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Daily Devotions

Ezekiel

Ezekiel 
Day 
Day 378

"Therefore prophesy, and say"

Text: Ezekiel 36:3

THREE POWERFUL “THEREFORE” STATEMENTS

The Lord sent a very strong word to Ezekiel to proclaim to Israel. He was to pronounce three mighty prophetic statements against the enemies of Israel.

“Therefore prophesy, and say, ‘Thus says the Lord God: ‘Because they made you desolate and swallowed you up on every side, so that you became the possession of the rest of the nations, and you are taken up by the lips of talkers and slandered by the people’— therefore, O mountains of Israel, hear the word of the Lord God! Thus says the Lord God to the mountains, the hills, the rivers, the valleys, the desolate wastes, and the cities that have been forsaken, which became plunder and mockery to the rest of the nations all around— therefore thus says the Lord God: ‘Surely I have spoken in My burning jealousy against the rest of the nations and against all Edom, who gave My land to themselves as a possession, with wholehearted joy and spiteful minds, in order to plunder its open country.””
Ezekiel 36:3-5

1. The first statement.

a) This was directed to Israel.

b) God mentioned how the enemies had made Israel desolate.

c) They had made Israel become slaves of other nations.

d) The people were slandered and plundered and mocked.

2. The second statement.

a) This concerned the physical landscape of Israel.

b) The mountains, the valleys, the desolate waste places and the cities.

c) The land was plundered and mocked by the enemies.

3. The third statement.

a) This contained the personal sentiments.

b) God spoke words of anger and displeasure against these enemies.

c) Israel was regarded by God as “My land”.

d) God noted with anger how the enemies had despoiled His land.

e) They had done this terrible thing:

i) “With wholehearted joy”

ii) “And spiteful minds, in order to plunder its open country”

f) God is holding all the enemies of Israel accountable for their atrocities.