EZEKIEL’S VISION

Ezekiel carries a unique revelation about the work of redemption going forward from his time. Chapters 40-48 recount a significant vision wherein Ezekiel was shown the rebuilding of the temple of God and the eventual layout of the tribes of the Jewish nation.

Most of this is easily lost on the 21st century Christian. We are far removed from structuring our lives around the temple, but to a Jew up until 70AD the temple/tabernacle was everything. Peter calls understanding the temple foundational to Christian doctrine:

1 Peter 2:1-5 Therefore, laying aside all malice, all deceit, hypocrisy, envy, and all evil speaking, as newborn babes, desire the pure milk of the word, that you may grow thereby, if indeed you have tasted that the Lord is gracious. Coming to Him as to a living stone, rejected indeed by men, but chosen by God and precious, you also, as living stones, are being built up a spiritual house, a holy priesthood, to offer up spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God through Jesus Christ.

The pure milk of the word that newborn babes are to desire is to come to God as a living stone, being built up as a temple. The importance of temple life is mostly lost to us.

THE LOST TEMPLE

To a first-century Jew (and to Jews from the time of Moses onward) the temple was everything. It was the central foundation of their entire religious, political, and moral life. Everything codified in daily Jewish life had to do with how you related temple and priestly system set in place. In order for the people of God to maintain the presence of God in their midst, they were to relate continually to the temple through daily prayer, fasts, and sacrifices.

In the time of Moses, you would awake, walk out of your tent and see the jutting top of the Tabernacle in the center of the sprawling national camp. Eventually, the tabernacle was replaced by the temple (though it is debatable whether this was required by God). Hovering over the tabernacle was this impressive cloud-by-day, fire-by-night manifestation of God’s presence. Some theologians have theorized that this large pillar stretched some 600 feet high.

As time passed, the people of Israel steadily walked away from God. Eventually, after hundreds of years of unfaithfulness, the presence of God is removed from in the midst of the Israelites, and they are sent into captivity for 70 years. It is in the midst of this exile that Ezekiel has his vision, and this vision becomes the hope of Israel.

When the Israelites are finally released to begin rebuilding the temple, there is great expectation. The book of Ezra recounts a bittersweet moment in Israel’s history:

Ezra 3:10-13 When the builders laid the foundation of the temple of the Lord, the priests stood in their apparel with trumpets, and the Levites, the sons of Asaph, with cymbals, to praise the Lord, according to the ordinance of David king of Israel. And they sang responsively, praising and giving thanks to the Lord: “For He is good, For His mercy endures forever toward Israel.” Then all the people shouted with a great shout, when they praised the Lord because the foundation of the house of the Lord was laid. But many of the priests and Levites and heads of the fathers’ houses, old men who had seen the first temple, wept with a loud voice when the foundation of this temple was laid before their eyes. Yet many shouted aloud for joy so that the people could not discern the noise of the shout of joy from the noise of the weeping of the people, for the people shouted with a loud shout, and the sound was heard afar off.

Those that had seen the prior temple wept such that their cries intermingled with the shouts of joy from the younger generation. Why? Because the presence of God never returned to the temple the way Ezekiel’s vision promised.

When Ezekiel recounts his walkthrough of the temple, he describes in detail the return of God’s presence:

Ezekiel 43:2-5 And behold, the glory of the God of Israel came from the way of the east. His voice was like the sound of many waters; and the earth shone with His glory. It was like the appearance of the vision which I saw—like the vision which I saw when I came to destroy the city. The visions were like the vision which I saw by the River Chebar; and I fell on my face. And the glory of the Lord came into the temple by way of the gate which faces toward the east. The Spirit lifted me up and brought me into the inner court; and behold, the glory of the Lord filled the temple.

By all accounts, this should have happened when the Israelites struck the foundation, but it didn’t. Ezekiel’s vision was not about the rebuilt temple, it was about the New Testament Christian living a life filled by the presence of God.

One of the most striking characteristics of this vision, and thus the prophetic utterance about New Testament Christianity, happens when the Spirit fills the temple:

Ezekiel 43:6 Then I heard Him speaking to me from the temple, while a man stood beside me.

When the presence of God dwells in His temple He will speak from within that temple. That temple is now the resident place within you that God longs to occupy. And when He occupies you, He will speak to you from within your heart.

God longed for the day he would occupy you and speak to you from the inner recesses of your heart. He occupies to speak to you. His voice is to become the driving force of expressing His life within your heart. We spend too much time preoccupied with the external manifestations of His presence. We seek visions, dreams, supernatural displays wonder, and all manner of esoteric experiences. Yet God longed for the day when He would re-commune with humanity and whisper to the core of your being. That day has come, and He has invited you to intimate converse. His desire is you.