Preacher Illustration

Every preacher loves a good sermon illustration. Sometimes, they use props. These are communication devices intended to help the hearer better catch the truth of God's Word in a multi-sensory experience that hearers can feel and experience. They are often what people remember after the sermon. 

In Ezekiel's case, the sermon illustration was himself. The first part of chapter four seems harmless enough. He's asked to arrange some cookware and bricks around his house. 

Ezekiel 4:1–3 (ESV) “And you, son of man, take a brick and lay it before you, and engrave on it a city, even Jerusalem. 2 And put siegeworks against it, and build a siege wall against it, and cast up a mound against it. Set camps also against it, and plant battering rams against it all around. 3 And you, take an iron griddle, and place it as an iron wall between you and the city; and set your face toward it, and let it be in a state of siege, and press the siege against it. This is a sign for the house of Israel.

The illustration is clear. We must be hearing of past events because Ezekiel is reenacting the very tactics Assyria and Babylon performed against Israel in the North and Judah in the South leading to the nation's destruction. 

Next, the Lord ups the proverbial ante for Ezekiel. 

Ezekiel 4:4–6 (ESV) “Then lie on your left side, and place the punishment of the house of Israel upon it. For the number of the days that you lie on it, you shall bear their punishment. 5 For I assign to you a number of days, 390 days, equal to the number of the years of their punishment. So long shall you bear the punishment of the house of Israel. 6 And when you have completed these, you shall lie down a second time, but on your right side, and bear the punishment of the house of Judah. Forty days I assign you, a day for each year.

Now this is a hard ask from the Lord. The message was to be as clear as possible. Israel's punishment was called for by the Lord and the people needed to know it would be long. But believe it or not, it gets worse. 

Ezekiel 4:10–13 (ESV) And your food that you eat shall be by weight, twenty shekels a day; from day to day you shall eat it. 11 And water you shall drink by measure, the sixth part of a hin; from day to day you shall drink. 12 And you shall eat it as a barley cake, baking it in their sight on human dung.” 13 And the LORD said, “Thus shall the people of Israel eat their bread unclean, among the nations where I will drive them.”

For the height of effect, the Lord asks Ezekiel to demonstrate the siege Israel will experience personally. He is to eat food cooked over human feces. An act the prophet refuses to perform. 

Ezekiel 4:14–15 (ESV) Then I said, “Ah, Lord GOD! Behold, I have never defiled myself. From my youth up till now I have never eaten what died of itself or was torn by beasts, nor has tainted meat come into my mouth.” 15 Then he said to me, “See, I assign to you cow’s dung instead of human dung, on which you may prepare your bread.”

Astonishing actions from the prophet to convey an astonishing message. The Lord's chosen nation will be utterly destitute because they refused to repent. 

What Ezekiel has shown us in these first four chapters is a picture of the ministry of the Word. Those who speak for God must have an experience with God, knowing Him personally (Ezekiel 1). They must feed on the Word of God, receiving it with joy for the sweetness it brings (Ezekiel 2). They must declare what God says without regard or fear, knowing their role in delivering the message is a calling of high accountability (Ezekiel 3). And now, in chapter four, we learn that the prophet must LIVE what he preaches. You cannot simply convey the message; you must be shaped by it. The Word of God affects not just the hearer but the speaker, sometimes in shocking ways. 

Ezekiel is demonstrating what the Word foretold for rebellion way back in Moses' day: 

Leviticus 26:39 (ESV) And those of you who are left shall rot away in your enemies’ lands because of their iniquity, and also because of the iniquities of their fathers they shall rot away like them.

This is why James 3 warns against many people desiring to be preachers. The call is enormous, the responsibility even larger, and the cost exceeds what we may deem rational. But if this is indeed the Word of the Most High God, should we expect anything less?