Please remember that this evening we are gathering to read through Ezekiel 8-11. As you read through these chapters think about the following:
· In Chapter 8, what is the nature of Ezekiel’s vision – is it a hallucination, a remembrance of what he had seen, or was he physically and supernaturally brought to Jerusalem?
· In Deuteronomy 28, God promises to bless and protect his people. Ezekiel’s vision takes place 6 years after the first time Jerusalem fell to the Babylonians and 130 years after the northern kingdom of Israel fell to the Assyrians. Could this have contributed to the idolatry witnessed by Ezekiel? See, Ezek. 9:9.
· The idolatry witnessed by Ezekiel was the intentional divine worship of other things. Since we don’t offer incense to pagan deities anymore, how are modern idolatries, such as money, power, etc., similar to or different than the idolatries of Chapter 8?
· In Chapter 9, what are we to make of the avenging angels slaughtering the unjust and the idolaters? If this is only a vision, is Ezekiel seeing actual people die? Are these avenging angels really Babylonian soldiers during the sack of Jerusalem? Or are these the same angels of which Jesus speaks about in the Parable of the Tares (Matthew 13:36-43).
· Chapter 10:3-5 describes the temple as it existed at its dedication by Solomon as recorded in 1 Kings 8:1-11. How does this description compare with the vision in Chapter 1 last week and the vision in the remainder of Chapter 10? How do these passages describe the true worship of God?
· In Chapter 11, what does Ezekiel mean by saying, “The city is a cauldron, and we are the meat”?
· Does Ezekiel quote Psalm 51 in Chapter 11? How does the outline of this Psalm track this chapter?
· In the final paragraph of Chapter 11, what does it mean that the glory of the Lord left? Where did it go? Why is this important?
· Is the leaving of the glory of the Lord from his abode to dwell among the exiles a prefiguration of the Incarnation? See, John 1.
Dinner is at 6. The menu is a rigatoni sausage casserole. If you have not read, please come anyway. Hope to see you here tomorrow.
And I will give them one heart, and a new spirit I will put within them. I will remove the heart of stone from their flesh and give them a heart of flesh,that they may walk in my statutes and keep my rules and obey them. And they shall be my people, and I will be their God.
Ezekiel 11:19-20