Title: Parting the River of Disbelief
Content Verses 1-2 accurately refer to the year in which Ezekiel became a prophet. The year in which Judah was defeated in the 4th invasion by the Babylonian army is B.C. It is said to be around 586 AD. Both the prophets Ezekiel and Jeremiah were prophets of the southern kingdom of Judah. The prophet Ezekiel was in the land of Babylon for 22 years between 593 B.C. and 571 B.C.
The 'thirtieth year' mentioned in the text refers to the year in which Ezekiel was called as a prophet by God, and it means 30 years from the Jubilee year of King Josiah. In the 18th year of Josiah's reign, King Josiah celebrated the Passover in a grand way to commemorate the Jubilee year. After that, King Josiah ruled Judah for 13 more years, and after King Josiah, Jehoiachin reigned for 11 years and then fell to Babylon, so adding those years adds up to 24 years. In addition, since 5 years have passed since Jehoiachin was taken captive to Babylon, it has been 29-30 years since King Josiah's Jubilee year. It was at this time that God called Ezekiel from the river Gebal.
Some say this is Ezekiel's age, Calvin says, overlooking the Israelite habit of counting years. This argument makes Calvin's story very convincing. This is because the people of Israel have always had a habit of looking back on the history of the faith community and the community they belonged to. He has always valued the community over the individual.
Why is this fact mentioned so important in the first place? What kind of god is the Bible always talking about? Who is the recipient of the word? Who is the prophet who prophesies these words? Why is God choosing him and what kind of message is he trying to deliver? because the content of the At that time, there were many priests left in the land of Judah, so why was Ezekiel called from the place where he was taken captive? This fact is more important. God did not call his servants from a special position, but instead called them from a foreign land where they were taken into captivity and groaned, exhorting them to repent.
It is said that there was a prophet Jeremiah in Jerusalem at that time who had been crying out for 35 years to burst his throat. Unfortunately, Jeremiah's cry did not exert its power like an echo in a still river and mountain, and became a joke and ridicule of the false prophets at the time. So, God wanted to let the people know that God’s message is echoing through the ‘one Holy Spirit’ in the same way as the voice of Jeremiah in Jerusalem, even in the rivers of Babylon, where the Israelites are suffering from captivity.
At that time, the false prophets who ridiculed and ridiculed Jeremiah were Ahab the son of Golliah and Zedekiah the son of Maaseiah, who were talking about receiving a revelation completely different from Jeremiah. They were saying that God had promised wonderful blessings to the people. So, although they displayed patriotism (?) to fight against Babylon to the end, they were of no use in the sight of God in faith. Moreover, they only showed their zeal, accusing the captives of being people who had given up on God's promised inheritance, and even insulted them. However, the result was that the king was taken into captivity, and Jerusalem was devastated.
After that, Shemaiah the Nehelamite wrote a letter to Zephaniah, the then high priest, and even accused Jeremiah of being a swindler, a madman, and a false prophet, and accusing him of being a lazy and indifferent priest because he did not punish him severely.
Looking at these records, we cannot help but be surprised at how similar the religious situation in Korea today is. As this country gained independence from Japanese colonial rule, it was founded by people who believed in Jesus. So, God blessed this country and accomplished the miracle of the Han River, but vanity theologians and church officials who did not know God’s grace appeared and disturbed the church, and created a church wrapped in material omnipotence. The prophets who struggled lonely when they were covered were condemned as a sect of heresy. In particular, when discussing the current work of the Holy Spirit, we have come to the point of looking at him with strange eyes, murmuring, and wary, so I wonder how deplorable it is. All the scholars and church leaders who have driven the country's faith in this atmosphere are convinced that if they do not repent and turn around, they will be punished for thousands of generations.
Ezekiel was taken captive to Babylon and was living a miserable life among the people. However, the Spirit of God appeared and moved the prophet Ezekiel, not in the land of Canaan, but in the land of Babylon, where they were taken captive. Since this was an event in which the ‘Spirit of Jehovah God and the Holy Spirit’, which must exist only in the land of Israel, appeared, the event that appeared to Ezekiel could be unacceptable to the Jews at the time.
This is because, in the opinion of the Jews at that time, they were the only chosen people, and only the land they lived in was the holy and chosen land. However, this was a thought that had no knowledge of God's characteristics. He had forgotten that God is forever working the way he wants to. It is a lesson that our believers today must not forget that God is not the kind of God who lives in the human mind.
It seems that the place where the prophet Ezekiel was at that time was in one of the branches of the Euphrates River in a Jewish settlement. While lamenting about his condition, the Prophet could not sleep at night and was captured by the Spirit of God as he walked along the river. That place was the ‘Gerbal River’.
Suddenly, the night sky opened in front of the prophet Ezekiel, and God began to show him a vision. Unfortunately, it was the fifth year of King Jehoiachin's captivity.
Why did God continue to make the Israelites more harassed by the Gentiles? It happened because Israel did not repent and act more arrogantly, misunderstand God's will, insist that it is not God's will, and do not look at the actions of themselves and their ancestors.
It is said that at this time, “visions and the glory of God,” which only the high priests would have had in the temple in Jerusalem, came to Ezekiel, who was standing by the River Gebar in the Chaldeans. At the same time, God came to speak to Ezekiel, who said, “The power of the Lord was upon me.” In other words, it is saying, ‘The heavens were opened and the image of God appeared to me.’ A spiritual world that human eyes cannot normally see was opened to Ezekiel. Examples of the opening of the heavens in this way can be found in several places in the Bible. First, in the Old Testament era, it appears in Deuteronomy 28:12, Psalm 78:23, Malachi 3:10, and also in Isaiah 64:1. It is also found in Revelation 4:1 in the New Testament. The vision always reveals who the God is who is speaking to the prophet now. This tradition has always been the same from the time of Abraham to the present.
Moreover, it is very similar to the people around me not wanting to believe in the presence of God who appeared at the end of the sky and cried out to me when I was having a hard time. It should be pointed out that this is the same unbelief that the Jews showed in the days of Jehoiachin. Moreover, Koreans who are not Jews are too proud. It is impossible to know when people started to have faith as if they knew everything God was doing. A Jew I met gave me advice, saying that if you do not always empty the realm of God, you will become arrogant and become an obstacle to experiencing God. I think Korean Christians are doing this wrong now.
What is clear is that in these words today, it is clear that God's words have worked and revealed His glory beyond the Jewish people's thoughts. Taking the prophet Ezekiel, he says two things. The first is that God is not confined to time and space.
Second, human thinking and God's work are very different.
The conclusion is, ‘Be humble before God, all of you!’ Along with the powerful message to reject any logic that restricts God, the Holy Spirit has also delivered a powerful message to us living in this age.