Painting a picture of Ezekiel

Each word of the Lord is a brushstroke in painting the full picture of your life.

1. Ezekiel’s attention is always on what God is doing.
2. Ezekiel writes his own story. His visions and messages are all in the order in which they happen. He gives a well-organized record of all his experiences, paying great attention to detail.
3. Ezekiel is a prophet who shares the early years of exile with God’s people in Babylon.
4. Ezekiel has amazing visions.
5. Ezekiel’s message is that God is with His people, even in exile.

• Ezekiel is about the glory of the Lord – some theologians reject this book because they say it has never been seen.
• Ezekiel experienced the glory of the Lord.
• The glory of the Lord is mentioned 60 times in Ezekiel.

Of all the prophets of the Old Testament, Ezekiel is the strangest. Like Isaiah, he has a tremendous sense of God’s holiness. Like Jeremiah, he acts out some of his prophecies. Like Daniel, he sees visions which leave him speechless. Like Hosea, he experiences heartbreak. He goes into trances, is struck dumb for months and feels himself transported great distances. Ezekiel is also a deeply sensitive and passionate man.

Ezekiel 40 (NLT)

On April 28, during the twenty-fifth year of our captivity—fourteen years after the fall of Jerusalem—the Lord took hold of me. ² In a vision from God he took me to the land of Israel and set me down on a very high mountain. From there I could see toward the south what appeared to be a city. ³ As he brought me nearer, I saw a man whose face shone like bronze standing beside a gateway entrance. He was holding in his hand a linen measuring cord and a measuring rod.

“The fortieth chapter of Ezekiel begins that last and most obscure portion of his book, the vision of the restored Jerusalem. Learned and religious men, both Christian and Hebrews, have believed these chapters to be full of deep and secret symbolism of great religious value. Outwardly they are a ritualistic account of exact measurements and priestly observances, supplying for the nation of the future some such formulae as the Book of Leviticus had supplied for the nation under Moses and Joshua.

In a vision Ezekiel feels himself borne once more to Judah, where he beholds a new city of Zion, replacing that which the Babylonians had destroyed. Accompanying the prophet is a man “whose appearance was like the appearance of brass,” and this man, or spirit, measures with a rod each object which they view together. Ezekiel records the measurements of the city walls, of the gates, of the door posts, of windows, arches, chambers. Then they enter a Temple, like to the former Temple of God; and here the spirit measures, and Ezekiel records, each minute detail with special care.”

 Reference

Julius A. Bewer & Charles Horne. (1908). The Bible and its Story, Volume 8: Prophets-Gospels, Ezekiel to Matthew Family Record. Francis R. Niglutsch.

About the author: Nadine Oosthuizen

Tell us something about yourself.