DCLM Daily Manna Friday 3 March 2023
TOPIC: Courting Disaster
Text: Ezekiel 23:22-36 (KJV)
22 Therefore, O Aholibah, thus saith the Lord God; Behold, I will raise up thy lovers against thee, from whom thy mind is alienated, and I will bring them against thee on every side;
23 The Babylonians, and all the Chaldeans, Pekod, and Shoa, and Koa, and all the Assyrians with them: all of them desirable young men, captains and rulers, great lords and renowned, all of them riding upon horses.
24 And they shall come against thee with chariots, wagons, and wheels, and with an assembly of people, which shall set against thee buckler and shield and helmet round about: and I will set judgment before them, and they shall judge thee according to their judgments.
25 And I will set my jealousy against thee, and they shall deal furiously with thee: they shall take away thy nose and thine ears; and thy remnant shall fall by the sword: they shall take thy sons and thy daughters; and thy residue shall be devoured by the fire.
26 They shall also strip thee out of thy clothes, and take away thy fair jewels.
27 Thus will I make thy lewdness to cease from thee, and thy whoredom brought from the land of Egypt: so that thou shalt not lift up thine eyes unto them, nor remember Egypt any more.
28 For thus saith the Lord God; Behold, I will deliver thee into the hand of them whom thou hatest, into the hand of them from whom thy mind is alienated:
29 And they shall deal with thee hatefully, and shall take away all thy labour, and shall leave thee naked and bare: and the nakedness of thy whoredoms shall be discovered, both thy lewdness and thy whoredoms.
30 I will do these things unto thee, because thou hast gone a whoring after the heathen, and because thou art polluted with their idols.
31 Thou hast walked in the way of thy sister; therefore will I give her cup into thine hand.
32 Thus saith the Lord God; Thou shalt drink of thy sister’s cup deep and large: thou shalt be laughed to scorn and had in derision; it containeth much.
33 Thou shalt be filled with drunkenness and sorrow, with the cup of astonishment and desolation, with the cup of thy sister Samaria.
34 Thou shalt even drink it and suck it out, and thou shalt break the sherds thereof, and pluck off thine own breasts: for I have spoken it, saith the Lord God.
35 Therefore thus saith the Lord God; Because thou hast forgotten me, and cast me behind thy back, therefore bear thou also thy lewdness and thy whoredoms.
36 The Lord said moreover unto me; Son of man, wilt thou judge Aholah and Aholibah? yea, declare unto them their abominations;
KEY VERSE
“Therefore, O Aholibah, thus saith the Lord GOD; Behold, I will raise up thy lovers against thee, from whom thy mind is alienated, and I will bring them against thee on every side.”
(Ezekiel 23:22)
DCLM Daily Manna Friday 3 March 2023 MESSAGE
These are the words of a minister who ended up with a ruined marriage and a ruined ministry after a one-night stand: “Adultery isn’t something that happens with the act – it happens months beforehand. It is an attitude. You disconnect yourself from the person you’ve said you’re spending the rest of your life with”. It is the height of folly for an individual, a family or a nation to ever think of departing from the protective custody of God.
Our passage gives a graphic description of the indulgence of Aholibah the younger sister of Aholah in mindless adultery with heathen nations. The narrative begins with how Aholah (representing the ten tribes of Israel) and Aholibah (representing Judah) abandoned their legitimate husband with whom they both had children. The nation of Israel had always been portrayed as God’s wife. God made it clear through Prophet Ezekiel that He was going to cause estrangement between His ailing wives and their ‘rich’ and ‘noble’ sin partners.
The sin partners are represented by Egypt, Assyria, Babylon and other nations with whom they had defiled and polluted themselves. The Lord remarked that He was going to deal furiously with His adulterous people (verse 25). He outlined the disasters that would come upon Judah which included loss of favour from the heathen nations, sudden destruction of Jerusalem, captivity for her sons and daughters, nakedness, loneliness and famine.
Under the New Testament economy, the Church (the body of believers) is the bride of Christ. Unfaithfulness is synonymous with adultery. The world around us presents all sorts of enticements to lure us away from the narrow path that leads to life. We must resist this and ensure that our focus, fancy and attraction are towards Christ and Him alone, to avoid everlasting disgrace and regret.
THOUGHT FOR THE DAY: No sin is so tasty as to be worth perishing for.
BIBLE IN ONE YEAR: Leviticus 15-17
