Judgment of Israel

We are continuing our series on the book of Ezekiel. We're on to our second one of the six part series. Welcome if you weren't here last week. Hopefully, we can sort of get you up to speed more or less. If you want to, our website has all our sermons.

They are updated on a weekly basis. So you may go and listen to Ezekiel one that was preached last week. Today, we're going to look at number two in the series, which confusingly is on chapter three. So just to keep you on your toes, we're looking at Ezekiel chapter three, which deals with actually about twenty chapters in total. Now we won't read through all of that.

Everyone's like, phew. Thank you. We'll try and summarise the theme of all of that, but Ezekiel three gives us a great summary of those chapters and what is said there. Last week, we saw in Ezekiel one and two, prophet Ezekiel, the Old Testament prophet receiving an incredible vision of God, seeing His glory and His power as He sits on this throne chariot at the Kebar Canal in Babylon. As His people Israel had been exiled, and prophet Ezekiel will now go on in the ministry to explain why that has happened.

And vision and then God turns to tiny little Ezekiel and says to Ezekiel, I'm sending you to be a prophet among My people. And we saw in the midst of that that God gives comfort by showing just His power and His glory. He shows comfort to Ezekiel and the people by saying that He's not just holed up in Jerusalem in the temple somewhere, He's riding this incredible chariot that moves in angles and across dimensions that we can't fathom. He's everywhere and anywhere, this God. And He is with them even in Babylon.

And then finally, the comfort that God is sending a messenger with a message for His people to hear. And so now we come to the second part of our series, and we're looking at what this message was, what Ezekiel had to say. Well, we find this message, like I already said, spread out across multiple chapters. In fact, Ezekiel chapter three right through to chapter 24. Commentators call these chapters the judgments against Israel.

And in these chapters, we find God highlighting the reasons for the exile of Israel and Judah specifically into Babylon. He says things like they had fallen into idolatry, that their leaders had become greedy and corrupt, that they had fallen and taken the idols and the gods of their neighbours and accepted them and adopted them as their own. God's covenant special people, Israel, were refusing to live in this covenant, this special relationship with Him. And like I said, we're not going to look at all of these chapters, but we're going to look this morning at chapter three, which is the introduction of, I guess, this whole twenty one chapters of the message. So let's have a look at Ezekiel chapter three, and we're going to read from the first verse.

And He who is God said to me, who is Ezekiel, son of man, eat whatever you find here. Eat this scroll and go speak to the house of Israel. So I opened my mouth and He gave me this scroll to eat. And He said to me, son of man, feed your belly with this scroll so that I, so that I give you and fill your stomach with it. Then I ate it and it was in my mouth as sweet as honey.

And He said to me, son of man, go to the house of Israel and speak with My words to them. For you are not sent to a people of foreign speech and a hard language, but to the house of Israel. Not to many peoples of foreign speech and a hard language whose words you cannot understand. Surely if I sent you to such, they would listen to you. But the house of Israel will not be willing to listen to you, for they are not willing to listen to Me because all the house of Israel have a hard forehead and a stubborn heart.

Behold, I have made your face as hard as their faces, and your forehead as hard as their foreheads. Like emery, harder than flint have I made your forehead. Fear them not, nor be dismayed at their looks, for they are a rebellious house. Moreover, He said to me, son of man, all My words that I shall speak to you, receive in your heart and hear with your ears. And go to the exiles to your people and speak to them and say to them, thus says the Lord God, whether they hear or refuse to hear.

Then the spirit lifted me up and I heard behind me the voice of a great earthquake. Blessed be the glory of the Lord from its place. It was the sound of the wings of the living creatures as they touched one another, the ones we talked about last week, and the sound of the wheels beside them, and the sound of a great earthquake. The spirit lifted me up and took me away, and I went in bitterness in the heat of my spirit, the hand of the Lord being strong upon me. And I came to the exiles at Tel Abib who were dwelling by the Kebar Canal, and I sat where they were dwelling.

And I sat there overwhelmed among them seven days. And at the end of seven, the word of the Lord came to me, son of man, I have made you a watchman for the house of Israel. Whenever you hear a word from My mouth, you shall give them warning from Me. If I say to the wicked, you shall surely die, and you give him no warning, nor speak to warn the wicked man from his wicked way in order to save his life, that wicked person shall die for his iniquity, but his blood I will require at your hand. But if you warn the wicked and he does not turn from his wickedness or from his wicked way, he shall surely die for his iniquity, but you will have delivered your soul.

Again, if a righteous person turns from his righteousness and commits injustice, and I lay a stumbling block before him, he shall die because you have not warned him. He shall die for his sin, and his righteous deeds that he has done shall not be remembered, but his blood I will require at your hand. But if you warn the righteous person not to sin and he does not sin, he shall surely live because he took warning and you will have delivered your soul. And the hand of the Lord was upon me there. And He said to me, arise, go out into the valley and there I will speak with you.

So I arose and went out into the valley and behold, the glory of the Lord stood there like the glory that I had seen by the Kebar Canal and I fell on my face. But the spirit entered into me and set me on my feet and He spoke with me and said to me, go, shut yourself within your house and you, oh son of man, behold, cords will be placed upon you and you shall be bound with them so that you cannot go out among the people. And I will make your tongue cling to the roof of your mouth so that you shall be mute and unable to reprove them for they are a rebellious house. But when I speak with you, I will open your mouth and you shall say to them, thus says the Lord God. He who will hear, let him hear.

And he who will refuse to hear, let him refuse for they are a rebellious house. So far, our reading. England, at the start of the seventeen hundreds, was considered to have been a moral swampland and a spiritual cesspool. The Scottish philosopher and satirical writer, Thomas Carlyle of the time, described the country's conditions as the stomach being well alive, but the soul extinct. Morally, the country had become decadent.

Alcohol consumption and drunkenness were rampant. Gambling was so extensive one historian described England as one large casino. Unwanted newborns were put out into the streets to be exposed to the elements to die. Ninety seven percent of the infants born to the working class poor would die in their childhood working in forced labour camps. Anglican Bishop George Berkeley wrote that the morality in Britain of the time had collapsed to a degree, he said, that was never known in any Christian country.

The Christian church of that time was no help either. A bland philosophical morality was the standard fare in the church's preaching. Sir William Blackstone, an English judge and politician, visited the churches of the most notable clergymen in London of the time. But he wrote that he did not hear a single discourse which had more Christianity in it than the writings of Cicero, the great Greek philosopher. In other words, you could hear a sermon from a Christian pastor and it may as well have been a sermon from Confucius or Mohammed or Buddha.

One such spiritually dead clergyman, however, was a man by the name of John Wesley. Wesley had gone to a colony in America to work as a missionary to the native Americans. He soon returned back to England in despair and he wrote, I went to America to convert the Indians, but who will convert me? On the ship going to America originally, Wesley had met some Moravian immigrants he was impressed by their spiritual strength in the Lord. Back at England, Wesley continued meeting with these Moravians.

And as Wesley struggled with his own sense of sin and guilt and his need of salvation, he received spiritual counsel from the Moravian Peter Bueller. On 24th May 1738, during a worship service, someone there read the preface of Martin Luther's commentary on Romans. And Wesley, in that moment, experienced God's saving grace to him. In his journal that night, he wrote, I felt my heart strangely warmed. I felt I now trusted in Christ for the first time.

Christ alone for salvation. And an assurance was given to me that He had taken away my sin. Wesley would become one of the greatest, most notable speakers and preachers of his day. Over the course of his life, Wesley travelled an estimated 250,000 miles for the cause of the gospel. In his preaching, he talked simply but consistently about Christ and emphasised repentance, faith, and holiness.

As Wesley preached, thousands responded. Once he noted in his journal that the word of God ran as fire among the stubble. It was glorified more and more, multitudes crying out, what must I do to be saved? And he said afterwards, people testifying, by grace, we are saved through faith. What makes a John Wesley?

What ingredients are needed to create someone like that in the context in which Wesley found himself? I suspect there are probably many complex reasons we can quote why the John Wesley's and the Martin Luther's and the Corrie ten Boom's and the Elizabeth Elliot's became such powerful witnesses to the gospel. Many, many reasons why they were the right people at the right time, but one factor that connects them all and connects them to the story of Ezekiel is that they spoke like prophets into the situations of their time. Prophets who were absolutely consumed by the gospel message. And that's what we see this morning in the passage we've just read, the starting of it.

We see the beginning of a man's prophetic ministry declaring the message of God to a lost generation. And what we see in chapter three is a summary of the character and of the flavour of Ezekiel and his ministry to Israel that spans these twenty one chapters. What was it about Ezekiel impressive and that speaks to us even today? Well, the first thing we see is a Christian consumed by the gospel. Now I say Ezekiel is a Christian even before the time of Christ because he was a man that lived by faith.

He actually goes on to prophesy the coming of Christ. He saw with spiritual eyes what was still coming ahead. And so I call Ezekiel a Christian today and his ministry to Israel as a prophet consumed by the gospel. Ironically, however, we start chapter three by seeing he became a man consumed by the gospel by first consuming it. We see in verse one, two, and three that he has he's given a scroll.

Now this is part of the continuing vision that he sees of God, this incredible God that started in chapter one through to chapter two, the end of or sort of the middle part of chapter three, it ends. And in this vision, he's given this scroll and he is made to eat it, made to consume it. And Ezekiel says as he ingests it, as he puts it in his mouth, he says, it is as sweet as honey. What does this mean? Well, it meant that God's word had become a part of Ezekiel.

It was now in him. It was in his heart. We find a similar phrase in Psalm 19, don't we, where King David writes, your word, God, is more precious than gold to me. It is sweeter than honey. Honey from the comb.

And this experience of God's word became physically entwined with the prophet. And it is actually something we see again and again in the other Old Testament prophets as well. Jeremiah, the prophet, also had a tough ministry. And in that ministry, in the midst of it, he was tired of being the bad news prophet. He was having a ripe old whinge in Jeremiah chapter 20 and saying, God, I can't do it anymore.

I can't keep being the prophet that brings these things because everyone hates me. He was persecuted by the good and the bad alike. And he says in Jeremiah 20 verse eight, to God, whenever I speak, I cry out and I shout violence and destruction. For the word of the Lord has become for me a reproach and a derision all day long. But if I say I will not mention Him or speak anymore in His name, there is in my heart as it were burning fire shut up in my bones.

And I am weary with holding it in and I cannot. The prophets of God are consumed by the message. They could not help but speak, but it's not only the message that becomes a part of them. We see that God in the midst of that moulds them to be the men that they needed to be of the time. We see that in verse eight, don't we?

Behold, God says, I have made your face as hard as their faces and your forehead as hard as their foreheads. Your head harder than theirs. In other words, you don't want to butt heads with Ezekiel. Ezekiel is a man gripped by God's word who would and could do nothing but share it, and he had the personality and the tenacity to go through with it. God had given him a hard head.

And friends, I dare say that there are believers here gripped in the same way as well. The word of God for some of us burns in our bones. And you cannot help but speak about it. That word, like that moment John Wesley got it, burns within them. And it became, at one point, the sweetest thing in the world, sweeter than honey from the comb.

And so for those of us that are there, I encourage you, brother, sister, speak. Let it speak. Don't suppress it because it will be to you a detriment. Let it speak. But perhaps there are those who don't yet have that sense of urgency.

And I want you to mark in your minds today that perhaps that day will come, and I silently pray that it does. And then I want you to remember that God will not simply give you the urgency of declaring that gospel, but He will equip you for the task as well. He may even give you a forehead like flint. Ezekiel became hard as stone in order to do what needed to be done. And if the God that he believed had called him, then that God will equip him as well.

But what exactly did God call Ezekiel to do? Well, Ezekiel was to be a prophet. He was to have a prophetic voice. And we see in verse 17 what these prophets were. Let's have a look.

Son of man, God says, I have made you a watchman for the house of Israel. Whenever you hear a word from My mouth, you shall give them warning from Me. A watchman, you probably have seen if you watch any of those medieval stories, is someone that stood on the ramparts of a city gate or a wall or in a watchtower and kept their eye on the horizon for disaster that was coming. That is what a watchman did. But do you notice what God calls Ezekiel to?

Ezekiel must simply be faithful in warning people. That is what he's called to do. It doesn't say you must convert 5,000 people or 10,000 people or the whole of Israel. You must tell them what I tell you. He was warned that he will be sent to a rebellious house, a people who will not listen.

But Ezekiel's success is not dependent on how many people turn back, but simply that he was faithful in delivering the message. In other words, the faithful carrying out of the responsibility of being a watchman is more important than whether Ezekiel seemed to be successful in warning people. And so this is the same calling that God has given the church. Jesus sends out His disciples on their mission trip and He warns them and He says to them, what I say to you now in this ministry at the moment is in whispers, is quiet and behind doors, but one day you will go and you will stand on the rooftops to declare these things. And there will be people that won't listen to you, but do not be afraid for the spirit of My Father will be in you and you will speak on His behalf and He will give you the words to speak.

This is the same calling that God gives the church. Now in theology, there's a concept called the munus triplex. I want to get pastor Bob to give his definition of that. The munus triplex is the concept drawn from Scripture that the church has been given a threefold task, three offices, being prophet, priest, and king. And just as Jesus was the perfect fulfilment of the Old Testament offices of prophet, priest, and king, in His life, He fulfilled that all and therefore was shown to be the Messiah.

Now the body of Christ, His church, have a ministry in the same way of being kings, priests, and prophets to the world. As Jesus orchestrates His ministry of salvation through the church, He gives the church the same responsibilities that He has. As kings, therefore, the church will rule over the hearts and the minds of people by God's law. As priests, the church will administer, and I'm talking big capital C church, the church, the faithful church, will administer the grace of God as priests. But as prophets, the church will call people to repentance and faith.

Now this teaching that the church holds this triple office is something that has become increasingly unpopular. It's something we don't talk about. And as our desire for, I think, solid theology has fallen, so has our understanding of some of the key responsibilities of the church. One of them is that the church must have a prophet like voice, crying out to people on the verge of eternal damnation. But turn your TVs on to the Christian channels today and you'll see the Joel Osteens and the Brian Houstons and the Joseph Princes telling you that you should believe in Jesus because He will give you a better life now.

It is an indictment that the biggest, most popular churches in Australia are where watered down gospels are preached just like in England in John Wesley's time. But the church is a watchman warning of a coming storm. Just listen to God's words to Ezekiel in verse 18. If I, God, say to the wicked, you shall surely die, and you, Ezekiel, give him no warning, nor speak to warn the wicked from his wicked way in order to save his life, that wicked person will die for his iniquity, but his blood I will require at your hand. If the storm is coming and we say peace, peace, when there is no peace, when our gospel proclamation does not include the concept of sin, the reality of judgment and hell, thinking that we can ease people into a faith that is soft and fuzzy.

God will give those people eternal death, but the blood might be on our hands. That is a terrifying condemnation of an easy to hear gospel. It doesn't help anyone to be polite about sin. Ezekiel, we would see, wasn't. The church isn't helping anyone when we are polite about judgment.

When we talk to our friends, we can't be polite about what is potentially awaiting them. And then we come to our third and our final point, the ministry of warning. Like I said, chapters four to 24 are pronouncements of judgment awaiting Israel. The highlighting of all reasons come throughout these chapters. Why God is so angry.

Why God is so heartbroken. Many times throughout these chapters, and I encourage you to read them, they're excellent reading. Ezekiel will be called to act out the judgment. The Bible commentators, the scholars on Ezekiel call these sign acts.

And it's almost uniquely and characteristically Ezekiel. Ezekiel is made mute, and so he has to act out what is going to happen to Israel. And so the next chapter from here is chapter four where Ezekiel is given the command to take a brick to engrave the name Jerusalem on it, and then he has to build like a scale model battle scene, of a siege scene with an army surrounding Jerusalem, you know, war machines, ramps against the gate, and so on. In the fifth scene, Ezekiel has to take a sharp sword. He has to shave off all his hair, and then divide his hair into three equal portions.

God says that each third represents what will happen at the judgment of Israel. A third of the people will die of disease. A third will die by the sword, and a third will be scattered to all the surrounding nations. And God keeps sending these things for Ezekiel to do, to act out these prophecies. And it culminates in chapter 24, which is the most devastating news that Israel will hear, but it's also personally devastating to Ezekiel.

Not only does the city fall and the temple will be destroyed, but it will be desecrated. It will be defiled by these enemies. But the final sign act that Ezekiel will act out would mean that God takes the life of Ezekiel's wife. And God tells Ezekiel, I will do this and you will not mourn the loss of your wife. And you will tell the people, you may not mourn the loss of the temple.

Instead, you will also groan inwardly because of your sin. And Ezekiel writes in verse 18 himself, so I spoke to the people in the morning and in the evening my wife died. Why? Why does this happen? Well, God says in verse 24 of that chapter, He says to the people, Ezekiel will be assigned to you, Israel.

You will do just as he has done. And when this happens, you will know that I am the sovereign Lord. We said last week that this is one of the themes throughout Ezekiel, God using that phrase, so that you may know that I am God. These things will happen so that you may know that I am God. And these things make us as twenty first century Christians in a very civilised world, in a very neat and tidy and friendly God, very uncomfortable.

But we also know that human nature has not changed. We see it happening all the time and we've probably been guilty of it ourselves. The nice miracles, the nice acts of God, the nice gifts that God gives us, the pleasant providences make us give an approving nod to God. Thanks. But it's the hard miracles that make us listen.

It's the frowning providences of God that make us really sit up. When things are pleasant, we feel awfully grateful, but so often we take that gift and we keep living our own way. I read an interesting story this week of a man by the name of Jack Abramoff who was a wealthy businessman in America and a political lobbyist who was jailed for fraud in the mid two thousands. He served six years in jail and he later wrote, God sent me a thousand hints that he didn't want me to keep doing what I was doing, but I didn't listen. So he set off a nuclear bomb.

Sometimes God's judgment is that bomb. Whether that is to turn a person to Christ for the first time or to refine a believer's character even more. One of the biggest mistakes we can make is to think that God is absent, however, in the midst of that. And so if you're an unbeliever this morning, I want to tell you, if you are experiencing suffering and pain, guilt, you may just be experiencing God's judgment on your life.

His word to you today is to repent, to turn away from that lifestyle, to turn away from those actions, to turn away from your unbelief in Jesus Christ, and to make Him your master, your only master, your king, and to receive His forgiveness. And if you don't know what that means this morning, but you know in your heart that you want whatever that is, please talk with someone. Talk with me after the service. Talk with someone about this. But friend, if you're a believer this morning and you know that you are a child of God and you are also experiencing pain, then be comforted that this is not a pain of judgment, but a pain of disciplining, of refinement.

Take courage from Hebrews 12 that says that God disciplines those He loves and that He does this as a father, like a parent wanting to strengthen and grow a child that He loves. Because for you, friend, Christ has made God your Father forever. But because He is your Father, He is interested in making you holy and mature. The biggest mistake, however, whether you are a Christian or a non Christian today, is to think that God is absent. Sometimes in our suffering, there's very little we can do about it.

Sometimes we are suffering as a result of our own decisions. But there is always at least one thing that you can do. Pray to see what God is wanting to do in it. And then let Him do it.

Let Him do it. So God's judgment in the life of the non believer can be a wake up call to receive Christ once and for all. And for the Christian, it is the realisation that God isn't finished with me just yet. From Israel's perspective, Ezekiel's ministry to Israel, we see that as angry as God was with Israel, He wasn't done with them. They were still His people, although He was really, really angry.

And He would keep His promise to them forever. And we see that in Jesus Christ. So may God give us the grace not only to receive this gospel, but to be consumed by it. To eat it. To find it as sweet as honey so that we may go to the world that so desperately needs it.

So lost. So broken. And warn them and plead with them even with tears. Receive Christ for the forgiveness of sin. Friends, that is our calling.

May we be a church of Christians consumed by the gospel. Let's pray. Father in heaven, this is a massive task You give us. But, Lord, there is nothing more important. There is nothing in all we do that has as much significance as the call to be watchmen to a generation that is on the verge of damnation.

And Lord, these are harsh words and these are words we don't want to hear too often. But I ask, Lord, that You will raise up in this church, men and women, who will, like Jeremiah, cry out and say, I withered away when I tried to be quiet. God, give us, give our hearts and our souls a determination to pray and to plead, to teach, to persuade, to argue, to debate, and to point to Jesus Christ. God, will You raise preachers, church leaders, missionaries, men and women who You will empower, who You will call, who You will equip to do what You want us to do. And then, Father, for the churches that don't preach this gospel, we pray for a change of their heart and their mind and their thinking about this.

What a massive opportunity they have. Father, don't let them miss it. And help us to be gentle as doves and cunning as serpents when we think about these things. When we discuss these things with people. When we plan and strategise how to do this.

How we, even us, this little church on the Gold Coast, can influence and sway and motivate even a nation like Australia to follow, to believe, to live according to the will of the living God. And we thank You finally, Lord Jesus, that You have given us Your spirit. The spirit that can make us hard as stone when we need to be. The spirit that can make us as soft as even the heart of our saviour Jesus was. Thank You that You give us that great comfort, that great strength.

And we pray that for each of us, we may sense Your spirit in us. In Jesus' name. Amen.