Friday, March 19, 2010

Ezekiel 1

4 comments:

Unknown said...

Intro to Ezekiel

"Out of the ruins of Jerusalem came a gutsy preacher named Ezekiel. He was amongh the Jews taken to Babylon after the fall of his country. He left behind his city. He left behind his Temple. He left behind his home.

But he didn't leave his faith.

He announced it to everyone who would listen. For twenty-two years he paced teh streets proclaiming both sids of the faith. The bad side? Turn or burn. Forgive me for being so direct, but Ezekiel was.

The good side? Turn and learn. God has a great plan for His people. A great city. Justice will reign and worship will be restored. Unlike Jerusalem, God's city is eternal. Who will be in God's city? Ezekiel anaswers that with the final words of the book. THE LORD IS THERE.

Out of the ruins came Ezekiel. Out of the ruins came the promise. Out of the ruins came new hope.

Is your life in ruins? Look ahead to God's city: THE LORD IS THERE."

*sigh*.

Unknown said...

Remember when I alluded to the positioning of the tribes of Israel, each one of them had a "symbol" on their banner and how God told them to set up camp around the tabernacle and how the four tribes that were situated north, south, east and west, carried the emblem of the four faces of the cherubim? Here we see the four faces described in verse 10, and in Revelation 4:8 we see them situated around the throne in John's vision (John is standing in one place and can only see one side of each cherubim's "four" faces but if you do the math, you can figure out EXACTLY how he was standing looking in on the throne scened. FASCINATING stuff. One picture into how many mysteries and marvels are revealed to us in scripture if we are familiar with them and linking point a to point b. I love this kind of stuff.

I would encourage you to read Revelation 4 to see a parallel to this passage. When you read about John seeing the see of glass, like clear crystal before the throne (from above... v6) and Ezekiel seeing the "dome of sparkled like ice and was frightening (from below... v22) don't you just get goosebumps???? the words to that hymn "heaven came down and glory filled my soul..." they just hit me as I read this.

I LOVE this stuff. We are getting glimpses of God here, people. It leaves one breathless and blessed.

Be blessed!

Jude said...

Hmmm...interesting stuff Prairie Chick. On my list: Read Rev 4

I enjoyed the glimpse of God, the imagery in general. I am not a big fan of fantasy litereature but was thinking that God was the original author of it when I try to visualize these 4 headed creatures.

I also found the mention of the "spirit" intersting. I am not sure that I have ever noticed the use of that word in the Old Teatament. I thought it was more of a New Testament concept. I should go back and read Exodus as perhaps there is mention of the spirit in the pillar of fire and the cloud. The image of these figures coming in the windstorm and these wheels beside them just takes a bit to fathom. I can't wait to read Ch 2 and find out what comes next!

Jude said...

Read Rev 4...the parallels are certainly there!