Reading from Tuesday, November 16

What's goin on, friends?

Reading for November 16
Ezekiel 33:1-34:31
The "CYA" clause of the Bible.

God is speaking to Ezekiel here and he draws a parallel between being a watchman for a city and being a follower of God. He says that if a watchman warns the people that an army is coming but they take no action, their punishment is on their own heads, but if he doesn't warn them and they are killed, then their death is on the watchman's head. God tells Ezekiel that he is the watchman for Israel and he must warn them of their sin. So in essence if Ezekiel warns these people and then dusts off his hands, he's good to go whether or not they listen doesn't matter.

I think this is a dangerous piece of text here. This puts a great deal of power and responsibility and authority on that of Ezekiel, but it could easily be interpreted to mean all Christians. Meaning it is on us to call everyone out on their sins and misdeeds. Then you get things like the Westboro Baptist Church. And that's not good for anyone. God sums it up here, but notice that he specifies that Ezekiel is a prophet and not just your everyday Christian:

³² You are very entertaining to them, like someone who sings love songs with a beautiful voice or plays fine music on an instrument. They hear what you say, but they don’t act on it! ³³ But when all these terrible things happen to them—as they certainly will—then they will know a prophet has been among them.”

My Bible has these little side bar notes every few chapters and one of them points out that Ezekiel 34 is the turning point for the book of Ezekiel. Similar to Jeremiah, the majority of the first half consisted of prophecies of doom while now we're getting into prophecies of peace and love. The chapter opens with Ezekiel hearing news of the destruction of Jerusalem. The text actually marks the date - January 8, 585 BC. This is unique because the dates in the Bible usually go by the Jewish calendar with notations like "In the fifth day of the ninth month". This book uses this notation style very frequently - every time Ezekiel received a new prophecy from God, he noted the day, month and year of the event. Now to switch to the other standard is jarring, and I think intentionally so. It's an important date.

Anyway, in the same way we got that great message of the new covenant from God in Jeremiah, we see a new vision of God as a loving and graceful shepherd here in Ezekiel. An image that carries through quite heavily to Jesus' ministry as he describes his relationship with his people.

¹¹ “For this is what the Sovereign Lord says: I myself will search and find my sheep. ¹² I will be like a shepherd looking for his scattered flock. I will find my sheep and rescue them from all the places where they were scattered on that dark and cloudy day. ¹³ I will bring them back home to their own land of Israel from among the peoples and nations. I will feed them on the mountains of Israel and by the rivers and in all the places where people live.

One more thing to note - take a look at that last sentence. "I will feed them on the mountains of Israel and by the rivers and in all the places where people live."

God's love is expanding.


Hebrews 13:1-25
This is an insanely great outro to Hebrews. Paul goes out with some really fantastic things to chew on, but I want to dwell on two specifically.


I was in a band for about ten years. The last few years of our existence, we toured up and down the East Coast trying to make a name for ourselves. We usually booked the shows but didn't book a hotel room for afterwards. Partly because we were cheap, but I think secretly we were testing God's ability to provide what we needed. This one night we played a show in Georgia and we didn't get a great turnout and as we were packing up, we watched as all of our potential places to stay walked out the door. Our merch girl started talking to a couple of high school girls who had been dropped off by their parents and they overheard us talking about needing a place to stay. Well the mom shows up and we can see them asking her if we can stay over there. The mom reluctantly agrees and is insistent that the boys and girls sleep on separate floors. We were more than fine with that since we would have ended up sleeping in the van otherwise.

It turned out to be a fantastic night. The mom made a bonfire and we roasted marshmallows and she taught us all the southern slang. Like how they say "Restrent" instead of "Restaurant". She had cots for all of us and made us breakfast in the morning. As we were getting the van ready to head to the next show, we were thanking her profusely and talking about how she really went above and beyond what was expected of our hosts. She responded by saying that she tries to live her life as a Christian and remembered this line from Hebrews:

² Don’t forget to show hospitality to strangers, for some who have done this have entertained angels without realizing it!

Now, obviously we aren't angels. But she treated us as if we were, and I think that's the point. Because to us, she was the angel.

-- -- --

The second one I want to point out doesn't have a fun story associated with it, but I think it's an important thing to remember:

⁵ Don’t love money; be satisfied with what you have. For God has said,    “I will never fail you.
      I will never abandon you.”^[b]
 6 So we can say with confidence,
   “The Lord is my helper,
      so I will have no fear.
      What can mere people do to me?”

In these days of recession and joblessness, this is harder to believe than ever. But I have always believed that God will provide everything you need to get by. Maybe it will be less than you think you need, but it will be everything you need. Of course the homeless and trodden throw a wrench in that theory...maybe this promise only applies to Americans with a college degree. Sarcasm.

Psalm 115:1-18

 ¹² The Lord remembers us and will bless us.
      He will bless the people of Israel
      and bless the priests, the descendants of Aaron.
 ¹³ He will bless those who fear the Lord,
      both great and lowly.

This plays into the idea of God providing what is needed. 

Proverbs 27:21-22
 ²¹ Fire tests the purity of silver and gold,
      but a person is tested by being praised.^[a]
 22 You cannot separate fools from their foolishness,
      even though you grind them like grain with mortar and pestle.

I'm trying to figure out what verse 21 means. Does he mean that the heart of a person is shown when they are praised? Like how they react to praise reveals who they really are? I'm not sure...