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If you’re reading along with us using the Resting at the River’s Edge Reading plans, you’re in the book of Ezekiel. I told Phil a few days ago that I was reading Ezekiel and his response was “Wheels within wheels? I’m sure some day we’ll see Zeke in heaven and say ‘Dude, you got the call and you did the best you could with it, but seeing it – this is something else!’”

In other words, if you can make sense of what Ezekiel saw, you’re doing better than everyone else who has ever tried! I can’t imagine the challenge Ezekiel had in describing what is clearly other-worldly. But one day we will see the unbelievable beings he saw and we will stand (or fall) amazed. What can we take away from a book with such mind-blowing “characters?”

I can’t begin to get my mind around the pictures described by Ezekiel, but I can still gain from reading the book. Here’s just two lessons I take from the first dozen chapters of Ezekiel.

God is…More Than
I struggled with a subtitle here and settled for this generic one – God is More Than. Let me tease it out a bit:

• God is more creative than I can possibly imagine. My mind can’t bring the beings Ezekiel is describing into a cohesive picture, yet God created them from nothing. Imagine the degree of creativity required to create such things! I like it that the God I serve isn’t limited in His creativity. (Note to self: Quit trying to suggest to God how to solve your problems when you’re praying – leave the solutions to His creativity – don’t put limits on His answers to your prayers by asking in a way that causes you to receive less than God’s creativity wants to give you!)
• God is more concerned with details than I sometimes remember. The amount of detail that Ezekiel includes about the beings is commendable – but beyond Ezekiel’s detailed writing is a God who included such detail in His creations. Eyes and wings and wheels and motors and hands and faces and much more. I am certain that no part of the beings occurred by happenstance –there is significance to each element. I don’t understand that significance yet, but I know the God who does. He is patient and kind and He is love. He is trustworthy. So I leave the details to Him for now. He’ll explain them to me when I need to know. For now I can be content to marvel at His ability to create such things.
• God is not from around here – and that’s a good thing. Reading about the whirling wheels and the cherubim who interacted with them (or perhaps were a part of them) makes it clear to me that God didn’t grow up in my neighborhood. There is no amount of influence that could make someone from earth imagine what God has created. The creations are clearly other-worldly, as is the God who created them. It can become easy to think of God as a super-human. He is not. He is from a realm that He can give us insight into but while in this body, we cannot truly know.
• God is the ultimate Commander in Chief. He commands the creatures that are beyond description. He speaks and they respond. There is no hesitation in them. (Another note to self: Learn from the creatures – obey without hesitation!) Imagine the power and authority required to command such creatures!
• God is…more than – More than I can imagine, more than I can understand, more than I can describe. And as such, he is more deserving of my praise than I am able to give. Lord, help me to give you more praise!

God Hates Sin
You don’t have to have read very far in Ezekiel (I’m actually a few days behind in my reading according to our reading plan), to understand how grievous sin is to God. As I read chapters six, seven, eight and beyond, my heart was pierced as I understood what an affront sin is to God. I was also struck by the perspective of the seventy elders who were burning incense to idols in the temple. They say:

“The LORD does not see us; the LORD has forsaken the land.”
Ezekiel 8:12b

Wrong, my friends! The Lord sees, and He is grieved by our sin. Beyond that, however, He will judge sin. Period. Let’s not be like the seventy elders and delude ourselves into believing that God does not see and will not judge. As the Apostle Peter reminded the early Christians:

⁸But do not forget this one thing, dear friends: With the Lord a day is like a thousand years, and a thousand years are like a day. ⁹The Lord is not slow in keeping his promise, as some understand slowness. He is patient with you, not wanting anyone to perish, but everyone to come to repentance.
2 Peter 3:8-9

The Lord sees, but is being patient, giving us and everyone else time to repent before He must come and judge. Peter goes on, reminding the Christians (and us today) that the Lord will come. He follows with an exhortation of how we are to live. I’ll let him write the ending to this blog:

¹⁰But the day of the Lord will come like a thief. The heavens will disappear with a roar; the elements will be destroyed by fire, and the earth and everything in it will be laid bare.

¹¹Since everything will be destroyed in this way, what kind of people ought you to be? You ought to live holy and godly lives ¹²as you look forward to the day of God and speed its coming. That day will bring about the destruction of the heavens by fire, and the elements will melt in the heat. ¹³But in keeping with his promise we are looking forward to a new heaven and a new earth, the home of righteousness.

¹⁴So then, dear friends, since you are looking forward to this, make every effort to be found spotless, blameless and at peace with him. ¹⁵Bear in mind that our Lord’s patience means salvation, just as our dear brother Paul also wrote you with the wisdom that God gave him. ¹⁶He writes the same way in all his letters, speaking in them of these matters. His letters contain some things that are hard to understand, which ignorant and unstable people distort, as they do the other Scriptures, to their own destruction.

¹⁷Therefore, dear friends, since you already know this, be on your guard so that you may not be carried away by the error of lawless men and fall from your secure position. ¹⁸But grow in the grace and knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. To him be glory both now and forever! Amen.
1 Peter 3:10-18

Amen!

This entry was posted on Wednesday, October 7th, 2009 at 8:03 am and is filed under Christian Living, God's Love, God's nature, God's power, Prophecy, Reading through the Bible in a Year. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.