Many times, it is hard for us to witness. We are called, however, to do just that. This daily devotional looks at how Ezekiel was commissioned to witness.
Nuggets
- God strengthens the people He calls for ministry.
- God calls each of us to do His work.
- We have a great responsibility in order to be the watchman for the nation.
I don’t know what it is about witnessing that makes us run, screaming, the other way. But we sure do.
Maybe it is our fear of rejection. Maybe it is our belief of our unqualified state.
It probably has a lot of components.
In our Sunday Morning Bible Study, we are starting to look at Ezekiel. He and Daniel, whom we will study next, prophesied in their own way during the Babylonian captivity.
Let’s see how Ezekiel was commissioned to witness.
God Gives Us Strength
“Look, I have made your face as hard as their faces and your forehead as hard as their foreheads. I have made your forehead like a diamond, harder than flint. Don’t be afraid of them or discouraged by the look on their faces, though they are a rebellious house” (Ezek. 3: 8-9 CSB)
God strengthens the people He calls for ministry.
Verse 8 is an interesting place at which to start the conversation. We have to remember who the Israelites were in Ezekiel’s time.
Don’t get me wrong. They were basically who they always were — hard-hearted, rebellious people.
The way Mackray described them was that they were worse than normal. They were mired in evil.
The only difference now was that they were captives to the Babylonians. They hadn’t learned anything,
Elaine-speak for verse 8. You think those Israelites are bullheads? They are. But I have made you just as bullheaded.
Better yet, verse 9 says God made Ezekiel’s head as a diamond. What God was saying here was that Ezekiel was invincible.
If you look at the King James Version, it says, “As an adamant harder than flint have I made thy forehead …” (Ezek. 3: 9 KJV). Mackray had this to say. He wrote, “It was given long before by God Himself to His captive prophet in Babylon, whose forehead, as he faced the people, whose hearts were cold and hard as stones, might well be firm as adamant, since, in his very name, Ezekiel, he carried the great power of God.”
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What I get out of all of this is Ezekiel was no slacker. He was enough of a strong-willed person to put up with the wayward, willful people.
I like the analogy of Ezekiel being a diamond. When a diamond catches the light just right, it reflects it.
Ezekiel was reflecting God.
Diamonds are made through temperature and pressure. Isn’t that how we are transformed into godly people?
Ezekiel was forged to stand up to the wayward people and present God’s message.
But look how Mackray, in a roundabout way, said Ezekiel was formed. He wrote, “But ‘the broken heart,’ though it may seem strange to say so, is the stoutest and bravest of hearts.”
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God forges us by breaking us. “The sacrifice pleasing to God is a broken spirit. You will not despise a broken and humbled heart, God” (Ps. 51: 17 CSB).
We are broken in order to fully submit to God. We truly have the fear of the Lord — reverence — when we are broken.
Glossary
The problem is that we equate being broken with weakness. In this case, that is not the case. The weakness makes us strong.
“But he said to me, ‘My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.’ Therefore I will boast all the more gladly about my weaknesses, so that Christ’s power may rest on me” (II Cor. 12: 9-10 NIV).
God gives us grace — He hardens us — so that we can withstand the temptations Satan throws our way. We can weather the taunts of the worldview people.
When God calls us to ministry — and He calls all of us — He will strengthen us so that we can perform the tasks He has given us.
The Actual Commissioning
“Next he said to me, ‘Son of man, listen carefully to all my words that I speak to you and take them to heart. Go to your people, the exiles, and speak to them. Tell them, “This is what the Lord God says,” whether they listen or refuse to listen.’ The Spirit then lifted me up, and I heard a loud rumbling sound behind me — bless the glory of the Lord in his place! — with the sound of the living creatures’ wings brushing against each other and the sound of the wheels beside them, a loud rumbling sound. The Spirit lifted me up and took me away. I left in bitterness and in an angry spirit, and the Lord’s hand was on me powerfully. I came to the exiles at Tel-abib, who were living by the Chebar Canal, and I sat there among them stunned for seven days” (Ezek. 3: 10-15 CSB)
God calls each of us to do His work.
God told Ezekiel that, while he needed to listen to all that was said, Ezekiel’s responsibility didn’t end there. Ezekiel had to take it to heart.
Greenhill explains what God was getting at. He wrote, “What is in the head may soon be lost, but what is in the heart abides.”
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We have to get it down to the heart level. “I have treasured your word in my heart so that I may not sin against you” (Ps. 119: 11 CSB).
Greenhill reminded us that we have to start getting all of the sin out of our hearts before we can get God’s Word into it. He equated our hearts with soil.
Apparently, Ezekiel did listen to God and got it down to his heart level. When he was sufficiently strengthened, God transported him to where he could work for Him.
Ezekiel needed the strength. He was not being called to preach to a sympathetic audience. He was going to have a tough row to hoe.
Welch reminded us of something important. He wrote, “To expect defeat is one of the surest ways of incurring it.”
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Isn’t that how it goes a lot of times? If we expect to lose, we will. If we expect to win, we will. It is a self-fulfilling prophecy.
The way I read this is that Ezekiel had to get out of the way and let God work. The Spirit did lift Him up. God did work through Him.
I also read it that Ezekiel didn’t especially want to get out of the way. He was bitter and angry.
Welch assured us that Ezekiel was not bitter and angry at God. He was bitter and angry at the people because God was.
We can’t doubt God. We can’t try to compromise with the worldview.
We have to serve God. It requires the strength that he gives us.
Welch wrote that it also requires sympathy. It sounds like Ezekiel was stunned at the conditions he found.
What God Sees Us Doing
“Now at the end of seven days the word of the Lord came to me: ‘Son of man, I have made you a watchman over the house of Israel.When you hear a word from my mouth, give them a warning from me. If I say to the wicked person, “You will surely die,” but you do not warn him — you don’t speak out to warn him about his wicked way in order to save his life — that wicked person will die for his iniquity. Yet I will hold you responsible for his blood. But if you warn a wicked person and he does not turn from his wickedness or his wicked way, he will die for his iniquity, but you will have rescued yourself. Now if a righteous person turns from his righteousness and acts unjustly, and I put a stumbling block in front of him, he will die. If you did not warn him, he will die because of his sin, and the righteous acts he did will not be remembered. Yet I will hold you responsible for his blood. But if you warn the righteous person that he should not sin, and he does not sin, he will indeed live because he listened to your warning, and you will have rescued yourself’” (Ezek. 3: 16-21 CSB)
We have a great responsibility in order to be the watchman for the nation.
The watchman was the sentinel that kept an eye out for enemies attempting to storm the city and lay siege to it. It was very important that the watchman stay alert and be concerned about the welfare of the others. Spurgeon reminded us that the watchman had to receive orders to begin watch and end the watch.
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Disciples must be the watchman, too. Disciples’ orders must come from God.
We are told in our job description to preach the gospel to all and then make disciples of them. We are to warn others of their spiritual condition.
The Disciple’s Job Description
Complete Job Description
Individual Description
Job Duty #4
Proclaim the Gospel (Mark 16: 15)
Job Duty #6
Make Disciples (Matthew 28: 19-20)
Wow! I wonder when Patterson wrote his sermon. He was talking about how people in his time wanted a watered down version of the gospel so that it wouldn’t hurt and be frightening.
Sound familiar?
Patterson countered with he must because it is a matter of life and death — spiritual life and death. Spiritual death is the separation from God that occurred as a consequence of Adam and Eve’s original sin.
- Sins are actions by humans that disobey God and break one of His reasonable, holy, and righteous laws and commandments, goes against a purpose He has for us, or follows Satan’s promptings.
- The consequences of sin are spiritual death and separation from God.
- The spiritually alive are those who have ABCDed, so they are no longer separated from God.
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Glossary
We have to realize that we have to know that there is sin in our lives — and it is wrong — before we can ABCD. In churchy terms, we have to be convicted before we are converted.
That means we have to be trained to hear God. We have to believe in His Word and what it tells us. We have to seek God.
Searching for and Seeking God
Spurgeon gave great advice to those who want to witness — which should be all of us. He wrote, “The great thing, I believe, with a successful winner of souls is to hear God’s truth from God’s own mouth.”
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Spurgeon gave us the order in which things need to occur.
- Jesus calls us.
- We are in fellowship with Jesus to receive training.
- We are sent forth in His power.
Why is the training so important? It is because the message is so important. It is a message of life and death.
Oh, yeah. Some people are going to reject the message. It is easy to say that they are rejecting God, not us. Sometimes, it doesn’t feel like that, but it is the truth.
We can’t say this enough. All disciples — of which we are one — are called to witness. Spurgeon put it this way. He wrote, “You may not all be called to the work of prophesying as ministers are, but you are all called by some means to warn men of the wrath to come and lead them to Christ, and I want you to feel that God is at the back of you when you warn sinners. God will own His truth, therefore never be ashamed of it.”
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We are all to preach God’s Word and make disciples. It is really important to them that we do witness.
No, not all of those we witness to are going to ABCD. Their response isn’t on us.
Our nonresponse to God’s commission for us to witness is going to have great consequences for us. We need to follow God’s plan for our lives.
The ABCDs of Salvation
If you have not become a believer in Christ, please read through the
Plan of Salvation and prayerfully consider what God is asking you to do.
A – admit our sins
B – believe His Son Jesus is our Redeemer
C – confess God as Sovereign Lord
D – demonstrate that commitment by making any changes needed in our lives to
live the way in which God has called us
The Disciple’s Job Description
Making the Connections
Why is it so important for us to preach God’s message? Welch wrote, “In the light of God[,] the presence of moral disorder can be reconciled with His superintending goodness and mercy. And as we are lifted up in spirit into that light we see that there is an explanation of these terrible perplexities, a solution of these baffling problems, an unfolding of an occult and inscrutable plan.”
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God has a plan for everything. He sees the good that will happen to us — and the bad.
Through it all, God is in control.
How Do We Apply This?
- Follow God’s laws and commandments because that is His Will for our lives.
- Be prepared to tell the unpopular and unpleasant message.
- Don’t sugarcoat the message just to be accepted by man. That is compromising with the worldview.
- Be passionate about God’s message and what He has done for us.
- Speak from our heart.
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What is all of this lesson about? Go out and witness where God calls us.
Father God. Thank You, Lord, that, when You call us to witness for You, You equip us to do just that. You call us and train us. You strengthen us to withstand the rejection. May we witness to all to whom You have chosen us to speak. Amen.
Searching for and Seeking God
Hearing His Word (Rom. 10: 17).
Reading His Word (Rev. 1: 3).
Praying to Him (Heb. 4: 16).
Studying His Word (Ac. 17: 11).
Meditating on His Word (Ps. 1: 1-2).
Memorizing His Word (Ps. 119: 11).
What do you think?
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