October, 1935
382
T H E K I N S ' S B U S I N E S S
judgment must fall even upon them. But the p u r p o s e of i,the judgments is to call His people away from the evil— back to His righteous ways. The difficulty is, so evil is the natural heart, that when God’s people get out of fellowship with Him, they resist Him; His pleadings with them are resented and treated as the words of an enemy. But as messengers of the Lord, we must faithfully deliver His mes sage, and thus- deliver' our own souls-Sf ,! whatever the people may do. Points and Problems 1. There is in this lesson a great revela tion of personal responsibility. And this responsibility is tw ofold: First, man is ac countable for his .-'bwn sins.' :iThe sinner who goes on in sin, whether he was warned or not warned, is doomed; he “shall die in his iniquity” (v. 8 ). This is a forecast of Romans 2 : 12 : “As many as have sinned without law shall also perish withqut law ; and as many as have sinned in [under] the law shall be judged by the law.” The responsibility cannot be shifted. But, seer ond, those who are enlightened are re sponsible for their fellow men, If we fail to warn our neighKbr. “His blood,” God declares, “willj| I require at thine hand” . (v. 8 ). A feeling c/f this solemn respon sibility was always, upon the Apostle Paul, moving him to so labor that he might be “pure from the blood of all men” (Acts 20:26, 27). 2 . . There. also?,here a revelation of the divine character. On the one hand, God is a God of /ot;S*having “no pleasure in the death of the wicked” (v. 11). When we see our Lord Jesus weeping over the city of His people (Lk. 19:41), we are "looking upon an amazing thing—the sor row of God. But on the other hand, God as -revealed in Ezekiel 33 is a God of justice. The charge of Israel,; “The way of the Lord is not equal” (vs. 17, 20), was false. With Him there is no respect of persons. Righteousness is rewarded. Wick edness is punished. I 3. Finally, this lesson contains a revela tion the hopelessness o f salvation by human works. On the one hand, “the righteousness of the righteous shall not deliver him in the day of his transgres sion” (v. 12). Let a man keep the law ^perfectly for years, and then fail but once, “all his -righteousnesses shall not be remem bered . . . he shall die for it” (v. 13). On the other hand, this is what the sinner must do: “Turn from his sin . . . walk in the statutes of life, without committing iniqui ty’’ (vs. 14, 15). If he does this, he shall not die. But no sinner has ever done it. Grace is our only hope. Golden Text Illustration Latimer stood before his judges on trial for heresy. He heard the scratch of a pen behind the tapestry and knew that every word was being taken down, and he was very careful as to what he said. Behind the eternal veil, the unseen scribe writes your record. “Every idle word that men shall speak, they shall give account thereof in the day of judgment” (Matt.; 12;36). “Every one of us shall give account o f himself to God” (Rom. 14:12).— 1,000 Tales Worth Telling, by P ickering , A Prophet Encourages His People E zekiel 18:1-32 Memory Verse: “In thee, O Lord, do I hope” (Psa. 38:15).'- _ . ' T; Approach: After the Babylonians had conquered Jerusalem and had taken cap tive many of its people, and while Jere-
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it, even though thatMiLwere found in one formerly righteous; and the change to the ways of righteousness would be recognized and rewarded by the Lord, even though the repentant one might formerly have been very wicked. There is no respect of persons with the Lord. Inasmuch as He is the holy God, He must condemn wicked ness ; and since He is the righteous God, He must reward righteousness (v. 13). Even though the righteous man was told that he should live, this declaration did not mean that the righteous one could com mit iniquity and still expect to have the promise fulfilled. The promise was given to the righteous man, and to him it would be fulfilled. But when the righteous man turned to wickedness, he thereby turned from the promise. In like manner, when the promise of death was given to the wicked, and the wicked man turned to righteousness, his wickedeness would not be reckoned against him, but the promise to the righteous would come to him (vs. 14-16). , If we will remember that Ezekiel was speaking to those who were already God’s people, but who were suffering punishment for their sins, we will be guarded against suggesting that these words o f Ezekiel describe the method by which souls may obtain eternal life in this age of the gospei. Eternal life does not depend on what is done with certain sins, or on certain acts of righteousness.- But salvation is depend ent upon the acceptance or rejection of a certain Person, Christ Jesus, the Saviour. The Lord graciously gives warnings against sinfulness in His own people, and the fact that He does so reveals His love for and interest in them. Being the holy God, He cannot condone sinfulness, and when sin is found among His people, His
II. T he M essage from G od (10-16).
Ezekiel had already been given prophe cies of judgment upon Israel because of the people’s wicked ways, and had declared that they would pine away in their cap tivity unless they would repent. They should have known by the very fact of their present state that God would keep His word, bringing whatever had been promised, whether blessing or curing. But, in presumption, the people said to God, in effect, “What is the use o f our trying to do good? Thou hast said we are to pine away in Our sins; hence we cannot live” (v. 10). There are none so hard of heart and dull of hearing as those who, in bitter stubbornness, resent the Lord’s chastise ments and refuse to obey His voice. The Lord replied that He had no pleas ure in their distress; but that His delight would be, rather, in their repentance and restoration (v. 11). The fact that the Lord sent messengers to them should have convinced them that He was interested in their recovery, even more than they were themselves. The Lord’s desire was that they should turn from their wicked ways, so that He might forgive and restore them. The fulfillment is pledged in an oath: ' “As I live, saith the Lord.” The Lord urged the people to return to Him. He manifested His ténder earnestness in the repeated entreaty, “Turn ye, turn ye,” and in the question, “Why will ye die?” Hence,' if they died, it would be because of their stubborn clinging to their sinful ness and their refusal to heed His words. Their complaint against the Lord’s sup posed injustice was met with the declara tion of the justice and equity of His ways (v. 12). Sin must have God’s wrath upon
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