The verse introduces the Lord's message to the prophet to address Jerusalem as a defiled land, and belongs to the section of prophetic warnings given before Jerusalem's destruction. The verses that follow accuse the prophets of conspiracy and violence, and the priests of violating God's law, profaning holy things, failing to distinguish between holy and common and between clean and unclean, and hiding their eyes from God's Sabbaths. Sabbath desecration was a grave sin among Israel that brought God's judgments upon the nation, and was among the sins that led to its repeated apostasy and eventual destruction as a nation.
The gap or breach in God's law is the neglected Sabbath commandment, which the priests and teachers fail to repair by hiding their eyes from God's Sabbaths. This was part of a pagan apostasy that replaced the Sabbath memorial with another practice, with sun-worship bringing Sunday as its worship day in place of the Sabbath of Jehovah. The chapter describes the same last-days work and people as Ezekiel 13, and restoring the Sabbath prepares God's people to stand in the day of the Lord. It describes the same time and people as Isaiah 30:8-11 and Jeremiah 6:9-19, namely the professed people of God in the last days walking in violation of God's precepts and law with uncircumcised, unrighteous, unbelieving ears that cannot hearken and no delight in the word of the Lord, refusing to walk in the old paths of God's commandments and to hearken to God's watchmen, and therefore facing evil brought upon them as the fruit of their thoughts.
The passage applies to professed Christian ministers who trample God's law and justify breaking it by teaching that the law Christ kept is Jewish, abolished, changed, and subject to man's will. They set aside the precept that reveals the Author of the law and put a day of pagan origin in place of the day God set apart, and by teaching that men may change or disregard God's law in one vital point they lead the mass of men to conclude it may be disregarded in all points, so that the increase of crime, murder, theft, and blasphemy are the legitimate fruits of that attitude. The verse begins a word of the Lord against men who teach what is not true, who prophesy lies in His name and make the people trust in a lie, and their lying teaching destroys the souls that believe it, even when the teachers themselves are deceived. The false prophet's cry has ever been peace and assurance in time of danger, healing the breach slightly and crying peace, peace when there is no peace, thereby lulling the people into slumber.
The verse introduces the Lord's message to the prophet to address Jerusalem as a defiled land, and belongs to the section of prophetic warnings given before Jerusalem's destruction. The verses that follow accuse the prophets of conspiracy and violence, and the priests of violating God's law, profaning holy things, failing to distinguish between holy and common and between clean and unclean, and hiding their eyes from God's Sabbaths. Sabbath desecration was a grave sin among Israel that brought God's judgments upon the nation, and was among the sins that led to its repeated apostasy and eventual destruction as a nation.
The gap or breach in God's law is the neglected Sabbath commandment, which the priests and teachers fail to repair by hiding their eyes from God's Sabbaths. This was part of a pagan apostasy that replaced the Sabbath memorial with another practice, with sun-worship bringing Sunday as its worship day in place of the Sabbath of Jehovah. The chapter describes the same last-days work and people as Ezekiel 13, and restoring the Sabbath prepares God's people to stand in the day of the Lord. It describes the same time and people as Isaiah 30:8-11 and Jeremiah 6:9-19, namely the professed people of God in the last days walking in violation of God's precepts and law with uncircumcised, unrighteous, unbelieving ears that cannot hearken and no delight in the word of the Lord, refusing to walk in the old paths of God's commandments and to hearken to God's watchmen, and therefore facing evil brought upon them as the fruit of their thoughts.
The passage applies to professed Christian ministers who trample God's law and justify breaking it by teaching that the law Christ kept is Jewish, abolished, changed, and subject to man's will. They set aside the precept that reveals the Author of the law and put a day of pagan origin in place of the day God set apart, and by teaching that men may change or disregard God's law in one vital point they lead the mass of men to conclude it may be disregarded in all points, so that the increase of crime, murder, theft, and blasphemy are the legitimate fruits of that attitude. The verse begins a word of the Lord against men who teach what is not true, who prophesy lies in His name and make the people trust in a lie, and their lying teaching destroys the souls that believe it, even when the teachers themselves are deceived. The false prophet's cry has ever been peace and assurance in time of danger, healing the breach slightly and crying peace, peace when there is no peace, thereby lulling the people into slumber.