Ezekiel 34
Firstly, after the 33rd chapter, telling of individual responsibility before God, comes this one on the responsibility of the leaders and caretakers of His flock. Who of the kings of Israel and Judah had walked in David’s footsteps? With notable exceptions, they lived to please themselves, and cared little for the flock of God. That David sinned, and very grievously, too (and reaped of his sowing), is well-known, but comparing his course as a whole with his successors’, the contrast is not, in general, to their credit. (See 2 Samuel 24:17; 1 Kings 9:4 and 11:4-6; 2 Chronicles 12:1; 21:5, 6; 28:1-4; 33:1-9; 30:11-13, telling of some of the kings of Judah).
Of the kings of Israel (the ten tribes), not one feared God; Jeroboam (1 Kings 12:20-33 and 13: 33, 34), and Ahab (1 Kings 16:30-33) were outstanding among them as leaders in iniquity.
More wicked, however, will be the shepherds of the last days, just before the Lord’s appearing and kingdom.
Ezekiel was therefore directed to prophesy against the shepherds (rulers) of Israel who feed themselves, eat the fat and clothe themselves with the wool, killing the fattened sheep and neglecting to feed the flock (verses 2 and 3). Their whole course lay exposed before God: the weak they have not strengthened; they have not healed the sick, nor bound up what was broken, nor brought again what was driven away, nor sought for, what was lost; with harshness and with rigor they have ruled over the flock (verse 4).
As to the flock: they were scattered because there was no shepherd; they became meat to all the beasts of the field. Jehovah’s sheep wandered through all the mountains, were scattered upon all the face of the earth, and there was none that searched or that sought for them (verses 5 and 6). The language is figurative and looks on to the last days. The shepherds will then be held to account, and the sheep will be delivered from them by God (verse 10).
Verses 11 to 16 tell of the coming gathering of all Israel again in their own land, not in unbelief, as is the case with the Jews who have been and are returning to Palestine in our times. Then the blessed God, — “I, even I”, He says in the touching language of verses 11 to 13— “will both-search for My sheep, and tend them. As a shepherd tendeth his flock in the day that he is among his scattered sheep, so will I tend My sheep, and will deliver them out of all places whither they have been scattered in the cloudy and dark day. And I will bring them out from the peoples, and gather them from the countries; will bring them to their own land, and I will feed them upon the mountains of Israel by the water courses, and in all the habitable places of the country.”
And as if this were not enough of grace to the undeserving recipients of divine favor, verses 14 to 16 tell yet more of God’s unfailing purpose to bless Israel.
Necessarily, judgment will in that day overtake the “fat” and the “strong”—those who have enriched or strengthened themselves at the expense of the flock. Nor are all the oppressors shepherds or rulers, as verses 17 to 22 make plain. “Between cattle and cattle” in verse 17 means, as the marginal note shows, “between sheep and sheep”; in verses 20 and 22, likewise, sheep are referred to, rather than cattle. All the children of Israel are sheep in the figure used here of a flock belonging to God, but some of them will be dealt with on account of their ill treatment of their fellows.
Verses 23 to 31 introduce the Lord Jesus as the Shepherd of the royal line of David, who will feed His flock. A fresh and lovely picture is afforded of the thousand years of blessing on earth following which the history of this present world will close. It will be noted that there is no mention here of the Lord’s humiliation, as in Isaiah, for example; the reason is that in Ezekiel the whole of the twelve tribes are in view; the ten were not guilty of the rejection of their Messiah, as were the two tribes of Judah and Benjamin. Nor is the Messiah’s being Jehovah presented in Ezekiel’s prophecies for the reason that His humiliation is not mentioned.
God will make with Israel a covenant of peace; evil beasts shall cease in the land, and the people shall dwell in safety in the wilderness and sleep in the woods. Jerusalem (“My hill”) will be the center of blessing on earth, with Israel dwelling in God’s special favor. A “plant of renown” will God raise up for His people, even the Lord Jesus. The reproach of the Jew will be gone forever then (verses 25 to 29).
Israel (the believing and blest remnant) will know that Jehovah their God is with them, and that they, the house of Israel, are His people, God’s flock, the flock of His pasture; they are men, and He is their God. What grace is this that God will thus work in the scenes of man’s rebellion and the rejection of His Son!
Yet is there far richer blessing in store for those who give heed to the present message of grace to Jew and Gentile.
ML 01/26/1936