The Consolation of Israel

I must admit the imagery in Ezekiel perplexes me at times and I struggle to piece it all together.  For instance, why would the last ten chapters be describing a future God-ordained temple when the new covenant ushered in a new temple, not made with human hands, with Jesus being the sacrifice, once for all?  Is not the old done away with, so why would it be repeated?  I wondered if God was instead revealing to Ezekiel a complete picture of what Daniel touched on - and how perhaps the glory of the Lord to fill the temple is the revealing of the prince in Ezekiel's final chapters.  My confusion pointing you reader once again to not take my word for it, but study yourself - I am offering thoughts, not doctrine, so be careful to take what I say lightly and search for yourself.   One thing is certain, however, Ezekiel clearly points to Christ. One verse there prompts recollection of verses elsewhere in the Old and New Testaments, especially between Ezekiel, Isaiah and Luke.  I will be using Isaiah Chapter 40:1- (in bold) as the Scriptural skeleton for my thoughts, all New Testament fulfillments in italics.  I welcome your comments and challenges!

“‘Comfort ye, comfort ye my people,’ saith your God.  Speak ye comfortably to Jerusalem and cry unto her, that her warfare is accomplished, that her iniquity is pardoned:  for she hath received of the Lord’s hand double for all her sins.

"The voice of him that crieth in the wilderness, Prepare ye the way of the Lord, make straight in the desert a highway for our God…. vs.1-3

Malachi 3:1 affirms this voice: “Behold, I send my messenger, and he will prepare the way before Me. ‘The voice of one crying in the wilderness, Prepare ye the way of the Lord, make his paths straight.”  Isaiah 42:16:  “I will bring the blind by a way that they knew not; I will lead them in paths that they have not known:  I will make darkness light before them, and crooked things straight.”  Isaiah 45:7: “I form the light and create darkness:  I make peace, and create evil: I the Lord do all these things.” John the Baptist clarified in John 1:19-23 that he was not the Christ, nor the embodiment of the prophet Elijah, but rather the voice or messenger crying in the wilderness.  In Matthew 11:13-14 Jesus seems to contradict John saying that, if we could receive it, John IS Elijah, but this in keeping with Jesus’ command that those who worship him must worship in spirit and in truth, thus John the Baptist spiritually IS Elijah, both of whom were to turn the hearts of the fathers back to the children, and the disobedient to the attitude of the righteous - to make ready a people prepared for the Lord [Luke 1:13-17].  Jesus further claimed that John the Baptist is greater than all born of women up to then, but least compared to those who’ve entered the Kingdom of Heaven - why?  because all the prophets and the law prophesied UNTIL John.  In other words, the King had arrived and John was the herald to commence His arrival - no longer was it a matter of prophecy, but of fulfillment.  Jesus the King had arrived and his followers enter in to the kingdom.

“And the glory of the Lord shall be revealed, and all flesh shall see it together:  for the mouth of the Lord hath spoken it.  The voice said, ‘Cry!’  And he said, ‘What shall I cry?’  All flesh is grass and all the goodliness thereof is as the flower of the field:  The grass withereth, the tower fadeth: because the SPIRIT of the Lord bloweth upon it:  surely the people is grass.  vs. 5-7

Jesus answered, “Most assuredly, I say to you, unless one is born of water and the Spirit, he cannot enter the kingdom of God.  That which is born of the flesh is flesh, and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit.  Do not marvel that I said to you, ‘You must be born again.’ The wind blows where it wishes, and you hear the sound of it, but you cannot tell where it comes from and where it goes.  So is everyone who is born of the Spirit.” John 3:5-6.  

“The grass withereth, the flower fadeth away, but the word of our God shall stand forever.
O Zion, that bringest good tidings,… vs. 7-9a  

Isaiah 61:1: “The Spirit of the Lord God is upon Me, because the Lord has anointed me to preach good tidings to the poor “Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of Heaven.”  Matthew 5:3  

“…get thee up into the high mountain; O Jerusalem, that bringest good tidings,… vs. 9a

“Then the angel said to them, ‘Do not be afraid, for behold, I bring you good tidings of great joy which shall be to all people.’” Luke 2:10 

“…lift up thy voice with strength; lift it up, be not afraid; say unto the cities of Judah, Behold your God! vs. 9b

“Rejoice greatly, O daughter of Zion!  Shout, O daughter of Jerusalem!  Behold, your King is coming to you; He is just and having salvation, lowly and riding on a donkey, a colt, the foal of a donkey.” Zechariah 9:9  “Then Jesus, when He had found a young donkey, sat on it; as it is written:  Fear not, daughter of Zion; Behold you King is coming, sitting on a donkey’s colt.”

So who is this King? Did, in fact, Israel receive her King in the form of a Savior? The comfort promised in Isaiah 40:1-2?  Simeon, a devout and just Jew, said of Jesus He was the fulfillment of Isaiah 66:13, the consolation of Israel.  

“Behold, the Lord God will come with strong hand, vs. 10a

Is. 50:2: “Is my hand shortened at all that it cannot redeem?” Is. 59:1-2,8a:  “Behold, the Lord’s hand is NOT shortened that it cannot save; neither his ear heavy, that it cannot hear: but your iniquities have separated between you and your God, and your sins have hid his face from you, that he will not hear…..they have made crooked paths.” 

“and his arm shall rule for him:  behold, his reward is with him, and his work before him. vs. 10b  

Isaiah 52:10: “The Lord has made bare his holy arm in the eyes of all the nations; and all the ends of the earth shall see the salvation of our God.” Isaiah 53:1: Who hath believed our report? and to whom is the arm of the Lord revealed?”

Ezekiel 34:2: “Son of man prophesy against the shepherds of Israel, prophesy, and say unto them, Thus saith the Lord God unto the Shepherds; Woe be to the shepherds of Israel that do feed themselves!  should not the shepherds feed the flocks?”  Isaiah 41:27-28: "The first shall say to Zion, Behold, Behold them: and I will give to Jerusalem one that bringeth good tidings.  For I beheld, and there was no man: even among them, and there was no counselor, that, when I asked of them, could answer a word." Rather than reconciliation, the law”yers” brought death.  Rather than peace, the law”yers” brought division.  Rather than feed the flock, the shepherds scattered it.  This was true of Israel, and is true today of many church shepherds, wolves in sheep’s clothing.  Ezekiel 34:10: “Thus says the Lord God; Behold I am against the shepherds; and I will require my flock at their hand, and cause them to cease from feeding the flock; neither shall the shepherds feed themselves any more…” and this happened when in AD 70 the temple was destroyed, sacrifice ceased and no longer could the shepherds of Israel perform all that the Lord had commanded.  Personally I can see no greater abomination than counting the sacrifice of our Lord - the vehicle of His grace - as “common” - thus the continuation of the sacrificial system AFTER the sacrifice of the Lamb of God surely caused desolation, culminating in one generation with the destruction of the temple. Ezekiel 36 shows a scattered Israel where God’s name is profaned among the heathens, yet this purposed so the heathens too might know Israel’s God and recognize the true Shepherd (vs. 36 then the heathen that are left round about you will know that I the Lord build the ruined places, and plant that that was desolate: I the Lord have spoken it, and I will do it….) Ezekiel 34:11,23 sums up, “Behold I, even I, will both search my sheep, and seek them out….I will set up one shepherd over them, and he shall feed them, even my servant David; he shall feed them, and he shall be their shepherd….And I will make with them a covenant of peace."

“He shall feed his flock like a shepherd:  he shall gather the lambs with his arm, and carry them in his bosom, and shall gently lead those that are with young." vs. 11

John 10:11: “I am the good shepherd.  The good shepherd gives His life for the sheep….I know My sheep and am known by My own.  As the Father knows Me, even so I know the Father; and I lay down my life for the sheep.  And other sheep I have which are not of this fold; them also I must bring, and they will hear My voice; and there will be one flock and one shepherd.” In him is the reconciliation of all his people.  Jew or Greek, slave or free, male or female - He is the door of the sheep (John 10:7).

Jesus Christ is the consolation of Israel, the light of the Gentiles.  I find Isaiah 66:7-14 profound.  Who would ever expect a child to come forth before the mother went in to labor?  Yet verse 7 says that “before she travailed, she brought forth; before her pain came, she was delivered of a man child.  Who hath heard such a thing?”  Clearly this child, born of the woman Israel, is the Lord Jesus of Revelation 12:5 who was to rule all nations with a rod of iron, brought forth before Israel’s travail, the destruction of its temple.  The Savior King of not only Israel, but those outside the covenant, who the dragon wanted to devour, has tried to devour throughout history (Pharaoh, Herod), the promised child of Genesis 3:15.  Isaiah 66:10 tells us we can “rejoice with Jerusalem, and be glad with her, all ye that love her:  rejoice for joy with her, all ye that mourn for her:  that ye may suck and be satisfied with the breasts of her consolations; that ye may milk out, and be delighted with the abundance of her glory.  For thus saith the Lord, Behold, I will extend peace to her like a river and the glory of the Gentiles like a flowing stream.”  The glory of the Gentiles is Christ the Lord - the same glory of Israel in Luke 2:32 -  Isaiah 66:12-14: “then shall ye suck, ye shall be borne upon her sides, and be dandled upon her knees.  As one whom his mother comforts, so will I comfort you, and ye shall be comforted in Jerusalem.  And when ye see this, your heart shall rejoice, and your bones shall flourish like an herb…..(Ezekiel’s vision of the dry bones?)  

Isaiah 60 reads, “Arise, shine, for thy light is come, and the glory of the Lord is risen upon thee.  For, behold, the darkness shall cover the earth, and deep darkness the people: but the Lord shall arise upon thee, and his glory shall be seen upon thee.  And the Gentiles shall come to thy light, and kings to the brightness of thy rising.  Lift up thine eyes round about, and see:  all they gather themselves together, they come to thee: thy sons shall come from far, and thy daughters shall be nursed at thy side.  Then thou shalt see, and flow together, and thine heart shall fear and be enlarged; because the abundance of the sea shall be converted unto thee, the forces of the Gentiles shall come unto thee….. Surely the isles shall wait for me, and the ships of Tarshish first (Paul, the apostle to the Gentiles, interestingly enough was Saul of Tarsus)….  Thou shalt suck the milk of the Gentiles and shalt suck the breast of kings: and thou shalt know that I the Lord am thy Savior and thy Redeemer, the mighty one of Jacob.”

“And behold, there was a man in Jerusalem, whose name was Simeon; and the same man was just and devout, waiting for the consolation of Israel: and the Holy Ghost was upon him.  And it was revealed unto him by the Holy Ghost that he should not see death before he had seen the Lord’s Christ.  And he came by the Spirit into the temple:  and when the parents brought in the child Jesus, to do for him after the custom of the law, then took he him up in his arms, and blessed God, and said, ‘Lord, now lettest thou thy servant depart in peace, according to thy word:  For mine eyes have seen thy salvation, which thou hast prepared before the face of all people; a light to lighten the Gentiles, and the glory of thy people Israel.”  Luke 2:25-32

Simeon continued [vs. 34] by blessing Mary, Joseph and Jesus and said unto Mary, “Behold, this child is set for the fall and rising again of many in Israel; and for a sign which shall be spoken against; (Yea, a sword shall pierce through thine own soul also,) that the thoughts of many hearts may be revealed.”

This blessed Christmas I pray that His light might shine in your hearts, that repentance be granted you, and that you, like Simeon can find peace in the Consolation of Israel.