Ezekiel 7:1–13

Read the passage.

In case you haven’t gotten the message by now (and I’m sure there were some Ezekiel spoke to who needed these reminders), God punishes sin. He doesn’t play around; when it’s time for judgement to be brought to bear, it is done fully and completely. There are some who say they follow a “God of love” who doesn’t want to punish anyone. They aren’t following the God of the Bible. No one actually wants to live in total anarchy where everybody does whatever they like with no rules to stop them. Read the last couple chapters of Judges for a glimpse of what that is like. Perhaps they think that wicked people should be “corrected” instead of “punished”, but the fact remains that evil deeds incur consequences.

There are also those who say that prophecy is confusing and not worth reading. I would argue that anyone could read this chapter and figure out what God is saying, even if they didn’t know any of Israel’s history. They would probably need to study more of the Bible to learn why God is saying all this, but what He says is pretty clear. Fictional prophecies are always vague and easy to misinterpret for narrative purposes. Biblical prophecy will either have straightforward meanings, or the symbolism used is explained in the text itself. God’s purpose for giving prophecies is never to be a “Gotcha!” or a puzzle to figure out. Instead they are clear warnings, calls to repentence, or sources of comfort to believers because they show that God has had everything planned out from the very beginning and nothing can thwart Him.

Change our hearts to want what You want, and not our own evil desires.