Ezekiel 4:1-5: a reflection

1“You also, son of man, take a tile, and lay it before yourself, and portray on it a city, even Jerusalem. 2Lay siege against it, build forts against it, and cast up a mound against it. Also set camps against it and plant battering rams against it all around. 3Take for yourself an iron pan and set it for a wall of iron between you and the city. Then set your face toward it. It will be besieged, and you shall lay siege against it. This shall be a sign to the house of Israel. 4“Moreover lie on your left side, and lay the iniquity of the house of Israel on it. According to the number of the days that you shall lie on it, you shall bear their iniquity. 5For I have appointed the years of their iniquity to be to you a number of days, even three hundred ninety days. So you shall bear the iniquity of the house of Israel.

God gives Ezekiel a series of strange and demanding sign-acts to perform. He is to take a brick, draw Jerusalem on it, and act out a siege against it; then to lie on his side for a long stretch of days, bearing symbolically the iniquity of the people. These were public, uncomfortable, even humiliating acts, obedience that must have looked bizarre to onlookers and cost Ezekiel considerable discomfort. Yet God asked it of him, and Ezekiel obeyed.

Notice the nature of the obedience God required: costly and strange. Ezekiel was not asked to do something dignified and comfortable; he was asked to perform sign-acts that were physically demanding and would make him look foolish. Obedience, for Ezekiel, meant doing hard, strange things that others would not understand, simply because God had commanded them. His faithfulness showed itself in a willingness to obey even when obedience was uncomfortable and looked strange.

That challenges our own willingness to obey. We are often willing to obey God when it is comfortable and makes sense to us, but more reluctant when obedience is costly, difficult, or would make us look foolish in others' eyes. Ezekiel obeyed even then. And in his bearing the iniquity of the people, there is a faint foreshadowing of Christ, who bore our iniquity fully. When God calls you to a costly or strange obedience, one that is uncomfortable or that others may not understand, do not shrink back. Obey, as Ezekiel obeyed, trusting that God's commands are worth following even when they are hard and look foolish. Faithfulness sometimes asks uncomfortable things; give it anyway.

Lord, you asked Ezekiel to perform strange, uncomfortable, even humiliating sign-acts, and he obeyed, doing hard things that must have looked foolish to onlookers, simply because you commanded them. Challenge my own willingness to obey. I am often willing to obey you when it is comfortable and makes sense, but reluctant when obedience is costly, difficult, or would make me look foolish. Give me Ezekiel's readiness to obey even then. When you call me to a costly or strange obedience that others may not understand, keep me from shrinking back. Help me obey, trusting that your commands are worth following even when they are hard. And thank you that Ezekiel's bearing the people's iniquity points to Christ, who bore mine fully. Make me willing to obey whatever it costs.