Context No. 2563 of 4322 · Ezekiel

Ezekiel 11:13-17: in context

13When I prophesied, Pelatiah the son of Benaiah died. Then I fell down on my face, and cried with a loud voice, and said, “Ah Lord GOD! Will you make a full end of the remnant of Israel?” 14The LORD’s word came to me, saying, 15“Son of man, your brothers, even your brothers, the men of your relatives, and all the house of Israel, all of them, are the ones to whom the inhabitants of Jerusalem have said, ‘Go far away from the LORD. This land has been given to us for a possession.’ 16“Therefore say, ‘The Lord GOD says: “Whereas I have removed them far off among the nations, and whereas I have scattered them among the countries, yet I will be to them a sanctuary for a little while in the countries where they have come.”’ 17“Therefore say, ‘The Lord GOD says: “I will gather you from the peoples, and assemble you out of the countries where you have been scattered, and I will give you the land of Israel.”

Ezekiel, seeing the remnant dwindle, cries out in alarm: will you make a full end of what is left of Israel? Then God gives him a word for the exiles, the ones the people back in Jerusalem had written off, saying, go far from the LORD; this land is ours now. To those scattered far from the temple, God says something remarkable: yet I will be to them a sanctuary for a while in the countries where they have gone.

The exiles had lost everything that had located their worship, the temple, the city, the land. They were far away, cut off from the holy place. And God says he himself will be their sanctuary in the lands of their exile. The presence they thought they had forfeited would go with them; God is not confined to a building or a country. When the familiar places and supports of faith are stripped away, this is the promise that holds: God does not stay behind in the ruined temple. He becomes the sanctuary, wherever his scattered people are.

When I am far from the familiar places and supports of my faith, do I know that God himself becomes my sanctuary, present with me there?

Sources

Ezekiel 11:16: yet I will be to them a sanctuary for a little while in the countries where they have come.
Ezekiel 11:15: your brothers... to whom the inhabitants of Jerusalem have said, Go far away from the LORD. This land has been given to us for a possession.
Ezekiel 11:17: I will gather you from the peoples, and assemble you out of the countries where you have been scattered.