Gary Gleans

The justice of God is a reality every man must recognize.  Israel is in the midst of being judged and so they are questioning the justice of God.  Ezekiel defends God’s justice in a very clear and logical way.  Today there is great debate over God’s justice because of confusion over God’s sovereignty and man’s responsibility.  Somehow people convince themselves that God’s sovereignty over the world eliminates human responsibility and therefore throws into question the justice of God.  One thing must be clearly understood: God would be completely just in sending every single person on the planet to hell for all of eternity.  The fact that anyone is saved and reconciled to God is pure grace and mercy. THE PRINCIPLE OF RESPONSIBILITY: Israel was complaining that they were suffering for the sins of their fathers but not their own sin.  Ezekiel makes it very clear that God judges every man for his own merits and actions.  The sinful man will be judged for his own sins.  The righteous m

God tells Ezekiel to speak a parable to the people about two Eagles, a twig and a vine.  The parable is of one eagle that takes a twig from the top of the tree and places it on the mountain and then takes a seed from a vine and places it in fertile ground next to a stream.  It seems obvious that the seed will sprout and grow while the twig has very little chance of survival.  However, things are not always as they seem.  A vine may grow in fertile ground and bear fruit but it is also fragile enough that it can be pulled up by the roots and destroyed.  Ezekiel then turns the parable around and illustrates God as an Eagle who controls the destinies of twigs and seeds according to His will.  There are things that seem logical to us but God’s ways are not always as we expect them to be especially when we are living in sin. THE FOOLISHNESS OF SIN: The first illustration of the twigs from the top of the tree is that of the king of Babylon taking the king and rulers from Israel to Babylo

History is an important discipline for every person to study so they do not end up repeating the errors of the past.  Ezekiel gives an overview of Israel’s history from God’s perspective as well as a look to the future that God has planned for this nation.  God is gracious and patient but He is also jealous and just.  God’s graciousness must never be taken for granted and we must never presume that His mercy outweighs His holiness.  God’s love and grace should encourage us to love and obey Him instead of making us feel confident in our sinful state.  As we look at the history of Israel it is vital that we examine our own lives to see how we have responded to God’s mercy.  GOD’S PAST PROVISION: Ezekiel pictures Israel as a lost and rejected child who was born to pagan parents.  She is pictured as a baby that was not washed, swaddled or even have its umbilical cord cut.  As she grew up she is pictured as a young woman who had no clothes and was naked and exposed.  This is likely a r

We all want to feel useful and like to think that we are an important part of something.  Uselessness is one of the worst feelings that any of us can ever have.  The children of Israel were chosen by God for the special purpose of blessing all the families of the Earth.  God chose them and separated them for that special purpose.  However, because of their rebellion and sin God looks upon the inhabitants of Jerusalem and simply calls them useless.  When men refuse to trust and obey God they fail to glorify God and fulfill the purpose for which they have been created.  The only way we can truly be useful is by living for and promoting the glory of God. JERUSALEM WAS USELESS BEFORE JUDGMENT: The inhabitants of Jerusalem are compared to a vine in the woods.  The vine can wrap around trees and prevent their growth just as Israel had become a stumbling block to the nations.  The wood of the vine cannot be used to make furniture of build a house or even be made into a peg.  The vine doe

Men are responsible before God for their sin.  There are consequences for sin that men must eventually pay.  God is patient and long-suffering but we must never think that God’s patience is and an indication of His indifference.  God will hold man to an account of His sin and there will be judgment.  The only way to escape this judgment is through personal righteousness or through repentance and restored faith in the Word of God.  Many men think they can carry on a relationship with God as if nothing has happened even though they continue to live in sin.  Others believe that they will escape from God’s judgment because they have a godly ancestry.  This is delusional thinking.  God judges every man according to his own righteousness and personal repentance.  We cannot hide behind the righteousness of others or hope that God will simply ignore our idolatry. GOD WILL NOT REVEAL HIMSELF TO THE UNREPENTANT: The elders of the people who had been taken captive to Babylon come to sit befo

The Word of God is a sacred trust.  To teach the Word of God or speak in such a way as to be revealing the Word of God is a high and holy calling that is never to be taken lightly.  There is a very big difference between speaking God’s word and speaking my own desires.  We all like to be liked so when we speak there is always a temptation to tell the people what they want to hear instead of what God has revealed.  This is a temptation that must be avoided at all costs.  Ezekiel condemns the prophets and prophetesses of his day for using their position to deceive the people instead of telling the people the truth of God’s Word.  We must learn to take the job of teaching God’s Word very seriously because all who do this will face a harsher judgment. THE JUDGMENT OF THE PROPHETS: The prophets were deceiving the people of Israel with false messages of hope as if they were coming from God.  Ezekiel and Jeremiah were warning the people of God’s coming judgment and calling them to turn f

Ezekiel is living in Babylon and is proclaiming the Word of the Lord to the people who are already in exile.  The false teachers were claiming that the nation of Israel would soon be restored and returned to the land.  Ezekiel is called to tell the truth that even those who in the land will be taken away.  Even though the people had already experienced captivity, they had still not understood the gravity of their sin and the Lord’s determination to punish them in hopes that they would repent.  As long as they kept believing that they were fine and going to be restored soon, they would not realize their sinfulness and they would not turn back to the Lord.  Ezekiel’s ministry was to try to wake the people up.  We all like to try to minimize the gravity of our own sin but that it not the path of God or the way to repentance. THE PEOPLE IN JERUSALEM WILL BE MOVING: Ezekiel is called to pack his bags and carry them out in the full view of all the people that were in exile.  He was then

Leaders are an important part of any nation.  They set the direction of the nation and create an atmosphere in which people can either thrive or struggle to survive.  Most of the problems Israel has experienced have been the result of terrible leadership.  We have already seen the impact of the unfaithfulness of the spiritual leaders.  This chapter turns its attention to the impact of the unfaithfulness of the political leaders.  There are two kinds of hope seen in this text, one generated by the princes of the land and the other generated by the Word of God.  These two kinds of hope continue to be evident in the lives of people today.  We must be careful to base our hope on the promises of God and not the fantasies of men. FALSE HOPE: The political leaders of Israel had been taken into captivity and were a big part of the reason the nation fell in the first place.  A message of gloom and doom is not very popular and political leaders tend to care more about popularity than truth.

Ezekiel continues his vision of the city of Jerusalem and the glory of God as He judges the city.  The vision from chapter one of God’s glory and the angels surrounding His throne is repeated.  The image is of the presence of a holy God in the midst of an unholy people.  The result of this is predictable and God judges the people for their sin.  One day all of man-kind will find themselves in the presence of a holy God and they will suffer a similar experience only magnified in proportion.  As we look at God’s judgment of Israel we must remind ourselves that this is only a small sampling of God’s future and complete judgment of the world. JUDAH’S REJECTION OF GOD: Judah has turned their backs on God and lived in rebellion against Him.  Their idolatry and immorality have become a stench in the nostrils of God.  In Ezekiel’s vision the man dressed in linen from the previous chapter is called to come forward and take some embers off of the altar before the Lord and spread them on the

The judgment of God is always just and always tempered with grace and mercy.  The reality of life is that nobody is worthy of salvation and that all of us are deserving of death, judgment and eternal punishment.  God in His mercy and grace has made a way for us to escape His wrath and judgment through the sacrifice of Jesus on the cross.  One day there will be a world-wide judgment during which time all those who have placed their faith in Christ will be spared and all those who have rejected Christ to continue worshiping idols of their own imagination will be eternally condemned.  God know how to separate the faithful from the faithless.  He illustrates this in multiple “mini judgments” in the history of man.  Ezekiel has a vision of one of these judgments. THE MARKING OF FAITHFUL MEN: Ezekiel has just witnessed four different types of idolatrous practices throughout the nation of Israel.  All of these are an abomination to the Lord and provoke Him to wrath.  Ezekiel has a vision

Secrecy is one of man’s greatest delusions.  There is no such thing as secrecy.  None of our actions, thoughts or motives are secret.  God knows all about all of them.  Israel has been practicing multiple forms of idolatry and somehow think they have been doing it in secret.  God shows Ezekiel several snapshots of the different types and styles of idolatry taking place in the nation.  God exposes this idolatry and demonstrates the reason for His wrath.  This is a very sobering thought because it means all of our idolatrous actions, thoughts and motives are also known by God and will be exposed when God judges all of mankind.  All men have idols and God knows about all of them.  Our only hope to escape the wrath of God is to expose our own idolatry before the Lord, repent and trust Christ for the forgiveness of sin through His death.  This chapter reveals four forms of idolatry taking place in the nation of Israel. THE IDOLATRY OF BAAL: Ezekiel is taken in a trance to the city of J

“The love of money is the root of all kinds of evil.”  Paul warned Timothy of this truth.  Ezekiel illustrates with the nation of Israel how this is the truth.  Money tends to foster pride in the lives of those who have a lot of money.  Pride is at the root of almost every sin.  Adam and Eve ate the fruit in the Garden because of pride.  Today people reject the message of the Gospel because of pride.  The nation of Israel was destroyed by God because she became proud in her sin and refused to repent.  Unfortunately much of today’s culture mirrors that of Israel’s.  Money and pride rule the day.  The warning from God is clear, repentance is the only way we can avoid the wrath of God. THEY WERE PROUD OF THEIR POSITION: Ezekiel describes the coming wrath of God on the nation of Israel.  The people will be slaughtered in the streets, the buildings will be utterly destroyed and the fields will be left in desolation.  This is not a new message by any means.  Isaiah, Jeremiah and now Eze

Ezekiel is in Babylon so he is called to turn his face to the west and proclaim a message to the mountains of Jerusalem.  The mountains are a representation of the high places where the children of Israel would build unauthorized altars for making sacrifices to the Lord that eventually became altars to their pagan gods and centers for idolatry.  The worship of idols had gotten so bad in Israel that there was an altar or a place for burning incense on every street.  Baal had become far more worshiped than God.  Ezekiel is called to proclaim a message against the nation because of all its idolatrous activity.  Our idols may be different today but they are no less common.  We worship our possessions and our comfort.  We have convinced ourselves that we have no need of God so we have become our own gods and we worship at the altars of our own pleasure and prosperity. THE DESTRUCTION OF IDOLATRY: God does not tolerate idolatry within His people without retribution.  Israel had sought a

Once again God calls Ezekiel to illustrate the coming judgment on Israel with the cutting and dividing of his hair.  God has determined to judge this nation and He will bring it about because of the massive rebellion in Israel and her refusal to respond to His call to repentance.  It is a scary thing to fall into the hands of God in His wrath.  He has made a means for us to escape this reality but if we refuse to take this path we too can expect judgment.  Too often people today look at God as only love and mercy but forget He is holy and just.  Ezekiel gives us another graphic illustration of God’s wrath. HOW ISRAEL WILL BE JUDGED: God calls Ezekiel to cut off all of his hair and then divide it into three equal parts.  One part his is to burn, representing those who would be consumed in the city of Jerusalem by the famine, pestilence and war.  The second part was to be chopped up into little pieces with the sword, representing how another third of the people would be killed by th

Illustrations help us to understand subjective truth in objective ways.  Israel had been warned repeatedly about the captivity and the destruction of their land.  God had determined to judge the nation and had been faithful to warn them of this fact over and over again.  Now God calls for Ezekiel to repeat this message in a very graphic way in hopes that the people would finally understand the severity of God’s judgment as well as the surety of His judgment.  There would be no escape and it would not be easy in any way shape or form.  God’s intention in revelation is for our preparation through repentance and faith.  God has revealed many things to us about His plans for the future judgment of the world.  They are far more severe than anything Israel ever experienced.  It would be very wise to respond to these warnings as He intends in order to escape the wrath that will shortly come upon the earth. THE DESCRIPTION OF GOD’S JUDGMENT: Ezekiel is called to design a brick and put iro

Experiences can be overwhelming.  Ezekiel is certainly having one of those experiences as He is given a glimpse of the glory of God and sent out to do the work of the ministry.  God commissions Ezekiel and He is overwhelmed by the experience to the point that he spend seven days in silence the first time he has the vision and then the Lord binds up his tongue the second time he has the vision.  It is not an easy or a trite thing to speak the Word of the Lord.  Our hearer’s response is not usually what we expect and it is a great responsibility.  GOD WARNS EZEKIEL OF THE PEOPLE’S RESPONSE: God sends Ezekiel to his own people that are in exile with him.  He does not send them to a foreign land to speak a foreign language.  He does not send him to a great multitude of people who live a long ways away from him.  Ezekiel is sent to his own people to speak his own language and there are not very many people left in the nation that God is chastising.  However, God warns Ezekiel that the pe

God calls Ezekiel to be a prophet to the nation of Israel.  He has had a vision of who God is and now He is instructed as to what God wants Him to do.  Ezekiel is in the proper position when he is called; on his face in worship.  God’s Spirit enters him and stands him on his feet so he can go and do what God wants Him to do.  Too often we try to do God’s work in our own strength without worship and without the Spirit.  On the other hand, we have a tendency to get comfortable in our places of worship and do not obey the Spirits call to go and preach the Word.  Both extremes are wrong.  True worship will result in obedience to the Spirits call to go and do the work of the ministry.  There are two qualities that are vital to the work of the ministry and God lets Ezekiel know from the beginning what is expected of Him. COMMUNICATION: The function of a prophet is simply to communicate the Word of God to people.  God let Ezekiel know that the people to whom he was being sent were a rebe

Ezekiel is a prophet and priest of God living in Babylon as one of the captives who was taken away from Jerusalem.  This was a time of judgment and chastisement for the nation of Israel and yet God has a message for the nation in this time of captivity.  God reveals His glory to Ezekiel and the message of this book is clearly inspired by God through His servant Ezekiel.  As the opening scene of this book unfolds we get a small glimpse of the glory of God or at least the glory the surrounds God.  This vision put Ezekiel on his face in worship before the Lord.  Any time we are given a glimpse into the glory of God it should fill our hearts with awe, our mouths with adoration and our lives with worship. GOD’S CHERUBIM: Ezekiel has a glorious vision in which he describes very unique angelic beings called Cherubim.  These angels appear in the Psalms as well as in Revelation and are always associated with the presence of God, the arrival of God, the holiness of God and the glory of God.

Humility is on the path to restoration before the Lord.  As long as we try to justify, excuse or ignore our sin, we will continue to sin and suffer the consequences of our sin.  But when we humbly recognize the fact of our sin, repent of that sin and cry out the Lord; we can find forgiveness and hope for restoration.  God judges sin and makes the consequences of sin severe in hopes that this suffering will bring us to our knees in humility so that through repentance we can be restored.  Suffering refines and is used by God to reconcile us to Himself. THE CONSEQUENCE OF SIN: This prayer begins with a plea for God to remember His people and to see their condition.  God never forgets anyone and always sees everything.  However, due to the consequence of sin if felt as if the nation of Israel had been abandoned by God.  Their property had been given to foreign nations.  Their families had been broken.  Water and wood had become expensive commodities.  They were exhausted and exiled. 

Israel is in a very difficult place in her history.  The devastation of the nation and the suffering of the people are at an all-time high.  When people thought of judgment they had no idea how harsh and complete it would be.  Jeremiah laments over the condition of the city and reminds us of why this has happened and gives us the details of what has happened.  This is a very sober reminder of how harsh the judgment of the Lord can be.  All men should take note of this fact and turn to the Lord in repentance. CONTRASTS AND CAUSES OF DEVASTATION: Jeremiah contrasts the former glory of Israel with her present reality.  The gold of the past is gone and has been replaced by stones in the street.  The once powerful warriors have become weak and worthless.  The once tender mothers have become careless and cannibalistic with their own children.  The once royal leaders have become poor and powerless.  This judgment on Israel is deemed as being more severe than that of Sodom because Sodom w

Hope is one of the key ingredients in the Christian walk.  It is one of the greatest blessings we have as believers and allows us to face difficult circumstances with confidence.  When we lose hope the results are devastating because it means we have lost sight of the very essence of our relationship with God.  However, hope always involves the future, which means it always looks at future promises and not present realities.  Hope and faith always walk hand in hand because they both look forward to and live in light of that which is not seen and has not been fully realized.  Life on this sin cursed planet will be difficult but we can overcome those times through the hope we have in the Lord Jesus. THE DESTRUCTION OF HOPE BRINGS DESPAIR: Jeremiah describes his own desperation because all hope has seemingly been destroyed.  He is living under the affliction of God’s wrath.  This has brought blindness to his eyes, bruises to his body and bitterness to his soul.  He sees no possible m