The Book of EZEKIEL - Chapter Five

1 ‘Now, son of man, take a sharp sword and use it as a  barber’s razor to shave your head and your beard. Then take a set of scales and divide up the hair. 2 When the days of your siege come to an end, burn a third of the hair inside the city. Take a third and strike it with the sword all around the city. And scatter a third to the wind. For I will pursue them with drawn sword. 3 But take a few hairs and tuck them away in the folds of your garment. 4 Again, take a few of these and throw them into the fire and burn them up. A fire will spread from there to all Israel.

5 ‘This is what the Sovereign Lord says: this is Jerusalem, which I have set in the centre of the nations, with countries all around her. 6 Yet in her wickedness she has rebelled against my laws and decrees more than the nations and countries around her. She has rejected my laws and has not followed my decrees.

7 ‘Therefore this is what the Sovereign Lord says: you have been more unruly than the nations around you and have not followed my decrees or kept my laws. You have not even conformed to the standards of the nations around you.

8 ‘Therefore this is what the Sovereign Lord says: I myself am against you, Jerusalem, and I will inflict punishment on you in the sight of the nations. 9 Because of all your detestable idols, I will do to you what I have never done before and will never do again. 10 Therefore in your midst parents will eat their children, and children will eat their parents. I will inflict punishment on you and will scatter all your survivors to the winds. 11 Therefore as surely as I live, declares the Sovereign Lord, because you have defiled my sanctuary with all your vile images and detestable practices, I myself will shave you; I will not look on you with pity or spare you. 12 A third of your people will die of the plague or perish by famine inside you; a third will fall by the sword outside your walls; and a third I will scatter to the winds and pursue with drawn sword.

13 ‘Then my anger will cease and my wrath against them will subside, and I will be avenged. And when I have spent my wrath on them, they will know that I the Lord have spoken in my zeal.

14 ‘I will make you a ruin and a reproach among the nations around you, in the sight of all who pass by. 15 You will be a reproach and a taunt, a warning and an object of horror to the nations around you when I inflict punishment on you in anger and in wrath and with stinging rebuke. I the Lord have spoken. 16 When I shoot at you with my deadly and destructive arrows of famine, I will shoot to destroy you. I will bring more and more famine upon you and cut off your supply of food. 17 I will send famine and wild beasts against you, and they will leave you childless. Plague and bloodshed will sweep through you, and I will bring the sword against you. I the Lord have spoken.’

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READINGS

The Book of EZEKIEL

Chapter Five

Read by Sir David Suchet

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OVERVIEW 

The Book of EZEKIEL

 - Overview -

The Bible Project 

Part 1 

Part 2 

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STUDY - LINKS

The Book of EZEKIEL

David Pawson

Part 1

Part 2 

Part 3

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The Book of EZEKIEL - Chapter Four

1 ‘Now, son of man, take a block of clay, put it in front  of you and draw the city of Jerusalem on it. 2 Then lay siege to it: erect siege works against it, build a ramp up to it, set up camps against it and put battering-rams around it. 3 Then take an iron pan, place it as an iron wall between you and the city and turn your face towards it. It will be under siege, and you shall besiege it. This will be a sign to the people of Israel.

4 ‘Then lie on your left side and put the sin of the people of Israel upon yourself. You are to bear their sin for the number of days you lie on your side. 5 I have assigned you the same number of days as the years of their sin. So for 390 days you will bear the sin of the people of Israel.

6 ‘After you have finished this, lie down again, this time on your right side, and bear the sin of the people of Judah. I have assigned you 40 days, a day for each year. 7 Turn your face towards the siege of Jerusalem and with bared arm prophesy against her. 8 I will tie you up with ropes so that you cannot turn from one side to the other until you have finished the days of your siege.

9 ‘Take wheat and barley, beans and lentils, millet and spelt; put them in a storage jar and use them to make bread for yourself. You are to eat it during the 390 days you lie on your side. 10 Weigh out twenty shekels of food to eat each day and eat it at set times. 11 Also measure out a sixth of a hin of water and drink it at set times. 12 Eat the food as you would a loaf of barley bread; bake it in the sight of the people, using human excrement for fuel.’ 13 The Lord said, ‘In this way the people of Israel will eat defiled food among the nations where I will drive them.’

14 Then I said, ‘Not so, Sovereign Lord! I have never defiled myself. From my youth until now I have never eaten anything found dead or torn by wild animals. No impure meat has ever entered my mouth.’

15 ‘Very well,’ he said, ‘I will let you bake your bread over cow dung instead of human excrement.’

16 He then said to me: ‘Son of man, I am about to cut off the food supply in Jerusalem. The people will eat rationed food in anxiety and drink rationed water in despair, 17 for food and water will be scarce. They will be appalled at the sight of each other and will waste away because of their sin.

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READINGS

The Book of EZEKIEL

Chapter Four

Read by Sir David Suchet

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OVERVIEW 

The Book of EZEKIEL

 - Overview -

The Bible Project 

Part 1 

Part 2 

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STUDY - LINKS

The Book of EZEKIEL

David Pawson

Part 1

Part 2 

Part 3

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The Book of EZEKIEL - Chapter Three

 

1 And he said to me, ‘Son of man, eat what is before  you, eat this scroll; then go and speak to the people of Israel.’ 2 So I opened my mouth, and he gave me the scroll to eat.

3 Then he said to me, ‘Son of man, eat this scroll I am giving you and fill your stomach with it.’ So I ate it, and it tasted as sweet as honey in my mouth.

4 He then said to me: ‘Son of man, go now to the people of Israel and speak my words to them. 5 You are not being sent to a people of obscure speech and strange language, but to the people of Israel – 6 not to many peoples of obscure speech and strange language, whose words you cannot understand. Surely if I had sent you to them, they would have listened to you. 7 But the people of Israel are not willing to listen to you because they are not willing to listen to me, for all the Israelites are hardened and obstinate. 8 But I will make you as unyielding and hardened as they are. 9 I will make your forehead like the hardest stone, harder than flint. Do not be afraid of them or terrified by them, though they are a rebellious people.’

10 And he said to me, ‘Son of man, listen carefully and take to heart all the words I speak to you. 11 Go now to your people in exile and speak to them. Say to them, “This is what the Sovereign Lord says,” whether they listen or fail to listen.’

12 Then the Spirit lifted me up, and I heard behind me a loud rumbling sound as the glory of the Lord rose from the place where it was standing. 13 It was the sound of the wings of the living creatures brushing against each other and the sound of the wheels beside them, a loud rumbling sound. 14 The Spirit then lifted me up and took me away, and I went in bitterness and in the anger of my spirit, with the strong hand of the Lord on me. 15 I came to the exiles who lived at Tel Aviv near the River Kebar. And there, where they were living, I sat among them for seven days – deeply distressed.

16 At the end of seven days the word of the Lord came to me: 17 ‘Son of man, I have made you a watchman for the people of Israel; so hear the word I speak and give them warning from me. 18 When I say to a wicked person, “You will surely die,” and you do not warn them or speak out to dissuade them from their evil ways in order to save their life, that wicked person will die for their sin, and I will hold you accountable for their blood. 19 But if you do warn the wicked person and they do not turn from their wickedness or from their evil ways, they will die for their sin; but you will have saved yourself.

20 ‘Again, when a righteous person turns from their righteousness and does evil, and I put a stumbling-block before them, they will die. Since you did not warn them, they will die for their sin. The righteous things that person did will not be remembered, and I will hold you accountable for their blood. 21 But if you do warn the righteous person not to sin and they do not sin, they will surely live because they took warning, and you will have saved yourself.’

22 The hand of the Lord was on me there, and he said to me, ‘Get up and go out to the plain, and there I will speak to you.’ 23 So I got up and went out to the plain. And the glory of the Lord was standing there, like the glory I had seen by the River Kebar, and I fell face down.

24 Then the Spirit came into me and raised me to my feet. He spoke to me and said: ‘Go, shut yourself inside your house. 25 And you, son of man, they will tie with ropes; you will be bound so that you cannot go out among the people. 26 I will make your tongue stick to the roof of your mouth so that you will be silent and unable to rebuke them, for they are a rebellious people. 27 But when I speak to you, I will open your mouth and you shall say to them, “This is what the Sovereign Lord says.” Whoever will listen let them listen, and whoever will refuse let them refuse; for they are a rebellious people.

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READINGS

The Book of EZEKIEL

Chapter Three

Read by Sir David Suchet

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OVERVIEW 

The Book of EZEKIEL

 - Overview -

The Bible Project 

Part 1 

Part 2 

-=-=-=-=-=-=-

STUDY - LINKS

The Book of EZEKIEL

David Pawson

Part 1

Part 2 

Part 3

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