1. Last Sunday evening we looked at the wall of protection or hope that the people of Israel were building around them. They were being besieged by the Babylonians and they needed protection.
2. In those days cities had walls around them to protect them from their enemies. And if the enemy could weaken or breach the wall, they would have a much better chance of victory.
3. Last week we looked at a deeper meaning of the symbolism of the wall. In Isaiah 26:1, the wall is a symbol of salvation.
Isa 26:1 In that day this song will be sung in the land of Judah: We have a strong city; God makes salvation its walls and ramparts.
In Zech 2, a wall is seen as of the protection of God. In a vision of the New Jerusalem we read:
Zech2: 4b-5 "Jerusalem will be a city without walls because of the great number of men and livestock in it. And I myself will be a wall of fire around it,’ declares the LORD, ’and I will be its glory within.
4. As we have seen before, especially in our study of Revelation, the city of Jerusalem is symbolic of the people of God. The New Jerusalem will be the heavenly city. The place were God will dwell forever with His people. A place where God lived. And so as we said, it represented His protection and His favour.
5. But the people, as we saw, created their own wall of protection. And by not relying on God they were in effect, causing God to put a wall between Him and them. We saw how they had relied not on God, but on idols, on allies with other nations and on their own corruption and sin.
6. God warned the people that He would destroy their wall. This meant the wall of Jerusalem which the Babylonians would destroy. But it also meant the things that their wall was built on or based.
7. We also considered now in the world today, in the church and in the lives of believers we also build walls. How we seek security and protection from false idols or gods, from allying ourselves with the world and in sinful practices. God will destroy these walls as well. The things of the world will end one day. But not only will these walls be destroyed but also those who built them, who rely on them and especially those who whitewash them or say that all is well when it is not.
8. And that, now as then, is most destructively done, by those who claim to be prophets or people who are called to represent God. That means ministers but it also means all of who confess Jesus Christ as Lord.
9. This evening we consider how we are to respond to the building of these walls. Walls that in the end will crumble, walls that will afford no protection but lead to the downfall of many and walls that separate many from God (iron pan in Ezekiel 2).
10. In our passage today God makes it clear how sinful Israel has become
Ezek 22:4 you have become guilty because of the blood you have shed and have become defiled by the idols you have made.
Ezek 22:7 In you they have treated father and mother with contempt; in you they have oppressed the alien and mistreated the fatherless and the widow.
Ezek 22:8 You have despised my holy things and desecrated my Sabbaths.
Ezek 22:12 In you men accept bribes to shed blood; you take usury and excessive interest and make unjust gain from your neighbors by extortion. And you have forgotten me, declares the Sovereign LORD.
11. God then lets them know how great His wrath is and how strongly He will judge them. He will disperse them among the nations. Hear the anger in Godís voice as He says:
Ezek 22:20-23 As men gather silver, copper, iron, lead and tin into a furnace to melt it with a fiery blast, so will I gather you in my anger and my wrath and put you inside the city and melt you. I will gather you and I will blow on you with my fiery wrath, and you will be melted inside her. As silver is melted in a furnace, so you will be melted inside her, and you will know that I the LORD have poured out my wrath upon you.’"
12. God then declares how defiled and guilty they are - the situation affected all the levels of leadership and throughout all of society.
Ezek 22:25 There is a conspiracy of her princes within her like a roaring lion tearing its prey; they devour people, take treasures and precious things and make many widows within her.
Ezek 22:26 Her priests do violence to my law and profane my holy things; they do not distinguish between the holy and the common; they teach that there is no difference between the unclean and the clean; and they shut their eyes to the keeping of my Sabbaths, so that I am profaned among them.
Ezek 22:27 Her officials within her are like wolves tearing their prey; they shed blood and kill people to make unjust gain.
Ezek 22:28 Her prophets whitewash these deeds for them by false visions and lying divinations. They say, ’This is what the Sovereign LORD says’--when the LORD has not spoken.
Ezek 22:29 The people of the land practice extortion and commit robbery; they oppress the poor and needy and mistreat the alien, denying them justice.
13. We have talked about this before, including last week. But we can see how in many ways things are the same in our society today and this includes the church. And I believe God is ready to destroy the nations and the false church today. In fact, in Revelation we read how He will do just that.
14. But today, as often in the past, He withholds His judgment in its fullest, because He still gives us the opportunity to repent. God did not want to destroy Jerusalem. He takes no pleasure in destruction of the wicked
Ezek 18:23 Do I take any pleasure in the death of the wicked? declares the Sovereign LORD. Rather, am I not pleased when they turn from their ways and live?
God wanted them to repent. He wants people to do the same today. And so we read in vs. 30 that God looked for a man among them who would build up the wall and stand before me in the gap so He would not have to destroy Jerusalem. Someone who would build up the wall. Someone who would build up a true wall of trusting in God. A wall that was built of the right material.
15. That meant someone who, unlike the false prophets, would fix the spiritual wall by pointing out what was wrong with it. Instead of plastering it over like the false prophets did. To bring the people back to the truth. To lead them to repentance.
16. That person would also stand in the gap. The gaps are the places where the wall is the weakest. Where there may even be a break in the wall. And for the people their gap was in their relationship with God. They had been unfaithful and disobeyed Him. And He in turn was about to destroy them.
17. And so to stand in the gap was to stand as a mediator between God and the people. That is why God says that person would stand before Him on behalf of the people. Someone who would intercede on their behalf. Just as Moses prayed for the people after they had sinned with the golden calf. God was about to destroy them.
Psa 106:23 So he said he would destroy them-- had not Moses, his chosen one, stood in the breach before him to keep his wrath from destroying them.
And of course, in John 17, Jesus prayed for the believers and those who would believe through them.
18. God looked for a man who would build the wall and stand in the gap. The man was to be found from among the people of God, a man among them. The sad news is that there was none to be found. Ezekiel was in Babylon and Jeremiah was in prison.
19. It is not easy to be such a man. Someone to speak the truth of Godís word to the people and to intercede on their behalf. Someone said that to be a man in the gap, we need four things:
a. Conviction - that the word of God is true and that Godís word is the only way to save mankind.
b. Compassion - willing to suffer abuse and rejection. Because they care - even for those who would persecute them. Just as Christ had compassion on those who crucified Him.
c. Courage - the strength of heart to stand up. To not fear man because we know that man cannot kill our soul.
d. Consecration. To be holy so that we are able to stand before God.
20. Because there was no one God said that He would pour out His wrath on them and consume them with His fiery anger.
21. Today we need men and women who are willing to stand in the gap. Those who are willing, no, who are compelled to pray for this world and to speak out against the evils of our time. We can so easily condemn the lost and the wicked, but we have a task to seek to restore them.
22. Do we pray for the lost? We may pray that evil will be destroyed but do we pray that those who commit evil will be saved? Do we have the conviction, the compassion, the courage and the consecration (consecrated life set apart for God)?
23. We may think "what difference can I make?" The word says that the prayers of a righteous man avails much. One of us can make a difference. Because one with God is a majority
24. Thinks of some who made a difference:
a. In New York in the mid 19th century there was a man named Jeremiah Calvin Lamphier. He decided to have a prayer meeting for businessmen on the 23 September 1857. The meeting was to last one hour. For the first half hour he prayed alone. In the next half hour he was joined by another five people. The next week there were 20 and the following week 40. Then they decided to have a daily prayer meeting. That soon went to a hundred, and after three months to a 1000. This was the beginning of a great revival in America in which 2 million were saved. It began with intercession of one man.
b. Another example of this comes from Roman times. The favourite sport in Rome was the gladiator fights in the arena. One day a monk visited Rome and joined the crowds streaming to the Colosseum, not realized why they were going there. When he saw these men fighting in their gruesome battles he was horrified and called out to them to stop fighting, but his voice was lost in the shouting of the crowd. So jumped out and stood between the two gladiators and called on them, in God’s name, to stop fighting. The crowd went wild with anger that this man should disrupt the games - they rushed out and beat him to death. But then they realized what they had done and were shocked and ashamed. It was the last gladiator fight in the Colosseum..
25. We are entering a time when we will need to choose. The walls that are built today for protection are walls that will fall. For only God can be our wall, our salvation. As a church, as individuals let us daily pray that people will be aware that there is one God and one God alone. That it is wrong to have any other gods before Him. And that they may place their trust in Him.
26. May your church Lord be purged of false prophets. Of those who lead people to their destruction. And may we more than ever proclaim the truth. For the sake of those who are lost and for the sake of your kingdom.
