Memory Text: And seek the peace of the city whither I have caused you to be carried away captives, and pray unto the Lord for it, for in the peace thereof shall ye have peace. (Jeremiah 29:7, KJV).
Within a few short years the king of Babylon was to be used as the instrument of God's wrath upon impenitent Judah. Again and again Jerusalem was to be invested [surrounded] and entered by the besieging armies of Nebuchadnezzar. Company after company-at first a few only, but later on thousands and tens of thousands-were to be taken captive to the land of Shinar, there to dwell in enforced exile. Jehoiakim, Jehoiachin, Zedekiah-all these Jewish kings were in turn to become vassals of the Babylonian ruler, and all in turn were to rebel. Severer and yet more severe chastisements were to be inflicted upon the rebellious nation, until at last the entire land was to become a desolation, Jerusalem was to be laid waste and burned with fire, the temple that Solomon had built was to be destroyed, and the kingdom of Judah was to fall, never again to occupy its former position among the nations of earth."-Ellen G. White, Prophets and Kings, pp. 422, 423.
As we have seen, and will see, none of this came upon them without plenty of warnings and pleadings by the prophets, especially Jeremiah. Their refusal to obey brought only ruin. May we learn from their mistakes!
Though Jeremiah might have felt very much alone at times, he wasn't. God had raised up Ezekiel, a contemporary, among the captives in Babylon, in order to comfort and to warn the exiles as well as to confirm what the Lord had been speaking through Jeremiah all these long and hard years. Through his ministry, Ezekiel was to warn the captives against the folly of believing the false predictions of an early return from Babylon. He was also to foretell, by various symbols and messages, the devastating siege that would eventually befall Jerusalem because of the people's refusal to repent and turn away from their sin and apostasy.
Read Ezekiel 8:1-18. What was the prophet shown? What does this tell us about how powerful the prevailing culture can be, and how it can impact even the most sacred things? What warnings should be here for us?
No matter how often, and clearly, the writings of Moses and the prophets warned against idolatry and worshiping other gods, these verses show that this is exactly what was being done, even within the sacred precincts of the temple. Weeping for Tammuz was a lamentation ritual for a Mesopotamian god. No wonder 2 Chronicles said: Moreover all the chief of the priests, and the people, transgressed very much after all the abominations of the heathen; and polluted the house of the Lord which he had hallowed in Jerusalem (2 Chron. 36:14).
Look carefully at Ezekiel 8:12. The translation about the chambers of their own imagery is a little ambiguous. It could mean the chambers where they stored their own idols, or it could mean the chambers of their own imagination, their own hearts. Either way, the elders, the leaders, had fallen so far that they said the Lord didn't see what they were doing, that the Lord had abandoned them. It is another way of saying, The Lord doesn't care about these things; they aren't important. Right there, in the sacred precincts of God's temple, these people engaged in the grossest idolatry, doing everything that they had specifically been forbidden by God's words to do. Even worse, in their own minds they justified their deeds.
Here we see again what Paul meant when he talked about those who worshiped the creation instead of the Creator (see Rom. 1:22-25).
Within a few short years the king of Babylon was to be used as the instrument of God's wrath upon impenitent Judah. Again and again Jerusalem was to be invested [surrounded] and entered by the besieging armies of Nebuchadnezzar. Company after company-at first a few only, but later on thousands and tens of thousands-were to be taken captive to the land of Shinar, there to dwell in enforced exile. Jehoiakim, Jehoiachin, Zedekiah-all these Jewish kings were in turn to become vassals of the Babylonian ruler, and all in turn were to rebel. Severer and yet more severe chastisements were to be inflicted upon the rebellious nation, until at last the entire land was to become a desolation, Jerusalem was to be laid waste and burned with fire, the temple that Solomon had built was to be destroyed, and the kingdom of Judah was to fall, never again to occupy its former position among the nations of earth."-Ellen G. White, Prophets and Kings, pp. 422, 423.
As we have seen, and will see, none of this came upon them without plenty of warnings and pleadings by the prophets, especially Jeremiah. Their refusal to obey brought only ruin. May we learn from their mistakes!
Though Jeremiah might have felt very much alone at times, he wasn't. God had raised up Ezekiel, a contemporary, among the captives in Babylon, in order to comfort and to warn the exiles as well as to confirm what the Lord had been speaking through Jeremiah all these long and hard years. Through his ministry, Ezekiel was to warn the captives against the folly of believing the false predictions of an early return from Babylon. He was also to foretell, by various symbols and messages, the devastating siege that would eventually befall Jerusalem because of the people's refusal to repent and turn away from their sin and apostasy.
Read Ezekiel 8:1-18. What was the prophet shown? What does this tell us about how powerful the prevailing culture can be, and how it can impact even the most sacred things? What warnings should be here for us?
No matter how often, and clearly, the writings of Moses and the prophets warned against idolatry and worshiping other gods, these verses show that this is exactly what was being done, even within the sacred precincts of the temple. Weeping for Tammuz was a lamentation ritual for a Mesopotamian god. No wonder 2 Chronicles said: Moreover all the chief of the priests, and the people, transgressed very much after all the abominations of the heathen; and polluted the house of the Lord which he had hallowed in Jerusalem (2 Chron. 36:14).
Look carefully at Ezekiel 8:12. The translation about the chambers of their own imagery is a little ambiguous. It could mean the chambers where they stored their own idols, or it could mean the chambers of their own imagination, their own hearts. Either way, the elders, the leaders, had fallen so far that they said the Lord didn't see what they were doing, that the Lord had abandoned them. It is another way of saying, The Lord doesn't care about these things; they aren't important. Right there, in the sacred precincts of God's temple, these people engaged in the grossest idolatry, doing everything that they had specifically been forbidden by God's words to do. Even worse, in their own minds they justified their deeds.
Here we see again what Paul meant when he talked about those who worshiped the creation instead of the Creator (see Rom. 1:22-25).
