Sins of the City (1)
Behold, the rulers of Israel, each according to his power, have been in you for the purpose of shedding blood. They have treated father and mother lightly within you. The alien they have oppressed in your midst; the fatherless and the widow they have wronged in you. You have despised My holy things and profaned My sabbaths. Slanderous men have been in you for the purpose of shedding blood, and in you they have eaten at the mountain shrines. In your midst they have committed acts of lewdness. In you they have uncovered their fathers’ nakedness; in you they have humbled her who was unclean in her menstrual impurity. Ezekiel 22:6-10 NASB
Despised – It’s hard not to draw a comparison between God’s indictment of Jerusalem and just about any modern city in the world. But before we rant about the abominations in our culture, we should take a close look at those things God considers obvious indicators of profanity. Verse 6 tells us that the shedding of blood (i.e., murder) results from the abuse of power and that rulers will be held accountable. Verse 7 tells us that this city has violated the fifth commandment. Moreover, they oppress and abuse those who have no political or economic standing. Then we come to verse 8. Notice how God describes the actions toward His holy things and His Sabbaths. They have despised them. The word is bazah, “to hold in contempt, to count as little worth.” David’s adultery was considered an act of despising the Lord. Someone who acts without regard for the community despises the fear of the Lord. Esau despised his birthright. Michal despised David’s religious enthusiasm. But Ezekiel proclaims that the city has despised two absolutely clear indicators of belonging to God. First, they have considered the holy things of no worth. The festivals, the implements of the Temple, the rituals, even the Levitical order—these things that God ordained for Himself—have been pushed aside as worthless. And secondly, God’s Sabbaths.
Did you catch that? Not “the Sabbath for Man.” God’s Sabbaths. The people of this city have ignored and disregarded God’s sanctified day of rest. Those days belong to God, not us. He has given us direct commandments concerning them. But what have we done? Oh, just changed the day, refused to stop working, added our own holidays, rejected His requirements and basically excused ourselves with religious gobbledygook. According to God’s indictment, Jerusalem profaned God’s sanctified day. They treated it as if it were just another day. The Sabbath was God’s gift to Israel. It was a sign of her covenant relationship with YHVH. It was a weekly reminder of God’s great love and care for all the earth and particularly for His chosen people. It was a test of faith. All life in Israel revolved around the Sabbath. To despise the Sabbath is to spit at God. Are we not even more guilty? We have tried to convince ourselves that God changed His mind (as a result of a declaration of the Pope) so that we honor (with at least token acknowledgment) another day in its place. Do we expect God to overlook this profanity because we have the right intentions? What do you think?
The list goes on. We will look at some of these other indicators of a truly idolatrous civilization. But it seems to me that the center of all this disaster is the fourth commandment. When men determine for themselves what it means to sanctify time, they invent their own clocks and calendars. They disengage from the Creator and claim a right to make their own world. They proudly display their pagan extrapolations as if God had intended men to worship as they please.
And God will not forget such profanity. From this arrogance spews out all the other pagan evils of the civilization. Without Sabbath, the world is just another version of hell.
Topical Index: Sabbath, despise, bazah, profane, Ezekiel 22:8
Amen.
The Sabbath was made for US, actually: YHVH and I, together with all of His creation, if I read 2Chronicles 36:21 correctly (where it was decreed that the land of Israel was to enjoy during the captivity as many years of Sabbaths, apparently, as had not been kept). But it was not made BY me. It is sacred time: time that is space where my God is to be found. If I go make another time for that, no matter what beautiful space I build, will He be there IN THAT WAY? If I will enjoy the true blessing of Rest, I must go get it where I was told to get it. True rest is only to be found in relationship, I have discovered. It is in relationship that that bottom restlessness, driven by disconnection, that results in this overpowering sense of alienation, is relieved. If I join my rest with His Rest, then is not my rest perfected? I do not believe it an accident that, in Hebrew reckoning, the day is preceded by rest. With the Sabbath my week also gets to start off with a bang. Sabbath. Better than coffee in the weekly cup. Just hanging out with the Lover of my soul. And y’all.
I agree 110% with your lesson on the Sabbath, but….. WHEN is the Sabbath? Of course, it is on the seventh day. But, the 7th day of WHAT? Julius Caesar’s 7 day calendar created by him in 46 BC??? The one that now hangs on our walls (but modified by Pope Gregory in 1582)??? OR, the Creator’s Calendar that never changes hanging in the sky, that Yahweh set there at creation for “times and seasons”? See http://www.lunarsabbath.com, http://www.lunarsabbath.net
Julius is rather recent. The Jewish celebration of Shabbat at sundown on (the Roman week) Friday, the end of the sixth day, has been in place for at least 800 years before Caesar, so I suppose it takes priority. And since it has been Friday at sundown ever since, are we prepared to argue that the Jewish reckoning is mistaken because we happen to be on Roman time?
New moon observances are not the same at regular Shabbat observances.
There’s a solid 14.3% chance that the Jewish reckoning of Shabbat on Friday-Saturday is correct!
Ge.1:14 And God said, Let there be lights in the firmament of the heaven to divide the day from the night; and let them be for signs, and for seasons, and for days, and years:
Ps. 104:19-23 He appointed the moon for seasons; the sun knows his time to go down.
You make darkness, and it is night, wherein all the beasts of the forest creep forth.
The young lions roar after their prey and seek their meat from God.
When the sun arises, they gather themselves together and lay down in their dens.
Man goes forth unto his work and to his labor until the evening.
The Sun was made to mark off the work days!
Tom, I tried googling Astronomers Royale Weekly Cycle and got a lot of specific answers to your good questions.
This is so timely, Skip. This week I read an article from a leader among Messianic ministries in which he bemoans “Jewish Roots” teachers (a group he amalgamates to include all who don’t teach according to his preferences), who dare to teach that Sunday worship for Christians is an abomination. In fact, he states that non-Jewish believers who think they are accountable to Torah are in fact guilty of “partial replacement theology since there is no longer any distinctive calling for Jews”.
As I read it, his position is that we should all be happily synchretized in order to keep the peace within “traditional” church culture. He ignores the historical record of the first three centuries and rests his position on the intent “of the last 1800 years”. I’m fairly certain (wry grin) this Israel-based messianic teacher knows the Sabbath is not on Sunday, so how does he justify his endorsement of continued deception within the (gentile) church that Sunday worship is keeping Shabbat? “Criticism brings unnecessary pain and disrespect,” he says. Oh, right — anything to keep the peace; let’s not upset the apple cart with truth. I guess ignorance is bliss for gentile believers, even if it leaves you confused when you try to mesh it with Scripture.
Sorry — got a little carried away with idioms at the end. 🙂
If failure to keep the Sabbath is so abominable to God/Yahweh, why has it never come up as a major sin to be repented of within any of the major reformations/awakenings the Church has gone through? Is it possible that even more important than observing the right day of the week is to love Jesus/Yeshua so much that one begins to truly cease from ones’ own labors and truly enters in to those works that were prepared for them in advance to walk in? As Messianic/Hebrew Roots believers are we not in danger of falling into the same sin as the Ephesian church (Rev. 2) that had perfected the art of singling out false apostles but had forgotten their first love?
The power of tradition and the influence of paradigm outweigh the directions of the text. Listen to my lectures on the formation of the Christian Church and review the real historical record. You might be quite surprised.
Skip, nothing surprises me about the Church anymore. What I long to see is a Church ruled by the first and foremost commandment (and the second which is like it) instead of by doctrinal wars. I have a son who has joined the Russian Orthodox Church in Exile because he’s convinced that is the only pure form of the Church left on earth. I can’t have a meaningful dialogue with him because he’s so convinced that he’s on the right path and I’m not. And that has been the history of the Church ad nauseum. When will we learn to love, to speak truth in love, so that we build up our brothers and sisters in the faith rather than tearing them down? I’m tired of the anger and hostility within the Body towards its own members. The real entity that we should be angry with and do battle with is that foul, unclean religious spirit that continues to tear the Body apart.
I have thought long and hard about your very question, Bruce. And it seems to me that there has been a slow progression of learning about what constitutes morality. The little that I know of history has shown some interesting developments. It seems that there was a time in the pagan world that worship of many gods was the norm: now among the major religions it seems to be the exception. Formal idol worship; same thing. We can now agree that parental respect is a clear sign of a moral base, and that, under the law, all people are now considered human, and it is murder to kill anyone. It is easy to take that for granted, but not long ago, some people were not considered human by others, and it was not considered immoral to kill them for myriads of reasons. Same for non-conjugal, non-consensual sex. Our courts have established an international standard for what constitutes lying, and it is against the law most everywhere in ‘civilized’ countries to desire and take another’s possessions. But there were times in past history that there were exceptions to all these ‘norms’. In fact, I think we could look back through history and see a long, bloody learning curve that has established that almost all of the Great Ten Commands are, in fact, necessary for the very fabric of society to exist. We have been learning the hard way.
Enter the last Command that we have apparently not ‘learned’ yet. It is that Fourth one. Major religions now can agree to the rest of the Nine, even though it has only been recently that we seem to have learned why. But we still apparently have yet to figure out why that Rest one is essential. Look around in society and describe what you see. The number one killer of major civilized countries is not now people who have got one of the other Nine wrong; it is now stress. Stress is where the body stays in perpetual crisis mode: the very definition of stress is lack of homeostasis, or biological peace. It is a symptom of an underlying disorder driven by a society that has no defusing mechanisms that are working. May I suggest that this may be because there is no substitute for a true Sabbath Rest for human health at the spiritual, mental or biological level? Perhaps we are right now on the learning curve for this last Command, and we will continue to die until we figure it out?
I appreciate your suggestion that “civilized” countries have generally adopted some form of the Commandments. But I question whether that is still the case. If we really did believe that life is ultimately valuable, then why do all the “civilized” nations protect abortion? If we really thought it was wrong to lie, then why is there consistent and deliberate misrepresentation of the truth by nearly every civilized government? If we know that taking the property of someone else is wrong, then how do you explain the confiscation of assists by governments in the form of taxes used to power their own agendas? And finally, if major religious groups in the world can behead innocent people in the name of “God,” have we really made ANY progress?
Come with me on a brief tour of the world. I can show you clear living examples of idol worship by large portions of the world’s population. I can show you millions who believe it is right to kill, steal and lie. I can show you religious groups who deliberately dishonor God’s word, show no compassion for the weak and systematically abuse women.
Is our only problem the fourth commandment? I think not. I think that open eyes discover the world is more pagan, more idolatrous, more violent, more possessed by evil today than it has ever been. We are not progressing. We are sliding down the slope to anarchy.
Oh Skip no need to travel the world. Just come to Northern California!
BTW if you ever do let me know. We would love to actually meet you.
Is central California close enough? We’ve booked Skip to come to Fresno — save the dates Feb 5-7, 2015. Email me at sbennett53@comcast.net and I’ll keep you in the loop as info develops.
Thanks Suzanne I will keep this. We are in Nevada City right now. Yah willing we may still be here then.
Agreed for sure. Knowing, even agreeing with, and doing, are quite different things. But it seems that there are nine of those commands that people who consider themselves moral would most often agree with on those at least theoretically accepted mores. When I question people, anyway, most of them think that nine are fine. Not that they necessarily think that they are doing them, or can do them, or have to do them, even. But they still think nine are mostly ‘right’; and that cuts across their religions and professed beliefs.
Yes, you are right. Those who think that the commandments apply, even if they don’t do them, usually only consider nine of the ten. Why? Because the Church has taught replacement of the Fourth Commandment for centuries, and provided theological justification for ignoring it even though the justification is entirely bogus and anti-Semitic.
It is my experience that even among those of us who desire to keep all ten commandments we still struggle with keeping them according to G’ds literal instructions.
We may keep the right day but in our hearts challenge the need to implement the details concerning HOW to do it. We may cease from our regular work on the Sabbath but take up something that isn’t a normal days activity.
Keeping THE Sabbath isn’t just a matter of taking the right day off.