Starting next week, Faith Church’s 4 Year Bible Reading plan will journey through the Old Testament Book of Ezekiel. I’d be the first to say that this is one of the more difficult books to read and understand in all the Bible. I realize I recently said the same thing about the Book of Jeremiah, but upon further reflection, I think Ezekiel, though shorter and with a clearer structure, is even more challenging than Jeremiah. This is because its content can best be described as…strange. That’s a word we probably feel applies to all the prophetic books of the Bible, but there is a sense in which Ezekiel is the strangest of all. It begins with a vision in chapter 1 with creatures that can only be described as strange. Other visions involved the temple (chapters 8-11), a valley of dry bones being put back to life (37:1-14), and a new temple when God restores His people (chapters 40-48). Throughout the book you find all sorts of strange acts that God calls Ezekiel to do like lying on his side and cutting his hair and beard (3:22-5:3), carrying baggage and eating bread with ”quaking” (12:1-20), and other acts involving swords (21:18-24) and sticks (37:15-28). Ezekiel’s teaching also includes some strange parables (see chapters 15, 16, 17, 19, 23) that feature language that is pretty graphic and explicit at times. The fact that many rabbis did not allow young men to read the book until the age of 30 confirms that I am not the only one who thinks the book is a challenge to read and understand!
The strangeness of this book may keep many readers from exploring it, either scaring them off from even starting to read it or causing them to stop reading out of confusion and frustration. If you do so, however, you will miss out on a treasure trove of truths, including the background of many teachings that will appear in the New Testament, since there are at least 65 direct or indirect quotations of this book in the New Testament (as noted in Raymond Dillard and Tremper Longman, An Introduction to the Old Testament, 326). For example, Jesus as the Good Shepherd draws upon the discussion in Ezekiel 34:11-24. The vast majority of these (48 of the 65 noted by Dillard/Longman) are in Revelation, so you could make the case that you can’t really understand the Book of Revelation (which many people want to understand!) without reading Ezekiel. Here are a few of the most prominent connections in Revelation: the creatures in heaven in Revelation 4-5 remind us of what we see in Ezekiel, the reference to Gog and Magog in Revelation 20:8 alludes back to Ezekiel 38, and the images of the temple and the river of life in Revelation 21-22 goes back to Ezekiel 40-48.
To help and encourage you to journey through this strange book, I want to give a brief overview of the man behind the book, the message of the book, and the meaning of it for us today.
The Man
The book offers us a number of details about who Ezekiel was and when he ministered. He was a priest (1:3). Whereas most priests would minister in the temple, Ezekiel did not – in part because he could not. Priests normally began their service at the age of 30, but at this point, Ezekiel (along with many others) found himself away from the temple in exile in Babylon as part of the second wave of exiles that Babylon took in 597 BC. Instead of being called into the temple service, Ezekiel received a call to be a prophet in 593 BC (which is probably when he turned 30; see 1:1). Dates are given for a number of his messages in the book, with the last date being 571 BC, so his ministry was a little over 20 years. He thus ministered prior to and after the destruction of the temple in 586 BC. His ministry overlapped with that of Jeremiah but differed from Jeremiah’s in that Ezekiel ministered among those in exile while Jeremiah had been among those who were still in Jerusalem. We don’t know if he ever had children, but we do know he had a wife as we read about her death in Ezekiel 24:15-27. He was not allowed to mourn her death in order to give a sign to the people about how God would cause the temple (a “Delight” to God) to be destroyed and the people would be shocked and unable to mourn. He was a man who truly lived out his message, as God called for him to do many other things in order to teach God’s people (see 3:22-5:3; 12:1-20; 21:18-24; 37:15-28). His ministry also included various visions, words of judgment to other nations, and parabolic teachings.
The Message
Scholars have noted that the Book of Ezekiel essentially consists of three parts. Chapters 1-24 discuss the impending destruction to come upon Jerusalem. Chapters 25-32 then turn to deal with the judgment that will come on other nations (Ammon, Moab, Edom, Philistia, Tyre, Sidon, and Egypt). The last part is chapter 33-48, which describes the future blessing and restoration of God’s people. These major sections show that the book features the same major themes as you see in other prophets, the judgment to come on God’s people (and the whole world) for their sin, but also God’s promise that there will be blessing and renewal in the future days because of His power and promises. The event that causes the shift from the call for repentance because of coming judgment to the call for hope because of the promised renewal is the fall of Jerusalem, is something that chapter 24 prepares for and chapter 33 describes.
While echoing the same overarching themes found in the other prophets, there are some distinctive elements in Ezekiel’s message that would have been particularly important for the people living in exile to know. God shows that because the people had profaned His temple and not worshiped God, God’s glory had left the temple and judgment would come. This was important to know, as it means the exile was not a sign that God was defeated, but that the people were being judged. Not only that, but it also means that God went with them into exile. God took their sin seriously and brought judgment, and He will also bring judgment to all the nations. The day will come when God will rebuild His people like He brought the dry bones to life. This will happen under the perfect ruler and through giving people new hearts, pointing forward to Jesus and the regenerating work of the Holy Spirit. Not only will the glory of the Lord return, but God will dwell in an even greater way than before; the new and better temple shows a new and greater reality when God regathers and transforms His people, pointing to the ultimate hope we see further described in Revelation.
The Meaning for Today
Ezkekiel’s message was especially helpful to those who were in exile in Babylon, but it continues to speak to us today as we also are God’s people who are living in exile as citizens of heaven. In a world and age in which sin continues, this book reminds us of God’s holiness and how sin is an affront to Him, calling us to holy living. We see God’s sovereignty and power on display, both in judging sin and in saving and transforming people. This gives us hope in overcoming our own sin and in the fact that God will defeat sin. We can see God’s faithfulness in sending the Good Shepherd for us – in spite of our sin and failing. And we can know that God is with us now even while we wait to be in His presence forever.
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