Our Response to God and His Word

For some, disbelief of God’s Word is not their primary struggle but disregarding it and delaying their obedience. In Ezekiel’s day some in the house of Israel were saying, “The vision that he sees concerns many years from now; he prophesies about distant times.” The Lord’s response to them is, “None of My words will be delayed any longer. The message I speak will be fulfilled.”

The act of delaying our obedience indicates we believe we will have additional time and opportunities to obey whatever the Lord is telling us. Nobody can be certain of further occasions for obedience, nor are they deserved. James exhorts his readers,

Come now, you who say, “Today or tomorrow we will travel to such and such a city and spend a year there and do business and make a profit.” You don’t even know what tomorrow will bring—what your life will be! For you are like smoke that appears for a little while, then vanishes. (Jas 4:13-14)

One of the worst examples of being a day late in obedience is recorded in Numbers 14. God was ready to take His people into the promised land, but they doubted His protection and provision, so they refused to enter Canaan. After God judged them for their disobedience and disbelief and informed them they would die in the wilderness, the Israelites decided they would enter the land. It was a disaster! Neither Moses nor the Lord went with them, and they were routed. Their obedience was a day late. Had they not disregarded His instructions and not delayed their obedience, then they would not have died in discipline.

What can we learn? First of all, God does not just have a word for yesterday or tomorrow but for today. The psalmist has warned us, “Today if you hear His voice: Do not harden your hearts” (Ps 95:7-8). Citing this psalm, the author of Hebrews tells us to “encourage each other daily . . . so that none of you is hardened by sin’s deception” (Heb 3:13). Delayed obedience is disobedience. One of the best ways we can serve others in our faith family is by encouraging them to obey the Lord the first time they are called to obedience and every time they are so called.

Second, we must be careful not to be quick to discern a word for others and miss the word for us. Ezekiel’s audience claimed his message was for people years down the road and in essence did not have anything to do with them. God does not just have a word for others but for us. If you find yourself thinking often about how someone you know needs to hear the sermon you are listening to, then you might just be the “someone.” When we hear a word from the Lord, there is a reason we have been given the opportunity. It may indeed be that the Lord wants us to pass the message on to others, but that should only be after it has done its work in our own lives.

Like Moses, we should pray, “Teach us to number our days carefully so that we may develop wisdom in our hearts” (Ps 90:12). All of our days were written in the Lord’s book and “planned before a single one of them began,” but only the Lord knows their total and where we are in the count (Ps 139:16). So many worry if these are the “last days,” and in one sense the answer to this is yes (Heb 1:2). I encourage the people I shepherd, however, not to think of them as the last days but as our only days. Now is the time for obedience. Any delay or disregard of the Lord’s Word on our part is an arrogant presumption and a waste of time. At what point has delaying obedience ever been for our best or for the best of those around us? Our delay and disregard reveal that someone else’s word (perhaps our own) is more important to us than the Lord’s.

Will We Distort God’s Word?

Ezekiel 13:1-23

When I was a student in seminary, I would often eat in the French Quarter in New Orleans. When I was leaving a parking area one night, I saw a woman who seemed to have a problem with her car. I stopped and asked if I could help. It turned out it was just a car battery that needed to be jumped, so my limited auto skills could be used. What was funny to me is the woman was a fortune-teller. She and others like her would set their tables and chairs up in Jackson Square and claim to know everyone’s future. I could not help but laugh when I asked her, “You didn’t see this coming, huh?”

In Ezekiel’s day there were not only those who disbelieved or disregarded God’s word, but tragically, there were also those who distorted it. Nothing is worse than someone who claims to have a word from the Lord but really speaks for himself. In Ezekiel’s day false prophets and false prophetesses alike were offering divinations, deceit, and distortions. The Lord, however, had a true word for both groups.

Ezekiel was told to prophesy against the prophets of Israel. The Lord was angry with this group because they prophesied out of their own imagination and followed their own spirit since they had seen nothing and they were like jackals among ruins. If we learned anything about jackals from the movie The Lion King (1994), they are selfish and opportunistic, seeking only their own good.

The false prophets did not go up to the gaps or restore the wall around the house of Israel so that it might stand in battle on the day of the Lord. They had seen false visions and spoken a lying divination when they proclaimed, “This is the Lord’s declaration,” even though He had not spoken. Finally, the false prophets led God’s people astray when they said, “Peace,” when there was no peace. They were like those who plaster a wall with whitewash.

The prophetesses were no better. Like the men the women prophesied out of their own imagination. They had sewn magic bands on the wrist of every hand and made veils for the heads of people of every height in order to ensnare lives. The prophetesses had disheartened the righteous person with lies, even though Yahweh had not caused him grief. They also encouraged the wicked person not to turn from his evil way to save his life. With their lies the women killed those who should not die and spared those who should not live. And they had done all of these things merely for handfuls of barley and scraps of bread.

God’s people were already struggling to believe and obey His true messages, and the proliferation of false messages did nothing to help the situation. God would no longer tolerate the false prophets and prophetesses. He would put them out of business. They had given His people false hope, so God would give these dispensers of deceit no hope. Because the false prophets and prophetesses spoke falsely and had lying visions, God was against them (13:8).

The punishment for their pretense was severe. The false teachers would not be present in the fellowship of His people or be recorded in the register of the house of Israel. They would also not be allowed to enter the land of Israel. The false prophets would be destroyed with their whitewashed wall in the city (cf. Jer 28:1-17). For the women God was going to tear the magic bands from their arms and tear the veils from their heads. He would free the people the women ensnared in their lies, and He would deliver His people from the predators’ hands. He would also stop false visions (13:23) and flattering divination within the house of Israel (12:24). Why would He do all of this? For the same reason repeated throughout the book—so they will know He is the Lord Yahweh (13:9).

What can we learn from the presence and then the punishment of the false prophets and prophetesses in Ezekiel 13? First of all, not everyone who claims to speak for the Lord really does. Competing voices are not new. So how can we recognize who is giving us God’s message today? Duguid is helpful here: “The contrast in our day between ‘true prophet’ and ‘false prophet’ is not so much as to who has really received the word of God, but rather who is rightly handling the Word of God”(Duguid, Ezekiel, 177). To know the difference, we should be like the Bereans who “examined the Scriptures daily to see if” what Paul and Silas shared with them was based in God’s Word (Acts 17:11).

My mentor, Jim Shaddix, exhorted us young pastors to make sure the biblical text was not just a diving board for our oral presentation but the pool in which our sermon swam (Vines and Shaddix, Power in the Pulpit, 204). He would tell us our job as preachers is not to present good stuff but to present God stuff, which is done best by biblical exposition. I once listened to a preacher reference the text where Jesus says, “Among those born of women no one greater than John the Baptist has appeared” (Matt 11:11). The preacher then proceeded to give us five ways we could be great and six ways not to be great. After listening for a little while, I closed my Bible. Apparently it was a bit dramatic because my wife elbowed me. I turned to her and said, “He’s not preaching from here anymore, so I don’t need to leave it open.”

Like the prophets and prophetesses in Ezekiel 13, those who call themselves into ministry often bring their own message with them. We should be cautious of those, in particular, who tell us what we want to hear rather than what we need to hear. What could be more dangerous than telling those people not to worry who in reality have much to fear? “We must speak clearly of the tragic and dangerous state of men and women without Christ. They are sinners under the wrath of God, at risk of eternal lostness” (Duguid, Ezekiel, 165).

Second, there are times when preaching against other preachers is necessary. Prophesying against the prophets will probably not lead to Ezekiel’s winning a popularity contest. But then again, “popularity is not a test of truth” (Wiersbe, Be Reverent, 73). Generalities will not suffice when specificity is needed. We may not just be able to say, “Here are some general characteristics of false teachers,” but may at times need to name names. When this occurs, Thomas offers some wisdom: “Preaching against preachers must never be done out of envy or spite, but always and only out of regard for the truth of God’s Word” (Thomas, God Strengthens, 96).

Third, we should avoid being jackals in the ruins or those who whitewash walls and give people false confidences. We are like jackals when all we care about is ourselves. If we intentionally withhold truth from those who are perishing because we want them to like us, then our real concern is only for ourselves. We whitewash walls when we allow people to feel safe even though they hold convictions contrary to God’s Word. We’re like those who say, “Peace,” when there is no peace. Let us run to the gaps and restore the walls by not being afraid to speak God’s Word to those around us.

Fourth, if we are going to be put to death for proclaiming a message, it better be the right one. The false prophets and prophetesses paid a real price for a false message. We who carry the gospel, however, know we have already died to self, and any cost that is necessary to proclaim Christ’s good news will be worth it.

Will We Deliver God’s Word and Desire to Obey Him

No Matter the Cost?

Ezekiel 12:7

I’m not sure any preacher has been asked to proclaim God’s Word in more peculiar ways than Ezekiel. From all we saw in Ezekiel 4, digging through walls, carrying baggage at night, and eating and drinking while trembling has now been added. Do you ever wonder what Ezekiel’s wife thought about all of this? We know his thoughts: I did just as I was commanded.

The prophet’s obedience is a challenge to my soul. Whatever he needed to do to proclaim the word of the Lord, he was willing to do. What about us? Are we willing to deliver His message in whatever way He asks us? Like Ezekiel, we’ve been asked to deliver God’s Word to those who are hostile and doing evil (Col 1:21). We are Christ’s witnesses (Acts 1:9) and living letters (2 Cor 3:3). He will strengthen us just as He did Ezekiel.

The need to deliver God’s Word is just as great in our day as it was in Ezekiel’s. While creation and conscience will leave everyone without excuse before the Lord, it takes a lot to get from a pinecone to propitiation without someone filling in the details. We have been given a message. We do not have to be cute or creative with it but faithful. How many will perish today because no one has delivered the message of Christ yet to their people group?

Will We Delight in the Greatest Word God Has

Spoken to Us—Christ?

Hebrews 1:2

As we consider God’s word, the prophets who deliver it, and our responses to it, we would be remiss if we did not consider Christ. The author of Hebrews informs us, “Long ago God spoke to the fathers by the prophets at different times and in different ways. In these last days, He has spoken to us by His Son” (Heb 1:1-2). Despite all of Ezekiel’s faithfulness, no one has ever done more to deliver the word of God than Christ, who is the Word made flesh (John 1:14). No one has ever given up more or paid a higher price to communicate God’s message than the One who left heaven ultimately to be nailed to a cross.

Jesus is God’s perfect prophet because He revealed God to us and spoke His word like no one else could ever do. He did not just deliver a message given to Him but was also the message’s source and fulfillment. Unlike the false prophets who were jackals in the ruins, Christ came to recover what had been ruined at the cost of His own body and blood.

As His ambassadors (2 Cor 5:20), we act in a prophetic way whenever we proclaim His gospel to a dying world. When we teach and admonish one another in all wisdom, it should be because the message of the Messiah dwells richly in us (Col 3:16). Like Paul, “We proclaim Him, warning and teaching everyone with all wisdom, so that we may present everyone mature in Christ” (Col 1:28). But even on our best days, we are imperfect. Fortunately, a day is coming when we will speak perfectly of God because we will know Him and He will dwell with us like never before. Until that day arrives, let us be diligent to present ourselves approved to God, workers who do not need to be ashamed but who correctly teach the word of truth (2 Tim 2:15).

Reflect and Discuss