WEEKLY SUNDAY
SCHOOL LESSON
An international
Sunday school lesson commentary
For
Sunday November 9, 2014
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readers worldwide
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THE
ALTAR, A SIGN OF HOPE
(Redemption
comes according to GOD’s blueprint, not ours)
(Ezekiel
43:13-21)
After
GOD decides to return HIS divine glory back into the Temple in Jerusalem, and
reside there once again among HIS people, HE tells Ezekiel to describe the
Temple plans, that, HE had shown him, to the people of Israel, and, to do it in
such a way that, it would bring to remembrance, the shame of all of their past
sins. GOD wanted the people to “feel the shame” for all of the profane things
that they had done in the old Temple, and let it be a deterrent from
re-visiting those same old trespasses again, after they begin to assemble in
the new Temple. Only if the people repent of their past behavior, was he to
describe the specifications of the construction of the new Temple to them.
GOD
wanted HIS people to be able to see HIS grace through HIS promise of restoration,
and be led to repent. Here HE stressed one basic primary law of the new Temple
that must be adhered to at all times, and that is; ABSOLUTE HOLINESS! In fact, GOD
says that the entire top of the hill where the Temple is built will be holy!
And the Temple itself must be adorned with holiness, not human ideals and
ingenuity.
Here, and in Ezekiel 44:5-9,
GOD is demanding “absolute holiness” from his people, the people who call
themselves by HIS name, and in today’s society, that means “Christians”. The
only way that man can be holy is by closely adhering to the Word, wisdom, and
directives of GOD at all times, especially in the Temple. Man has already
proven that he will not adhere to GOD’s holy standards when given a chance to
administer his own human ingenuity into GOD’s program in the Church. Eventually
he will began to totally favor his own program and religious ideas, and began
to ignore GOD altogether.
We must turn from the
practice of allowing people to minister in the Temple, who do not exhibit
through their behavior, that they really have a heart for GOD. There is to be
no hiring of people to work on staff who are not firmly rooted in the word of
GOD, and who have not first proven themselves by testing (dedokimasmetha), to
be free of worldly ideas that can be used to profane the Temple.
Only those who have
experienced a “spiritual circumcision” of the heart, and exhibits such through
their behavior at all times, may be able to minister in the Temple. This is
something that Ezra, Zerubbabel, Nehemiah, and the returning exiles heavily
stressed when they began to put GOD’s plan, that, was given to Ezekiel, into
practice (Ezra 4:1-3, Nehemiah 13:1-9).
Ezekiel
was allowed by GOD to see the same glory that had once adorned the Temple of
old in Jerusalem. Now GOD, would be coming back to Jerusalem, and resting in a
rebuilt glorified physical edifice, where HE would also restore the Israelites
relationship of friendship with HIM, and fulfill the covenant that HE had made
with Abraham.
As
Ezekiel’s prophecies continue to waver back and forward between pre-exilic,
post exilic, and eschatological times, here in the passage of Ezekiel 43,
verses 13-27, we find perhaps one of the more stronger arguments that the
prophet’s foretelling of the coming post-exilic Temple may not be descriptions
of a yet to come future eschatological restoration of Israel. Beginning in
verse 13 of this chapter, we see the detailed description of plans for a
sacrificial alter to be built in the new Temple.
Here
we can see that there is a theologically based problem with this being an
eschatological reference, instead of a post-exilic one, since CHRIST JESUS is
the once-and-for-all-time sacrifice that won us our salvation. Therefore, this
passage begs the question, Why will we need a sacrificial altar in the “Millennial
Kingdom Temple? And the answer is that, we won’t. Here in this passage Ezekiel
is clearly prophesying of the Temple that was built by the exiles who would
return to Israel from Babylon.
In
the Millennial Kingdom Temple there will be no need for a sacrifice altar or
Levitical priests of the family of Zadok to minister before the LORD on behalf
of the people for their sin because there will be no sinning in the Millennial
times here on earth under the direct rule of CHRIST. GOD will have already
cleansed us of our sin nature and filth and we will only have the desire to
live like CHRIST (Ezekiel 36:26-29). There will be no sinful desires in the
Millennial Kingdom as satan, sin, and death will be locked away for a thousand
years.
A
Sunday school lesson by,
Larry
D. Alexander
LARRY D. ALEXANDER- Official Website
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