Ezekiel 3:4-9\u00a0<\/b>\u2013\u00a0He then said to me: \u201cSon of man, go now to the people of Israel and speak my words to them.\u00a05\u00a0You are not being sent to a people of obscure speech and strange language,\u00a0but to the people of Israel\u2014\u00a06\u00a0not to many peoples of obscure speech and strange language, whose words you cannot understand. Surely if I had sent you to them, they would have listened to you.\u00a07\u00a0But the people of Israel are not willing to listen\u00a0to you because they are not willing to listen to me, for all the Israelites are hardened and obstinate.\u00a08\u00a0But I will make you as unyielding and hardened as they are.\u00a09\u00a0I will make your forehead\u00a0like the hardest stone, harder than flint.\u00a0Do not be afraid of them or terrified by them, though they are a rebellious people.\u201d<\/i><\/p>\n
\u201cHe then said to me: \u201cSon of man, go now to the people of Israel and speak my words to them.<\/i>\u201d\u00a0 God told His prophet Ezekiel to go and speak His Words to the people of Israel.\u00a0\u00a0Matthew 28:19-20<\/b>\u00a0\u201cTherefore go and make disciples of all nations,\u00a0baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit,\u00a020\u00a0and teaching\u00a0them to obey everything I have commanded you. And surely I am with you\u00a0always, to the very end of the age.\u201d<\/i>\u00a0 Jesus told all His people to go to the whole world and speak, and teach, His Word.<\/p>\n
\u201cYou are not being sent to a people of obscure speech and strange language,\u00a0but to the people of Israel\u20146\u00a0not to many peoples of obscure speech and strange language, whose words you cannot understand.<\/i>\u201d\u00a0 The Lord God told Ezekiel to go out among his own countryman, and bring the word to them.\u00a0 The Lord was not sending Ezekiel to a foreign country that spoke a different language.\u00a0 He said talk to you neighbors, your family, your friends and your nation.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0Luke 14:23-24<\/b>\u00a0\u201cThen the master told his servant, \u2018Go out to the roads and country lanes and compel them to come in, so that my house will be full.\u00a024\u00a0I tell you, not one of those who were invited will get a taste of my banquet.<\/i>\u00a0 Jesus gave a parable that where the master told his servants to go out to the streets, to the alleys, to family, friends and our nations and invite them to come to the wedding feast (See\u00a0Revelation 19:6-9<\/b>).<\/p>\n
\u201c<\/span>Surely if I had sent you to them, they would have listened to you.\u00a07\u00a0But the people of Israel are not willing to listen\u00a0to you because they are not willing to listen to me, for all the Israelites are hardened and obstinate.<\/i>\u201d It would seem that one\u2019s own people would be prone to listen to one of their own, but unfortunately, it is the opposite.\u00a0\u00a0Mark 6:4<\/b>\u00a0\u201cJesus said to them, “A prophet is not without honor except in his own town, among his relatives and in his own home<\/i>.”\u00a0 So predictable, too often, but not always, our family, the company that trained us, even the church we attend cannot or refuses to acknowledge one\u2019s abilities.\u00a0 Refuses to see the growth and the hand of God.\u00a0 Often a person must move on to strangers who can see what they are and not what they were. \u00a0We see that even Jesus\u2019s home town could not see Him as the Son of God that came to save the world, but could only see the little boy with a runny nose and this, to their own loss.<\/p>\n \u201cBut I will make you as unyielding and hardened as they are.\u00a09\u00a0I will make your forehead\u00a0like the hardest stone, harder than flint.\u00a0Do not be afraid of them or terrified by them, though they are a rebellious people.<\/i>\u201d\u00a0 God enabled Ezekiel to be ready for the hard hearts and heads and for the anger, frustration and hate that he would face from his people.\u00a0 The people who Ezekiel would face would be hard hearted against God.\u00a0 But God would harden Ezekiel\u2019s heart for God.\u00a0 God did not harden the heart of Ezekiel against whom He was being sent to give the Word.\u00a0 God was sending Ezekiel to save, not to destroy, and to give hope, not destroy hope.\u00a0 But God was also protecting Ezekiel so that those who do not love God would not cause Him to pull back in the giving of God\u2019s message, but to be bolder and stronger against the most aggressive attacks against the message He was given by God.\u00a0\u00a02 Peter 1:3<\/b>\u00a0\u201cHis divine power has given us everything we need for a godly life through our knowledge of him who called us by his own glory and goodness<\/i>.\u201d\u00a0 By the divine will and love of our God and Savior Jesus Christ we have been given the precious and sweet Holy Spirit to prepare us, to strengthen us and to soften us so that we will be able to stand up to every challenge and to cry with the broken hearted, that all may be touched by God through us.\u00a0 We stand for the sanctity and inerrancy of the Word of God.\u00a0 We tell the pure message that God gave to us in a precise canon what we now call the Bible.\u00a0 Others may doubt, but we have studied and the Holy Spirit has convinced us of the infallibility of the Bible.\u00a0 The world tells us that the Bible is a book of antiquity and not relative to our world.\u00a0 We know better.\u00a0 We know that God\u2019s truth is infallible and unchangeable.\u00a0 The world would strip God of His omniscience and omnipotence so as to change our opinion of God (and to excuse themselves).\u00a0 Yet the Holy Spirit equips and enables us so that we do not yield to the challenge (Ephesians 6:10-20<\/b>).<\/p>\n Family Ezekiel was given a tough job to do, He was told to be the Watchman for Israel.\u00a0 He was his brother\u2019s keeper. \u00a0He was not to have the heart of Cain who killed his brother and had no love for him.\u00a0 Ezekiel was challenged that if He did not give the saving message that God told him to give then he would hold him responsible for their evil ways (Ezekiel 3:18<\/b>).\u00a0 How is this so?\u00a0 Family, we need to look deeper than action but judge as God does, looking at the heart (1 Samuel 16:7<\/b>).\u00a0 God\u2019s people will have His love and so love others.\u00a0 If we don\u2019t have love than we don\u2019t belong to God (1 John 4:8<\/b>).\u00a0 God loves the world and desires it all to be saved (John 3:16<\/b>).\u00a0 So if we have God\u2019s love within, we will care about the salvation of all the people of the world, just as He does.\u00a0 If we will not bring the message of God to the world, or at least our part of it, then we have to question if we have God\u2019s love within, and what really is the status of our relationship with God.\u00a0 Furthermore, since Jesus told us to share the Gospel, if we don\u2019t, then we are disobedient and Jesus said that if we do not obey Him, then we really don\u2019t love Him (John 14:15<\/b>).\u00a0 So if Ezekiel did not obey God, if He did not share the message from God, then the love of God and to God, was missing.\u00a0 The same is true for us.\u00a0 Ezekiel could have protested \u201cYeah but\u201d, and so could we.\u00a0 But God\u2019s Word was clear to him and is clear to us.\u00a0 Jesus has not given us a list of substitutes to do instead.\u00a0 He gave us the \u201cGreat Commission\u201d to share the Gospel.\u00a0 We might say that we do other things.\u00a0 Jesus did not give us options to do instead of, but in addition to.\u00a0 Family, let us honor the Savior and Lord that we love by letting His love flow through us back to Him, and to each other, and thereby the love of God is completed.\u00a0\u00a01 John 2:3-5<\/b>\u00a0\u201cWe know that we have come to know him if we keep his commands.\u00a04<\/a>\u00a0Whoever says, \u201cI know him,\u201d but does not do what he commands is a liar, and the truth is not in that person.\u00a05<\/a>\u00a0But if anyone obeys his word, love for God\u00a0is truly made complete in them. This is how we know we are in him.<\/i>\u201d<\/p>\n God told Ezekiel that he indeed was his brother\u2019s keeper.\u00a0 He tells us the same. Praise God!<\/p>\n Psalm 150:6<\/b>\u00a0–\u00a0Let everything that has breath praise the Lord.\u00a0 Praise the Lord!<\/i><\/p>\n Micah 7:7<\/b>\u00a0–\u00a0But as for me, I watch\u00a0in hope\u00a0for the\u00a0Lord, I wait for God my Savior; my God will hear\u00a0me.\u00a0<\/i><\/p>\n Micah 6:8<\/b>\u00a0–\u00a0He has shown You, O man, what\u00a0is\u00a0good; And what does the\u00a0Lord\u00a0require of You but to do justly, to love mercy, And to walk humbly with Your God.<\/i><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Ezekiel 3:4-9\u00a0\u2013\u00a0He then said to me: \u201cSon of man, go now to the people of Israel and speak my words to them.\u00a05\u00a0You are not being sent to a people of obscure speech and strange language,\u00a0but to the people of Israel\u2014\u00a06\u00a0not to many peoples of obscure speech and strange language, whose words you cannot understand. Surely…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1192],"tags":[1841,705,100,106,93,101,94,90,17,711,2187],"class_list":["post-1589","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-devotion","tag-ephesians","tag-ezekiel","tag-john","tag-luke","tag-mark","tag-matthew","tag-micah","tag-peter","tag-psalm","tag-revelation","tag-samuel"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.Bob4God.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1589","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.Bob4God.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.Bob4God.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.Bob4God.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.Bob4God.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1589"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"http:\/\/www.Bob4God.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1589\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1590,"href":"http:\/\/www.Bob4God.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1589\/revisions\/1590"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.Bob4God.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1589"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.Bob4God.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1589"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.Bob4God.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1589"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}