Ezekiel - Lesson 36

Lesson 36, The Arrival of the Messiah, the Signet of the Renewed Covenant, Ezekiel 34, 23-31. Have you ever wondered what the ancient Israelites actually expected in their Messiah? The New Testament, the scrolls from Qumran, and other early Jewish writings suggest that when Jesus arrived on the scene as Israel's Messiah, commoners and rabbis in various branches of Judaism were speaking of several different kinds of messiahs. A teacher of righteousness, a priestly messiah like Aaron, a prophetic messiah like Moses, and a royal messiah like David. And of course, a warrior messiah who would deliver the Jews from the yoke of the Romans. But how much of these expectations were actually biblical, which in Jesus' time meant were supported by the Hebrew scriptures, and to some extent the early Greek translation, the Septuagint. But how did the ancient Israelites who lived in the First Testament perceive the Messiah? To answer this question, we must be disciplined in our examination of the First Testament and resist imposing on texts that we identify as messianic meanings that would not have been in the minds of the original authors or the people for whom they wrote these scriptures. That means we must begin with the Hebrew word Messiah, Mashiach, translated into Greek as Christos. Morphologically, the Hebrew word, which was all Ezekiel had, is an I-class passive form referring to one who has been anointed with anointing oil. This was a vital element in ritual consecration, by which a person was ordained for a special social and religious role. Israel's high priests were inducted into the office of priest through the ritual of anointing, pouring, sprinkling a special aromatic olive oil solution, a recipe reserved only for anointing oil on the head and garments of the candidate, Exodus 29.7, 21, 31.11, 37.29, and Leviticus 8.10. But this did not mean that any anointed person qualified for the role, office of anointed Messiah, with uppercase M. We find this word as an adjective to the high priest, the anointed priest, but always after the word for priest, HaKohen HaMashiach, Leviticus 4, 3, 5, and 16. When used as a noun, it often has the suffix my anointed one or his anointed one, but when used as a title by itself, it always refers to a royal figure. After David himself had been anointed by Samuel as true king of Israel, chosen by Yahweh, compare 1 Samuel 16.6 and 12-13. In 1 Samuel 24.6, David refused to harm Saul when he had him in a corner in a cave, declaring, because he is Yahweh's anointed one. The biblical narrator described the anointing of David like this. When Samuel took the horn of oil and anointed Mashiach, him in the presence of his brothers, the spirit of Yahweh took control of David from that day forward, 1 Samuel 16.13. Later, after Ish-bosheth had been eliminated as a contender for the throne, representatives of all the tribes came to David at Hebron, his capital as king of Judah, to confirm his kingship over all Israel. In his presence they affirmed, in the past, even while Saul was king over us, you were the one who led Israel in their military campaigns. And Yahweh said to you, you will shepherd my people Israel, and you will become their ruler, Nagid. Then king David made a covenant with them before Yahweh, and they anointed him king over Israel, 2 Samuel 5.2-3. But what did the Israelites expect of Yahweh's anointed king? Two texts are particularly helpful because the contexts relate directly to Ezekiel's presentation. A generation before Israel had a king, sounding like Mary in her Magnificat in Luke 1, 46-55, when Hannah presented her son Samuel to Yahweh at the tabernacle, speaking prophetically in the Aramaic Targum. She is introduced as Hannah the prophet prayed. Speaking prophetically, she declared, these are not the ordinary words of an ordinary lay woman. She said, my heart exalts in Yahweh, my horn is exalted in Yahweh, my mouth derides my enemies because I rejoice, celebrate in your salvation. There is none holy like Yahweh, for there is none besides you. There is no rock like our rock, talk no more so proudly, let not arrogance come from your mouth. For Yahweh is a God of knowledge, and by him actions are weighed. The bowels of the mighty are broken, but the feeble bind on strength. Those who are full have hired themselves out for bread, but those who are hungry have ceased to hunger. The barren has born seven, but she who has many children is forlorn. Yahweh kills and brings to life, he brings down to Sheol and he raises up. The Lord, Yahweh, makes poor and makes rich, he brings low and he exalts. He raises up the poor from the dust, he lifts the needy from the ash heap to make them sit with princes and inherit a seat of honor. For the pillars of the earth are the Lord's, Yahweh's, and on them he has set the world. He will guard the feet of his faithful ones, but the wicked shall be cast off in darkness, for not by might shall a man prevail. The adversaries of Yahweh shall be broken to pieces, against them he will thunder in the heavens. Yahweh, the Lord, will judge the ends of the earth, and he will give strength to his king and exalt the horn of his anointed. With his utterance, Hannah declared the theme of the books of Samuel, which we really should call the books of David. They're not about Samuel, they're about David. But she has also raised the question, who is this anointed one of whom she speaks? Well, as time would tell, it was not Saul. He turned out to be a negative foil for the real one, the real anointed one of Yahweh. Although neither Ezekiel nor any other prophet, prophetic book, refer to the Messiah by this title, Messiah, although we can talk about Daniel 9, 25-26, without the article a Messiah, or they never have the suffix, Isaiah 45, 1 speaks of Cyrus, the anointed one. These texts provide vital background for interpreting our text. Ezekiel had alluded to this figure several times in his earlier prophecies. In chapter 17, he had described the Messiah's arrival in metaphorical terms. Thus, as the Lord Yahweh declared, I myself will take a sprig from the highest crown of the cedar and plant. And from the top of its shoots I will pluck a tender sprig, and I myself will plant it on a high and towering mountain. On the high mountain of Israel I will plant it that it may bear branches and produce fruit and become a magnificent cedar. Every winged bird will nest under it, in the shelter of its boughs it will perch. Then all the trees of the countryside will know that I am Yahweh.

I bring down the tall tree, I exalt the low tree, I cause the green tree to wither and make the withered tree thrive. I am Yahweh, I have spoken, I will perform, as I have declared. The last lines echo Hannah's words, and the overall picture here accords precisely with the images in Ezekiel 34, 1-22. Yahweh had brought down the dynasty of David, and now we see him exalting this low tree. David is back. But there would be one more enigmatic statement that Yahweh would make through Ezekiel, probably about 15 years after the date of this oracle on New Year's Day in the 27th year of Jehoiakim's and Ezekiel's own exile, April 26, 571 BC. In the city of Babylon, on the day of the Akitu festival, the people joined the gods in celebrating the kingship of Marduk, with huge processions and rituals in his honor that climaxed with the whole city shouting, Marduk is king, Marduk is king, Marduk is king, as we have it in the Enuma Elish text from that time. As it turned out, at the end of Ezekiel's last oracle against Egypt, chronologically, we hear the last words from Yahweh through Ezekiel's mouth. After this, his mouth is silenced, as far as we know. This text matches Sir Winston Churchill's exasperated description of Russia in 1939. Of Russia, he said, it is just a riddle wrapped in a mystery inside an enigma. In my mind, we find the best clue to Ezekiel's enigmatic statement in Psalm 132, 17. There, I will cause a horn to sprout for David. I have prepared a lamp for my anointed Messiah. Remarkably, this is the only other place in the Hebrew Bible where horn, keren, and I cause to sprout, ashmiach, occur together. On the surface, this looks like a mixing of bovine, horn, and botanical to sprout metaphors. However, this may work. In Moses' blessing of Joseph, from whom would come the northern kings in Deuteronomy 33, 16-17, as the head of Israel's train of prophets, Moses had spoken of Joseph in royal terms like this. May these, the choice produce of the earth, rest on the head of Joseph, on the forehead of the prince of his brothers. As the firstborn bull, he is majestic, hadar, and his horns, kerenayim, are the horns of an aurochs. With them he shall gore the peoples, all of them to the ends of the earth, and they are the ten thousands of Ephraim, and they are the thousands of Manasseh. The aurochs, this is the ancient, massive bovine from which apparently our cattle have descended, but they went extinct in about the 6th century. The last one was killed in 16th century in Poland. Indeed, in Psalm 92.10, the obviously Davidic psalmist exploited this very description. You have caused my horn to rise, grow like that of an aurochs. You have poured over me fresh oil, i.e., reanointed me. People who grew up on a farm with livestock may remember the feel of the little knobs on male bovines, calves, or caprovines' heads. Soon after birth, actually, on bovines they were on both male and females, but on others, sheep, etc., they were only on the males. Soon after the birth, little knobs, like plants, they began sprouting. Although these species do not shed their horns and grow new ones each year, like deer do, once they are cut off, they remain little stumps. The metaphor of the bovine aurochs would suggest that once the horns of the animal were removed, they were gone for good. This may be how the survivors of the raising of Jerusalem in 586 B.C. felt. It was over. David was gone for good. However, a miracle was about to happen, as is the case with deer and elk. Ezekiel envisioned this royal animal regaining its full majesty, probably represented by horns more majestic than the original dynasty of David had ever had. Larger horns, like the long horns of Texas and beyond. With this as background, we may return to our text. As I noted in my comments on 34.1-22, if the gospel in verses 1-10 involved an announcement of the deliverance for Israel, and verses 11-22 describe the nature and thoroughness of that deliverance, then verses 23-30 declare the goal of Yahweh's deliverance, the establishment of an eternal covenant of peace. Yahweh did not speak of this covenant as eternal here ad olam, but in 37.25b and 26, he will pick up and enhance this theme, colorize it. They, their children and their grandchildren, will occupy the land forever, ad olam. David, my servant, will be their prince, nasi, forever, le olam. I will make with them a covenant of peace. It will be an eternal covenant, a covenant forever, berit olam, with them. I will give to them the land of Israel and multiply them. Well, our text divides into two parts. The first deals with the agent or the guarantee of that eternal peace, verses 23-24, and the second with the nature of that peace. So let's look at verses 23-24, the guarantee and guarantor of Yahweh's covenant of peace. Without warning, in verse 23, Yahweh's attention moved from his own negative activity, that is, resolving problems within the flock, to exciting new positive actions on Israel's behalf. The repetitious and staccato style of verses 23-24 reflect Ezekiel's increasing excitement as he approached the climax of the oracle. The Lord said, Then I will appoint a single shepherd over them to tend them, my servant David. He will tend them and be their shepherd. Then I, Yahweh, will be their God, and my servant David will be ruler among them. I am Yahweh, I have spoken. The important, the big question we need to contemplate here is, what do these verses tell us about the person Yahweh had in mind? To answer this question, we may note seven important details. First, this person will be neither self-appointed nor elected by the people, but raised up by, that is, chosen and installed by Yahweh himself, a principle established through Moses in the Mosaic charter for kingship long ago, in Deuteronomy 17.15. He will be chosen by Yahweh. Moses had said to the Israelites, if in the future you want to set a king over yourselves, you may, go ahead. But he must be one whom the Lord chooses, elected by Yahweh. Second, Yahweh installed this ruler over his flock after the problems of the past are resolved. The sequence envisioned here suggests that this person would not appear to solve these problems. He is not a conquering king. Rather, once the covenant triangle had been restored by Yahweh himself, the divine shepherd, then he would install his agent. Well, this is the pattern we observed in the historical David. According to Deuteronomy 17.14, Yahweh would identify his chosen king, Melech, after the people had entered the land, taken possession of it, and occupied it. Although David had to take care of some internal problems, Jebusites and Philistines, he did not gain the right to rule by seizing the land from the Canaanites and delivering it into Israel's hands through conquest. That was Joshua's assignment. In fact, according to Judges 11.26, by the time Jephthah rescued his people from the Ammonites, Israel had been in the land for 300 years. And this one concerned events at least half a century before the rise of David. David was installed, not as the conquering king, but as the symbol of Yahweh's rule over this land. This was a theocracy. And according to 1 Chronicles 29.23, the Davidic king sat on, quote, the throne of Yahweh. They were his vice-regents. Third, Yahweh cast this person as a singular shepherd. Given the prominence of the theme of the shepherd in Ezekiel 34.1-22, we are not surprised that Yahweh characterized this person by that name, a shepherd. As the Israelites who anointed David and Hebron had recognized, Yahweh had commissioned him to shepherd my people Israel and be ruler, Nagid, over them. 2 Samuel 5.2 By announcing a single ruler, Yahweh reversed the division of Israel into northern and southern kingdoms that occurred after the death of Solomon, 1 Kings 11-12. He will expand on this notion in Ezekiel 37.15-24, where the numeral one, echad, echad, occurs 11 times. One, one, one, singular. Fourth, this shepherd would be David. Here Ezekiel followed Hosea 3.5, Amos 9.11, and Jeremiah 23.5, in naming him after the dynasty's founder. These prophets did not expect a literal resurrection of the eighth son of Jesse, but Ezekiel's use of the singular shepherd and his emphasis on one also precluded the generic restoration of the dynasty. That is simply a series of kings. He envisioned a single person who would embody the dynasty, but who occupied the throne himself. Having earlier foretold and witnessed the fall of the Davidic house, chapter 17, chapter 19, Ezekiel now announced the restoration of this ancient pillar of Israel's security. His pronouncement was based on Yahweh's election of and covenant with David, announced by Nathan the prophet in 2 Samuel 8. Thus says Yahweh Tzevaoth, the Lord of heaven's armies, I took you from the pasture, from following the flock, that you should be prince, nagid, over my people Israel. The psalmist celebrated this notion in Psalm 78, 70 to 72. He chose David, his servant, and took him from the sheepfolds, from caring for the nursing ewes, and he brought him to tend, that's from the same root as the Hebrew word for shepherd, he brought him to shepherd Jacob, his people. Israel, his own possession. He tended, shepherded them with the integrity of heart, with his skillful hands he led them. Yahweh's eightfold affirmation of the eternality, olam, of the Davidic covenant, 2 Samuel 7, 13 and 16 and 24 to 29, eight times he talks about an eternal dynasty. This had provided the basis for all the prophetic hopes, and a fact reflected most clearly in Jeremiah 33, 17, 22 to 21, and 25 to 26. Jeremiah, Ezekiel's contemporary, a little older than Ezekiel, but their ministries overlapped, said, David will never lack a man to occupy the throne of Israel. If you could break my covenant with a day and my covenant with a night, so that day and night should cease to appear at the proper time, then my covenant with David could also be broken, with the result that he would cease to have a son reigning upon his throne. As surely as I have established my covenant with night and day, the fixed laws of the universe, so surely I will never reject the descendants of Jacob and of my servant David. I will never fail to take rulers for the descendants of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, from his descendants. However, we must view the capture of Zedekiah, and with it the collapse of the Davidic house in 586, against the backdrop of this covenant. If Yahweh appeared to have revoked the covenant in allowing this to happen, as we know Ezekiel would say, in bringing Nebuchadnezzar in to make this happen, Ezekiel hereby announced that Yahweh had not forgotten the ancient promise, that had been the basis of the fourth pillar of Judah's earlier misplaced doctrine of security. Yahweh would fulfill his irrevocable promise and his unfailing covenant to the house of David, as the sole legitimate dynasty in Israel. Fifth, the shepherd would be the servant of Yahweh. Ezekiel's repetition of the epithet both intentionally contrasted him with self-seeking shepherds of verses 1 to 10, and it recalled the traditional view of David's willing subordination to Yahweh. In the first testament, servant of Yahweh, Eved Yahweh, functioned as an honorific title for those who stood in an unofficial relationship to God, often with the implication of a special election to a task, and to be his vassals, his servants. However, its 31-fold application to David, servant of the Lord, far exceeded that of any other person. Others are called servant of the Lord, but no one anywhere near as often as David, my servant. For David, bearing the title involved serving as Yahweh's vice-regent, his vice-king, in the administration of the triangular relationship involving Yahweh, Israel, and the land. Sixth, this shepherd will be a chief in the midst of his people. Ezekiel's use here of the ancient title Nasi, accorded with his efforts elsewhere to downplay the roles of Israel's past monarchs, who had besmirched the name, the title Melech, king. Would there be misbehavior? Compare verses 1 to 10 of Ezekiel 34. And he harked back to 1 Kings 11.34, where Yahweh had said of Solomon, I will make him Nasi, prince, all the days of his life, for the sake of David, my evid, my servant. However, the prophet emphasized the ruler's identification with the people by noting that while he may be shepherd over Israel, he will be chief in their midst. Lexically, the word Nasi means the promoted one, the sponsored one. But he would still be one of the flock, a sort of first among equals, primus inter paris. This role also recalled Deuteronomy 17, 19 to 20, where Moses charged Israel's kings to read the Torah continuously to prevent their hearts from being elevated above their kinsfolk, their countrymen. In this arrangement, Yahweh was the divine patron of the people, but he installed David as his representative, his vice regent, and his deputy. Ezekiel's announcement of the appointment of a new David for Israel should have installed new hope in the hearts of the exiles, Ezekiel's audience. Contrary to appearance, the demise of the Davidic house in 586 BC did not reflect divine impotence or indifference to previous commitments. These events had both fulfilled previous prophetic utterances, 12 on to 16, and 17, 19, and they set the stage for a dramatic and a new act of Yahweh. The decadence of the old order had been removed. Now Yahweh challenged the people to look forward to a new day when Yahweh's Davidic servant would be reinstated in accordance with his eternal and irrevocable covenant. Seventh, this person would be Yahweh's signet chotham. He would be Yahweh's token for the people of his irrevocable commitment to the covenant triangle and his enduring fidelity to the people of Israel and the land he had given them as their grant. I use the word token advisedly, not in the sense of perfunctory, minimalist, or merely symbolic, but for an object that signifies authority, validity, and points to something bigger. My vocabulary derives from 2812, where Yahweh had said of the king of Tyre, you were the signet of perfection, full of wisdom, and perfect in beauty. He hereby alluded to Adam as God's signature of ownership of the garden of Eden, the garden of God, 2813. In Haggai 2.23, a laser prophet would apply this same word to Zerubbabel, the grandson of Jehoiakim, as the seal of Yahweh's commitment to the people. Yahweh's claim to Israel as his people in Ezekiel 34.24 represented this notion beautifully. Then I, when this person is installed, then I, Yahweh, will be their God, and my servant David will be ruler among them. I am Yahweh. I have spoken. We recognize this immediately as the first part of the covenant formula that occurs hundreds of times in the First Testament. But here Yahweh reinforced it with a very next verse. In the context and as the confirmation of Yahweh's covenant of peace with Israel, he would install David as their king. In 2 Samuel 7.23-24, David had recognized that when Yahweh granted him eternal title to the throne of Israel, this had not been about him. Yahweh's election of him as king was the sign of his irrevocable pledge to the nation of Israel, expressed fully as, I will be your God and you shall be my people. In the ancient world, authorized officials normally used seals to stamp documents with signatures. But with Israel, Yahweh went one stage further. He gave the nation the stamp itself, and he placed it in the midst of the people to function something like the crown jewels of the British ruler that you can see in the Tower of London. Historically, these insignias of power belonged to the monarchy. But the jewels themselves were not stashed away in some secret place where we could just imagine them. To this day, they are on public display as tokens of Britain's rich royal past, a source of pride for the whole country, and now a token to the world of the growth of democratic parliamentary government. The primary motivation behind Yahweh's restoring the flock was neither the reward to reward David for fine service, nor even to show pity for the bruised and battered sheep of Israel, but to resurrect his irrevocable covenant with the people, compared Deuteronomy 4.31. Finally, in its full force and scope, having restored the covenant triangle in Ezekiel 34.1-22, in verses 23-24, Yahweh promised to install David as his signet, that is, the symbol of Israel's status and the administrator-guarantor of the covenant's benefactions, all the good things that come with it. In verses 25-30 of chapter 34, Ezekiel describes the nature of the coming peace. Verse 25, Then I will make a covenant of peace for them. I will eliminate vicious animals from the land so they may dwell securely in the desert and sleep in the forest. I will make them and the environs all around a blessing. I will send down the shower in its seasons. They will be showers of blessings. The trees of the field will yield their fruit. The land will yield its produce. Then they will live securely on their land. And they will know that I am Yahweh when I break the bars of their yoke and rescue them from the power of those who enslave them. They will no longer be booty for the nations, nor will the wild animals devour them. They will dwell securely with no one terrorizing them. I will provide them with a peaceful plantation. No more will there be victims of famine in the land, nor will they suffer the derision of the nations. They will know that I am Yahweh their God with them and that they, the house of Israel, are my people. The Declaration of the Lord Yahweh. But how would this work? How would it work out? Verses 25 to 29 announce that when Yahweh would appoint the Davidic shepherd, he would also establish with Israel his covenant of peace, which Jeremiah had identified as the new covenant, or I think we should say the renewed covenant. If you look closely at that covenant, there's actually nothing new except one little element. Berit Hadashah, Jeremiah 31, 31 to 40. Yahweh's opening sentence here in verse 25 declared the thesis for the entire paragraph. Then I will make a covenant of shalom for them. This announcement recalled 1660, where Yahweh had promised that after the judgment of Jerusalem, he would remember his covenant made with her as representative of the nation, that is the city as the representative, in the days of her youth and establish an eternal covenant, berit olam, for them. Now Yahweh resumed that subject, and he expands it, he unpacks it, labeling this paragraph the covenant of peace. As the prophet passed this word on to the people and committed them to writing, he may well have been inspired by the vision anticipated by Isaiah in Isaiah 54, 7 to 10, more than a hundred years ago. For a brief moment I abandoned you, Isaiah reports, but with deep compassion I will regather you in overflowing wrath for the moment I hid my face from you. Nevertheless, with everlasting kindness, chesed olam, I will have compassion on you, as your Redeemer, Yahweh, declared. That for this is like the days of Noah to me, as I swore that the waters of Noah would never again flood the earth, so I have now sworn not to be angry with you, nor to rebuke you again. Though the mountains may shake and the hills may move, my unfailing love, chesed, for you will never be shaken, nor will my peace covenant, b'rit shalom, be moved. This is what Yahweh, who has compassion on you, has declared. Like our text, this passage associates the covenant of peace with the cessation of divine wrath, expressed by Yahweh's abandonment of his people and the hiding of his face, which we will see in Ezekiel 39-29. And that image metaphor comes from Deuteronomy 31, 16-18. Ezekiel presented Yahweh's promise of peace for his people as a treaty oath, freely promised and unilateral. His use of the expression karath b'rith, to cut a covenant for, reflects both the one-sided nature of this development and the need for a new ritual to establish the covenant hekim b'rith in 1660. But what did Ezekiel mean by the word shalom, a covenant of peace? Obviously, the term signified much more than the absence of hostility or tension, let alone alienation. It spoke of wholeness, harmony, fulfillment, symmetry, humans at peace with their environment and at peace with God. Everything is in place and in order, and people and animals and God and the whole cosmos is in a good space. It's important to observe in the following exposition that this would not involve an absolutely new covenant. The description here borrows heavily from Leviticus 26, 4-13. Given Ezekiel's heavy dependence upon the covenant curses for his pronouncements of doom against Judah, we might have expected him to rely on the covenant blessings from Leviticus 26 and Deuteronomy 28. We might have expected him to rely on these covenant blessings for his description of the nation's restoration. But Yahweh's dependence on that base text from Leviticus was not slavish. He freely rearranged the elements, modified expressions, expanded on some, and abbreviated others. However, we find the most striking modification of the covenant blessings in the unconditional nature of this prophecy. The earlier document had been prefaced with stern prohibitions on idolatry and commands to observe Yahweh's Sabbaths and revere his sanctuary, and then cast the blessings in the form of clear conditional clauses. In Ezekiel's prophecy, Yahweh dropped all hints of contingency, citing no qualifications or human preconditions and making no appeal for repentance. In fact, he painted the picture of Israel's restoration entirely from the divine perspective. Just as the original exodus from Egypt had been accomplished by Yahweh's own will, his own energy, and for his own purposes, so he would initiate and effect this new chapter in the history of his relationship with his people. The complete destruction of the old order at the hands of Nebuchadnezzar had freed him from the burdens of the nation's past infidelity and allowed him to begin anew. That's why earlier we heard so often him talk about breathing easier after he had vented his fury. The description of the effects of Yahweh's covenant of peace is intentionally repetitious. He deliberately highlighted Israel's security as the central issue with the key word levitach, in safety, securely, which occurs three times, 25, 27, 28. This is an ambiguous expression, in safety, securely, that may denote both freedom from fear and casual smugness. Ezekiel envisioned Yahweh guaranteeing Israel's security with six specific actions cited in an ABC-ABC order. The A elements involve peace. Peace with the animals, verse 25b-d. B, the blessing of the vegetation, verses 26-27c. C, deliverance from oppression, 27d-28a. A', peace with the animals, verses 28b-d. The blessing of the vegetation, that's B', verses 29ab. And then C', deliverance from oppression. This is very artfully done. Note the three types of promised activity in duplicate. First, Yahweh would restore security by eliminating predatory animals. This promise reversed Ezekiel's earlier pronouncements identifying wild animals as agents of divine judgment. We saw that in 517, 415, 1415, 1421, 3327. Verse 25 describes an environment so secure the people will sleep out in the open anywhere they please. This image always reminds me of an evening in 1968 at Christmas time. During my time as a student at the Friedrich Alexander University in Erlangen, West Germany. At that time, Ellen and I enjoyed an unforgettable evening at a live performance of Engelbert Humperdinck's Hansel and Gretel in Nuremberg, Germany. Who can forget the scene and especially the tune of Abends will ich schlafen gehen When at night I go to sleep Fourteen angels watch to keep Two my head are guarding Two my feet are guiding Two are on my right hand Two are on my left hand Two who warmly cover Two who o'er me hover Two to whom tis given To guide my steps to heaven Sleeping softly then it seems Heaven enters in my dreams Angels hover round me Whispering they have found me Two are sweetly singing Two are garlands bringing Strewing me with roses as my soul reposes God will not forsake me When dawn at last will wake me That's the image we have here Sleeping in the forest with nobody to trouble you No wolves, no snakes, no problems Second, Yahweh would restore economic security By blessing the land with great fruitfulness I will make them in the environs around my hill a blessing I will send down the shower in its seasons They will be showers of blessings The trees of the field will yield their fruit And the land will yield its produce This image has been immortalized in the first line of a song We used to sing, especially at harvest festivals There shall be showers of blessing This is the promise of love There shall be seasons refreshing Sent from the Savior above There shall be showers of blessing Precious, reviving again Over the hills and the valleys Sound of abundance of rain There shall be showers of blessing Send them upon us, O Lord Grant to us now a refreshing Come and now honor Thy word There shall be showers of blessing Oh, that today they might fall Don't we long for this? Now as to God we are confessing Now as on Jesus we call Showers, showers of blessing Showers of blessing we need Mercy drops round us are falling But for the showers we plead Lyrics by A.D. Whittle And the musical score by James McGranahan, 1883 Well, the present expression of flourishing Contrasts with Yahweh's curse To make the sky like iron And the earth like bronze In Leviticus 26, 19, 20 And Deuteronomy 28, 23-24 Verse 29 in our text Reinforce this theme of flourishing I will provide them with a peaceful plantation A perfect shalom plantation No more will there be victims of famine in the land The last line promised the famine Will never again ravish the land As it had during the days of the nation's judgment And we've seen that repeatedly in this book The threats of famine 5, 2, 6, 11-12 and others Third, Yahweh would restore security to Israel By removing the oppression of foreign enemies Employing a modified version of the recognition formula Then they will know, verse 27b Ezekiel declared that Yahweh would break the bars of their yoke of bondage And rescue Hetzil That's the same verb we saw earlier Of Yahweh rescuing Israel from the jaws of their shepherds Monster shepherds He will rescue them from the hand of those who enslaved them This language cast the restoration of Israel as a new exodus Reminiscent of the nation's earlier deliverance from Egyptian bondage However, we should note that he did not speak of deliverance from Babylonian bondage The hands of those who enslaved them Is intentionally vague Allowing for any enslaving power The Assyrians, Babylonians, Romans, Muslim overlords Over native African, northern African populations That we saw, or the czars of Russia enslaving their citizens It could also speak of the Europeans in America And modern enslavement of women And in many parts of the world, especially in the sex trafficking world But also enslavement to drugs and to alcohol and pornography And all sorts of hedonistic passions and appetites Of course the very name Jesus speaks of the greatest enslavement of all The enslavement to sin As the envoy from heaven told Joseph You shall call his name Jesus For he will save his people from their sins The Greek word here in Matthew 1.21 is plural Just like it is in Ezekiel, the enslavement Yahweh's present reference to breaking the bars of their yoke Alluded to Leviticus 26.13 Where Yahweh had concretized the image of the effects of the yoke on people's posture Yahweh will now make you walk erect This linkage helps us interpret Jesus' declaration Take my yoke upon you for my yoke is easy and my burden is light You can walk upright carrying Jesus' yoke, Matthew 11.30 Indeed centuries earlier, Yahweh had given the Israelites an affectionate name Jeshurun, straightened one To commemorate what he had done for Israel This name appears only four times in scripture Three times in Deuteronomy and once in Isaiah Jeshurun, straightened one A century before Ezekiel's time Isaiah had retrieved the name from the Torah When he spoke of Israel's renewal in Isaiah 44.2 These external dimensions of the messianic gift of shalom Would have been welcome in and of themselves But Ezekiel's portrayal of the new day climaxed With his announcement of the renewal of the ancient covenant They will know that I am Yahweh, their God, with them, not against them And that they, the house of Israel, are my people The declaration of the Lord Yahweh Ezekiel 34.31 By casting this promise in another modified form of the recognition formula Ezekiel declared Yahweh's true goal in all his saving actions That the family of Israel might realize the presence of God among them And the reestablishment of the covenant relationship between them and their God In Exodus 19, the first words the Israelites hear from the Lord After they've arrived at Sinai You have seen what I did to the Egyptians How I carried you on eagles' wings and brought you to myself Well that's what's happened here God has brought them to himself And he has come to them Yahweh would finally reverse the tragedy of 586 Then when he expelled them from the land He left the land himself And he turned his face away from the people In Ezekiel's idyllic picture of the messianic age We see each member of the triangular relationship fulfilling his role Yahweh is present among them And his signet is tending them on his behalf The land is yielding its abundance And the people are enjoying the security and well-being of Shalom Ezekiel's association of covenant renewal With the taming of wild animals And the rejuvenation of the vegetation Bears a striking resemblance to Hosea 2 18-23 Which portrays Yahweh Not as the principal to the covenant But as a covenant mediator Establishing peace between feuding parties Hosea wrote On that day I will make a covenant for them With the wild animals, the birds of the air And the creeping creatures of the ground I will also abolish the bow, the sword and war from the land Thus I will permit them to lie down in safety There it is again I will betroth you to me forever This marriage is back Indeed I will betroth you to me With righteousness and justice With goodness and compassion I will betroth you to me with faithfulness Then you will know Yahweh In that day I will respond The declaration of Yahweh I will respond to the sky And it will respond to the earth Then the earth will respond with new grain And wine and oil And they will respond to Jezreel And I will sow it for myself in the land I will show mercy toward Lo-Ruch Ha-Ma That name means no mercy And say to Lo-Ami Which means not my people You are my people And he will say You are my God Some such covenant also underlay Job 5.23 Which described divine deliverance from a series of disasters From six calamities he will rescue you In seven no harm will touch you In famine he will redeem you from death In battle from the stroke of the sword You will be protected from the lash of the tongue And need not fear when destruction comes You will laugh at violence and starvation And have no fear of the wild animals For you will have a covenant with the stones of the field And the wild animals will be at peace with you Remarkably the poet Framed this list with two elements Found in Ezekiel's picture of peace Suggesting famine and dangerous animals Functioned as shorthand for the full range of calamities In Ezekiel 34.30 Ezekiel sealed Yahweh's glorious promise With a divine imprimatur The signatory formula The declaration of the Lord Never to be cancelled This chapter ends with a short little epilogue On the significance of the peace And now the shepherd metaphor comes back Verse 31 Now you are my flock You are the human flock of my pasture And I am your God The declaration of the Lord Yahweh Ezekiel's vision of the messianic age Verses 25-30 Had temporarily suspended the shepherd flock imagery That dominated the oracle to that point He did not attempt to relate the wild animals To creatures that prey on the flock Nor did he link the rejuvenation of vegetation With Yahweh's renewal of pasture land And even the evil shepherds had disappeared Therefore Yahweh appropriately Wrapped up this prophecy This is the ribbon By returning to the central issue Verse 31 reaffirmed that the flock Of which the prophet had spoken earlier Represented the nation of Israel However he reversed the order of the bipartite Form of the covenant formula In place of you are my people The prophet declared you are my flock Then he clarified the issue by reiterating That Israel is the flock of his pasture And affirming that the flock of which he spoke Was indeed a human flock An adam flock In our discussion of Ezekiel 34 1-22 We learn that Yahweh is the true shepherd of Israel And that when he shepherds his flock He takes care of them with unreserved protection And generosity In this messianic conclusion to that oracle We have learned several additional dimensions To that pastoral imagery Of course we must begin with the shepherd Capital S Whom Yahweh installs as the guarantee Of his covenant commitment and his favor This David is indeed Jesus The Christ, the Messiah He described himself in his style of shepherding In John 10 Where in contrasting himself With other shepherds in this world He declared But the shepherd who enters by the door Is the shepherd of the sheep To him the gatekeeper opens The sheep hear his voice He calls his own sheep by name And he leads them out When he has brought out all his own He goes before them And the sheep follow him For they know his voice But then in a bizarre move Jesus transformed this studio portrait Into a cartoon I am the door If anyone enters by me He will be saved And will go in and out and find pasture Pastoral language remains But the thief comes only to steal And kill and destroy I came that they may have life And have it abundantly I am the good shepherd The good shepherd Lays down his life for the sheep Wow This is beyond anything that Ezekiel spoke of Or probably expected But as I noted earlier The only possible antecedent for that statement The good shepherd lays down his life for the sheep The only possible antecedent is Isaiah 53 Where incredibly one of the most unlikely sheep Had been elevated to the status of servant of Yahweh And then was pierced by God For our transgressions In the midst of the Lenten season We often look forward to the passion of Christ And the images of Isaiah 53 haunt us He was oppressed and treated harshly Yet he never said a word He was like a lamb going to the slaughter And a sheep is silent before the shearers He did not open his mouth Unjustly condemned he was led astray No one cared that he died without descendants That his life was cut short in midstream But he was struck down for the rebellion of my people He had done no wrong and he had never deceived anyone But he was buried like a criminal He was put in a rich man's grave But it was Yahweh's good plan to crush him And cause him grief Yet when his life is made an offering for sin and Asham And he will have many descendants He will enjoy a long life And Yahweh's good plan will prosper in his hands When he sees all that is accomplished by his anguish He will be satisfied And because of his experience My righteous servant will make it possible For many to be counted righteous For he will bear all their sins I will give him the honors of a victorious soldier Because he exposed himself to death He was counted among the rebels He bore the sins of many And he interceded for rebels Isaiah 53, 7-12 But we need to interpret another familiar text in John In the light of this In the light of all that we have said As Jesus told Nicodemus, the learned Pharisee In John 3, 16-17 For God demonstrated his covenant Commitment to the world, the cosmos By giving his one and only son So that none who believe in him will perish But have eternal life God sent his son into the world Not to judge the world But to save the world through him Although Ezekiel's focus was on the nation of Israel Being party to the covenant of peace We need to remember that Israel's role In God's grand plan of redemption Was microcosmic Ezekiel's image of her previous judgment And her ultimate restoration Functioned as microcosms of the fate, judgment And destiny of the world In John's gospel We learn that when God confirmed Jesus As king of the Jews, 1919 The hour of his crucifixion Was the hour of his exaltation And of course, this set the stage for the resurrection About which Paul spoke in Romans 1, 1-5 One of only two times in all of Paul's letters Where he talks about the David He quotes David several times But here, he talks about the David Romans 1, 1-5 God promised this good news long ago Through his prophets in the Holy Scriptures The good news is about his son In his early life, he was born into King David's family line There he is And he was appointed, ordained as the son of God When he was raised from the dead By the power of the Holy Spirit He is Jesus, Messiah, Christ, our Lord Through Christ, Messiah God has given us the privilege And authority as apostles To tell Gentiles everywhere What God has done for them So that they will believe and obey him Bringing glory to his name Romans 1, 2-5 Jesus' death and resurrection proved He was indeed God's signet Given to the world as the guarantor Of his shalom Ezekiel's vision of the messianic age Recognized a measure of truth In his contemporary theological formulations Yes, Yahweh had entered into An eternal marriage covenant with a nation Yes, Yahweh had an enduring interest in his land Yes, Yahweh's promise to David Of eternal title to the throne of Jerusalem Still stood These covenant hopes would be fulfilled In the messianic age At that time When Yahweh's people live securely in the land Are ruled by a divinely appointed David And enjoy the well-being of God's presence and grace They will finally acknowledge him As their savior and Lord Covenant Lord And by God's grace We, Gentiles, have been grafted Into this blessed hope This picture of Israel's restoration In their own paradise Is programmatic and paradigmatic Of Yahweh's creation of a new heavens And a new earth Where the entire globe becomes one vast Eden And the song of the angels on the first Christmas Which means celebration of the Messiah Christmas It will be realized Glory to God in the highest And throughout the whole earth His peace reigns Because he is pleased with all What a day that will be I close this lesson with Paul's magnificent prayer And doxology at the end of Ephesians 3 For this reason I bow my knees I fall down before my Father, the Father From whom every family in heaven and earth is named That according to the riches of his glory He may grant you to be strengthened with power Through his Spirit in your inner being So that Christ, Messiah May dwell in your hearts through faith And that you, being rooted and grounded in love May have strength to comprehend With all the saints What is the breadth and length and height and depth And to know the love of Messiah That surpasses knowledge That you may be filled with the fullness of God Now to him who is able to do far more abundantly Than all that we ask or think According to the power at work within us To him be the glory in the church And in Messiah, Christ, Jesus Through all generations Forever and ever and ever and ever Amen