SCRIPTURE: Ezekiel 23
OBSERVATION/APPLICATION:
Therefore I delivered her into the hands of her lovers, the Assyrians, for whom she lusted. They stripped her naked, took away her sons and daughters and killed her with the sword. [Ezekiel 23:9-10]
Ezekiel uses explicit language to describe how Samaria (capital city of the ten northern tribes of Israel) and Jerusalem (capitol city of Judah and Benjamin, the two southern tribes of Israel) sell themselves to immoral, violent cultures and religions.
They choose prostitution (it is not forced on them by hard circumstances), they are like sluts that are ‘easy’… easy prey for their neighbours to rape and reject.
Here it is said that God gives them what they desires, and they regret it.
They choose the life of pleasure and freedom, and end up being used, abused and discarded, and eventually killed.
Still others, like seed sown among thorns, hear the word; but the worries of this life, the deceitfulness of wealth and the desires for other things come in and choke the word, making it unfruitful. [Mark 4:18-19]
Jesus uses a different analogy to show what happens when God’s people reject God and run after other pleasures or treasures.
He describes them as seed that is choked by the thorns, they become unfruitful.
It is not as graphic as Ezekiel’s imagery, but the message is the same.
If we set our desires on worldly pleasures and treasures, God will deliver us over to them, and we will discover that they are not so great after all.
In another parable we find the same message, where the son demands his wealth from his father and goes to a distant land to waste it and himself… and he ends up with pigs.
Through it all, when we turn away from God and try to find our own happiness and pleasure, we discover that there is no way to find them, except with God.
We discover, the hard way, that God really is the only way, the only God!
You will suffer the penalty for your lewdness and bear the consequences of your sins of idolatry. Then you will know that I am the Sovereign LORD. [Ezekiel 23:49]
What am I lusting after, what desires are choking me, what is making me unfruitful?
Do I really think that the things that I am holding on to apart from God can keep me happy and successful?
If I persist, God may let me experience the full emptiness of these things, and I may discover the hard way that God is for real after all.
Don’t wait to find out the hard way.
Only God can satisfy the soul, and give us life to the full.
Do not love the world or anything in the world. If anyone loves the world, love for the Father is not in them. For everything in the world—the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life—comes not from the Father but from the world. The world and its desires pass away, but whoever does the will of God lives forever. [1 John 2:15-17]
PRAYER:
Lord, the word ‘lust’ seems extreme, but that is really what it is. Help me to see that my desire for worldly pleasure is adulterous and dangerous. Help me to cling to You as my only love, my only hope, the only One that can satisfy me!