Same judgment pronounced by Israel's converted rebel (Acts 28:25-27)
Paul describes Isaiah as "very bold" in declaring
his Gentile reception and Israel's rejection (Romans 10:20-21)
Paul also "waxed bold" when turning to the Gentiles
in the face of the blasphemy of the Jews (Acts 13:45-46)
Paul describes Israel's blindness as temporary until the
fullness of the Gentiles is complete and then quotes Isaiah again to show that God will save Israel, according
to His covenant promise (Romans 11:25-27 cf. Isaiah 59:20-21)
The first time that "the Word of the Lord came"
to Jeremiah, a "son ... of the priests", was when he was a child, a teenage youth, during the reign of
Judah's last good king, Josiah (Jeremiah 1:1-4)
Jeremiah is told that the Lord "sanctified"
and "ordained" him a prophet before the Lord "formed thee in the belly" (Jeremiah 1:5)
Paul was similarly told that "it pleased God, Who
separated me from my mother's womb, and called me by His grace" (Galatians 1:15)
Jeremiah is told not to "say I am a child" who
"cannot speak", but "whatsoever I command thee thou shalt speak" (Jeremiah 1:6-7)
The Lord encourages him "not be afraid of their faces",
because "I am with thee to deliver thee" (Jeremiah 1:8)
The Lord further assures Jeremiah, "I have put My
words in thy mouth", which He witnessed when "the Lord put forth His hand, and touched my mouth"
(Jeremiah 1:9)
Jeremiah's commission is two-fold:
Nations and kingdoms will be "rooted out", but
Israel will yet be replanted (Jeremiah 1:10) in the days when God makes a new covenant with Israel (Jeremiah 31:27-28,31-34,38-40)
"The Word of the Lord came" again to Jeremiah
and declared that "I will hasten My Word to perform it" as the "rod of an almond tree", which
is the first to awaken from winter's sleep (Jeremiah 1:11-12)
The Babylonians as a "seething pot" from the
North would destroy the walls of Jerusalem, because of Judah's idolatry (Jeremiah 1:13-16)
This happened when "Nebuchadnezzar, king of Babylon"
came against Jerusalem and "the city was broken up"; he "brake down the walls of Jerusalem"
(Jeremiah 39:1-2,7-8; Jeremiah 52:5,12-14)
The Lord encourages Jeremiah again after being commissioned
to prophesy judgment, "be not dismayed at their faces" (Jeremiah 1:17)
"I have made thee this day a defenced city, and an
iron pillar, and brazen walls against the whole land" (Jeremiah 1:18)
Israel's Tribulation overcomers are given a similar promise
to "rule the nations with a rod of iron" (Revelation 2:26-27)
"They shall fight against thee; but they shall not
prevail against thee; for I am with thee" (Jeremiah 1:19)
The Lord's disciples and Israel's Tribulation overcomers
are given a similar promise, "And ye shall be hated of all men for my Name's sake. But there shall not an
hair of your head perish." (Luke 21:17-18)
The Word of the Lord came to Ezekiel in the thirtieth
year after Judah's last revival under Judah's last good king (Josiah) - the time is marked from the finding of
a copy of the Law and the greatest passover celebration ever held (Ezekiel 1:1 cf.II Kings 22:1-3,10-11;II Kings 23:21-23,30-37;II Kings 24:1-2)
Ezekiel sees the "heavens opened" and beholds
"visions of God" in the "land of the Chaldeans" (Ezekiel 1:1,3)
The Glory of the Lord is witnessed outside of Israel in
the land of the Captivity, which is indicative that although His House was still standing in Jerusalem, His Glory
had already departed from there (Ezekiel 10:4,18; Ezekiel 11:23-24)
The four faces of the cherubim, living creatures (Ezekiel 1:5,10 cf. Ezekiel 10:20-22),
which attend the Glory of God, represent kingship over each part of God's living creation:
The apostle John sees this same Glorious Throne scene
"set in heaven" (Revelation 4:2-7), where praise is offered up for the Lord's redemption and exaltation of His earthly people
(Revelation 5:7-10)
This revelation of the Lord's Glory made both prophet
and apostle "fall down" prostrate before Him (Ezekiel 1:28 cf. Revelation 1:17)
Even though Israel is "stiff-hearted", Ezekiel
is to say unto them, "Thus saith the Lord" (Ezekiel 2:4) and they will "know that there hath been a prophet among them" no matter "whether
they will hear, or whether they will forbear" (Ezekiel 2:5)
Israel's rulers "took knowledge" that Peter
and John "had been with Jesus" when they saw their "boldness" and yet "perceived that
they were ignorant and unlearned men" (Acts 4:13)
Likewise, Ezekiel is told not to be "afraid of their
words" nor "dismayed at their looks" and is told to "speak My Words" (Ezekiel 2:7)
as in "Thus saith the Lord" (Ezekiel 2:4)
Ezekiel is told not to be rebellious like his nation,
but rather to "open thy mouth" and "eat" (Ezekiel 2:8) the Lord's Words, "a roll of a book" (Ezekiel 2:9), wherein contain "lamentations, and mourning, and woe" (Ezekiel 2:10)
The "Words of God" were "sweet to the taste"
(his spirit), but "bitter to the digestion" (his flesh):
God tells Ezekiel to "eat this roll" and "caused
him to eat" and it was "sweet as honey" in his mouth (Ezekiel 3:1-3)
Note the contents of the "roll of the book"
(Ezekiel 2:9-10)
God tells Ezekiel to go and speak to Israel, a "hard-hearted"
people with a known language who "will not hearken"; whereas had He sent him to "people of a strange
speech and of a hard language", they "would have hearkened" (Ezekiel 3:4-7)
Paul quotes Isaiah in confirmation of his ministry as
that of rejection by the Jews and reception by the Gentiles (Romans 10:20-21 cf. Isaiah 65:1-2)
God tells Ezekiel that He has made his face "strong
against their faces" and his forehead "harder than flint" (Ezekiel 3:8-9)
Note the similarity to what God made Jeremiah (Jeremiah 1:18)
God tells Ezekiel to receive His Words into his heart
and "hear with thine ears" and to go and tell his people in captivity, "Thus saith the Lord God"
(Ezekiel 3:10-11)
"Thus saith the Lord God" occurs 122 times in
the book of Ezekiel alone and only 20 times in all the other books of the prophets combined
Ezekiel says that the Spirit "took me up" and
he heard the Spirit as the "voice of a great rushing" and he heard the movement of the cherubim as the
"noise of a great rushing"; he then says that the Spirit "lifted me up and took me away" and
"I went in bitterness" and "then I came to them of the Captivity" (Ezekiel 3:12-15)
The Lord makes reference to the Spirit as the "sound
of the wind" and associates it with Israel's being "born again" (via resurrection) at His Second
Coming (John 3:1-10 cf. Ezekiel 37:1-14)
God has set Ezekiel as a watchman to Israel to warn both
the wicked to turn away from sin and the righteous to sin not; if he doesn't warn them then "his blood will
I require at thine hand", but if he does warn them then "thou hast delivered thy soul" (Ezekiel 3:17-21)
Paul tells the Ephesian church elders that he is "pure
from the blood of all men", because "I have not shunned to declare unto you all the counsel of God"
(Acts 20:26-27)
God tells Ezekiel to go forth and he "beholds the
Glory of the Lord" and "falls on his face" (Ezekiel 3:22-23)
John "leaned on the breast" of the lowly Jesus
(John 21:20-24), but "fell at His feet as dead" before the glorified Son of Man (Revelation 1:13-17)
Ezekiel says that the Spirit "entered into me"
and "set me upon my feet" and "spoke with me"; the Spirit told him to "shut thyself within
thine house" and "thou shalt be dumb" (Ezekiel is NOT to reprove), but "when I speak with thee,
I will open thy mouth" (God will reprove); God reiterates twice that Israel is a "rebellious house"
(Ezekiel 3:24-27)
When God regathers and sanctifies Israel in their land
for His Holy Name's sake, He will take away Israel's "stony heart" and will replace it with a "heart
of flesh" by His Spirit (Ezekiel 36:22-28)
This will be the establishment of God's "New Covenant"
with Israel (Jeremiah 31:31-34)
His countenance was as "lightning", which heralds
His return in judgment (Matthew 24:27-28)
His omniscient eyes burn as "lamps of fire"
and His arms and feet are strong as "burnished brass" and His voice as that of "a multitude"
and "the sound of many waters" (Revelation 1:14-15)
Daniel's companions "greatly quaked" and "fled"
and "hid" themselves (Daniel 10:7) and Daniel was "left alone" and "retained no strength" (Daniel 10:8)
God puts Daniel into "a deep sleep" and lets
him "hear His Words" of prophecy concerning Israel's final tribulation (Daniel 10:9,14) just as He caused "a deep sleep" to fall on Abraham when He gave him the prophecy
of Israel's first bondage (Genesis 15:12-14)
Daniel is humbled again, "I became dumb" (Daniel 10:15),
and so the angel "touched my lips" and "opened my mouth" (Daniel 10:16) and again, confessed that there "remained no strength in me" and there was "no
breath left in me" (Daniel 10:17)
The angel "touched me" and "strengthened
me" (Daniel 10:18) and said "be strong" and "I was strengthened", because "thou hast
strengthened me" (Daniel 10:19)
The angel said that "I come unto thee" (Daniel 10:20)
to "show thee" (Daniel 10:21) as God had commanded earlier, "Gabriel, make this man to understand the vision"
(Daniel 8:16)
The Lord made John to understand via an angelic instructor
the visions which he saw of "things which must shortly come to pass" (Revelation 1:1-2)
Daniel was told to "SEAL the book ... TILL the TIME
OF THE END" (Daniel 12:4,9)
John was told to "SEAL NOT ... this book: for the
TIME IS AT HAND" (Revelation 22:10)