Jeffrey Heine: We are continuing our study, in the prophet Ezekiel. And today, we are gonna be in chapters thirty five and thirty six. Portions of those, two chapters are printed in your worship guide. I was told that if, if if I could because I requested all of 35, all of 36, I was told that if we did that, it would need to be size three font. And some of you would wonder like, what's the difference?
Isn't it always in size three font? It it's usually pretty tiny. It would it would it would be even worse. And so there are some different portions that are there for you. If you do have access to a bible, either a pew bible or or, you brought one with you or you've got one on your phone, I would recommend that because we're gonna be in some spots that aren't necessarily, in the worship guide.
But we're gonna be in Ezekiel chapters thirty five and thirty six this morning. To ground our time, to begin our time together, I'd actually like to read from the conclusion towards the end of chapter 36 as we, turn our attention to God's word together. So hear these words and let us listen carefully from Ezekiel chapter 36 beginning in verse 33. And let us listen carefully for this is God's word for us. 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.
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. And they will say, this land was a that was desolate has become like the garden of Eden and the waste and the desolate and the ruined cities are now fortified and inhabited. 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. This is the word of the Lord. Let's pray together. Our father on this Palm Sunday, we remember Jesus' triumphal entry into the city of Jerusalem. And in like manner, we ask that your holy spirit would enter our midst to grant us wisdom and revelation and the knowledge of Christ.
That the eyes of our hearts would be enlightened and that we would know what the hope is to which you have called us. So spirit, would you take the words of these scriptures, make them to us the word of Christ that out of your wisdom and revelation, we would follow the way of Jesus all the more with a foundation of faith built upon your truth and hearts that trust and adore and obey you. So in this holy time and through these simple words, would you speak Lord for your servants are listening. In the name of the father, the son, and the holy spirit. Amen.
In 02/2016, construction started in Lower Manhattan on the first all glass residential skyscraper named 1 Seaport. It was to be 60 stories tall in the heart of what was commonly known as Billionaire's Row. And today, nine years later, standing 670 feet tall with 200,000 square feet of space, the massive tower sits empty. The issue? The tower was built in an area of Manhattan that was marshland.
It was already known that it was marshland with bedrock a 55 feet below ground level. The engineers knew this going into the project. So early in construction, they were weighing the different options for how to strengthen the foundation of that area. And in an effort to save $6,000,000, that's million with an m, In an effort to save $6,000,000, they went with a cheaper method to strengthen the foundation. But in time, it was clear that it had not worked.
The building was leaning, they found, three inches to one side. And since they were already this far into construction, the next idea was to pour more concrete on the other side of the slant and and try to even it out, but that just resulted in the tower according to legal filings to look like a banana. So it sits there, uninhabited, leaning, empty, and useless. The prophets of the Old Testament are not easy to read, not as literature nor as spiritual direction. And if we pay attention, if we really pay attention to what they are saying, they push us around.
They agitate us in both mind and spirit. Every few chapters reading Isaiah or Jeremiah, I find myself asking, do they really mean this? Is this to be read as a metaphor? Is it literal? Is righteousness this important?
Is sin that bad? And is judgment this harsh? And in those ways, the prophets, Isaiah, Jeremiah, and like Ezekiel, they are to the people of God like zealous engineers, checking and rechecking the grounding of our faith, unwilling to let us build on a weak foundation. The foundation of who we understand God to be, what he is doing, and why. Their words are not always comfortable or comforting.
They poke and they prod below the ground level of our hearts. Their words dig below the surface, and they often say things that we don't really wanna hear. But as the prophets who have been entrusted with the oracles of God, their words help establish and correct the foundations of our faith, both our theology, what we think about God and what we believe about him. In their invasive and confrontational work, the prophets fortify the integrity of our trust in God. And that is what Ezekiel seeks to do in our passage today.
In chapters thirty five and thirty six, Ezekiel will continue to confront and cause us to examine our foundational beliefs regarding who God is and what he is doing and why. And Ezekiel will do this through two connected prophecies. Two prophecies that will go out to two mountains, The Mountain Of Seir in chapter 35 and the Mountain Of Israel in chapter 36. They're kind of twin prophecies. Chapters thirty five and thirty six are like two brothers, but less like James and John or Peter and Andrew and more like Jacob and Esau.
Two brothers in turmoil, in conflict. And that's fitting because as as some of you may recall, the other name for Jacob and his descendants is Israel. And the name for the descendants of Esau, it's the Edomites. They reside in the place of Edom, which is where Mount Seir is. The primary work of Ezekiel both in his words and his actions is to inform the people of Israel that they have refused and rebelled against God and that their present exile is due to their faithlessness.
And throughout the past 34 chapters, Ezekiel has done this work. He's called out Israel for their covenant breaking, for their injustices, from their idolatry, and we've seen judgment as a central theme throughout. Judgment that's not just for the people of God, but also for the superpower Babylon and all the nations who oppressed and violate God's people. So chapters 12 through 24 emphasize God's righteous judgment on Israel. Then after 24 from 25 through 32, it was God's righteous judgment of the nations.
And then last week, we saw a turn that happens in chapter 34. There is hope still for the people of God. The prophet promises restoration, a new king that will one day come to reign, and the people will not suffer in captivity forever. In this new section of hopefulness, Ezekiel receives these two twin prophecies to the two mountains. Ezekiel is to declare the word of the Lord to the Mountains Of Seir and the mountains of Israel.
And though we are removed by a considerable amount of time, twenty six hundred years or so from the scenes that are happening in '35 and '36, both both of these prophecies will examine and fortify our foundational understandings of who God is and what he is doing and why. So let's get to it. Chapter 35. The first prophecy to that first mountain, a prophecy against the Mount Of Seir. Let's look together at verse one.
The word of the Lord came to me. Son of man, set your face against Mount Seir and prophesy against it. And say to it, thus says the Lord God. Behold, I am against you Mount Seir and I will stretch out my hand against you and I will make you a desolation and a waste. I will lay your city's waste, and you shall become a desolation, and you shall know that I am the Lord.
Skip to verse 12. I have heard all the revilings that you uttered against the mountains of Israel saying, they are laid desolate. They are given us to devour. And you magnified yourself against me with your mouth and multiplied your words against me. I heard it.
Thus says the Lord God. While the whole earth rejoices, I will make you desolate. As you rejoiced over the inheritance of the house of Israel because it was desolate, so I will deal with you. You shall be desolate, Mount Seir, and all Edom, all of it. Then they will know that I am the Lord.
God is speaking against the people of Edom because they gave Israel over to the power of the sword. While Israel was oppressed and destroyed, rejoicing at their suffering. They saw their suffering and thought, good. They their land is now vacant. It's given to us to devour it, for us to plunder Israel.
It was good news in their minds. So they delighted in the plight and destruction of Israel, and Yahweh says that they participated in the suffering of God's people. And for that, God declares that they will be judged. He says through Ezekiel, I will make Mount Seir a waste and a desolation. This is the holy judgment of God on an unholy people.
But we need to recognize that this judgment on the people Edom was not because the people of Israel were so innocent and righteous. God isn't punishing Edom because Israel was innocent. We've read for 34 chapters that the people of God were not living godly lives. They gave up worshiping Yahweh to worship idols instead. They forsook the commands of God.
They forgot obedience to him. They oppressed others who were less powerful than themselves. And even the temple, the temple, the place where Yahweh would dwell with his people, it was being used for worshiping false idols and gods. God is not bringing judgment against Edom because Israel is so faithful or righteous. They are not innocent.
They aren't even sorry. So why? Why is God defending Israel if they are still enemies with him? Still rebelling against him? Why would God vindicate them, defend them, redeem them?
Well, thankfully for us, as we seek to understand who God is at the very foundations, Yahweh states for us why. He's going to act on behalf of Israel and judge her oppressors because, and he says this multiple times, he says it four times in verse four, nine, 12, and 15. The basis for God's divine action in vindicating and redeeming Israel is this, then they will know that I am the Lord. The basis for the prophetic word against Mount Seir and the coming judgment, the basis for Yahweh promising that he himself will deal with the oppressors of his people and make them a desolate place is ultimately to achieve the aim that the nations would know that he is Yahweh, the Lord. And when we see the Lord, all caps like that, it's meaning the personal name that God revealed to Moses that he is Yahweh, the Lord.
And God acts in judgment. And this judgment is itself a revelation of who he is. And through the display of his power and his vindication of the unrighteous treatment of his people, the Lord says he will make himself known to the nations. Now let's remember in our study through Ezekiel that it was God's sovereign hand that led Israel into judgment. It led them into exile through the unrighteous acts of the nations.
It was through the acts of Edom, through the acts of Babylon that God judged Israel's rebellion. But these nations, Edom, Babylon, they are no less guilty for their actions. Yahweh permitted their actions to bring judgment on a rebellious Israel, and these nations are accountable for their wickedness. So Yahweh will judge them accordingly, not merely for the sake of his justice, but for the sake of the nations knowing that the god of Israel is Yahweh the lord, the one true only god. That is foundational for our understanding of who god is.
He is righteous in his judgments. After Ezekiel receives this prophecy against the Mountain Of Seir, God gives him another oracle. This time, for the mountains of Israel. So let's consider this second mountain, second prophecy together in chapter 36. You may remember a few years ago when we studied the life of David and how David longed to build a temple for the Lord in his old age.
But it would be his son, Solomon, would spend billions, all of that gold, all of the treasury to construct the temple in Jerusalem. And it would stand for four hundred years as a central place where the people of God would worship Yahweh. But in Ezekiel's time, that glorious temple had become a place of idols and false worship. Ezekiel received word five years into his exile in Babylon. He's been there for five years and word finally makes its way that Jerusalem has fallen.
The city is a wasteland. The temple which was before, he knew that it was defiled by idols but now it's completely destroyed. The lush hills and the valleys of the promised land are desolate. The people are either dead or slaves or refugees on the run. Jerusalem, the epicenter of the people of Yahweh, it lies in ruin.
And it's to those ruins, the smoldering rubble, to those desolate mountains the Lord now speaks through the prophet Ezekiel declaring in chapter 36 verse one. And you son of man prophesy to the mountains of Israel and say, oh mountains of Israel, hear the word of the Lord. Verse six. Therefore prophesy concerning the land of Israel and say to the mountains and to the hills and to the ravines and to the valleys, thus says the Lord God. Behold, I have spoken in my jealous wrath because you have suffered the reproach of the nations.
Therefore, thus says the Lord God, I swear that the nations that are all around you shall themselves suffer reproach. But you, oh mountains of Israel, shall shoot forth your branches and yield your fruit for my people Israel for they will soon come home. For behold, I am for you, and I will turn to you, and you shall be tilled and sown, and I will multiply people on you, the whole house of Israel, all of it. The cities shall be inhabited and the waste places rebuilt, and I will multiply on you man and beast, and they shall multiply and be fruitful, And I will cause you to be inhabited as in your former times and will do more good to you than ever before. Then you will know that I am the Lord.
I shall let people walk on you, even my people Israel, and they shall possess you. You shall be their inheritance, and you shall no longer bereave them of children. The Lord says to Ezekiel, tell the mountains of Israel that they will not remain desolate forever. Tell the hills and the ravines and the valleys, a restoration will come for my people will come home. Fruitfulness will return to the land that is now in waste.
But how can this be? In verse nine, the Lord declares, for behold, I am for you and I will turn to you and you shall be tilled and sown. The basis for this hopeful declaration, the basis for new life to come to the mountains of death is that Yahweh is for them. His righteousness is displayed in His mercy. God did not set forward a growth plan for Israel, a development plan.
He didn't give them a checklist of items to get in order so He could discern if they were ready for restoration. And he isn't responding to any desperate cries of repentance or pleas for forgiveness. No, we see God committing himself at this point to a rebellious covenant breaking people living in exile in a ruin of their own making. He's promising them more good than they've ever seen and it's clear that they don't deserve it. So how can this be?
This is foundational to who we understand God to be. How can this be? The mercy to the mountains of Israel, what bears the same objective as his judgment against the mountains of Seir. We read in verse 11, we see it again. Then you will know that I am the Lord.
In his judgment and in his mercy, the objective is the same, that the people will know that Yahweh alone is God. This is foundational to our understanding of who God is and our trust in him. The righteousness of God displayed in his mercy and displayed in his judgment reveal to us who he is. He is righteous in all he decrees, and he is supreme in all he does. These can be hard truths to receive, but they are essential to our foundations of the faith.
And we might be tempted to save the $6,000,000 and not go through the hassle of a sure and solid foundation, but without the truth of who God is as he has revealed himself to be. In time, our faith will be found unstable and faulty, a leaning tower without the truth of who God is as he has revealed himself to be. Whatever we construct will be deserving of deconstruction. Whatever we build up will deserve to be torn down because it will be empty and useless and uninhabitable. We must build on the foundation of who God has revealed himself to be.
He is sovereign And in his judgment and in his mercy, the objective is the same, that the people will know that he is the Lord. And he gives Ezekiel more to proclaim to the mountains of Israel. Let's look at verse 22. Therefore, say to the house of Israel, thus says the lord god, it is not for your sake, oh 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. 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. Again, Ezekiel gives us critical foundational truths about who God is and what he is doing and why. Here, the Lord speaks to the why. The why of his actions of mercy toward a rebellious people.
He states the motivation behind his sovereign will to act toward his people in grace and redemption saying, it is not for your sake, oh house of Israel, that I am about to act, but for the sake of my holy name. Listen carefully and closely to what is being said here. God is saying that he isn't acting in mercy and redemption on the account of his people. It is not do them. It is not because of what they offer.
It is not because of what they've accomplished. It's not because of their potential in the future, and it's not because he just adores them so much. It isn't for their sake that he is acting and rescuing and redeeming them. Let the uneasiness of that statement rest with you. Because the truth, this truth that pushes against some of the most common beliefs that we often hold regarding how we think God must be.
What is being said here by God through Ezekiel to us about himself is bedrock for us. And we need this truth because too often, we can become accustomed to the mushy marshland. Here's what I mean by that. Often at the core of our thinking about God and his acts of salvation, we often believe that the bedrock must be God's love for us. We read those true words of Jesus in John three sixteen, for God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten son that whosoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life.
And we make God's love for us the deepest bedrock and we neglect the other true things that God has said about Himself. I'm not saying that God's love is not central. I'm saying that there is a layer even deeper, even deeper in the bedrock that makes his love for us so much better than we might have ever realized. So what is God saying through Ezekiel? What is this deeper bedrock of foundational truth?
It is not for your sake, o house of Israel, that I am about to act, but for the sake of my holy name. This this God's commitment to his holy name. This is a calibrating truth that the Lord declares through Ezekiel. God's first commitment is not his love for us. His first commitment is not to us.
His first bedrock commitment is to Himself. God's supreme zeal is for Himself, not us. Not you, not me. His zeal is for himself, his own name, and his glory, which means that the foundation of his love for you is his commitment to himself. Why might that sound strange or unfamiliar to us?
Well, for one, it's because there is no one else like the lord. No one. The lord does not give his glory to another. So throughout our lives, we have only encountered bullies and charlatans who have desired glory and desired our praise, but they have never deserved it. You have only encountered power hungry, oppressive, unworthy con artists.
You've only met with those who desire or even demand your allegiance, but they have never been owed it because they don't deserve it. And that is why, partly, why these words can seem so strange to us. Because it is the Lord alone that we encounter who is worthy of our total devotion. Our triune God alone is the only one whose love and his commitment to himself, it does not make him selfish but glorious. And it makes his perfect love for us all the more trustworthy and unshakable.
There's only one who deserves your total life devotion. He is your creator, redeemer, and sustainer. He is father, son, and holy spirit. You were made to bow your knee to only one. You surrender only to one.
You are eternally humbled only to one. And only from him only from him are you loved in an irrevocable fury of steadfast love. He's the only one who is worthy, and he knows it. And in his kindness, he helps us know it. Through revelation, he causes us to know it too.
Yahweh acts in judgment and in mercy that you may know that he alone is the Lord. And in this knowledge, you experience the endless goodness of his love for you because the foundation of his love for you is his commitment to himself. Out of his holy commitment to himself is his sovereign wisdom and will that he set his endless love on you because you are not his first commitment. Because his first commitment is to himself, that means that his love for you, it will not increase with your faithfulness nor diminish with your failures. Because you are not at the center, you don't have the power to diminish his love or his faithfulness to you.
He is faithful to you because he is faithful to himself. How tragic would it be if our faith had us at the center? How tragic would our theology be if we were at the center? How tragic would our worship be if we were at the center? Because it would show, it would display and reveal that we do not know that he is the Lord.
It is the unavoidable reality of all realities that one day everyone will know either through his mercy or through his judgment that he alone is the Lord. So let me say it again. It is supremely good news that God's commitment to us is born out of his supreme commitment to himself. Because that means his commitment is not subject to our lovability. His commitment to you is not subject to your goodness, your potential, your success, your failure, or even your ability to understand these things.
His commitment to you is born out of his supreme commitment to himself, and he will never forsake himself, which means he will never forsake you. His love thereby is trustworthy. It is steadfast and sure. We can believe his love for us because of his commitment to himself, his own sake. Everything else in time will deconstruct as it should because it's marshland.
It might make us feel good or special for a moment, but it is not enough. It is not worthy of building our lives upon it. The foundation of his love for you is his commitment to himself. This bedrock foundation is strong enough that you can build your life and your faith upon it. For the sake of his own holy name, Yahweh promises to act in salvation.
And here are some of the actions that he declares through Ezekiel that he will accomplish. Let's look together at verse 24. I will take you from the nations and gather you from all the countries and bring you into your own land. I will sprinkle clean water on you, and you shall be clean from all your uncleanness. And from all your idols, I will cleanse you.
And I will give you a new heart, and I will put a new spirit within you. And I will remove the heart of stone from your flesh and give you a heart of flesh. And I will put my spirit within you. And I will cause you to walk in my statutes and be careful to obey my rules. You shall dwell in the land that I gave to your fathers, and you shall be my people.
I will be your God, and I will deliver you from all uncleanness. I will summon the grain and make it abundant and lay no famine upon you. 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. Hear those refrains of I will. 11 times in eight verses, I will.
This is covenant language, the new covenant. It it bears with it God's cleansing of his sin stained people. Who can wash us clean? I will do it, says the Lord. The cleansing act will be God's doing.
It is by his hand that we are cleansed of all unrighteousness. It is the work of God alone to wash us clean because we do not have the strength or the skill or the means or even enough of the desire to cleanse ourselves. But the hand of the Lord is strong enough, skilled enough. The hand of the Lord through the crushing of the sun provides the means and the will to wash us clean from all unrighteousness. And just as he will cleanse his people, he will put new hearts in them, hearts that are not hardened like stone but flesh, alive to beat and long to obey.
And along with this cleansing in the new heart that beats for righteousness, God says, I will put my spirit within you. One hundred and thirty four years ago yesterday, the great British preacher Charles Spurgeon preached an entire sermon on just that sentence, I will put my spirit within you. And he said this, quote, when the spirit comes, he infuses a new life and that new life is a fountain of holiness. The new nature cannot sin because it's born of God. This life produces good fruit and good fruit only.
The holy spirit is the life of holiness. At the same time, the coming of the holy spirit into the soul, it gives a mortal stab to the power of sin. The old man is not absolutely dead, but it is crucified with Christ. It is under a death sentence. But as a man nailed to a cross might linger long, but yet he cannot live, so the power of evil dies hard, but die it must, end quote.
The spirit is promised to the people of God. Ezekiel speaks of this wonder of God dwelling in us, that the creator of all things seen and unseen, who himself was never created, would place inside us redeemed creatures, part of his divine being to reside in us, that the spirit of living God would dwell in us. It is more than we've ever imagined it to be. And just as unfathomable as it is that we could be washed perfectly, eternally, irrevocably clean, that the one who hovered over the waters at creation, who searches the very depths of the godhead, who raised the sun from the grave would dwell in us, the people of god. We should be like Job who cover our mouths when confronted with such greatness and wonder of god.
Israel, Ezekiel confronts this this bedrock foundation of our faith in who God is, what he is doing, and why. But one thing that he does not explain to us is how. In these prophecies of of the coming new covenant, Ezekiel does not tell us how these things will be accomplished. He says who God is and what he is doing and why, but how. How are we washed?
How are we redeemed? How will we receive the spirit? And it is here that the the gospel news of Jesus Christ explodes onto the scene in brilliant technicolor. How are we cleansed? How are we washed whiter than snow, pure without blemish or spot, with the filthiness of our rebellion, with our selfishness and self centeredness, our faithlessness, our unfaithfulness to God's love, how will what was scarlet with sin be made wider than snow?
It will be through the crimson blood of Jesus. That is how these great acts of Yahweh will be accomplished. It is through the son. Every I will that Ezekiel is prophesying will be accomplished through Jesus. Jesus is the yes to every promise of the father.
That is how this new covenant will be established in the blood of Jesus poured out for the forgiveness of many. And after we are cleansed by his blood, after we are washed and purified, Yahweh says, then then you will look at your rebellion with new eyes, with redeemed eyes. Let's look at one last passage, verse 31. You will. Note note the the we just went through all the I wills.
This is the first time we step in and participate. Right? This is the first time we've got something for us to do. 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. It is not for your sake that I will act, declares the Lord.
Let that be known to you. Be ashamed and confounded for your ways, oh house of Israel. The Lord repeats, it is not on your account that I'm going to act. Let it be known to you. Understand this.
And then he calls us to view our rebellion against him with redeemed eyes. The best way that I can define sin for us in this passage, our sin is the resistance, our refusal, our rebellion against God's love for us. It's our turning away from his love. It's not just doing bad things, it's refusing his love. And he's saying with with purified eyes, with redeemed eyes, look back on this rebellion.
Look back at it. Be ashamed and confounded by your ways. Again, allow the prophet to confront you. Hear what he says and pay close attention to the sequence. It's in light of the promised divine acts of cleansing, restoring, rescuing, and redeeming.
Redeeming us out of our exile, not to Babylon, but to sin and to death. And now in the this place, standing in the place of belovedness and the place of restoration, we can see truly for the first time the folly and foolishness of our sin. How foolish it was to ever turn from God's love. And through these redeemed and beloved eyes, we should be confounded by our foolish disobedience, our foolish resistance of God's love. It's this is not a shame that leads to despair.
It's an honest looking. It's a beholding with redeemed eyes, the foolishness of refusing and turning away from the love of God. Seeing our sin rightly is part of knowing and learning and understanding that our God is the Lord. But thanks be to God that his acts are not dependent upon us, but rather his commitment to himself. His acts of salvation are not based on our wisdom or our foolishness, our righteousness or our failure, but he acts on the account of his own name.
And because of his commitment to his name, he acts out of the wealth of his mercy and his limitless love for you. A love made manifest that we can see with our own eyes in our savior Jesus Christ. So to him be the glory in the church throughout all generations forever and ever. Amen. Let's go to the Lord together.
Oh Lord, by your spirit, would you help us to consider the very foundations of our trust and faith in you? May we be sure and certain that we have not placed ourselves at the center, but that we yield recognizing your goodness and greatness and graciousness. Oh, spirit, give us eyes to behold Jesus this morning. And in our beholding, may we cast off the foolishness of our sin and run headlong into his gracious embrace knowing that you will never forsake us and you will never leave us because of your great and holy name. We pray these things in the name of the father, the son, and the spirit.
Amen.