Son of man, thou dwellest in the midst of a rebellious house, which have eyes to see and see not. Ezekiel 12:2 The disuse of spiritual faculties Homilist. Eyes and ears are for many reasons the most important and valuable organs of the human body, the chief "gates" — to use the language of Bunyan — to the famous town of Mansoul. The one brings us into contact with form, the other with sound; the one has relation to space, the other to time. No part in the human frame is so wonderful in their execution as these. "The eye," says one, "by its admirable combination of coats and humours and lenses, produces on the retina, or expansion of nerve at the back of the socket or bony cavity, in which it is so securely lodged, a distinct picture of the minutest or largest object; so that, on a space that is less than an inch in diameter, a landscape of miles in extent, with all its variety of scenery, is depicted with perfect exactness of relative proportion in all its parts." Nor is the ear less wonderful. "It is a complicated mechanism lying wholly within the body, showing only the wide outer porch through which the sound enters. It conveys the sound through various chambers to the inmost extremities of those nerves which bear the messages to the brain. So delicate is this organ, that it catches the softest whispers, and conveys them to the soul, and so strong that it hears the roll of the loudest thunder in the chamber of its mistress." Now, the text — as well as other parts of Scripture — teaches that man's spiritual nature has organs answering to those organs of the body. The text calls us to notice the spiritual disuse of these faculties. I. It involves the greatest DEPRIVATION. 1. The disuse shuts out the grandest realities of existence. What are the immutable principles of rectitude, what is the great spiritual universe, what is God Himself, to the man who is morally blind and deaf? 2. The disuse shuts out the sublimest joys of existence. What are the charms of physical to moral beauty, the beauty of holiness and God? What are the charms of physical harmony to those of that great moral anthem that fills the spiritual universe with rapture and delights the ear of God Himself? How great then the deprivation of the spiritually blind and deaf! God is with them, His pure, happy heavens lie about them, and they know it not. 3. The disuse deteriorates the faculties themselves. Unused organs often die out. II. It involves the greatest WICKEDNESS. 1. It is an abuse of talent. All the powers we possess, we possess as trustees, not as proprietors; they are entrusted to us for a specific purpose. 2. It is an abuse of the greatest talents. These spiritual faculties are the highest we have — higher than bodily power, higher than intellectual ability, higher than natural genius.Conclusion — 1. The sad condition of the unregenerate world. 2. The deeply needed mission of Christ. ( Homilist. ) Rebelliousness means loss of faculty J. Parker, D. D. You cannot commit sin and be as clear-minded as you were before you committed it. The obscurity of mind may not be immediately evident; but let a man allow one bad thought to pass through his brain, and the brain has lost quality, a tremendous injury has been inflicted on that sensitive organ; by and by, after a succession of such passages, there will be no brain to injure. Sin tears down whatever it touches. Your habit is bringing you to imbecility, if it is a bad habit. You must name it; preachers may not speak distinctly and definitely, but they create a standard by which men may judge themselves, and by which preachers may also judge their own aspirations and purposes. You are losing your eyesight by your sin; you are becoming deaf because you are becoming worse in thought and desire and purpose; you are not the business man you were a quarter of a century ago, when you were a disciplinarian, a Spartan, a self-critic, when you held yourself in a leash, and would not allow yourself to go an inch faster than your judgment approved; since then you have loosened the reins, you have allowed the steeds to go at their own will, and the consequence is that you miss one-half of what is spoken to you, and you fail to see God's morning and God's sunset; they are but commonplaces to you, mayhap but broad vulgarities. Men should be good if they wish to keep their genius. The bad man goes down. His descent may not be palpable today or tomorrow, but the process is not the less certain and tremendous because it is sometimes imperceptible. ( J. Parker, D. D. ) Prepare thee stuff for removing. Ezekiel 12:3-7 A drama of exile Urijah R. Thomas. I. THE VISION IN ITS HISTORICAL FULFILMENT. II. THE VISION IN ITS PRACTICAL LESSONS FOR THE PRESENT. 1. The consequence of sin is moral exile. All evil, not only in act, but in thought and in wish, involves in greater or less degree a going away from the holy — is a self-exileship, not perhaps, as in the vision, from a holy place, but from the holy God. 2. This moral exile is awfully sad.(1) This exile is burdensome. The man goes with the baggage of an emigrant. He carries as much as he can. And he who goes away from God into any sin goes burdened. Responsibility, an accusing conscience, a growing fear; these, as with Cain, load guilty souls.(2) The exile was severed from social ties. With what solitariness of soul, as though he were utterly alone and in the dark, does each man have to say, "I have sinned"!(3) The exile went out into wild uncertainties. Whither he should hurry when once beyond the city walls he could not tell. And into what unexplored regions of wrong-doing, or what abysses of consequent remorse a sinner may wander, who can tell? 3. This moral exile is stealthy. Not through a gate, but by a hole dug through the wall; not at noon, but at night, the exile gets away from the holy city. So with the beginnings of all sin. The excuses, the concealments, the artifices of the selfish, the impure, the mean, breathe the stealthy spirit of the father of lies. Evil chooses the dark first, and then gets blinded. 4. This moral exile is shameful. The exile, ashamed to look on the ground, is a true type of those who, first with blush of shame, and whitened lip, and trembling voice or hand, do wrong; and who at last "will wake to shame and everlasting contempt." ( Urijah R. Thomas. ) It may be they will consider. The Divine expectation J. C. Gray. I. THE SUBJECT TO WHICH THIS EXPECTATION REFERS. 1. Men do not consider that they are sinful creatures. 2. Nor that they are dying creatures. 3. Nor that they are immortal creatures. II. THE MEANS EMPLOYED FOR BRINGING ABOUT THE EXPECTATION WHICH IS HERE EXPRESSED. 1. The Divine forbearance. 2. The afflictive dispensations of Divine Providence. 3. The ministry of the Gospel. ( J. C. Gray. ) I have set thee for a sign unto the house of Israel. Ezekiel 12:6 Men and ministers J. M. Whiten, Ph. D. Ideas may be communicated quite as effectively through the eye as through the ear, by visible signs as by audible words. Thus our cemeteries display a profusion of emblems which eloquently, though silently, express the sentiments both of grief and of hope. Thus our sacraments of baptism and the Lord's Supper express the fundamental ideas of purification, brotherhood, and life through Christ, by symbols, or signs, as a visible Gospel. In like manner, a truth may be embodied, as it were in a person, who stands before his fellow men as the representative sign of an idea. This is the function of the Christian ministry today. The words applied to Ezekiel may be applied to every individual member of the Christian ministry: "I have set thee for a sign unto the house of Israel." I. A SIGN OF WHAT? To answer, we must analyse the convictions generally entertained as to the duties of the Christian ministry. These convictions, so far as reasonable, are the judgment of the conscience of the community in concurrence with the teaching of the Scriptures. 1. In purity, he must be the man above suspicion, pure even to the verge of being puritanical, forbidding himself some things in which his fellow Church members indulge themselves without rebuke. 2. In unselfishness, he must be the man who never spares himself in doing good, never discriminating between rich and poor in an all-serving helpfulness; patient under provocation, conciliating in speech and in temper, the first to deny himself, a liberal giver, a prompt, unstinting paymaster, owing no man anything but unlimited love. 3. In truth, he must be the mirror of sincerity, both in private study and in public speech and action, aiming ever at the reality of things, not the paid advocate of a creed, not the hired mouthpiece of a church or denomination, not the echo of other men's voices, not a professionalist in any way, but transparently representing the real and conscientiously formed convictions which he cherishes in his own heart and mind. 4. In courage, he must be no time server, or flatterer, never failing to ask, Is it right? before asking, Is it safe? — as bold for an unpopular truth as for a popular one, as plain spoken to rich sinners as to poor ones, willing, if need be, to lose a place by doing a duty, just as ready to be counted in a minority as in a majority, if only on the side of truth and right. 5. In piety is required the Christian minister's central and vital characteristic. Together with every other required quality, men will insist on that peculiar quality in a Christian minister which is called "spirituality," and which I may call other-worldliness — an unaffected recognition of interests that lie beyond the grave, and of the Being in whom we must trust for the hereafter. II. BUT WHY DOES THE GENERAL CONSCIENCE REQUIRE THIS PURITY, UNSELFISHNESS, TRUTH, COURAGE, PIETY, IN THE CHRISTIAN MINISTER? Certainly not by reason of any contract between him and his brethren. He has simply contracted to be their teacher. He has not contracted to furnish a model of all the virtues at so much a year. Neither is it by virtue of any profession he has made as a Christian man. The profession that every Christian man makes is a profession of a purpose and endeavour — rather than of an actual attainment — and whatever any man professes or does not profess in the way of good endeavour, to that good endeavour he is bound whether professing it or not. Why, then, this demand of the public conscience upon the Christian minister, except that, simply as a man teaching men, he in his position must be what every man in any position should be; must stand as a sign of the character that God requires of all? I ask you, then, my friends, to exalt your requirements of character in Christian ministers to the very highest, insisting only on those real excellences, which are displayed in that one only pattern of a perfect human life which God has given us in Jesus Christ. When you have done it, and formed a true and high ideal of the character that the Christian ministry should possess, then you have simply figured to yourself what a true man should be among men, independently of any contract, or profession, or endeavour after consistency. And the minister whom you expect to live up to that ideal is set to be God's sign to you for your own living. Whatever would spot his skirts in God's sight, will spot yours. Whatever you would be sorry to see him do, you should be sorry to see yourself do. III. FURTHER SUGGESTIONS. 1. The danger of the clerical profession to society. What this danger is, may be illustrated by the answer which I dare say many a person would give, if asked why a Christian minister should pray, "Why, it is his business to." The subtle fallacy in that word, "his business," is no small drawback to a minister's influence for good, and the only way he can offset it is by that high personal character which the most unspiritual men must admit to be everybody's business. 2. The Divine end in the institution of the Christian ministry is the formation of right character. What we need most is to take our grand and beautiful and vital truths out of showcases, and put them on as everyday clothing. Let us insist that those shall do this whose privilege it is to make these truths their especial study, and to exhibit them to others. But remember, that in so doing they are but a sign of that which is required of all. 3. The alleged decline of the influence of the Christian ministry is a real gain be its influence on character. A fallacy has gone out and a truth has come in. When the Christian minister has been brought down from his former fictitious elevation to his proper level of a man among men, then the spiritual rule by which he is judged is brought down to be the rule for all. This is a solid gain for the power of conscience, when the high expectations which the congregation press upon their minister are perceived to declare. the obligations which press equally upon every one of them as the servant of God. ( J. M. Whiten, Ph. D. ) Sign making lost among modern prophets J. Parker. He was to be performing a very singular act, and to be so constantly doing it that people would say, What is he doing now? He is moving things: what is the madman after today? Watch him: — he brings forth his stuff in their sight; he goes forth at even in their sight; he digs through the wall in their sight; in their sight he bears the burden upon his shoulders and carries it forth in the twilight ( i.e. in the dark); he covers his face that he may not see the ground. The Lord makes this use of the man that by an act singular, absurd, irrational, unaccountable, he may attract attention, so that the people may say, What is it? It is thus the preachers would do if they dare. The preacher has lost his power of sign making, and he has taken now to sentence making. The preacher should always be doing something that attracts the religious attention of mankind. He should be praying so unexpectedly and vehemently as to cause people to say, What is this? But he dare not. Quietness has been patented, and indifference has been gazetted respectable. They are right who beat drums, sound trumpets, fly flags, tramp the streets like soldiers taking a fortress, so that people shall say, looking out of high windows and round the street corners, What is this? what are these men doing now? "It may be," saith the Lord, — "it may be they will consider." But they can only be brought to consideration by sign and token, by madness on the part of the Church. Trust the Church for going mad today! The Church now locks up its premises six days out of seven, and blesses the man who occupies it as little as possible on the seventh day. Rebelliousness overfloods the fading energy and zeal of the Church. ( J. Parker. ) The days are prolonged, and every vision faileth. Ezekiel 12:22-25 Prophecy a living force W. Burkitt Dalby. Right in the midst of the history of Israel, when Divine purposes of the highest moral and spiritual importance were being wrought out in her, in the very centre of one of her grandest outbursts of revealing thought upon the principles and power of religion, this sceptical proverb took its rise and possessed a certain plausibility, and had its seeming justification in the circumstances of the time: "The days are prolonged, and every vision faileth." I. THE PROVERB AND ITS MEANING. The saying may be held to express relief or disappointment. There were doubtless many Israelites who were glad to escape from the consciousness of the ceaseless vigilance of the Keeper of Israel. There are always some minds to whom the thought that "Thou God seest me" is an oppression and a nightmare. Others, however, were bitterly disappointed at what seemed to them the neglect and failure of Jehovah to redeem His promises to His people ( Lamentations 3 ). But our proverb is more probably the outcome of a shallow materialism than of either relief or disappointment. The materialist belongs to all ages and peoples, and is always ready to say that visions have nothing in them. Indeed, there had been, as Ezekiel tells us in ver. 24, "vain visions" and "flattering divinations within the house of Israel." And because the true visions had been contingent, conditional on their effect upon the character of the people, they had very often seemed to fail. The desert can never rejoice and blossom as the rose, except for a people who have learnt the joy of unselfish sacrifice and long adorned themselves with the beauty of holiness. Moreover, many of the truest visions never will and never can be realised in such a world as this, because they have in them an element of idealism. Now, the man who lives in a world governed entirely by material standards of value, cannot stand this kind of thing at all. He calls upon his gods — upon actuality, upon reality and common sense — to deliver him out of it; just as many of the exiled Israelites were, at this very time, thinking of abjuring their nation and religion, and becoming the servants of the gods of Babylon. Babylon, at any rate, was no vision. Babylon commanded the big battalions, the scarlet-coated legions which had never known defeat, the mighty engines of war, the inexhaustible resources of the valley of the Euphrates; she had the mastery of all the rich trade routes between East and West; and possessed, in her own queenly magnificence, her towers, her palaces and temples, her wharves and markets, her civilisation and unrivalled power, the assurances of what seemed eternal prosperity. What folly to set up the visions of prophets over against the great heathen power which dominated the world! It is not wonderful if today also there are those who feel orphaned, desolate, forlorn, as though God had left us. "No voices and no visions now! no direct Divine message! no obvious Divine interposition!" — this is the thought that lies behind very much of our public action and private conduct — this is the thought most to be dreaded; for its influence tends in national politics to a hard, cynical selfishness in place of any lofty enthusiasm for liberty and philanthropy. It is equally fatal in private life; for if God is really silent to us, if He has left us to our own devices, the times are indeed dull and joyless, and there is nothing for it but for each of us to do the best he can for himself, and, according to the wicked old worldly proverb, let the devil take the hindmost. II. BUT NO! PROPHECY IS A LIVING FORCE. The Babylon of today is materialism — the materialistic view of the world and of life, in the laboratory of the chemist, the counting house of the merchant, and the abodes of society. Where are the prophets and where the spiritual influences which we can set over against this mighty tyranny? Some people talk of this as a materialistic or prosaic century — feel it to be so — because they themselves lead prosaic and materialistic lives. Yet our age has been blessed with a bright succession of true prophets, or at least prophetic souls — great teachers of the essential spirituality of the universe — men who have spoken, not only words of wisdom, but of wisdom weighted with the power of deep and passionate conviction. It is a question whether the Church of God has ever been blessed with a grander succession of true preachers than in our own day; whilst the authority of the great names outside the Church — of the Carlyles, Ruskins, Tennysons — has been essentially a moral and spiritual authority. Materialism only represents one tendency, one phase, of the life of the age; whilst great fields of life and influence have been occupied by men who have been seekers after God in the temper and spirit of old Hebrew piety, which ever cried, "Oh that I knew where I might find Him, that I might even come into His presence!" Such men have wrought in many minds an increased seriousness of thought, a deepened power of feeling, a wider sympathy, a truer spiritual insight. Then, again, the great influences which come from science are now being recognised as not necessarily materialistic. The eternal power and Godhead are more clearly, not less clearly, seen today than ever, in the majestic order of creation as revealed by the telescope and the microscope. The God of the infinitely great and infinitely little, the God who presides over the slow development of human society, from whom come the influences which form character and which move the world forward age by age, from whom comes the unconquerable tendency in things which makes for righteousness, never was, to the seeing heart and eye, more manifestly present than in the thought and life of our time. The silent, ceaseless activities of a Deity whose being is everywhere, who crowds the waters of a stagnant pool with myriads upon myriads of tiny inhabitants, and fills the vast spaces of the heavens above us with stars, suns, systems innumerable, are being recognised as still more impressive than the ancient manifestations; whilst, as our science begins to hear in many directions the "Thus far shalt thou go and no further" which limits discovery, a sense of awe in presence of the encompassing mysteries of our lot gathers about us; and signs are not wanting — the very nature of some of the more recent discoveries warrants the impression — that science herself will come to be our teacher of reverence, and her text books, which conduct us to the limits of the known, will become more and more suggestive of awe and wonder in presence of the unknown. The great Master of the unseen, the eternal, now, as ever, is Christ. Who can doubt that He has ruled the thought of the nineteenth century as of the first, or that His majestic figure will dominate the twentieth? As to the Babylon of our day, He is but waiting to smite it down. For us, at ally rate, to know Him, and the power of His resurrection, and the fellowship of His sufferings, that surely is enough to banish materialism out of our life forever, to save us utterly from the dull and joyless inability to see life's greater meanings. ( W. Burkitt Dalby. ) Ungodly proverbs J. C. Parker. Jeremiah has been talking about this upbreaking of the kingdom, and Ezekiel is talking about it; and when the prophecies were delivered to Zedekiah he said they did not sufficiently coincide to confirm one another; for he looked for those literal coincidences which bewilder so many people and which can only satisfy pedantry; he did not see that coincidence is in the purpose, in the substance of the message. So there came up a proverb in Israel, "The days are prolonged," then came a laugh suggestive; and "Every vision faileth," then the laugh was prolonged. We have fallen into the mockery of proverb making. In English we say, "Words are but wind." How foolishly we have lived to believe that: whereas words are the only real life. In the beginning the Word was with God, and the Word was God, and the word is the man, the soul if he be other than a profane person. We ourselves say in English, "In space comes grace": God does not mean to kill us, or He would not have given us such space for what is called repentance and amendment. We ourselves say, "Every man for himself, and God for us all": a singular mixture of mammon and spirituality, of selfishness and pseudo-religion. Let us not be victimised by our own wit. See to it that we do not slip into hell through the trapdoor of an epigram. There is only one word about this business that is true, namely, "Now is the accepted time, now is the day of salvation." The Lord says His patience will give way, His long-suffering will come to an end, — "There shall be no more any vain vision nor flattering divination within the house of Israel. For I am the Lord: I will speak, and the word that I shall speak shall come to pass; it shall be no more prolonged: for in your days, O rebellious house, will I say the word, and will perform it, saith the Lord God." Better believe this. All the ages have testified to it; all philosophies point in this direction. "He that being often reproved hardeneth his neck, shall suddenly be destroyed, and that without remedy." ( J. C. Parker. ) The days are at hand. Death and eternity at hand C. Simeon, M. A. I. THE TIDINGS HERE ANNOUNCED to the Jews. Similar tidings to you, but you have disregarded them as the Jews of old; set the days are at hand. II. THE SIGN BY WHICH THEY WERE CONFIRMED. Apply — 1. It may be that some of you will consider; 2. But the great mass of you will not. ( C. Simeon, M. A. ) It shall be no more prolonged: for in your days, O rebellious house, will I say the word, and will perform it, saith the Lord God. Ezekiel 12:24, 25 Critical moments J. Parker, D. D. Do not enter a fool's paradise; do not enter upon vain imaginations, saying, As it was yesterday, so it will be tomorrow, — for there is a moment which changes all things. Study the action of time, and you will see how many critical moments there are. It is only a moment that separates the night from the day, the day from the not-day, the positive from the negative — an almost incalculable line, so minute, so infinitesimal. God can work wonders in a moment. He may take eternity for some works, but in many a moment He strikes men blind, and turns men into perdition. There is but a step between thee and death. Thy breath is in thy nostrils: a puncture in the right place, and life is gone. One touch, and the balance is lost, and he who was strong an hour since will be buried next week. Seizing these realities, grasping them with the whole mind and heart, the Church ought not to be other than in dead earnest. ( J. Parker, D. D. ) God's warnings to be heeded J. Ellis. "You see that buoy, sir, moored in the bay?" said the captain of the steamship in which we visited the Orlmeys. "Yes," I replied, after carefully picking out in the twilight the well-known danger signal. "Well, there is a reef of rocks, that, starting from the shore, runs to a point within ten yards of the buoy. The worst tiring about it is that there is no indication of the reef; even at low water it is covered with water, and woe be to the ship that should strike on that dangerous reef. In the dark nights that buoy is an object of deep interest to me. Anxiously do I look out for it, and we steer with care until it is found." The reef was never seen by the captain, but marked on his chart. He believed his chart to be true. So must we, as believers and Christians, trust in the testimony of the Word of God, and heed its warnings. ( J. Ellis. ) God's reckonings sometimes long delayed An ungodly farmer one day met his Christian neighbour, also a farmer, and began to taunt him. "Why, my corn grows as well as yours. What difference does it make, all your prayers and talking about God's blessing? I don't see any good you'll get by it." The Christian neighbour looked the man full in the face, and replied, "Friend, God does not pay every week, but He does pay in the end." The vision that he seeth is for many days to come, and he prophesieth of the times that are far off. Ezekiel 12:27 Now (a sermon for young men and young women): — One would have thought that if the glorious Lord condescended to send His servants to speak to men of the way of salvation, all mankind would delight to hear the message. But, alas! it has not been so. Man's opposition to God is too deep, too stubborn for that. Men display great ingenuity in making excuses for rejecting the message of God's love. The evil argument which is mentioned in the text has been used from Ezekiel's day right down to the present moment, and it has served Satan's turn in ten thousand cases. The sons of men, when they hear of the great atonement made upon the cross by the Lord Jesus, and are bidden to lay hold upon eternal life in Him, still say concerning the Gospel, "The vision that he seeth is for many days to come, and he prophesieth of times that are far off." That is to say, they pretend that the matters whereof we speak are not of immediate importance, and may safely be postponed. They meet our pressing invitation, "All things are now ready, come ye to the supper," with the reply, "Religion is meant to prepare us for eternity, but we are far off from it as yet, and are still in the hey-day of our being; there is plenty of time for those dreary preparations for death." They put off the day of conversion, as if it were a day of tempest and terror, and not, as it really is, a day most calm, most bright, the bridal of the soul with heaven. I. GRANTED FOR A MOMENT THAT THE MESSAGE WW BRING TO YOU HAS MOST TO DO WITH THE FUTURE STATE, YET EVEN THEN THE DAY IS NOT FAR OFF, NEITHER IS THERE SO GREAT A DISTANCE BETWEEN NOW AND THEN, THAT YOU CAN AFFORD TO WAIT. You, perhaps, think seventy years a long period, but those who are seventy, in looking back, will tell you that their age is an hand's breadth. Man is short-lived compared with his surroundings; he comes into the world and goes out of it, as a meteor flashes through yonder skies which have remained the same for ages. Look at yonder venerable oak, which has for five hundred years battled with the winds, and what an infant one seems when reclining beneath its shade! Stand by some giant rock, which has confronted the tempests of the ages, and you feel like the insect of an hour. Therefore do not say, "These things are for a far-off time"; for even if we could guarantee to you the whole length of human existence, it is but a span. But there comes upon the heels of this a reflection never to be forgotten — that not one man among us can promise himself, with anything like certainty, that he shall ever see threescore years and ten. Nay more, we cannot promise that we shall see half that length of time. Let me check myself! What am I talking of? You cannot be certain that you will see this year out, and hear the bells ring in a new year. Ay, and this very night, when you close your eyes and rest your head upon your pillow, reckon not too surely that you shall ever again look on that familiar chamber, or go forth from it to the pursuits of life. It is clear, then, that the things which make for your peace are not matters for a far-off time, the frailty of life makes them necessities of this very hour. II. OUR MESSAGE REALLY DEALS WITH THE PRESENT. For observe, first, we are sent to plead with you, young men and young women, and tenderly to remind you that you are at this hour acting unjustly and unkindly towards your God. He made you, and you do not serve Him; He has kept you alive, and you are not obedient to Him, "Will a man rob God?" You would not rob your employer. You would not like to be thought unfaithful or dishonest towards man; and yet your God, your God, your God — is He to be treated so basely, notwithstanding all His goodness? Again, our message has to do with the present, for we would affectionately remind you that you are now at enmity with your best friend — the Friend to whose love you owe everything. I have to remind you, however, of much more than this, namely, that you are this night in danger. Are you content to abide for a single hour in peril of eternal punishment? Many other reasons tend to make this weighty matter exceedingly pressing; and among them is this, that there is a disease in your heart, the disease of sin, and it needs immediate cure. Surely a sick mar can never be cured too soon? The gospel which we preach to you will also bring you present blessings. In addition to present pardon and present justification, it will give you present regeneration, present adoption, present sanctification, present access to God, present peace through believing, and present help in time of trouble, and it will make you even for this life doubly happy. It will be wisdom for your way, strength for your conflict, and comfort for your sorrow. III. I SHALL NOT DENY, BUT I SHALL GLORY RATHER IN ADMITTING, THAT THE GOSPEL HAS TO DO WITH THE FUTURE. The Gospel of Jesus Christ has to do with the whole of a young man's life. Dear young friends, if you are saved while yet you are young, you will find religion to be a great preventive of sin. What a blessing it is not to have been daubed with the slime of Sodom, never to have had our bones broken by actual vice. Prevention is better than cure, and grace gives both. Grace will also act as a preservative as well as a preventive. The good thing which God will put in you will keep you. Whosoever believeth in Him has passed from death unto life; he shall not live in sin, but he shall be preserved in holiness even to the end. ( C. H. Spurgeon . ) The far-off looks insignificant "Look at the stars, those vast globes of light, by reason of the distance between us and them, do seem but as so many spangles; so we have but a weak sight of things which are set at

Benson Commentary Ezekiel 12:1 The word of the LORD also came unto me, saying, Ezekiel 12:1-2 . The word of the Lord also came, &c. — This is supposed to have happened in the sixth year of Zedekiah, and five years before the siege of Jerusalem: and the prophecies contained in the following chapters, to the twentieth, are thought to be of the same year. Thou dwellest in the midst of a rebellious house — “He was among them of the captivity in Chaldea, as appears from Ezekiel 12:10 , Ezekiel 11:24 ; Ezekiel 14:22 , and Ezekiel 24:2 . And these seem to have disbelieved the prophecies that Jerusalem should be smitten and burned, and its inhabitants scattered abroad: see Ezekiel 4:2 ; Ezekiel 9:5 ; Ezekiel 10:2 ; Ezekiel 11:9 .” — Newcome. They saw Jerusalem still inhabited, and under the government of its own king. And as they who were left in Judea thought themselves much more highly in God’s favour than those who had been carried away captives, so those who had been made captives repined at their lot, and thought those who remained in their own country were in a much better condition than themselves; therefore the following symbolical representations were designed to show, that they who were left behind, to endure the miseries of a siege, and the insults of a conqueror, would be in a much worse condition than those who were already settled in a foreign land: see Lowth. Which have eyes to see, and see not, &c. — Who will not make use of that sense and understanding which God has given them, nor learn from those examples and incidents which have happened, and by which God intended they should be instructed. Ezekiel 12:2 Son of man, thou dwellest in the midst of a rebellious house, which have eyes to see, and see not; they have ears to hear, and hear not: for they are a rebellious house. Ezekiel 12:3 Therefore, thou son of man, prepare thee stuff for removing, and remove by day in their sight; and thou shalt remove from thy place to another place in their sight: it may be they will consider, though they be a rebellious house. Ezekiel 12:3-6 . Therefore, prepare thee stuff for removing — Hebrew, ??? ???? , vessels, or instruments of removing, namely, such as were suited for that purpose. Get all thy goods together, and pack them up as those do that remove from one place to another. Do this openly, and at noon-day, that the people, among whom thou dwellest, may all see and take notice of it. The prophets often prophesied in this way by signs, as being of greater force and efficacy than words. Thou shalt bring forth thy stuff by day in their sight — Before it is quite night, that they, who ought to learn by this sign, may see and consider it. Thou shalt go forth at even — To signify that Zedekiah and his retinue should escape out of the city by night, 2 Kings 25:4 . Dig through the wall in their sight — To show that the king would make his escape by the same means. Carry it forth in the twilight — What the prophet was here commanded to carry out in the twilight, it seems, was something different from the goods he removed in the day-time; probably, necessary provision for his present subsistence may be intended. Thou shalt cover thy face that thou see not the ground — As Zedekiah shall do, that he may not be discovered. Or, as the prophet was now in Chaldea, this covering of his face, that he might not see the ground, might be intended to signify, that though Zedekiah should be brought into that country, yet he should never see it; as his eyes would be put out on the borders of Judea, as we read they were, Jeremiah 52. For I have set thee for a sign unto the house of Israel — I will show, by what thou dost, what shall happen to the Jewish nation, and particularly to their king. Ezekiel 12:4 Then shalt thou bring forth thy stuff by day in their sight, as stuff for removing: and thou shalt go forth at even in their sight, as they that go forth into captivity. Ezekiel 12:5 Dig thou through the wall in their sight, and carry out thereby. Ezekiel 12:6 In their sight shalt thou bear it upon thy shoulders, and carry it forth in the twilight: thou shalt cover thy face, that thou see not the ground: for I have set thee for a sign unto the house of Israel. Ezekiel 12:7 And I did so as I was commanded: I brought forth my stuff by day, as stuff for captivity, and in the even I digged through the wall with mine hand; I brought it forth in the twilight, and I bare it upon my shoulder in their sight. Ezekiel 12:8 And in the morning came the word of the LORD unto me, saying, Ezekiel 12:9 Son of man, hath not the house of Israel, the rebellious house, said unto thee, What doest thou? Ezekiel 12:9-16 . Hath not the house of Israel said — That is, I know they have said; as the words, “are they not written in the book of Chronicles, &c.?” mean, they are written there. What doest thou, &c. — They have inquired by way of derision and contempt, what these signs mean. Say — This burden concerneth the prince, &c. — Namely, King Zedekiah, chap. Ezekiel 7:27 . The prince that is among them shall bear upon his shoulder, &c. — Their king shall even be forced himself to carry what he can out of the city, in the dusk of the evening. They shall dig through the wall, &c. — His retinue shall make a private way to get out of the city, that they may not be discovered: see Jeremiah 39:4 ; Jeremiah 52:7 . It is probable that the king and his companions fled through a breach made by themselves in the wall. Or the gate through which they fled might have been walled up during the siege. He shall cover his face, &c. — See note on Ezekiel 12:6 , and on 2 Kings 25:7 . My net also will I spread upon him — Though he thinks to escape, yet I will bring his enemies upon him, who shall encompass him, and stop his flight, as when a wild beast is entangled in a net. I will bring him to Babylon, yet shall he not see it — Neither the land nor the city; for his eyes will be put out at Riblah: see notes on 2 Kings 25:5-7 . I will scatter toward every wind all that are about him — Either the Egyptians, who came to assist him, or those that fled with him. And I will draw out the sword after them — I will cause them to be pursued by the sword and slain, whithersoever they go. But I will leave a few men — Hebrew, ???? ????? , men of number: that is, populus numerabilis utpote parvus, a people easily numbered, as being few: Hor., Ars Poet., 50: 206. From the sword &c ., that they may declare all their abominations — May confess that they were justly punished for their idolatries and immoralities: or that they may declare the cause (namely, their heinous wickedness) why the city of Jerusalem, and the temple dedicated to Jehovah there, were delivered up to destruction, and thereby may justify my proceedings. And they shall know that I am the Lord — Namely, the Chaldeans shall know it. See how God brings good out of evil! The dispersion of sinners, who had done God much dishonour and disservice in their own country, proves the dispersion of penitents, who shall do him much honour and service in other countries. Ezekiel 12:10 Say thou unto them, Thus saith the Lord GOD; This burden concerneth the prince in Jerusalem, and all the house of Israel that are among them. Ezekiel 12:11 Say, I am your sign: like as I have done, so shall it be done unto them: they shall remove and go into captivity. Ezekiel 12:12 And the prince that is among them shall bear upon his shoulder in the twilight, and shall go forth: they shall dig through the wall to carry out thereby: he shall cover his face, that he see not the ground with his eyes. Ezekiel 12:13 My net also will I spread upon him, and he shall be taken in my snare: and I will bring him to Babylon to the land of the Chaldeans; yet shall he not see it, though he shall die there. Ezekiel 12:14 And I will scatter toward every wind all that are about him to help him, and all his bands; and I will draw out the sword after them. Ezekiel 12:15 And they shall know that I am the LORD, when I shall scatter them among the nations, and disperse them in the countries. Ezekiel 12:16 But I will leave a few men of them from the sword, from the famine, and from the pestilence; that they may declare all their abominations among the heathen whither they come; and they shall know that I am the LORD. Ezekiel 12:17 Moreover the word of the LORD came to me, saying, Ezekiel 12:17-19 . Moreover, &c. — As he was a sign to them in digging through the wall and carrying out his stuff, so he must now be a sign to them in another way. Eat thy bread with quaking, &c. — Show all the signs of anxiety and consternation when thou takest thy common sustenance. This he was to do that he might express the calamitous condition of those that should be in Jerusalem during the siege. And say unto the people — Thy fellow-captives; Thus saith the Lord of the inhabitants of Jerusalem — This was designed to inform the captives that they were not in a worse condition than those that were left behind in Judea. They shall eat their bread with carefulness, &c. — See note on Ezekiel 4:16-17 . That her land may be desolate — Rather, because her land shall be desolate, namely, the land of Jerusalem, or the country, of which it was the head city, which was shortly to be laid waste, emptied of its inhabitants, wealth, and plenty. Because of the violence, &c. — The injustice, oppression, and tyranny of the Jews toward one another. Ezekiel 12:18 Son of man, eat thy bread with quaking, and drink thy water with trembling and with carefulness; Ezekiel 12:19 And say unto the people of the land, Thus saith the Lord GOD of the inhabitants of Jerusalem, and of the land of Israel; They shall eat their bread with carefulness, and drink their water with astonishment, that her land may be desolate from all that is therein, because of the violence of all them that dwell therein. Ezekiel 12:20 And the cities that are inhabited shall be laid waste, and the land shall be desolate; and ye shall know that I am the LORD. Ezekiel 12:21 And the word of the LORD came unto me, saying, Ezekiel 12:22 Son of man, what is that proverb that ye have in the land of Israel, saying, The days are prolonged, and every vision faileth? Ezekiel 12:22-25 . Song of Solomon of man, what is that proverb? — The saying become proverbial. The days are prolonged, and every vision faileth — Words of the same import with those that occur Ezekiel 12:27 , and Ezekiel 11:3 . Both of them the words of scoffers, who turned the grace of God into wantonness, and took encouragement from his patience and long-suffering, to despise his threatenings, as if they would never be fulfilled. Tell them therefore — Who either use this proverb, or who stumble at my deferring to execute judgment; I will make this proverb to cease — My patience shall soon be at its period, and will call on my justice to vindicate it, and then calamities felt will prove that there can be no more place for such a proverb, the groundlessness of it being manifest to all. Say unto them, The days are at hand — The time when God will show his wrath, and make his power and justice known to the world by fulfilling his threatenings and the predictions of his prophets. For there shall be no more any vain vision — The false prophets, who foretold peace and safety, shall see their prophecies so confuted by the events, quite contrary to what they foretold, that they will never pretend any more to publish new prophecies. I am the Lord — I am able to discover the vanity and falsehood of the prophets that have flattered the people, and will do it by accomplishing what my true prophets have foretold. The word that I shall speak shall come to pass — No length of time shall make me forget it; no pretences of self-flattering prophets or people shall divert me from my purpose; no power can hinder, nor counsel defeat my design. It shall be no more prolonged: for in your days, &c. — My threatenings shall be fulfilled in your own days, and you shall have ocular demonstration of their truth. Ezekiel 12:23 Tell them therefore, Thus saith the Lord GOD; I will make this proverb to cease, and they shall no more use it as a proverb in Israel; but say unto them, The days are at hand, and the effect of every vision. Ezekiel 12:24 For there shall be no more any vain vision nor flattering divination within the house of Israel. Ezekiel 12:25 For I am the LORD: I will speak, and the word that I shall speak shall come to pass; it shall be no more prolonged: for in your days, O rebellious house, will I say the word, and will perform it, saith the Lord GOD. Ezekiel 12:26 Again the word of the LORD came to me, saying, Ezekiel 12:27 Son of man, behold, they of the house of Israel say, The vision that he seeth is for many days to come , and he prophesieth of the times that are far off. Ezekiel 12:28 Therefore say unto them, Thus saith the Lord GOD; There shall none of my words be prolonged any more, but the word which I have spoken shall be done, saith the Lord GOD. Benson Commentary on the Old and New Testaments Text Courtesy of BibleSupport.com . Used by Permission.

Expositor's Bible Commentary Ezekiel 12:1 The word of the LORD also came unto me, saying, THE END OF THE MONARCHY Ezekiel 12:1-15 ; Ezekiel 17:1-24 ; Ezekiel 19:1-14 IN spite of the interest excited by Ezekiel’s prophetic appearances, the exiles still received his prediction of the fall of Jerusalem with the most stolid incredulity. It proved to be an impossible task to disabuse their minds of the pre-possessions which made such an event absolutely incredible. True to their character as a disobedient house, they had "eyes to see, and saw not; and ears to hear, but heard not". { Ezekiel 12:2 } They were intensely interested in the strange signs he performed, and listened with pleasure to his fervid oratory; but the inner meaning of it all never sank into their minds. Ezekiel was well aware that the cause of this obtuseness lay in the false ideals which nourished an overweening confidence in the destiny of their nation. And these ideals were the more difficult to destroy because they each contained an element of truth, so interwoven with the falsehood that to the mind of the people the true and the false stood and fell together. If the great vision of chapters 8-11 had accomplished its purpose, it would doubtless have taken away the main support of these delusive imaginations. But the belief in the indestructibility of the Temple was only one of a number of roots through which the vain confidence of the nation was fed; and so long as any of these remained the people’s sense of security was likely to remain. These spurious ideals, therefore, Ezekiel sets himself with characteristic thoroughness to demolish, one after another. This appears to be in the main the purpose of the third subdivision of his prophecies on which we now enter. It extends from chapter 12 to chapter 19; and in so far as it can be taken to represent a phase of his actual spoken ministry, it must be assigned to the fifth year before the capture of Jerusalem (August, 591-August., 590 B.C.). But since the passage is an exposition of ideas more than a narrative of experiences, we may expect to find that chronological consistency has been even less observed than in the earlier part of the book. Each idea is presented in the completeness which it finally possessed in the prophet’s mind, and his allusions may anticipate a state of things which had not actually arisen till a somewhat later date. Beginning with a description and interpretation of two symbolic actions intended to impress more vividly on the people the certainty of the impending catastrophe, the prophet proceeds in a series of set discourses to expose the hollowness of the illusions which his fellow exiles cherished, such as disbelief in prophecies of evil, faith in the destiny of Israel, veneration for the Davidic kingdom, and reliance on the solidarity of the nation in sin and in judgment. These are the principal topics which the course of exposition will bring before us, and in dealing with them it will be convenient to depart from the order in which they stand in the book and adopt an arrangement according to subject. By so doing we run the risk of missing the order of the ideas as it presented itself to the prophet’s mind, and of ignoring the remarkable skill with which the transition from one theme to another is frequently effected. But if we have rightly understood the scope of the passage as a whole, this wilt not prevent us from grasping the substance of his teaching or its bearing on the final message which he had to deliver. In the present chapter we shall accordingly group together three passages which deal with the fate of the monarchy, and especially of Zedekiah, the last king of Judah. That reverence for the royal house would form an obstacle to the acceptance of such teaching as Ezekiel’s was to be expected from all we know of the popular feeling on this subject. The fact that a few royal assassinations which stain the annals of Judah were sooner or later avenged by the people shows that the monarchy was regarded as a pillar of the state, and that great importance was attached to the possession of a dynasty which perpetuated the glories of David’s reign. And there is one verse in the Book of Lamentations which expresses the anguish which the fall of the kingdom caused to godly men in Israel, although its representatives were so unworthy of his office as Zedekiah: "The breath of our nostrils, the anointed of Jehovah, was taken in their pits, of whom we said, Under his shadow shall we live among the nations". { Lamentations 4:20 } So long therefore as a descendant of David sat on the throne of Jerusalem it would seem the duty of every patriotic Israelite to remain true to him. The continuance of the monarchy would seem to guarantee the existence of the state; the prestige of Zedekiah’s position as the anointed of Jehovah, and the heir of David’s covenant, would warrant the hope that even yet Jehovah would intervene to save an institution of His own creating. Indeed, we can see from Ezekiel’s own pages that the historic monarchy in Israel was to him an object of the highest veneration and regard. He speaks of its dignity in terms whose very exaggeration shows how largely the fact bulked in his imagination. He compares it to the noblest of the wild beasts of the earth and the most lordly tree of the forest. But his contention is that this monarchy no longer exists. Except in one doubtful passage, he never applies the title king ( melek ) to Zedekiah. The kingdom came to an end with the. deportation of Jehoiachin, the last king who ascended the throne in legitimate succession. The present holder of the office is in no sense king by Divine right; he is a creature and vassal of Nebuchadnezzar, and has no rights against his suzerain. His very name has been changed by the caprice of his master. As a religious symbol, therefore, the royal power is defunct; the glory has departed from it as surely as from the Temple. The makeshift administration organised under Zedekiah had a peaceful if inglorious future before it, if it were content to recognise facts and adapt itself to its humble position. But if it should attempt to raise its head and assert itself as an independent kingdom, it would only seal its own doom. And for men in Chaldea to transfer to this shadow of kingly dignity the allegiance due to the heir of David’s house was a waste of devotion as little demanded by patriotism as by prudence. I. The first of the passages in which the fate of the monarchy is foretold requires little to be said by way of explanation. It is a symbolic action of the kind with which we are now familiar, exhibiting the certainty of the fate in store both for the people and the king. The prophet again becomes a "sign" or portent to the people-this time in a character which every one of his audience understood from recent experience. He is seen by daylight collecting "articles of captivity"- i.e. , such necessary articles as a person going into exile would try to take with him-and bringing them out to the door of his house. Then at dusk he breaks through the wall with his goods on his shoulder; and, with face muffled he removes "to another place." In this sign we have again two different facts indicated by a series of not entirely congruous actions. The mere act of carrying out his most necessary furniture and removing from one place to another suggests quite unambiguously the captivity that awaits the inhabitants of Jerusalem. But the accessories of the action, such as breaking through the wall, the muffling of the face, and the doing of all this by night, point to quite a different event- viz., Zedekiah’s attempt to break through the Chaldaean lines by night, his capture, his blindness, and his imprisonment in Babylon. The most remarkable thing in the sign is the circumstantial manner in which the details of the king’s flight and capture are anticipated so long before the event. Zedekiah, as we read in the Second Book of Kings, as soon as a breach was made in the walls by the Chaldaeans, broke out with a small party of horsemen, and succeeded in reaching the plain of Jordan. There he was overtaken and caught, and sent before Nebuchadnezzar’s presence at Riblah. The Babylonian king punished his perfidy with a cruelty common enough amongst the Assyrian kings: he caused his eyes to be put out, and sent him thus to end his days in prison at Babylon. All this is so clearly hinted at in the signs that the whole representation is often set aside as a prophecy after the event. That is hardly probable, because the sign does not bear the marks of having been originally conceived with the view of exhibiting the details of Zedekiah’s punishment. But since we know that the book was written after the event, it is a perfectly fair question whether in the interpretation of the symbols Ezekiel may not have read into it a fuller meaning than was present to his own mind at the time. Thus the covering of his head does not necessarily suggest anything more than the king’s attempt to disguise his person. Possibly this was all that Ezekiel originally meant by it. When the event took place he perceived a further meaning in it as an allusion to the blindness inflicted on the king, and introduced this into the explanation given of the symbol. The point of it lies in the degradation of the king through his being reduced to such an ignominious method of securing his personal safety. "The prince that is among them shall bear upon his shoulder in the darkness, and shall go forth: they shall dig through the wall to carry out thereby: he shall cover his face, that he may not be seen by any eye, and he himself shall not see the earth". { Ezekiel 12:12 } II. In chapter 17 the fate of the monarchy is dealt with at greater length under the form of an allegory. The kingdom of Judah is represented as a cedar in Lebanon-a comparison which shows how exalted were Ezekiel’s conceptions of the dignity of the old regime which had now passed away. But the leading shoot of the tree has been cropped off by a great, broad-winged, speckled eagle, the king of Babylon, and carried away to a "land of traffic, a city of merchants." The insignificance of Zedekiah’s government is indicated by a harsh contrast which almost breaks the consistency of the figure. In place of the cedar which he has spoiled the eagle plants a low vine trailing on the ground, such as may be seen in Palestine at the present day. His intention was that "its branches should extend towards him and its roots be under him"- i.e. , that the new principality should derive all its strength from Babylon and yield all its produce to the power which nourished it. For a time all went well. The vine answered the expectations of its owner, and prospered under the favourable conditions which he had provided for it. But another great eagle appeared on the scene, the king of Egypt, and the ungrateful vine began to send out its roots and turn its branches in his direction. The meaning is obvious: Zedekiah had sent presents to Egypt and sought its help, and by so doing had violated the conditions of his tenure of royal power. Such a policy could not prosper. "The bed where it was planted" was in possession of Nebuchadnezzar, and he could not tolerate there a state, however feeble, which employed the resources with which he had endowed it to further the interests of his rival, Hophra, the king of Egypt. Its destruction shall come from the quarter whence it derived its origin: "when the east wind smites it, it shall wither in the furrow where it grew." Throughout this passage Ezekiel shows that he possessed in full measure that penetration and detachment from local prejudices which all the prophets exhibit when dealing with political affairs. The interpretation of the riddle contains a statement of Nebuchadnezzar’s policy in his dealings with Judah, whose impartial accuracy could not be improved on by the most disinterested historian. The carrying away of the Judaean king and aristocracy was a heavy blow to religious susceptibilities which Ezekiel fully shared, and its severity was not mitigated by the arrogant assumptions by which it was explained in Jerusalem. Yet here he shows himself capable of contemplating it as a measure of Babylonian statesmanship and of doing absolute justice to the motives by which it was dictated. Nebuchadnezzar’s purpose was to establish a petty state unable to raise itself to independence, and one on whose fidelity to his empire he could rely. Ezekiel lays great stress on the solemn formalities by which the great king had bound his vassal to his allegiance: "He took of the royal seed, and made a covenant with him, and brought him under a curse; and the strong ones of the land he took away: that it might be a lowly kingdom, not able to lift itself up, to keep his covenant that it might stand" ( Ezekiel 17:13-14 ). In all this Nebuchadnezzar is conceived as acting within his rights; and here lay the difference between the clear vision of the prophet and the infatuated policy of his contemporaries. The politicians of Jerusalem were incapable of thus discerning the signs of the times. They fell back on the time-honoured plan of checkmating Babylon by means of an Egyptian alliance-a policy which had been disastrous when attempted against the ruthless tyrants of Assyria, and which was doubly imbecile when it brought down on them the wrath of a monarch who showed every desire to deal fairly with his subject provinces. The period of intrigue with Egypt had already begun when this prophecy was written. We have no means of knowing how long the negotiations went on before the overt act of rebellion; and hence we cannot say with certainty that the appearance of the chapter in this part of the book is an anachronism. It is possible that Ezekiel may have known of a secret mission which was not discovered by the spies of the Babylonian court; and there is no difficulty in supposing that such a step may have been taken as early as two and a half years before the outbreak of hostilities. At whatever time it took place, Ezekiel saw that it sealed the doom of the nation. He knew that Nebuchadnezzar could not overlook such flagrant perfidy as Zedekiah and his councillors had been guilty of; he knew also that Egypt could render no effectual help to Jerusalem in her death-struggle. "Not with a strong army and a great host will Pharaoh act for him in the war, when mounds are thrown up, and the towers are built, to cut off many lives" ( Ezekiel 17:17 ). The writer of the Lamentations again shows us how sadly the prophet’s anticipation was verified: "As for us, our eyes as yet failed for our vain help: in our watching we have watched for a nation that could not save us". { Lamentations 4:17 } But Ezekiel will not allow it to be supposed that the fate of Jerusalem is merely the result of a mistaken forecast of political probabilities. Such a mistake had been made by Zedekiah’s advisers when they trusted to Egypt to deliver them from Babylon, and ordinary prudence might have warned them against it. But that was the most excusable part of their folly. The thing that branded their policy as infamous and put them absolutely in the wrong before God and man alike was their violation of the solemn oath by which they had bound themselves to serve the king of Babylon. The prophet seizes on this act of perjury as the determining fact of the situation, and charges it home on the king as the cause of the ruin that is to overtake him: "Thus saith Jehovah, As I live, surely My oath which he hath despised, and My covenant which he has broken, I will return on his head; and I will spread My net over him, and in My snare shall he be taken and ye shall know that I Jehovah have spoken it" ( Ezekiel 17:19-21 ). In the last three verses of the chapter the prophet returns to the allegory with which he commenced, and completes his oracle with a beautiful picture of the ideal monarchy of the future. The ideas on which the picture is framed are few and simple; but they are those which distinguished the Messianic hope as cherished by the prophets from the crude form which it assumed in the popular imagination. In contrast to Zedekiah’s kingdom, which was a human institution without ideal significance, that of the Messianic age will be a fresh creation of Jehovah’s power. A tender shoot shall be planted in the mountain land of Israel, where it shall flourish and increase until it overshadow the whole earth. Further, this shoot is taken from the "top of the cedar"-that is, the section of the royal house which had been carried away to Babylon-indicating that the hope of the future lay not with the king de facto Zedekiah, but with Jehoiachin and those who shared his banishment. The passage leaves no doubt that Ezekiel conceived the Israel of the future as a state with a monarch at its head, although it may be doubtful whether the shoot refers to a personal Messiah or to the aristocracy, who, along with the king, formed the governing body in an Eastern kingdom. This question, however, can be better considered when we have to deal with Ezekiel’s Messianic conceptions in their fully developed form in chapter 34. III. Of the last four kings of Judah there were two whose melancholy fate seems to have excited a profound feeling of pity amongst their countrymen. Jehoahaz or Shallum, according to the Chronicler the youngest of Josiah’s sons, appears to have been even during his father’s lifetime a popular favourite. It was he who after the fatal day of Megiddo was raised to the throne by the "people of the land" at the age of twenty-three years. He is said by the historian of the books of Kings to have done "that which was evil in the sight of the Lord"; but he had hardly time to display his qualities as a ruler when he was deposed and carried to Egypt by Pharaoh Necho, having worn the crown for only three months (608 B.C.). The deep attachment felt for him seems to have given rise to an expectation that he would be restored to his kingdom, a delusion against which the prophet Jeremiah found it necessary to protest. { Jeremiah 22:10-12 } He was succeeded by his elder brother, Eliakim, (Jehoiakim) the headstrong and selfish tyrant, whose character stands revealed in some passages of the books of Jeremiah and Habakkuk. His reign of nine years gave little occasion to his subjects to cherish a grateful memory of his administration. He died in the crisis of the conflict he had provoked with the king of Babylon, leaving his youthful son Jehoiachin to expiate the folly of his rebellion. Jehoiachin is the second idol of the populace to whom we have referred. He was only eighteen years old when he was called to the throne, and within three months he was doomed to exile in Babylon. In his room Nebuchadnezzar appointed a third son of Josiah-Mattaniah-whose name he changed to Zedekiah. He was apparently a man of weak and vacillating character; but he fell ultimately into the hands of the Egyptian and anti-prophetic party, and so was the means of involving his country in the hopeless struggle in which it perished. The fact that two of their native princes were languishing, perhaps simultaneously, in foreign confinement, one in Egypt and the other in Babylon, was fitted to evoke in Judah a sympathy with the misfortunes of royalty something like the feeling embalmed in the Jacobite songs of Scotland. It seems to be an echo of this sentiment that we find in the first part of the lament with which Ezekiel closes his references to the fall of the monarchy (chapter 19). Many critics have indeed found it impossible to suppose that Ezekiel should in any sense have yielded to sympathy with the fate of two princes who are both branded in the historical books as idolaters, and whose calamities on Ezekiel’s own view of individual retribution proved them to be sinners against Jehovah. Yet it is certainly unnatural to read the dirge in any other sense than as an expression of genuine pity for the woes that the nation suffered in the fate of her two exiled kings. If Jeremiah, in pronouncing the doom of Shallum or Jehoahaz, could say, "Weep ye sore for him that goeth away; for he shall not return any more, nor see his native country," there is no reason why Ezekiel should not have given lyrical expression to the universal feeling of sadness which the blighted career of these two youths naturally produced. The whole passage is highly poetical, and represents a side of Ezekiel’s nature which we have not hitherto been led to study. But it is too much to expect of even the most logical of prophets that he should experience no personal emotion but what fitted into his system, or that his poetic gift should be chained to the wheels of his theological convictions. The dirge expresses no moral judgment on the character or deserts of the two kings to which it refers: it has but one theme-the sorrow and disappointment of the "mother" who nurtured and lost them, that is, the nation of Israel, personified according to a usual Hebrew figure of speech. All attempts to go beyond this and to find in the poem an allegorical portrait of Jehoahaz and Jehoiachin are irrelevant. The mother is a lioness, the princes are young lions and behave as stalwart young lions do, but whether their exploits are praiseworthy or the reverse is a question that was not present to the writer’s mind. The chapter is entitled "A Dirge on the Princes of Israel," and embraces not only the fate of Jehoahaz and Jehoiachin, but also of Zedekiah, with whom the old monarchy expired. Strictly. speaking, however, the name qinah, or dirge, is applicable only to the first part of the chapter ( Ezekiel 19:2-9 ), where the rhythm characteristic of the Hebrew elegy is clearly traceable. With a few slight changes of the text the passage may be translated thus:- 1. Jehoahaz. "How was thy mother a lioness!- Among the lions, In the midst of young lions she couched- She reared her cubs; And she brought up one of her cubs- A young lion he became, And he learned to catch the prey- He ate men." "And nations raised a cry against him- In their pit he was caught; And they brought him with hooks- To the land of Egypt" ( Ezekiel 19:2-4 ). 2. Jehoiachin. "And when she saw that she was disappointed- Her hope was lost. She took another of her cubs- A young lion she made him; And he walked in the midst of lions- A young lion he became; And he learned to catch prey- He ate men". "And he lurked in his lair- The forests he ravaged: Till the land was laid waste and its fulness- With the noise of his roar". "The nations arrayed themselves against him- From the countries around; And spread over him their net- In their pit he was caught. And they brought him with hooks- To the king of Babylon; And he put him in a cage, That his voice might no more be heard- On the mountains of Israel" ( Ezekiel 19:5-9 ). The poetry here is simple and sincere. The mournful cadence of the elegiac measure, which is maintained throughout, is adapted to the tone of melancholy which pervades the passage and culminates in the last beautiful line. The dirge is a form of composition often employed in songs of triumph over the calamities of enemies; but there is no reason to doubt that here it is true to its original purpose, and expresses genuine sorrow for the accumulated misfortunes of the royal house of Israel. The closing part of the "dirge" dealing with Zedekiah is of a somewhat different character. The theme is similar, but the figure is abruptly changed, and the elegiac rhythm is abandoned. The nation, the mother of the monarchy, is here compared to a luxuriant vine planted beside great waters; and the royal house is likened to a branch towering above the rest and bearing rods which were kingly sceptres. But she has been plucked up by the roots, withered, scorched by the fire, and finally planted in an arid region where she cannot thrive. The application of the metaphor to the ruin of the nation is very obvious. Israel, once a prosperous nation, richly endowed with all the conditions of a vigorous national life, and glorying in her race of native kings, is now humbled to the dust. Misfortune after misfortune has destroyed her power and blighted her prospects, till at last she has been removed from her own land to a place where national life cannot be maintained. But the point of the passage lies in the closing words: fire went out from one of her twigs and consumed her branches, so that she has no longer a proud rod to be a ruler’s sceptre ( Ezekiel 19:14 ). The monarchy, once the glory and strength of Israel, has in its last degenerate representative involved the nation in ruin. Such is Ezekiel’s final answer to those of his hearers who clung to the old Davidic kingdom as their hope in the crisis of the people’s fate. Ezekiel 12:21 And the word of the LORD came unto me, saying, PROPHECY AND ITS ABUSES Ezekiel 12:21 - Ezekiel 14:11 THERE is perhaps nothing more perplexing to the student of Old Testament history than the complicated phenomena which may be classed under the general name of "prophecy." In Israel, as in every ancient state, there was a body of men who sought to influence public opinion by prognostications of the future. As a rule the repute of all kinds of divination declined with the advance of civilisation and general intelligence, so that in the more enlightened communities matters of importance came to be decided on broad grounds of reason and political expediency. The peculiarity in the case of Israel was that the very highest direction in politics, as well as religion and morals, was given in a form capable of being confounded with superstitious practices which flourished alongside of it. The true prophets were not merely profound moral thinkers, who announced a certain issue as the probable result of a certain line of conduct. In many cases their predictions are absolute, and their political programme is an appeal to the nation to accept the situation which they foresee, as the basis of its public action. For this reason prophecy was readily brought into competition with practices with which it had really nothing in common. The ordinary individual who cared little for principles and only wished to know what was likely to happen might readily think that one way of arriving at knowledge of the future was as, good as another, and when the spiritual prophet’s anticipations displeased him he was apt to try his luck with the sorcerer. It is not improbable that in the last days of the monarchy spurious prophecy of various kinds gained an additional vitality from its rivalry with the great spiritual teachers who in the name of Jehovah foretold the ruin of the state. This is not the place for an exhaustive account of the varied developments in Israel of what may be broadly termed prophetic manifestations. For the understanding of the section of Ezekiel now before us it will be enough to distinguish three classes of phenomena. At the lowest end of the scale there was a rank growth of pure magic or sorcery, the ruling idea of which is the attempt to control or forecast the future by occult arts which are believed to influence the supernatural powers which govern human destiny. In the second place we have prophecy in a stricter sense-that is, the supposed revelation of the will of the deity in dreams or "visions" or half-articulate words uttered in a state of frenzy. Last of all there is the true prophet, who, though subject to extraordinary mental experiences, yet had always a clear and conscious grasp of moral principles, and possessed an incommunicable certainty that what he spoke was not his own word but the word of Jehovah. It is obvious that a people subjected to such influences as these was exposed to temptations both intellectual and moral from which modern life is exempt. One thing is certain-the existence of prophecy did not tend to simplify the problems of national life or individual conduct. We are apt to think of the great prophets as men so signally marked out by God as His witnesses that it must have been impossible for any one with a shred of sincerity to question their authority. In reality it was quite otherwise. It was no more an easy thing then than now to distinguish between truth and error, between the voice of God and the speculations of men. Then, as now, divine truth had no available credentials at the moment of its utterance except its self-evidencing power on hearts that were sincere in their desire to know it. The fact that truth came in the guise of prophecy only stimulated the growth of counterfeit prophecy, so that only those who were "of the truth" could discern the spirits whether they were of God. The passage which forms the subject of this chapter is one of the most important passages of the Old Testament in its treatment of the errors and abuses incident to a dispensation of prophecy. It consists of three parts: the first deals with difficulties occasioned by the apparent failure of prophecy; { Ezekiel 12:21-28 } the second with the character and doom of the false prophets (chapter 13); and the third with the state of mind which made a right use of prophecy impossible. { Ezekiel 14:1-11 } I. It is one of Ezekiel’s peculiarities that he pays close attention to the proverbial sayings which indicated the drift of the national mind. Such sayings were like straws, showing how the stream flowed, and had a special significance for Ezekiel, inasmuch as he was not in the stream himself, but only observed its motions from a distance. Here he quotes a current proverb, giving expression to a sense of the futility of all prophetic warnings: "The days are drawn out, and every vision faileth". { Ezekiel 12:22 } It is difficult to say what the feeling is that lies behind it, whether it is one of disappointment or of relief. If, as seems probable, Ezekiel 12:27 is the application of the general principle to the particular case of Ezekiel, the proverb need not indicate absolute disbelief in the truth of prophecy. "The vision which he sees is for many days, and remote times does he prophesy"-that is to say, The prophet’s words are no doubt perfectly true, and come from God; but no man can ever tell when they are to be fulfilled: all experience shows that they relate to a remote future which we are not likely to see. For men whose concern was to find direction in the present emergency, that was no doubt equivalent to a renunciation of the guidance of prophecy. There are several things which may have tended to give currency to this view and make it plausible. First of all, of course, the fact that many of the "visions" that were published had nothing in them; they were false in their origin, and were bound to fail. Accordingly one thing necessary to rescue prophecy from the discredit into which it had fallen was the removal of those who uttered false predictions in the name of Jehovah: "There shall no more be any false vision or flattering divination in the midst of the house of Israel" ( Ezekiel 12:24 ). But besides the prevalence of false prophecy there were features of true prophecy which partly explained the common misgiving as to its trustworthiness. Even in true prophecy there is an element of idealism, the future being depicted in forms derived from the prophet’s circumstances, and represented as the immediate continuation of the events of his own time. In support of the proverb it might have been equally apt to instance the Messianic oracles of Isaiah, or the confident predictions of Hananiah, the opponent of Jeremiah. Further, there is a contingent element in prophecy: the fulfilment of a threat or promise is conditional on the moral effect of the prophecy itself on the people. These things were perfectly understood by thoughtful men in Israel. The principle of contingency is clearly expounded in the eighteenth chapter of Jeremiah, and it was acted on by the princes who on a memorable occasion saved him from the doom of a false prophet. { Jeremiah 26:1-24 } Those who used prophecy to determine their practical attitude towards Jehovah’s purposes found it to be an unerring guide to right thinking and action. But those who only took a curious interest in questions of external fulfilment found much to disconcert them; and it is hardly surprising that many of them became utterly sceptical of its divine origin. It must have been to this turn of mind that the proverb with which Ezekiel is dealing owed its origin. It is not on these lines, however, that Ezekiel vindicates the truth of the prophetic word, but on lines adapted to the needs of his own generation. After all prophecy is not wholly contingent. The bent of the popular character is one of the e