Through the Bible (Ezekiel 21-23)

it's been really cool just uh seeing how the lord is using this study in ezekiel to meet us right where we're at isn't it amazing you know how the lord speaks to us in his word as we go through the bible just the things that are going on and and i feel in some ways like i'm doing an inadequate job connecting the dots have you ever had something you sense in your heart the lord is showing you but you have a hard time articulating it um have you ever had that you know we're like man i feel like i am saying it but it's not it's just not maybe connecting the way it needs to or should uh because um man the lord has stirred my heart on this and and it really has to do with the the parallel of the people of ezekiel's time and the exact same things that we're doing today in modern times people haven't changed um probably one of the the comments i hear from you know mostly non-believers but sometimes you'll hear this from a believer oh the bible's just an old book of ancient people who had nothing to do with us old stories you know and and people that dismissed the bible is like you know what does it have to do with us who can relate to people 3000 years ago or whatever and i think man what book are you reading that maybe that's the quran maybe you should make sure you got the bible in your hand because the bible man nails us down to the t you know minus the uh you know the ancientisms but you don't even need those things you know like uh there's perfect correlations of of what we're dealing with today and i would say even the issues uh that are current to 2021 if you want to talk about critical race theory or uh black lives matter or uh you know the the kind of the socialism you know and uh social justice that uh that we're trying to see you know happen in america and it's an interesting thing because um really a lot of times the people of israel they were doing what they were doing under the guise of it being really good what they were doing was good when they would worship moloch they thought that was good man it's such a brave thing for a mother to take her baby and sizzle it on the arms of a of a pagan deity we think that it's just like where's you know where's the witch's broom or the pitchfork you know and you know these people were nuts and they were but you have to understand in their culture it was really cool it was the hip thing to do man you have a baby and then you come to the temple of moloch and you just give it to moloch and let it die there on the arms and it was that was the thing and it would have to do with who was hip and prosperous and you know who was open-minded and uh and yet it was just the epitome of evil and in the same way today you know whether we want to connect the dots that's not even hard to do with abortion and the you know the horrible i think that's going to go down as the worst thing if the lord should tarry um i think we're gonna you know you know we our our nation hates our history of slavery and we should slavery was a horrible part of our history and it was it was you know definitely a black um you know uh mark on our society and history and and you know for the you know for the our culture you know we're trying to even deal with it today and and people are wrestling with you know reparations and guilt and white fragility and and white privilege and is that linked to you know even though a lot of our found our you know uh ancestors fought in the civil war for you know you know for freedom and yet it's that's where we don't know what to do with that it's such a horrible thing in our history it's horrible we don't know what to do with it um i think that if the lord tarries which i don't think he will but if he does i think abortion is going to go down worse than slavery because it is you know it's one thing to enslave a bunch of people that's horrible enough but to murder 61 million babies it's it's unthinkable when you really do the math and think about it 61 million since roe versus weighed um nearly approaching 62 million here and you know it's amazing how the people love to say well you know the mother has a right to speak up and her power over home but what about the baby you know like there's just such a lack of logic the logic is is painful um nobody that i've ever heard um speak out pro-choice all the pro-choice people as they like to call it not one of the pro-choices you know people that i hear were aborted not one of them think about that for a second not one pro-choice person was aborted and they didn't have a choice in the matter but uh that's interesting to me it's just stupid the whole thing's ridiculous and and like when you look at medical science and and and all that you think it's just ridiculous that we go into the womb and do surgery on a baby in its first trimester and save its life and we think oh we've saved that precious life and then that same doctor can go into the next room over in uh in some states you know the very end of the birth and uh go in there and dismember a baby and suck it out in the most horrible did you guys see that doctor who had done something like 1700 abortions or something and he was in front of congress explaining he even brought his tools with them and he just calmly in very medical terms said here's what we did here and and he was explaining and you could hear people gasping in the in congress you know like because it was so you know it's one of those things we don't want to talk about but this doctor just brought his tools and here's what they do did you chop this and you suck this out and you and everybody says because it was just it was us having to face our sins it's interesting you know some of these newer things that we're doing culturally it's really interesting it was norm chomsky who said this he said if you want to start a revolution come up with a slogan that nobody can reject so black lives matter who's going to reject that of course black lives matter every you'd be a weirdo to say that that's not true um and there you know i'm sure there's some crazy white supremacist somewhere who believes that black lives don't matter and i know that there is a history in our nation that has that but but you know you have to have a slogan like that to push a whole other agenda of marxism and anti-family you know destructing the nuclear family marxism and all kinds of other political agendas you know nice slogan even social justice social justice is an interesting thing because the word i heard it i think it was john mcarthur said you know the word justice doesn't need an adjective and it's really true but you put the nice little word social justice on there and it's kind of an interesting thing who would reject that who everybody wants social justice of course who would reject that but you know all that to say is is there's all kinds of agendas and sadly uh without really vetting the cause people have jumped on board and fallen for these agendas including the church people that should have known better you see you say brad i don't get the correlation do you understand the people of jerusalem of all the people that should have known better they were the ones the jews god's chosen people by that time they had the law given to them by moses they had the law of god they had the law of moses they had the ten commandments and yet with with the the word in their hands if you would they just started sliding into the world and doing worldly grotesque stuff one of the things that our culture is very big on is you know it's not my fault and i'm a victim black lives matter uh social injustice critical race theory very much those things hinge on it's not my fault it's somebody else who's the oppressor who's oppressing me and i'm the victim and there's the oppressors and the problem is it's this world view that says basically i'm the way i am um so just deal with it but there's there's no wrongdoing of the person individually it's it's a it's a you know social uh you know systemic sort of problem that's made me or put me in the position that i am the problem with that is the bible knows nothing of that even last week we saw in ezekiel chapter 18 that the soul that sins it will die so that the danger of this world view that ever it's everybody else the reason i'm the way i am is you know it's not my fault it's because of everybody else the problem with that is you won't be able to say that in front of god the day you stand before god god will look at you and say what did you do with what i gave you and and you won't be able to say yeah but but those people and they did no the lord will according to ezekiel 18 the soul that sins it shall die don't say sour grapes you know it's my parents fault or or whatever remember that chapter the bible says nope you're gonna have to own it the soul that sins it will die you will have to stand before god someday and that's what i'm most concerned about socialism and black lives matter and critical race theory and social justice as it's called um i i'm concerned that the the society that we live in which is really the world now we're so connected that we don't get it i think it's for that reason we have chapters and verses like we have tonight i hope you brought your kids to sunday school tonight because this is going to be uh rated r maybe rated x really it's pretty bad so uh no we won't fault you if you get up and bring junior to the club if you've got a little kid in here it's pretty brutal these are some of the worst chapters of the bible we're about to read are you ready like bring it on you wait you don't know what you're talking you didn't read ahead i could tell all right but some people would say what we're about to read is just more ezekiel nonsense you know more ezekiel this diatribe against the you know the jews and their rebellion and and you know it you know some people look at this book and they well it's just another chapter about the jews were naughty and god's going to crush them and he's going to use the assyrians he's going to use the babylonians and um and they're going to some most people are going to die somebody knows captivity and you at a real high level you can say yeah that's that's what ezekiel's about but it's about so much more and and people that don't read their bible realizing it's multifaceted and multi-leveled i can see why they say the bible's boring but when you look at the layer upon layer it's like peeling an onion layer upon layer the bible starts to come to life and it's powerful it's not just a bunch of information that's what i'm concerned about is we've become a culture of information did you know that one million one hundred and eleven thousand one hundred and eleven times one million one hundred eleven thousand one one hundred and eleven um did you know if you multiply those two numbers together you know what the answer is it's i can't really say the number the way you're supposed to say it but if you write it out it's one two three four five six seven six five four three two one who would have known did you know that the speaker of the house in england in london the speaker of the house doesn't get to speak it's true did you know that when somebody says man we really gave him the whole nine yards do you know where that came from world war ii the 50 caliber machine gun that they had that fed these the belt with the with the rounds of the 50 cal as it turns out it was 27 feet long and it was nine yards long the belt so they had to bring these you know this box and hook it up and that was it was nine yards of 50 caliber rounds and if you shot that whole thing you gave them the whole nine yards did you know that do you know that more people are killed annually by donkeys than are that in in air crashes from planes it's true donkey does did you know that mel blanc who was the voice of bugs bunny was allergic to carrots brett what are you doing man it's time for a bible study uh well my point is this useless information we are so into that in this world useless information it's all over the internet it's all over social media and we just oh that's that's interesting and we get all the and then we got the book of ezekiel right before us that's living and powerful god's holy word to humanity and a lot of people and i'm preaching to the choir tonight because y'all are here with us studying the bible but a lot of people like what you're gonna you're gonna read the book of ezekiel in chapter 23. but you have to understand these words are powerful words and they're here for us to remember just the truth you know hebrews 4 12 the word of god is living and powerful sharper than any judge's sword you know if you think the bible was just nothing more than ancient trivia then you would just go away and think yeah okay whatever but when you realize this is god's word for us today then you have to search it and say lord what does this mean for us that's our that's our goal tonight say what does this mean for you and me so let's take a look chapter 21 we're going to see ezekiel give us another little story lesson that is a story about a sword if you've been with us ezekiel does pantomime and he does little drama acts and plays and parables and he's speaking to them in creative ways well now he's going to make a themed sort of uh sermon about the sword and you might be tempted to think well this is the sword of the spirit the word of god which you can't make that argument because the sword of the spirit is is um quick and powerful sharper than a church sword but as the word of god is the sword it also is that which judges do you understand that the word is the indictment against humanity so that when a person stands before god before the throne and they'll say it was because they treated me bad the word is going to be okay well let's consult the word which is the indictment and the word says no see the word is the sword that destroys even we as christians we love the word of god as just this our the book that god has given us his love letter to us and it is but you also understand this is an indictment against humanity as well if you rebel against it and so this picture this sword that ezekiel's going to employ and talk about and it's going to be a picture of judgment and wrath let's take a look number one verses 1 through 7 is the sword drawn drawn right out of its sheath here we go verse 1 and the word of the lord came unto me saying son of man set thy face toward jerusalem and drop thy word toward the holy places and prophesy against the land of israel and say unto the land of israel thus saith the lord behold i am against thee and will draw forth my sword out of his sheath and will cut off from the the righteous and the wicked seeing then that i will cut off from the righteous and the wicked therefore shall my sword go forth out of its sheath against all flesh from the south to the north that all flesh may know that i the lord have drawn forth my sword out of its sheath it shall not return any more sigh therefore thou son of man with the breaking of thy loins and with bitterness sigh before their eyes and it shall be when they say unto thee wherefore saith thou thou thou shalt answer for the tidings because it cometh and every heart shall melt and all hands shall be feeble and every spirit shall faint and all knees shall be weak as water behold it come cometh and shall be brought to pass saith the lord god ezekiel is told by the lord i'm going to draw my sword does this sound intimidating picture god going like this is intimidating do you remember when christ comes the second coming of christ very different than the first coming he's coming on a white horse but what's coming out of his mouth a sword it's the sword that indicts it's the judgment against the world in the small local application here this is the word indicting these people because they should have known better they had the sword but now the sword's dropping it's coming out of the sheath and and so how is ezekiel supposed to represent this to the people he's supposed to walk around now going people are going what's up with him [Music] psy and sigh again hey ezekiel uh why are you sighing because the sword's coming down the knees are gonna it's like if you hack someone and kill them their knees just go weak and their body drops that's the imagery here and ezekiel's going it's heavy it's a very very heavy word the sword drawn number one but then we see the sword sharpened in verses 8 through 17. it says in verse 8 and the word of lord came unto me saying son of man prophesy and say thus saith the lord say a sword a sword is sharpened all and also furbished it is sharpened to make a sore slaughter it is furbish that it may glitter should we then make mirth um it can tempeth contendeth the rod of my son as every tree and he that giveth it to be furbished that it may be handled this sword is sharpened and is furbished to give it into the hand of the slayer cry and howl son of man for it shall be upon my people it shall be upon all the princes of the is of israel terrors by reason of the sword shall be upon my people smite therefore upon thy thigh because it is a trial and what if the sword condemn even the rod it shall be no more saith the lord god thou therefore son of man prophesy and smite thine hands together and let the sword be doubled the third time the sword of the slain it is the sword of the great men that are slain which entereth into their privy chambers i have set the point of the sword against all their gates that their heart may faint and their ruins be multiplied ah it is made bright it is wrapped up for the slaughter go thee one way or the other either on the right hand or on the left whether so over thy face is set i will also smite my hands together and will i cause my fury to rest i the lord have said it there's dramatic things going on so the first part the sword drawn ezekiel is supposed to go around sighing now that the sword is sharpened and glistening uh brightly uh ready to go razor's edge that if somebody even raises a rod that says here the rod would just be sliced through because the sword is so sharp um and so what he's supposed to do he's supposed to cry out now cry verse 12 and howl so he goes from sighing to crying and howling because this sword is sharp and ready to roll ready to fall on jerusalem he says in verse 15 i have set the point of the sword against all their gates so you and i know what this point of the sword is and i hope they would get the point but they don't the point is the babylonians are coming and the point of their sword is at the very gate of jerusalem there the gates i should say of jerusalem so this is all very intimidating language and this is ezekiel trying to put it on as heavy heavy as he can and the lord's once again trying to warn the people of what's coming down but you've got number one the sword drawn number two the sword sharpened number three the sword directed toward jerusalem it's verse 18. it says in verse 18 the word of the lord came unto me again saying also thou son of man appoint thee two ways that the sword of the king of babylon may come both twain shall come forth out of one land and choose thou a place choose it at the head of the way to the city a point a way that the sword may come to rava of the ammonites and to judah in jerusalem the defense for the king of babylon stood at the parting of the way at the head of the two ways to use divination or fortune telling he made his arrows bright he consulted with images and he looked in the liver this is a form of idolatry by the way um and the images there the word is probably terrifying which is an interesting uh imagery uh that this you know um this is this king of babylon's doing but he's divining here he's fortune telling he's doing the heebie-jeevy stuff to get you know his directions about what to do and that's what means to look at the liver means to open up and fillet an animal open and gut the animal and sacrifice it and what have you so this is this is what the babylonians are doing verse 22 at his right hand was the divination for jerusalem to appoint captains to open the mouth in the slaughter to lift up the voice with shouting to appoint battering rams against the gates to cast a mount and to build the fort and it shall be unto them as a false divination in their sight to them that have sworn oaths but he will call to remembrance the iniquity that they may be taken therefore because uh therefore thus saith the lord god because you have made your iniquity to be remembered in that your transgressions are discovered so that all your doings your sins do appear because i say that you are come to remembrance you shall be taken with the hand and thou profane wicked prince of israel whose day has come when iniquity shall have end thus saith the lord god remove the diadem and take off the crown this shall not be the same exalt him that is low and abase him that is high i will overturn overturn overturn it and it shall be no more until he come whose right it is and i will give it to him he's talking here to the last king of jerusalem we know him to be zedekiah take off your crown zedekiah and i'm going to not give it to another until one is worthy to take it who is the last king there of israel zedekiah who's the next king that's going to be worthy anybody jesus jesus is the one who's going to be the rightful heir to the throne and he's the only one worthy and it's been a long time since a king has really ruled from jerusalem on the throne when that happens that's called the millennial kingdom and that's what's being referred to in verse 27 until he who's right it is and i will give it to him jesus that's jesus so verse 25 is about zedekiah the king who's losing the throne but there's a there's a bit of language here that's very common to the bible but i need to point it out because this is so much human nature verse 24 um their transgressions are going to be remembered and their transgressions are going to be discovered and it says there in the middle of verse 24 so that in all your doings your sins do appear that's a good thing to remember because somehow these people were convinced that their sins would not come back to haunt them that their sins somehow would be forgotten and that they were somehow pulling it off that's the the dumb part of us as human nature goes we think that we're pulling off but the bible says be sure of this your son will find you out you always get nailed by sin always and if you think you're pulling it off today you're not going to always pull it off you it will catch up to you one way or another i know that sounds very bleak but um that's that's the desperate situation of humanity we're in a horrible situation because your sin will find you out not god will find you out he knew about it all along but your sin will fight now in other words your sin will catch up to you and that's what's really being said here the jews for hundreds of years now have been partying down in jerusalem you know doing their religious things on the temple mount but also doing their pagan things on the same day they would sacrifice a baby to moloch the bible's going to tell us in the next chapter that then they would go and worship at the temple worship jova and they were just so comfortable with their sinfulness and the lord says this man so that all your doings your sins are gonna appear and i'm i see it all the lord says i'm gonna remember all this stuff that's why i love the grace and the mercy of god because when you confess your sin when you repent of your sin he takes your sin and forgets them he remembers your sins no more the bible says man i love that part of god's nature remember that's something you can't do you can't forget stuff is that don't you wish you could forget things why is it that your brain forgets the things you need to remember and you remember the things you wish to forget that's just our brain oh lord why did you do that but the lord's quite the opposite um the lord he can remember what he wants to remember but he can forget what he wants to forget and good news the repentant sinner if if that person goes lord says oh lord blot out my sins and remember them no more the lord is faithful to do that the problem is with the jews here there's no repentance they're still doing their sins thinking that god doesn't see it or at least maybe he's apathetic about it that's the mistake they made and people are making the same mistake today they're still just going off in their sin thinking that hey look nothing's happening nobody knows i alone am the person who knows about my sin but god sees it and it will catch up to you i've got that verse marked in my bible so that all you're doing is your sins do appear that's a true statement i've seen it practically and i know it spiritually to be true how many times does a person think they've pulled it off and then somewhere along the way it's all exposed well you've got the sword drawn the sword sharpened you got the sword directed toward jerusalem but interesting now the sword is going to be directed toward ammon remember the ammonites they were during this time they were the ones who came during jeremiah's time around this time and was messing they were messing around with the jews in jerusalem remember that that little team of soldiers that came and faked like they were friends of zedekiah and everybody but actually they weren't they they came and slaughtered a bunch of jews if you remember that part of the story um this is kind of what we're talking about here verse 28 and thou son of men prophesy and say thus the uh saith the lord god concerning the ammonites and concerning their reproach even say thou the sword the sword is drawn for the slaughter it is furbished to consume because of the glittering whilst they see vanity unto thee whilst they divine a lie unto thee to bring thee upon the necks of them that are slain of the wicked whose day is come when their iniquity shall have an end isn't that interesting that um their iniquity has an end the bible says that there's a day where iniquity has an end i think that's either the most comforting word or the most horrifying word depending on what your perspective is so verse 30 shall i cause it to return into his sheath will i put away my sword is he's saying i will judge thee in the place where thou was created in the land of thy nativity and i will pour out my indignation upon thee i will blow against thee in the fire of my wrath and deliver thee into the hand of the brutish men and the skillful to destroy thou shalt be for fuel to the fire thy blood shall be in the midst of the land thou shalt be no more remembered for i the lord have spoken it um so the ammonites are going to get busted for their horrible treatment of the remnant of the jews that were left there in jerusalem if you remember that part of the story we were in jeremiah well chapter 22 now um speaks more of judgment that the city of jerusalem was headed for judgment and and he's going to sort of help define now again we've been covering this this is why i mentioned so much about this at the beginning of our study is this is where people go oh more judgment more definitive judgment about the jews this is you know painful how much judgment we're talking about but this is judgment that god he's not changed he's still the judge so we need to make sure that we're on the right side of the judge so keep that in mind as we read this but the first part of this chapter if you like to break up chapters and sections verses 1 through 16 is speaking of the cause of judgment the cause of judgment verse 1 moreover the word of the lord came unto me saying now thou son of man will thou judge without judge the bloody city yea thou shalt show her all her abominations remember one of the things you're going to have to picture with ezekiel we see him as a prophet we know he was a priest and he was headed for the priesthood but under captivity now he's working as a prophet but but you almost have to you know shift gears a little bit because throughout the book of ezekiel we lose it a little bit in the english translation but the image is also that ezekiel is almost like a courtroom judge he's actually it's like a judicial sort of situation where where ezekiel's sort of indicting these people there's legal terms being used speaking about how ezekiel is kind of you know judging these people or maybe like an attorney a prosecuting attorney and making his case against the jewish people you got to picture that and especially in this chapter ezekiel sort of takes on that litigation kind of mode so that's what it says there in verse 1 and 2. verse 3 then say thou thus saith the lord god the city of the sheddeth blood in the midst of it that her time may come and maketh idols against herself to defile herself thou i become guilty of thy blood that thou shed and has defiled thyself in thine idols which thou hast made and thou hast caused thy days to draw near and art come even unto thy years therefore have i made their reproach unto the heathen and a mocking to all the countries those that bear pardon me those that be near and those that be far from thee shall mock thee which art infamous and much vexed interesting in verse 2 it says son of man will thou judge will thou judge a bloody city your margin says city of bloods what does that mean city of bloods plural bloods um it's a word that is hard to translate and and that's why we don't use a word we don't say that's the city of bloods unless you're talking about gangs in la the bloods and the crypts or whatever but uh but uh it doesn't work in our vernacular but what it's saying is the city that sheds blood and and it means that it's just bloodletting upon bloodletting about bloodletting that's why it's the word bloods over and over and over again it's it's the shedding of blood over and over and over again that's the idea here and then um the lord says because you're that city that sheds blood um you know it says you've defiled yourself you've you've bloodied the whole city and now you're defiled or you know filthy um now then there's something here that that sort of answers a question do you remember when i asked the question like in a prophecy update when i say why is the whole world becoming more and more anti-semitic why does the world hate the jews and it's really hard to figure it out like there's not a lot of great reasons why people should hate the jews as they do and they've hated them for centuries millennia the jewish people people are always on the chopping block um of society uh and and people treat the jews bad now it's anti-semitism if you if you missed the last couple prophecy updates i've talked about how uh hatred for the jews is on the rise especially in the united states sad to say but this verse that we just read in verse 5 answers the little bit of the question of why that would be all the way back from ezekiel's time because of their utter rebellion against god in ezekiel's time and even to the present day it says here in verse 5 those that be near and those that be far from thee shall mock thee which aren't infamous or better word may be notorious and much vexed that's that's why there's anti-semitism is because in a sense because of their you know rejection of god in the old testament there is a bit of a a hatred that is sort of just on them it's almost like there's a curse upon the jews do you remember in fiddler on the roof you know the the what was his name tevye he's like why don't you choose somebody else for a while or whatever he looks like come on you're we're the chosen people stop choosing us choose somebody else but being the chosen people as they rejected god the world has largely rejected them and and we're seeing that even to this day and there's no good reason why other than you can see that they're in kind of a cursed state now don't forget even though they've blown it as have we um god still has a plan for the jews a plan of mercy a plan of forgiveness and a plan of salvation romans 11 25 all of israel is going to be saved one day so don't make the mistake of a lot of the you know churches around the world that say god's done with the jews and the church has replaced israel that's hogwash don't believe that but it is true the jewish people largely are cursed today and it's really hard to watch um and instead of just saying those jews we should we should be thankful because we're we're sinners just as much as the jews are we deserve the same kind of curse really um but praise the lord we live in an age of grace where we're saved by christ who died on the cross and if a jew wants to accept christ today they can largely they don't but they can just like you and me but but that's a whole nother story this is really where that i think anti-semitism you might even say is kind of like the birthplace of anti-semitism is uh ezekiel 22 5 where they become a vexed notorious mocked people that's really sad verse six behold the princes of israel everyone were in in thee to their power to shed blood in thee or in jerusalem have they set light by father and mother um they didn't listen to their parents as this is what that's actually saying in the midst of thee they have dealt by oppression with the stranger in the jerusalem they have vexed the fatherless and the widow thou hast despised mine holy things and hath profaned my sabbaths uh in thee are men that carry tales to shed blood and in thee they eat upon the mountains in the midst of thee and they commit lewdness some of this we don't recognize if you're not if you're kind of new to the bible there's some stuff here they're like so what they their hot dogs up on the mountaintops what's wrong with that so they went for a hike and had some lunch um you got to understand when they go to the high places and they're eating food they're eating meat that was sacrificed to idols in the high places picture you know pagan altars on the mountaintops where they'd go and worship and do weird heeby gb witchcraft type paganism and they'd eat the food that they were sacrificing to these gods that's that's what's going on they weren't just going for a hike um but verse nine tells tells us they were carrying tails excuse me or slanders lies that caused people to shed blood i hope you understand that your words telling rumors and stuff spreading gossip and stuff it's like shedding blood that's that's what happens here they say there's lies going around and um you know i think that you know gossip and spreading rumors can be bloody i've seen it ruin people so we live in a culture of of that i i fear that our kids are victims of this because of social media you know the bullying that goes on and you know it used to be when i was a kid you'd go to school kids would be mean to you but at least home was safe at least at home you'd go home and you'd have mom and dad sister and brother and it was a safe place home is now where kids are still being attacked on their social media 24 7. and people are saying stuff and you know i i've just heard some really sad stories of what happens to our kids um you know kids that are you know did you see this last week sexting is is becoming a huge thing among grade schoolers grade schoolers um and um and parents have no idea what their kids are doing with their phones but it's i hear these stories all the time of kids that are sexting and sending pictures and then somebody gets all that picture and the kid thinks that only those people will see it but then the kid takes a screenshot and then sends it to the whole school and then and then that kid's ruined for the rest of his life or her life it's just it happens we've even seen suicide locally here of our uh junior highs and high school kids because of those very things it's a huge problem that a lot of adults don't even realize it's even a problem but it has to do with this the tales that are being told that are shedding blood that's the kind of stuff that was going on in jerusalem and then it goes on in verse 10 and these have they discovered their father's nakedness now this is a phrase that if you're with us in the book of leviticus um you're you're uh you're this is not an uncommon phrase but it's a funny thing uncovering someone's name or you know discovering a nakedness person it's a lot like they walked in oh my goodness a naked person uh the discovering nakedness is actually uh usually having sex with a person um and it's just the way that king james put puts it they've discovered their father's nakedness or x-rated stuff is kind of what's going on here um it's not like they accidentally stumbled into their father being naked um i hope you get that on that phrase because that's a phrase all throughout leviticus don't discover your daughter's nakedness don't discover your grandma's nakedness like like it goes on and on and radical but that's what it means you're supposed to wear clothes and not have sex with each other especially within the family incestuous relationship oh is this the bad part brett not even close here we go so i'm just getting ready got to get prepped here um so in verse 10 in thee have they discovered their father's nakedness in thee have they humbled her that was set a fart apart for pollution verse 11 and one has committed abomination with his neighbor's wife and another hath lewdly defiled his daughter in law and another in the jerusalem hath humbled his sister his father's daughter [Music] in thee have they taken gifts to shed blood thou has taken usury and increase and thou has greedily gained of thy neighbors by extortion and have forgotten me saith the lord god this is where you know it you can almost read ezekiel up to this point and go well these people weren't that bad until this chapter you're like that's pretty bad it's like it's hard to get our brains around moloch and sacrificing babies and all that but this is stuff where you know a guy's sleeping with his daughter-in-law and um they're um they're doing creepy creepy stuff sexually and they're greedy and extortion and gossip and and and worse yet they've forgotten god altogether and that's what the lord is saying about these people verse 13 behold therefore i have smitten mine hand at thy dishonest gain which thou has made and at thy blood which hath been in the midst of thee can thine heart endure or can thine hands be strong in the days that i shall deal with thee i the lord hath spoken it and will do it and i will scatter thee among the heathen and disperse thee in the countries and will consume thy filthiness out of thee and thou shalt take thine inheritance in thine self in the sight of the heathen and thou shalt know that i am the lord and this is part of that diaspora the scattering of the jews for 2000 years it's all part of this narrative of ezekiel verse 17 brings us to that second section first section verses 1 through 16 we've seen the cause of judgment but now we see the means of judgment the means verse 17 and the word of the lord came unto me saying son of man the house of israel is to me become dross they're all uh all they are brass and tin and iron and lead in the midst of the furnace they are even the dross of silver um and it says verse 19 therefore thus saith the lord god because you are all become drows behold therefore i will gather you in the midst of jerusalem as they gather silver and brass and iron and lead and ten into the midst of the furnace and blow the fire upon it to melt it so will i gather you in my anger and in my fury and will leave you there and melt you yea i will gather you and blow upon you the fire of my wrath and you shall be melted in the midst thereof as silver is melted in the midst of the furnace so shall ye be melted in the midst thereof and you shall know that i the lord have poured out my fury upon you many of you are familiar with this when you see the process of purifying metals like silver uh silver and certain you know ore and stuff can have all kinds of impurities but when you melt it in the furnace all those uh things are separated out and when you purify silver the drose is all the junk stuff that sort of starts to surface and you can even kind of scoop it out uh to make the silver really a pure silver um and the other stuff is just junk and you throw it away that's what the lord is saying you're not silver at all you're just a bunch of dross you're the junk that the judgment's gonna reckon as just trash that's pretty pretty heavy word given to the people here but it's out of his fury he's doing this the third section of this chapter and final section is the recipients of god's judgment number three verses 23-31 it says in the word of lord came unto me saying son of man say unto her jerusalem thou art the land that is not cleansed nor rained upon in the day of indignation there is a conspiracy of her prophets in the midst of thereof like a roaring lion ravening the prey they have devoured souls they have taken the treasure and precious things they have made her many widows in the midst thereof her priests have violated my law and have profaned mine holy things they have put no difference between the holy and the profane neither have they showed difference between the unclean and the clean and have hid their eyes from my sabbaths and i am profaned among them her princes in the midst thereof are like wolves ravening the prey to shed blood and to destroy souls to get dishonest gain and her prophets have dobbed them with untempered mortar seeing vanity and divining lies into them saying thus saith the lord god when the lord hath not spoken the people of the land have used oppression and exercised robbery and have vexed the poor and needy yea they have oppressed the stranger wrongfully and verse 30 i sought for a man among them that should make up the hedge and stand in the gap before me for the land that i should not destroy it but i found none therefore have i poured out mine indignation upon them i have consumed them with the fire of my wrath upon their own way have i recompensed upon their heads saith the lord god the recipients of the judgment are the four people we looked at on sunday the the pr prophets the priests the princes and the people uh there's a nice alliteration for you right out of the bible um those four p's uh are all guilty and we saw and looked at on sunday verse 30 was kind of our main text that the lord was looking for someone who was willing to stand in the gap and sad sad sad there was no one to do so and we looked at how we're living in the same kind of day of ezekiel and i wonder if the lord is looking for those who would stand in the gap that means to intercede on behalf of a very sinful wretched people there was no one so the lord crushes jerusalem and we need to be those standing in the gap if you missed that i think it's another important part of this understanding the heart of the lord and what we should be doing in days like we live in today chapter 23 hold on to your hat we have a little story of two girls one girl's name is a whole a holla uh and the other girl's name is a holy bab a hola and a holiba and they're not holy whatsoever let's take a look here we go and again these two girls are an idiom a picture of israel specifically jerusalem and samaria we'll talk about that first one says the word of lord came again unto me saying son of man there were two women the daughters of one mother and they committed whoredoms in egypt and committed whoredoms in their youth and their were their breasts pressed and they bruised the teats of their virginity i told you verse 4 and the name of them was a holla and the elder and a holy boy her sister and they were mine and they bear sons and daughters thus were their names samaria is a holla and jerusalem is a holy ba okay now what's with with us okay we got this already we're realizing these two daughters are a picture and they're called um women that are doing you know whoredoms or prostituting themselves is the idea and the the the word ahola it's interesting it means his tent or their tent and a holiba means my tent or my tabernacle now this is interesting because um when we talk about the the samaritans who were the samaritans and where is samaria samaria yeah where some area some area i don't know samaria samaria is where the samaritans lived and the samaritans were people that were sort of half breeds um from when the assyrians attacked the northern ten tribes over a hundred years earlier the syrians you know crushed the northern ten tribes took them and half of them were taken out or most of them were taken off into captivity hooks in their noses um but the small remnant got sort of a mixed bunch of people sort of half jew half assyrian and they became the samaritans and the jews hated the samaritans from that day forward so that's when jesus he tells the story of a good samaritan the jews thought there's no such thing good samaritan is an oxymoron jumbo shrimp you know microsoft works um so so when jesus talked about a good samaritan it blew them away so in a way if you're hearing ezekiel people go okay one represents samaria and she's a prostitute and they would all say yeah pretty much that's what they would say but then a holiba is jerusalem and they're going to know what we're a holy book and and this is the point ezekiel's going to say you know um this woman a hola she was a and a prostitute and this woman a holy ba is a and a prostitute just the same and the jews living in jerusalem would have freaked out at that so you have to understand that it'd be god saying you guys are just as bad as the samaritans maybe worse and this is the big splash of cold water ezekiel's trying to give them but he gets very graphic verse five and a whole ahola played the harlot when she was mine and she doted on her lovers and the assyrians her neighbors which were clothed with blue captains and rulers all of them desirable young men horsemen riding upon horses thus she committed her whoredoms with them with all them that were chosen men of assyria and with all on whom she doted with all their idols she defiled herself neither left she her whoredoms brought from egypt for in her youth they lay with her they bruised the breasts of her virginity and poured their whoredom upon her wherefore i have delivered her into the hand of her lovers into the hand of the assyrians upon whom she doted these discovered her nakedness they took her sons and daughters and slew her with the sword and she became famous or literally infamous among women for they had executed judgment upon her so that's that's a whole lot not a great story this bruising of the breast means it was sort of like she was giving herself sexually but they also were fondling her to the point of like a crazy abusive sexual relationship and they were abusing her so this picture is about as ugly as it gets and yet now we move over in verse 11 to a holy boy and the holy bi is a representative of who jerusalem here we go and when her sister a holy boss saw this she was more corrupt in her inordinate love than she and in her whoredoms more than her sister in her whoredoms now pause just for a second one of the things about sinfulness and this is something that you gotta know and this is a hard one because i'm going to say it but i have a hunch a lot of us are not going to get it but my sin on me does not look that bad my sin on you oh it's disgusting when i see you sitting oh i'm disgusted i can't believe and then my said i mean that's not that bad hey people make mistakes like have you noticed this this is this is the way of the jew at this time they would say those samaritans horrible wretched sinners and god's saying uh you guys are worse and the jews in jerusalem say no we're not and god's saying no you are worse it's an amazing part of human nature to sort of dismiss our sins as not disgusting by the way when do you notice that your sins are disgusting when you are caught when you've been pinned down sometimes after the very act of sin you realize how disgusting it really was but while you're doing it hey i'm not that bad it's not i'm not a samaritan i'm not that bad but the lord is saying no you guys are worse jerusalem is worse than a hola a holiba is way worse that's something for you and me to remember the reason why is because you know i i marvel sometimes at the way we look at each other and our enemies even oh they're horrible sinners i can't believe it but i wonder if we're making that most fundamental error of seeing someone else's sin on them and going ew but failing to see the grotesqueness of our own sin the the doing of that when you realize how horrible your sins are it makes you become very gracious and very merciful to others who are caught up in sin um usually the person that's self-righteous i'm glad i'm not like that person because they're a horrible sinner usually that's a person that has not recognized that they stink they stink of sin just like everybody else and they're the last one to know it um the old saying the whole world stinks when you have limburger cheese on your mustache [Laughter] it's true the whole world stinks ah they're sinners they're hybrid no you're the stinky one you're the one who stinks uh takes one to no one you know uh that's the thing but but here god is given this wake-up call to jerusalem saying you're worse than samaria this would have been a shocker for the jews to hear this from ezekiel so verse 12 she a holiba the jerusalem woman she doted upon the assyrians her neighbors captains rulers clothed most gorgeously uh horsemen riding upon horses all of them desirable young men then i saw that she was defiled and they took both one way uh she decided you know herself just like the other sister to go after the whoredoms if you would is what she's saying verse 14 and that she increased her whoredoms for when she saw men portrayed upon the wall the images of the chaldeans portrayed with vermilion or scarlet girded with girdles upon their loins you mean the men were wearing girdles is that attractive to these women the girdle is a belt that would hold all their weaponry and their gear was very masculine it's a bad word the girdle you're you're all thinking oh they were working worrying about their shape no they were they were carrying weapons and it made them look manly and studly so the you know she was taken with them um verse 15 girded with girdles upon their loins exceeding uh in died attire upon their heads all of them princes to look after the manner of the babylonians of chaldea the land of their nativity and as soon as she saw them with their eyes she doted upon them and sent messengers unto them into chaldea and the babylonians came unto her into the bed of love and they defiled her with their whoredom as she was polluted with them and her um her mind interesting way of saying it was alienated from them this is another way of saying once she started you know having sexual relations with them she lost interest in them this is an interesting thing about sin once you do the sin you start to see how disgusting it really is and that's where it starts right here in verse 17 she's alienated from them so verse 18 she discovered her whoredoms and discovered her nakedness when my mind was alienated from her like as my mind was alienated from her sister yet she multiplied her whoredoms in calling to remembrance the days of her youth wherein she had played the harlot for the land of egypt for she doted upon their paramours whose flesh is as the flesh of asses whose issue is like the issue of horses thus thou callest to remembrance the lewdness of thy youth in bruising of thy teats by the egyptians for the paps of thy youth now if you look around anybody with a red face it's because they have an niv version but i have to say the niv makes it a little clearer i'll read verse 20 in the niv it says she lusted after her lovers whose genitals were like those of donkeys and whose emission was like that of horses like you say brett is this the bible uh i didn't color the sunday school picture when i was a kid uh this this wasn't in sunday school no and a good thing too um this this is a chapter you say brett why does the bible do this like why why what's the point um well remember this book is not trivia this book isn't you know 1 million one hundred eleven thousand one hundred and eleven times one million it's not that this book has stuff that actually is life and death heaven and hell and this is is god revealing to the people just how horrible the mindset of jerusalem had become and and the reason i read that niv is not for us to have a good laugh the reason i read the niv version of that is to realize wow god is using strong imagery and language to show just the insane rebellion and the grotesqueness of sin by the way whenever you read stuff that's really gross or violent in the bible usually it's linked to the topic of sin sin destroys sin is ugly sin stinks sin wounds and hurts sin brings about sorrow sin brings about sadness here's god a loving god saying don't do this stuff oh i want to do this stuff it looks like fun don't do it it stinks it's horrible but the jews just for centuries now have just blown off god altogether and now god's using this strong language saying look at yourselves look what you're into look what you're doing it's almost like here ezekiel the prophet i wonder if him saying this stuff would have shocked the people like what prophet ezekiel you're saying what did we hear you right what you said that this woman who represents jerusalem what she was into yep um and this was meant to to be the wake up call but sadly we know to no avail well the lewdness verse 21 um of her youth uh that was that was the now by the way some of this has to do with the story if you're if you know the story that we went through in uh jeremiah some of the stuff you know we're talking about remember when they went to the egyptians for help even isaiah talked about this or they were trying to buddy up with the babylonians and they became a vassal state and you know like this is all talking about how they were playing the game with these other nations fornicating themselves and getting into their idolatry and all this other stuff and and and so even though this is a very sexual uh horrific sort of example you do recognize this is the story of what they did and and you could take some interesting parallels if you really wanted to that are kind of actually strikingly uh exacting of what they were doing even though it's horrible imagery well now verse 22 it says therefore o a holy ba thus saith the lord god behold i will raise up thy lovers against thee from whom thy mind is alienated and i will bring them against thee on every side the babylonians and the chaldeans piqued and showa and all the syrians with them all the of them desirable young men captains and rulers great lords and renowned all of them riding upon horses and they shall come against thee with chariots wagons wheels and with an assembly of people which shall set against the buckler and shield helmet round about and i will set judgment before them and they shall judge thee according to their judgments and i will set my jealousy against thee and they shall deal furiously with thee they shall take away thy nose and thy ears and thy remnant shall fall by the sword yeah that's what it sounds like they're gonna chop off your noses and your ears and they did do that by the way they will your remnant shall fall by the sword they shall take thy sons and thy daughters and thy residue shall be devoured by fire they shall also strip thee out of thy clothes and take away their thy fair jewels thus will i make thy lewdness to cease from thee and thy whoredom brought thee from the land of egypt so that thou shalt not lift up thine eyes unto them nor remember egypt anymore for thus saith the lord god behold i will deliver thee in the land into the hand of them whom thou hatest into the hand of them whom thy mind is alienated and they shall deal with thee hatefully and shall take away all thy labor and shall leave thee naked and bear and nakedness of thy whoredom shall be discovered both thy lewdness and thy whoredoms i will do these things unto thee because thou has gone a whoring after the heathen and because thou art polluted with their idols thou hast walked in the way of thy sister therefore will i give her cup unto thine hand bible speaks of the cup is what you got coming the same cup that you know hola had a holy bo is going to get it's but it's interesting isn't it that the the cup that's talked about here makes me think of the garden of gethsemane because when jesus said oh lord if it'd be possible let not this cup you know he was trying to say i don't want to drink of this cup but it's what was coming to him but why was that cup coming to him well it's an amazing picture because here a holy bar and a whole drink the cup but jesus drinks the cup and it's the same cup the cup of sinfulness and suffering but jesus never sinned so why did he drink the cup because our sins when jesus drank of the cup of suffering it was because of us and he did it in our place like a whole lot and holy but drank the cup and so they got crushed jesus drinks the cup so that we don't have to um i love that cup the cup of suffering of christ is why we're saved that's what makes we think of verse 31 verse 32 thus saith the lord god shalt thou drink of thy sister's cup deep and large thou shalt be laughed to scorn and had in derision it containeth much thou shall be filled with drunkenness and sorrow with the cup of astonishment and desolation with the cup of thy sister samaria thou shalt even drink it and uh suck it out and thou shalt break the shards thereof and pluck off thine own breasts for i have spoken it saith the lord god therefore thus saith lord god because thou has forgotten me and cast me behind thy back therefore bear thou thy lewdness and thy whoredoms the lord said moreover unto me son of man without judge aholah and a holy book yea declare unto them their abominations they have committed adultery and blood is in their hands and with their idols have they committed adultery and have also caused their soul their sons whom they bear unto me to pass for them through the fire to devour them moreover this they have done unto me they have defiled my sanctuary the same day and have profaned my sabbaths for when they had slain their children to their idols then they came the same day into my sanctuary to profane it and lo thus have they done in the midst of mine house wow this is where he says one one minute they're sacrificing their children on moloch the next minute they're going in into the temple and they're defiling it god says i'm not gonna i'm not gonna stand by and let that happen again if you think abortion is different than this you need to look at what we're doing it's the same only worse because we're doing by the millions and millions and millions and i think that we're going to have to answer for that apart from salvation through the grace of jesus christ that's the only salvation we have is through jesus well verse 40 and furthermore that you have sent for men to come from far unto whom a messenger was sent and lo they came for whom thou diswashed thyself painted thy eyes deck thyself with ornaments and statist upon a stately bed and a table prepared before it whereupon thou has set mine incense and mine oil and a voice of multitude being at ease was with her and with the men of the common sort were brought sabians from the wilderness which put bracelets upon their hands and beautiful crowns upon their heads then i said unto her that was old in adulteries will they now commit whoredoms with her then she with them yet they went in unto her as they went in into a woman that played the harlot and so they they in unto ahola and unto a holiba the lewd women and the righteous men they shall judge them after the manner of adulteresses and after the manner of women that shed blood because they are adulteresses and blood is in their hands for thus saith the lord god i will bring up a company upon them and will give them to be removed from that spo and spoiled and the company shall stone them with stones and dispatch them with their swords and they shall slay their sons and their daughters and burn up their houses with fire thus will i cause lewdness to cease out of the land that all women may be taught not to do after your lewdness and they shall recompense your lewdness upon you and you shall bear their sins of their idols and you shall know that i am the lord god well brett that's just to find how to do i came to a wednesday night and what a horrible chapter thanks a lot well it's the bible folks um and again you have to say well the lord is wanting us to get the message that um who this is horrible horrible ugly brutal imagery um you say that's just kind of depressing but you got to always remember the redemptive part there in john chapter four here's where i find the redemption there in john chapter four jesus turns to the disciples and say you guys we must needs go through where samaria and jesus went to samaria and found a woman at the well of samaria now if you don't know your bible if you've not really studied that most scholars believe that woman to be a prostitute and there's a couple bits of evidence we know she was at least an adulterer and maybe what we might call a floozy part of us believe she was an adulteress because of the time of day she was at the well the bible specifically says with time and in those days they had very specific social times for the wealthy people to go for the trashy people the homeless and a time for the prostitutes to go to the well and it just so happens this woman is at the well at the time where the lowest of the low go there so jesus goes to the well at that time isn't that something and jesus goes and tells this woman hey woman give me something to drink oh well how is it that you being a jew she knew that jews hated samaritans how is it that you being a jew asked of me a woman of samaria to give you something to drink well just said if you knew who was asking for you to give a drink you'd be wanting to drink the water that he gives because he gives a drink that is a drink of that spring's everlasting life well you don't have anything to draw out of the well how are you going to give me something to drink and jesus said i am that drink i am that water of life i am the one that's gonna give you the water that is gushing forth out of your belly torrents of living water jesus talked about this over and over again in his ministry and she said i want that and she perceived that he was a prophet at that point and when did she really perceive you as a prophet well as when jesus said go and go and tell your husband and then i'll we'll talk further oh i have no husband and jesus said oh you've spoken well that you have no husband because you actually have five husbands and the one you're with right now is not your husband so if you didn't think she was kind of an adulteress before now you kind of know wow she's in those days having five husbands and the one you're living with right now well according to the bible that's adulterous type behavior this is an adulterous woman of samaria let's just call her a hoba because that's that's the picture the jews would have hated her because she was a samaritan and a prostitute they would have hated her but jesus the disciples were freaked out why is jesus going to samaria to talk to this woman at the well they were totally freaked out by this but jesus talks to her and she says i perceive thou art a prophet but i love it because she came to that well that day to get water from a well but by the end of the story it says she left her water pots the thing that she came for she could care less about at that point after having met jesus the messiah because remember she finally perceives that he's the one she says there's one that's going to come that's supposed to be the messiah and jesus said i that speaketh unto thee and he she left her water pots pierre goes back into town and tells the whole town now this cracks me up she goes in there announcing hey you guys i just met a man who just told me everything i've ever done i wonder if all the men of the city like everything this prostitute of samaria everything he told me everything and the whole town was going to come out and see jesus the messiah it's an amazing story that jesus would go to samaria to begin with but see that's the redemptive part i hope that the ugliness of sin comes out of this study tonight the stench of sin because you know what did you see the last part of this chapter where they would come and gussy themselves up painting their faces and having fancy robes and clothes and that's part of this chapter the scarlet threads that they were wearing and there was a beautification of ugliness that's what we do with sin today we love to take our sin and package it in hollywood we love to take our sin and package it up in popularity or an instagram account that looks really cool and you know you you know we we packaged sin to look cool that's what they were doing but the lord is saying no it's ugly and it stinks and and your sin separates me from you and so god is showing the jews how horrifying their sin really is chapter 23 is about as potent as it gets when it comes to god saying you want to know what your sin is just look at a hola and a holiba chapter 23 of ezekiel and you you might want to just throw up after that chapter but the good news is that's why christ came to drink the cup of suffering that a holy bar and a whole had to drink we don't have to drink it why because christ drank of that cup christ came to samaria the woman at the well christ was the one who redeemed us back to god the father so even though this chapter is dark and brutal it just once again does what the book of galatians says the old testament law it's a school master that drives us to jesus christ chapter 23 of ezekiel drives me to jesus it makes me want to say oh lord forgive me for my stinky sins wash me in your blood save me by your grace and take me back into the fold of the house of god i hope that that that if there's ever a chapter in the bible that makes one repent of their sins chapter 23 of ezekiel should be that chapter so may the lord give us ears to hear what the spirit would say tonight to the church in jesus name let's pray lord we recognize our own humanity and sinfulness in these chapters lord we see that humanity is done so badly and we've sinned against you and and lord we look at the ugliness of even what we've done in our nation as an american nation lord we've become the the chiefest of sinners um the number one um group that pushes pornography on the world we've been the number one group of what excess is like and greed and and treating people badly and arrogance and pride lord we have sinned against you and i pray lord that we would see the ugliness of that lord we know that you spent great pains to talk through ezekiel for those people in that day but we can't help but think that these chapters are largely to remind us of our own failure and and how thankful we are lord that while we were yet sinners even to the outermost your word says while we were yet sinners you died on the cross for our sins and you wash us clean lord thank you for your grace and your forgiveness help us to be a repentant bunch lord put within us a hunger and a thirst after righteousness lord just to walk after your truth and to put away sinful grotesque things so help us lord help us not to be self-righteous help us to be humbled in light of our wretchedness humbled but also joyful knowing that you've washed us clean and you make within us a brand new creation how thankful we are in jesus name amen

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Keywords: Brett Meador, Bible, Church, Teaching, Study, Christian, Jesus, Oregon, Through the Bible, Athey Creek, Athey Creek Church, Athey Creek Christian Fellowship

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Length: 75min 50sec (4550 seconds)

Published: Wed Jun 09 2021