God Calls Us Back to the Place of Worship

Today's chapter, Ezekiel 40, tells of gates, walls, and chambers, and the account of measuring length and width goes on and on.

“Why would God have such things recorded in such detail?”

Think about the situation of the people who first heard these words.

Ezekiel saw this vision in the twenty-fifth year after they had been carried into exile. Fourteen years had also passed since Jerusalem fell. The temple had been destroyed, and the people were still living in a strange land.

The people must have thought:

“Can we ever worship God again? Will God take us back?”

Then the hand of God comes upon Ezekiel. In visions God brings him to a high mountain in the land of Israel and shows him the temple.

To a people still living in exile, God came first. It was God who began the restoration.

There stood a man shining like bronze, holding a measuring line and a measuring reed. He says to Ezekiel:

⁴And the man said to me, “Son of man, look with your eyes, and hear with your ears, and set your heart upon all that I shall show you, for you were brought here in order that I might show it to you. Declare all that you see to the house of Israel.”

The Hebrew behind “set your heart upon” literally means “put your heart.” It is a call to give your whole heart to what God is showing you.

To Ezekiel, who had lived amid ruins, God now shows the things he will bring to pass.

We, too, when hardships go on and on, let the circumstances before our eyes steal our hearts. Even as we sit before the Word, our worries sound loud and God's promises sound small. At such times we must listen again to what God is saying.

Now Ezekiel follows the man who is guiding him.

He passes the wall around the outside of the temple and goes in through the east gate. He examines the threshold and the guard rooms of the gate. In the outer court there is a pavement and thirty chambers. He examines the north gate and the south gate, then enters the inner court and sees the gates there as well.

Each time, the length and width are measured. The same measurements and the same structure are repeated. There are gates and steps, and there are spaces set apart. All this shows that serving God follows an order that God himself sets.

Israel had a temple before, too. But inside it they served idols and disregarded God's word. They said they were worshiping, yet in their lives they practiced injustice.

The temple that God shows them anew puts a question to the people:

“In whose presence, and by whose word, are you living?”

The God who loves us is a holy God. The grace that receives us turns us away from sin and makes us grow more like God.

So our prayers for restoration also need a confession like this:

“Lord, please watch over my situation. And let my heart and my life follow your word.”

If we are asking for peace in our homes while speaking hurtful words to our family, then our lips, too, must be brought before the Word.

As Ezekiel goes further in, the facilities for preparing the sacrifices come into view.

From verse 38 on, we find the chamber where the burnt offerings are washed, and the tables on which the offerings for the burnt offering, the sin offering, and the guilt offering are slaughtered. Next come the chambers for the priests who have charge of the temple and for the sons of Zadok, who have charge of the altar. In verse 47 we see the altar set in front of the temple.

⁴⁷And he measured the court, a hundred cubits long and a hundred cubits broad, a square. And the altar was in front of the temple.

Along with a way home to their own land, the people needed a way back to God. The sin that had separated them from God had to be dealt with. God had to forgive them and take them back.

We read this scene in the light of the New Testament. Hebrews 10 tells us that Jesus Christ offered his own body once for all, and that by that one sacrifice he made his people perfect. And it urges us to draw near to God by the blood of Jesus.

¹⁰And by that will we have been sanctified through the offering of the body of Jesus Christ once for all.

¹⁴For by a single offering he has perfected for all time those who are being sanctified.

As we look at the place of sacrifice that God showed Ezekiel, we think of Christ's perfect atonement. Our salvation rests on Jesus, who gave himself up on the cross.

So when you realize your sin, come to God, relying on Christ.

“Lord, I have done wrong. Forgive me and make me new.”

We can pray and worship today and call God our Father because Jesus opened the way for us to come to God.

Now Ezekiel arrives at the vestibule of the temple. Chapter 40 ends with the scene of that vestibule and its pillars being examined.

Why did God show all these things?

This vision leads on to chapter 43, where the glory of God comes to the temple once again. Seen in that flow, God's purpose in showing the temple becomes clear.

God dwells among his people and restores their life of worshiping him.

Coming out of exile and getting back their homes and their work was an urgent need. At the heart of that restoration was the grace of living with God.

From the time God first created humankind, he made us to live in fellowship with him. Sin broke that relationship, but God gave his covenant that he would dwell among his people, and to keep that promise he sent Jesus Christ.

God makes us his people and has us live with him. The church, too, stands on this grace.

Ephesians 2 says that Jews and Gentiles come to God together in Christ, and that in the Spirit they are being built together into a dwelling place for God.

¹⁹So then you are no longer strangers and aliens, but you are fellow citizens with the saints and members of the household of God,

²⁰built on the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Christ Jesus himself being the cornerstone,

²¹in whom the whole structure, being joined together, grows into a holy temple in the Lord.

²²In him you also are being built together into a dwelling place for God by the Spirit.

Think of the gathering where we, from different nations and languages, worship together. People who differ from one another call the same God Father. God has welcomed us as one family.

So even when we can't understand each other well, we should be patient with one another, look out for those in hard circumstances, and seek out those who are alone. For we are a family God has brought to live together.

Mission, too, grows out of this. Someone who did not know God hears the gospel, believes in Christ, and comes to worship together with God's people.

That is why the command in Ezekiel 40:4 does not end with hearing and seeing.

⁴And the man said to me, “Son of man, look with your eyes, and hear with your ears, and set your heart upon all that I shall show you, for you were brought here in order that I might show it to you. Declare all that you see to the house of Israel.”

“Declare all that you see to the house of Israel.”

Ezekiel had to proclaim the restoration God would bring to a people worn out from long waiting.

We, too, can pray with a discouraged brother, share the forgiveness of Jesus with someone held back by guilt, and invite our neighbors to the place of worship.

Dear brothers and sisters, picture someone who looked at the plans for a house and saw the life they would share there with their family.

For a people who remembered the ruined temple, this word was a great hope. God shows them once more a place to worship and makes a way for them to come to him.

Let us, too, come to God relying on Christ, bringing our worries, our hardships, and even our shameful sins. Let us set our hearts on the Word, repent, and obey in the places entrusted to us.

In Christ, God has received us. Now let us begin this day as worshipers who live with God.

Let us pray.