I will cut off both righteous and wicked
Sun, 18 September, 2005: Today’s Bible readings.
1 The word of the LORD came to me: 2 “Son of man, set your face toward Jerusalem and preach against the sanctuaries. Prophesy against the land of Israel 3 and say to the land of Israel, Thus says the LORD: Behold, I am against you and will draw my sword from its sheath and will cut off from you both righteous and wicked. 4 Because I will cut off from you both righteous and wicked, therefore my sword shall be drawn from its sheath against all flesh from south to north. 5 And all flesh shall know that I am the LORD. I have drawn my sword from its sheath; it shall not be sheathed again.
God tells Ezekiel that He will bring judgment against Israel because of their continued disobedience. The were to be the people of God, but they were living in rebellion against Him. And so He will bring the sword of judgment, and it will show all that God is the LORD.
What do we learn from this?
God displays that He is the LORD when He comes in judgment. And when the visible church is in blatant disobedience to Him, God will bring judgement against it. God will not let those who claim to be His people to continue in rebellion against Him unjudged.
Notice that God says that his judgement will fall on both righteous and wicked. The righteous do not necessarily get a free pass when judgement falls upon the disobedient church. They will suffer too.
Where is Christ in this passage?
Here we see that judgment will sometimes fall on both the righteous and the wicked. We understand that the righteous are those who are trusting in God for salvation, and are attempting (however imperfectly) to live lives that are pleasing to God. They are not righteous in that they are perfect. But as they are in Jesus Christ, they are righteous in God’s eyes. They have the perfect righteousness of Christ applied to them, and so God declares them to be righteous. This doesn’t exempt them from suffering, and they will suffer in the general judgment of God. But when they stand before God on judgment day, He will declare them to be righteous and acceptable to Him because of the person and work of Jesus Christ.
