by Rev. Lachlan MacLeod, Greenock
(Preached at the Induction of Rev. H. R. Moshe Radcliff in St. Jude’s Church, Glasgow, on Wednesday, 23rd September 1970).
Ezekiel exercised his prophetic office among the captives in Babylon during their captivity in that place. This was one aspect of the Lord’s gracious dealings with His people Israel at that time, that though they were carried away from their own land, He did not leave them without a witness but sent His prophets to them from time to time with His Word. Sometimes they were denounced because of their sins and called to repentance, and at other times, as in this chapter, they were given great and precious promises. It must be acknowledged however that this promise of a return to their own land was only partially fulfilled in the return from Babylon, though we have every reason to believe that the Lord will in His own time fulfil all His promises to His beloved Israel. The full and final blessing is yet to come, and the return from Babylon after 70 years captivity was but an earnest or pledge of it. For a few minutes just now let us consider:—
I. The One Who removed the children of Israel, and why.
II. The One Who is promising to gather them again, and why.
III. The spiritual blessing He promises.
IV. Our duty.
I. First of all then let us consider the One Who removed the children of Israel and why He did this.
As far as the actual carrying away of Israel and Judah was concerned, we see from the scriptures that Shalmaneser, King of Assyria, was used to carry away the 10 tribes (2 Kings, ch. 18, v. 9, 10), and Nebuchadnezzar, King of Babylon, the people of Judah (2 Kings, ch. 25, v. 8-10) and when the final dispersion took place after the fall of Jerusalem in 70 A.D., the Romans were the instruments used. From the scriptures, however, we see that they were but instruments doing the work of the Lord. At verse 19 of this chapter He says “And I scattered them among the heathen, and they were dispersed through the countries.” Here the Lord claims that it was He who did this work. The Lord Who took them from Egypt with His mighty hand and out-stretched arm and planted them in the land of Canaan was the One Who plucked them from off the land and scattered them among all people from one end of the earth to the other. The heathen nations were but the servants of the Lord in all this (Jeremiah, ch. 25, v. 9). They would never have succeeded against Israel without His permission.
The question we have to ask now is, Why did the Lord do this? Why did He take His people Israel away to captivity? Were they not His covenant people, the seed of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, the people for whom He did so many wonderful things? Yes, but they sinned and broke His covenant with them times without number. They were faithfully warned by the Lord, through His servant Moses, what the consequences of such action would be. In the 28th Chapter of the book of Deuteronomy He sets before them most solemnly what was to follow should they go aside from His Word and serve other gods. At the 63rd verse of the chapter we read, “And it shall come to pass, that as the Lord rejoiced over you to do you good, and to multiply you, so the Lord will rejoice over you to destroy you, and to bring you to nought, and ye shall be plucked from off the land whither thou goest to possess it.” They were expressly told not to make any covenant with the people of Canaan nor with their gods. “Thou shalt make no covenant with them nor with their gods. They shall not dwell in thy land, lest they make thee sin against Me: for if thou serve their gods, it will surely be a snare unto thee.” But they obeyed not His voice. They followed the Lord during the lifetime of Joshua and the elders that outlived Joshua but then we find that they soon forgot God and mingled with the heathen and learned of them their way. The Lord, Who did so much for them was forgotten, “and the children of Israel did evil in the sight of the Lord, and served Baalim. And they forsook the Lord God of their fathers, which brought them out of the land of Egypt, and followed other gods, of the gods of the people that were round about them, and bowed themselves unto them, and provoked the Lord to anger. And they forsook the Lord, and served Baal and Ashtaroth.” (Judges, ch. 2, v. 10-13). The Lord in His infinite mercy and compassion many times delivered them and healed their backsliding, but idolatry became their besetting sin and we find them over and over again falling into it, till at last they are found sacrificing their own children. “They did not destroy the nations, concerning whom the Lord commanded them, but mingled among the heathen, and learned their works. And they served their idols which were a snare unto them: Yea, they sacrificed their sons and their daughters unto devils, and shed innocent blood, even the blood of their sons and of their daughters, whom they sacrificed unto the idols of Canaan; and the land was polluted with blood.” (Ps. 106, v. 34-38).
This then is why the Lord delivered His people over to their enemies and had them carried away into captivity. “Wherefore I poured My fury upon them for the blood that they had shed upon the land and for their idols, wherewith they had polluted it. And I scattered them among the heathen, and they were dispersed through the countries according to their own way and according to their own doings I judged them.” (verses 18, 19). As you all know the Babylonish captivity lasted for 70 years, at the end of which they were brought back to their own land again. However, although brought back there was not a general turning to the Lord, nor any great spiritual awakening nor reformation. When the long-looked for Deliverer, the Lord Jesus Christ, God manifest in the flesh, appeared in their midst, they received Him not, as it is written, “He came unto His own and His own received Him not.” This was the great and crowning sin of Israel, that they rejected their own Messiah — that they crucified and slew the One Who came in God’s great name to save. On the day of Pentecost, Peter charged the people of Israel with this crime, “Ye men of Israel, hear these words: Jesus of Nazareth, a man approved of God among you by miracles and wonders and signs, which God did by Him in the midst of you, as ye yourselves also know: Him, being delivered by the determinate counsel and foreknowledge of God, ye have taken, and by wicked hands have crucified and slain.” (Acts, ch. 2, v. 22, 23). They utterly rejected Him and asked that His blood be upon them and their children (Matt. ch. 27, v. 25), and this has been their lot for the past near 2,000 years. In 70 A.D., Jerusalem was destroyed by the Romans and there followed a terrible time of suffering for the Jews. Ever since, they have been without a place to call their own and have been persecuted and driven from land to land and from city to city, oppressed and spoiled evermore, and no one to save them, an astonishment, a proverb and a byword among the nations. (Deut. ch. 28, v. 28, 29, 37). Yet in all this they were kept a distinct people — massacred and oppressed in all ages, yet kept from being lost among the nations. Surely this is one of the great miracles of History.
II. Let us now consider that the Lord Who scattered them among the heathen, promises to gather them to their own land, and why.
As already noticed the restoration to their own land after the captivity in Babylon lasted but for a few centuries. For their rejection of their Messiah they were cast off — but not for ever. Their casting away was blessed in the calling of the Gentile nations. “Through their fall salvation is come unto the Gentiles”. However, they are to be grafted in again. (Rom. ch. 11, v. 23, 24). We have it here also in the 24th verse of this chapter, “For I will take you from among the heathen, and gather you out of all countries, and will bring you into your own land”, and also in Ezek. ch. 11, v. 17, “Therefore say, Thus saith the Lord, God; I will even gather you from the people, and assemble you out of the countries where ye have been scattered, and I will give you the land of Israel.” He knows where they are and how to bring them back to their own land. He is gathering them back even now. Since 1948, when the Republic of Israel was set up, He has been gathering them and causing them to flow back in their thousands from every nation under heaven. The ancient enemies of Israel have possessed the land for many generations, but it is to be taken from them. This land is in a special sense the Lord’s. He calls it there in verse 5. “My land.” He charged Idumea with having appointed His land as their possession. The Lord never gave it to them and although He has permitted them to have it for a time, it is His purpose to give it back again to the people of Israel. “Jerusalem,” said the Saviour, “is to be trodden down of the Gentiles till the times of the Gentiles be fulfilled.” Well, Jerusalem has been trodden down for many a long year but Jerusalem is now in Jewish hands — has been since the Six Days War of 1967, and they will probably never lose possession of it again. We know that there is plenty of trouble out there just now. Most interesting developments are taking place at this very moment in the Land of Israel. The Lord has given them back part of their inheritance already and He will give it all to them, according to His promise. Their enemies will likely do all in their power to regain possession of it but God is to be with the Jews. He has promised to make Jerusalem a burdensome stone for all people, “And in that day will I make Jerusalem a burdensome stone for all people: all that burden themselves with it shall be cut in pieces, though all the earth be gathered together against it.” (Zech. ch. 12, v. 3). And at verse 6 He says, “In that day will I make the governors of Judah like an hearth of fire among wood, and like a torch of fire in a sheaf; and they shall devour all the people round about, on the right hand and on the left.”
Now we have the question, Why is the Lord going to do all this? He is going to do it for His Own Name’s sake — not for anything that is in them. “Therefore say unto the house of Israel, Thus saith the Lord God, I do not this for your sakes, O house of Israel, but for mine holy name’s sake, which ye have profaned among the heathen, whither ye went.” (verse 22). The Lord is going to bring them back and is going to bless them but He will teach them that it is all in sovereign mercy, as He did when He took them from Egypt (Deut. ch. 7, v. 7, 8 and ch. 9, v. 4-6). When that day comes they will confess that nothing belongs to them but shame and confusion of face. (verses 31, 32). The true Israel of God have had to say in every age, “Not by works of righteousness which we have done, but according to His mercy He saved us”, so the Jews will say in connection with their return to the land of their fathers.
III. The third point we purposed to notice was the spiritual blessings promised.
In verses 25-28 we see how the Lord promises to “sprinkle clean water upon you . . . a new heart also will I give you, . . . and I will put My spirit with you and cause you to walk in my statutes, . . . etc. Now what can all this mean but Gospel blessings — the Spirit applying to them the redemption purchased by Christ, by working faith in them. They are not only to be called again to their land but they are to be called effectually by the grace of God and made new creatures in Christ Jesus. They will see the preciousness of Christ and the glory of His cross. The cross is the stumbling block with the Jews and has been the stumbling block all along, but the day is coming when great numbers of them will see the glory of His sufferings, for it is written, “They shall look upon Me Whom they have pierced and they shall mourn for Him, as one mourneth for his only son, and shall be in bitterness for Him, as that is in bitterness for his firstborn.” When the two on the way to Emmaus were joined by the risen Messiah on the evening of the day of the resurrection and had their understanding opened to understand the scriptures, they saw the glory of what took place at Calvary, and their hearts burned within them. The same was true concerning Saul of Tarsus when the Lord called him by His grace. He too saw the glory of the cross — the glory of the suffering Saviour and he had to say, “God forbid that I should glory, save in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, by whom the world is crucified unto me, and I unto the world.” (Gal. ch. 6, v. 14). This, we believe, is what will happen when the Lord will call effectually the Jews to Himself. He will pour His Spirit upon them (Zech. 12 v. 10) and then the great spiritual work spoken of in these verses will be accomplished. Their hearts will be circumcised, as Moses promises in Deut. ch. 30, v. 6, and they will be blessed and made a blessing. “And I will make them and the places round about My hill a blessing, and I will cause the shower to come down in his season; there shall be showers of blessing.” (Ezekiel, ch. 34, v. 26).
IV. In the last place let us notice our duty in relation to all this.
At the 37th verse of this chapter we read, “Thus saith the Lord God, I will yet for this be enquired of by the house of Israel to do it for them.” When the children of Israel were in Egypt the Lord caused them to cry to Him for deliverance, and He heard their cry and came down to deliver them. (Ex. ch. 3, v. 7-9). In Babylon when the end of the 70 years drew nigh there were those among the captives who understood the signs of the times and began to pray for deliverance. Daniel tells us, “I Daniel understood by books the number of the years, whereof the word of the Lord came to Jeremiah the prophet, that he would accomplish seventy years in the desolations of Jerusalem.” Then he says, “And I set my face unto the Lord God, to seek by prayers and supplications, with fasting, and sackcloth, and ashes.” (Dan. ch. 9, v. 2-3). He then goes on to confess his own sins and the sins of his people and to pray for Jerusalem, the Sanctuary, and the people of Israel. Now surely it is the duty of every one who belongs to the true Israel of God, to plead the promises contained in this chapter and elsewhere in the holy scriptures. Since we are met together here this evening in connection with the Induction of Mr Radcliff to work among the Jews as a minister of the Church, surely we should remember him and his work at the throne of grace. Let us plead that his work among his own people be abundantly blessed. May we get grace to plead the promises. “For I know the thoughts that I think towards you, saith the Lord, thoughts of peace and not of evil to give you an expected end. Then shall ye call upon me, and ye shall go and pray unto me, and I will hearken unto you. And ye shall seek me, and find me, when ye shall search for me with all your heart.” (Jer. ch. 29, v. 11-13).