Ezekiel 22 Commentary
Jerusalem’s leaders take the lead in wickedness. Religious leaders at the temple of the LORD defile the Creator God – the God whose worship they should be promoting. There is wickedness in the community. Neighbors cannot be trusted. There is bloodshed, extreme sexual immorality, idolatry, and injustice.
Then: “I looked for someone among them who would build up the wall and stand before me in the gap on behalf of the land so I would not have to destroy it, but I found no one.” Verse 20.
Abraham once stood beside the LORD and pleaded for the ‘cities of the valley’. Lot was saved. Moses would pray and the entire nation would escape unhurt on several occasions – only to eventually die. Remember the exclusion from the Promised Land of the same ‘saved’ generation!
Who can stand in the gap? It can never be a human function! And so the sword stays; the punishment remains. Humanity is in desperate times; there is no one to mediate.
But it isn’t a blank space. The good news is that there is a man, the man Jesus Christ who shows up and mediates between God and man. So even in these pages, the mention of the crown’s rightful owner, “to whom it rightfully belongs”, chapter 21, is a look up to the times of the Messiah.
A city has a personality. It can honor the LORD; it can dishonor the LORD. Equally, nations can honor the LORD or dishonor the LORD. Government can initiate and sponsor immoral laws. The saints,(prophets) can be peaceful and suffer no loss of peace about it. Won’t there be one individual distressed about it? Won’t the Spirit within the saint anger because of such things?
Ezekiel’s list of wickedness isn’t shocking anymore. What may be shocking, on the other hand, is the saint’s ‘peace’ in the midst of it all. Your vote, for or against wickedness, this chapter is asking for it. Or, we may be the subject of the vote ourselves. In which case, the command would be, “come out her and be separate”.
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