"At the end of seven days the word of the Lord came to me. Son of man, I have made you a watchman for the house of Israel; so hear the word I speak and give them warning from me. When I say to a wicked man, 'You will surely die,' and you do not warn him or speak out to dissuade him from his evil ways in order to save his life, that wicked man will die for his sin, and I will hold you accountable for his blood. But if you do warn the wicked man and he does not turn from his evil ways, he will die for his sin; but you will have saved yourself. Again, when a righteous man turns from his righteousness and does evil, and I put a stumbling block before him, he will die. Since you did not warn him, he will die for his sin. The righteous things he did will not be remembered, and I will hold you accountable for his blood. But if you do warn the righteous man not to sin and he does not sin, he will surely live because he took warning, and you will have saved yourself. The hand of the Lord was upon me there, and he said to me, "Get up and go out to the plain, and there I will speak to you." So I got up and went out to the plain. And the glory of the Lord was standing there, like the glory I had seen by the Kebar River, and I fell face-down. Then the Spirit came into me and raised me to my feet. He spoke to me and said: "Go, shut yourself inside your house. And you, son of man, they will tie with ropes; you will be bound so that you can not go out among the people. I will make your tongue stick to the roof of your mouth so that you will be silent and unable to rebuke them, though they are a rebellious house. But when I speak to you, I will open your mouth and you shall say to them, 'This is what the Soveign Lord says.' Whoever will listen let him listen, and whoever will refuse let him refuse; for they are a rebellious house."
This verse has been on my mind now for the past few days. After I finished going through the book of Revelation- trying to understand it the best I could as I don't have a lot of knowledge on prophesy- I needed another book to study. I was listening to Joel Rosenberg on u-tube talk about the end times and the signs that are already here on earth now in front of us. He was referring to some scripture in the book of Ezekiel, so I started reading from the beginning of the book and found it to be interesting already. The passage before the one quoted above speaks about this particular crowd of people Ezekiel is being sent to and how rebellious they are. God states that they will not listen to what He says and so they also will not listen to what Ezekiel says to them either. Why, then, is God sending Ezekiel to speak to them- knowing they won't listen? And why would Ezekiel go- knowing they won't listen to him when he speaks to them? It seems to me like a waste of time to go somewhere you are not welcome...a place where no one will listen to you because of having a hard heart. With this earthly mind of mine, it is hard for me to wrap my thoughts around God's perspective...it is His and not mine. One perspective that I did not look at from reading this passage the first few times was the perspective of Ezekiel and what he might get out of going to speak to these hard hearted people. God may have wanted to show Ezekiel just how far the people were from Him. And in doing so, He may have wanted to give Ezekiel His heart for the lost. At first, I thought that the words of God to Ezekiel was kind of harsh as He was speaking about Ezekiel being held accountable for the blood of those who are not warned as they die in their sins. I mean...what incredible pressure and responsibility God put on Ezekiel to give the people the Word they desperately needed to hear. Is this passage speaking to any of you in the same way it spoke to me? Do you know of someone out there who desperately needs to hear the Word of God before they die- away from Him? Do you feel the burning in your heart for someone that you know...maybe the fear of what might happen to them if they were to die today? How much do you think God holds us responsible today for those who do not know Him? The same as Ezekiel? Is their blood on our shoulder, or did that just apply to Ezekiel? Maybe God has a work to do in the life of that person you think may, or may not be hard in the heart. Maybe, He has a work to do in you and needs your obedience in order to do what needs to be done. Sometimes, God sends you to places that don't make sense in order to do a work in you rather than what you think you might be there for. May Your Spirit fall on all of us today Jesus. May you show us people who desperately need a touch from You today and beyond. May we be Obedient to You as You tug on our hearts. We Love You with ALL of our Hearts. Send us out to be Your Disciples in the nations. Amen!
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