Ezekiel 33
After the pronouncement of divine judgment upon the troublers of Israel, from the Ammonites to the Egyptians, in chapters 25 to 32, God returns to the consideration of His earthly people. As a nation, Israel had been put under the rod of His displeasure; Jerusalem was now in ruins, three kings of. Judah were captives in Egypt and Babylon, and hardly an Israelite remained in the land of promise; the ruin of Israel was complete.
“The children of thy people”, a term found in verses 2, 12, 17, and 30 (and in chapter 3:11, and later in this book) is significant of the altered position of the nation; Israel is “not My people” (Hosea 1:99Then said God, Call his name Lo-ammi: for ye are not my people, and I will not be your God. (Hosea 1:9)), yet objects of mercy are among them, and a compassionate God seeks their good. He had told them through Ezekiel in chapters 3 and 18, and now a third time, in chapter 33, that thenceforth His dealings would be with individuals; their national position as God’s favored people was gone. The prophet had been made a watchman unto the house of Israel to warn them of judgment to come (chapter. 3:17-21), but they had not hearkened to the word of God which he delivered to them, and since then Jerusalem had been captured and destroyed, and its remaining inhabitants for the most part put to death by the Babylonian conqueror.
In the long-suffering and mercy of God, Ezekiel is again declared a watchman to the house of Israel, and directed to hear the word at His mouth and to warn them (verse 7). The wicked, if they do not turn from their wicked ways, shall die in their iniquity; the prophet, if he gave warning, whether it was heeded or not, had delivered his own soul (verses 8 and 9).
Man is ever ready to blame. God for his condition as a sinner, and verse 10 gives an example of this: “Thus ye speak, Our transgressions and our sins are upon us, and we waste away in them; how then should we live?” The answer is ready,
“Say unto them, As I live, saith the Lord Jehovah, I have no pleasure in the death of the wicked; but that the wicked turn from his own way and live. Turn ye, turn ye from your evil ways, for why will ye die, O house of Israel?” (verse 11, N.T.).
“Now then we are ambassadors for Christ, as though God did beseech... by us; we pray... in Christ’s stead, Be ye reconciled to God; for He hath made Him to be sin (or sin-offering) for us, Who knew no sin, that we might be made the righteousness of God in Him.” Alas! that the many spurn the offer of mercy!
What follows in our chapter (verses 12 to 20) is not the gospel of the grace of God, which was only published when His beloved Son had met the full demands of divine righteousness and holiness as the sinner’s Substitute on the cross of Calvary. It is a declaration of individual responsibility in a day of judgment, not a day of grace. Life is for those who live in the fear of God; death is for them who turn away from His Word. The way was still open for individual repentance, though the nation of Israel as a whole was under the judgment of God.
Verse 21, if the reckoning of time be from the same date as in Jeremiah’s last chapter, shows that a very long time elapsed from the fall of Jerusalem until the news reached Ezekiel in far off Chaldea. Now at length the mouth of Ezekiel was opened in testimony (see chapters 3: 20, 27, and 24:24-27). That testimony (verses 25 to 33) is of further judgment.
There were yet in the land of Palestine some Israelites who had escaped the sword of Nebuchadnezzar and the captivity of many of their fellows. These had thought to possess the land for themselves, but their state is exposed, and their judgment is announced in verses 25-29. As for the captives where Ezekiel was, they heard his words, but at heart they were unchanged; they were indifferent to the messages he gave them from God. The day was coming when they would know that a prophet had been among them.
ML 01/19/1936