2. THE VIEW GIVEN TO EZEKIEL OF “THE LIKENESS OF THE GLORY OF THE LORD” (Chap. Ezekiel 1:4-28)
EXEGETICAL NOTES.— Ezekiel 1:4. The storm-cloud. “A whirlwind,” a tempest such as Job perceived (Ezekiel 38:1), or like that which Jonah encountered (Ezekiel 2:10), “came out of the north,” the region from which the Chaldean forces proceeded, and, in general, to the Jews, “the region pregnant with destiny” (Hengst.). “A great cloud, and a fire infolding itself.” Fire in volumes was mixed up with the cloud, and (Exodus 9:24) flashed hither and thither, circling round. “A brightness was about it,” the cloud, “and out of the midst thereof,” of the fire, “as the colour of amber,” or as the eye of chasmal. The appearance was such as gave tints, shone, burned like chasmal. The mild colour of amber does not seem to express the meaning of this uncertain word. There was a look like that of are glowing from “the midst of the fire.”
Ezekiel 1:5-14. The living creatures. Ezekiel 1:5. Out of this same fire came “the likeness of four living creatures,” representing all beings with life (Revelation 4:6); and, as the best representative of vital energies, each of the four had “the likeness of a man.” But not entirely so. Ezekiel 1:7. “Their feet,” including knee and thigh, were of the nature of “a straight foot;” they were upright, not bent, and that part which was next the ground was “like the sole of a calf’s foot, and they sparkled like the colour,” the eye, the gleam “of burnished,” or shining, “brass” (Revelation 1:15). Their wings proceeded from their shoulders, for (Ezekiel 1:8) “they had the hands of a man under their wings,” one hand under each of “their four sides.” Ezekiel 1:9. Two “wings” of each “were joined” to a wing of each of its nearest neighbours, and as each had four faces, one of which looked towards a distinct quarter of the sky, “they turned not when they went.” So “they went every one straight forward” in the direction in which any one of their faces looked, and as a conjunct whole. Ezekiel 1:10. Of the four faces, one was like that of “a man,” another like that of “a lion,” another of “an ox.” and the fourth of “an eagle.” Ezekiel 1:11. “Thus were their faces, and their wings were stretched upward;” rather, and their faces and their wings were separated from above, i.e., it could be seen that their heads were distinct and their wings were distinct, though two wings of one were in contact with two wings of others. Ezekiel 1:12. They were moved by an irresistible impulse, and, separated as they were from one another, yet they were animated by one life-breath. “Whither the spirit was to go, they went.” Ezekiel 1:13. “Their appearance was like burning coals of fire, like the appearance of lamps,” torches; “it,” the fire, was separate from, and “went up and down among the living creatures.” Ezekiel 1:14. The creatures had a motion which made the impression as of a “flash” of a meteor, or “the zigzag course” of “lightning.”*
Ezekiel 1:15-21. The wheels. Ezekiel 1:15. “Behold one wheel upon the earth by the living creatures, with his four faces.” Ezekiel saw wheels upon the ground, one in close proximity to each of the four creatures, and lower than they. Ezekiel 1:16. “They four” wheels “had one likeness;” each consisted of two wheels really, “as it were a wheel in the middle of a wheel,” set in the other at right angles. Ezekiel 1:17. “They went upon their four sides;” they could go in any direction without turning round. Ezekiel 1:18. “As for their rings,” circumference or felloes, “they were so high that they were dreadful,” they had both height and terribleness, and “full of eyes round about.” Ezekiel 1:20. “The spirit of the living creature was in the wheels.” The same energy which actuated the former actuated the latter also, and they were one in standing, going, or rising upwards.
Ezekiel 1:22-28. The throned one. Ezekiel 1:22. Above “the heads of the living creatures” Ezekiel saw an expanse extended, having a colour like that “of the terrible crystal,” exciting fear by its purity and splendour. Ezekiel 1:23. “Under the firmament,” or expanse, which therefore came between the throne and the living creatures, “were their wings straight, the one toward the other,” joined to one another, as Ezekiel 1:11, “and every one had two which covered;” there was a wing for each side of “their bodies.” Ezekiel 1:24. When the living creatures were in movement “the noise of their wings was like … the voice of speech,” rather, “the noise of tumult, as the noise of an host.” The sounds were heard only when they were in motion, for “when they stood they let down their wings.” Ezekiel 1:25. Their movement or rest was not self-directed, but was instigated or checked by “a voice from the firmament that was over their heads,” from Him who was on the throne, since, Ezekiel 1:26, “above the firmament was the likeness of a throne, as the appearance of” the pale-blue “sapphire stone, and upon the likeness of the throne,” not the distinguishable form of a man, but “the likeness as the appearance of a man.” “No man hath seen God at anytime.” This manifestation had three aspects— Ezekiel 1:27.
(1.) Over the dim form was shed shining light like to glowing ore, and the same as in Ezekiel 1:4, which radiated “from the appearance of his loins even upward” (chap. Ezekiel 8:2).
(2.) Upon the lower part, “from the appearance of his loins even downward was as it were the appearance of fire.”
(3.) All round was a shining light (Ezekiel 1:28), “as the appearance of the bow that is in the cloud in the day of rain.” Those three aspects were united to frame “the appearance of the likeness of the glory of the Lord.” The visions of God overpowered Ezekiel, “I fell upon my face” (Revelation 1:17).
The details of this wondrous vision may be summarised. A furious storm from the north is seen driving a vast cloud, pervaded and glowing with restless fires, and surrounded with radiance. From this fiery cloud four living beings appear, whose general aspect was that of man. Each had four different faces and four wings, and two of the wings were stretched out in juxtaposition to the wings of others. One spiritual energy stirred in the living creatures, and under its impulse they moved like meteors shooting across the field of vision and shining with the brightness of fire. By the side of each creature was a gigantic double wheel, not needing to turn when it changed from one direction to another. Eyes were set round the outer rims, and, possessed by the same energy as the living creatures, the wheels made all movements perfectly simultaneous with theirs. Above all was an expanse of awful pureness, and on which was the likeness of an azure throne. Some one in the figure of a man was seated on this throne—the upper half of his body shining like glowing metal, the lower half like fire, while, girdling round the throne, the hues of a bright rainbow were displayed. A voice proceeded from this throne-crowned expanse, at the sound of which the living creatures let down their wings in lowly reverence and silence. Ezekiel also heard himself addressed by an unseen speaker.
The appearances which accompanied the designation of Ezekiel, and also the repetition of their prominent aspects at other turns of his service, indicate the fact of a special meaning adhering to them in view of what was appointed him.*
1. The storm, the cloud, the fire, signify the wrath of God and the sufferings which may proceed therefrom. “The Lord hath His way in the whirlwind and in the storm, and the clouds are the dust of His feet” (Nahum 1:3). Of Israel it is said, “The Lord thy God is a consuming fire, even a jealous God” (Deuteronomy 4:24). Ezekiel is to prepare himself to carry a message of judgment and woe to his people; he is to be invested with authority and then to inspire them with terror. But not unmitigated. “The brightness round about,” which Ezekiel 1:27-28 signify to be that of the rainbow, warrants the belief that pity and grace will surround all inflictions. The false prophets spoke of deliverance without punishment and without repentance; Ezekiel has to bear down all such fancies, and proclaim that there will be scathing trials, but afterwards a new heart and the outpoured Spirit.
2. The cherubim. In chap. Ezekiel 10:20, Ezekiel intimates that the living creature which he saw by the Chebar he was led to recognise as the cherubims. An important part is assigned to them in the Bible. They were placed at the east of the garden of Eden; they stood over the Ark of the Covenant in Tabernacle and Temple. In each case they signified the divine presence. Hence the familiar expressions, “He dwelleth between the cherubims,” “He sitteth between the cherubims.” Their outstretched wings form “the chariot of the cherubims.” While it is also said, “He rode upon a cherub,” as a token that He rules all movements among the forces of nature. It was an obvious reflection of cherubic forms which John saw, in his Revelation, “in the midst of the throne.” What did they signify? In all cases they signify that God is present, and belong to His manifestation in living, organised creatures, in all quarters of the world. It is to be noted that the faces of a man, a lion, an ox, and an eagle on each are emblematical of the fulness and power of life. The fact that they were, in Ezekiel, double in number and more complex in form than those found in Tabernacle or Temple, is a fact which goes to prove that they were not real beings, not even angelic, but symbolical, and they “at one and the same time proclaim and veil His presence. When He is honoured as He who is enthroned above the cherubim, He is acknowledged as the God who rules the world on all sides, in power, wisdom, and omniscience.” They represent not God Himself, except as He is absolute Life, working in living creatures and moving them to the ends which He prescribes. In accordance with those ends, the cherubims had the appearance which bright burning coals of fire have, yet the fire was separate from them. Thus was indicated that all living creatures could be made to carry out the righteous judgment of God with ominous rapidity. So Ezekiel was prepared to testify that all hopes of earthly help which Israel might cherish would be speedily falsified.
3. The wheels. In the Buddhist, and partially in the Hindu religion, a wheel “is the symbol of supreme power in the hands of certain monarchs, who are held to have exercised universal dominion, and who are, for this reason, termed turners of the wheel.” A similar idea is conveyed here. The wheels represent the forces of nature as distinct from, but in working harmony with, living beings. This distinction appears from chap. Ezekiel 10:13, where the right interpretation seems to be that the wheels were called Galgal, “whirlwind;” and from chap. Ezekiel 10:6, where fire was taken from between them. Those natural energies revolve, along with the cherubim, under obedience to one and the same in working impulse. They are used when the Spirit will, and go to any quarter of the heaven that He wills. One wheel is within another; changes are complicated, and not in one direction only. They are full of eyes: “the symbol of intelligent life; the living Spirit’s most peculiar organ and index.” “Space is everywhere equally present to them.” They do not move blindly; they can perceive that which is opposed to the interests of God in any quarter; they can follow up all traces of His enemies, and carry His terrors wherever they should strike. Ezekiel must expect to speak of various trials hanging over all classes in Israel, and certainty in their infliction.
4. The appearance of a throned man.
“Whose faith has centre everywhere,
Nor cares to fix itself to form.”
This portion of the vision is seen upon a firmament which presents “visible poetry, gloriously embossed, and whose psalms are writ in the rhythm of motion.” It intimates that “the heavens do rule,” that all forms of animate and inanimate existence are under the will of the God of glory.* Besides, He is in a human form, which cannot be adequately seen, while the appearance of brightness and fire, and a rainbow, indicates the holiness and righteousness and grace which make a glorious unity in Him, and are possessed in absolute perfection—a type of the glory and grace of Him who was made flesh and dwelt among us. “God is the unrepresentable One. He has no similitude; and yet, without any misgiving or sense of inconsistency, there are ascribed to Him acts and appearances which, without the conceptive or imaging faculty, can have for us neither force nor meaning” (Lewis). The mighty voice and the movements with the cherubims point to the truth that He punishes His enemies and comforts His friends. Thus, sitting above the cherubims, He does the same as in the Temple, yet with differences. He was about to work in new methods, and would make known to exiled Israel, through Ezekiel, that if their covenant was to “vanish away,” He would not go. He would rule the heathen as well as His chosen seed, and one day evoke from all quarters the glorious cry, “Hallelujah! for the Lord God omnipotent reigneth!”
“One God, one law, one element,
And one far-off Divine event,
To which the whole creation moves.”
—Tennyson.
“There was nothing accidental or capricious about this vision; all was wisely adjusted and arranged, so as to convey beforehand suitable impressions of that work of God to which Ezekiel was now called to devote himself. It was substantially an exhibition by means of emblematical appearances and actions, of the same views of the Divine character and government, which were to be unfolded in the successive communications made by Ezekiel to the covenant-people” (Fairbairn).
HOMILETICS
(1.) THE VISION IS SUGGESTIVE REGARDING THE GOVERNMENT OF GOD
I. As to its resources.
1. They are manifold. Wind and fire, thunder and lightning, the wisdom of man, brute force, patient labour, swift movements are significant portions of the materials which He can gather to execute His purposes. Men live in perpetual contact with forces which may affect their organs of sight, hearing, taste, touch, and which can be marshalled in any number, in any strength, and at any moment. We see wrongly if we do not see that the uniform of God’s servants is worn by all animate and inanimate creatures.
2. They are mutable. They are restrained and again in motion, now in the darkness and then in the light, here as a glow and there as a meteoric flash, acting inertly at one time and intensely after that. Changes continually come up. How remarkable are the vicissitudes in nations, churches, families. We are settled in nothing—in nothing but in God.
3. They are inscrutable. “We are but of yesterday and know nothing.” We see little else than an item on the outside of a few of His resources. “His judgments are a great deep.” “His providence walks and works, darkly, deeply, changeably, wheels about so that mortals cannot tell what conclusions to make” as to all the causes which bring about changes, or as to all the consequences which shall follow. “His ways are high above, out of our sight,” with nations, councils, churches, individuals—in panics, wars, demoralisations.
4. They are subordinated to one pervading impulse. Living or non-living, one and the same mighty Spirit works in all. The Spirit which brooded over a chaotic creation “renews the face of the earth” year by year. The Spirit of understanding and of love is the “Spirit of judgment and of burning.” He divides to each thing severally as He will; but there is no division in their camp. They do not fall out by the way. They work together to fulfil His word. There is no crookedness in their goings when He commands to go “straight forward.” They run very swiftly in accordance with the might by which He energises them. No bullet goes so fairly or rapidly to the target as do the manifold resources of God when stirred by the Spirit of life. Why should men resist Him? Why do they yield to a spirit of error, of lying, and of whoredoms, except on the ground that they rebel and vex the Holy Spirit? When will that kingdom which is righteousness, peace, joy in the Holy Ghost, be permanent on earth? But whatever discord may be introduced by men, the Spirit will not be baulked in His aims. “He maketh the wrath of man to praise Him,” and He will avenge the dishonour done to His righteousness and grace by means of the pliant resources at His command. They do not look back, that would have denoted unwillingness; nor turn aside, that would have intimated self-will; nor suspend their movements before their course is completed, that would have spoken of weariness. So should men follow obediently, unswervingly, persistently Him who guides wanderers into the way of life, and sustains them therein.
5. They inflict chastisement. Gales, fire, lightning, are disastrous in various ways to men. The doors of Lebanon open that the fire may devour its cedars. Snares, fire and brimstone, and an horrible tempest rain upon the wicked, and Ezekiel saw such agencies in action as ominous of calamities which he was to declare would befall his people. Thus, above Nebuchadnezzar and his desolating army; above losses, pains, bereavements; above wars, depression of trade, lowering of health, we must observe the signs of the Lord condemning untruthfulness, unrighteousness, formality, pride, selfishness. “Who can stand before Him when once He is angry?” Is there not a warning to “cease to do evil, to learn to do well”?
6. They may be brought from any quarter. Out of the north, as the Assyrians; out of the east, as the plague of locusts in Egypt; out of the north-east, as the Euroclydon in Paul’s sea passage to Rome, God’s resources can be drawn. Men may boast of their soldiery or navy, of their preparedness for any war, of their civilization or religiousness, of their worship or their benevolence; but they lay themselves open to the menacing word, “I the Lord do blow upon it.” In front, in flank, or in rear assailants may fall upon them. “Political changes and revolutions are, after all, only the moving of the shadow on the earthly dial-plate, that marks the mightier motions going forward in the heavens.”—Moore.
7. They radiate with mercy. His resources are not only for punishment. They are meant to show to men their evil and their need of repentance; to show that God is “not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance.” Judgment is His “strange act.” He wants to purify the world, though the process be slow, just as He is separating the dross from the heart of every believer in His Son. Even if a deluge of wrath is sent forth in order to sweep off evil habits from a people, after the floods have lifted up their voice the rainbow will appear. The covenant of the Lord is sure in faithfulness and mercy. “Once in the end of the world hath He appeared to put away sin by the sacrifice of Himself.” “God was in Christ reconciling the world unto Himself.”
II. As to the representation of the divine.
1. It is supreme. All things are under His feet. He is a Prince upon His throne. Nothing stirs or rests, nothing develops or degenerates, nothing pains or soothes apart from His control. It is not a mechanical force which operates the changes of all creatures. It is ONE who possesses power, wisdom, righteousness, love—“who does His will among the armies of heaven and the inhabitants of this earth.” What can stand if He will overthrow? Who hinder if He will open the gates to anxiety, sorrow, shame, death?
2. It is closely allied to man. Ezekiel saw “the likeness of the appearance of a man.” We must not say that God is corporeal and has the figure of a man, but we can say that He has some striking affinities with human nature—“For we are also His offspring”—and these foreshadow the mystery to be presented in the end of the world, and in which Paul grandly exults. God “was manifest in the flesh.” Therefore was it possible for the Son of God to pray “That they all may be one; as Thou, Father, art in me and I in Thee, that they also may be one in us.”
3. It is beyond our knowledge. “He dwells in the light which no man hath seen or can see.” He does condescend to our faculties, and by means of the hieroglyphics of undefined forms, of clouds, fire, living beings, revolutions, He shows us what His power and resources are. Our thoughts of Him suggest more riddles than they can solve. No research can define Him. There is a glory excelling that which men have beheld. He has never appeared as He really exists; but “He has so appeared as to leave no doubt on the minds of His servants as to their knowing that they have seen God.” If in certain aspects He is “unknowable,” yet all doubts as to His character pass away when Jesus reveals Him. “He that hath seen me hath seen the Father.”
III. As to the preparation of a human servant.
1. Reverence. A deep feeling pervades Ezekiel of the holy supremacy of God. He who is glorious produces another state of mind than that which springs from a gratified curiosity or an increased knowledge, and the man who is not “moved with fear” before the manifested will of the Almighty is a man who will never serve Him aright. The sight of Christ Jesus, the only-begotten of the Father, will lay us at His feet, utterly self-emptied by a sense of His spotless glory and our unworthiness, and will be a prelude to His touch and restoration.
2. Weakness. Ezekiel cannot act of himself in co-operation with this all-ruling God. He has no strength to carry out such arduous duties as are justly required. But this weakness is his stepping-stone to light and power. When he is weak then is he strong, for God will bestow sufficient grace. Trust in self is gone that God may work. Wisdom, energy, faithfulness not his own are open to him.
3. Called. Ezekiel is thrilled by the voice which addresses him. He could not serve at all till that call of God was heard. Men cannot act for His kingdom by their own impulses and preparations. It is not colleges or ordination by man which make fit, but, hearing the voice of the Lord within, they can take up any service pointed out, in face of their other occupations, of fears, of reluctance. Before Him all events, however solemn, all duties, however untried, become dwarfed and feasible. “In Christ strengthening me I can do all things.” Between His voice and yours let no other voice come. You will know the mark to aim at, and reach “the prize of the high calling of God in Christ Jesus.” If we teach or preach about His kingdom without knowing we are warranted by Him, it is rather sin than service. His must be the impulse and sustainment.
4. Susceptible. Ezekiel hears; for it is little matter to have the call of God if we have not ears to hear. We must let that mind be in us which will desire to recognise and apprehend whatever He will say to us. “If men did consult with Christ, and do all upon His warrants, they should never miscarry in their ways, but proceed farther in the paths of godliness in a few weeks than they did before in many years.”—Greenhill. “Though you have no visions of God, unwavering fealty to His law will secure that He will guide you by His counsel, and afterwards receive you to glory.”—Goulty. When the suggestions and motions of God’s Spirit come on a receptive heart, they subdue carnal reasonings, stubbornness of will, all shifts and pretences, and frame “a vessel unto honour, sanctified and meet for the Master’s use,” such as Ezekiel became.
“It is of much concernment for ministers to see that they have a good and clear call to their ministry. If they can clear it up that God hath sent them, they may expect His assistance, His blessing, His protection, and success in their labours. However things prove, this will be their comfort in the midst of opposition, reproach, persecution, hazard of liberty and lives; I was called of God, I am in His work, in His way, He brought me into His vineyard, He will stand by me, I will go on, let Him do with me what He pleaseth.”—Greenhill.
ILLUSTRATIONS
God the life of all things.—Nothing exists, subsists, is acted upon or moved by itself, but by some other being or agent; whence it follows that everything exists, subsists, is acted upon, and is moved by the First Being, who has no origin from another, but is in Himself the force which is life.—Swedenborg. God has a world of real forces in Himself. He bears within Him an inexhaustible spring, by virtue of which He is the Life eternally streaming forth, but also eternally streaming back into Himself. He neither empties nor loses Himself in His vital activity. He is a sea of self-revolving Life; an infinite fulness of forces moves, so to speak, and undulates therein.—Dorner. In this communication of life, God gives Himself so unreservedly that creation feels Him as her own, His joy as her joy, His peace as her peace, His strength as her strength, His personality and independence as her personality and independence.—W. White.
Foreknowledge.—The divine foreknowledge has put a stamp of that which was coming upon that which went before. This stamp is the basis of figurative language, of analogy, of typology, of prophecy, yea, of all knowledge. Every lower thing is a figure, a type, or prophecy of a higher thing; every present thing contains a representation of a coming thing, and every visible thing is more or less the image of things invisible. God’s foreknowledge thus becomes the great highway of knowledge to man, by which he can traverse not only the earth, but the universe so far as it is accessible to his inspection.—W. White.
Clouds.—Those war-clouds that gather on the horizon, dragon-crested, tongued with fire;—how is their barbed strength bridled? What bits are these they are champing with their vaporous lips; flinging off flakes of black foam? Leagued leviathans of the sea of heaven, out of their nostrils goeth smoke, and their eyes are like the eyelids of the morning.… Where ride the captains of their armies? Where are set the measures of their march? Fierce murmurers, answering each other from morning until evening—what rebuke is this which has awed them into peace? What hand has reined them back by the way by which they came? “The wondrous works of Him which is perfect in knowledge?” We have too great veneration for cloudlessness.—Ruskin.
Human ignorance.—There has never been a weak deity worshipped, and it is safe to say there never will be one. Man is too strong himself not to admire strength, and looks with pity or contempt upon weakness. And no deity can be pitied or despised and hold his sovereignty over men’s minds. The heavens must be braced beyond the possibility of fall, or they who live beneath the dome could never gaze with awe into the overhanging spaces.… I do not expect that any of mortal kind have a correct idea of God.… How little do we know even yet of the qualities and uses of material and finite Nature! For Nature is yet a mystery. She sits like the veiled prophet in the inner temple of her abode, whose outer walls we in our groping have at last stumbled against, and upon the panels of whose mighty gates a few of our most ambitious scientists are beginning to rap. If, then, so little is known of Nature, how little indeed must we know of the Invisible Spirit, who is so removed from our senses that no man could look upon His face and live. How flippantly men talk of God! As if they could understand the measureless reality whose reflection they only behold! The men who say God must be this or that, must do this or that, are for the most part men who have great intellectual vanity and great spiritual ignorance. The bowed head, the closed eye, the hand on the mouth and the mouth in the dust,—these are the evidences of piety, and, I may say, of spiritual knowledge also.—W. H. Murray.
An infinite unknown.—We are separated from it, not by any anger of storm, not by any vain and fading vapour, but only by the deep infinity of the thing itself.—Ruskin. Capable are we of God, both by understanding and will; by understanding, as He is that sovereign truth which comprehends the rich treasures of all wisdom; by will, as He is that sea of goodness whereof whoso tasteth shall thirst no more.—Hooker.
A Seer.—The more I think of it, the more I find this conclusion impressed upon me—that the greatest thing a human soul ever does in this world is to see something, and tell what it saw in a plain way. Hundreds of people can talk for one who can think, but thousands can think for one who can see. To see clearly is poetry, prophecy, and religion—all in one.—Ruskin.
Law in the spiritual.—Laws are operant in the things of the Spirit as truly as in the things of matter. The forces there are not disorderly, nor do the movements which they generate start haphazard. They are not impulsive, freakful, and fickle. They who suppose that the coming of the Spirit to human consciousness is the result of arbitrary sending and of periodical ordering, and not the result of a ceaseless and ceaselessly expressed benevolence, doubtless mistake.… The anarchy must be reduced to order; the chaos taught the use and made to feel the force of law; the imperfect organisations of society be supplanted by the perfect.… The Spirit, through change of custom, law, and habit, and by a gradual transition of the world from old to new, can, at last, after ages of revolution and growth, accomplish another structure.—W. H. Murray.
God manifested.—He the Creator, the Governor, became a presence clear and plain before men’s hearts. He, by the marvellous method of the Incarnation, showed Himself to man. He stood beside man’s work. He towered above, and folded Himself about, man’s life. And what then? God in the world must be the standard of the world. Greatness meant something different when men had seen how great He was. Just suppose that suddenly Omniscience towered up above our knowledge, and Omnipotence above our strength, and the Infinite Wisdom stood piercing out of the sight of our ignorant and baffled skill. Must it not crush the man with an utter insignificance?… He would be brought face to face with facts. He would measure himself against the eternal pillars of the universe. He would learn the blessed lesson of his own littleness in the way in which it is always learnt most blessedly—by learning the largeness of larger things.… If you could only see God for ever present in your life, and Jesus dying for your soul, and your soul worth Jesus dying for, and the souls of your brethren precious in His sight, and the whole universe teeming with work for Him, then must come the humility of the Christian.—Brooks.
In the divinity of His person there is laid an infinite, eternal, and unchangeable ground for the most unbounded confidence. If He were a being possessed of nothing higher than the highest possible endowments of humanity, we might well scruple to place in such an one a confidence stretching through eternity. But being God, in trusting in Him we rely upon a power that cannot be withstood, upon a wisdom which hath no limits, upon a truth that is infallible, upon a love that is unchangeable, upon a fidelity that cannot fail.—W. White.
The enduring Word of God.—We are not more unworldly than the patriarchs, more spiritual than the prophets, more heavenly-minded than the apostles; we are not nearer the great celestial verities than men of the olden time—at least by any philosophy, or science, or culture of our own that is independent of the study and the grace of the Scriptures; we are not beyond the Bible either in its letter or its thought. There are ideas there the world has not yet fathomed; there are words and figures there whose rich significance interpretation has not yet exhausted. The scriptural style and the scriptural language are not meant for one age, but for all ages. Its Orientalisms will grow in the West; its archaisms will be found still young in the nineteenth century. Science is ever changing, as it is ever unfinished; its language is ever becoming obsolete, as it is ever superseded; philosophy is continually presenting some new phase of its ever-revolving cycles; the political world is ever a dissolving view; literature becomes effete, and art decays; “but the word of our God shall stand for ever.” Not so sure are the types of nature as even the form and feature of this written word, if it be indeed the word of God, uttered in humanity, breathed into human souls, informing human emotions, conceived in human thoughts, made outward in human images, and indissolubly bound, as the wondrous narrative of the supernatural, in the long chain of human history.—T. Lewis.
Changes.—We are apt to fret and murmur at the motions of the wheels when they cross our hopes and interests; but if the Spirit of God be in the wheels and acts them according to His own pleasure, then all our impatience is groundless and sinful. We should stay and quiet our minds under all turns and changes in a world for discipline, rebuke, threatening, lamentation, calling.—M. Meade.
Unity.—The prophet, cast into the wide world and feeling himself lost in it, was led by the Divine Teacher into a region of thought to which the Israelite had been hitherto comparatively a stranger—was led to see how each part of the universe, which must have often seemed to him a storehouse of divided material idols, was pointing when seen by the divine light to a spiritual unity, as its explanation and its centre.… It is Spirit only which distinguishes and unites, which brings each thing forth in its clearness and fulness, and brings all into harmony, … a Spirit which had come from some higher region. There is One, human and divine, from whom this Spirit has proceeded, in whom it dwells perfectly.—Maurice.
3. THE COMMISSION TO EZEKIEL (Chaps. 2–3, 1–15)
EXEGETICAL NOTES.— Ezekiel 1:1. “Son of man.” This is the customary form of address to Ezekiel, and is used only of him and Daniel among all the prophets. As both were prophesying in captivity, the title must have been conditioned by that fact, and would signify to the exiled prophets, away from the city which God had chosen to place His name there, that above them He was who was the God of the spirits of all flesh, who would communicate with the souls He owned, and supply all that would make up for absence from the land of promise and covenant. The title hardly could intimate, as is said by commentators, that Ezekiel was in need of a continual reminder of his human origin and frailty and unworthiness, or that he was to watch against being puffed up by his visions, or that he was spoken to familiarly as a special friend of God. We may listen to the phrase as expressing both a contrast and a connection between the speaker and the hearer.
Ezekiel 1:2. “The Spirit.” Not the spirit of Ezekiel, as if he had been altogether unconscious and his spirit came to him again; nor scarcely the Holy Spirit, as operative in prophetic revelation; but the Spirit which was in the living creatures, and which, no doubt, was the Spirit of God.
Ezekiel 1:3. “The children of Israel.” The most common expression used by Ezekiel for his people, perhaps significant of an amalgamation already begun of the Jews with the remnants of the ten tribes formerly gone into captivity. “To a rebellious nation,” or to the nations, the rebels. They who were children of him who wrestled with the angel are deteriorated, not to the level of a heathen nation, as in Isaiah 1:4, but to that of heathen nations.