Grace Evangelical-Lutheran: Ezekiel 18,1-4.21-24.30-32. 3. Trinity

Ezekiel 18,1-4.21-24.30-32 3522

3. Sonntag nach Trinitatis 49

Cornelius, centurion, Acts 10

3. Juli 2022

1. ℣ Turn unto me and have mercy upon me:

℟ Forgive me all my sins. (Psalm 25,16a.18b).

O Jesus, who receives sinners; receive us and open heaven unto us, so that we enter in and receive blessing and comfort. Amen. (Jesus minnt die Sünder an Erdmann Neumeister 1718 elkg 569,7 2021).

2. »The word of Yahweh came to me, Ezekiel: „The soul who sins shall die. The son shall not suffer for the iniquity of the father, nor the father suffer for the iniquity of the son. The righteousness of the righteous shall be upon himself, and the wickedness of the wicked shall be upon himself. … Therefore I will judge you, O house of Israel, every one according to his ways. Repent and turn from all your transgressions, lest iniquity be your ruin. Cast away from you all the transgressions that you have committed, and make yourselves a new heart and a new spirit! Why will you die, O house of Israel? For I have no pleasure in the death of anyone; so turn, and live, declares the Lord who is Yahweh.“«

3. Yahweh has sent His prophet, Ezekiel, to call Israel to repentance. This Israel is not the 10 tribes of the north, for any Ezekiel’s day that Israel had ceased to be a nation 120 years earlier when a Assyria conquered them in 722 bc (the Israelite remnant eventually becomes the Samaritans). Now only the 2 tribes of Judah and Benjamin remain, and the nation is referred to interchangeably from this point on as Judah or as Israel.

4. Yahweh had already sent Israel numerous prophets who exhorted the people to put aside their idols and return solely to Yahweh. They had ignored these prophets and were in the midst of exile in Babylon that began in 597 bc when Nebuchadnezzar exiled King Jehoiachin as punishment for his father’s rebellion against Babylon. A number of prominent Jews joined him in exile, Ezekiel, as a young priest, was one of them. Yahweh called Ezekiel to be a prophet 5 years later in 602 bc. Ezekiel is a contemporary of Daniel who had also been among this deportation. (586 bc destruction of Jerusalem and the temple; 582 bc another deportation to Babylon.)

5. Ezekiel draws attention to the popular proverb of his day: fathers eat sour grapes, and the teeth of their sons are set on edge. „The Israelites do not question the principle that sin deserves punishment and that it is in fact punished. Rather, their complaint is that God is punishing the wrong people. The immediate plea is perhaps not so much the people’s innocence as it is an expansion of a certain cosmic determinism or fatalism by which they are being victimized. Allegedly, God does not care who suffers so long as the balance of sin and punishment is kept“ (Hummel 536).

6. Essentially, what Ezekiel is hearing from the Jews in exile in Babylon is: we are suffering for sins we didn’t commit, therefore why is Yahweh treating us unjustly (Hummel 536)? Why are we as individual exiles suffering the punishment of those who are actually guilty of idolatry, and why are we, as individuals, suffering for the sake of our idolatrous nation? People today utter the same protest in regards to their suffering: why is God unfairly punishing me?

7. Chapter 18, then, is the cornerstone of the book, for here Yahweh emphasizes individual justification or condemnation, and furthermore Yahweh has no delight in anyone’s death; He wants everyone to repent and live. Sin has to be recognized, exposed and repented of. This is often an uncomfortable process because no one enjoys being told they are wrong and have sinned against God and man. Yet God’s mercy and grace is quickly given. The Apostle John zeros in on this in his epistle where he exhorts us: »“If we say we have no sin, then we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us. If we confess our sins, then He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness. If we say we have not sinned, then we make Him a liar, and His word is not in us. My little children, I am writing these things to you so that you may not sin. But if anyone does sin, then we have an advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous. He is the propitiation for our sins, and not for ours only but also for the sins of the whole world« (1. John1,8-10; 2,1-2).

8. Ezekiel likewise focuses on the true issue: the real problem is the heart and spirit. Humanity is a fallen race who can do nothing but sin. Ultimately, everyone is guilty before Yahweh and deserves punishment. In His mercy, Yahweh does not hold the individual accountable but the sacrificial lamb. In the old covenant the lamb bore the sins of the individual, and in the new covenant the Lamb of God bore the sin of the individual. The old, idolatrous heart and spirit needs to be renewed, as the Psalmist proclaims: »Create in me a clean heart, O God, and renew a right spirit within me. Cast me not away from Your presence, and take not Your Holy Spirit from me. Restore to me the joy of Your salvation, and uphold me with a willing spirit. O Yahweh, open my lips, and my mouth will declare Your praise. The sacrifices of God are a broken spirit; a broken and contrite heart, O God, You will not despise« (Psalm 51,10-13.15.17).

9. Under the old testament, Yahweh restored repentant Israel. »Therefore thus says the Lord who is Yahweh: „Now I will restore the fortunes of Jacob and have mercy on the whole house of Israel, and I will be jealous for My Holy Name. They shall forget their shame and all the treachery they have practiced against Me, when they dwell securely in their land with none to make them afraid, when I have brought them back from the peoples and gathered them from their enemies’ lands, and through them have vindicated My holiness in the sight of many nations. Then they shall know that I am Yahweh their God, because I sent them into exile among the nations and then assembled them into their own land. I will leave none of them remaining among the nations anymore. And I will not hide My face anymore from them, when I pour out My Spirit upon the house of Israel, declares the Lord who is Yahweh.« (Ezekiel 39,25-29). The Prophet Jeremiah, another contemporary of Ezekiel, prophesied of a new testament: »Behold, the days are coming, declares Yahweh, when I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel and the house of Judah, not like the covenant that I made with their fathers on the day when I took them by the hand to bring them out of the land of Egypt, My covenant that they broke, though I was their husband. For this is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel after those days: I will put My תּֽוֹרָת (torah) within them, and I will write it on their hearts. And I will be their God, and they shall be My people.« (Jeremiah 31,31-33). That new testament was inaugurated by Jesus, and in Him we are redeemed back to Yahweh, all our sin is forgiven and the Holy Spirit works to create our faith in Christ and to create a new spirit in us.

10. Lord, ’tis not that I did choose Thee;

That, I know, could never be;

For this hard would refuse Thee

Had Thy grace not chosen me.

Thou hast from the sin that stained me

Washed and cleansed and set me free

And unto this end ordained me,

That I ever live to Thee (Lord, ’tis not that I did Choose Thee, Josiah Conder, 1789-1855 lsb 573,1)

This is most certainly true.

11. The peace of God, which surpasses all understanding keep your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus (Philippians 4,7). Amen.

12. Let us pray. Praise be to God the Father who made us. Praise be to God the Son who redeemed us. Praise be to God the Holy Spirit who sanctified us. Praise to the Holy and Glorious Trinity, now and forever. Amen. (Johann Jakob Rambach 1693-1723, Rambachs Handbüchlein, Gebetbuch, ethaltend … #48; Stratman 51).

To God alone be the Glory

Gode ealdore sy se cyneþrymm

✠

All Scriptural quotations are translations done by The Rev. Peter A. Bauernfeind using the Biblia Hebraica Stuttgartensia, 4. Edition © 1990 by the Deutsche Bibelgesellschaft, Stuttgart, and the Novum Testamentum Graece, Nestle-Aland 28. Revised Edition © 2012 by Deutsch Bibelgesellschaft, Stuttgart.

Grace Evangelical-Lutheran

Grace Evangelical Lutheran Church

Thursday, July 14, 2022

Ezekiel 18,1-4.21-24.30-32. 3. Trinity

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