1. REVERENCE FOR GOD’S PROMISES
JoLynn Gower
cell

2. EZEKIEL THE JUDGE Ezekiel is asked by God to judge
Matthew 7:1-3 "Do not judge so that you will not be judged. For in the way you judge, you will be judged; and by your standard of measure, it will be measured to you. Why do you look at the speck that is in your brother's eye, but do not notice the log that is in your own eye?”
1 Corinthians 5: But actually, I wrote to you not to associate with any so-called brother if he is an immoral person, or covetous, or an idolater, or a reviler, or a drunkard, or a swindler—not even to eat with such a one. For what have I to do with judging outsiders? Do you not judge those who are within the church?

3. THE TWO-FOLD SIN Shedding blood – blood-guilty; injustice
Making idols – idol defiled; worship idols made of gold and silver and money
Ezekiel 22:5 "Those who are near and those who are far from you will mock you, you of ill repute, full of turmoil.”
Why they would be judged (cause)
Who would judge (means)
Who would be judged (recipients)

4. SHEDDING INNOCENT BLOOD
The death of children sacrificed to Molech
The officials in Jerusalem were accepting bribes and condemning innocent people to death so that others could claim their property
Amos 5:12-13 For I know your transgressions are many and your sins are great, you who distress the righteous and accept bribes and turn aside the poor in the gate. Therefore at such a time the prudent person keeps silent, for it is an evil time.
This is the same thing that Ahab and Jezebel had done in the northern kingdom (1 Kings 21)

5. THE PAGAN’S RESPONSE
So evil was the judicial system in Jerusalem that the Gentile nations heard about it
Ezekiel 22:5 “Those who are near and those who are far from you will mock you, you of ill repute, full of turmoil.”
INJUSTICE, ABUSE OF POWER
Judgment for Judah; judgment in our time
2 Peter 3:10 But the day of the Lord will come like a thief, in which the heavens will pass away with a roar and the elements will be destroyed with intense heat, and the earth and its works will be burned up.

6. ABUSE OF PEOPLE Parents, widows, aliens, orphans
Ezekiel 22:7 “They have treated father and mother lightly within you. The alien they have oppressed in your midst; the fatherless and the widow they have wronged in you.”
Oppressed: asah oseq: extorted
Wronged: yanah: to rage or be violent
The rulers are singled out because they are responsible for the direction of the nation
The abuse seems to have stemmed largely from greed ; dishonest gain and bloodshed

7. IDOLATRY OF PROPHETS They have eaten in the mountain shrines
Ezekiel 22:25 “There is a conspiracy of her prophets in her midst like a roaring lion tearing the prey. They have devoured lives; they have taken treasure and precious things; they have made many widows in the midst of her.”
Ezekiel 22:28 “Her prophets have smeared whitewash for them, seeing false visions and divining lies for them, saying, 'Thus says the Lord God,' when the Lord has not spoken.”

8. IDOLATRY OF PRIESTS
Ezekiel 22:26 “Her priests have done violence to My law and have profaned My holy things; they have made no distinction between the holy and the profane, and they have not taught the difference between the unclean and the clean; and they hide their eyes from My sabbaths, and I am profaned among them.”
2 Chronicles 36:21….to fulfill the word of the Lord by the mouth of Jeremiah, until the land had enjoyed its sabbaths. All the days of its desolation it kept sabbath until seventy years were complete.

9. IDOLATRY OF THE RULING CLASS
Ezekiel 22:27 “Her princes within her are like wolves tearing the prey, by shedding blood and destroying lives in order to get dishonest gain.”
Destroying: abad: annihilate; cause to perish or make to vanish
Micah 3:9-11 Now hear this, heads of the house of Jacob and rulers of the house of Israel, who abhor justice and twist everything that is straight, who build Zion with bloodshed and Jerusalem with violent injustice. Her leaders pronounce judgment for a bribe, her priests instruct for a price and her prophets divine for money. Yet they lean on the Lord saying, “Is not the Lord in our midst? Calamity will not come upon us.”

10. IDOLATRY OF THE PEOPLE
Ezekiel 22:29 “The people of the land have practiced oppression and committed robbery, and they have wronged the poor and needy and have oppressed the sojourner without justice.”
Extortion and thievery
Justice: mishpat: verdict; presenting a case at court
Everyone does what he/she wants to do
Judges 21:25 In those days there was no king in Israel; everyone did what was right in his own eyes.
Proverbs 12:15 The way of a fool is right in his own eyes, but a wise man is he who listens to counsel.
Proverbs 21:2 Every man's way is right in his own eyes, but the Lord weighs the hearts.

11. IN THE GAP
Ezekiel 22:30-31 "I searched for a man among them who would build up the wall and stand in the gap before Me for the land, so that I would not destroy it; but I found no one. Thus I have poured out My indignation on them; I have consumed them with the fire of My wrath; their way I have brought upon their heads," declares the Lord God.
Ezekiel 22:20 As they gather silver and bronze and iron and lead and tin into the furnace to blow fire on it in order to melt it, so I will gather you in My anger and in My wrath and I will lay you there and melt you.

12. TWO KINDS OF FIRE
Refiner’s fire: Zechariah 13:9 "And I will bring the third part through the fire, refine them as silver is refined, and test them as gold is tested. They will call on My name, and I will answer them; I will say, 'They are My people,’ and they will say, 'The Lord is my God.' “
Malachi 3:2; Revelation 3:18
Romans 12:2 And do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind, so that you may prove what the will of God is, that which is good and acceptable and perfect.

13. TWO KINDS OF FIRE
Consuming: Isaiah 30:30 And the Lord will cause His voice of authority to be heard, and the descending of His arm to be seen in fierce anger, and in the flame of a consuming fire in cloudburst, downpour and hailstones.
Hebrews 12: This expression, "Yet once more," denotes the removing of those things which can be shaken, as of created things, so that those things which cannot be shaken may remain. Therefore, since we receive a kingdom which cannot be shaken, let us show gratitude, by which we may offer to God an acceptable service with reverence and awe; for our God is a consuming fire.