Day 246 (Ezekiel 23-24) - Year 8

**Tara-Leigh Cobble** (0:01)
Hey, Bible readers, I'm Tara-Leigh Cobble, and I'm your host for The Bible Recap.
Today's chapters are dark and graphic. It's not exactly light reading, but in every heavy paragraph, in every dark chapter, there's still something we can learn about God. It's true on these pages, and it's true in our own stories too. Before we jump in, just know that I'm going to do my best to make this appropriate for all our listeners. The Bible itself is graphic enough, so I'll try to go easy on explaining things in detail. Chapter 23 is one big metaphor. God is talking about two women, but this isn't about women at all. The women represent two cities, Samaria, which is the capital city of the northern kingdom of Israel, and Jerusalem, which is the capital city of the southern kingdom of Judah. And we've seen many times where Yahweh has portrayed his relationship with his people as a marriage. And anytime his people wander off to other gods, he compares it to adultery. He uses a picture of intimate betrayal to show what's happening on a spiritual level. So while there definitely was sexual sin happening in both Samaria and Jerusalem, that's only a fraction of the broader point Chapter 23 is trying to make. The major point is, the people of these cities have turned their eyes away from Yahweh, who has always provided for them and protected them, and instead they've looked to other nations to save them. They've paid them tribute for protection, and as they've grown more familiar with them and tried to earn their favor, they've also become enamored with their gods and worshiped them instead. Verse 7 is talking about Samaria and it says, She defiled herself with all the idols of everyone after whom she lusted.
It started with lust and it ended with idol worship. Sin always wants more from us. It's never satisfied. We're hardwired to worship something. Whatever we spend our time thinking about and fixating on, whatever we look to as our source of joy and fulfillment, it will eventually get our hearts.
All along, God has been begging them to repent. But even when their sin and idolatry isn't satisfying to them anymore, they still don't turn back to God. They double down on idolatry. And even though Jerusalem witnesses Samaria's demise, she doesn't learn anything from it. In fact, she doubles down on the doubling down. And the whole process of more, more, more actually becomes a chore to the two cities. They're abused and unloved by their lovers. Verse 43 says they were worn out by adultery. Idols are exhausting.
But God says it's too late for them to repent now. He calls Ezekiel to judge them. They will drink the cup of his wrath. They will finally bear the penalty for their sins.
One important thing to note about the books of the prophets is how we have to treat their use of metaphor. Remember how we talked about the fact that books of wisdom like Psalms and Proverbs aren't necessarily giving us promises or prophecies? Well, the books of prophecy have their own unique lens as well. They aren't always literal. They all involve a lot of metaphorical language and hyperbole. And this is just another example of why we have to read things in context and read them as they're intended to be read.
That's why, for the most part, we don't look at them with a microscope. We zoom out to see the big picture the story is telling us. It doesn't mean there might not be microscopic meaning there. And it doesn't mean the Bible isn't true literally. It just means the Bible isn't always literal. Sometimes it's metaphorical. Like yesterday, when God compared the people of Jerusalem to dross and said he's going to burn them up, it doesn't necessarily mean they're going to die by fire. The books of prophecy have a way of humbling us because they refuse to let us be controlling about all the details. Moving on to chapter 24, to fully appreciate what's happening in the first half of this chapter, we have to take ourselves out of the modern age, where we can watch something happen on the other side of the world in real time. In Ezekiel's day, news took weeks or even months to travel from one nation to their next door neighbor. So Ezekiel, being nearly 900 miles away from Jerusalem when he's in exile in Babylon, isn't getting a notification from CNN telling him Babylon has laid siege to Jerusalem. God is telling him personally. And God says it's happening right now. Talk about having a trusted news source. But then God flips to the cooking channel. He's bringing up that cauldron and meat we first talked about in chapter 11 God seems to be comparing Israel to the choicest cuts of meat. But as they're being prepared, it becomes clear that they've all got E coli, for lack of a better illustration, and that not only does the meat itself have to be discarded, but it's even ruined the cauldron too. And it has to be tossed into the fire as well. In the midst of all this, as the meat is being removed, it's dripping with blood and Israel just leaves it out like, no big deal, this is just contaminated and unclean and it's out here for everyone to see and encounter. No thanks.