Ezekiel 3:1-3 - Homiletics.

Eating a book.

I. THE FOOD PROVIDED .

1 . This is in the form of literature. Ezekiel receives a written roll. All good literature is mental food—not merely a plaything or a sweetmeat, but soul stuff for sustaining intellectual life and promoting mental growth. God feeds our highest nature through literature. His Spirit comes through his Truth, his Truth is revealed in his Word, and his Word is contained in a book—the Bible.

2 . This must be taken as it is provided. Ezekiel did not write the roll. He found it. The word of God was sent to him. He did not invent or imagine it. We do not create Divine truth. We find it in the Bible. if we would be honest we must take what we discover there, and not feed on our own notions to the neglect of the Divine revelation.

3 . The Divine provision is full and ample. The roll was inscribed on both sides—"written within and without" ( Ezekiel 2:10 ). The Bible has far more in it than Ezekiel's roll. It is a library in itself, both extensive and closely filled. There is no verbosity in it. Its many words are rich and deep. No age will ever consume the whole of its vast and varied teachings.

II. THE MEAL CONSUMED . Ezekiel must not only read the roll; he must eat it. All Divine truth needs to be treated thus. We must feed on the Bible to profit by it.

1 . There must be personal appropriation. We take a thing to ourselves in the most absolute kind of possession when we eat it. No book will profit much until it is thus appropriated. The bibliomaniac is not always a student of literature. The possession or a large library is no guarantee of great learning. The mind is fed by the books which are studied, not by those that only collect dust as they stand on the shelves. The Bible profits only as it is used. The clasps of some Bibles are suspiciously stiff. They suggest that the books are more prized than searched.

2 . There must be internal consumption. There is no good in running over the words of a book with the eye, if the thoughts of it are not absorbed into the mind. Good books cannot be profitably skimmed. We may have much verbal knowledge of the Bible without ever making it our food. The meaning of texts, historical and geographical allusions, side lights of manners and customs, may all be studied, and yet the Bible may lie outside us, and our souls starve for want of spiritual food, because we do not take its essential truths down into our inner being in comprehension, meditation, and application.

3 . There must be assimilation. The food, when digested, is converted into a part of the bodily fabric—blood, bones, nerves, and flesh. A good book well digested becomes a part of a man's life. It colours his thought and gives tone and character to his mind—its own breadth and elevation enlarging and exalting the reader. This is the highest use of literature. In assimilating Plato or Milton the great souls of the philosopher and the poet take possession of our souls, and lift them into a higher atmosphere.

III. THE EFFECTS FOLLOWING .

1 . There is a pleasant taste. Ezekiel found the roll as honey for sweetness. The mentally inert have no idea of what rare delights they miss by not preparing themselves to enjoy the pleasures of literature. The writer of Psalms 119:1-176 found the highest of these delights in the Law of God. To the loving student of the Bible that grand ancient literature of man and God is a source of most profound delight. He who truly sympathizes with the spirit in which the Bible was written will never need to read it as a task. He will delight in it as in a savoury meal.

2 . Pain ensues. This was the case in the parallel vision of St. John ( Revelation 10:10 ). Ezekiel also found bitterness later (verse 14). The reason is that "lamentations, and mourning, and woe" were written on the roll ( Ezekiel 2:10 ). There are bitter truths to be considered in God's Word. Conscience makes the pleasant reading of the Bible to be followed by painful reflections. Yet this bitterness is a wholesome tonic.

3 . The final result is an increase of strength . Ezekiel is able to set his face like an adamant (verse 9), and prophesy to the rebellious people. Feeding on God's Word tits us to teach that Word and to exemplify it by our conduct.