Reading from Thursday, November 4

Yo yo, sons. What's the wordy word in the happy haps?

Reading for November 3
Ezekiel 10:1-11:25
Before I get into this reading, I want to go back to the idea of Israel's ultimate destruction which we read about last night. Ever since the Israelites took over the land of Jericho, they have more or less been displeasing to God. And while God obviously did some despicable things to both Israel and the surrounding nations, they were what I would call "one offs". They were single isolated occurrences of punishment on his people for specific wrongdoings. Now, after centuries of infidelity, God finally had enough. There was no other way to get the message through to his people than to utterly destroy them by sending the Babylonians to their doorstep. 

But even in the pinnacle of his anger and vengeance, he still desperately wants this relationship with his people. This is where crazy poo-eating, mushroom taking Ezekiel comes in. God puts upon him the task of restoring the people of Israel to the good graces of their God. Maybe that's why he is so privy to these insane visions of God - God had to show himself to someone to get a big enough motivational fire under them to go out and proclaim that God was still there and still desired a relationship with his people, even after the destruction of the land which bared his name. 


OK onto this reading - Ezekiel is back to his crazy hallucinations of Godly possession of objects. In Chapter 10, he talks about the cherubim that reside in the Temple of God in Jerusalem. Cherubim are those creepy little angel statues that you see on churches, and sometimes as a fountain - peeing out of their little wieners. 

These temple cherubim did not look like the image above though. They looked like this: 

 ⁹ I looked, and I saw beside the cherubim four wheels, one beside each of the cherubim; the wheels sparkled like topaz. ¹⁰ As for their appearance, the four of them looked alike; each was like a wheel intersecting a wheel. ¹¹ As they moved, they would go in any one of the four directions the cherubim faced; the wheels did not turn about^[b] as the cherubim went. The cherubim went in whatever direction the head faced, without turning as they went. ¹² Their entire bodies, including their backs, their hands and their wings, were completely full of eyes, as were their four wheels. ¹³ I heard the wheels being called “the whirling wheels.” ¹⁴ Each of the cherubim had four faces: One face was that of a cherub, the second the face of a human being, the third the face of a lion, and the fourth the face of an eagle.

Very similar to the image of God with the four faces - and equally as terrifying with the whirling wheels of eyes and death connected to them. There is no lesson to be had in Ezekiel's vision of the Cherubim of death, at least not one that I can see. He's just sort of conveying what he had seen. 

-- -- --

Chapter 11 though gets back to God's promise to restore Israel with its people. God is telling Ezekiel what to say when he goes out and prophesies among the people, here's the gist of what he asks of old Zeke:

 ¹⁶ “Therefore say: ‘This is what the Sovereign LORD says: Although I sent them far away among the nations and scattered them among the countries, yet for a little while I have been a sanctuary for them in the countries where they have gone.’

 ¹⁷ “Therefore say: ‘This is what the Sovereign LORD says: I will gather you from the nations and bring you back from the countries where you have been scattered, and I will give you back the land of Israel again.’

 ¹⁸ “They will return to it and remove all its vile images and detestable idols. ¹⁹ I will give them an undivided heart and put a new spirit in them; I will remove from them their heart of stone and give them a heart of flesh. ²⁰ Then they will follow my decrees and be careful to keep my laws. They will be my people, and I will be their God. ²¹ But as for those whose hearts are devoted to their vile images and detestable idols, I will bring down on their own heads what they have done, declares the Sovereign LORD.”

Verse 20 is a repeat of something we saw back in Jeremiah I believe. When God is giving the promise of the new covenant to his people, I remember that phrase being there. Other than that, this seems to serve as an apology to his people. It's fair to say that God had no other choice to get Israel's attention, but I'm sure it pained him to do so...

Hebrews 6:1-20

¹⁰ God is not unjust; he will not forget your work and the love you have shown him as you have helped his people and continue to help them. ¹¹ We want each of you to show this same diligence to the very end, so that what you hope for may be fully realized. ¹² We do not want you to become lazy, but to imitate those who through faith and patience inherit what has been promised.

At first, this seems like Paul is going back on his idea of Faith vs. Works. God not forgetting good you've done in his name is clearly a reward for specific works. But then he clarifies it here in verse 12: "...to imitate those who through faith and patience inherit what has been promised" He is referring to Abraham there who in Genesis received and believed a promise from God that he would be the father of a great nation, even though he was childless at a very old age. 

Psalm 105:16-36
This is kind of a brief history of Israel - specifically the events of Exodus and the first Passover. Nothing too great in terms of take away, but its a good thing to remember as Israel's history is founded on those turbulent years. 

Proverbs 27:1-2

 ¹ Do not boast about tomorrow,
   for you do not know what a day may bring.
 ² Let someone else praise you, and not your own mouth;
   an outsider, and not your own lips.

Yeah - stop bragging ya jerk.