Ezekiel 35
The promise of Millennial blessing in chapter 34 leads the divine Author of the prophecies of Ezekiel to speak further about the closing scenes leading to the establishment of peace and righteousness on earth. An enemy to the south of Israel, Edom, the people of Esau, Jacob’s brother, has been briefly mentioned in chapter 25 (verses 12 to 14), and to that land of perpetual hatred the Holy Spirit here returns in His forecast of events yet to come. The reason for again mentioning Edom is plain: When all the earth rejoices, the land of Edom will be a desolation, an abiding token of the judgment of God to be seen throughout the coming thousand years of peace and blessing.
Mount Seir (verse 3) is the range of hills extending from north to south through the land of Edom, and Seir and Mount Seir are names applied to the country in Scripture. “Most desolate” in verses:3 and7 hardly expresses the full sense of the Hebrew original; it has been translated “a desolation and an astonishment.” In verses 4, 14 and 15, also, “desolate” is “a desolation”, a somewhat stronger term.
Little did the children of Esau reckon that God was taking notice, and would in due time visit them as a nation on account of their feeling toward their brother Jacob, and the treatment they accorded him, when opportunity arose.
It is idle for men, even Christians, in the light of the promised judgment of Edom, and (not to mention other Old Testament nations which will be revived to meet God’s righteous anger on account of the past) of that proud religious system called in Revelation 17 and 18 “the great whore” and “Babylon the great”, to deny that the offenses against God, His truth and His people, committed by bygone generations, will not be dealt with in judgment upon the living who occupy the same ground morally before Him.
God requires what is past, as the Preacher declares in Ecclesiastes 3:15, and the prophetic word in both Old and New Testaments gives abundant proof of this principle of His government.
Edom, non-existent today, as a nation, will be found again in its homeland as time draws on to the end of God’s patience with this world, and they will there again plot against the children of Israel (Psalm 83:6; Isaiah 34:5-17; Jeremiah 49:7-22).
The Edomites will, in the day of their judgment, know that He who deals with them is Jehovah’ (verses 4, 9 and 15). They will know it in His judgments. Philippians 2:10, 11, Revelation 1:7, and other passages point to those who will be in the class of the Edomites, —owning the power, and the just judgment of God, but strangers to His grace.
The Edomites had a deep-seated hatred of their kinsmen according to the flesh, the children of Jacob, and when Nebuchadnezzar’s army was accomplishing the destruction of Jerusalem, they helped them. Verse 5 in our chapter may be read: “Because thou...has given over the children of Israel to the power of the sword, in the time of their calamity, in the time of the iniquity, of the end...,” See also Amos 1:11, 12; Obadiah 11-14, and Psalm 137:7 which tell of the attitude of Edom when Jerusalem fell.
Of no other, land does Scripture promise such a judgment as that to be poured out on Edom:—perpetual desolations, and their cities without inhabitants (verses 9 and 15). They had planned to seize the land of Israel (“these two nations and these two countries” referring to Israel and Judah), but they forgot that that land is set apart for God’s earthly people (Deuteronomy 32:8). It never has been and it never will be a blessing to any other nation, but only to the Israel of God. They forgot, too, that Jehovah, the eternal God, heard all their reproaches, uttered against the mountains of Israel (verse 12), and their many words against Himself (verse 13).
“Because sentence against an evil work is not executed speedily, therefore the heart of the sons of men is fully set in them to do evil.” Ecclesiastes 8:11.
God’s long continued forbearance is misjudged by man, yet His word (if they would but believe it) fully declares that the day of His grace will end, Truly is it said,
“The fool hath said in his heart, There is no God.” (Psalms 14 and 53), and, “He that planted the ear, shall He not hear? He that formed the eye, shall He not see?” Psalm 94:9.
ML 02/02/1936