The Berean

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"These [in Berea] were more fair-minded than those in Thessalonica, in that they received the word with all readiness, and searched the Scriptures daily to find out whether these things were so." - Acts 17:11
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Ezekiel 9:1-8

(1) And he cried in mine ears with a loud voice, saying, Draw near, ye that have charge of the city, and every man [with] his destroying weapon in his hand. (2) And behold, six men came from the way of the upper gate, which is turned toward the north, and every man [with] his slaughter weapon in his hand; and in the midst of them, one man clothed with linen, with a writer's ink-horn by his side; and they went in, and stood beside the brazen altar. (3) And the glory of the God of Israel was gone up from the cherub, whereupon it was, to the threshold of the house; and he called to the man clothed with linen, who had the writer's ink-horn by his side; (4) and Jehovah said unto him, Go through the midst of the city, through the midst of Jerusalem, and set a mark upon the foreheads of the men that sigh and that cry for all the abominations that are done in the midst thereof. (5) And to the others he said in my hearing, Go after him through the city, and smite: let not your eye spare, neither have pity. (6) Slay utterly the old man, the young man, and the maiden, and little children, and women; but come not near any man upon whom is the mark; and begin at my sanctuary. Then they began at the elders who were before the house. (7) And he said unto them, Defile the house, and fill the courts with the slain: go forth. And they went forth, and smote in the city. (8) And it came to pass, while they were smiting, and I was left, that I fell upon my face, and cried, and said, Ah, Lord Jehovah! wilt thou destroy all the remnant of Israel in thy pouring out of thy fury upon Jerusalem?


Ezekiel's blood must have run cold when he heard God's judgment, which appears in the last verse of the previous chapter: "Therefore I also will act in fury. My eye will not spare nor will I have pity; and though they cry in My ears with a loud voice, I will not hear them."

Continuing the vision in Ezekiel 9, it relates a partial execution of that judgment. It is important to note here that the prophet witnesses God actually leaving His portable throne (described in detail in Ezekiel 1). At this point, "the glory of the God of Israel" actually demounts from it and removes, as verse 3 records, "to the threshold of the temple." So He has taken His place in the Temple, but not on the Mercy Seat in the Holy of Holies. He is, in effect, in the gate, a place of judgment.

And this is a momentous judgment. In verses 5-6, God commands some of the angels, "Go . . . through the city and kill; do not let your eye spare, nor have pity. Utterly slay old and young men, maidens and little children and women." This is a summary judgment on the entire populace of Jerusalem!

When Ezekiel heard this command, how did he respond? Certainly not in a self-righteous, I-told-you-so manner. When he is alone with God, the angels having left on their mission, he falls on his face in apparent anguish, crying out: "Ah, Lord GOD! Will You destroy all the remnant of Israel in pouring out Your fury on Jerusalem?" (verse 8).

This is a vital question. Ezekiel is concerned about the people and about the scope of God's judgment. Like Lot, he lived in his own kind of Sodom, in his own type of Gomorrah, and he felt anguish over the sin that he saw and heard and over its consequences—as it were, tormented by what was happening around him. Ezekiel was emotionally and spiritually tormented or tortured, not by what the pagans were doing around him, but by what the leaders and the people of Israel were doing in his immediate environment—and even in the Temple! Their wickedness and what they were about to suffer for it are what tormented this righteous man. In vision, he must have witnessed a terrible slaughter, and the trauma and shock of that vision affected him most acutely. Indeed, a prophet of God has no pretty job.

— Charles Whitaker

To learn more, see:
The Torment of the Godly (Part One)



 

Topics:

Ezekiel' s Prophecies

Ezekiel's Torment

Fury on Jerusalem

God's Judgment

Jerusalem as Sodom and Egypt

Prophet, Function of

Remnant of Israel




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