Good Morning, Siblings!
Today’s readings are Ezekiel 28-30
Read today’s Bible Readings at BibleGateway.com by clicking here.
WOW! Your notes were amazing in the comments on the Bible readings from the last couple of days. I really enjoyed gleaning from your insight and rabbit trails. Thank you for digging deep and sharing the treasures you found! Iron sharpens iron and you came through in a big way. I’m honored to be able to read our Father’s word alongside you.
Rabbit Trails
Fair warning: Somedays I’m raring to go and somedays I’m a bit on the tired side. Today is the latter. Notes may be brief unless I catch my second wind!
Pay attention to chapter 28 because many people say that these characteristics are actually describing satan. If you read it with that in mind, it certainly makes more sense.
Why, then, would it be addressed to the prince of Tyre? If this prince was merely the figurehead, with his power coming from the adversary, it all fits. These are just my ruminations. Read it for yourself and draw your own conclusions. As always, test it to Scripture, if it doesn’t line up, toss it.
I want to add in a little side note regarding our readings. When we live in the world and follow the ways of the world, as most of us understandably do before we begin reading the Bible daily and really applying what it says to our lives, we have been taught to very much treat ourselves as if we are the gods of our own lives. We make decisions based on our desires, our goals, our wisdom, what we feel is best, etc. We are our own straight edge in many ways.
When we come out of that world and start seeing all of this in the Word, realizing that we have been contradicting instructions from our Father in many ways, it can be very overwhelming. There is so much to learn and so much to unlearn.
I’ve seen many of you comment about being overwhelmed, feeling grieved that you don’t know more and that it is taking so long to learn, your hearts aching with desire to follow the example of our Messiah, and upset with yourself for not having started on this whole bible journey sooner.
I want to encourage you – you are working on the Father’s timeline now. He is your Bible teacher and, as your creator, He knows how much you can learn at any given time and if He needs you to learn any faster He will give you the supernatural ability to do so.
Do not feel as if you need to ingest and digest everything the first go around.
The goal was never to read the Bible once – but to become daily Bible readers.
We will come around this bend again and each time we do you’ll add another layer of knowledge. While the knowledge is important and we are told to study and know it, the key isn’t how much we know at any given time. The key is the foundation that knowledge is being built upon. That is the foundation we stand upon, our solid rock, our Messiah, our Creator. When we have access to the source we can have confidence that our well will not run dry. Instead, He is renewing us, training us up, teaching us, and guiding us. All we have to do is seek Him with our whole heart.
You will seek me and you will find me when you seek me with your whole heart. Jeremiah 29:13
“Because your heart is proud,
and you have said, ‘I am a god,
I sit in the seat of the gods,
in the heart of the seas,’
yet you are but a man, and no god,
though you make your heart like the heart of a god— Ezekiel 28:2
This begins a passage that really does seem to describe the adversary in great detail. We can certainly glean one of the patterns of how he works through these descriptions. However, we need to also take this as a warning that when we behave in line with these descriptors, we are also lining ourselves up with the pattern of the adversary. It is just as important to know what we are to do as it is what we are not to do. The word of YHWH makes it a point to show us both behaviors for a reason.
24 “And for the house of Israel there shall be no more a brier to prick or a thorn to hurt them among all their neighbors who have treated them with contempt. Then they will know that I am the Lord God. Ezekiel 28:24
Isn’t this a beautiful promise? To me, it reads as if the Father is enfolding Israel in His protective arms. They have gone through so much. So many countries, kingdoms, people groups, wars, and other hardships have come against them, seeking to eradicate them, and failed. They remain.
With the realization that we have been grafted into Israel and are adopted into this chosen people by our Father (Isaiah 56 and Romans 11 are starting points to understanding this), I can’t help but wonder, what if us “church” folks had of begun reading and studying the word diligently generations earlier? Could we could have prevented some of these horrors that our brethren suffered? Surprisingly, many of these atrocities were committed by the hand of our own predecessors. The holocaust was done in the name of Christianity. The founder of the protestant reformation movement, Martin Luther, urged people to burn their synagogues, schools, and homes.
But then I am reminded of my own words “We are working on His timeline, not ours”, and I know that we were born during this time, chosen to be here in His word, for His good purpose, at this moment. The temporary blindness discussed in Romans 11 reminds me that only the Father can give us the power of understanding – although we do have the ability to put those scales back in place once He drops them from our eyes. Ruminations like this serve to humble me, strengthen my resolve to be in the Word so that I know my Father’s voice in our time, and anchor my feet all the more steadfast in their placement on this narrow path the Father has seen fit to place me on.
By His grace we are here and in His grace we must remain.
25 “Thus says the Lord God: When I gather the house of Israel from the peoples among whom they are scattered, and manifest my holiness in them in the sight of the nations, then they shall dwell in their own land that I gave to my servant Jacob. 26 And they shall dwell securely in it, and they shall build houses and plant vineyards. They shall dwell securely, when I execute judgments upon all their neighbors who have treated them with contempt. Then they will know that I am the Lord their God.” Ezekiel 28:25-26
Reading that, knowing that we are adopted into that chosen people, brings me great peace.
Ezekiel 29:4-5 seems like a very strange set of verses.
I will put hooks in your jaws,
and make the fish of your streams stick to your scales;
and I will draw you up out of the midst of your streams,
with all the fish of your streams
that stick to your scales.
5 And I will cast you out into the wilderness,
you and all the fish of your streams;
you shall fall on the open field,
and not be brought together or gathered.
To the beasts of the earth and to the birds of the heavens
I give you as food.
Upon researching them, all the notes I came across were referencing crocodiles and I thought this was strange because I had been looking for some odd fish parallel. Turns out, I read too fast past Ezekiel 29:3 and from there we can see the Pharaoh, king of Egypt, referred to as a great dragon that lies in the midst of his streams. Aha! Now I see it! We have to go back to Ezekiel 29:3 to see this:
speak, and say, Thus says the Lord God:
“Behold, I am against you,
Pharaoh king of Egypt,
the great dragon that lies
in the midst of his streams,
that says, ‘My Nile is my own;
I made it for myself.’
Just a reminder that anytime something doesn’t make sense in the Word, slow down, read the verses before and after it, and make sure you haven’t missed something. Likewise, if you ever read something or hear Scripture quoted that seems to contradict YHWH, make sure to dig deeper into the context because YHWH and His word, never contradict one another. Makes sense, right?
Remember, YHWH’s Word is the straight edge to which all else must line up – Never the other way around.
We have seen this prove true and we will continue to see it prove true as we go forward to the completion of our reading cycle. True messengers of YHWH will line up with His word and will not contradict it. Moving forward, we will see this with Messiah at every turn, with all of the apostles, and yes, with Paul. I know there are a lot of teachings out there that Paul taught a “new” gospel. Ironically, in and of itself this shows a lack of Scriptural knowledge because that would disqualify Him from being a representative of YHWH. We will see that Paul did, in fact, line all of His teachings up with Scripture, enforce all that YHWH had taught, and did not contradict YHWH.
Fast forward to Ezekiel 30:13
Thus says the Lord God: I will destroy the idols..
I want to point something out here. All through the Bible we see people creating idols, bowing down to idols, worshipping idols, cherishing idols, etc. Why do they keep coming back to idols again and again? Why do we make things idols in our lives today? Why can’t we put these things aside and worship Him only?
Part of that reason is this: We love our idols. Seriously, we love them.
But the thing is, YHWH loves us and these idols keep us from Him. We put them in between us and Him. They grieve Him and yet we hold them dear.
What, then, is He to do? Destroy them – for our own good.
I want to apply this to something else in our life: People.
It is so easy in our day and age to avoid actually following YHWH. Instead, we follow a person who we think is following YHWH and our hearts tell us that is the same thing. It is not.
There is no such thing as a second hand relationship with the Father.
And so, from time to time you will see a famous pastor take a very public stumble. From time to time, a loved one will suffer a grievous lapse in character that will cause you to be deeply disappointed in them. What do these two people have in common? Folks start following and looking to them as a substitute for looking to the Father.
That is why it is a great blessing when someone we love and respect stumbles before us. I do not mean that I wish anyone harm in any way but I wanted to let you know, as I have seen time and again, that when we start following a person instead of YHWH, He will often allow or cause that person to disappoint us in such a way that we are shaken awake from our stupor, realize our mistake, and redirect ourselves to Him.
Blessed is the disappointment that leads us back to Him.
Then they will know that I am YHWH.
Ezekiel 30:26
Test everything, hold tight to what is good.~ 1 Thess 5:21
We are saved by Grace alone: Obedience is not the root of our salvation, it is the fruit!
May YHWH bless the reading of His Word!