October 29, 2020: Day 68 – Ezekiel 16

This is a difficult chapter.  The entire premise of this chapter revolves around the image of Israel as a whore.  There, I said it, but I didn’t actually say it first, the Bible did!  I’m not blaming the Bible for something I did, but rather I’m trying to interpret what the Bible is trying to say to us as it gives us this image of Israel the whore.  We know that this isn’t the only time, in fact Israel being depicted as an unfaithful wife is not foreign.  We have the entire book of the Bible Hosea where the true prophet of the Lord is commanded to take a wife of whoredom.  

The story of Israel according to this chapter begins with Israel being an abandoned baby in the wilderness whom no one claimed.  God claimed that abandoned baby and took care of her, Israel, when no one else would.  This baby grew up into a young woman who then forgot God and her upbringing and decided to turn to the way of infidelity.  But she is different in that most who are described as “whores” (I hesitate to use this word but it really is the most accurate word in the Hebrew), normally charge and ask for money for their services.  But here the Scripture says that Israel was not even good at that.  Instead of demanding a fee, Israel paid other nations in order for those nations to abuse and take advantage of Israel.  But not all is lost.  There is hope.

When you turn to vs.59 and following you will see that God says that he has established his covenant with Israel and he will not forget her.  He will forgive Israel for all that she did and establish that covenant so that they will  know that God  is Lord.  That is something that we all need to be reminded of periodically.  God is Lord.  God is good, all the time, all the time, God is good.