EZEKIEL
is a book about
GLORY
in which God is
GOD.

“God is God, and I am not”
– Winkie Pratney says that the above statement can save you hundreds of thousands of dollars of theological education.
– This summarizes Ezekiel’s preaching and prophecy, as well as the reason for his evident hope in the midst of judgment; the statement “I am the LORD” is repeated in his prophecy some 92 times by my count!
– While God is always God, we don’t always know it or act like it; thus, in Ezekiel the objective of God’s activity is that people would “know that I am the LORD.” (5:13, etc.) A change must take place in us, and God must take His place as glorified Lord in our lives.

Ezekiel: Prophet of Holiness
– Holiness is Ezekiel’s concern as both priest and prophet. More than other prophets, his book focuses on ritual holiness that Israel lacked.
– In ch. 1, Ezekiel has the vision of God’s glory that leads seamlessly to his great responsibility as prophet (ch. 2-3, 33, also cf. Isaiah 6.)
– As A.W. Pink said, “God is sovereign, and man is responsible”; these twin ideas exemplify Ezekiel’s focus on both God’s holiness and man’s obligation. The two ideas are constantly and completely connected.

Israel: A Holy Nation,
– Ez. 2 to 24 focuses on prophecies of judgment against Israel. God’s anger is placed in the context of his choice of Israel and Jerusalem as the epicenter of His self-revelation (5:5-8), and the weight of such a rejection (16:47).
– The Jewish captivity (ch. 3) and the fall of Jerusalem in 588/587 BC (see 33:21) provide the historical backdrop against which God spoke through Ezekiel in judgment of the nation that had forgotten him.

Glory: “For My Name’s Sake”
– Jeremiah deals with God’s judgments in terms of what God feels—grief; Ezekiel deals with God’s judgments in terms of what God wants—glory.
– For Ezekiel, judgment contains a revelation of God—often God says that when they are chastised, “they will know that I am the LORD.” Yet even this revelation is not for their sake, but “for [his] name’s sake” (20:9, 36:22, etc.)

Glory: The Importance of God’s Presence
– Ezekiel’s book begins and ends with the glory of the LORD, as does the book of Revelation. The presence and intimacy of God finally cherished among his holy people is the ultimate fulfillment of all biblical prophecy (Ez. 48:35, Rev. 21:11, 21:23, 22:4).
– In the narrative, God’s glory departing (ch. 8-10), and later returning to a new Israel (43-44), form the most central images in the entire narrative.
– Glory (Heb. kabod=weight, honor, importance) in the OT is related to God’s physical manifestation 45 times; Kittel calls it “the force of His self-manifestation,” or “that which makes God impressive to man.”

Pride: Rebelling Against God’s Glory
– Ezekiel deals with Israel’s wicked elders at length (ch. 8, 11, 14, 20), as well as false prophets (13), selfish “shepherds” (34), and laments for Israel’s princes (19). He deals with pride in high places quite extensively.
– Ezekiel also prophesies against wicked Gentile leaders in ch. 29, 32, 38, and 39. This reaches its apex in ch. 28 with the prince of Tyre, a kind of spiritual carbon copy of Satan in his original calling and rebellion. Ezekiel 28 and Isaiah 14 give us the most biblical insight into the independent spirit—which is what made Satan into Satan.

Making Israel Homesick
– In ch. 20, the Lord hearkens to Israel’s history in detail, recounting the story of the exodus. As with Jeremiah and Hosea, broken covenant is the background for both judgment and renewal (Ez. 16 & 23, Dt. 31:16ff).
– God’s covenant with the nation of Israel in Ex. 19 involved a new land, a dwelling-place for God, and a calling to holiness (Ex. 19:3-6, Ez. 20); inasmuch as Israel had persistently violated its calling, God did not want to dwell among them (Ez. 11:23, Dt. 32:30) or keep them in the land he had promised (Lev. 26:15ff, note v. 33).
– For these covenant promises to be renewed, Israel would have to remember the covenant and live holy (Ez. 11:17-25, 36:16-38, Lev 26:40-45).

Millennium: Israel Restored
– Ez. 36-48 especially concerns the restoration of Israel; the regathering of their nation has begun in our time, but it is obvious that the wars (38-39), restored temple (40-42), worship (43-46) and land (47-48) are yet future.
– New Jerusalem has no death (Rev 21:4, cf. Ez. 42:13) and no temple (Rev. 21:22), so this leads most to think that Ezekiel 40-48 was not describing the new heaven and new earth. Rather, comparison with similar passages (Isaiah 66, Rev. 20) bears witness that this is the longest prophecy about the Millennium in the entire Bible.

Book Recommendations:
Two books that I highly recommend on the person and character of God are Knowledge of the Holy by A.W. Tozer, The Nature and Character of God by Winkie Pratney. Tozer’s book is devotional, while Pratney’s book is an accessible manual to key concepts about who God is and what he is like.

Winkie Pratney also deals with many themes relevant to the study of Ezekiel in the 21CR Conference, Session 5 (“The Chief End of Man”). For more material specific to Ezekiel, see my general recommendations.

Key Passages:
The (manifest) glory: ch. 1, 8:2-4, 9:3a, 10:4, 10:18, 11:23, 43:2-6, 44:2-4
Covenant renewal: 16:60-62, 37:26
The land of Israel: 20:42, 28:25-26, 37:15-28
Dwelling/sanctuary defiled: 23:38, 36:17
Dwelling/sanctuary cleansed: 37:23,27-28, 48:35
Purpose of judgment: 35:11, 39:21-23
Purpose of the temple vision: 43:6-11, (also 44:6-8, 45:9)
See also separate page on “I am the LORD” in Ezekiel.