What this signifies is the earth's last empire: the final game of thrones! We know that once a peace agreement is in place, there will be some 3 and 1/2 years of peace till one anti-christ from Babylon will want to take his seat as leader of the world.
In Ezekiel the Holy Spirit is active and authority is there to relay without a doubt that which will involve, not only Israel but the entire world!
What I love about Ezekiel is that he had to be ready as the watchman
to warn others!
Ezekiel 3:8-21 NKJV 8 "Behold I have made your face strong against their faces, and your forehead strong against their foreheads. 9 Like adamant stone, harder than flint, I have made your forehead; do not be afraid of them, nor be dismayed at their looks, though they are a rebellious house." 10 Moreover He said to me: "Son of man, receive into your heart all My words that I speak to you, and hear with your ears. 11"And go, get to the captives, to the children of your people, and speak to them and tell them, 'Thus says the Lord GOD,' whether they hear or whether they refuse." 12 Then the Spirit lifted me up and I heard behind me a great thunderous voice; "Blessed is the glory of the LORD from His place!"
So Ezekiel is told his forehead is now hard like adamant stone harder than flint to repel that from a rebellious speaking and acting people. He is told of a people rebellious who will not hear.
The rest of the chapter relates that Ezekiel himself will be a sign through the means of being struck dumb. The only words that he could speak were what God gave him to say by His Holy Spirit. This was how the people would know that God was speaking through the Prophet! This also shows that the servant of God is a watchman sent to warn the people. What God dwells on is sin; the prophet is to warn them of their sins. In the reading there is an element of warning to them of what is coming, but this warning message also has a personal and individual aspect to it. It is not just telling the world, that the Tribulation is coming but it also relates of the coming of Jesus Christ!
There is the part of "show My people their sins" that in effect, the prophet Ezekiel is speaking by saying .........."Look here, you perverts. What you are doing is way out of line and is not the way it should be! This is the way God has said for righteous behavior. You should change. Repent now!"
Yes, the prophet Ezekiel was supposed to deal with the bitterness, the anger, and the astonishment that had been building inside him for the seven days. God tells him, "This is how you channel that attitude and those emotions within you. This is how you act in a godly manner: You preach a warning message, as a watchman."
It is like right now all around the world people are talking, and even screaming about global warming! And in truth, there is no warming, but s that of the earth readying itself to receive the Lord of Glory, the consuming fire ....for the earth will worship Jesus whether we do or not! Those stones will cry out with praise when man sits alone trying to figure out what is going on with the earth and with people who speak with a un-intelligible speaking. Those rocks will give heave to make a land slide, those fire driven volcanoes will belch out more and more molten lava to give praise to God Almighty! And do we give any voice to the same amount of praise and expect to fire for HIM in these last days?
Ezekiel was coming into conflict with the people. No doubt, people were going to have some attitude. And certainly people do not want to hear such messages of warning. They are not interested in hearing where things are going from bad to worse and especially finding when they are the personally responsible party.
Yes, being a watchman on the wall is a message only the watchman himself will give to the people. And in that message, he too will have to channel the things like anger, bitterness, and astonishment that builds within as he who prays for people outside of their own family! You cannot of the world pray for the world, but outside of the world, you pray for sin to be seen in men's eyes where their hearts are pricked and they have a willingness to hear God speak! As the watchman you cannot make people listen, so anger can build. But channeled toward God in praise, we become like those volcanoes that light up the night and the darkness in the world.
Yes, there is a Game on within the world. What country and what leader will take the lead role? All is up for grab! Everyone desires to be number 1! For those who choose to lie their way around situations, creating pandemonium in the streets with a single agenda on their heart and then they sneek through passages in secret meetings and speak things that changes nothing but still brings destruction like we see today in certain large cities of the U. S. have we the lamenting spirit?
Each individual on this earth has a responsibility and especially if they have heard the word of God. Repentance must come in each of us for society to change. I remember how people came for awhile when the Twin Towers in New York were hit September 11, 2001! Yes, some people came for about two weeks, asked for prayer and when the smoke cleared and the ash was removed, the people went back to living their lives as they saw fit!
What stands out, yes what is even more astonishing, is that what the prophet Ezekiel will speak will fall on deaf ears. So he must have a forehead like flint. He is the undaunted, the courageous spirit to keep repeating the same message until he dies! Are we willing to give that message? For all things are coming to a head this year and if we do not turn and repent to see God and His purpose for our lives....then kiss it good-bye! We have much to look forward to in the new year of 2021. But people are choosing to ignore what is going on in the world today. They desire to have like it was in those good days before Covid-19!
Ezekiel 14 :1-23 Now some of the elders of Israel came to me and sat before me. 2 And the word of the LORD came to me, saying, 3 "Son of man, these men have set up their idols in their hearts, and put before them that which causes them to stumble into iniquity. Should I let Myself be inquired of it at all by them? 4 Therefore speak to them, and say to them, 'Thus says the Lord GOD: "Everyone of the house of Israel who sets up his idols in his heart, and puts before him what cause him to stumble into iniquity, and then comes to the prophet, I the LORD will answer him who comes, according to the multitude of his idols, 5" that I may seize the house of Israel by their heart, because they are all estranged from Me by their idols." 6 "therefore say to the house of Israel, ' Thus says the Lord GOD: "Repent, turn away from your idols and turn your faces away from all your abominations.
Ezekiel 14:7 "For anyone of the house of Israel or of the strangers who dwell in Israel, who separates himself from Me and sets up his idols in his heart and puts before him what causes him to stumble into iniquity, then comes to a prophet to inquire of him concerning Me, I the LORD will answer him by Myself. 8 "I will set My face against that man and make him a sign and a proverb and I will cut him off from the midst of My people. Then you shall know that I am the LORD." 9 " And if the prophet is induced to speak anything, I the LORD have induced that prophet and I will stretch out My hand against him and destroy him from among my people Israel. 10 "And they shall bear their iniquity; the punishment of the prophet shall be the same as the punishment of the one who inquired, 11" that the house of Israel may no longer stray from Me, nor be profaned anymore with all their transgressions, but that they may be My people and I may be their God, says the Lord GOD."
Ezekiel 14:12 The word of the LORD came again to me, saying: 13 "Son of man, when a land sins against Me by persistent unfaithfulness, I will stretch out My hand against it; I will cut off its supply of bread, send famine on it and cut off man and beast from it. 14 Even if these three men, Noah, Daniel and Job, were in it, they would deliver only themselves by their righteousness," says the Lord GOD. 15 "If I cause wild beasts to pass through the land, and they empty it and make it so desolate that no man may pass through because of the beasts, 16 " even though these three men were in it, as I live," says the Lord God, "they would deliver neither sons nor daughters; only they would be delivered, and the land would be desolate. 17 "Or if I bring a sword on that land and say, 'Sword go through the land' and I cut off man and beast from it, 18 "even though these three men were in it, as I live," says the Lord God, 'They would deliver neither sons nor daughters, but only they themselves would be delivered.
Ezekiel 14:19 "Or if I send a pestilence into that land and pour out My fury on it in the blood and cut off from it man and beast, 20 "even though Noah, Daniel and Job were in it, as I live" says the Lord GOD, "They would deliver neither son nor daughter; they would deliver only themselves by their righteousness."
Ezekiel 14:21 For thus says the Lord GOD: "How much more it shall be when I send My four judgments on Jerusalem -----the sword and famine and wild beasts and pestilence---to cut off man and beast from it? 22 "Yet behold, there shall be left in it a remnant who will be brought out, both sons and daughters; surely they will come out to you and you will see their ways and their doings. Then you will be comforted concerning the disaster that I have brought upon Jerusalem, all that I have brought upon it. 23 " And they will comfort you, when you see their ways and their doings, and you shall know that I have done nothing without cause that I have done it," says the Lord GOD.
God's answer and judgment against those who worship idols was for their good so that His people might not continue to be far from Him. Idols causes man to be alienated from God! In In Romans 1:18-32 in the New Testament reminds us that God the Lord will eventually abandon people to their corrupt passions. The Lord GOD would send false prophets to tell them what they wanted to hear rather than what they needed to hear. So if God would do that to Jerusalem, would He not also do that to the church? Would not God want men to be about God's business and know Him as God?
Noah, Daniel and Job were righteous men. They were known as those with a righteous behavior in the midst of a corruption in a generation. The only way they prevailed in those corrupted times was because of their righteousness. What each man held in that moral responsibility, they held to themselves and it could not be transferred to any other people including their children.
S Sword, plague, famine and even dangerous animals are named among that which brings punishment to a people. The sword is war; and we can see a civil war today that resembles what was going on like back in the day of our president Abraham Lincoln. There has been famine in some regions where crops failed and even a plague appeared, but God did not sent it, but He certainly allowed it!
These men of Israel came to the prophet to know what God was speaking, but in their inquiry they held to their idols. And God revealed this to the prophet Ezekiel. It was then God who would answer them according to their idol enthroned on their heart. For in that the lying prophets will give the people exactly what they want to hear and in what they desire to live will certainly appear as a doom most certain for that group of people!
There are people praying even now for nations around this world. There are people praying for the country of which I and my family reside. I cannot speak about other states, but I certainly hear the reports out of New York as a city now dead, where people have abandoned it to live in other states and where people who do continue to live there have no money to leave and are being killed by the violence of others with no value for life. Yes, our hearts should be set for God and not idols. We should be about praising Him and glorifying His awesome deeds for the miraculous occurred in salvation to us! But there is sin in the world as Noah saw. A man of integrity and for his sake and his family were saved along with his wicked son Ham on the ARK.
Has the faithful become the harlot? Great wealth was spent on things such as those things of idols and rebellion was seen. Rebellion was seen in Ezekiel: chapter 2, 3, 12, 17 and 24. Israel, the rebellious house would fall given in chapters 1-24. Ezekiel was the watchman, the prophet to bring the warning message of what was coming toward them! Visions were given and actions are mentioned in detail. Yes parables of doom are presented in Ezekiel 15- Ezekiel 19, then there are the rebukes and the threats in chapter 20-22. News of the fall of the rebellious house in chapters 24 and chapter 25-32 presents other nations destroyed. Judgment was on the lips of the prophet till the news of the fall came. Then a message of hope appeared.
God has given us His Holy Spirit to stay connected, with new hearts and a new spirit to be the people God desires in being faithful to Him and to avoid any future judgment. TODAY, some are His sons and some are just those He created. They serve no real purpose but only in being themselves, serving themselves and are given to their own agendas. Holiness returns, and justice is seen in those who love God and serve Him with hearts set for Him.
Humans need quality leadership in important areas of life, or because of Satan's influence on the carnal mind, human community life tends to degenerate! And when it degenerates, it could like Mad Max and the Superdome kind of existence where it is only survival of the fittest, resulting in large numbers of people living as little more than slaves of those mightier than they are. For the majority, life in such a community becomes a hopeless existence like we are seeing in some cities of this nation even today!
It takes Godly leadership to lead and when it is in short supply as it was throughout most of Israel's relationship with God and as the scriptural record chronicles that an occasional Noah, Abraham, Joseph, Moses, Joshua, David, or another good leader arose among them, but Ezekiel 34 succinctly summarizes Judah's leadership, in particular, as shepherds who ruled for their own well-being rather than the citizens'. Such leadership does not produce good results and it never will!
Our nation has been helped by one I know that was sent by God Himself for such a time as this! We pray for our President and believe God has His hand on him always. But for those of a different heart, set for their own agendas will see more pandemonium and decay with death. But that of God is to strengthen leadership where man is working, life is produced in being productive and it includes, not only the religious ministry, but also includes leadership in government, education, business, entertainment, and media, reaching all the way to parents in the family home, yes, children having an actual father and mother.
Game On! The Stakes are high, your life is called and where will we stand? Hopefully we are not standing with our heads stuck in sand, but aware and active to speak and believe for the better is here if we will only reach out and stand for that which is of God. We can receive it with hearts boldly proclaiming His goodness in the land of the living. I have read the book of Revelation and we win!
