Reading: Ezekiel 22-24, Psalm 37

Have you ever asked for something, then immediately regretted getting it? I remember reading a story when I was growing up about people getting their wishes granted, causing instant regret. When I was in middle school I watched an episode of The Twilight Zone on the same theme. Later, the 90s paranormal drama The X-Files picked up the idea when Mulder finds a jinn wrapped in a carpet, and the story of wishes gone back escalates to absurd proportions. While there are no jinni or wish granting going on the Scriptures, there was a claim made by the elders of Israel about Ezekiel a couple chapters ago. What a maker of parables! They thought Ezekiel’s prophecies were parables. Now they will get a parable they will never forget.

This part of Ezekiel, were it written today, would be full of hyperlinks to other parts of the Bible. If you look really carefully you can see most of the story of the books of Moses reflected in what Ezekiel says here. The sojourner wronged. The fatherless and the widow mistreated. The Sabbath ignored. The contempt for parents. Adultery, bribery, murder, extortion, sexual exploitation. We could read a book on the connections to the rest of Hebrew Scripture, but I want to point a couple important ones: the imagery of a purifying fire, and the distinction between the common and the holy. Let’s start with the common and the holy. Remember Leviticus? I know, I miss it too. That entire book, along with large chunks of Exodus and Numbers, was concerned with making a distinction between what was common and what was holy. The holy things could enter God’s presence in the new garden represented by the throne of God in the tabernacle. The common things were destroyed by entering that same space. Here we learn, in the midst of a long list of terrible things that Jerusalem has been doing, a charge that they have made no distinction between the common and the holy. For the ancient reader, this would dredge up the whole point of Leviticus, and I think it should do the same for us. Second, and closely connected, is the purifying fire. God declares that his people have become dross, and will be gathered to be heated in fire like dross to extract precious metals. Because they have made no distinction between the common and the holy, God will do it for them.

Having been given that cheery picture of their future, Ezekiel turns to talking about their past. In what is probably the most awkward chapter of the Hebrew Scriptures, at least among teenagers when they first discover it, Ezekiel compares Israel and Judah to extremely promiscuous sisters Oholah and Oholibah. When this story gets going, I can imagine the elders of Israel wishing they had said nothing about parables. The story portrays the sisters as harlots, rescued from Egypt, who return to their ways when they are brought to the promised land. The elder, Oholah goes after all sorts of foreign men while ignoring her husband, and is destroyed by them. Oholihab, seeing what happened to her sister, doubles down and does even more of the same. The results are predictable. The foreign peoples that Judah pursued will turn and destroy her, just as happened to the northern kingdom. God’s chosen people will be purged of the harlot’s ways. Once again, as they did not make a distinction between the common and the holy, God will do it for them.

The third section today is about the attitude of the elders of Jerusalem, who see themselves as the choice meat in the pot that Jerusalem under siege has become. In other words, they think that they are the precious metal, the holy things, that God is after in his refining fire. God has another idea. They are kindling. Chaff. Corrosion. The fire is there to eliminate them, to reveal that they would not be cleansed, so they will be cleaned away. God is done with the bad leadership of his people.

Last we come to the difficult story about the death of Ezekiel’s wife. The story isn’t complicated, and in the context of the book it isn’t necessarily even all that surprising. The prophets personal lives were often used to illustrate God’s actions and emotions. Jeremiah was forbidden to marry, because of the coming judgement. Hosea was told to marry a harlot. But Ezekiel’s situation seems particularly harsh, because he is denied the opportunity to mourn. God’s people will not mourn the destruction of the Temple and the collapse of Jerusalem. Instead, there in Babylon they will continue to live and carry their grief inside them. It is an intense reminder of what happens to a refugee people. Not everything has changed since antiquity. The human heart still buries grief.

The death of Ezekiel’s wife also illustrates the cost of being chosen. Through the Story so far, we have run into many chosen people. Things don’t always go well for them. In the case of Ezekiel, very little goes well for him. But there is a vindication of a sort for Ezekiel at the end of this story, as the messengers arrive telling him that his prophecies have come true, and his muteness is healed. The story he have heard today has been very bad, but there is a hint of hope here at the end. The chosen one suffers enormously, but then is vindicated in his obedience.