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The Bible Breakdown
Ezekiel 46: Worship God's Way
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The More We Dig. The More We Find.
Well, hello everybody. Welcome back to the Bible Breakdown Podcast with your host, pastor Brandon, today, ezekiel, chapter 46, and today's title is Worship God's Way. Worship, god's Way, and we're going to talk about, as we're finishing up the book of Ezekiel, how, now that the kingdom of God has been restored and we're looking at the new heavens, the new earth, all the wonderful stuff, god then invites us into his presence and it's this wonderful invitation that we have to worship the Lord. We're going to get all that in just a moment. So, if you have your Bible, want to open up with me to Ezekiel, chapter 46. While you're doing that, if you're new here, as always, make sure you like, share and subscribe to the YouTube channel and the podcast. Make sure you leave us a five-star review on the podcast it always helps and make sure you're going to the bible breakdown discussion on facebook. There's an amazing group of people doing wonderful work there and the more we dig, the more we find. Well, once again, if you have your bibles, want to open up with me to ezekiel, chapter 46. Remember, as we are. You know we are already well man, we're well past, you know, crossing over third base and heading toward home. We're almost done, and the overall idea of Ezekiel is God's promise of renewal, and what we're starting to see now, as we're getting close to the end, is this is the promise of renewal. There's been this long journey that God has had them on, and it started with this just terrible moment of the destruction of Jerusalem, destruction of the temple. But now it's come full circle. The temple is being rebuilt and now worship is happening again. And so let's dive into this as we continue to finish up on Ezekiel, chapter 46.
Speaker 1:This is what the word of the Lord says in Ezekiel 46, verse 1. This is what the sovereign Lord says the east gateway of the inner courtyard will be closed during the sixvereign Lord says side. Then he will stand at the gate post while the priest offers his burnt offering and peace offering. He will bow down and worship inside the gateway passage and then go back out the way he came. The gateway will not be closed until evening. The common people will bow down and worship the Lord and remember every time you see L-O-R-D in all caps, that means Yahweh, so the divine covenant name of God. They will worship Yahweh in front of this gateway on the Sabbath days and the days of the new moon celebrations, each Sabbath day the prince will present to the Lord there's capital L-O-R-D. Again a burnt offering of six lambs, one ram, with no defects. He will present a grain offering, a basket of choice flour to go with the ram and whatever amount of flour he chooses to go with each lamb, and he is to offer one gallon of olive oil for each basket of flour. At the new moon celebrations he will bring one young bull, six lambs and one ram, all with no defects. With the young bull he must bring a basket of choice flour for a grain offering. With the ram he must bring another basket of flour and with each lamb he is to bring whatever amount of flour he chooses to give. With each basket of flour he must offer one gallon of olive oil to give. With each basket of flour he must offer one gallon of olive oil.
Speaker 1:The prince must enter the gateway through every entry room or through the entry room and he must leave the same way. But when the people come in through the north gateway to worship the Lord during the religious festivals, he must leave by the south gateway and those who entered through the south gateway must leave by the north gateway. They must never leave by the same gateway they entered into, but must always use the opposite gateway. This is going somewhere, I promise. Verse 10, the prince will enter and leave with the people on these occasions. So at the special feast and sacred festivals, the grain offering will be a basket of choice flour with each young bull, another basket of flour with each young bull, another basket of flour with each ram and as much flour as the worshiper chooses to give with each lamb. Give one gallon of olive oil with each basket of flour. When the prince offers a solitary burnt offering or peace offering to the Lord, the east gateway to the inner courtyard will be opened for him and he will offer his sacrifices as he does on Sabbath days. Then he will leave and the gateway will be shut behind him. Each morning you must sacrifice one year old lamb with no defects as a burnt offering to the Lord. With the lamb, a grain offering must also be given to the Lord about three quarts of flour with a third of a gallon of olive oil to moisten the choice flour. This will be a permanent law for you. The lamb, the grain offering and the olive oil must be given as a daily sacrifice, every morning, without fail. This is what the sovereign Lord says.
Speaker 1:If the prince gives a gift of land to one of his sons as an inheritance, he will belong to him and his descendants forever. But if the prince gives a gift of land from his inheritance to one of his servants, the servant may keep it only until the year of Jubilee, which comes every 50th year. At this time the lamb will return to the prince, but when the prince gives the gifts to his sons, those gifts will be permanent. The priest may never take anyone's property by force. If he gives property to his sons, it must be from his own land.
Speaker 1:Now pause for a second. That would make a lot of sense because, since the land was God's promised land, this is a very important thing because it should stay within the family, which also for what it's worth. Remember, they don't have this land right now. Now, there were some people who were left in Israel, but most of the people were taken here, there and everywhere, except for where they wanted to be, and so he's already saying when you return to the land, this is what's going to happen. So when this was written, it would have been wildly encouraging to the people, because they're saying okay, not only are we going to make it back, but God's already telling us how to conduct ourselves when we do so. Let's finish this up. The Bible says in verse 19,.
Speaker 1:In my vision, the man brought me through the entrance beside the gateway and led me to the sacred rooms assigned to the priests, which face toward the north. He showed me a place at the extreme west end of these rooms. He explained this is where the priest will cook the meat from the guilt offerings and sin offerings and bake the flour from the grain offerings into bread. They will do it to avoid carrying the sacrifices through the outer courtyard and endangering the people by transmitting holiness to them. Then he brought me back to the outer courtyard and led me to each of its four corners. In each of the corners I saw an enclosure. Each of these enclosures was 70 feet long, 5 1⁄2 feet wide and surrounded by walls. Along the inside of these walls was a ledge of stone with fireplaces under the ledge all the way around, with fireplaces under the ledge all the way around. The man said to me these are the kitchens that are to be used by the temple assistants to boil the sacrifices offered by the people.
Speaker 1:Now, what in the world was that all about and why should I care? Well, first of all, remember that it wasn't written to us, but it was written for us. It was written to an exile people who are all over the place except for where they want to be, which is back in their own land, surrounded by their family and with the temple of God as a place for them to worship. They're not there, and what God is saying I am going to renew everything. Remember, the overall idea of Ezekiel is God's promise of renewal, and so he's saying I'm going to renew it, and when I do this is how you're going to keep it, and I love this idea.
Speaker 1:I don't know if you've ever had a chance to go to a theme park such as Disney World or Universal, but these big parks and everything they have, all of these underground walkways for all of the employees, so that when they take out the trash, when they move back and forth, you never see an employee doing that. And the reason why is because they try to hide all of that stuff so that you can focus on what you're supposed to focus on. Well, they weren't the first ones to think of this. Actually, the priest would do this kind of stuff because he wanted to keep separate what they were doing from everybody else. But that's beside the point.
Speaker 1:The point of this is is God is saying when everything returns, this is how we're going to be in fellowship with one another. One of the things I love about this is number one God promises renewal, but then he also promises relationship. Can I tell you, the number one thing that we are after when it comes to Christianity is relationship relationship with God. The reason why we go to church is to celebrate our relationship with God and our relationship with one another. And the reason why we do all the things, the reason why we engage in spiritual disciplines, reading God's word like we're doing today, and prayer and all these other things, is so that we can have a relationship, have fellowship with God. And the number one thing that he is saying is don't forget, I'm not just going to restore everything for the sake of it. Restore it so it can be an environment where we can connect with one another. That's a wonderful lesson for us, because if we're not careful, sometimes we get so busy doing the things and stuff that we forget why we do the things and stuff. Think about it for just a moment.
Speaker 1:Why do you read your Bible? Why do you go to church on Sunday? Why do you pray? Why do you give in the offering? Why do you go to church on special things like worship nights and stuff like that? Why do you attend life groups?
Speaker 1:There are secondary reasons, such as connecting with God's people and all these other things, but the primary reason is about our relationship and about fellowship with God, and it's not always just to receive from God, but it's also to worship Him, to give to God. It's one of the things I love about going to church is that when we come together as a church, then we together are able to worship the Lord and there's a two-way relationship that's happening. It's he is blessing us and we are honoring him through our worship. So I want to ask you this question today. I want you to take a moment today and I want you to ask this question to yourself. As I ask it, and once again, that is why do you pray? Why do you go to church? Why do you give in the offering? Why do you read your Bible, like we're doing right now?
Speaker 1:And if it's anything other than because I want to know God more, then there's a course correction for us. There's plenty of good reasons and it's okay to have all those reasons, but the number one reason needs to be for us and God, because that is the reason why he does all this is so that we can have fellowship with him. Let's pray together right now, god, thank you so much for today. Thank you, god, that the reason why you do all of these things is so you can have relationship with us, is to get us back to the Garden of Eden where you walk with us in the cool of the day, we're able to see you and to know you and have fellowship with you. I pray today, god, that above everything else, that would be our heart cry that we can know you more and the power of your resurrection. In Jesus' name, we pray Amen. And what God's word says in Ezekiel 37, verse 14,. It says I will put my spirit in you and you will live again. I love you. I'll see you tomorrow. For Ezekiel, chapter 47.
