Yesterday our Pastor preached on Ezekiel 37. Very often during preaching, I will read the referenced scriptures in context, often many verses before and after the one being discussed. Yesterday was one of those days. I want to share with you what I "saw" and how it blessed me even though it was not the same context as yesterday's sermon:
Ezekiel 36:24-28
"For I will take you out of the nations; I will gather you from all the countries and bring you back into your own land. I will sprinkle clean water on you, and you will be clean; I will cleanse you from all your impurities and from all your idols. I will give you a new heart and put a new spirit in you; I will remove from you your heart of stone and give you a heart of flesh. And I will put my Spirit in you and move you to follow my decrees and be careful to keep my laws. You will live in the land I gave your forefathers; you will be my people, and I will be your God."
When I read, "I will sprinkle clean water on you, and you will be clean; I will cleanse you from all your impurities and from all your idols…" I saw a picture of the Israel's Messiah. The Word of God is the cleansing agent – Yeshua IS the Living Word, the Living Torah. It is by the Word that God's people Israel will be cleansed and purified, their stony heart turned to flesh. For Israel, the Word is the revelation of the Messiah.
My prayer, even while sitting in church yesterday, was "Lord, cleanse Your people Israel and make them holy by the washing with water through the Word in order that they may be presented to You radiant and without stain or wrinkle or any other blemish … holy and blameless."
Ezekiel saw this very same cleansing that Paul referred to in Ephesians 5:26. He saw the people Israel, whose hearts had been transformed from stone to flesh, who were cleansed from all impurities and idols, become radiant with the washing with water through the Word…the Messiah.
What a picture of God's passion toward His people Israel. After all that has been said and done, He reaches out to embrace His very own, opens their eyes, transforms their hearts, and cleanses them with the Living Torah, the revelation of the only true and prophesied Messiah, Yeshua haMashiach!
Lord, may it be accomplished according to Your infallible Word! Amen!
Love,
Jan
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