Ezekiel 4

Ezekiel is the prophet who did ‘strange’ things to give messages to the Israelites. And one of those strange things is in chapter 4. God asks him to build a model of the city of Jerusalem and to besiege it to show how Jerusalem would be besieged (which happened in 588-586BC). Then he asks Ezekiel to lie on his left side for 390 days, symbolising the time of punishment for Israel, then an extra 40 days on his right side to symbolise the punishment of Judah. It explicitly states that these days represented one year per day. Also, during this time, he was to eat bread, exactly 20 shekels (228 grams) every day, and drink water, exactly 1/6 of a hin (which is less than a quart – I don’t know how large a quart is!) every day. The bread was to be made with lots of different seeds (not just wheat or barley), and was to be prepared over a fire which was fuelled by human waste (ew!). Ezekiel shared my own sentiments about the human waste, and told the LORD that nothing defiled had ever entered his mouth and so the Lord concedes to let him prepare it with cow dung as fuel. This food part was to show how the Israelites would be eating in the siege (and we find in Jeremiah and Lamentations that it would be even worse than this – they would eat their own children!).

Well, what can we take out of this? I have taken out of it the power of an object lesson. The people of Israel would have seen Ezekiel daily, lying on his side and eating stinky bread. They would have been curious and asked what he was doing, and he would have told them – ‘this is how you will eat if you do not repent’. I think the message hits harder when the consequences are laid out right before your eyes. When you can see the message in action, it makes so much more of an impact.

Today, our message is so much more hopeful, and we should indeed be living it as such. If people can’t see us living what we believe, if every moment is not a testament to His grace and love, then it is unlikely that our mere words will win them over. They need to be able to see right in front of them the consequences of their choices (which if they repent will be very good!). How much do you reflect the message that you have?