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Good weekend to you my ‘Walking with Jesus’ friends, as we begin a new month together, February 2025!!
We are thirty days into the new year of 2025 and 12 days or so into the new US leadership, and I wonder what you have seen as you’ve watched the headlines all around the world in these tumultuous days? Fires in California / hostage negotiations in Israel / installation of a new President and many new key leaders in Washington, oh my it’s been a busy time! Here’s an important question: Do you see God at work in our world over these past days? If so, what convinces you it was God and not simply politics or strong winds fanning California flames or something else? What helps you discern when and how God is directly involved in human events, even your own life? That key question was front and center for many people 2600 years ago as it is today!
Come again with me back to the Middle East in the year 592bc and specifically to the grand city of Babylon. Today the ruins of ancient Babylon are located adjacent to the city of Hillah, 62 miles south of Bagdad, Iraq. Some of the ruins of this great ancient city of Babylon have been reconstructed giving us a glimpse, in 2025, of the grandeur and magnificence of what it was like in the days of King Nebuchadnezzar.
You’ll recall Daniel, the young Jewish captive, had been in Babylon since 605bc, but soon after his arrival, through the miracle of God giving Daniel the interpretation of the King’s dream, Daviel was elevated to a high position of influence as advisor to King Nebuchadnezzar, the most powerful man in the world. (Daniel 2:46-49)
Yesterday we met Ezekiel, also a Jewish captive who had been brought, along with 10,000 other Jewish captives, from Jerusalem to mighty Babylon in 597bc. As we saw in Ezekiel 1 yesterday, five years later in 592bc, Ezekiel suddenly had a life changing encounter with Almighty God through a multisensory vision. (Ezekiel 1) Today, let’s join Ezekiel in that remarkable vision experience in Babylon and seek to understand what God was saying to His people then. Is God saying much the same to us today in 2025?
While very different in many ways, our world and our great cities and powerful people today are so very similar to Babylon in 592bc, as is evidenced by the headlines you and I have seen over the past 30 days, no matter where you live in the world.
For Ezekiel and many thousands of captive Jews in exile in Babylon, the grandeur of their beloved Jerusalem was dwarfed by the size and majesty of the great city of Babylon. The power of the little army serving the King of Israel was a small fraction of the ferocity and enormity of the huge, well-equipped army of the Babylonians which had conquered many nations and great cities including Jerusalem, in their rise to dominance over the entire known world.
The beauty of Jerusalem buildings, palaces and even the great Temple in Jerusalem were overshadowed by the opulence and majesty of great buildings and temples in Babylon. As a result Ezekiel and his fellow Jewish captives naturally felt insignificant and perhaps even shamed by their captors the mighty Babylonians.
Oh yes, it was true God had warned His people, through Jeremiah and other prophets, that if His people did not repent and turn from their wicked ways, God would allow enemies to overrun Jerusalem and take them as captives, yet generation after generation of Jerusalem Jews disregarded God’s warnings. Pause for a few seconds and reflect.
Do you sometimes feel overwhelmed in our world today? Overwhelmed by technology you don’t understand? Overwhelmed by rich, famous and very powerful people who seem to have such authority to shake up our world? Overwhelmed by feeling lost in the crowds of your city and mine? In this sense of being overwhelmed, do you feel insignificant and maybe even helpless or hopeless?
That is exactly what both Jeremiah and the remnant of broken people who remained in Jerusalem felt. It’s also what Ezekiel and the thousands of Jewish captives scattered across the Middle East felt. The God of Israel seemed so far away and so disappointed with His people.
But God had not given up on His people Israel or His plan for our world, just as He has not given up today! While in 592bc there were far more Israelites living as dispersed, conquered peoples in many other nations of Central Asia than were actually living in the land of Israel, God still deeply loved His people Israel and God had plans to restore them as a nation of blessed people to a place of significant influence in our world. But in their captivity, they could not see anything but despair and hopelessness. And so, God spoke! God spoke to captive Ezekiel, with an overwhelming vision that Ezekiel records for us in the first chapter of his book.
Visions throughout the Bible are not dreams. Dreams occur when a person is asleep. Visions occur when a person is wide awake yet is overwhelmed by the Holy Spirit of God and the person both sees images which others standing beside them may not see and they hear sounds, including the voice of God, which those people with them may not hear. Visions is one of many ways God communicates powerful messages to people He knows are ready to receive and understand such miraculous experiences.
For Ezekiel, his vision began as a far in the distance “windstorm coming out of the north – an immense cloud with flashing lightning and surrounded by brilliant light. The center of the fire looked like glowing metal, and in the fire was what looked like four living creatures.” (Ezek. 1:4,5) Pause. From earliest times God often uses fire and great storm clouds to manifest His glorious, magnificent, holy presence. Remember Moses and the people encountering God at Mount Sinai? (Exodus 19:16-19)
Ezekiel knew he was having a visionary encounter with Almighty, Holy God and after some time Ezekiel fell on his face in humility and worship, overwhelmed by the grandeur and majesty of God as revealed in this vision.
I’m going to suggest you read all of Ezekiel 1 this weekend my friends and perhaps listen to it via the audio drama Bible link available to you at the bottom of this page. The primary purpose of this overwhelming vision from God was simply that… for Ezekiel to be overwhelmed by the awesome, majesty, glory and power of Almighty God and the magnificent angels who are around God in His holy presence.
God wanted Ezekiel and His people in captivity to understand that God was fully aware of everything happening on earth including their captivity. Then and now God was and is Almighty and Sovereign over the entire universe! Everything and anything, anywhere at any time, then or now, is all happening under God’s watchful eye and sovereign authority! God wanted His people and Ezekiel then, and you and me today, to know that no powerful or wealthy or significant human being, not even a vast army can do anything to thwart God’s purposes! (Ps. 33:11)
Now friends, embrace that powerful truth from God as you watch the turmoil of our world! I don’t know what worship music Ezekiel knew but here’s a powerful worship song by a group of worshipers overwhelmed with God’s majesty! Worship Almighty, Glorious Jesus with this powerful song; and on Monday we’ll seek to understand the meaning of Ezekiel’s vision.
Today’s Scripture: Ezekiel 1.
Choose below to read or listen.
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Bible images provided with attribution to www.LumoProject.com.
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Pastor Doug Anderson
“Let us run with perseverance the race marked out for us, with our eyes fixed on Jesus…” (Heb. 12:1,2)
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