Ezekiel’s Prophetic Call
Over the last twelve months we’ve all become statisticians. Four million in the UK, that’s about 6% of us, have been infected by Covid-19. Tragically,116,000 people have so far died. That’s 0.18% of the population. Without all the measures taken, it would have been considerably higher.
And we as a church know what it is to lose people to Covid. Perhaps not surprising, given our demographics, our loss to Covid has been 17 times higher than the UK average.
And right now, with our building closed, we feel a bit lost. It’s as if we’re in Exile.
But there IS hope. It feel’s, as nations of the UK, we’re at the start of the beginning of the way home. The vaccine has been created and over 14 million have now had the first jab. 
It’s perhaps not surprising, given our buildings’ location at the junction of Chester Road, Gravelly Lane, and Boldmere Road, that we have a picture of traffic lights. Being still in lockdown, we’re currently on ‘red’. It’s all about stop, wait, be patient. But this won’t last forever.  The lights will eventually turn ‘green’, Go, and when they do, we sure better be ready to go! But, in between red and green is ‘amber’. That in between time to anticipate/ get ready for green.
Ezekiel too was at the start of the beginning of the way home for the Israelites. The book of Ezekiel starts with the Israelites on red, held captive in Babylon.  Being a prophet, Ezekiel could see ‘green’, the time when the Israelites were finally back home.
Chapter 2 begins with God speaking to Ezekiel: “Son of man, stand up, get to your feet, and I will speak to you.”
God called him “Son of Man.” The Hebrew is ‘ben adam’, which is literally ‘son of Adam’ Mention of Adam and you don’t need to have been to Vicar School to think of Adam Faith, Adam and the Ants, Adam and Eve! In Hebrew, ‘adam’ can mean either the man’s name, Adam, as in Adam Sandler. But it can also mean ‘all mankind’. It’s a bit like, one fish, lots of fish. The singular of ‘sheep’ is ‘sheep’. The plural of ‘sheep’ is, err, ‘sheep’. The one word is used for either singular or plural. 
So, if, when you read about Adam in Eden, you find yourself saying, I don’t ‘Adam and Eve’ it, don’t worry. Genesis might be telling us about Adam singular (one man called Adam) or, equally, it could also be telling us about Adam plural (all of mankind, all of humanity) That’s why we shouldn’t rush to assume the first three chapters of Genesis are to be understood literally.  The story Genesis chapters 1-3 is telling is much bigger than one man and one woman. The truth it is telling is about you and me and ALL of HUMANITY. 

We are all Adam, we are all child of Adam. So, when God refers to Ezekiel as Son of Man:
•	God is Creator – the source of all life
•	Ezekiel is created - mere human
•	What God is saying to that man, Ezekiel, God is saying to all of mankind, all of humanity

But didn’t someone else get referred to as the Son of Man? Because we know how the bigger story unfolds – the story of how Creator God was so taken with His Creation, how God so loved the world that He gave His one and only Son – Jesus became the Son of Man, Son of Adam – all of humanity.
In reply, Ezekiel called God THE LORD “Yahweh” Back then, people thought God’s name was too holy to mention.
By the way, if you’re reading from the New International Version or Good News translations, you’ll see a rogue ‘sovereign’ slip in – the ‘Sovereign Lord’. Some Christians talk about God being ‘Sovereign’.  It’s usually when they are faced with a tough situation they can’t explain. So they say, God is Sovereign, He can do what He likes. Or God is Sovereign, He controls all things. Really? When Covid took the life of that person, God controlled that? When that child was run over, God was in control then? Sometimes, the way to test authenticity is to stress-test it, by applying it to the extreme. Does it still sound right? Sovereign is not a word used in the Bible to describe God. It’s an interpretation.
Knowing someone’s name is a step towards knowing them, having a friendship with them. It’s hard to say you’re in a relationship with someone if you don’t even know their name. Ezekiel knows God’s name. He’s on the way to friendship with God. By prefacing with THE LORD Yahweh, Ezekiel was being mindful not to become flippant with God. Yes, we are to be in friendship with God. After all, Jesus said in John 15:
“I no longer call you servants, because a servant does not know his master’s business. Instead, I have called you friends, for everything that I learned from my Father I have made known to you.”
But it’s not friendship between two equals. Ezekiel is Son of Man but God is Yahweh, THE Lord. One is created, the other Creator.
So, God called Ezekiel by name and directed him to.. Babylon. And where was Ezekiel? In Babylon! God calls us to step-up and serve Him right where we are.  In your street/ apartment block, work place, in your extended family, in your social media network. Don’t expect him to call you elsewhere until you have stepped-up right here, right now.
On this occasion, God wasn’t calling Ezekiel to the Babylonians. No need to order the Lonely Planet Guid to Babylon or to download the DuoLingo or Babbel language apps. God was calling him to those in Exile.
God was sending Ezekiel to those who should have known better. To those who had once been part of God’s Way; to those who, intellectually at least, still thought of themselves as knowing the Truth; and yet who were no longer living the Life. Israel was never about a nation State. It was always meant to be about a movement of people who love God and love others. We run into trouble when we confuse the modern nation State of Israel, with it’s political borders and passport stamp, with the movement of God’s people. 
Over the years, the Israelites had gradually drifted from this. Israel had stopped being Israel and had become more like Babylon. Like a shopping trolley that pulls to the right unless corrected, faith, living faith, can drift, if not corrected, into mere religion. When the ritual, the order of things, the pomp and ceremony, what you wear, start to matter more.
It hadn’t been that long ago that Jeremiah, another 0f God’s Big Beast prophets, had gone to Jerusalem to warn the Judahites of what they were risking if they didn’t change their ways. They refused to listen to Jeremiah.  And then it was too late. What Jeremiah had predicted, happened. The Babylonian Empire invaded and took tens of thousands of people captive and trafficked them back to Babylon. If they were going to look, sound, behave like Babylon, they might as well be in Babylon. It was as if they got what they desired, not just what they deserved.
A few years later, and God was raising up a young radical, another Prophet, to continue calling Israel back to God.
This wasn’t going to be easy. Israel would continue to be stubborn, reckless, hard-hearted. He’s talking about God’s people. The survival rate for Prophets wasn’t great. There are easier and safer callings. If you want an easy life, don’t follow Christ. But Ezekiel would be sent by God, the Holy Spirit in the power of the Holy Spirit.
•	Verse 2: “As he spoke, the Spirit came into me.”
•	Chapter 3 verse 12: “Then the Spirit lifted me up, and I heard
•	Verse 14: “The Spirit then lifted me up and took me away”
But so Ezekiel wasn’t just all emotion and no substance, God said he was to devour the Word. The people might be stubborn, rebellious, stiff-necked, but Ezekiel couldn’t be. He needed to be different. So if God says eat the scroll, Ezekiel must eat the scroll. Normally scrolls only had writing on one side. This scroll had writing front and back. Maybe God had a lot to say to Ezekiel and the people of Israel? Maybe God has a lot for Ezekiel to say?
If we think of Scripture as the Word of God, then read it, study it, pray it, live eat, and depend on it - as if it’s part of your staple diet… Just as you might eat potatoes, pasta, or even bread.  After all, in Matthew 4, when tempted, Jesus said:  'Man (Adam) shall not live on bread alone, but on every word that comes from the mouth of God.'

But then that wayward shopping trolley tries to drift away from living faith to dry, tedious, empty, then dead, religion.  Jesus said in John 6: “ I am bread of life” When Ezekiel obeyed, “it tasted as sweet as honey” God’s is gracious, compassionate, merciful, just, forgiving, God IS love. When we operate in Word and Spirit, we too speak truth with the same grace, compassion, mercy, justice, forgiveness, and love. When we speak out of religion, our words lack grace.
And the scroll was full of words of “lament and mourning.” Lament is all about expressing great sorrow or regret and even grief about something or someone, as in the loss of a life. It’s about being deeply moved, distressed about something dreadful that has happened. And you can no longer contain your emotions. Ezekiel was to be as moved and distressed as God. This wasn’t just about their drift from God and what others had done. Ezekiel was Adam too. Ezekiel was to be with the people in Exile.
”I came to the exiles who lived near the Kebar River. And there, where they were living, I sat among them for seven days—deeply distressed.”
It turns out is wasn’t just Boney M, Psalm 137 says: “By the rivers of Babylon we sat and wept when we remembered Zion.”
It was the start of the beginning of the way home.
It is for us as a church too.
But it can also be your start too,

DannyBrierley@ChesterRoadBaptist.org.uk