Jerusalem – the boiling pot.

The opening of this chapter is fascinating. In an age where it would take weeks to get word from Jerusalem to the exiles in Babylon, Ezekiel gets a heavenly notification that the siege of Jerusalem has begun.

🤓📱💬 God was doing Instant Messaging way before humans figured it out.

Right.

Ezekiel writes down the date (January 15), and then performs the sign-act with the cooking pot. Imagine what his neighbors thought weeks later when they got the news from Judah confirming that Ezekiel had known the correct date of the beginning of the siege. No letter. No messenger. But he knew.

Most cooking pots at this time were clay. And if you’re a person who likes to go down random rabbit holes online, and you fancy rediscovering “lost arts,” look into cooking with clay cookware. Nearly every culture has some kind of traditional clay cooking vessel. In ancient Israel, they looked like this:

But the pot in Ezekiel’s cooking demonstration is bronze (v11).

“Long ago, at many times and in many ways, God spoke to our fathers by the prophets,”
‭‭Hebrews‬ ‭1‬:‭1‬ ‭ESV‬‬

God has been speaking to the people by the prophet Ezekiel in many ways. He has acted out a lot of odd things. And now, he hauls a pot out in the yard and starts building a fire to make bone broth.

“…Put a pot on the fire, and pour in some water. Fill it with choice pieces of meat— the rump and the shoulder and all the most tender cuts. Use only the best sheep from the flock, and heap fuel on the fire beneath the pot. Bring the pot to a boil, and cook the bones along with the meat.”
‭‭Ezekiel‬ ‭24‬:‭3‬-‭5‬ ‭NLT‬‬

Once the meat is cooked, Ezekiel is to pull the pieces out randomly, (v6).

If you’ve ever boiled meat (and especially meat on the bones) you know about the “scum” that collects on the surface. It’s a collection of proteins, rendered fats, and soluble compounds (often blood and connective tissue). While not harmful it is typically removed to improve the broth’s flavor, texture, and appearance.

If you left your pot of unskimmed broth on the stove and let the liquid boil away and the “scum” gets “baked on” the pot, you have a real mess to try to clean up.

In some cases, it might be easier to just throw the pot away.

That’s what Ezekiel does. On purpose.

“Yes, heap on the wood! Let the fire roar to make the pot boil. Cook the meat with many spices, and afterward burn the bones. Now set the empty pot on the coals. Heat it red hot! Burn away the filth and corruption. But it’s hopeless; the corruption can’t be cleaned out. So throw it into the fire.”
‭‭Ezekiel‬ ‭24‬:‭10‬-‭12‬ ‭NLT‬‬

Most modern ovens have a “self-cleaning” feature. Here’s how Wikipedia explains it:“A self-cleaning or pyrolytic oven is an oven which uses high temperature (approximately 932 °F (500 °C)) to burn off leftovers from baking using pyrolysis, which uses no chemical agents.” In plain English- it gets so hot that it turns the food mess inside the oven to ash that can easily be wiped clean after it cools.

The siege of Jerusalem is going to turn up the heat red hot. But not even that will bring the wicked inhabitants to repentance and purge the corruption from them.

Reminds me of this:

“The rest of mankind, who were not killed by these plagues, did not repent of the works of their hands nor give up worshiping demons and idols of gold and silver and bronze and stone and wood, which cannot see or hear or walk, nor did they repent of their murders or their sorceries or their sexual immorality or their thefts.”
‭‭Revelation‬ ‭9‬:‭20‬-‭21‬ ‭ESV‬‬

(This is yet another reminder that the fall of Jerusalem is the mini-model of the end-times Day of the LORD so we better pay attention.)

It takes something much stronger than a blazing fire to purge the filth of sin. It takes repentance and rebirth. That’s why there is no reform of the sinful nature in the New Testament. Sin is worse than we realize. You can’t reform it. It has to die. The sinful nature must be crucified and the one who trusts in Christ receives the resurrection life of Jesus. There is only one person with a righteous record and it’s Jesus. He offers to share His record with all who come to Him in obedient faith.

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The Death of Ezekiel’s Beloved Wife

Ezekiel is not an old man. He’s a happily married young man. And he adores his wife.

😐 I’ll say. Not many women would put up with Ezekiel’s weirdness. She must’ve been quite a woman.

Imagine knowing that your partner was going to die by the end of the day.

And also being told you’re not allowed to cry.

The fancy people who call themselves “prophet” and “prophetess” and who have ministries named after themselves and who speak at big conferences (for a price) – they better be glad they aren’t ACTUAL prophets like Ezekiel. No one in their right mind would sign up to be a prophet. People who truly function in the office of a Prophet have to be called by God and every one of them we’ve read about so far has had a pretty difficult, if not downright dreadful, life.

SIDE NOTE

I’ve mentioned this before but I will again. My view is that a NT believer can receive and use the “gift of prophecy” (1 Cor. 12 & 14), and its purpose is for exhortation, edification, and comfort (1 Cor. 14:3). But foretelling and forewarning seem (to me) to belong in a slightly different category; that of the ministry calling (role or office) of the prophet (Acts 11:27-28, Eph. 4:11-12).

I’m not dogmatic on this and I could be wrong. But it’s a distinction that I find helpful.

Back to Ezekiel and why no one would sign up to be a real prophet…

God is going to take away Ezekiel’s wife and Ezekiel’s seemingly indifferent response is going to be yet another sign.

Many of the 10,000+ exiles have family members back in Jerusalem and Judah.

“and I was told to give this message to the people of Israel. This is what the Sovereign Lord says: I will defile my Temple, the source of your security and pride, the place your heart delights in. Your sons and daughters whom you left behind in Judah will be slaughtered by the sword. Then you will do as Ezekiel has done. You will not mourn in public or console yourselves by eating the food brought by friends. Your heads will remain covered, and your sandals will not be taken off. You will not mourn or weep, but you will waste away because of your sins. You will groan among yourselves for all the evil you have done. Ezekiel is an example for you; you will do just as he has done. And when that time comes, you will know that I am the Sovereign Lord.”
‭‭Ezekiel‬ ‭24‬:‭21‬-‭24‬ ‭NLT‬‬

When Jerusalem finally falls, a messenger will come with the sad news. The exiles won’t mourn. They will just go about dejected without an appetite. But Ezekiel, he’ll finally be able to talk.