Center for Biblical Theology and Eschatology

Israel Shall Be Made To Confess That God Is The Lord

by Rev Clarence Bouwman

Date: Preached on Sunday Morning, April 21, 2002
Text: Ezekiel 6:13a

Singing: Psalms and Hymns are from the "Book of Praise" Anglo Genevan Psalter, Psalm 47:3
Psalm 26:3,4
Psalm 96:4,5
Psalm 97:3,4,5
Psalm 99:1,2

Beloved Congregation of the Lord Jesus Christ!

The words of the prophet Ezekiel are getting hotter, more direct, more pointed. The Lord God had appointed Ezekiel to be a watchman for Israel, and in the material we read today we hear the prophet blowing the trumpet, issuing the warning blast that the enemy is on the horizon, is coming. But the enemy is not the Babylonian army; the enemy is God…. He’s coming, coming in judgment, and the purpose is to convince the people of Israel that He is the Lord.

The Lord God was pleased to include in His word to us this portion of His proclamation to Israel. That’s to say: we too are to hear the prophet’s trumpet blast, for we too are to know that God is the Lord. That’s remarkable, for: don’t we know that God is the Lord?! Or might it be that we know it – but don’t really know it?

I summarize the sermon with this theme:

ISRAEL SHALL BE MADE TO CONFESS THAT GOD IS THE LORD.
 

1. Who the Lord is.
2. How the Lord drives home His identity.
3. When one must take the Lord seriously.

1. Who the Lord is.

In the year 603 BC the armies of Babylon captured the city of Jerusalem and took into exile the leading people of the city. One might expect that the people whom Babylon left behind in Jerusalem would be repentant of their sins, and make it their business to live close to the Lord and His word. But it was not so. I read in II Chron 36 that the puppet king Babylon put on Jerusalem’s throne "stiffened his neck and hardened his heart against turning to the Lord God of Israel" (vs 13). "Moreover, all the leaders of the priests and the people transgressed more and more, according to all the abominations of the nations" (vs 14).

This ongoing apostasy in Israel was catalyst for the Lord God to speak to the prophet Ezekiel in far off Babylon, by the River Chebar. In chaps 6 & 7 the Lord tells the prophet to "set your face toward the mountains of Israel, and prophesy to them" (6:2). No, Ezekiel by the River Chebar could not see those mountains; at 700 kms distance they were much too far away. But Ezekiel had to face those mountains nevertheless, had to turn his body to face the west, and then say particular words that God put in his mouth (cf chaps 2 & 3). He had to speak, but his hearers were not the people living in the mountains of Israel 700 kms to the west; he had to address the mountains of Israel, and his hearers were his fellow exiles in Babylon. That is to say: God declares in their hearing what He will do to Israel and Jerusalem. Why must they hear what God intends to do 700 kms away? The exiles are to hear it so they might themselves come to know that their God is the Lord.

"You shall know that I am the Lord." That intriguing formulation is found seven times in the course of these two chapters (6:7b, 10a, 13a, 14b; 7:4b, 9b, 27b). The words are identical each time, with the exception that two times the word "you" is replaced by the word "they" (6:10, 14). Yet even when the pronoun ‘you’ is used the reference is not to the exiles in Babylon but to the people in the mountains of Israel 700 kms away. But again, since the people in the mountains of Israel cannot hear Ezekiel’s words, the fine point of his preaching in these chapters is that his fellow exiles in Babylon will come to acknowledge that their God is the Lord. That’s the purpose of the prophecy: the exiles are to know who God is.

"They shall know that I am the Lord." Did the exiles not know that God was the Lord? Certainly, they did, on the surface. They knew –like we do- that God had appeared to Moses at the burning bush and declared that He was Yahweh –I am who I am- a name that comes back in our Bibles as the word ‘Lord’ spelled with capital letters. But the thing is that the exiles did not understand the significance of that name. More, the exiles –and it’s true of those who stayed behind in Israel too- did not appreciate the majestic identity of the God who called Himself Yahweh, the Lord.

Who is the Lord, Yahweh? We have seen something of His greatness and His majesty in the vision He showed to Ezekiel in chap 1. You recall the vision: Ezekiel saw this whirlwind, a great cloud with raging fire engulfing itself (vs 4). Whirlwind, cloud, fire: these are terms used elsewhere in the Bible to point up the presence of almighty God. As the flaming whirlwind comes closer, Ezekiel sees angels reflecting the glory of God, living creatures carrying the chariot God, ready to go wherever the Master instructs. Above the angels and the chariot of God is a firmament of awesome crystal (vs 22), and above the firmament the likeness of a throne, and "on the likeness of the throne was a likeness with an appearance of a man high above it" – God in His majesty! (vs 26). "This," says Ezekiel, "was the appearance of the likeness of the glory of the Lord" – so awesome that when Ezekiel saw it he fell on his face… (vs 28). The message is so clear: the Lord is awesome; the Lord is overwhelmingly great, majestic, terrible in holiness. He is no small God whom you can carry around and manipulate, no closet deity whom you can serve as you wish. The Lord: the vision of chap 1 lays out how infinitely great and holy He is. We understand: given the greatness of this God, it is not for people to ignore Him, and it is not for people either to worship Him in manners of their own choosing.

But see, though the Lord had revealed His holiness to Israel by the hand of the Babylonian army, had defeated Jerusalem and taken the best of the people into exile, the people did not change their habits, did not take God’s holiness and majesty seriously. Listen to what the Lord has Ezekiel say in our chapters. Chap 6:3-7: on the mountains and hills of Israel 700 kms away are still high places and altars and idols!

High places. These physically higher spots in the land were considered holy, and used the prime places to offer sacrifices to the gods. The Canaanites had used these high places for the service of the Baals and the Ashtoreths long before Israel first came into the Promised Land. When God’s people years earlier were about to invade the Promised Land, the Lord God instructed His people through Moses to make no covenant with the Canaanites of the land nor show any mercy to them; they were instead "destroy their altars and break down their sacred pillars and cut down their wooden images and burn their carved images with fire" (Dt 7:5). The reason for the command was that Israel was to serve the Lord God alone, and do so in the manner and place of His choosing (cf Dt 12) – lest they be carried away by idolatry of the Canaanites. But the books of Joshua and Judges spell out that the people did not obey this command. O yes, they served the Lord and offered their sacrifices to Him, but they did so on the very high places God had commanded Israel to destroy (Dt 12:4). Even such notable leaders as Samuel and Solomon offered sacrifices to God on the high places (I Sam 9:12; I Kings 3:2ff). During the reign of Rehoboam the people "built for themselves high places, sacred pillars, and wooden images on every high hill and under every green tree" and so "did according to all the abominations of the nations which the Lord had cast out before the children of Israel" (I King 14:23f). Time and again we read in the book of Kings that a particular king did what was right in the eyes of the Lord, "but the high places were not removed" (cf I Kings 15:14). King Josiah made an effort to cleanse the land of its high places (II Kings 23), but the people did not follow his reforms; in the days of our text the mountains and hills of Israel were plastered with high places and altars and idols, and even the valleys and ravines between the hills and mountains had their artificial high places (cf Jer 7:31). Is this to say that the people of Israel forget their God and served only the Baals? Not at all! The point was that Israel wanted to serve the Lord God alone, but thought to do so by taking on board some of the practices of the nations around them in their service of their gods. What can be wrong with using a high place to make a sacrifice to the Lord?

But the thing is, congregation, that when you take something of heathen origin and then dedicate that item to a new and holy purpose, you are playing with fire; gradually the influence of the old faiths that formed the practice you want to use reasserts itself – and eventually takes over. That’s what was happening in Israel. It’s not that the people before the exile rejected God completely. Rather, serving Yahweh on the high places of the heathens opened the way for the rituals the heathens used to receive a place in Israel’s worship, and gradually the thinking behind the rituals influenced Israel’s thinking also – with as result that eventually Israel was serving Yahweh according to patterns learned from the heathens around them. Those patterns, of course, arose from within the sinful human heart. God had revealed Himself to Israel as a God of infinite holiness and greatness, and therefore His people-by-covenant were holy also, different, special – and that was to be evident from the way they served this God. But see: the people placed themselves over God and determined for themselves how this God ought to be served. Once you have shrunk God in your thinking to the point that you decide how He’ll be served, it’s but a small step to serve idols also. It is full-blown syncretism, mixing the world with the faith and making one mess out of the two.

God’s reaction to this syncretism was scathing; I’ll come back to that in a moment. First though, exactly because God’s reaction was so scathing, we do well to pause for a moment to consider whether we follow the same practice Israel followed. That is: have we, in our service of God, incorporated habits borrowed from the world around us, or –worse- adopted the philosophy behind the habits? Think for a moment of the music we use to praise our God. In our church services we use music rooted in a distinctly God-centered culture; the tunes in the Book of Praise either come directly from the time of the Great Reformation or are built on the music style of the period when the Holy Spirit’s renewing work was appreciated in Europe. But as we seek to worship God and sing His praises at school or at home or at our weddings or around our campfires, what sort of tunes do we use? Are they tunes rooted in the style of music that reflects the renewing work of the Holy Spirit or are they tunes borrowed from the world around us – and therefore rooted in a music genre that flows from unbelief?

I can ask the question too in relation to our clothing. Certainly, the style of clothing we wear on Sunday should be no different from the style we wear during the week. But is it fitting to come to church –we come here to worship God- with clothing that reflects the values of the world – be it following the fashions of the catwalk or the clothing tastes of lead singers?

No, I do not say this because I want to pick on music or pick on clothes. I mention these two examples because we need to think. Do we pick up what is acceptable in the world and incorporate these habits into our service of God – be it in church or in the home or at school or at work? It’s an item we need to be so very careful about. I read in preparation for this sermon the statement that we need to "discover the means whereby the ways of the world may be converted into the worship of God." But there’s a fundamental error in that instruction, and that is that God is so different, God is so great, God is so majestic that no "way of the world" can possibly be "converted" into acceptable worship of God. We need to bear in mind that God is the Lord, specifically that the God we are allowed to worship is none other than the God who revealed Himself in that splendid vision of Ezekiel 1. Knowing who this God is, having such high thoughts of God as God has revealed of Himself in Ezekiel 1, cuts out any room for worldly influences in the way we worship this God and in the way we live before Him!

The people still living in Israel did not have such high thoughts of God, and so were happy to include in their service to this God some bits and pieces they learned from the nations around them. God’s reaction, I said, was scathing, and it’s to that reaction we now need to turn – second point:

2. How the Lord drives home His identity.

"Then they shall know," says the Lord God, "that I am the Lord." How shall the Lord compel this knowledge in Israel? That holy and exalted God of chap 1, brothers and sisters, comes into action. Look at chap 6:3ff: "I, even I, will bring a sword against you, and I will destroy your high places. Then your altars shall be desolate…. I will lay the corpses of the children of Israel before their idols…. The slain shall fall in your midst, and you shall know that I am the Lord" (6:3ff).

Do you hear it, beloved? Just five years earlier (according to the date given in Ezekiel 1) God had given the people of Israel and the city of Jerusalem over to the Babylonians on account of the people’s sins. Now God pronounces further devastation upon the inhabitants of Israel because they have not learned the lesson of the earlier punishment. So zealous is God for His own honor: the people shall be made to know that He is the Lord – that awesome and majestic and holy God of Ezekiel 1. If defeat before the armies of Babylon doesn’t teach that, than destruction and death around their high places maybe will teach that lesson. But learn it Israel shall!

The details are worked out in vss 8-14. There will, says God through Ezekiel in vs 8, be those who escape the devastation that will come upon the people of Israel in the Promised Land. What will happen to them? They will be carried away captive, says vs 9, they will join their brethren in Babylon. But see now what will happen to these new exiles. Vs 9: "they will loathe themselves for the evils which they committed in all their abominations." They will loathe themselves, and that’s to say that they will be sorry for their sins, broken in heart because they have adopted the styles of the world in their service of the Lord. Here is repentance from their sins, and the result will be that they acknowledge "that I am the Lord." The effect of their repentance and self-loathing will be that they throw out the influences of the world in their future service of the Lord, and they shall worship Him as He has commanded in His word. Amongst the descendents of these exiles in Babylon is also our Lord Jesus Christ, the one who served God perfectly according to His word, with never a single worldly influence in His service. And that, of course, is what made His service to God acceptable – so that He could pay for our sins and we may be children of God.

But, the Lord continues in Ezek 6, not all will escape the slaughter around the high places. Vs 11f: "they shall fall by the sword, by famine, and by pestilence. He who is far off shall die by the pestilence, he who is near shall fall by the sword, and he who remains and is besieged shall die by the famine. Thus will I spend My fury upon them." Vs 14: "I will … make the land desolate…." For none shall live…. Then –vs 14- "they shall know that I am the Lord." Who shall know it? The dead, those slain by God on account of their sins…, shall know that God is the Lord…. How, you wonder, can the dead know? The dead, of course, enter the judgment hall of God…, and that is to say that they see God face to face in all the glory portrayed in Ezek 1, and so they fall on their knees to worship the great and awesome God of heaven and earth – whether they want to or not. "They shall know that I am the Lord."

This prophecy, I’d said before, though it was directed to the mountains of Israel so many hundreds of kilometers away, was spoken in the hearing of the exiles by the River Chebar. What was the punch of the message for them? That’s our third point:

3. When one must take the Lord seriously.

The thing is, congregation, that the Israelites in exile should not think that they were better than their brethren still in Israel. Sure, Ezekiel has to face the land of Israel, and his words are directed to the brethren still living there. But it’s the exiles in Babylon who are to hear, and they –said God in chap 2- are an impudent and stubborn people. They have to come to appreciate who their God is! And no, they cannot leave till another day the question of whether or not they appreciate properly who God is. His awesome greatness dictates that there is urgency in coming to grips with the holy identity of this God. The people in Israel who perish shall see God’s greatness on the day of their death – and acknowledge His majesty. The people in Israel who escape the sword and end up in exile shall see God’s greatness too on the day of their conversion – and acknowledge His majesty. Now the exiles also need to come to grips with the greatness of the God who speaks to them through Ezekiel – stubborn and rebellious though they are. Hence the material of chap 7.

Back in chap 3 the great and awesome God of chap 1 had appointed Ezekiel to be a watchman on the walls for the benefit of the people inside the walls. Well now, in chap 7 the watchman makes three clear, sharp blasts on his trumpet. Upon command from God Ezekiel must declare a short, pithy message in vss 2-4. The phrases are short, the grammar is shoddy, and both those elements point up that Ezekiel is so involved in the urgency of the message he must bring that he hasn’t the time to phrase things just right. The people in the city must know that "an end, the end has come…; the Lord God will repay you for all your abominations. My eye will not spare…." In a word: here comes the enemy, God Himself; make ready to meet your God! Repent, acknowledge the greatness of the Lord, or perish in your unbelief – either way you must acknowledge the greatness of this God! Vs 4: "Then you shall know that I am the Lord!"

Vss 5-9 form a second blast on the trumpet. The message is the same, is clear, sharp, piercing, with the phrases equally short and the grammar equally shoddy: "an end has come, the end has come…. Doom has come to you…. Now upon you I will pour out My fury…. My eye will not spare, nor will I have pity…." The urgency is the same: repent, acknowledge the greatness and the majesty of this God with loathing for your sins. Repent, or perish in your unbelief; either way "you shall know that I am the Lord who strikes."

Lest the people in the city are not awakened by these two sharp, clear blasts on Ezekiel’s trumpet, the Lord lays a third long steady blast on Ezekiel’s lips. In the vss 10-27 the grammar gradually improves, the phrases not so biting; it’s as if Ezekiel calms down somewhat. The blast of his verbal trumpet goes on and on, keeps on ringing in the ears of the people, and so forms another urgent call to repentance – before it is too late. But either way, whether the people repent of their syncretism or not, they shall acknowledge that God is the majestic, awesome Yahweh of chap 1.

Ezekiel spoke the words of chaps 6 & 7 for the benefit of the exiles in Babylon. God has included the words of these chapters in the Bible He gave to us. That’s because we too are to know that our God is the Lord, that God of majesty and holiness so stunning that all who see Him must fall on their faces in awe and adoration – if not in repentance and the obedience of faith, then in the judgment.

The same God who came to Ezekiel comes to us in His Word, and comes soon in Person on the clouds of heaven. That puts an urgency into the ultimate question: do you know that God is the Lord? Are you so taken by a sense of His holiness that you give no room for any influence from the world in the way you worship this God? 

Amen!

Rev Clarence Bouwman is the Pastor of Smithville Canadian Reformed Church in Smithville, Ontario. He has also been the minister of the Yarrow Canadian Reformed Church, the Free Reformed Church of Kelmscott, Western Australia, churches in Byford, Western Australia, and Chilliwack, B.C. As a matter of courtesy please advise Rev. C. Bouwman, if you plan to use this sermon in a worship service.