November 1, 2020: Day 71 – Ezekiel 19

Just to be clear, this is a lamentation and it is used as a lamentation.  So, as we read in Ecclesiastes, there is a time and a season for all things, including lamentations.  A lament is a time when we identify ways in which we are feeling abandoned and distraught because of the life situations that are a part of our current reality.  Every now and then it is important to make clear that we are in a time of lament.  The author of Ezekiel wanted to make clear that what he had just written in very poetic form was meant to be a lament.

We find two very different images that are given to us in order to depict the current state of the nation of Israel.  The first is that of a lion which we find in Genesis 49:9 as the depiction of the son of Jacob whose name happened to be Judah.  Okay, it didn’t happen to be, it purposefully was Judah.  Remember, at this point Israel and Judah are both the people of God and Judah represents the Southern Kingdom.  So here we find this lion who is captured and brought for all to see in its captivity.  That would be Judah, the southern kingdom.  

The next image is that of a vineyard which is described as “your mother”.  This would be Israel who was plucked up and trampled on and then transplanted into the wilderness, into a dry and thirsty land.  This poetry which is really quite beautiful, describes the very tragic reality that the people of God found themselves which was in captivity, both the lion and the vine of vineyard.