September 3, 2025 • 27 mins
Ever wonder how long God's patience lasts? Ezekiel chapters 20-21 reveals that pivotal moment when divine patience reached its limit with ancient Israel.
The imagery is striking—God drawing His sword against His own people after centuries of disobedience. "Behold, I am against you," He declares, words that stand in stark contrast to His earlier promises to be with them. This reversal marks one of the most significant turning points in biblical history.
We explore the vivid metaphors God uses to communicate His impending judgment: a consuming fire in the forests of Negev and a polished sword "flashing like lightning." These aren't just poetic figures but prophecies that found literal fulfillment. The once-lush landscape described in Joshua's time as "flowing with milk and honey" transformed into the arid desert we see today—physical evidence of divine judgment that has endured for millennia.
Most significantly, this judgment permanently altered Israel's national identity. The Babylonian captivity ended the line of Jewish kings, and even after their return from exile, they would never again enjoy true independence under their own monarch. The scepter departed, fulfilling ancient prophecies and setting the stage for the future Messiah—the only one who can legitimately claim David's throne.
This episode challenges popular notions of God's character. Yes, He is loving, merciful, and patient, but these passages reveal He will not tolerate persistent rebellion forever. When judgment finally comes, it arrives with the speed of lightning, comprehensive and inescapable.
What does this mean for us today? God's patience remains vast but not endless. His love doesn't negate His justice. This sobering reality calls us to examine our own lives and recognize that, sooner or later, all accounts must be settled with the divine King.
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May God Bless you!! - Glenn and Steve
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:20):
If you were with us last time, on Reasoning Through
the Bible, we were teachingthrough Ezekiel, chapter 20, and
God, through the prophetEzekiel, has been giving a
strong condemnation of the cityof Jerusalem and the Jewish
people and the nation Because oftheir disobedience over many
(00:40):
centuries.
God has finally decided.
Now is the time he will actOver these several chapters.
He's quite graphic and quiteblunt what he's going to do.
At the end of last time, if youwere with us, god made a series
of directives to the Jewishpeople.
He was speaking through theprophet Ezekiel to the remnant
(01:03):
that was taken to Babylon.
God said in chapter 20, I willbe king over you said a series
of I wills.
I will bring you out of thelands that you've been scattered
.
I will bring you into thewilderness.
I will enter into judgment withyou face to face.
(01:24):
I will make you pass under therod.
I will bring you into the bondof the covenant we talked about
that.
He said he would take part ofthem and make a covenant with
them and the other part would becast out.
The one with the new covenantwould go back into the land.
He says that quite specifically.
(01:46):
We talked about how the bringingback to the land did not fit
during the intertestamentalperiod, simply because he says
in verse 40 that the whole houseof Israel, all of them, will
serve me in the land and thatnever happened in between the
Babylonian captivity and thetime of Christ.
In fact, it never reallyhappened at all in all of Jewish
(02:09):
history so far.
When he says there twice foremphasis, all of them will serve
me, this has to be a futuretime we also talked about.
It can't be symbolic of thechurch simply because it
mentions so many times that heis taking them back to the
specific land, the land that Iswore to give to your fathers.
(02:31):
Says that in verse 42.
We'll pick up today in verse 45.
Steve, can you read there tothe end of?
Speaker 2 (02:40):
chapter 20?
Now the word of the Lord cameto me saying Son of man, set
your face toward Taman and speakout against the south and
prophesy against the forest landof the Negev and say to the
forest of the Negev hear theword of the Lord.
Thus says the Lord God, behold,I'm about to kindle a fire in
(03:04):
you and it will consume everygreen tree in you as well as
every dry tree.
The blazing flame will not bequenched and the whole surface,
from south to north, will beburned by it.
All flesh will see that I, theLord, have kindled it.
It shall not be quenched.
(03:24):
Then I said Ah, lord, god, theyare saying of me.
Is he not just speakingparables?
Speaker 1 (03:32):
Now this section.
He speaks of the land of thesouth, the Negev, and he talks
of it having a forest there thatGod is going to burn down.
I would take it that the Lordthere is both literal and
figurative, that he is having afigurative or a spiritual
burning of the people because ofthe disobedience.
(03:55):
He's going to take away all ofthe lushness that is in the
nation.
Every green tree, it says.
I also take it to be quiteliteral simply because Babylon
was going to come in and destroythe whole region.
What's really interesting isthat there's again a forest
there.
(04:15):
If we remember all the way backto the time of Joshua and the
time of Moses, moses sent in the10 spies to the land.
It was very lush, very green,very productive.
It's described as a landflowing with milk and honey, so
productive that what the 10spies brought back one cluster
(04:38):
of grapes that was so big it hadto be put on a pole that's
carried by two men.
So this was a very lush, verygreen, very productive part of
the land.
Yet if you go there today, it'svery dry, almost a desert.
So what happened?
Well, what happened was thisjudgment right here in Ezekiel,
(04:59):
chapter 20.
God sent in his judgment.
He burned the entire land in aspiritual sense and a literal
sense.
We find it today to be very,very desolate.
It's a very dry place.
In the millennium, we'll findthat there's going to be a river
flowing out of Jerusalem andwe'll return the land to a very
(05:22):
lush, productive land.
We're going to see that beforewe get out of Ezekiel, when we
get to Ezekiel, chapter 47.
Steve, that just seems to me tobe a very amazing series of
prophecies that have beenliterally fulfilled.
Speaker 2 (05:36):
It is, and it's also, I think, a depiction that it's
not just Jerusalem that's goingto be destroyed, it is going to
be Judah proper.
That southern nation of Judahincludes Jerusalem.
The capital is going to becompletely done away with, and
this is the final part of God'sdiscipline on that nation.
(05:58):
Judah will cease to exist as anation itself.
Now, when they do come backfrom exile in Babylon, the area
there is referred to as Judahonce again, or Judea, but it's
never its independent nation ofitself.
This is depicting the lastthroes of the nation of Judah.
Speaker 1 (06:19):
That brings us to Ezekiel, chapter 21.
This is a continuation.
We still have another two orthree chapters of God condemning
the land, the people from Judah, specifically Jerusalem.
He's over and over again givingwhy he's condemning them and
(06:41):
what he's going to do to condemnthem Again.
Very graphic, very descriptivelanguage here In chapter 21,
he's going to talk about reallyfour things God is going to draw
his sword, he's going tosharpen and polish his sword and
then he's going to use hissword against two people.
He's going to use it againstJerusalem and he's going to use
(07:02):
it against Ammon.
With that, he's going to use itagainst Jerusalem and he's
going to use it against Ammon.
With that, we'll go ahead andpick up the first five verses of
Ezekiel, chapter 21.
It says this and say to theland of Israel Thus says the
(07:23):
Lord Behold, I am against youand I will draw my sword out of
its sheath and cut off from youthe righteous and the wicked.
Because I will cut off from youthe righteous and the wicked.
Therefore, my sword will goforth from its sheath against
(07:43):
all flesh, from south to north.
Thus all flesh will know that I, the Lord, have drawn my sword
out of its sheath.
It will not return to itssheath again, steve.
What lesson can we draw fromthose?
Speaker 2 (07:53):
verses.
Well, I guess the basic one isthat this is another depiction
of God reaffirming that this isgoing to be the end of the
people there livingindependently in the land.
He's going to use Babylon as anation of judgment against the
(08:14):
Israelites.
Another factor is that he doesrefer to the land of Israel,
even though it's going to begoing up against the nation of
Judah Once again.
We've talked about this beforethat there's some theories out
there that the northern kingdomof Israel, once it was taken off
(08:34):
by the Assyrians, those 10tribes, really were assimilated
and they ceased to existaltogether and all that was left
were the two southern tribes ofthe Judah, and that the modern
day Jews that we have today areall really from the two southern
tribes.
But we see, and God is donedealing with the northern tribes
(08:56):
altogether, but we see herethat God is using the term
Israel.
Even though he's talking aboutthe southern tribe of Judah,
he's still talking about thenation of Israel itself.
They're still all underjudgment, even though it's down
to the southern nation of Judah.
Speaker 1 (09:13):
Again, god is fed up with the disobedience and the
sin.
He says here that he's going todraw his sword.
It reminds me of back in Joshua, chapter 5,.
Yahweh appears to Joshua in theform of a man with a drawn
sword and Joshua goes up to himand says are you for us or for
(09:36):
our enemies?
He basically says I didn't comehere to take sides, I came to
take over because he has attimes drawn his sword and used
it.
Here God says I'm drawing mysword and I'm going to use it,
and we need to remember that Godwill at times use his sword.
(09:57):
Steve, look at the end of verse3.
Who does God say he's going toremove?
Speaker 2 (10:02):
from the land.
Well, he specifically says he'sgoing to remove the righteous
and the wicked from the land.
But let's go to the first partof 3, even talk about it.
He says the land of Israel.
So, as I just depicted a whileago, this is talking about all
of Israel and, glenn, I thinkit's interesting too there that
he also says behold, I amagainst you.
That's a complete opposite asto when they first went into the
(10:26):
land, he told Joshua and allthe others I will be with you.
Here it is at the very end ofthe arc of them going in to take
over the land of Israel.
At the very beginning, he waswith them.
Now, in its final stages, he'ssaying I am against you.
Speaker 1 (10:46):
He does say he's against them.
And what's interesting here ishe says he's against both the
righteous and the wicked.
Well, we take that to be theself-righteous and the wicked
simply because, if you were withus in earlier chapters, they
went out trying to identifythose that would actually follow
and put their faith in the Lordand they found none.
(11:09):
They've already been weighedand evaluated and found wanting.
When he says here, therighteous and the wicked, this
is the people who think they arerighteous, the people who hold
themselves to be righteous butreally are not.
Simply because remember thehistory of the Jewish nation.
It had been many centuries wherehe had given them laws.
(11:32):
He had given them theconsequences of violating the
laws.
He had sent many prophets togive God's word to them on how
they were falling short and theywere all ignored or killed or
otherwise found to be useless bythe people.
The people insisted on prayingbefore statues, worshiping idols
(11:53):
and chasing after othercountries.
In verse 3, god says he's goingto draw his sword and use it in
the land of Israel.
I am against you simply becauseof all the centuries of
disobedience, god is veryserious about punishing the
disobedience of the people inthe land.
(12:15):
Let's read the next few versesand we'll find out what God does
next.
Steve, can you start at verse 6and go down to verse 13?
Speaker 2 (12:22):
As for you, son of man, groan with breaking heart
and bitter grief, groan in theirsight.
And when they say to you, whydo you groan?
You shall say Because of thenews that is coming, and every
heart will melt, all hands willbe feeble, every spirit will
(12:43):
faint and all knees will be weakas water.
Behold, it comes and it willhappen, declares the Lord.
God, again, the word of theLord came to me saying, son of
man, prophesy and say Thus saysthe Lord say A sword, a sword
sharpened and also polished.
(13:03):
Sharpened to make a slaughter,polished to flash like lightning
.
Or shall we rejoice the rod ofmy son despising every tree?
It is given to be polished,that it may be handled.
The sword is sharpened andpolished to give it into the
hand of the slayer.
Cry out and wail, son of man,for it is against my people, it
(13:27):
is against all the officials ofIsrael.
They are delivered over to thesword with my people.
Therefore, strike your thigh,for there is a message to the
prophet Ezekiel, and tells himto go out and give this message
(13:51):
to the Jewish people.
Speaker 1 (13:53):
Verse 6, he tells him to go and groan with a broken
heart.
And when people ask him, whyare you groaning?
He is to say because of the badnews that's coming.
And of course this bad news wasliterally fulfilled.
The false prophets had saidgood news was coming, but the
(14:13):
true God says no bad news iscoming.
Look at such descriptivelanguage here.
Every heart will melt, allhands will be feeble, every
spirit will faint and all kneeswill be as weak as water.
People think that we're verystrong, very self-sufficient,
(14:33):
but when God actually shows up,we become as weak as water.
Repeatedly in the scriptures.
People think they're okay, butwhen God or any heavenly being
actually shows up, people becomeweak, fall down or hide their
eyes.
When the angel showed up toDaniel, it made him sick for
(14:56):
days.
That's what I find interestinghere.
The other thing I find look atverse 10.
It says he has pulled out hissword and now he has sharpened
it and polished it.
What does it say, steve?
For what reason is hesharpening and polishing his
sword?
Speaker 2 (15:15):
He said he has sharpened it and polished it in
order to give it into the handof the slayer.
So God has prepared this swordof judgment against Israel.
Speaker 1 (15:26):
He has sharpened and polished his sword for a
slaughter.
He will cause this slaughter bygiving God's sword to the
slayer.
Of course, the slayer meansBabylon.
Babylon is going to be God'sinstrument to go and punish the
people of Israel for theirdisobedience.
(15:46):
The Lord is being extremelyclear about his intentions.
He's going to use a weapon toslaughter the disobedient people
of Jerusalem.
God will end the pagan idolworship once and for all.
God is very clear, very blunt,very powerful.
Steve, what can we concludeabout the nature of God from
(16:08):
this?
Speaker 2 (16:09):
As we've mentioned many times before, he will only
put up with so much.
He only has patience for solong, and I almost said that he
only has mercy for so long.
But really he is a merciful God.
He does have mercy, he also hasgrace, but he's not going to be
(16:31):
mocked.
He's described Israel as beingobstinate and stubborn people.
He's described them as beingharlots going after other gods.
He has also said I've turnedaway from you, I'm turning my
back on you.
Now he is fulfilling this finaljudgment on them and if you
remember, as we've also talkedabout going back to Deuteronomy,
(16:54):
he said if you follow myordinances and statutes, you'll
have blessings and you'll beable to live long in the land,
but if you don't follow myordinances and statutes, then
there'll be curses upon you andyou won't live long in the land.
Well, this is it.
They're no longer going to beable to live in the land anymore
, at least for this 70-yearperiod.
(17:17):
But it's never really the same.
Even after they come back fromthe Babylonian exile not all of
them come back and they're stillunder occupation, and they
remain occupation even up untilthe time whenever Jesus comes,
the Messiah.
This is a watershed moment forthe nation of Israel and for the
(17:40):
land that God had promised tothem.
He said enough is enough, andhe's going to follow through
with the things that he said ifthey didn't follow him.
Speaker 1 (17:49):
This section says exactly that.
You said a watershed moment.
It's a great turning point inthe history of the Jewish people
.
Right here is where God saysthings are going to change.
Right now.
I will do these things.
If you look at the end of verse10, the Hebrew there in our
English translation is a littleawkward, but what he's actually
(18:11):
trying to say is that some ofthe other English translations
make it a little more clear whatGod is saying.
Should we rejoice in thescepter of my son?
Well, no.
The sword, the sword ofslaughter, despises every such
wooden symbols of authority.
That's what he's saying is thatthe sword of slaughter that
(18:32):
he's going to give to Babylon togo in and destroy things are
not going to be lost,intimidated by, they're not
going to recognize any symbolsof authority, such as a scepter
of a king or a ruler.
God is merely saying hispunishment is not going to stop
merely because of the symbol ofkingly authority in Israel.
(18:53):
Look at verse 13.
It says it mentions a testingand a rod.
A rod here is the scepter, asymbol of authority.
After the Babylonian captivity,the time of the Jewish kings was
over.
That's why we say it's awatershed moment.
It's a changing of the entirenation.
You remember when Israel cameout of Egypt, god set them up
(19:18):
under judges and said just lookto me and I will guide you.
Well, they didn't have faith inthat.
They wanted kings.
Most of the Jewish kings werebad.
There was a few good ones witha long series of bad ones.
So here, after all thesecenturies of bad kings, god says
it's over.
(19:39):
I'm giving my sword.
It's drawn, it's polished, it'ssharpened.
I'm giving it to Babylon.
They're going to come in.
They're not going to recognizeany authority of any kingly
scepters.
The line of the kings are goingto stop here.
After they came back from theBabylonian captivity, the kings
were not there, they were gone.
(20:00):
If we look at the genealogiesat the beginning of the Gospels,
the only one that could standup today and claim to be of the
kingly line is the Lord JesusChrist.
That's the message here.
Such a great lesson that'sburied back here in these
wonderful sections of Ezekiel.
Speaker 2 (20:19):
Yeah, and when we get to the New Testament, the first
century of the birth of Christ,we have Herod, but he's not of
the line of David, he's not fromthe kingly line of David, he's
actually an Edomian and he'sserving at the behest of the
Roman government.
So you're exactly right, glenn,that the lineage of the line of
(20:40):
David Jesus fulfills thatlineage of the line of David
Jesus fulfills that, and we'regoing to see him rule over the
house of David in the millennialkingdom whenever he returns
again and sets up that earthlykingdom.
Speaker 1 (20:52):
The Jewish people had been in sin for so long and God
was so long-suffering and sopatient, but he finally says it
will stop.
Right here I'm drawing my swordand I'm not going to recognize
any of the leaders, and we'regoing to stop this sin right now
.
And he did so.
(21:12):
I think the lesson for us isnot only the big picture with
Israel, but we need to takeGod's character into mind.
In our day, I may think I canget by with my sin and I may
fool you and I may fool thepeople around me, but I'm not
going to fool God.
He knows what my sin is, myfriend, he knows yours and
(21:35):
sooner or later, if we continuein it, if we don't repent, he
will pull out his sword andhe'll stop it.
This is a great lesson for us.
Is that, yes, god is loving,yes, he is patient, yes, he is
long-suffering, but he willeventually deal with sin.
And we need to come clean rightnow, both you and I.
(21:56):
Let's continue reading inchapter 21, starting in verse 14
.
We're going to see what happens.
The glittering sword Ah, it ismade for striking like lightning
(22:28):
.
It is wrapped up in readinessfor slaughter.
Show yourself sharp, go to theright, set yourself, go to the
left, wherever your edge isappointed.
I will also clap my handstogether and I will appease my
wrath.
I, the Lord, have spoken, steve.
He sounds very resolute, doeshe not?
(22:49):
He?
Speaker 2 (22:50):
is resolute, glenn.
To us we're reading thesechapters and verses, one right
after the other, but this istaking place around 591 to the
588 time period.
The fall of Jerusalem wasn'tuntil 586.
These things that Ezekiel isstill saying to the people, that
God is having him say to themand even act out in front of him
(23:12):
.
A while ago, he said moan infront of them, in their sight,
so that they can see you.
When they ask you, you tellthem directly.
This is God depicting somethingthat's still yet to happen in
the future of Ezekiel's time,and everything that we've been
reading in this session doestake place there, in the 586 BC
(23:35):
time.
But he is resolute and it'stelling these people that are in
exile, they're having to cometo grips that their nation is
gone and, yes, they might beable to go back, but it's not
going to be the same when youreally think about it.
They're not going to beindependent anymore, they're not
going to have their own kingsanymore, and it's just going to
(23:58):
be different.
God is really telling them howit's going to be and giving them
knowledge as to what it's goingto be different.
God is really telling them howit's going to be and giving them
knowledge as to what it's goingto be, and he had to say it
multiple times and in multipleways through Ezekiel, to get it
through to the people that he isresolute, that this is it and
(24:18):
this is how it's going to be.
But remember, throughout all ofthose sessions that we've
talked about and verses thatwe've read scattered through
there, he has given them hopethat there's going to be a
restoration of the nation itself, albeit that it's going to be
sometime in the future.
Speaker 1 (24:35):
In verse 14, he says let the sword be doubled.
What he means there is let itstrike twice as many times.
He's saying this sword is goingto get used, but let's double
the amount of times that it getsused.
God is piling on the punishment, emphasizing the death and
destruction that will happenAgain.
God had told these people, hispeople, all the way back in
(25:00):
Deuteronomy, when he first gavethe law to Moses on Mount Sinai.
He told him what would happenif they disobeyed.
Yet here they are, a thousandyears or more later.
God had been long-suffering andpatient, but now he is
promising to act Again.
Been many centuries, but lookat verse 15.
(25:20):
It tells us there how quicklyhe will act, steve, when God's
sword of punishment finallystrikes, how fast will it?
Speaker 2 (25:31):
act?
It's going to act likelightning and of course
lightning strikes very quickly,very bright for a little bit and
very thunderous.
You hear that loud clap andrumble that happens after it.
Speaker 1 (25:43):
It's going to be a very quick, decisive strike and
it says in the next verse, verse16, that it's going to strike
everywhere, to the right and tothe left, wherever it is
appointed to go.
This is a very sobering lessonand very severe lesson, Steve.
I think we need to take it toheart for today.
Speaker 2 (26:04):
We do need to take it to heart today.
What we need to take out of it,I think, glenn, for our time,
is that God is patient, butthere is going to come a time
whenever His patience runs outfor people and you don't want to
be in a situation, like he saidearlier in our session here,
that he's against them.
That kind of goes against thegrain of some of the teaching
(26:28):
that is in our day and age thatGod is an all-loving God and
that he is for everybody and heis merciful and he is forgiving.
He is merciful and forgiving,but if you're disobedient from
him and doing sinful things,then he can also be against you.
And I don't know about you,Glenn, but I don't want to be on
(26:49):
the other side of God and havehim against me.
Speaker 1 (26:53):
I do not either, so we probably should stop here for
today because of time, but comeback next time.
We're going to see one of themost powerful men in the world
resort to using occulticdivination to make major
decisions with people's lives,so we'll see that next time.
Speaker 2 (27:12):
On Reasoning Through the Bible Thank you so much for
watching and listening.
May God bless you.
If you were with us last time, on Reasoning Through
the Bible, we were teachingthrough Ezekiel, chapter 20, and
God, through the prophetEzekiel, has been giving a
strong condemnation of the cityof Jerusalem and the Jewish
people and the nation Because oftheir disobedience over many
(00:40):
centuries.
God has finally decided.
Now is the time he will actOver these several chapters.
He's quite graphic and quiteblunt what he's going to do.
At the end of last time, if youwere with us, god made a series
of directives to the Jewishpeople.
He was speaking through theprophet Ezekiel to the remnant
(01:03):
that was taken to Babylon.
God said in chapter 20, I willbe king over you said a series
of I wills.
I will bring you out of thelands that you've been scattered
.
I will bring you into thewilderness.
I will enter into judgment withyou face to face.
(01:24):
I will make you pass under therod.
I will bring you into the bondof the covenant we talked about
that.
He said he would take part ofthem and make a covenant with
them and the other part would becast out.
The one with the new covenantwould go back into the land.
He says that quite specifically.
(01:46):
We talked about how the bringingback to the land did not fit
during the intertestamentalperiod, simply because he says
in verse 40 that the whole houseof Israel, all of them, will
serve me in the land and thatnever happened in between the
Babylonian captivity and thetime of Christ.
In fact, it never reallyhappened at all in all of Jewish
(02:09):
history so far.
When he says there twice foremphasis, all of them will serve
me, this has to be a futuretime we also talked about.
It can't be symbolic of thechurch simply because it
mentions so many times that heis taking them back to the
specific land, the land that Iswore to give to your fathers.
(02:31):
Says that in verse 42.
We'll pick up today in verse 45.
Steve, can you read there tothe end of?
Speaker 2 (02:40):
chapter 20?
Now the word of the Lord cameto me saying Son of man, set
your face toward Taman and speakout against the south and
prophesy against the forest landof the Negev and say to the
forest of the Negev hear theword of the Lord.
Thus says the Lord God, behold,I'm about to kindle a fire in
(03:04):
you and it will consume everygreen tree in you as well as
every dry tree.
The blazing flame will not bequenched and the whole surface,
from south to north, will beburned by it.
All flesh will see that I, theLord, have kindled it.
It shall not be quenched.
(03:24):
Then I said Ah, lord, god, theyare saying of me.
Is he not just speakingparables?
Speaker 1 (03:32):
Now this section.
He speaks of the land of thesouth, the Negev, and he talks
of it having a forest there thatGod is going to burn down.
I would take it that the Lordthere is both literal and
figurative, that he is having afigurative or a spiritual
burning of the people because ofthe disobedience.
(03:55):
He's going to take away all ofthe lushness that is in the
nation.
Every green tree, it says.
I also take it to be quiteliteral simply because Babylon
was going to come in and destroythe whole region.
What's really interesting isthat there's again a forest
there.
(04:15):
If we remember all the way backto the time of Joshua and the
time of Moses, moses sent in the10 spies to the land.
It was very lush, very green,very productive.
It's described as a landflowing with milk and honey, so
productive that what the 10spies brought back one cluster
(04:38):
of grapes that was so big it hadto be put on a pole that's
carried by two men.
So this was a very lush, verygreen, very productive part of
the land.
Yet if you go there today, it'svery dry, almost a desert.
So what happened?
Well, what happened was thisjudgment right here in Ezekiel,
(04:59):
chapter 20.
God sent in his judgment.
He burned the entire land in aspiritual sense and a literal
sense.
We find it today to be very,very desolate.
It's a very dry place.
In the millennium, we'll findthat there's going to be a river
flowing out of Jerusalem andwe'll return the land to a very
(05:22):
lush, productive land.
We're going to see that beforewe get out of Ezekiel, when we
get to Ezekiel, chapter 47.
Steve, that just seems to me tobe a very amazing series of
prophecies that have beenliterally fulfilled.
Speaker 2 (05:36):
It is, and it's also, I think, a depiction that it's
not just Jerusalem that's goingto be destroyed, it is going to
be Judah proper.
That southern nation of Judahincludes Jerusalem.
The capital is going to becompletely done away with, and
this is the final part of God'sdiscipline on that nation.
(05:58):
Judah will cease to exist as anation itself.
Now, when they do come backfrom exile in Babylon, the area
there is referred to as Judahonce again, or Judea, but it's
never its independent nation ofitself.
This is depicting the lastthroes of the nation of Judah.
Speaker 1 (06:19):
That brings us to Ezekiel, chapter 21.
This is a continuation.
We still have another two orthree chapters of God condemning
the land, the people from Judah, specifically Jerusalem.
He's over and over again givingwhy he's condemning them and
(06:41):
what he's going to do to condemnthem Again.
Very graphic, very descriptivelanguage here In chapter 21,
he's going to talk about reallyfour things God is going to draw
his sword, he's going tosharpen and polish his sword and
then he's going to use hissword against two people.
He's going to use it againstJerusalem and he's going to use
(07:02):
it against Ammon.
With that, he's going to use itagainst Jerusalem and he's
going to use it against Ammon.
With that, we'll go ahead andpick up the first five verses of
Ezekiel, chapter 21.
It says this and say to theland of Israel Thus says the
(07:23):
Lord Behold, I am against youand I will draw my sword out of
its sheath and cut off from youthe righteous and the wicked.
Because I will cut off from youthe righteous and the wicked.
Therefore, my sword will goforth from its sheath against
(07:43):
all flesh, from south to north.
Thus all flesh will know that I, the Lord, have drawn my sword
out of its sheath.
It will not return to itssheath again, steve.
What lesson can we draw fromthose?
Speaker 2 (07:53):
verses.
Well, I guess the basic one isthat this is another depiction
of God reaffirming that this isgoing to be the end of the
people there livingindependently in the land.
He's going to use Babylon as anation of judgment against the
(08:14):
Israelites.
Another factor is that he doesrefer to the land of Israel,
even though it's going to begoing up against the nation of
Judah Once again.
We've talked about this beforethat there's some theories out
there that the northern kingdomof Israel, once it was taken off
(08:34):
by the Assyrians, those 10tribes, really were assimilated
and they ceased to existaltogether and all that was left
were the two southern tribes ofthe Judah, and that the modern
day Jews that we have today areall really from the two southern
tribes.
But we see, and God is donedealing with the northern tribes
(08:56):
altogether, but we see herethat God is using the term
Israel.
Even though he's talking aboutthe southern tribe of Judah,
he's still talking about thenation of Israel itself.
They're still all underjudgment, even though it's down
to the southern nation of Judah.
Speaker 1 (09:13):
Again, god is fed up with the disobedience and the
sin.
He says here that he's going todraw his sword.
It reminds me of back in Joshua, chapter 5,.
Yahweh appears to Joshua in theform of a man with a drawn
sword and Joshua goes up to himand says are you for us or for
(09:36):
our enemies?
He basically says I didn't comehere to take sides, I came to
take over because he has attimes drawn his sword and used
it.
Here God says I'm drawing mysword and I'm going to use it,
and we need to remember that Godwill at times use his sword.
(09:57):
Steve, look at the end of verse3.
Who does God say he's going toremove?
Speaker 2 (10:02):
from the land.
Well, he specifically says he'sgoing to remove the righteous
and the wicked from the land.
But let's go to the first partof 3, even talk about it.
He says the land of Israel.
So, as I just depicted a whileago, this is talking about all
of Israel and, glenn, I thinkit's interesting too there that
he also says behold, I amagainst you.
That's a complete opposite asto when they first went into the
(10:26):
land, he told Joshua and allthe others I will be with you.
Here it is at the very end ofthe arc of them going in to take
over the land of Israel.
At the very beginning, he waswith them.
Now, in its final stages, he'ssaying I am against you.
Speaker 1 (10:46):
He does say he's against them.
And what's interesting here ishe says he's against both the
righteous and the wicked.
Well, we take that to be theself-righteous and the wicked
simply because, if you were withus in earlier chapters, they
went out trying to identifythose that would actually follow
and put their faith in the Lordand they found none.
(11:09):
They've already been weighedand evaluated and found wanting.
When he says here, therighteous and the wicked, this
is the people who think they arerighteous, the people who hold
themselves to be righteous butreally are not.
Simply because remember thehistory of the Jewish nation.
It had been many centuries wherehe had given them laws.
(11:32):
He had given them theconsequences of violating the
laws.
He had sent many prophets togive God's word to them on how
they were falling short and theywere all ignored or killed or
otherwise found to be useless bythe people.
The people insisted on prayingbefore statues, worshiping idols
(11:53):
and chasing after othercountries.
In verse 3, god says he's goingto draw his sword and use it in
the land of Israel.
I am against you simply becauseof all the centuries of
disobedience, god is veryserious about punishing the
disobedience of the people inthe land.
(12:15):
Let's read the next few versesand we'll find out what God does
next.
Steve, can you start at verse 6and go down to verse 13?
Speaker 2 (12:22):
As for you, son of man, groan with breaking heart
and bitter grief, groan in theirsight.
And when they say to you, whydo you groan?
You shall say Because of thenews that is coming, and every
heart will melt, all hands willbe feeble, every spirit will
(12:43):
faint and all knees will be weakas water.
Behold, it comes and it willhappen, declares the Lord.
God, again, the word of theLord came to me saying, son of
man, prophesy and say Thus saysthe Lord say A sword, a sword
sharpened and also polished.
(13:03):
Sharpened to make a slaughter,polished to flash like lightning
.
Or shall we rejoice the rod ofmy son despising every tree?
It is given to be polished,that it may be handled.
The sword is sharpened andpolished to give it into the
hand of the slayer.
Cry out and wail, son of man,for it is against my people, it
(13:27):
is against all the officials ofIsrael.
They are delivered over to thesword with my people.
Therefore, strike your thigh,for there is a message to the
prophet Ezekiel, and tells himto go out and give this message
(13:51):
to the Jewish people.
Speaker 1 (13:53):
Verse 6, he tells him to go and groan with a broken
heart.
And when people ask him, whyare you groaning?
He is to say because of the badnews that's coming.
And of course this bad news wasliterally fulfilled.
The false prophets had saidgood news was coming, but the
(14:13):
true God says no bad news iscoming.
Look at such descriptivelanguage here.
Every heart will melt, allhands will be feeble, every
spirit will faint and all kneeswill be as weak as water.
People think that we're verystrong, very self-sufficient,
(14:33):
but when God actually shows up,we become as weak as water.
Repeatedly in the scriptures.
People think they're okay, butwhen God or any heavenly being
actually shows up, people becomeweak, fall down or hide their
eyes.
When the angel showed up toDaniel, it made him sick for
(14:56):
days.
That's what I find interestinghere.
The other thing I find look atverse 10.
It says he has pulled out hissword and now he has sharpened
it and polished it.
What does it say, steve?
For what reason is hesharpening and polishing his
sword?
Speaker 2 (15:15):
He said he has sharpened it and polished it in
order to give it into the handof the slayer.
So God has prepared this swordof judgment against Israel.
Speaker 1 (15:26):
He has sharpened and polished his sword for a
slaughter.
He will cause this slaughter bygiving God's sword to the
slayer.
Of course, the slayer meansBabylon.
Babylon is going to be God'sinstrument to go and punish the
people of Israel for theirdisobedience.
(15:46):
The Lord is being extremelyclear about his intentions.
He's going to use a weapon toslaughter the disobedient people
of Jerusalem.
God will end the pagan idolworship once and for all.
God is very clear, very blunt,very powerful.
Steve, what can we concludeabout the nature of God from
(16:08):
this?
Speaker 2 (16:09):
As we've mentioned many times before, he will only
put up with so much.
He only has patience for solong, and I almost said that he
only has mercy for so long.
But really he is a merciful God.
He does have mercy, he also hasgrace, but he's not going to be
(16:31):
mocked.
He's described Israel as beingobstinate and stubborn people.
He's described them as beingharlots going after other gods.
He has also said I've turnedaway from you, I'm turning my
back on you.
Now he is fulfilling this finaljudgment on them and if you
remember, as we've also talkedabout going back to Deuteronomy,
(16:54):
he said if you follow myordinances and statutes, you'll
have blessings and you'll beable to live long in the land,
but if you don't follow myordinances and statutes, then
there'll be curses upon you andyou won't live long in the land.
Well, this is it.
They're no longer going to beable to live in the land anymore
, at least for this 70-yearperiod.
(17:17):
But it's never really the same.
Even after they come back fromthe Babylonian exile not all of
them come back and they're stillunder occupation, and they
remain occupation even up untilthe time whenever Jesus comes,
the Messiah.
This is a watershed moment forthe nation of Israel and for the
(17:40):
land that God had promised tothem.
He said enough is enough, andhe's going to follow through
with the things that he said ifthey didn't follow him.
Speaker 1 (17:49):
This section says exactly that.
You said a watershed moment.
It's a great turning point inthe history of the Jewish people
.
Right here is where God saysthings are going to change.
Right now.
I will do these things.
If you look at the end of verse10, the Hebrew there in our
English translation is a littleawkward, but what he's actually
(18:11):
trying to say is that some ofthe other English translations
make it a little more clear whatGod is saying.
Should we rejoice in thescepter of my son?
Well, no.
The sword, the sword ofslaughter, despises every such
wooden symbols of authority.
That's what he's saying is thatthe sword of slaughter that
(18:32):
he's going to give to Babylon togo in and destroy things are
not going to be lost,intimidated by, they're not
going to recognize any symbolsof authority, such as a scepter
of a king or a ruler.
God is merely saying hispunishment is not going to stop
merely because of the symbol ofkingly authority in Israel.
(18:53):
Look at verse 13.
It says it mentions a testingand a rod.
A rod here is the scepter, asymbol of authority.
After the Babylonian captivity,the time of the Jewish kings was
over.
That's why we say it's awatershed moment.
It's a changing of the entirenation.
You remember when Israel cameout of Egypt, god set them up
(19:18):
under judges and said just lookto me and I will guide you.
Well, they didn't have faith inthat.
They wanted kings.
Most of the Jewish kings werebad.
There was a few good ones witha long series of bad ones.
So here, after all thesecenturies of bad kings, god says
it's over.
(19:39):
I'm giving my sword.
It's drawn, it's polished, it'ssharpened.
I'm giving it to Babylon.
They're going to come in.
They're not going to recognizeany authority of any kingly
scepters.
The line of the kings are goingto stop here.
After they came back from theBabylonian captivity, the kings
were not there, they were gone.
(20:00):
If we look at the genealogiesat the beginning of the Gospels,
the only one that could standup today and claim to be of the
kingly line is the Lord JesusChrist.
That's the message here.
Such a great lesson that'sburied back here in these
wonderful sections of Ezekiel.
Speaker 2 (20:19):
Yeah, and when we get to the New Testament, the first
century of the birth of Christ,we have Herod, but he's not of
the line of David, he's not fromthe kingly line of David, he's
actually an Edomian and he'sserving at the behest of the
Roman government.
So you're exactly right, glenn,that the lineage of the line of
(20:40):
David Jesus fulfills thatlineage of the line of David
Jesus fulfills that, and we'regoing to see him rule over the
house of David in the millennialkingdom whenever he returns
again and sets up that earthlykingdom.
Speaker 1 (20:52):
The Jewish people had been in sin for so long and God
was so long-suffering and sopatient, but he finally says it
will stop.
Right here I'm drawing my swordand I'm not going to recognize
any of the leaders, and we'regoing to stop this sin right now
.
And he did so.
(21:12):
I think the lesson for us isnot only the big picture with
Israel, but we need to takeGod's character into mind.
In our day, I may think I canget by with my sin and I may
fool you and I may fool thepeople around me, but I'm not
going to fool God.
He knows what my sin is, myfriend, he knows yours and
(21:35):
sooner or later, if we continuein it, if we don't repent, he
will pull out his sword andhe'll stop it.
This is a great lesson for us.
Is that, yes, god is loving,yes, he is patient, yes, he is
long-suffering, but he willeventually deal with sin.
And we need to come clean rightnow, both you and I.
(21:56):
Let's continue reading inchapter 21, starting in verse 14
.
We're going to see what happens.
The glittering sword Ah, it ismade for striking like lightning
(22:28):
.
It is wrapped up in readinessfor slaughter.
Show yourself sharp, go to theright, set yourself, go to the
left, wherever your edge isappointed.
I will also clap my handstogether and I will appease my
wrath.
I, the Lord, have spoken, steve.
He sounds very resolute, doeshe not?
(22:49):
He?
Speaker 2 (22:50):
is resolute, glenn.
To us we're reading thesechapters and verses, one right
after the other, but this istaking place around 591 to the
588 time period.
The fall of Jerusalem wasn'tuntil 586.
These things that Ezekiel isstill saying to the people, that
God is having him say to themand even act out in front of him
(23:12):
.
A while ago, he said moan infront of them, in their sight,
so that they can see you.
When they ask you, you tellthem directly.
This is God depicting somethingthat's still yet to happen in
the future of Ezekiel's time,and everything that we've been
reading in this session doestake place there, in the 586 BC
(23:35):
time.
But he is resolute and it'stelling these people that are in
exile, they're having to cometo grips that their nation is
gone and, yes, they might beable to go back, but it's not
going to be the same when youreally think about it.
They're not going to beindependent anymore, they're not
going to have their own kingsanymore, and it's just going to
(23:58):
be different.
God is really telling them howit's going to be and giving them
knowledge as to what it's goingto be different.
God is really telling them howit's going to be and giving them
knowledge as to what it's goingto be, and he had to say it
multiple times and in multipleways through Ezekiel, to get it
through to the people that he isresolute, that this is it and
(24:18):
this is how it's going to be.
But remember, throughout all ofthose sessions that we've
talked about and verses thatwe've read scattered through
there, he has given them hopethat there's going to be a
restoration of the nation itself, albeit that it's going to be
sometime in the future.
Speaker 1 (24:35):
In verse 14, he says let the sword be doubled.
What he means there is let itstrike twice as many times.
He's saying this sword is goingto get used, but let's double
the amount of times that it getsused.
God is piling on the punishment, emphasizing the death and
destruction that will happenAgain.
God had told these people, hispeople, all the way back in
(25:00):
Deuteronomy, when he first gavethe law to Moses on Mount Sinai.
He told him what would happenif they disobeyed.
Yet here they are, a thousandyears or more later.
God had been long-suffering andpatient, but now he is
promising to act Again.
Been many centuries, but lookat verse 15.
(25:20):
It tells us there how quicklyhe will act, steve, when God's
sword of punishment finallystrikes, how fast will it?
Speaker 2 (25:31):
act?
It's going to act likelightning and of course
lightning strikes very quickly,very bright for a little bit and
very thunderous.
You hear that loud clap andrumble that happens after it.
Speaker 1 (25:43):
It's going to be a very quick, decisive strike and
it says in the next verse, verse16, that it's going to strike
everywhere, to the right and tothe left, wherever it is
appointed to go.
This is a very sobering lessonand very severe lesson, Steve.
I think we need to take it toheart for today.
Speaker 2 (26:04):
We do need to take it to heart today.
What we need to take out of it,I think, glenn, for our time,
is that God is patient, butthere is going to come a time
whenever His patience runs outfor people and you don't want to
be in a situation, like he saidearlier in our session here,
that he's against them.
That kind of goes against thegrain of some of the teaching
(26:28):
that is in our day and age thatGod is an all-loving God and
that he is for everybody and heis merciful and he is forgiving.
He is merciful and forgiving,but if you're disobedient from
him and doing sinful things,then he can also be against you.
And I don't know about you,Glenn, but I don't want to be on
(26:49):
the other side of God and havehim against me.
Speaker 1 (26:53):
I do not either, so we probably should stop here for
today because of time, but comeback next time.
We're going to see one of themost powerful men in the world
resort to using occulticdivination to make major
decisions with people's lives,so we'll see that next time.
Speaker 2 (27:12):
On Reasoning Through the Bible Thank you so much for
watching and listening.
May God bless you.
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