The word of the Lord came to Ezekiel as God's mouthpiece among the captives in Babylonia, opening a rebuke of foolish prophets who follow their own spirit and have seen nothing yet claim the Lord has spoken when He has not sent them. The rebuke was true in Ezekiel's time and also stands as a prophecy of conditions among God's professed people in the last days. The breach they fail to repair is the breaking of God's law by removing the seventh-day Sabbath and attempting to replace it with Sunday observance. Ministers who defend Sunday keeping without a command from God offer untempered mortar, claiming the Lord has spoken when He has not, and their weak wall daubed to cover the change of the law cannot stand when God's judgments come. They falsely soothe the people by crying peace where there is none, so their errors must be exposed and the breach thoroughly repaired rather than covered with insecure teaching.
Setting and Rebuke
The word of the Lord came to Ezekiel, who stood as God's mouthpiece among the captives in Babylonia by the river Chebar while Jeremiah prophesied in Jerusalem. That coming of the word opens a rebuke against the foolish prophets who follow their own spirit and have seen nothing. It condemns religious teachers who say the Lord says when the Lord has not sent them and has not spoken.
Those denounced have seen vanity and lying divination and make others hope that their word will be confirmed. Because they have spoken vanity and seen lies, God declares that He is against them. Their false message leads Israel to trust what is false, and their false support is pictured as a wall built crookedly and covered with untempered mortar that will fall. This exposes those who promise to test the Sabbath question by the Bible and then turn from the Bible to trust in tradition only, resting their case on human authority instead of the law and the testimony, even as it applies to ministers who defend Sunday keeping without a command from God and to the need to stand by God's standard and obey it rather than follow human tradition or merely claim to speak for God.
The prophets so exposed are light and treacherous, profaning the sanctuary and doing violence to God's law. They are headstrong and despise God, causing His people to err while strengthening the hands of the wicked. They prophesy out of their own heart having seen nothing, running though God has not sent them and speaking what He has not spoken. As counterfeits, their very existence proves that there are true prophets.
Prophecy for the Last Days
The word that came to Ezekiel spoke truly of his own time and at the same time symbolized conditions in the last days. It stands with Isaiah 30 and Ezekiel 22 as prophecy about the same people and the same time, applied to God's professed people in the last days. It condemns professed servants of God who fail to repair the breaches in the spiritual hedge formed by God's law and gospel truth, putting false teaching in place of that truth. Their errors must be exposed, and the breach in the spiritual defenses must be thoroughly repaired rather than covered over with insecure teaching.
Because they do not repair the breach in the defense of the people, they will not be able to stand in the battle of the day of the Lord, and they will be excluded from the record and inheritance of Israel. Their substitute teaching is a weak and crooked wall covered with untempered mortar, which however polished it appears cannot stand when God's judgments come. That wall with its builders and its supporters will fall, for no permanent solid structure can be made from such incohesive particles, and the unsound religious work it represents cannot be upheld. The chapter is connected with the great hailstorm that serves as heaven's artillery during the battle of the great day under the seventh plague. Its false prophets cry peace and assurance when danger is present, falsely soothing the people by declaring peace where there is none, including false hopes of peace and a coming millennium through a humanly altered law.
Those who invent lies and lead others to trust them face great condemnation. The warning is a call to make preparation before judgment comes, for when the decree is made that the unjust remain unjust, Jesus' mediation has ended and no one can then come to the Father. That prospect makes present diligence and earnest seeking of God necessary.
Sabbath Truth Versus Tradition
The breach left unrepaired is the removal of the seventh-day Sabbath from God's law and the attempt to replace it with Sunday observance, and those who teach that change claim to speak for the Lord when He has not spoken, using cunning to mislead with false hopes. They fail to mend the people's defense and therefore cannot stand in the battle of the day of the Lord, being excluded from the record and inheritance of Israel. Their false teaching promises peace and a coming millennium through a humanly altered law, but the wall they build and reinforce will fall, and its builders and supporters will fall with it.
Ministers who defend Sunday keeping without any command from God offer arguments that are the untempered mortar daubed upon that weak wall. Those who declare the first day holy without scriptural authority fulfill the charge against prophets who claim the Lord has spoken when He has not. The rebuke falls on foolish prophets who follow their own spirit and have seen nothing, yet say the Lord saith when the Lord has not sent them and has not spoken. Having seen vanity and lying divination and having caused others to hope their word would be confirmed, they have spoken vanity and seen lies, so God declares He is against them. This exposes those who promise to test the Sabbath question by the Bible and then turn from the Bible to trust in tradition only, resting their case on human authority instead of the law and the testimony.
The theory that God gave one seventh portion of time for rest, held instead of keeping the seventh day as the Sabbath commanded by God, is an unscriptural human inference that falls under the same rebuke against teaching one's own inference as truth. The image of a wall built by one person and daubed by others represents that unsound religious work upholding the change of God's law and Sabbath, and it will fall. It is a wall built crookedly and covered with untempered mortar by prophets who follow their own spirit, claim God has spoken when He has not sent them, and lead Israel to trust a false message. The call therefore is to stand by God's standard and obey it, rather than follow human tradition or merely claim to speak for God.
Changing the law and breaking the everlasting covenant cannot stand, nor can covering sectarian prejudice and division with large charity and tolerance, nor yielding principle for peace. The wall and those who daub it come to ruin, because no permanent solid structure can be made from such incohesive particles. By contrast, holding the word exactly as it reads and being of one mind and one judgment builds up fitly joined together into a perfect building in Christ.
Prophecies and wonderful works done in the name of Jesus by those who work iniquity are a vain vision and a lying divination, for iniquity means lawlessness and transgression of the commandments of God. Uniting profession of faith and claim of the gifts of the Spirit with disregard of the commandments and teaching that the commandments are abolished proves the claim false. Those who transgress the law have no vision from God, their religion is vain, and no matter how loud their profession and how many wonderful works they do they are self-deceived and will perish at the final rejection when Jesus says Depart from me. God does not bestow the precious gifts of His Spirit where the law is rejected, for antinomianism and the Spirit cannot go together.
The word of the Lord came to Ezekiel as God's mouthpiece among the captives in Babylonia, opening a rebuke of foolish prophets who follow their own spirit and have seen nothing yet claim the Lord has spoken when He has not sent them. The rebuke was true in Ezekiel's time and also stands as a prophecy of conditions among God's professed people in the last days. The breach they fail to repair is the breaking of God's law by removing the seventh-day Sabbath and attempting to replace it with Sunday observance. Ministers who defend Sunday keeping without a command from God offer untempered mortar, claiming the Lord has spoken when He has not, and their weak wall daubed to cover the change of the law cannot stand when God's judgments come. They falsely soothe the people by crying peace where there is none, so their errors must be exposed and the breach thoroughly repaired rather than covered with insecure teaching.
Setting and Rebuke
The word of the Lord came to Ezekiel, who stood as God's mouthpiece among the captives in Babylonia by the river Chebar while Jeremiah prophesied in Jerusalem. That coming of the word opens a rebuke against the foolish prophets who follow their own spirit and have seen nothing. It condemns religious teachers who say the Lord says when the Lord has not sent them and has not spoken.
Those denounced have seen vanity and lying divination and make others hope that their word will be confirmed. Because they have spoken vanity and seen lies, God declares that He is against them. Their false message leads Israel to trust what is false, and their false support is pictured as a wall built crookedly and covered with untempered mortar that will fall. This exposes those who promise to test the Sabbath question by the Bible and then turn from the Bible to trust in tradition only, resting their case on human authority instead of the law and the testimony, even as it applies to ministers who defend Sunday keeping without a command from God and to the need to stand by God's standard and obey it rather than follow human tradition or merely claim to speak for God.
The prophets so exposed are light and treacherous, profaning the sanctuary and doing violence to God's law. They are headstrong and despise God, causing His people to err while strengthening the hands of the wicked. They prophesy out of their own heart having seen nothing, running though God has not sent them and speaking what He has not spoken. As counterfeits, their very existence proves that there are true prophets.
Prophecy for the Last Days
The word that came to Ezekiel spoke truly of his own time and at the same time symbolized conditions in the last days. It stands with Isaiah 30 and Ezekiel 22 as prophecy about the same people and the same time, applied to God's professed people in the last days. It condemns professed servants of God who fail to repair the breaches in the spiritual hedge formed by God's law and gospel truth, putting false teaching in place of that truth. Their errors must be exposed, and the breach in the spiritual defenses must be thoroughly repaired rather than covered over with insecure teaching.
Because they do not repair the breach in the defense of the people, they will not be able to stand in the battle of the day of the Lord, and they will be excluded from the record and inheritance of Israel. Their substitute teaching is a weak and crooked wall covered with untempered mortar, which however polished it appears cannot stand when God's judgments come. That wall with its builders and its supporters will fall, for no permanent solid structure can be made from such incohesive particles, and the unsound religious work it represents cannot be upheld. The chapter is connected with the great hailstorm that serves as heaven's artillery during the battle of the great day under the seventh plague. Its false prophets cry peace and assurance when danger is present, falsely soothing the people by declaring peace where there is none, including false hopes of peace and a coming millennium through a humanly altered law.
Those who invent lies and lead others to trust them face great condemnation. The warning is a call to make preparation before judgment comes, for when the decree is made that the unjust remain unjust, Jesus' mediation has ended and no one can then come to the Father. That prospect makes present diligence and earnest seeking of God necessary.
Sabbath Truth Versus Tradition
The breach left unrepaired is the removal of the seventh-day Sabbath from God's law and the attempt to replace it with Sunday observance, and those who teach that change claim to speak for the Lord when He has not spoken, using cunning to mislead with false hopes. They fail to mend the people's defense and therefore cannot stand in the battle of the day of the Lord, being excluded from the record and inheritance of Israel. Their false teaching promises peace and a coming millennium through a humanly altered law, but the wall they build and reinforce will fall, and its builders and supporters will fall with it.
Ministers who defend Sunday keeping without any command from God offer arguments that are the untempered mortar daubed upon that weak wall. Those who declare the first day holy without scriptural authority fulfill the charge against prophets who claim the Lord has spoken when He has not. The rebuke falls on foolish prophets who follow their own spirit and have seen nothing, yet say the Lord saith when the Lord has not sent them and has not spoken. Having seen vanity and lying divination and having caused others to hope their word would be confirmed, they have spoken vanity and seen lies, so God declares He is against them. This exposes those who promise to test the Sabbath question by the Bible and then turn from the Bible to trust in tradition only, resting their case on human authority instead of the law and the testimony.
The theory that God gave one seventh portion of time for rest, held instead of keeping the seventh day as the Sabbath commanded by God, is an unscriptural human inference that falls under the same rebuke against teaching one's own inference as truth. The image of a wall built by one person and daubed by others represents that unsound religious work upholding the change of God's law and Sabbath, and it will fall. It is a wall built crookedly and covered with untempered mortar by prophets who follow their own spirit, claim God has spoken when He has not sent them, and lead Israel to trust a false message. The call therefore is to stand by God's standard and obey it, rather than follow human tradition or merely claim to speak for God.
Changing the law and breaking the everlasting covenant cannot stand, nor can covering sectarian prejudice and division with large charity and tolerance, nor yielding principle for peace. The wall and those who daub it come to ruin, because no permanent solid structure can be made from such incohesive particles. By contrast, holding the word exactly as it reads and being of one mind and one judgment builds up fitly joined together into a perfect building in Christ.
Prophecies and wonderful works done in the name of Jesus by those who work iniquity are a vain vision and a lying divination, for iniquity means lawlessness and transgression of the commandments of God. Uniting profession of faith and claim of the gifts of the Spirit with disregard of the commandments and teaching that the commandments are abolished proves the claim false. Those who transgress the law have no vision from God, their religion is vain, and no matter how loud their profession and how many wonderful works they do they are self-deceived and will perish at the final rejection when Jesus says Depart from me. God does not bestow the precious gifts of His Spirit where the law is rejected, for antinomianism and the Spirit cannot go together.