Ezekiel 36 - You're Not The Center

Life's not all about you. It's about living into the LORD's holy name.

Biblia.com

SINCE WE LAST LEFT OFF... the glory of the LORD had departed from Jerusalem, and Ezekiel continued warning the exiles that the city’s fall was certain, exposing false prophets, corrupt leaders, idolatry, empty religion, and Israel’s long history of covenant unfaithfulness.

In today's passage, the LORD begins to reveal how and why He saves His sinful people.

Ezekiel 36:18–28 (NASB95)

¹⁸ “Therefore I poured out My wrath on them for the blood which they had shed on the land, because they had defiled it with their idols.

¹⁹ “Also I scattered them among the nations and they were dispersed throughout the lands. According to their ways and their deeds I judged them.

²⁰ “When they came to the nations where they went, they profaned My holy name, because it was said of them, ‘These are the people of the LORD; yet they have come out of His land.’

²¹ “But I had concern for My holy name, which the house of Israel had profaned among the nations where they went.

²² “Therefore say to the house of Israel, ‘Thus says the LORD God, “It is not for your sake, O house of Israel, that I am about to act, but for My holy name, which you have profaned among the nations where you went.

²³ “I will vindicate the holiness of My great name which has been profaned among the nations, which you have profaned in their midst. Then the nations will know that I am the Lord,” declares the LORD God, “when I prove Myself holy among you in their sight.

²⁴ “For I will take you from the nations, gather you from all the lands and bring you into your own land.

²⁵ “Then I will sprinkle clean water on you, and you will be clean; I will cleanse you from all your filthiness and from all your idols.

²⁶ “Moreover, I will give you a new heart and put a new spirit within you; and I will remove the heart of stone from your flesh and give you a heart of flesh.

²⁷ “I will put My Spirit within you and cause you to walk in My statutes, and you will be careful to observe My ordinances.

²⁸ “You will live in the land that I gave to your forefathers; so you will be My people, and I will be your God.

Heidelberg Catechism

Q&A 70

Q. What does it mean to be washed with Christ’s blood and Spirit?

A. To be washed with Christ’s blood means

that God, by grace, has forgiven my sins

because of Christ’s blood

poured out for me in his sacrifice on the cross.

To be washed with Christ’s Spirit means

that the Holy Spirit has renewed me

and set me apart to be a member of Christ

so that more and more I become dead to sin

and increasingly live a holy and blameless life.

Summary

We always want to put ourselves at the center of everything. It's easy to understand that self centeredness is the root of sin, but today's passage illustrates how easy it is to make salvation all about ourselves as well. While it's not wrong to think that God always saves His covenant people (which we've seen over and over is the primary theme of the Old Testament) because He loves them, here the LORD reveals a deeper motivation: He had concern for His holy name.

Remember the primary attributes of the covenant the LORD has with His people - including us - He will be our God, and we will be His people. We are people who are called by His name (2 Chronicles 7:14). Our primary purpose is to glorify God, but our sin produces the opposite results: it profanes God's holy name. I'm sure your kids never misbehaved, but perhaps you've seen other people's kids who embarrassed their parents by acting badly in public. This is what our sins do - they profane the LORD's name among the nations.

It's humbling to read that God didn't save us because we're so awesome. We're nowhere near the center of this story. He saved us to vindicate the holiness of His great name which had been profaned... so that the nations will know that He is the LORD. His salvation, then, proves Himself holy in their sight. God is at the center, not us!

The New Testament explains that God chose you in Him before the foundation of the world, that you would be holy and blameless before Him (Ephesians 1:4). But your sin profaned this holiness that you were created for. God didn't save you so that you could live unto yourself as you see fit. Rather, He saved you to vindicate His name - so that you would once again be holy and blameless before Him, a true image bearer of God's holy name, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand (Ephesians 2:10).

  Dig Deeper  

Another way to render the word translated profaned in this passage is defiled. So sin not only made you filthy, it defiled the LORD's name. So it makes sense that in order to save you, the LORD must cleanse you from all your filthiness and from all your idols. But another primary lesson we've learned reading the Bible is that sin has not just defiled our external attributes, it's infected our hearts - which the ancient Hebrews understood to be the center of not just our emotions, but also our intellect and volition.

Think back to young children again - they have an almost magnetic attraction to dirt and mud. Moments after their bath, they're just as dirty as they were before. Our hearts - that is, our intellect, emotion and will - have that same attraction to sin, so it's not enough for God to just cleanse us and send us back out. We'd just continually defile ourselves. We need a whole new heart.

And that's exactly what God does for those He saves! He gives us a new heart and new spirit. He's taken out your heart of stone that preferred filth over holiness, and put in its place a heart of flesh - one that longs to bear the LORD's holy name. But the LORD's done even more for you! He's put His Spirit within you and causes you to walk in His statutes.

So in saving you, the LORD vindicated His holy name by cleansing you from all your filthiness and causing you to be able to fulfill the purpose that He chose you for before the foundation of the world: to the good works which He prepared you for. So life is not all about you. It's about living into the LORD's holy name.

AAA Prayer (About)

• ACKNOWLEDGE WHO GOD IS: Our Father, who proves Himself holy in the sight of the nations;

• ALIGN YOUR LIFE WITH GOD'S WILL: Pray that you'll stop putting yourself in the center of everything and instead make your continual focus to glorify the LORD's holy name;

• ASK GOD FOR WHAT YOU NEED:

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