Scripture Daily

Context No. 3916 of 4322 · Ezekiel

Context · Reflection

Ezekiel 24:13-17: in context

13“‘“In your filthiness is lewdness. Because I have cleansed you and you weren’t cleansed, you won’t be cleansed from your filthiness any more, until I have caused my wrath toward you to rest. 14“‘“I, the LORD, have spoken it. It will happen, and I will do it. I won’t go back. I won’t spare. I won’t repent. According to your ways and according to your doings, they will judge you,” says the Lord GOD.’” 15Also the LORD’s word came to me, saying, 16“Son of man, behold, I will take away from you the desire of your eyes with one stroke; yet you shall neither mourn nor weep, neither shall your tears run down. 17Sigh, but not aloud. Make no mourning for the dead. Bind your headdress on you, and put your sandals on your feet. Don’t cover your lips, and don’t eat mourner’s bread.”

This is among the personally painful passages in all the prophets. God tells Ezekiel that he will take away, with one blow, the delight of his eyes, his beloved wife, and that Ezekiel is not to mourn her openly as others would, but to bear the loss in silent grief, as a sign to the people of the coming loss of all they held dear.

We read this with great tenderness, for it lays bare a servant of God carrying an almost unbearable personal cost in obedience to his calling. There is a depth of sorrow here that we should not rush past. Ezekiel loved his wife, the desire of his eyes, and God asked him to bear her sudden death and even to restrain his mourning, for the sake of the message the people needed. It is a stark reminder that following God has sometimes cost his servants dearly, in ways that reach into the deep and private places of their lives. And beneath the hardness is something we can hold onto: Ezekiel obeyed. He did not curse God or abandon his calling; he carried the grief God gave him, and God saw and honored the burden his servant bore.

When following God asks of me a heavy or costly burden, even one that reaches into the deep and private places of my life, can I, like Ezekiel, carry it in obedience, trusting that God sees and honors the grief his servants bear?

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