Ezekiel 13 | Wayfarer

When the wall collapses, will people not ask you, “Where is the whitewash you covered it with?”
Ezekiel 13:12 (NIV)

The Iowa town where Wendy and I live is a unique place. Pella was founded by a Dutch pastor and his flock back in 1847. They were fleeing religious persecution back in Netherlands and were intent on creating “a city of refuge” on the Iowa prairie. Visitors from the Netherlands today will often say that Pella is more Dutch than the Netherlands itself. Dutch heritage is so woven into the town that any commercial businesses must include classic Dutch architectural design flourishes on their buildings. Even Walmart and McDonalds comply (see the featured photo on today’s post).

Of course, the architectural flourishes are just that. Behind the doors of that cute looking shop on the square, it’s just a building like any other building. In some cases, that building is 170 years old and in critically major disrepair. This has led to locals using the metaphor of a “Dutch Front.” The front of the building looks cute, quaint, and Dutch, but on the inside it’s a hell-hole. The metaphor is often (and aptly) used to describe people who keep up self-righteous, religious appearances for public consumption, but whose actual lives are filled with greed, anger, slander, hypocrisy, and critical spirits.

In today’s chapter, God has Ezekiel prophesy against false prophets and professional diviners and spiritualists who practiced black magic. I was fascinated that God’s metaphor for false prophets was basically the same metaphor as our Dutch Front. In Zeke’s day, a strong wall around the city protected it from an enemy attack. God tells Zeke that the false prophets of his day were like a “flimsy wall” that had been whitewashed to look good. These prophets would tell people what they wanted to hear, that everything was going to be okay and that they would live in peace, while God was trying to warn them of the impending doom and destruction.

In the quiet this morning, I find myself meditating on this metaphor. Even Jesus used a form of it with the hypocritical religious Pharisees of His day:

“Woe to you, teachers of the law and Pharisees, you hypocrites! You are like whitewashed tombs, which look beautiful on the outside but on the inside are full of the bones of the dead and everything unclean.”

There are two truths that I have observed along my life journey that come to mind as I reflect on Jesus’ words.

First, there is no one perfect and even the most sincerely devout individual has blind spots and imperfections. We are all works in progress. I have known critics and non-believers who are quick to paint any and all self-proclaimed believers with the same coat of whitewash in an effort to justify their unbelief and poor life choices. It is a very human thing to generalize an entire subset of humanity as “those people.” It makes easier for us to dismiss them instead of understanding them.

Second, Jesus was most critical of self-righteous, fundamentalist religious-types. Much like the false prophets, they played the religious game, they even thought they were being devoutly sincere, but they were blind to the spiritual reality. Their hearts weren’t seeking after the heart of God, but rather were seeking public approval ratings that made them feel good while ignoring the heart changes inside that desperately needed to be made.

In the quiet this morning, I find myself standing in the tension. Look hard enough and you will find my flaws. My wife, my children, and my inner circle of friends know them very well. As a disciple of Jesus, my first priority is not to seek and point out the flaws and hypocrisies of others. My priority is to be God’s perpetual and faithful cardiac patient. My heart has to perpetually change if I am going to be the disciple God calls me to be: My life, words, and actions increasingly blossoming with the Fruit of the Spirit. There is a time and place for calling out sin and hypocrisy just like Zeke in his day, and Jesus in His. Yet, I’m reminded that His criticism of the religious leaders was a very small part of His story, which was primarily about His healing and restorative sacrificial love for others. May my life increasingly reflect His.

If you know anyone who might be encouraged by today’s post, please share.

The word of the Lord came to me: “Son of man, prophesy against the prophets of Israel who are now prophesying. Say to those who prophesy out of their own imagination: ‘Hear the word of the Lord!'”
Ezekiel 13:1-2 (NIV)

I do not believe that we who live in a post-enlightenment age can possibly fathom the religious climate of Ezekiel’s day. A person living in Jerusalem in that day would be familiar with various temples and religious centers catering to a giant web of Canaanite deities. A person living in the time of Ezekiel would be very familiar with mediums, prophets, fortune tellers, and soothsayers. It was a central part of daily life and the economy in the ancient world.

As I read of the prophetic performances God asked Ezekiel and his contemporaries to produce, it is easy to think that they stood out like sore thumbs. However, when I stop to consider the loud cacophony of prophets who catered to popular gods like Baal, Asherah, Dagon, Molech, Lotan, and Chemosh on the streets of Jerusalem, I wonder if Ezekiel’s prophetic performance art caused any more of a stir than a man dressed like Barney the dinosaur would cause in Times Square today.

In today’s chapter God tells Ezekiel to prophesy against false prophets and those sons and daughters of Israel who were profiting from telling people what they wanted to hear and who appear to have mixed themselves and their faith with the practice of other religions. The question I ask myself is whether Ezekiel’s voice could even be heard above the din of the idolatrous crowd.

Today, I find myself mulling over how our culture (even in out post-enlightenment age) both parallels and contrasts the religious atmosphere of Ezekiel’s day. The internet has raised, to unprecedented levels, the cacophony of voices saying anything and everything to anyone and everyone. I am very aware that the voice of my squeaky little posts are lost in the din of information, advertisement, entertainment, opinion, and conjecture. Did Ezekiel feel the same way?

This morning I’m reminded of Van Gogh’s many drawings and paintings of the sower. The sower does not always know where his seed may fall, nor how they might take root, grow, or bear fruit. The sowers job is to cast his seed into the field. The prophets job is to sow his message into the din of contemporary voices.