Listen or read the following transcript as D. A. Carson speaks from Ezekiel 10–11 in this sermon from The Gospel Coalition Library
“I looked, and I saw the likeness of a throne of sapphire above the expanse that was over the heads of the cherubim. The Lord said to the man clothed in linen, ‘Go in among the wheels beneath the cherubim. Fill your hands with burning coals from among the cherubim and scatter them over the city.’ And as I watched, he went in.
Now the cherubim were standing on the South side of the temple when the man went in, and a cloud filled the inner court. Then the glory of the Lord rose from above the cherubim and moved to the threshold of the temple. The cloud filled the temple, and the court was full of the radiance of the glory of the Lord. The sound of the wings of the cherubim could be heard as far away as the outer court, like the voice of God Almighty when he speaks.
When the Lord commanded the man in linen, ‘Take fire from among the wheels, from among the cherubim,’ the man went in and stood beside a wheel. Then one of the cherubim reached out his hand to the fire that was among them. He took up some of it and put it into the hands of the man in linen, who took it and went out. (Under the wings of the cherubim could be seen what looked like the hands of a man.)
I looked, and I saw beside the cherubim four wheels, one beside each of the cherubim; the wheels sparkled like chrysolite. As for their appearance, the four of them looked alike; each was like a wheel intersecting a wheel. As they moved, they would go in any one of the four directions the cherubim faced; the wheels did not turn about as the cherubim went.
The cherubim went in whatever direction the head faced, without turning as they went. Their entire bodies, including their backs, their hands and their wings, were completely full of eyes, as were their four wheels. I heard the wheels being called ‘the whirling wheels.’ Each of the cherubim had four faces: One face was that of a cherub, the second the face of a human being, the third the face of a lion, and the fourth the face of an eagle.
Then the cherubim rose upward. These were the living creatures I had seen by the Kebar River. When the cherubim moved, the wheels beside them moved; and when the cherubim spread their wings to rise from the ground, the wheels did not leave their side. When the cherubim stood still, they also stood still; and when the cherubim rose, they rose with them, because the spirit of the living creatures was in them.
Then the glory of the Lord departed from over the threshold of the temple and stopped above the cherubim. While I watched, the cherubim spread their wings and rose from the ground, and as they went, the wheels went with them. They stopped at the entrance to the East gate of the Lord’s house, and the glory of the God of Israel was above them.
These were the living creatures I had seen beneath the God of Israel by the Kebar River, and I realized that they were cherubim. Each had four faces and four wings, and under their wings was what looked like the hands of a man. Their faces had the same appearance as those I had seen by the Kebar River. Each one went straight ahead.
Then the Spirit lifted me up and brought me to the gate of the house of the Lord that faces east. There at the entrance to the gate were twenty-five men, and I saw among them Jaazaniah son of Azzur and Pelatiah son of Benaiah, leaders of the people. The Lord said to me, ‘Son of man, these are the men who are plotting evil and giving wicked advice in this city.
They say, “Will it not soon be time to build houses? This city is a cooking pot, and we are the meat.” Therefore prophesy against them; prophesy, son of man.’ Then the Spirit of the Lord came upon me, and he told me to say: ‘This is what the Lord says: This is what you are saying, O house of Israel, but I know what is going through your mind. You have killed many people in this city and filled its streets with the dead.
Therefore this is what the Sovereign Lord says: The bodies you have thrown here are the meat and this city is the pot, but I will drive you out of it. You fear the sword, and the sword is what I will bring against you, declares the Sovereign Lord. I will drive you out of the city and hand you over to foreigners and inflict punishment on you.
You will fall by the sword, and I will execute judgment on you at the borders of Israel. Then you will know that I am the Lord. This city will not be a pot for you, nor will you be the meat in it; I will execute judgment on you at the borders of Israel. And you will know that I am the Lord, for you have not followed my decrees or kept my laws but have conformed to the standards of the nations around you.’
Now as I was prophesying, Pelatiah son of Benaiah died. Then I fell facedown and cried out in a loud voice, ‘Ah, Sovereign Lord! Will you completely destroy the remnant of Israel?’ The word of the Lord came to me: ‘Son of man, your brothers who are your blood relatives and the whole house of Israel are those of whom the people of Jerusalem have said, “They are far away from the Lord; this land was given to us as our possession.”
Therefore say: “This is what the Sovereign Lord says: Although I sent them far away among the nations and scattered them among the countries, yet for a little while I have been a sanctuary for them in the countries where they have gone.” Therefore say: “This is what the Sovereign Lord says: I will gather you from the nations and bring you back from the countries where you have been scattered, and I will give you back the land of Israel again.”
They will return to it and remove all its vile images and detestable idols. I will give them an undivided heart and put a new spirit in them; I will remove from them their heart of stone and give them a heart of flesh. Then they will follow my decrees and be careful to keep my laws. They will be my people, and I will be their God. But as for those whose hearts are devoted to their vile images and detestable idols, I will bring down on their own heads what they have done, declares the Sovereign Lord.’
Then the cherubim, with the wheels beside them, spread their wings, and the glory of the God of Israel was above them. The glory of the Lord went up from within the city and stopped above the mountain east of it. The Spirit lifted me up and brought me to the exiles in Babylonia in the vision given by the Spirit of God. Then the vision I had seen went up from me, and I told the exiles everything the Lord had shown me.”
This is the Word of the Lord.
Does God ever give up on people? Does he ever give up on nations? A great deal of contemporary thought would answer this question negatively. No, of course not! God doesn’t give up on people. God is the God of unconditional love, isn’t he? After all, witness Peter, “There is Jesus saying, ‘I have prayed for you that your faith fail not.’ ”
Witness the children of Israel again and again and again turning from him, and yet God goes after them, brings them back, restores the people to the land. Witness a passage like Romans 2, verse 4, “We may show contempt for the riches of his kindness, tolerance, and patience in his delay in returning, not recognizing that God’s kindness leads us toward repentance.”
That’s why he delays, which only goes to show he’s more forbearing and patient than we are. Of course God doesn’t give up on people. Indeed, this conclusion is sometimes pushed hard enough that hell itself is reinterpreted. If God doesn’t ever give up on anyone, then maybe he’ll keep going after the people in hell and keep going after them and keep going after them until they all repent and hell is empty.
All because of the axiom that God does not give up on people, but is this a fair reading of Scripture? What of counter-evidence? Witness the flood. Noah, his wife, three children, and their spouses got out, but one surely has to say that God rather gave up on the rest of them. Witness Sodom and Gomorrah. Lot and his family got out, but God rather gave up on the twin cities. Witness the mighty empires that have vanished with scarcely a trace.
Have you met any Assyrians recently? There’s a small community that still speaks ancient Akkadian, believe it or not, about 150. But not many. They’re not a world empire. Witness Judas Iscariot. Oh yes, grace was shown him, but Jesus says it would’ve been better for him it he had never been born. Does God give up on people? It is written, “Then they will go away to eternal punishment, but the righteous to eternal life.” Does God give up on people?
Part of the problem with Israel at this point in her history was that those in Jerusalem thought that whatever else God did, he wouldn’t give up on them: not Jerusalem, not the temple, not the covenant community. Oh maybe those who are already off in exile, second-class Jews, but not the faithful remnant left behind in Jerusalem. God couldn’t give up on those.
Yet here the glory of God withdraws from the temple, the city of Jerusalem, and the temple is erased off the face of the earth. What we must understand is that when God abandons people, whether individuals or nations, he does so not because he is impotent and frustrated, not because he is checkmated and vengeful, but because he is not only the God of grace but also the God of justice.
He is the God who finally says, “Thus far will you go and no farther.” He is the God who pronounces judgment: sometimes temporal, sometimes final. His judgments are always perfectly just. He is the God who gives up on people, or to use Paul’s language, “He gives people over to what they want to do.”
In this passage before us, Ezekiel, if you will recall, is now 14 months from his inaugural vision. He’s still in the midst of these extraordinary activities that he’s doing outside his mud hut. Lying no longer to the left, facing north, denouncing Israel, but to the right, facing south, denouncing Judah. The elders have come to him and solicited his opinion, perhaps about whether there was any possibility of returning to Jerusalem.
He goes into a vision. In this vision, he is transported to Jerusalem. We saw all of that last night. There we saw how God shows him how corrupt the worship of the old city really is. There God commands the executioners of the city to go forth and start killing from the temple outward all those who do not have on their foreheads the mark of God.
Now in these two chapters, what Ezekiel sees (Still in the vision. He’s not really in Jerusalem.) is the glory of God abandon the temple with two different kinds of consequences. We’ll run through what the text says. Then we’ll think through the application for us today.
1. The startling reality itself. The glory of God abandons the temple.
There are four elements that need some explanation if we are to understand chapter 10 aright.
A. Much of this vision of the mobile throne of God is a variation of the throne vision of chapter 1, which I spent some time explaining on Sunday.
I won’t go through all of the verses again. You recall how in that vision, these four creatures form a kind of hollow square. Each has four wings, and with two wings they reach out like this and they join the wingtips of the nearest angels to form a kind of hollow square.
Inside that square, there’s lightening and fire and coals and flashes and heat. Beside each of these four creatures are these four wheels, wheels intersecting like this so that they can’t tip over. These gigantic wheels don’t turn like that to steer, rather this whole contraption, this mobile throne goes the way a cursor does on a video screen: straight ahead or side-by-side, except this one goes in 3D.
Then we’re now told that the wheels, and even the creatures themselves, are covered with eyes, because in the symbolism of apocalyptic, you can mix your metaphors, and many eyes symbolize the fact that God’s throne sees everything. God knows everything. God’s knowledge is perfect. Then supported on the wingtips and perhaps on the heads of these creatures, there is this mighty expanse glistening like hoarfrost or ice made of chrysolite we’re told, topaz.
On that is the throne. Above that, well now the vision gets glorious on the one hand, but hazier and hazier. He saw the appearance of the likeness of the glory of the Lord. That’s what he saw by the banks of the Kebar River. When Ezekiel was first transported in this vision to the temple, he was plunked down by the North Gate, the gate that the king uses.
There there is this idol of jealousy, the idol that provokes God to jealousy because the king of all people who’s supposed to be defending the faith actually goes by his favorite pagan idol on the way to the temple! The North Gate was the gate the king used. He also sees the glory of the God of Israel over the temple, over the Most Holy Place.
We’ll come back to that symbolism in a moment. Now we are introduced to this mobile throne parked on the south side of the temple. As we work through the account, we discover that the glory of God then moves from the temple to the mobile throne. Then the whole mobile throne with the glory of God leaves the city. That’s the general framework of these two stories. Now we’ll plug in some of the pieces to see what they mean.
B. The four creatures who support the throne are now for the first time identified as cherubim. Before they were just four living creatures.
The single of cherubim is cherub. Cherubim is the plural. They crop up in verses 1, 2, 3, 5, 8, 9, 11, 14, 15 … again and again and again. Now for the first time they’re called cherubim.
Look at verse 15: “Then the cherubim rose upward. These were the living creatures I had seen by the Kebar River.” But he hadn’t called them that then. In fact, down at verse 20: “These were the living creatures I had seen beneath the God of Israel by the Kebar River, and I realized that they were cherubim.” What’s the point? Why does Ezekiel make such a big deal of this?
We’ll miss the point if we think that a cherub is a cute little godlet in a diaphanous nightie parked on a cloud playing some kind of guitar or some other instrument. In the Old Testament, the cherubim usually referred to angels, some high order of angels, charged especially with three roles: To be mighty protectors of what is holy, to be mighty agents of the living God, and to be models and leaders of worship. Let me give you an example of each of those incase you got lost.
First, the mighty protectors of what is holy. They first appear in that role in Genesis 3 outside the garden of Eden when Adam and Eve are expelled, guarding the way to the Tree of Life. They are carved on the walls of Solomon’s temple. Then there are two figures in the Most Holy Place of the tabernacle and the temple. In the middle of this cubicle room was the ark of the covenant. On that ark was where the high priest spread the blood every year on the Day of Atonement.
Over that ark of the covenant were two cherubim whose wings stretched out so that one touched the one side of the Most Holy Place, the other touched the other side of the Most Holy Place, and the wingtips touched just over the ark of the covenant where the blood was shed. In other words, it was a way of indicating symbolically that the mighty angels of God protect all that is holy, all that is set apart for God.
Second, mighty attendants, or agents, of the living God. There’s a whole group of references here. For example, Psalm 18:10: “The Lord mounted the cherubim and flew; he soared on the wings of the wind.” A bit like this mobile throne vision. They are mighty attendants.
For example, if you come to my home in Libertyville on a Saturday morning and knock on the door unannounced, I likely would open the door dressed in a flannel shirt and blue jeans. You introduce yourself, reminding me where we met in the past, and then I invite you in to share breakfast with us. You sit down and we have breakfast, and I find out you’re doing in Libertyville. We talk.
Supposing instead you decided to drop in on Bill Clinton on a Saturday morning. There’s no way you’re going to saunter up to the White House, ring the doorbell, and Bill will open it and say, “Who are you?” “Well, I’m one of your constituents, and I’d like to have a chat.” It just doesn’t work like that. The higher up you are on the pecking order the more you have flunkies and Secret Service agents and cherubim and things around you.
Thirdly, models and leaders of worship and adoration. In Exodus 25:18–20, they stand with heads bowed and their faces looking down in never ending adoration toward the mercy seat. That too is part of the symbolism of the Most Holy Place. In the vision of John that we’ll come to right at the end tonight, again the cherubim are the ones that orchestrate all of the praise of heaven.
Now the question is, “Why did Ezekiel not recognize these characters in the first place?” or at least, “Why doesn’t he talk about them that way?” They were always the four living creatures, and now he says, “I realize that they were the cherubim.” It’s possible he had never seen the temple carvings. He turned the full age of a priest while he was in exile.
He had already been out for quite a few years. The priests had their courses of duties. He maybe never even got in the temple himself. They were carved on the inside walls on the double doors, in the temple furnishings, in the Holy of Holies. He was brought up in a priestly family. He must’ve heard of them, but of course there weren’t photographs in those days.
Maybe he didn’t see them. But the significance of his realizing what they are now … Ahh, this is important. The throne supported by the cherubim provides a portrait of the Sovereign Lord pulling away with planned solemn dignity, but it’s still the Lord, the cherubim are still associated with him.
For even a man like Ezekiel, prophet though he was, he sees a vision of God on this mobile throne 700 miles away from Jerusalem and he has to think hard to realize that it’s the same God as the God who is covenantally promised to disclose himself in Jerusalem at the temple at the high feasts, on the Day of Atonement. There is where the blood is shed. That’s where God had covenanted to meet with his people. That’s where he would display himself in glory. But on the banks of the Kebar River in Babylon? Give me a break!
Therefore, even by the symbolism that God uses, the symbolism that is so much connected with the temple and with the presence of God, cherubim, God in this vision graciously transfers this whole thing to the mobile throne so that Ezekiel will be forced to realize, “This is the same God. Just because Jerusalem falls does not mean God is dead. I want you to trust me, not Jerusalem. I want you to trust me, not the temple rites. I want you to trust me, not the priestly sacrifices. I want you to trust me. It’s the same me! I’m the God of all the earth.”
So now we’re in a place then to think about the movements of this embodiment of glory. The man in the linen cloth introduced at the end of the last chapter that we looked at last night, he now approaches this mobile throne parked on the south side. There the Lord tells the man clothed in linen (chapter 10, verse 2), “Go in among the wheels beneath the cherubim. Fill your hands with burning coals from among the cherubim and scatter them over the city.”
That means that the destruction of the city by fire is finally God’s doing from God’s throne. It’s a way of saying that even though it might be mediated in about five and a half years’ time through Nebuchadnezzar and his troops, at the end of the day, the fire that destroys the city is not the result of the tinder box of Nebuchadnezzar but is the result of the throne of God.
This is God’s doing. We’re told in verse 6: “When the Lord commanded the man in linen, ‘Take fire from them,’ the man went in …” That means this is a huge contraption. You mustn’t think of this as a tiny little sort of mobile car about three inches tall. He heads into this whole contraption and before he gets inside, one of these mighty cherubim reaches behind him with his hands.
You recall in chapter 1 there is mention of hands, but no purpose for them. Now we know what the hands were for. The hands were to handle the hot coals. He reaches behind him into this hollow square and pulls out some hot coals and dumps them in the hands of the man in linen. Then he goes and scatters them over the whole city, which is all part of the symbolism of saying that the fire and destruction came from the throne of God, none less.
Now you follow the movement. When in the vision Ezekiel at first arrived in chapter 8, verse 4, there before him was the glory of God over the Most Holy Place. By chapter 9, verse 3, the glory is beginning to move to the threshold of the temple. That is now repeated, that action, it’s re-described in chapter 10, verse 3.
“Now the cherubim were standing on the South side of the temple …” That is, the cherubim of this mobile chariot. “… when the man went in, and a cloud filled the inner court. Then the glory of the Lord rose from above the cherubim …” I think now the cherubim of the Most Holy Place. “… and moved to the threshold of the temple. The cloud filled the temple, and the court was full of the radiance of the glory of the Lord. The sound of the wings of the cherubim could be heard as far away as the outer court …”
Then you move on. Chapter 10, verse 18: “Then the glory of the Lord departed from over the threshold of the temple and stopped above the cherubim.” Now he is on this throne, which is on the expanse, which is on the cherubim. “While I watched, the cherubim spread their wings …” That’s the other set of wings, the wings that they use for mobility. “… and rose from the ground, and as they went, the wheels went with them. They stopped at the entrance to the East gate of the Lord’s house, and the glory of the God of Israel was above them.”
Then by the time you get to chapter 11, verse 22, verse 23. “Then the cherubim, with the wheels beside them, spread their wings, and the glory of the God of Israel was above them. The glory of the Lord went up from within the city and stopped above the mountain east of it.” That’s the Mount of Olives, and that’s the end of the vision. “The Spirit lifted me up and brought me to the exiles in Babylon in the vision given by the Spirit of God.” That brings me to the whole point.
C. The departure of the glory of God.
The significance is traced back to the earliest part of Israel’s history. You can’t catch the significance of this without knowing something of Old Testament history. When the people of God were rescued from slavery in Egypt, the Egyptian army was so close behind that God intervened with a kind of pillar of smoke, a pillar of fire by night. Then in due course, God lead them through the desert.
When this pillar of fire moved, this pillar of smoke by day, this glorious representation of the very presence of God that had done so many spectacular things to free them from slavery, when this pillar moved, they moved. When it stayed still, they stayed still. In due course then, God gave Moses the plans for the tabernacle. The tabernacle was basically a big tent divided in two parts. One roughly rectangular, the other a square, in three dimensions a cube. The cube was the Most Holy Place.
When this tabernacle, this tent, was finally consecrated, the glory of God descended over this tent, over this Most Holy Place, and remained a visual symbol throughout all the years of wilderness wandering so that when the people knew it was time to move on, it was because God took off from the tent and began to move out. So they wrapped up the tent and took off. This happened again and again, a kind of constant visual reminder of the presence of God amongst them. There are some horrendous accounts in all of this that I have glossed over very quickly.
For example, in the account of the golden calf, when the people have been rescued in only a few weeks and already they’re back into their idolatry again, God threatens not to allow his glory to be in the midst of the people lest he break out and destroy them. Moses intervenes in prayer. “If you will not be amongst them, how will anyone know that they are your people and you are their God?” God promises in Exodus 33, “My presence will go with you and I will give you rest.” Eventually the people enter the Promised Land. Centuries go by.
Eventually under Solomon in the tenth century before Christ, the temple is built. There there is a mighty occasion just before Solomon prays his fantastic prayer of dedication. He prays, and just before he does so, the glory of God comes down on the Holy Place of the temple. We read in 1 Kings 8, “When the priest withdrew from the Holy Place, the cloud filled the temple of the Lord.
And the priests could not perform their service because of the cloud, for the glory of the Lord filled his temple. Then Solomon said, ‘The Lord has said that he would dwell in a dark cloud; I have indeed built a magnificent temple for you, a place for you to dwell forever.’ Then the king turned around and blessed the people and said, ‘Praise be to the Lord, the God of Israel, who with his own hand has fulfilled what he promised with his mouth to my father David.
For he said, “Since the day I brought my people Israel out of Egypt, I have not chosen a city in any tribe in Israel to have a temple built for my Name to be there, but I have chosen David to rule my people Israel.” Then he goes on to recount the history coming up to Jerusalem, the dedication of the temple.
Then he begins to pray, “And if at any time your people turn away from you in years to come, then if they turn again to the temple where you disclose yourself, then hear from heaven and forgive.” Along the line, Solomon also says, “But no temple is big enough to hold you. The heaven and the heavens of heaven aren’t big enough to hold you.”
Thoughtful Jews didn’t think that God was somehow restricted to a temple, small enough to encapsulate a little piece of masonry, but the King of all the earth, the Sovereign Creator and Maker had chosen graciously to manifest himself in this visible form in the temple in Jerusalem. So now he is abandoning the temple after having been in the temple for four centuries, after having been in the tabernacle before that for about three and a half centuries. What is it saying to the people of Israel? How could they read it? That brings us to the second main point.
2. There are some negative consequences of God’s abandonment of the temple.
Some are intrinsic, of course. As God abandons the temple, so it is a mark of judgment, and the temple in Jerusalem will be destroyed, but two additional consequences are spelled out.
The first is the destruction of the city by fire. The Lord abandoning the temple is thus dramatically tied in the vision to the final destruction of the city by fire. It’s a bit like the famous entrance to hell pictured in Dante’s Inferno. “Abandon hope, all you who enter here.” So with the departure of God from the city, with the departure of the glory, it was saying to Jerusalem, in effect, “Abandon hope, all you who live here.”
Also in chapter 11, verses 1–13, there is specific judgment on the leaders. Ezekiel, we’re told, is carried by the Spirit in his vision to the temple gate facing east, which was the traditional place for public assembly and for business to be conducted and the like. There he sees 25 men. These aren’t the 25 sun worshippers of an earlier chapter, chapter 8:16.
These are princes of the people, we’re told, leaders of Israel’s nobility. Included amongst them are Jaazaniah son of Azzur. This isn’t the same Jaazaniah we’ve run across before of a noble, faithful clan. We don’t know anything about him, and Pelatiah, about whom we don’t know anything about either, although his name, as we’ll see, recurs.
The charge of the Lord against them is summarized in verse 2. If you are reading a NIV, which is what I’m reading, you’ll notice there’s a footnote. In ancient Hebrew texts, there was no punctuation, so you had to tell from the context whether it was a statement or a question. The NIV has it as a question. The NIV footnote has it as a statement. I think the footnote is right.
Just take off the question mark and you’ll be right. They are charged with saying, “This is not the time to build houses.” (Verse 3) What’s so bad about that? God had said through Jeremiah, “Do not rebel against Nebuchadnezzar. Your sentence is to be submissive to the superpower. Don’t rebel.” But these people in the name of religion are saying,
“This isn’t the time to build houses. This isn’t the time to be secure. This is the time to arm yourself to the teeth. This is the time to start a rebellion. God won’t allow the temple to be destroyed. God will preserve his city.” That’s what Jeremiah’s facing in Jerusalem. Meanwhile, Ezekiel, out in the boonies of Babylonia, is facing the same kind of attitude amongst the exiles who want the people to rebel so that Babylon will be overthrown.
They are saying, “This is not the time to build houses. This city is a cooking pot, and we are the meat.” That is, because in the ancient world strong-walled cities felt relatively secure, they were saying, in effect, “We’re safe inside this iron pot. We’re the good-value stuff in the middle of the pot, and this city is the wall. There’s no way that Babylon can get at us. We can win. God’s on our side.”
What that means is that they haven’t been listening to Jeremiah, they haven’t been listening to Ezekiel, and they haven’t been listening to the word of the Lord. That’s what that means. “Therefore prophecy against them; prophecy son of man.” (Verse 4) In particular, he’s to say two things to them as he prophecies. First, verses 5–7, he’s to say that the real meat, the real people of value, are the innocent victims of their corruption.
“Then the Spirit of the Lord came upon me, and he told me to say: ‘This is what the Lord says: This is what you are saying, O house of Israel, but I know what is going through your mind. You have killed many people in this city and filled its streets with the dead. Therefore this is what the Sovereign Lord says: The bodies you have thrown there are the meat and this city is the pot …”
In other words, far from being a safe sanctuary, this city has become a city of the dead, a city of victims, a city of the corrosive idolatry, a city of the violence that we have been looking at over the previous weeks. It’s almost as if Ezekiel is saying, “The only good Jerusalemite is a dead Jerusalemite.”
“Moreover,” he says, in the following verses, “those who think that they are the meat and safe in the pot will be expelled from the city and die.” Verse 7: “… I will drive you out of it. You fear the sword, and the sword is what I will bring against you, declares the Sovereign Lord. I will drive you out of the city and hand you over to foreigners and inflict punishment on you. You will fall by the sword, and I will execute judgment on you at the borders of Israel.”
Do you remember what happened to the puppet king Zedekiah? Taken to the borders of Israel at Riblah, forced to witness the execution of all of his sons, then his own eyes were popped out. “Then you will know that I am the Lord. This city will not be a pot for you, nor will you be the meat in it; I will execute judgment on you at the borders of Israel. And you will know that I am the Lord, for you have not followed my decrees or kept my laws but have conformed to the standards of the nations around you.”
At this point in Ezekiel’s vision, Pelatiah, the chap we’ve just been introduced to, dies (verse 13), a kind of foretaste of what was to come. Almost certainly Pelatiah did die at the very moment Ezekiel 700 miles away was having his vision so that weeks later when the news came through that Pelatiah of Jerusalem had died, people in Babylonia would say, “When did he die?” It was on such and such a date.
“That was the date that Ezekiel said that he died,” which would have the effect of enhancing Ezekiel’s authority as a prophet. For Ezekiel’s part, the vision once again frightens him and he cries out, verse 13b, “Ah, Sovereign Lord! Will you completely destroy the remnant of Israel?” Listen to what God says by way of response, for we come now to some positive consequences of God’s abandonment of the temple, the last main point.
3. Some positive consequences of God’s abandonment of the temple.
You’ve been very patient these last few nights. I know the opening chapters of Ezekiel are immensely depressing. From chapter 33 on there’s nothing but hope and glory and promise. Now for the first time, intermingled with the judgment you begin to get these notes of a vision of hope in the future. We need to understand what the text says, and then we’ll apply it to ourselves.
A. Far from God cutting off the remnant as Ezekiel thought, God was preserving the remnant, but in exile.
Do you see what Ezekiel was saying all along, what he was presupposing all along? That the people in exile were already in a desperate situation. The remnant is back there in Jerusalem. That’s the hope of the future connected with the temple.
God says, “No, that’s not the way it is. Jerusalem is going to be wiped out. The real remnant is you guys off in Babylon.” That’s a complete reversal of everything that Ezekiel thinks. But listen to the text. Verses 14 and 15: “The word of the Lord came to me: ‘Son of man, your brothers who are your blood relatives and the whole house of Israel …” Your people out there in Babylon, all the people dispersed.
“They are the very people that are those of whom the people of Jerusalem have said, ‘They are far away from the Lord; this land was given to us as our possession.’ ” Do you hear that? At the very moment that the exiles are interceding with God, “God have mercy on the people in Jerusalem. Don’t destroy the city. Will you wipe out the remnant? Will you not have mercy? How can you possibly let the temple die?”
Meanwhile, the people back in Jerusalem are saying, “Well, all those Jews out there, they got their deserts, of course. They’re obviously the second-class Jews. They’re obviously the people who are under the judgment of God.” In other words, all these people that Ezekiel represents and who are interceding for Jerusalem, they’re the ones who are being wiped out by the very people that he is interceding for.
Verse 16: “Therefore say: ‘This is what the Sovereign Lord says: Although I sent them far away among the nations and scattered them among the countries, yet for a little while I have been a sanctuary for them in the countries where they have gone.’ ” Do you hear that? More important than the sanctuary of masonry in Jerusalem is the very presence of God. “I have been a sanctuary.”
Never ever, ever confuse the symbolism and the rites. Never confuse the buildings and the services. Never confuse the priestly classes with God himself. Even the exiles, even Ezekiel is so wrapped up in the temple that he has failed to recognize that God himself has been a sanctuary to the remnant in exile.
Verse 17: “Therefore say: ‘This is what the Sovereign Lord says: I will gather you back from the nations and bring you back from the countries where you have been scattered, and I will give you back the land of Israel again.’ ” Now for the first time, Ezekiel begins to understand that the remnant of the people of God is not the Jerusalem cloud. They are consigned to judgment. But the people to whom he ministers and others like them on the banks of the Kebar River building mud huts living in exile. But there’s better news yet.
B. God saw things differently than Ezekiel.
By his judicial rejection he had the effect of demolishing hope in the means of God’s grace and redirecting the attention toward God himself, but now God is going to do something else. God promises the transformation brought about by a new covenant.
Verse 19: “I will give them an undivided heart and put a new spirit in them; I will remove from them their heart of stone and give them a heart of flesh. Then they will follow my decrees and be careful to keep my laws. They will be my people, and I will be their God. But as for those whose hearts are devoted to their vile images and detestable idols, I will bring down on their own heads what they have done.”
This small paragraph is a foretaste of Ezekiel 36, which in this series we’re not going to get to. One of the great passages on new covenant promise. You find other similar passages in Jeremiah 31 and in Joel 2, great passages that look forward to the coming of a new covenant. Let me take just a moment or two in the Jeremiah one so that you see the power of it with language similar to what is going on here. Jeremiah 31, begin at verse 29. God is now talking to Jeremiah and he says, “In those days people will no longer say, ‘The fathers have eaten sour grapes, and the children’s teeth are set on edge.’ ”
That was a proverb in ancient Israel. It was a proverb that was used because the old covenant was a tribal representative system of religion. God manifested himself to prophets and priests and kings especially. Then they taught the people. They mediated the presence of God to everybody else. Not everybody could be a priest. You couldn’t volunteer to be clergy. That was assigned only to Levites, Levites from the house of Aaron.
Not everybody could be assigned to be king. That had to come from the Davidic line. Those people were endowed with special enduement from the Holy Spirit of God. They were assigned the task of blessing the people, instructing the people, leading the people in the ways of God. When they sinned or went astray, they led the whole people astray.
The judgment came down on all the people. “The fathers have eaten sour grapes, and the children’s teeth are set on edge.” It was a system of representative tribal religious structure. That’s the way the old covenant was built. But God says, “In those days the people will no longer say, ‘The fathers have eaten sour grapes, and the children’s teeth are set on edge.’ Instead, everyone will die for his own sins; whoever eats sour grapes—his own teeth will be set on edge.”
Then in case we haven’t figured out what all this means, grapes and teeth and all that, “ ‘The time is coming,’ declares the Lord, ‘when I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel and with the house of Judah. It will not be like the covenant I made with their forefathers when I took them by the hand to lead them out of Egypt, because they broke my covenant, though I was a husband to them,’ declares the Lord.
‘This is the covenant I will make with the house of Israel after that time,’ declares the Lord.” Here’s the difference now. Here’s the fundamental difference. “ ‘I will put my law in their minds and write it on their hearts. I will be their God, and they will be my people. No longer will a man teach his neighbor, or a man his brother, saying, “Know the Lord,” because they will all know me, from the least of them to the greatest,’ declares the Lord. ‘For I will forgive their wickedness and will remember their sins no more.’ ”
Now understand … This is not saying that under the new covenant there will not be anybody who’s teaching. Of course there’s teaching. In the new covenant, there are teachers. Ask Paul. Ask Jesus. Ask the disciples. The point is that the teachers of the old covenant were mediating teachers. The king mediated between God and the people. The priest mediated between God and the people. The prophets mediated between God and the people. They had special enduement of the Spirit. They were mediators.
Under the new covenant, it will be different. Under the old covenant, the fathers eat sour grapes; the children’s teeth are set on edge. Under the new covenant, everyone in the covenant will know me from the least to the greatest. There won’t be any mediating teachers anymore. I’m a teacher in the church of God, yes, but not because I have some special enduement that you can’t have. I’m not a mediating teacher. I don’t have an inside track.
That is precisely why Peter can insist for instance on the universality of the priesthood of believers. In Paul’s metaphor, I’m part of the body. Think of me as a stomach. It takes away all my dignity. I’m nothing but a stomach. I take in food and I get the digestion going for the rest of the body.
That’s what I do. That’s what a teacher does. It’s not because I’m intrinsically a step up. I’m not a father in the church. I’m not someone with a mediating voice. I don’t have an inside track to God. No one does, because in the new covenant terms everyone is endued by the Spirit of God and has the law of God written on the heart.
So on the night he was betrayed, the Lord Jesus took bread and he broke it and he said, “This bread is my body of the new covenant,” according to Luke and according to Paul. “Do this in remembrance of me.” So you see, one track of the great redemption that Christ has achieved for us is turned on the removal of our guilt because of Christ’s death. In terms of Jeremiah it says here, “I will forgive their wickedness and I will remember their sins no more.”
But the other track that emerges out of the triumph of the cross is the gift of the Holy Spirit in regeneration so that we become new creatures and the law of God is written on our hearts. That’s why biblical Christianity can never be merely a creedal system. As important as justification by faith is, you can believe in justification by faith as an intellectual system and still not be born again, still not be transformed.
The ultimate transformation awaits the new heaven and the new earth. I know that. But still, but still, with different degrees of speed of growth, with different degrees of conformity to Christ, nevertheless a genuine Christian by definition has the law of God written on his heart. He’s a member of the new covenant. That’s the way the text reads.
Living as we do this side of the coming of the Messiah, we know where these promises then meet their ultimate fulfillment. In the large sweep of things, Ezekiel stands at a certain place along the track of redemptive history, and one of the big messages that is given to Ezekiel, in effect, is, “Despite the most discouraging circumstances you can imagine, God is still in control, and his way will triumph. The remnant will be saved and God himself will be glorified. Don’t live in fear.”
That vision recurs in a variety of ways in the New Testament. In Revelation 4 and 5, there’s a great apocalyptic vision of God seated on his throne in chapter 4. Then in chapter 5, we’re told that this God, who is seated on this throne, has a scroll in his right hand. This scroll, it turns out, has all of God’s purposes for judgment and blessing for the whole universe in his right hand.
That’s what’s in that scroll. In the symbolism of that vision, the scroll is sealed with seven seals. The only way that God’s purposes for judgment and blessing will be effected for the whole universe will be if somebody comes along and slits the seals of that scroll. This God is presented in chapter 4 as terrifying, surrounded by cherubim (there they are again) and many, many other angels and separated from John the seer by thunder and lightening.
It’s a terrifying vision. Then a mighty angel steps forth and says, “Who is worthy to approach this God and take the scroll and open the seals?” In terms of the vision it does not mean, “Who can get a sneaky peak inside to figure out what’s coming down?” but “Who can bring to pass all of God’s purposes for judgment and blessing?”
We’re told no one was found who is worthy. No one among the angels. No one on earth. No one under the earth in the abodes of the dead. No one. So John wept and wept because no one could open the seals. In the symbolism of that vision, what that meant was, therefore, God’s purposes would be frustrated. Therefore, God’s purposes would not come to pass.
John was living at a time when the church was about to face massive persecution. Now he learns that God’s purposes won’t come to pass? As he weeps, he’s finally touched on the shoulder by an elder who said, “Stop your crying, John. Look, the lion of the tribe of Judah, he has prevailed to open the scroll. So I looked,” John said, “and I saw a lamb.”
You’re not to understand two animals, a lion and parked next to it a lamb. The point is you can mix your metaphors in apocalyptic. The lion is the lamb. Because the one whom we serve, the one who brought to pass all of God’s purposes for judgment and blessing is simultaneously the royal king of David.
He’s the lion from the tribe of Judah and he’s the lamb. In fact, in the vision he’s said to be a slaughtered lamb, a lamb who has borne our curse, yet he’s a lamb with seven horns. Horns in apocalyptic regularly symbolize kingly rule. He has the perfection of kingly rule. He’s the maximum of self-sacrifice and immolation and he’s the maximum of kingly authority.
He’s the royal king and the conquering lamb. He has prevailed to open the scrolls. Then all of heaven unleashes with a cacophony of praise because all of God’s purposes will be accomplished. From then on, just about every time God is mentioned throughout the whole rest of the book of Revelation, we read of him who sits on the throne and the lamb, of him who sits on the throne and the lamb, him who sits on the throne and the lamb.
For already that chapter 5 says that lamb came from the throne. Until we come to the last two chapters of the book of Revelation. There the symbolism of the temple comes back. Already in Jesus’ ministry, he claimed to be the real temple. “Destroy this body and in three days I will raise it up again.” Here was another temple being destroyed.
There was that temple in the old covenant being destroyed and it meant the curse of God on the people. Here was another temple being destroyed and it meant the curse of God on the temple, Jesus himself. Now in the final vision of the new heaven and the new earth the New Jerusalem is built like a cube, like the Most Holy Place.
John starts listing the things that he can’t find there. “There was no light in that city, for the Lord God himself and the lamb are its light. I saw no temple in that city, for the Lord God himself and the lamb are the temple.” The temple was always a point of mediation between God and us. There’s no more mediation. It’s gone. We are now forever in the presence of the Lord God Almighty and the lamb, and there is never again any mediation, ever.
Brothers and sisters in Christ, this was not all foreseen by Ezekiel. God kept unveiling things line by line, line by line, line by line until in the fullness of time this great heritage became ours. We may be living in troubled times. I’m neither a prophet nor the son of a prophet. I don’t want to predict what’s going to happen, but it won’t surprise me if in years to come Christian witness and ministry, however fruitful it may be, may become more difficult.
It’s not impossible. I have been to many parts of the world where the expectancy of Christian leaders is that they will face persecution. That could well return here. It could easily. But don’t be discouraged, not ever, for God is on his throne. The lamb breaks open the seals. In ways that may be surprising, as they were surprising to Ezekiel, God will bring in the new heaven and the new earth.
In this rebel world where we fear the light,
All our gods must be domesticated, tame,
But the sovereign Lord who sees through the night
Is not threatened by pretensions built on shame.
In majestic splendor, God rules throughout our days.
He is holy in his deeds and wise in all his ways.
Mighty Babylon and the Third Reich too,
Join the dust of empires that have passed away,
Full of strutting pride mouthing boasts untrue,
They lie crushed before the God whose word holds sway.
Surely all the nations are dust upon the scales.
So with whom will you compare this God whose will prevails?
Not the patriarchs, not the priestly clans,
Not the wise in all their learning glimpse the cross.
Not the royal court, not the zealot bands,
Thought that God would buy back rebels at such cost.
Who has comprehended the wisdom of the Lord?
For the grandeur of his plans our God must be adored.
Who will take the scroll in the Sovereign’s hand,
Break the seals and bring God’s purposes to pass?
While we wait in fear at what God has planned,
From the throne, the lion roars and death has passed.
Sing to Christ the conqueror a new song full of praise,
For the triumph of the lamb means God will have his way.
Let us pray.
Great, glorious, good God, we worship you. Your plans are infinitely beyond all of our most imaginative expectations. Here in the fullness of time, you have disclosed them to us in Christ. Forgive us, Lord God, when our grasp of salvation is so small, so merely personal that we cannot see the sweep of your power and glory. At the same time, blessed God, we thank you that you who rule nations and bring your purposes to pass deign to ask of us the love of our poor hearts.
We thank you for the mercies that sent the Lord Jesus to the cross, the just dying for the unjust that we might be forgiven. We thank you for the blessed gift of the Spirit, by whom we have found conviction of sins, by whom also we have been regenerated, given the Holy Spirit as the down payment of the promised inheritance that is still to be ours when Christ comes.
So with the church in every generation, instead of focusing merely on our todays, we too cry, “Even so, come, Lord Jesus.” Glorify yourself, we beseech you. Glorify yourself in us. For Jesus’ sake, amen.
