“I brought you to a garden land where you could eat lush fruit. But you barged in and polluted my land, trashed and defiled my dear land. The priests never thought to ask, ‘Where’s God?’ The religion experts knew nothing of me. The rulers defied me. The prophets preached god Baal And chased empty god-dreams and silly god-schemes.
Ezekiel 20:18The Message“‘Then I addressed myself to their children in the desert: “Don’t do what your parents did. Don’t take up their practices. Don’t make yourselves filthy with their no-god idols. I myself am God, your God: Keep my statutes and live by my laws. Keep my Sabbaths as holy rest days, signposts between me and you, signaling that I am God, your God.” See the chapter |
19 Cross References
“Now look: Suppose that this child has a child who sees all the sins done by his parent. The child sees them, but doesn’t follow in the parent’s footsteps— doesn’t eat at the pagan shrines, doesn’t worship the popular idols of Israel, doesn’t seduce his neighbor’s spouse, doesn’t bully anyone, doesn’t refuse to loan money, doesn’t steal, doesn’t refuse food to the hungry, doesn’t refuse to give clothes to the ill-clad, doesn’t live by impulse and greed, doesn’t exploit the poor. He does what I say; he performs my laws and lives by my statutes.
“Do you need to ask, ‘So why does the child not share the guilt of the parent?’ “Isn’t it plain? It’s because the child did what is fair and right. Since the child was careful to do what is lawful and right, the child will live truly and well. The soul that sins is the soul that dies. The child does not share the guilt of the parent, nor the parent the guilt of the child. If you live upright and well, you get the credit; if you live a wicked life, you’re guilty as charged.
He said, “Son of man, I’m sending you to the family of Israel, a rebellious nation if there ever was one. They and their ancestors have fomented rebellion right up to the present. They’re a hard case, these people to whom I’m sending you—hardened in their sin. Tell them, ‘This is the Message of God, the Master.’ They are a defiant bunch. Whether or not they listen, at least they’ll know that a prophet’s been here. But don’t be afraid of them, son of man, and don’t be afraid of anything they say. Don’t be afraid when living among them is like stepping on thorns or finding scorpions in your bed. Don’t be afraid of their mean words or their hard looks. They’re a bunch of rebels. Your job is to speak to them. Whether they listen is not your concern. They’re hardened rebels.
God’s Message: “Because of the three great sins of Judah —make that four—I’m not putting up with them any longer. They rejected God’s revelation, refused to keep my commands. But they swallowed the same old lies that got their ancestors onto dead-end roads. For that, I’m burning down Judah, burning down all the forts of Jerusalem.”
“Your children, the very ones that you said would be taken for plunder, I’ll bring in to enjoy the land you rejected while your corpses will be rotting in the wilderness. These children of yours will live as shepherds in the wilderness for forty years, living with the fallout of your whoring unfaithfulness until the last of your generation lies a corpse in the wilderness. You scouted out the land for forty days; your punishment will be a year for each day, a forty-year sentence to serve for your sins—a long schooling in my displeasure.
“And you continue, so bullheaded! Calluses on your hearts, flaps on your ears! Deliberately ignoring the Holy Spirit, you’re just like your ancestors. Was there ever a prophet who didn’t get the same treatment? Your ancestors killed anyone who dared talk about the coming of the Just One. And you’ve kept up the family tradition—traitors and murderers, all of you. You had God’s Law handed to you by angels—gift-wrapped!—and you squandered it!”
Your life is a journey you must travel with a deep consciousness of God. It cost God plenty to get you out of that dead-end, empty-headed life you grew up in. He paid with Christ’s sacred blood, you know. He died like an unblemished, sacrificial lamb. And this was no afterthought. Even though it has only lately—at the end of the ages—become public knowledge, God always knew he was going to do this for you. It’s because of this sacrificed Messiah, whom God then raised from the dead and glorified, that you trust God, that you know you have a future in God.
Advertisements