Ezekiel 20:39

The Message

“‘But you, people of Israel, this is the Message of God, the Master, to you: Go ahead, serve your no-god idols! But later, you’ll think better of it and quit throwing filth and mud on me with your pagan offerings and no-god idols. For on my holy mountain, the high mountain of Israel, I, God, the Master, tell you that the entire people of Israel will worship me. I’ll receive them there with open arms. I’ll demand your best gifts and offerings, all your holy sacrifices. What’s more, I’ll receive you as the best kind of offerings when I bring you back from all the lands and countries in which you’ve been scattered. I’ll demonstrate in the eyes of the world that I am The Holy. When I return you to the land of Israel, the land that I solemnly promised with upraised arm to give to your parents, you’ll realize that I am God. Then and there you’ll remember all that you’ve done, the way you’ve lived that has made you so filthy—and you’ll loathe yourselves.

Cross References

2 Kings 3:13

Elisha addressed the king of Israel, “What do you and I have in common? Go consult the puppet-prophets of your father and mother.” “Never!” said the king of Israel. “It’s God who has gotten us into this fix, dumping all three of us kings into the hand of Moab.”

Proverbs 21:27

Religious performance by the wicked stinks; it’s even worse when they use it to get ahead.

Isaiah 66:3

“Your acts of worship are acts of sin: Your sacrificial slaughter of the ox is no different from murdering the neighbor; Your offerings for worship, no different from dumping pig’s blood on the altar; Your presentation of memorial gifts, no different from honoring a no-god idol. You choose self-serving worship, you delight in self-centered worship—disgusting! Well, I choose to expose your nonsense and let you realize your worst fears, Because when I invited you, you ignored me; when I spoke to you, you brushed me off. You did the very things I exposed as evil, you chose what I hate.”

Matthew 6:24

“You can’t worship two gods at once. Loving one god, you’ll end up hating the other. Adoration of one feeds contempt for the other. You can’t worship God and Money both.

Acts 7:42

“God wasn’t at all pleased; but he let them do it their way, worship every new god that came down the pike—and live with the consequences, consequences described by the prophet Amos: Did you bring me offerings of animals and grains those forty wilderness years, O Israel? Hardly. You were too busy building shrines to war gods, to sex goddesses, Worshiping them with all your might. That’s why I put you in exile in Babylon.

Joshua 24:15

“If you decide that it’s a bad thing to worship God, then choose a god you’d rather serve—and do it today. Choose one of the gods your ancestors worshiped from the country beyond The River, or one of the gods of the Amorites, on whose land you’re now living. As for me and my family, we’ll worship God.”