Month: July 2020

327. Clean and Undefiled

Ezekiel 37:23 Neither shall they defile themselves any more with their idols, nor with their detestable things, nor with any of their transgressions: but I will save them out of all their dwelling places, wherein they have sinned, and will cleanse them: so shall they be my people, and I will be their God.

“Cleanness” is an important matter to God and His prescribed rituals in the Mosaic Law of the Old Testament. God’s people could only eat “clean” food. Certain ritual washings were performed before offering sacrifices. Cleansings of persons who had had leprosy or skin diseases were done. Cleansing of houses with mold had to be done. Various cleansing rituals made one ceremonially clean.

The cleaning was not always related to anything scientific, as far as we can determine. It was simply a matter of doing what the Lord said in order to approach Him in worship or prayer. Obedience made one clean. Sin always defiled, made one unclean, and unable to approach a Holy God. The “clean and unclean” laws were symbolic of the clean or defiled heart. Unclean was equated with Sin, and clean was equated with Holiness. Outward ritual cleanliness was symbolic of inward holiness, which, in the simplest terms, meant worshiping the One True God in pure faith, with no holding on to idols behind your back (in the back of your mind).

Outward “Clean and Unclean Rules” were done away with at the coming of Christ, because it is faith in Him alone that makes one clean of defiling sin. Now access to God is always open through Jesus, and by faith in His Name. His Blood washes away sin and makes us clean and holy inside. Outward ritual cleansing is no longer required because inward, permanent, and spiritual cleansing comes by faith.

But the promise, “I will cleanse them,” is still real for NT believers. “The blood of Christ cleanses us from all sin.” “By a single offering he has perfected for all time those who are being sanctified. [Hebrews 10:14].” “Therefore…since we have a great priest over the house of God, let us draw near with our hearts sprinkled clean from any evil conscience and our bodies washed with pure water. [Hebrews 10:21,22].” We may enter God’s Presence any time clean and undefiled by repentance and faith, for God has promised to cleanse the soul from Sin and its defilements. Why go through a day defiled? Come clean!

 

326. One Nation and One King

Ezekiel 37:22 And I will make them one nation in the land upon the mountains of Israel; and one king shall be king to them all: and they shall be no more two nations, neither shall they be divided into two kingdoms any more at all.

God will One Day have what He created in the beginning: One Nation with One King. This is a promise, and God will keep it. I separated myself from God my Creator and made myself a second king, in Adam. But our sin and rebellion did not thwart God’s Plan for Eternity. He set about to make a people out of which He, God Himself, would be born on earth and come to save us. He would bring the kingdom of God to every person who will receive Him. 

All these believers will become One People, One Nation, with only One King, Jesus. The Church is one body and one spirit, with one hope, one Lord, one faith, one baptism one God and father of all. This all came true on the Day of Pentecost,, but we can only see it by faith. But when the fog and smoke of this world passes away, then we will actually see One Kingdom and only One King, who will be worshiped and followed by all the believers.

This prophecy of two sticks, Israel and Judah, becoming one was fulfilled with the coming of Jesus Christ: it is the Church, of which Jesus is the Absolute Head. We think and live and decide and do things in this Nation with this King. We wander away from the Kingdom Rule again and again, but the Lord is always there waiting with patient and loving arms. 

We will never in this life see Unity and Oneness until we see God face to face. Then all will be one under God, who is over all and through all and in all. For now, we take it by faith in God’s promise that there is a Unity to everything and everyone who is in God. God has been working since the Fall to bring about true Unity of Love once again; and He will do it.

325. Gather and Bring

Ezekiel 37:21 And say unto them, Thus saith the Lord God; Behold, I will take the children of Israel from among the heathen, whither they be gone, and will gather them on every side, and bring them into their own land.

The Lord promises to take His people out from among the unbelievers of the world, where Sin, Death and Satan captured sinners. We have been rescued from the Enemy camp and taken to the safe Homeland where we belong. We were created to live in Eden in a marvelous, beautifully created world to enjoy God forever. Jesus came to bring us into the Kingdom of God. Jesus is the Kingdom until He gathers believing men and women into the Kingdom. This is our own Land. We don’t belong in the World, in which we are held captive. If we were not told we would not know that this world is not our home. It feels like our home for it is the only thing we know and see, but the Lord has graciously revealed that we caused this terrible place by our sin, and that we have been wrenched forcibly from our proper Home with God. God had to reveal to us that there is another life, a much better place. There is a realm where only the Lord rules wisely and well. Jesus invites us to come into the Kingdom of God. “Enter thou into the joy of the Lord.” “Come unto me!” 

This world with its destructive and seductive ways and lying Prince is not, cannot be, and will never be, a real home for us, no matter how familiar we become with it. The world should become more uncomfortable and unfamiliar to the Christian. We learn to abhor worldly ways and worldly comforts with it transitory deceptions. When we finally realize that this world, this flesh, and this temporary life will end in utter disappointment and death, then we may turn to the Lord for rescue and let Him bring us Home.

Then we live in both worlds: among the heathen and among the saints. The Lord is continually bringing us out from the one into the other by the power of the gospel. We need the Word of Truth: You have been taken out, gathered and brought into the Land. In His presence there is fullness of joy: at His right hand are pleasures forevermore. It is not hard: confess Jesus is Lord and give thanks always.

324. We Become One

Ezekiel 37:17 And join them one to another into one stick; and they shall become one in thine hand.

This is another promise that we cannot see, but we believe it to be true simply because the Lord said it. The two sticks symbolize Israel and Judah. The promise is that they will both be joined together as one stick. The extended NT promise is that the Church, all believers in Christ, will be one. Jesus prays (and His prayer is answered): “…that they may be one, even as we are one.” This is true, even if we don’t see it.

The visible church has undergone, and will continue to undergo, division after division until strife, separation, and infighting seem to be the only things the church knows how to do. But the invisible Church has a bond that we cannot see. The Spirit is able to do the impossible: He brings all the various and extremely different parts together and makes them one. This is the reality in the spiritual world. The Church is as much One as the Father and the Son is One. We cannot understand this until we get there and see it, and it will be a wonderful experience.

The man and the woman in a committed marriage union are also one, even though we only get dim glimpses of such unity very rarely. Unity is a mystery. It must be believed. The binding power of perfect love will truly be an awesome experience. Love is more powerful than glue. Two sticks joined together as one in the hands of God is multiplied millions of times over. There will be a “great multitude that no one can number” joined as one in praise of God’s Salvation.

Sin always separates; Christ perfectly unites. We live with both activities going on all the time. One is life, the other is death; one is sin, the other is grace. Focus on the one and forgive the other. Only God can do that; we can’t. Enjoy God.

323. Come out of the Graves

Ezekiel 37:12, 14 Therefore prophesy and say unto them, Thus saith the Lord God; Behold, O my people, I will open your graves, and cause you to come up out of your graves, and bring you into the land of Israel. And shall put my spirit in you, and ye shall live, and I shall place you in your own land: then shall ye know that I the Lord have spoken it, and performed it, saith the Lord.

The Lord God will open the graves of His people, they will come out of the graves, He will bring them to the land, He will put His spirit in them, they will live, and He will place them in their own land. All of this verbiage is to promise one thing: I will rise from the dead; my body will be resurrected; I will live again; I will dwell in the heavenly kingdom of God. 

All who are in the graves will hear His voice and will come out. “All” means all human beings who ever lived on earth, for all died. “Graves” means simply the dead bodies, whatever happened to them, whether buried, entombed, embalmed, cremated, or dismembered. The “voice” of the Lord will shout like a trumpet, like the voice of Jesus at the tomb of Lazarus, “Come forth!” Every human will hear the voice and come alive in the body. 

For the believers, the Lord will place His spirit in them and give them life and bring them into heaven. The promise is that believers will live eternally in the heavenly Kingdom of God (the Promised Land). This is our Home, the Place we belong.

The important words of this promise are “spirit” and “life.”This we have now already, here in this earthly life. We can believe the future promise and hope, but that present promise is harder to grasp. We don’t see God’s eternal life, the heavenly eternal kingdom, the Holy Spirit indwelling. But we believe it. It is real. The Resurrected Life is indeed here and now inside us. The problem is that in this temporal earthly life we still live with this body of sin, the body of death. It is what we see and feel, and we tend to live by sight instead of walking by faith. When we are finally shed of this mortal coil the life of God in us goes on to live forever in a perfect environment with great people and a holy God. Life and Love will be all-consuming in the Resurrection.

322. Breathe on the Slain

Ezekiel 37:9 Then said he unto me, Prophesy unto the wind, prophesy son of man, and say to the wind. Thus saith the Lord God; Come from the four winds, O breath, and breathe upon these slain, that they may live.

When the Holy Spirit (the wind) breathes on someone, that person lives. We, who have been slain by Sin and subject to Death, are breathed upon through the prophecy of the Word of God by the Wind of the Spirit. Then we live. Real living and true life comes from the Word and the Spirit. We were dead in the spirit when we were born with no hope of knowing God or knowing life. But then the Spirit through the Word breathed upon us and gave us life.

We, as sinners, are ever in danger of returning to spiritual death, disease, pain and suffering, since every sin brings a little death. When the sin is forgiven we return to life. We receive the forgiveness of sins when the Spirit breathes life into us. Since we die a little every day, we need to be resurrected and made alive again a little every day. We could not live long or well without the sweet, life-giving Gospel. Prophecy comes to us through the reading, hearing, discussing and learning the Bible. The Breath of God gently breathes life into us again and again. We should use this promise and not try to live too long without hearing the Word of Law and Gospel. 

Just like we need to breathe in fresh air every few seconds to keep alive physically, so also we need to breathe in the fresh air of the Spirit to keep alive spiritually. The dry bones will live; the dry spirit will live. Thank God for the Prophets and Apostles who prophesy to the four winds: the Spirit blows and breathes new life. That’s a promise. We may sometimes say we went to church, read the Bible, attended a Bible study, took Communion, and responded by saying our prayers, and then went away empty: “I got nothing out of that.” But that is not true, according to the Promise. The Holy Spirit is always present with the Word of gospel and forgiveness to breathe life. God does not promise you will always feel the life; He says you have life. Believe it.

321. Ye Shall Live

Ezekiel 37:5, 6 Thus saith the Lord God unto these bones; Behold, I will cause breath to enter into you, and ye shall live: and I will lay sinews upon you, and will bring up flesh upon you, and cover you with skin, and put breath in you, and ye shall live; and ye shall know that I am the Lord.

The great dry bones chapter of Ezekiel promises a resurrection. Dry bones will live. This is the Great Promise of Scripture: a bodily resurrection with sinews and flesh and skin and breath. This guarantee is based on the bodily resurrection of Jesus Christ. He is the first resurrection: blessed are those who have a part in the first resurrection. The Second Death has no hold on them. He who is in Christ by faith will rise again in a spiritual body at the Last Day.

You shall live when the breath (the Spirit) enters into you. The Holy Spirit is the life giver. He gives life to our dead spirit and we are born anew. This is a spiritual resurrection, in which gives God’s life to us day and night. Every “breath” we take reminds us that the Spirit is breathing life into us constantly. This refreshing inspiration enters every time we hear the Gospel. This kind of new life at first looks impossible. The Lord asks, “Can these bones live?” He answers with a resounding command: “Prophesy over these bones: ‘O dry bones, hear the word of the Lord.’”

Amazing, impossible, things happen when the dry bones of death inside of us hear the word of the Lord. The breath, wind, or spirit (the same word in both Hebrew and Greek) is an awesome power: 1) at Creation, the Spirit hovered over the waters, and on the sixth day God breathed into Adam’s nostrils and the man became a living soul; 2) at the Dry Bones, the Wind breathes on the dead; 3) Jesus tells Nicodemus, “You must be born of water and the Spirit…the wind blows where it wishes…so it is with everyone who is born of the Spirit.” 4) Jesus breathes on the disciples and they receive the Holy Spirit, to forgive the sins of anyone; and, 5) “All Scriptures is breathed out by God.” 

Trust the Lord God when He says, “I will cause breath to enter into you, and ye shall live.” Believe the awesome, life-giving power of the Breath of God. It gives life to the universe and to every human; it causes resurrection; it converts and saves and forgives; it infuses the Bible with Truth and Life and Power.

320. Increase the Flock

Ezekiel 36:37, 38 Thus saith the Lord God; I will yet for this be enquired of by the house of Israel, to do it for them; I will increase them with men like a flock. As the holy flock, as the flock of Jerusalem in her solemn feasts; so shall the waste cities be filled with flocks of men: and they shall know that I am the Lord.

Church growth is a promise. The Lord promises that He will increase the Church with people. The Church is a flock of people. He will fill empty and waste places with flocks of people. The result is that many people will know that He is the Lord. This growth of the Church has been taking place ever since.

The Lord also promises that when the Church asks the Lord for increase He will do it for them. There are many waste cities in the world still today, but these places will be filled with flocks of people. The promise has not as yet apparently been completely fulfilled, but we are told that when there is a filling the world will end. We, of course, do not know when that time will come. So we wait and work and watch the Lord fill the Church with people. The flock will increase and grow like a mustard seed. 

The Kingdom of God is unseen to human eyes but God gives us pictures. The Kingdom is like a flock, like a seed, like a sower, like a treasure in the field, like a pearl of great price, like a temple building. One may plant, one may water, but God gives the increase. God builds, God grows. God increases.

The Kingdom of God has a transformative power on the world, on nations, on communities, on churches, on families, and finally on individuals. The Lord promises increase of spiritual life in the heart and He promises a filling of the waste places in the heart. Entrust yourself to the Lord and let Him work the growth and increase. We don’t always know what God is doing or how He is doing it, but we have His promise that He is doing something to cause growth and filling and increase.

319. Build and Plant

Ezekiel 36:36 Then the heathen that are left round about you shall know that I the Lord build the ruined places and plant that that was desolate: I the Lord have spoken it, and I will do it.

When God promises something He says He will do it. It may be hard to believe some of the Lord’s promises, like this one. The Lord says that the unbelievers around us will know that He has built and planted. Jesus says that when your light shines people around you will give glory to your Father. We don’t see that happening, but God says it happens. So it must be so.

Specifically, unbelievers around you will know that the Lord has built up what was ruined and planted where it was desolate. This promise is for us NT Christians to believe in a spiritual way. It is possible that people will see that the Lord has built up the ruined places in our souls, and He will plant fertile growth in the dry and empty places in our souls. We ourselves don’t easily see what the Spirit of God is doing in us to repair and restore what is broken down within us. Yet we are expected to believe that others will see what the Lord is doing.

The people in the world around us actually are affected by the presence of Christians among them. They don’t, as far as we can see, come to know the Lord because of what He is building and planting in us Nevertheless, something happens whether they can acknowledge it or not. We will never know how much impact salt and light has on the world around us, but we can believe the promise that it makes a difference. Certainly, the working of the Spirit in our spirit makes a difference to us, but we can also believe that it makes a difference to others. Every believer is a witness, who witnesses to what the Lord is building and planting in the soul. Believe God and live life. It matters.

318. No Uncleanness or Famine

Ezekiel 36:29, 30 I will also save you from all your uncleannesses: and I will call for the corn, and will increase it, and lay no famine upon you. And I will multiply the fruit of the tree, and increase of the field, that ye shall receive no more reproach of famine among the heathen.

The Lord promises no famine. How can He do that? For there have very often been famines across the world, even in the days of the Bible. Everyone knows what it is like to be hungry, and many people have learned to know what it is like to starve during a famine. Can God promise no famine for you? Yes, He absolutely can if He is talking about spiritual hunger and thirst.

When Jesus came He promised and He brought life, and life more abundantly. He provided abundant bread and fish for the multitudes on two separate occasions. He gave the disciples a multitude of fish to catch on two separate occasions. He turned water into wine, and more and better wine than the guests ever had. For what purpose did He do these provision miracles? He did it to show in graphic terms that the fertile kingdom and the abundant life come to us through faith in Jesus. We can be sure that we will never suffer a spiritual famine. We may, and we should, get hungry and thirsty for spiritual filling and refreshment, but thank God, the Word of the Gospel is always available. If a man becomes hungry and thirsty for spiritual food, the Lord will make sure it is provided in His way and time. No one who wants the Gospel will be left without access to it. The Holy Spirit will always make sure the Church is doing its mission work, as Jesus commanded.

He also promises to save us from our uncleannesses. Sin makes us empty and hungry, and it also defiles and pollutes the soul (not to mention the world around us). As we live in a filthy world the soul becomes defiled and corrupted. Most people get used to it, and they think that’s just the way life is. But the Word tells us that is not the way it is supposed to be. There is a better way, a clean way: believe and receive the Blood of Christ for cleansing. Once we have become morally clean and spiritually satisfied, there is always more available. So we turn to Christ with His Word and Promise: we are cleaned and satisfied. No uncleanness. No famine.