It is the Sabbath, Shabbat as it is in Hebrew – a day of rest, of peace and I am in Tel Aviv looking out toward the Mediterranean, reading Ezekiel. In my word study I came across a horrific website that degrades anything religious or, for that matter and more importantly, biblical. An editor wrote an inflammatory article and then admitted in his footnote that he lied but it didn’t matter because “gullible Christians don’t read footnotes.” What struck me was that here was someone defaming God’s Word absolutely certain he can get away with it because we, as Christians, don’t know enough to not take everything we read at face value. I urge all my students, all my readers, please check any fact I give you, particularly when I tell you, “the Bible says…” or something similar. I will never seek to mislead but, believe it or not, I have made mistakes… if you can’t imagine it, ask my children! Back to Ezekiel…
I listen to God telling Ezekiel what his message is to be and that no longer will the proverb stand that “The days keep passing by and every vision fails” (Ezekiel 12:22). In other words, the people were tired of hearing that according to this vision, such and such will happen but time goes by and nothing happens, the visions were not fulfilled, so no need to worry about another vision. In the police department we used to say that about City Managers… no matter what the newest one tries to change, not to worry, because of politics they would soon be gone and we could ‘get back to normal!’ But in Ezekiel 12:23, God says, ‘no more!’ (That is a paraphrase!) What He says will happen will happen right away so they might listen!
Guess what, it did! My thoughts for now are these: First, as Christians we must stop swallowing everything someone tells us about God’s Word and know it well enough for ourselves to be competent to “Give a reason for the hope that is in us” (1 Peter 3:15). Second, we must come out of our rut, (you know that a rut is nothing more than a grave with the ends kicked out), and live like we REALLY believe that God’s prophesies are coming true in these last days, that Christ’s return is truly imminent and get excited that the victory is His!
Doc Riggs' Ministry Minute 