Lay on your left side for 390 days to represent the 390 years that the northern tribes of Israel sinned against God. After that, lay on your right side for 40 days to represent the 40 years the southern tribes of Judah sinned against God. This is what God told Ezekiel to do. He was to embody how sin cripples a nation. [1]
The northerners and southerners of Israel gambled against God and lost. Assyria led the northern tribes into captivity. The Babylonians did the same to the southern tribes.
Can you imagine having to learn to read, write, speak, and understand a foreign language? Eat strange cuisine? Hear that your homeland is under the rule of a foreign power?
How depressing! But thankfully the story doesn’t end there. God is faithful! There is hope!
“I will show the holiness of My great name, which has been profaned among the nations, the name you have profaned among them. Then the nations will know that I am the Lord, declares the Sovereign Lord, when I am proved holy through you before their eyes.” [2]
Praise God for a restoration that He initiates! His own people had profaned His Name among the nations, but that was about to change. He was going to prove His holiness through them.
“I will take you out of the nations; I will gather you from all the countries and bring you back into your own land.” [3]
Homecomings are special events. My stepfather told us how when he received his release papers from the Korean War, he was so happy. He packed his bag and walked away from his barracks. Suddenly, a bomb hit the barracks and blew it up. God was so gracious to my stepfather to bring him home. No enemy blow up God’s plan for us.
God is bringing His people home: “I will sprinkle clean water on you, and you will be clean; I will cleanse you from all your impurities and from all your idols. I will give you a new heart and put a new spirit in you; I will remove from you your heart of stone and give you a heart of flesh.” [4] Praise God for forgiveness, cleansing and for transforming grace!
“I will put my Spirit in you and move you to follow My decrees and be careful to keep My laws.” Praise God for an appetite to obey! Jesus commanded us to: “Baptize disciples!” “Teach them to obey everything I commanded you.” [5]
“...You will be My people, and I will be your God.” [6] Praise God for restored identification with Him!
“I will call for the grain and make it plentiful. I will increase the fruit of the trees and the crops of the field, so that you will no longer suffer disgrace.” [7] Praise God for replacing poor production with plentiful production; and for replacing disgrace with grace.
“On the day I cleanse you from all your sins, I will resettle your towns, and the ruins will be rebuilt. This land that was laid waste has become like the garden of Eden; the cities that were lying in ruins, desolate and destroyed, are now fortified, and inhabited.” “Seek first God’s kingdom and His righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well.” [8]
“Then the nations around you that remain will know that I the Lord have rebuilt what was destroyed and have replanted what was desolate.” [9] God glories in replanting the uprooted. He enjoys restoring what was lost.
Whether on a national or an individual level, God is able to restore our losses! As Jesus said, “The Son of Man came to seek and to save the lost.” [10]
[1] Ezekiel 4:4-6
[2] Ezekiel 36:23
[3] Ezekiel 36:24
[4] Ezekiel 36:25-26
[5] Ezekiel 36:27 & Matthew 28:20
[6] Ezekiel 36:28
[7] Ezekiel 36:29-30
[8] Ezekiel 36:33-34 & Matthew 6:33
[9] Ezekiel 36:36
[10] Luke 19:10
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