Ezekiel 9 ~ He said

Arch of Titus, in Rome, depicting the destruction of Jerusalem 70 A.D., the only people not killed were brought to Rome as slaves. These are the Tools of the Temple, minus the Ark of the Covenant - disappeared in 2 Maccabees 2:4-8 as Jeremiah had it hidden.

Ezekiel 9 ~ (New International Version)

Audio Link to Ezekiel 9

¹ Then I heard him call out in a loud voice, "Bring the guards of the city here, each with a weapon in his hand." ² And I saw six men coming from the direction of the upper gate, which faces north, each with a deadly weapon in his hand. With them was a man clothed in linen who had a writing kit at his side. They came in and stood beside the bronze altar.

³ Now the glory of the God of Israel went up from above the cherubim, where it had been, and moved to the threshold of the temple. Then the LORD called to the man clothed in linen who had the writing kit at his side ⁴ and said to him, "Go throughout the city of Jerusalem and put a mark on the foreheads of those who grieve and lament over all the detestable things that are done in it."

⁵ As I listened, he said to the others, "Follow him through the city and kill, without showing pity or compassion. ⁶ Slaughter old men, young men and maidens, women and children, but do not touch anyone who has the mark. Begin at my sanctuary." So they began with the elders who were in front of the temple.

⁷ Then he said to them, "Defile the temple and fill the courts with the slain. Go!" So they went out and began killing throughout the city. ⁸ While they were killing and I was left alone, I fell facedown, crying out, "Ah, Sovereign LORD! Are you going to destroy the entire remnant of Israel in this outpouring of your wrath on Jerusalem?"

⁹ He answered me, "The sin of the house of Israel and Judah is exceedingly great; the land is full of bloodshed and the city is full of injustice. They say, 'The LORD has forsaken the land; the LORD does not see.' ¹⁰ So I will not look on them with pity or spare them, but I will bring down on their own heads what they have done."

¹¹ Then the man in linen with the writing kit at his side brought back word, saying, "I have done as you commanded."

When we read Isaiah, it is difficult to tell if Isaiah speaks to past, present or future. Ezekiel has the same Spirit quality.

In 3 A.D., when we look at the guards speaking to the man with the writing kit, aren't we reminded of Pontius Pilate proclaiming in 3 languages "This is the King of the Jews". Not only did Pilate write it, Pilate commanded the guards to watch over His tomb. Pilate eventually faced losing his military career for sending his troops to attack & kill citizens of Judea. Sometimes his troops were hidden among the crowds for better crowd penetration - once for using Temple money to build a Roman aqueduct. In 70 A.D., when Jesus would have died a natural and timely death, Jerusalem was obliterated by Titus' troops.

In 581 B.C., Priest turned Prophet, Ezekiel had already been taken to Babylon, it looked as if Nebuchadnezzar would continue to use the corrupt Jerusalem, Kingdom of Judah as his puppet state for a long time. No one was expecting Nebuchadnezzar to raze the Kingdom & the First Temple - the one Solomon built.

When we see this passage as the destruction of the First Temple, the people who remained after the destruction of the 1st Temple were the Samaritans. The despised Samaritans. The ones Jesus declared Himself first to in John 4. The remaining people did not have a copy of the Scriptures, but until the "remnant" returned from Babylon, the Samaritans, the unclean (in the eyes of man) continued to worship on the ruins of the Temple Mount and have prayer, worship and sacrifice. What man saw as unclean, the Lord saw as compassionate! The Samaritans had DNA studies done on them in the 1960s linking them to the tribes of Manasseh, Ephraim, and Levi.

Perhaps when the Samaritans were removed (other people without their lineage were removed as well) by the returning remnant from Babylon, this is why 2 Maccabees 2:4-8 wasn't fulfilled yet. Or perhaps God didn't want His Temple to hold the Ark until Jesus Christ was being welcomed into it.

The Lord described the condition of the remnant, struggling to worship God. Something we can relate to in the New Testament.

1 Corinthians 1:
⁷ Therefore you do not lack any spiritual gift as you eagerly wait for our Lord Jesus Christ to be revealed.

8 He will keep you strong to the end, so that you will be blameless on the day of our Lord Jesus Christ. ⁹ God, who has called you into fellowship with his Son Jesus Christ our Lord, is faithful.

¹⁸For the message of the cross is foolishness to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God. ¹⁹For it is written:
"I will destroy the wisdom of the wise;
the intelligence of the intelligent I will frustrate."

²⁰Where is the wise man? Where is the scholar? Where is the philosopher of this age? Has not God made foolish the wisdom of the world? ²¹For since in the wisdom of God the world through its wisdom did not know him, God was pleased through the foolishness of what was preached to save those who believe. ²²Jews demand miraculous signs and Greeks look for wisdom, ²³but we preach Christ crucified: a stumbling block to Jews and foolishness to Gentiles, ²⁴but to those whom God has called, both Jews and Greeks, Christ the power of God and the wisdom of God. ²⁵For the foolishness of God is wiser than man's wisdom, and the weakness of God is stronger than man's strength.

²⁶Brothers, think of what you were when you were called. Not many of you were wise by human standards; not many were influential; not many were of noble birth. ²⁷But God chose the foolish things of the world to shame the wise; God chose the weak things of the world to shame the strong. ²⁸He chose the lowly things of this world and the despised things—and the things that are not—to nullify the things that are, ²⁹so that no one may boast before him. ³⁰It is because of him that you are in Christ Jesus, who has become for us wisdom from God—that is, our righteousness, holiness and redemption. ³¹Therefore, as it is written: "Let him who boasts boast in the Lord."

Psalm 19:14

May the words of my mouth and the meditation of my heart
be pleasing in your sight,
O LORD, my Rock and my Redeemer.


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