thus says the Lord God: On the day that I cleanse you from all your iniquities, I will cause the cities to be inhabited, and the waste places shall be rebuilt. 34 And the land that was desolate shall be tilled, instead of being the desolation that it was in the sight of all who passed by. 35 And they will say, ‘This land that was desolate has become like the garden of Eden, and the waste and desolate and ruined cities are now fortified and inhabited.’
Connection between Israel and the land
When living out of sync with the creator, expect to be out of sync with his creation (Hos 4:1-3)
It goes back to man’s curse in Genesis 3:17-19
God’s promise here is more than lots of food and money
God’s wrath was poured out and left the land uninhabitable - hostile to life
God is making it all good again - making it like the Garden of Eden
And as a result, the nations will know God
36 Then the nations that are left all around you shall know that I am the Lord; I have rebuilt the ruined places and replanted that which was desolate. I am the Lord; I have spoken, and I will do it.
37 “Thus says the Lord God: This also I will let the house of Israel ask me to do for them: to increase their people like a flock. 38 Like the flock for sacrifices, like the flock at Jerusalem during her appointed feasts, so shall the waste cities be filled with flocks of people. Then they will know that I am the Lord.”
God himself takes up the work of Israel
Cleansed
Cleansed
9 Or do you not know that the unrighteous will not inherit the kingdom of God? Do not be deceived: neither the sexually immoral, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor men who practice homosexuality, 10 nor thieves, nor the greedy, nor drunkards, nor revilers, nor swindlers will inherit the kingdom of God. 11 And such were some of you. But you were washed, you were sanctified, you were justified in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ and by the Spirit of our God.
19 Therefore, brothers, since we have confidence to enter the holy places by the blood of Jesus, 20 by the new and living way that he opened for us through the curtain, that is, through his flesh, 21 and since we have a great priest over the house of God, 22 let us draw near with a true heart in full assurance of faith, with our hearts sprinkled clean from an evil conscience and our bodies washed with pure water. 23 Let us hold fast the confession of our hope without wavering, for he who promised is faithful.
1 There is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus. 2 For the law of the Spirit of life has set you free in Christ Jesus from the law of sin and death. 3 For God has done what the law, weakened by the flesh, could not do. By sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh and for sin, he condemned sin in the flesh, 4 in order that the righteous requirement of the law might be fulfilled in us, who walk not according to the flesh but according to the Spirit.
