One Hour. One Book: Ezekiel

Ezequiel is actually a an incredible profit that has his naming strengthened by God huzzah k-- is to become strong like ma and Ezekiel is God is my strength or God strengthens me or God got his added strength to me the book itself can be very difficult in terms of its own its own contents and so my experience is whenever anybody wants to start a weird theology they say it comes from Ezekiel because nobody actually knows what's in there Ezekiel had a very unique message I want to do four things in this sort of introductory lecture and one of them is just a quick overview of the captivity and its prophets the second thing is a quick overview of Ezekiel and his message and the third one is a note about how a priest became a prophet because Ezekiel was a priest and God moved him from being a priest to being a prophet those are two very different skill sets and very different approaches to God and so it's going to be important that you understand that and then the last one is I want to look at the opening of the book and the profound vision of God's glory which I think the book begins with and it is it's an incredible book in that respect I'm gonna use this I'm gonna use essentially whether you call it three or four it doesn't make any difference to me okay but I'm going to call this essentially the chapters one two three that have to do with the call of Ezekiel and inside that call there's going to be a very important vision there are four visions in the book and we're going to see those four visions each of them are turning points in his life and they're incredible visions of God the most specific vision of God in the Bible is in Ezekiel one through three and there's a reason he's going to get one of the worst jobs in the Bible you have to know God deeply to serve him with the grit he's gonna have to serve him with because his call am I allowed to say he's called really crummy it's a really crummy call okay he's going to get called to do stuff that nobody would volunteer for I mean you know he's going to be lying around on one side then lying around on the other side then he's supposed to cook his meal one poop and yeah I mean he's got the stuff he's called to do is pretty profound pretty gritty he's not he's not your normal guy okay and the weird part is part way through this his wife's got to be saying are you sure God told you I mean it's really bad so I want you to see how deep the call of the Prophet goes now in for 232 there's a there's a kind of you know usually we have the condemnation section and then usually after the condemnation what do we have we have a consolation and you can do that with this book but there's actually something more specific and by the way this would be for 232 and this would be 33 to 48 now inside the condemnation section though there are two different things that go on in 4 to 24 if there is he's dealing specifically with God's people specifically with the Jews and the internal Jewish workings inside Babylon during the Exile and that is from chapters Florida to 24 and that really takes a place over a five-year period then after that in 25 to 32 he's dealing outside of that frame more into the nations and when he's dealing with the nations he's dealing in a two-year period so this is altogether seven years of prophecies that our condemnation prophecies now when I call them condemnation prophecies don't mean it doesn't mean everything he says is in a bad mood it does mean that that's the general frame of it okay so let's that's the general look at it but of course the most important line here notice that 24 has a line right there 24 will be that incredible moment in his life that that prediction of the prophets loss and that's the prediction of his death of his wife's death and that's in chapter 24 it's actually in chapter 24 verses 15 to 17 so I'll I'll put that in there but this is the turning point of the books so here's what I want you to see about this book yes it's a prophets book yes it's a prophetic snippets of a prophet and various prophecies but it's more than that it's also biographical it's how I got called what God did in my marriage and then how that played out okay it's actually his story interwoven with the prophecies of God to a people so in a way it's kind of like life lessons that he got through it I want you to see it both in in both terms prophecy and biography you know I want you to be able to see that there was clarity in Ezekiel amid some real static one of the points that Ezekiel makes in terms of his call and his writing in in the uniqueness of it is that it's aimed at people when other prophets were saying false things about God so what I want you to see is he is probably about Oh in the early 90s there was a movie that came out called Minority Report the idea was that one guy came out with a report that was different than everybody else's that had to do with the future in technology but Ezekiel was giving a Minority Report what does that mean means four out of five prophets surveyed said the opposite of what Ezekiel said they were all saying one thing Ezekiel was called to say the opposite why because most of them were wrong most of them weren't walking with God they were telling people that they wanted to hear so Ezekiel at a very dark time is a Minority Report prophet let me set this up maybe with a story that will help a girl said my mother and I returned to my parent's house late one evening to find my father my college-age brother and my 10 year old sister fast asleep my mother had forgotten her house keys so we knock it's loudly at the front door and then to side doors and then went around and tapped on the windows I picked up a little pebble and was clicking at the wing window and I couldn't get anybody to wake up so we went outside we hit the horn on the car but the neighbors light went on and we knew we were bothering the neighborhood and and nobody was getting up so after a while we decided to go down to the local supermarket and outside the supermarket there was a phone so we went over the phone and we called my brothers as an extension of his phone in the house even he woke up we said look we've been trying to get in the house nobody's awake can you open the front door my brother went down and open the front door so we got in the house and we tiptoed up into the house I went to bed my mom said she went quietly into a room and there she saw her husband in front of the TV sound asleep in his easy-chair she walked over very quietly she clicked off the TV and what did he say I was watching that now here's the thing don't turn that off I'm watching it the crazy part about that is dad was sound asleep as the world was rushing on in a very real way Ezekiel makes the argument the trouble is coming even though most people are asleep and don't see it that it things are about to happen and I believe there's a biblical case for me to conclude that there's a lot of that in the church right now that a lot of people are saying it's going to be fine it's going to be fine when real trouble is coming if you're actually paying attention to the erosion not only of morality but also of a biblical conscience this week you may have seen the one of the companies in Norway and in Sweden are now embedding chips in the arms of their of their employees so that they can walk through security with a chip that's underneath their skin and of course those people who have some kind of biblical conscience get worried and so I got a bunch of emails saying is this the mark of the beast and what I said was everything's going to be reasonable when it comes it's all gonna be tried and tested technology no I don't think that company just started the mark of the beast I what I think happened is everybody just in a culture that is quickly distancing itself from the specifics of the Bible and the precise nature of prophecy alongside of that as they disc the Bible and forget about it fewer people will even care then they're going to do whatever technology makes sense and everybody's going to agree when people started using plastic cards Christians were upset you have no idea we have a kiosk out there where you can give online through your credit card but that is a step a leap forward you have no idea what the Brethren did when credit cards came out they were of the devil now are they probably but so is everything else in the world I mean come on the fact of the matter is they're going to quickly take us into a place where buying and selling is done without cash for those of you who don't know cash is this stuff that the government used to print before we all had plastic cards then next it'll be you know we can just kind of walk up to our thing and go like that to our with our phone and it will automatically move numbers from your account to their account there is no money that actually exists for most of this all that to say this that things are changing and it's not that I think ah panic you're not going to stop it you're not going to turn back the you know the Antichrist will be thwarted today because a bee will stand up and say no to her chip okay now if you were to ask me should you get one put in your skin I'd say no why cuz it just gives me the willies okay do I go even toward that stuff but the fact of the matter is it's going to be perfectly perfectly acceptable when the time comes and it's going to make sense and everybody's gonna walk around going oh I get it and nobody's gonna think the Bible because those guys are going to be seen as intolerant bigots who are caught up in superstition of some ancient set of mouldy books that don't matter that's what's going to happen now I want you to see that the world is screaming for help and many believers are snoring and like the Dada they seem to be thinking they're paying attention but they're really not I want you to see that Ezekiel's call and writing uniqueness was that he was dropped into a place where he had to say something that was different than everyone else who supposedly represented God why because Luke might be in that situation in the year or two stuck in a Bible study where everybody's basically talking about something but it's not the Bible or sitting on a university campus where people are purporting to know Jesus and if Jesus were here he'd be tolerant of whatever we want because that's the Jesus of America and you'll be sitting there going did you ever actually read anything about Jesus I mean do you actually know anything from Jesus I want you to go back for a moment to the captivity period I want you to see what that period look like now remember that the captivity period has three starts in three ends 606 597 586 this will be Daniel this will be Ezekiel this will be everybody but the blind crippled and crazy and not everybody got taken but there were people that were left in Judea but after Zedekiah's sons were killed and they were carted off into Babylon this will be the beginning the end also has three waves so counting 70 from this the the first wave going back will be about when 536 now in 539 and you're gonna see the the some people will make at 539 532 539 is when Cyrus decreed that they go back but they didn't go back until 536 which would be 70 years after that but that's not the only wave that goes back this is the wave that goes back with shesh Bazar and Zerubbabel and they go back and that'll be Israel one through six after they get back they get started they're working on the temple and then they discover something about their homeland what do they discover they discover that great grandma's farm is right up the road and not technically is their farm so what do they do they go in and they open up the place and it's been vacant and the animals are scattered and the farm is all overgrown and the vines are all untended when they go in and they start sweeping out the place and they start dreaming a little bit and they start doing you know they start you know they call up the property brothers and they bring them in and then they do a renovation and then it's something nice and new okay what happens is by 5:20 you have a time when God is saying wait a minute you are living in paneled houses in great grandma's house all redone nice renovation by the way love the dishwasher and love the granite countertops but I'm living in a shack says the Lord and a prophet by the name of Haggai will call out and say you need to get back on the stick here you're not really following me you're not now right in the middle of that period we know in the captivity that you have basically two places you have Jerusalem you'll have Babylon and you have placements of prophets that are in specific places so who's the Jerusalem prophet for the duration of the good portion of the captivity Jeremiah and his job is to see the people leaving and explain to them how to live outside the land he's also in jeremiah 29:10 the one who writes down how long the captivity will be who's reading him and discovers when they should be going back Daniel which means Jeremiah is much older than Daniel okay now Jeremiah is actually dying off and by the time of Ezekiel Ezekiel's taken into captivity when he's very young and he knows about the prophecies of Jeremiah he also knows about the hot hits that were sung by the rhythm and blues section in Jerusalem called what lamentations the laments of of Jerusalem and those are five songs or poems that became they were one of them is even across tically done they're done in ways that are catchy and you can remember them okay meanwhile that first group that went to Babylon included Daniel and Daniel's an older statesman who becomes essentially like a prime minister so that by the time Ezekiel has taken Daniels reputation and Shadrach Meshach Abednego are all known people to the Jews coming in so the conditions for Ezekiel are not bad he's not parked in the middle of a terrible place he's taken to a university much like Daniel and his three friends were but he's taken to University spread out all over the 60-mile circumference of Babylon he's on a place called the along the hvar canal or khabar River and it's a place that you will now know because it's there's a city called this tel-aviv an Ezekiel 3 gives the name tel-aviv which is now the largest city or second largest city used to be the largest city Jerusalem's now outstrip Tel Aviv but Tel Aviv as very large city in the Mediterranean in Israel when you land the first night you go to a hotel in Tel Aviv it's not the one from Ezekiel because that's over in Babylon but the name comes from an ancient name tel is the word for archaeological Mound or ruin Aviv is the word for spring so it's old ruined spring time it's old and new mixed together and so it's kind of a nice poetic idea probably Tel Aviv was the name that the Jews gave it so in the captivity expect Daniel and Ezekiel to be over here the important thing for us is this period of time you're going to learn more about the return and the waves of return I've only begun that story just to sort of cap off the end of this but you're going to learn more about that with banning with David while I'm gone here's what's important to me as we look at Ezekiel's career Ezekiel as a priest what's the operative year of his life that should make a difference in his life how old does he need to be well for things to really change for him thirty years of age so watch when he turns 30 in the book because that's when he should engage as a priest and that will be the important of Jesus because he's about thirty years of age that means he engages it's the age of an engaged priest which he wouldn't have been a priest except for in Hebrews you know that he was so all that to say this the captivity period is a unique period in the Bible it's a unique period because there are some songs that are reflective of it can anybody think of a psalm that reflects the captivity period now back in Jerusalem Jeremiah is adding to the whole knowledge of the prophecies Ezekiel is a younger contemporary to Jeremiah and he'd been preaching actually by the time Ezekiel is born Jeremiah has already been preaching five years so he's the next generation he's the young kid who's growing up Ezekiel is born probably I'd put it on the front page of Ezekiel he's born probably in about 622 BC if in Ezekiel 1:1 he turned 30 and 597 I'm going backwards and doing 597 plus 30 and that's how I'm getting this I'm thinking around 622 ish he is born and Jeremiah's prophecies are recorded over a 46 year period while Ezekiel's prophecies cover a 22 year period and so let's put it this way 593 to 571 is probably the period of time that Ezekiel is actually covering in his prophecies so this will be prophecies of Ezekiel or prophecies of Zeke they will be from between 593 and 571 essentially if Jeremiah ends by 581 Jeremiah his last prophecies are about 581 you'll find that Ezekiel's are 571 in other words their contemporaries for the last part of Jim this will be Jeremiah's life and this will be Zeke okay so Ezekiel actually overlaps him but only the last part Jeremiah is already an old guy by the time the Ezekiel starts his work and Jeremiah hangs on forever he's kind of whiny but he doesn't go away it's kind of like country music okay now Ezekiel will offer this Minority Report he will hold reverence as a higher value than acceptance and that's one of the things I think you should write on the cover of the book he holds reverence higher than acceptance Ezekiel is a prophet seized with a vision of the glory of God and because he Revere's God he doesn't care if other people accept him reverence above acceptance that's that's a theme he will use the term sovereign Lord the term sovereign Lord 400 times 400 times now that's if you translate in the New International Version but essentially he uses the term Sovereign Lord all the time for God in a way it's reflective of the earlier ministry of Daniel how does this reflect something that also would be akin to what Daniel did what was Daniel's title for God the Most High God El Elyon this one is the sovereign God the reigning God sovereign just means reigning it means king god and so you you see that Daniel laid the foot and Ezekiel picked up the whole idea now let's talk about who Ezekiel is if you look in the beginning of the book you'll find he is part of the family of Zedeck the Zeta kite family and in the period of the kings Zadok is a priest he comes from the time of David but Zedeck eventually declines I want you to see that his the word in the New Testament for the family or the line of thinking of Zedeck is sad you see it actually comes from the same root Zedekiah so he is in fact the son of a fellow by the name of Bootsy bu zi rabbinic tradition identifies Bootsy as Jeremiah but we're not really at all sure that that's what it means we do know that Bootsy means my contempt and it seems like it's a nickname not a name because who would call their child my contempt I mean you know contemptuous one I so it looks like it's a nickname it is he related to Jeremiah some writers think so many do not you could write the paper or submit it to the Society of local literature and make yourself famous I have no idea what I know is that he's carried off to Babylon eleven years before the ruin of the temple so when is the temple destroyed temples destroyed in 586 eleven years before that he is taken off taken away so in 597 he is carted away that means when he gets to Babylon when he left there was still an operating temple in Jerusalem it's true the Babylonians were pretty much running everything and the Jerusalemites were paying tribute to Babylon but there was still an operating temple Jeremiah was prophesying telling him that the temple was going to be destroyed most people were walking around going Jeremiah is an old fuddy duddy he doesn't know what he's talking about the temples not going to be destroyed we're going to go off to Babylon we're gonna train the Babylonians and how to know go the world is going to be swept with a vision of God and we're going to come back and there's going to be a great Messianic Kingdom that was the prophecy line of a lot of people Ezekiel comes out having remembered the operation of the temple if you are born a priest then your whole life is scheduled around I want to become trained to do the sacrifices trained to be part of a priestly work and then when I'm 30 I'm gonna start my job but his life is interrupted and so he's carted off into Babylon it's interesting because Ezekiel was like prophets in some ways Ezekiel evidently knew Daniel I would make a few notes in the beginning of Ezekiel because you are not going to be back in this book for much of your Christian life there's hardly anybody who opens this book so you're not gonna remember it 20 years from now when you dust off Ezekiel again and get back here by the way it's a fabulous book it's a great book with a great message but like Leviticus you got to get into it to understand what it is okay so a couple notes one of them is Ezekiel evidently knew Daniel he mentioned Daniel three times in his book I'm gonna give you the three times he mentioned okay in ezekiel 14 it's actually ezekiel 1414 in ezekiel 14 20 those are two of them twice he mentions them in ezekiel fourteenth ezekiel 14 14 ezekiel 14 20 and the third time is zekiel 28 3 so 3 times daniel is mentioned obviously Zeke knows Dan and Dan is a high placed official and Zeke is not and Dan is a much older stately man with a great reputation and Zeke is a young kid being brought in years after him Daniel was was obviously there since his youth when he got there about age 15 in 606 and so by the time hits 597 let's do the math a little bit if Daniels carted away and he's about age 15 by 597 what is he he so Daniel is 24 now you're gonna go 24 that means he's young no that means half his life is over in the biblical economy he's a middle-aged man these are people the reason they started having babies at 13 and 14 is they were dead by 42 okay so you have to think in a different lifespan so he's now of course he lives to be in his 80s but he lives twice as long as most people he's as old as dirt the point is that 20 he's 24 by the time Ezekiel is taken into captivity Ezekiel is a younger contemporary now Jeremiah is also a contemporary but he's in that different location and what is probably the most important part of the Book of Jeremiah as it regards Ezekiel I want you to look for a moment hold your finger in the front of Ezekiel and go to Jeremiah 29 and I want you to see the flavor of Jeremiah 29 because in Jeremiah 29 you see a little bit of part of the it's it's part of a condemnation section but it's especially a message to the Exile and I know that because at the beginning at the top of Jeremiah 29 in your Bible it says message to the Exile okay but but here's what it is okay take a look at Jeremiah 29 now these are the words of the letter which Jeremiah the Prophet sent from Jerusalem to the rest of the elders of the Exile the priests the prophets and all the people whom Nebuchadnezzar had taken into exile from Jerusalem to Babylon so you understand what this scroll is you're looking now at I take you back now to an ancient scroll that as we open it the first part says from Jeremiah to all the Jews in Babylon so he'll be in Jerusalem and he's writing to the ex Isles who were in Babylon what's their problem their problem is they've gone through the if you to don't knock it off also thank you - I spent your brother - now you're both spanked how do we live in a foreign land everything we have from the wall tells us how to live in the land under our own kings how do we now live under a foreign King in a pagan environment in a place we weren't even supposed to be the entire ex the way randy reads it in the white spaces is life in plan b it's when you're growing up in a place you don't belong it's not natural to you the whole thing is messed up yeah all of a sudden you're looking around and and this is the person who comes in here who gets saved who says I'm on my third marriage and this child is from my first marriage and this child's from my second marriage and pastor Randy what's the right thing to do about and I say stop Wright was three marriages ago now we're just trying to do lesser of two evils okay we don't even have right and wrong this is life and Plan B he's writing to people who are living in a place they weren't supposed to be so what do you do well you have a couple options as a Christian one of the things you could do is say you're in the wrong place because of your sin your rotten thing okay because that's what some Christians do to people who are down anybody know a Christian like that you've met one okay now what would be a better thing to do a better thing to do would be to express God's how do you deal with it right now oh by the way there's other Christians that will go don't worry it's all gonna be okay you know Christians like that too right you want whatever they've been having for breakfast the point is that the point is that mushrooms won't get you through it you got to know what to do today so let's get to verse two this was after King Jeconiah and Queen Mother the court officials the princes of Judah and Jerusalem the craftsmen and the Smith had departed from Jerusalem see I made it into the Bible here the Smiths had departed from Jerusalem but I think he had in mind the actual workers and artisans so this is after Jerusalem got emptied out this is you might right next to it second Kings 24 it's the period of second Kings 24 and it's after they get emptied out and you might ask yourself hmm how did he get the ladder to them well I'm glad you asked verse 3 the letter was sent by the hand of ella ella saw the son of shaphan and gomorrah the son of Hilkiah whom Zedekiah king Judis sent about to Babylon to Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon saying thus says the Lord of hosts the God of Israel to all the excels whom I have sent into exile from Jerusalem to Babylon okay so Jeremiah establishes who it's from and who it's to he says build houses and live in them plant gardens and eat their produce take wives and become the fathers of sons and daughters take wives for your sons and give your daughters to husbands that they may bear sons and daughters and multiply their and do not increase seek the welfare of the city where I have sent you into exile and pray to the Lord on its behalf for in its welfare you will have welfare this is a huge earth-shattering change in Scripture okay know the interesting thing is when you start reading it right away you go what do you mean marry Babylonians none of them would have ever thought that what they were saying is do we stop marrying among our people you have hundreds of thousands of Jews there should we marry should we continue what do we do we just go and starve do we just stand there and say we refuse to eat we refuse to drink if it's not our homeland we will just dot do we bare our necks and say slaughter us all and Jeremiah says thus says the Lord have a wedding get your kids married continue to have children continue to be a people in a foreign land they have never heard this in the Bible this is new to the Bible as far as they knew they walked out in Chains and assumed that they were heading to their death as far as they were concerned there was no place for a Jew but Judah and the whole game just changed right here but here's what I find interesting it's verse 7 seek the welfare of the king who took you into captivity of the city where you're now living pray for them I want you to turn what has always been about you word I'm now putting you in the world and Plan B and I want you to pray for the people who put you there why because I use them to put you there I want you to to do that for thus says the Lord of Hosts verse 8 the God of Israel do not let your prophets who are in your midst and your dinners deceive you do not listen to the dreams which they dream for they prophesy falsely to you in my name I have not sent them declares the Lord now here's the part that Daniels reading much later for thus says the Lord when seventy years have been completed for Babylon I will visit you and fulfill my good word to you and bring you back to this place for I know the plans that I have for you declares the Lord plans for your welfare and not for calamity to give you a future and a hope how many of you have heard verse eleven it's one of the only verses in Jeremiah people read but it's not by the way I have a wonderful plan for Andrea's life God does have a wonderful plan for Andrea's life but it's not in verse 11 of Jeremiah 29 because in Jeremiah 29:11 what that's about is I have a plan for the future of the Jewish people that's what it says but Randy I love that verse it means so much to me that's fine if you want to do that play Ouija board with the Bible and make it say whatever you want I'm just telling you that's not what it says now is there application for the principle that God has a plan for your life yes see Ephesians 1 there are plenty of places we can get that but don't take it from places that don't say it why because when you get sloppy about how you interpret the Bible what you're telling the next generation of disciples is that it's okay to make up the script don't make up the script does God have a plan for your life yes is it for your destruction no all things work together for his good and that's your best good okay don't walk around with these verses and stick them on your wall like everything that is nice in the Bible I'll just apply to my life you're being unfair to the text don't change the text leave the text be the text I don't want to take away God's plan for your life and I hope you understand I'm not doing that I'm simply saying that people hijack whatever verse sounds good to them it's kind of the butterfly approach oh I like that one that one's sweet I love that verse and they're just kind of dancing through the Bible taking what they want if first eleven means God has a plan for your life then verses 8 and 9 mean don't go to church because they're all lying to you okay yeah you can't do it that way or you're gonna end up in real trouble or at least I'm gonna end up with an empty church the interesting thing is verse 12 then you will call upon me you will come and pray to me and I will listen to you you will seek me and find me when you search for me with all your heart tell me verse 13 tell me who did that who did that Daniel he fell in front of God and he searched with him for all his heart and didn't eat why because that's what God told him to do at the end of the 70 years and the 70 years was coming up and that's why Daniel said I can't do this I've got God whatever it is Oh God I won't eat I won't bathe I won't do anything I'm just waiting for you God why because that's all your heart when he said all your heart he meant all your heart so this is a wonderful link here's what I want you to see why is Jeremiah included in the text of Scripture when most of the prophecies died with the people because a few of them linked Jeremiah to Ezekiel to Daniel to Nehemiah which pushes the story and tells you that what God said here this guy understood what God said there that guy understood what God said there that guy understood and that's how the program moved does that make sense God's Word fits together beautifully I took you to Jeremiah 29 because I wanted you to see that Jeremiah kept a ministry to the broken people of Jerusalem well Ezekiel on the other hand contended with the false prophets that Jeremiah wrote about and it's interesting to me that Ezekiel's job I'm not sure who had the worst job Jeremiah or Ezekiel I can just tell you that I wouldn't sign up for either I don't want to watch my country fall apart and sit and write lamentations and rhythm and blues songs I really don't want to do that by the way there are some preachers that I think are actually really good at that oh I feel bad we all should feel bad it's all getting worse going to hell in a handbasket there goes America that's just not the guy I want to be now the other side of it is Ezekiel on the other hand is getting out while everybody's saying just send me your two dollars and I'll turn it into 500 dollars because the lord has told me if you send me two dollars I can send you about 500 and a hanky and a blest marker you can get this mark just send today what but wait if you act now I'll send you even the eraser to go along with an Ezekiel's got to get up and go hogwash they're ripping you off that's his message okay I want you to feel it by the way when you get down to it the first half of the zekiel collection was given to tear down false hope the first half of this is I need the tear down false hope why because there was in the background a false hope that was being put upon the people of Israel in exile that the Exile was about to be alleviated that they were about to be returned home and always look on the bright side of life it's all going to be wonderful tomorrow just wake up and tomorrow it will all be better and there was this hope and change kind of thing that was being pushed everywhere the interesting thing is that the second half of the book is identifying the truth and showing them from false hope what real hope look like so the second half of the book is going to deal with real hope and you know where where the turning point was the death of his wife it's as though God used Ezekiel to illustrate graphically in his own pain what God wanted to say now here's the question that we asked at the beginning of every prophetic work does God have the right to use my life if that means taking from me those things which are most important to me does he have the right this would be an interactive moment yes do most believers really believe he has the right no in fact we write theologies that say he wouldn't do that but he clearly does because in person after person after person of the Bible he does that now let's talk about what the book contains and then we'll go to a break after we give just a little bit few notes in the front of the book that will help you first of all there are four visions in the book and you should know these four visions they will be the most important part vision number one is one two three and that will be also the call it is his call vision and it's a very important vision that will help you to understand exactly where God is going with the book but it's not the only vision we're going to talk about in the book there's also another one if you go to for instance chapter 8 through 11 there's a second vision and it's in the middle of this 8 through 11 and this is a vision that all relates to the glory of God Jerusalem the temple and the Jewish people all of his visions are glory of God Jerusalem Temple and and his people and so we're gonna take a look at that vision very closely there's another vision that comes from this section in fact the last two visions both come from this section the other one is a very incredibly important one and this one will be come from Jared from Ezekiel 37 Ezekiel 37 1 to 14 and the last one will be Ezekiel 42 48 chapters 40 to 48 and this will be about the restored temple we're gonna look at each of these in detail but these are the four visions you got number one number two number three number four there are four visions in the book but that's not all the book contains it also contains four events and the book the four events of the book include the call in 1 1 2 3 so we keep running into this event 1 call 1 2 3 but that's not the only event the second event you already know about it's the prediction of the profits lost this is event 2 that's the prediction of the loss of his wife in chapter 24 verses 15 to 17 then after he gets through a mourning period event number 3 actually takes place with sort of the renewal of his call a renewed call this is in 33 1 to 20 and I just call it call to the sequel this is his second call so he's called 1 2 3 there's a prediction of his loss he goes through that loss and he's recalled by God because he needs to be recalled and by the way you saw that in Revelation Ezekiel has the same pattern as revelation in the sense that do you remember in Revelation 10 halfway through the book John basically got sick and the the angel said eat the book you're not done yet you got to keep going that's the Ezekiel 33 moment in Revelation 10 it's the same story told in a very real way to reignite his passion I think it's important that we remember that even people that are dedicated to God and God is using can run out of steam you can get to the point where you're just plain sick of doing it and God has to re reignite you the last one is and it's kind of interesting right after this event number 4 happens also in the same chapter it is 33 beginning in verse 21 and it's after he's renewed his call his 21 to 30 3 it is all right now you're called again now let me explain what you're going to do for the rest of the of the prophecies so this is an explanation let me tell the story this way God called the man with a profound vision of himself but he called him to do something that was very hard stand up and preach against false hope and he led him all the way to the point where he married this woman he loved his wife and God predicted by the way your wife is gonna die and when she does she's gonna get sick she's gonna die and you are not to cry you are not allowed and he says this is the biggest thing in my life how can you do this to me and God just says quietly do exactly what I tell you to do but in the pattern of the first 24 chapters he's been told to do some pretty weird things so he's already into that okay God whatever you're doing now he doesn't do it without holding back tears and sucking it up but he does it and a few chapters go by and God explains to him in his second call what that was about but it's not until later then he says here's what I want your life to be about and he turns him outward and he begins to console the people that's the way to tell the story in terms of his own relationship okay so what we've got then are a number of different ways that God opens up and explains himself to people all right so let's let's break it out and say it this way before you go to a break just think of it and conceptualize it in three boxes okay one two three is a call and then there's a series of waves of condemnation or promise judgments the first five years of those are in chapters 4 to 24 and then he gets the prediction that his wife is gonna die and he can't cry then another two years he all he does is collect prophecies concerning the nations around him and in those prophecies he shares them but honestly in chapters 25 to 32 this guy huh is absolutely brokenhearted by the way right in the middle of that section there's actually a scroll stuck in there that doesn't go with the rest of it it was a piece that actually comes from Egypt and was stuck right in the middle of it it's a prophecy to Egypt that's an addendum it's not that it's not his it's that somebody decided that in his papers was this also this prophecy so they stuck it in there it doesn't seem to fit very well but to somebody's idea that was important is it important to God sure because it's there so you'll learn it you'll know it but you'll go wait that's kind of weird why is that there it's almost like right in the middle of his life story they went back 15 years and just dropped it oh by the way he there was this letter in his papers let's put that's and conclude that it's like that now the third box then the third box will be from 25 to 32 we'll give you the kind of the second part of the console the condemnation and the third box will be a consolation it'll be from the recalling of him to the explanation of what he's supposed to do in 33 all the way through 48 and that consolation will be this is what God is going to do for the people that okay is that clear enough I mean the chart may not be clear but is the idea or flow clear good I'm trying not to over complicate the book I want you to see one last thing and then we'll take a break seven times in the book he uses a phrase you should put the phrase in the beginning of the book so you know to look for it seven times in the book the hand of the Lord was upon me the hand of the Lord was upon me let's put it this way seven moves of God or in the book the hand of the Lord was upon me every time the hand Lord was upon him God moved him to do something do you remember seeing the hand of the Lord being upon John in Revelation or Daniel in Daniel twice once in Revelation one and then in our last class in Daniel they were standing in front of a priest figure in Revelation one it's Jesus what happened to John when he saw Jesus what's that he fell down like as one dead Daniel says the same thing happened to him how did they get back up a hand was put upon them I want you to know that phrase the hand of the Lord was upon me because a move of God or a wreath strengthening or recommitment of God as the hand of the Lord was upon me you're going to go through times in your life when you're going to know the hand of the Lord is upon you those are moments when God gives you I'm thinking of one I prize share it with you at some point I was standing in the middle of a question-and-answer session in which somebody asked me a question and I promise you as God is my witness I had no idea I did not know the answer to their question I opened my Bible it fell open to the answer to their question with the question in my handwriting and the answer and all the verses right there with lines on my page and I stood there and gave a brilliant oration of something I have no memory of ever writing the hand of the Lord was upon me in that moment God wanted to use me to say something and I knew it and I knew it because I knew I didn't know it and I knew it because I knew I didn't prepare it numerous times I will have be in the middle of speaking something and you know me I'm scripted I've got in front of me the notes and I'll go off script this is always dangerous because when I go off script this is when I get in trouble but every now and then I'll meet somebody at the door with tears in their eyes saying that was the thing I was waiting for from God I was unaware I didn't know why I pops in your head and you have to quickly evaluate is this a good thing to say does it match what the scripture I'm teaching says if it does sometimes you just say what because the hand of the Lord is upon you I don't have to bring to you you

Channel: One Hour. One Book.

Views: 66,453

Rating: 4.7536392 out of 5

Keywords: GCBI, Dr. Randy Smith, Bible teaching, Bible class, Hebrew, Greek

Id: NOhSrtnBWCs

Length: 51min 59sec (3119 seconds)

Published: Sun Jan 10 2016