Article for November 26, 2023
Ezekiel 34:20–22 20“Therefore, thus says the Lord God to them: Behold, I, I myself will judge between the fat sheep and the lean sheep. 21Because you push with side and shoulder, and thrust at all the weak with your horns, till you have scattered them abroad, 22I will rescue my flock; they shall no longer be a prey. And I will judge between sheep and sheep.
What will the last Sunday of the age be like? Have you ever wondered? Would that be a day before the second coming of the Lord? Would it be like any other Sunday? Or will it have a tell-tale mysticism about it. What will that last Sunday of the age be like?
There are many if not all who try to push their way through life. We have many wolves among the sheep who even disguise themselves as sheep. Many of the wolves in this world have piercing horns that kill the weak with lies and deceit. The worldly ways are disguised as what is good and the good is hidden from the eyes of the wolves’ prey.
Who judges us in the end will not be the wolves or the world, but “The Almighty God” which the world tries daily to hide from us all. The wolves even try to hide God from themselves in their misguided cunningness. Talk about the blind who think they lead, for a while they will believe their own lies, but in awhile they will see the truth. The Truth is coming, and the Truth will set us, the ones being preyed upon, free.
Ezekiel 34:23–24 23And I will set up over them one shepherd, my servant David, and he shall feed them: he shall feed them and be their shepherd. 24And I, the Lord, will be their God, and my servant David shall be prince among them. I am the Lord; I have spoken.”
David, the son of David, the true heir of the throne of God, He is coming in these last days. Our shepherd is called many things. Our shepherd comes to call His own, His sheep whom He knows, and He knows where all His sheep are. We have a God who provides for our needs of body, yes. More importantly we have a God who provides the food we need to nourish our spirit, too.
God provides food for the spirit every day, yet we do not eat of that food every day. Many are still trapped by the fruit of the forbidden tree trying to get an acquired taste of sin. Instead, we should go to the sweet taste of life, eternal life which the knowledge of it is fed to us through the word of our God.
God puts the good food out for us, but there are many who want you to believe God’s food is not what you want and that the food of sin tastes better. God’s food leads us to the truth that sets us free and takes us into everlasting life. Sin’s food takes us to death and eternal darkness. We are indeed all sinners, and sinners are who Jesus Christ came to save. But like the women who came with no oil in their lamps not all will pass into the light of our Lord Jesus Christ.
Ezekiel 34:11–12 11“For thus says the Lord God: Behold, I, I myself will search for my sheep and will seek them out. 12As a shepherd seeks out his flock when he is among his sheep that have been scattered, so will I seek out my sheep, and I will rescue them from all places where they have been scattered on a day of clouds and thick darkness.
Our days are met with darkness and many clouds that hover over us. Maybe that is why they call the place to store your files the “cloud”, as clouds store water for rain, the “cloud” helps you remember your past through many files and folders. Either way we do remember our past and the dark clouds that follow us all our life.
Clouds eventually rain down on what has been stored, and we get wet. But there is a shepherd that knows us and because He knows who we are, He comes to save us from that looming darkness and those hovering clouds. The world scatters us and puts roadblocks between us, but Jesus Christ our shepherd knows where we are and comes to rescue us. Jesus rescues us from a world that tries to hide us because this world continues lives in darkness and under the darkened clouds.
Our journey may seem dreary with thick fog and pouring rain accompanied by the rumbling thunder and only lit by an occasional lightning strike. But the light we see off in the distance is the light that emanates from our Savior Shepherd. Jesus Christ will come on that last day to save all. We who are His sheep He knows us and His sheep know Him.
Ezekiel 34:13–14a 13And I will bring them out from the peoples and gather them from the countries, and will bring them into their own land. And I will feed them on the mountains of Israel, by the ravines, and in all the inhabited places of the country. 14I will feed them with good pasture, and on the mountain heights of Israel shall be their grazing land.
Saved by the death and resurrection of our Lord Jesus. We will see the cross He died on, the grave He slept in, the hell He descended to and was resurrected from. And we will see the resurrected Lord standing in the light that comes from Him. With new hearing we will here as trumpets sound, and drums thunder, “I, I myself” have brought you out of the great tribulation and made you a multitude of believers. And we will without thinking, bow to the ground in gratefulness and thankfulness and worship the lamb who was slain for our prosperity because we have a God of forgiveness, grace, mercy, and Love. Amen.
Ezekiel 34:14b–16 14bThere they shall lie down in good grazing land, and on rich pasture they shall feed on the mountains of Israel. 15I myself will be the shepherd of my sheep, and I myself will make them lie down, declares the Lord God. 16I will seek the lost, and I will bring back the strayed, and I will bind up the injured, and I will strengthen the weak, and the fat and the strong I will destroy. I will feed them in justice. . . .
What more can be said on that great and last day of the age. For we will live now and forever in a land of bread and honey and eating from the fruit of the tree of life. What more can be said but to give God the glory for the eternity He opened up to us and prepared it for our joy and His joy. Amen, amen, amen.
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