Ezekiel 23:36 - Homiletics.

(last clause)

Abominations declared.

I. ABOMINATIONS MAY BE HIDDEN .

1. They may be committed in secret . Then they are unknown to every one but the guilty persons and their accomplices.

2. Their corrupt character may not be admitted . Then they may be done in open daylight without shame or rebuke. Not only the outside public, but even the guilty persons themselves, may not perceive the full evil of what they are doing.

3. They may be forgotten . People do not wish to call to mind a disagreeable past. As the years glide by it slides further and further into the dim land of forgetfulness. By dint of reiterated self-flattery the guilty persons almost persuade themselves that they did not do the evil things of those old bad years, or that somehow they have left their former selves behind them in that evil past; or they put the thought of it quite out of their minds.

II. ABOMINATIONS CANNOT BE HIDDEN FOREVER . God does not forget them. The recording angel has written them in his awful book with ink that never fades. The subtle poison of them lingers in the souls of the guilty. "Whatsoever a man soweth, that shall he also reap." Some seeds take long to germinate. But the seeds of evil deeds have a fatal vitality, though they be slow to make an appearance. We cannot escape the consequences of our misdeeds by forgetting them.

III. IT IS BEST THAT ABOMINATIONS SHOULD BE REVEALED TO THE GUILTY ON EARTH . It is no piece of idle vengeance that tortures Israel with a revelation of its abominations.

1. It is well for the guilty to know them . There is no chance of repentance until the heinousness of sin is acknowledged. But that this may be the case, the abominations must first be revealed to the sinner. There may be little good in proclaiming his guilt aloud to the world. What is needed is that it should be brought well home to his own conscience.

2. It is well that they should be known now . If men wait for the certain revelation of final judgment, the abominations will be declared in trumpet-tones of denunciation, and burned into the soul in memories of fire. It is infinitely better to become conscious of them first, that the awakening knowledge of guilt may perchance lead to contrition and repentance.

IV. GOD DECLARES THEIR ABOMINATIONS TO SINNERS . He is too merciful to permit his children to perish without warning. The Bible contains awful revelations of human sin. If we take it as a lamp, and turn its light on our own lives and into our own hearts, it will reveal many an abomination of wickedness hitherto calmly ignored. The prophets of Israel were required to reveal man's sin quite as much as to make known the thoughts and will of God. John the Baptist came to prepare for Christ by declaring to men the abominations of their ways. Christ himself makes men feel their sin by his own holy presence. So Peter feared to be near him ( Luke 5:8 ). A vision of Christ throws a wholesome light on the hideous condition of an impenitent soul. This is to lead to repentance and salvation through Christ. Then the abominations may be blotted out ( 1 John 1:7 ).

Ezekiel 23:40 and Ezekiel 23:42

The foreign and the common.

In Ezekiel 23:40 Israel is seen to be seeking distant foreign connections, like a faithless wife who goes far afield for companions in sin. In Ezekiel 23:42 the charm of the distant and the foreign is swallowed up in the vulgarity of sin, which is the same in essence all the world over.

I. THE CHARM OF THE FOREIGN . The Jews were especially warned against foreign alliances, as they meant distrust in God, and as they led to the introduction of corrupting heathen influences. Nevertheless, the foolish people gave way to the fatal fascination of foreigners.

1. There is a charm in novelty . We are tempted to accept alien ideas just because they strike us with a certain freshness. Thus all sorts of earthly notions and practices have been imported into God's Israel, the Christian Church, by have peculiarly wide and varied relations with the world, and Christianity claims all the earth as its domain. But the fatal charm is that of following the example of the various practices of mankind instead of impressing a Christian influence on the race. This was Israel's mistake. Called to carry out a mission to the world, she succumbed to the spirit of the world. There is great danger lest the Church should follow her example in this respect. Indeed, this has happened already to a deplorable extent. A pseudo-liberalism claims to be following the zeit-geist, and so to be adapting Christianity to the world. This means unfaithfulness to Christ. St. Paul would be all things to all men, but only that he might win all men to Christ, never so as to surrender Christ to please the world. That is the part of a Judas.

II. THE DISILLUSION OF THE COMMON . Israel and Judah cast wistful glances on the foreigner. But when they had accomplished their purpose and were indulging in revelry with a multitude of people who had adorned them with the barbaric magnificence of golden bracelets and crowns, what did it all amount to but the shame of a low, drunken debauch? Novelty in sin does not elevate the evil thing, which is essentially the same, however it may be clothed and decorated. The so-called refinement of vice is but a veneer on the surface which leaves the rottenness beneath untouched. Cosmopolitanism does not save from moral corruption. The whole world is essentially one in its sin. There is a horrible vulgarity about all wickedness. If we would be saved from this we must in a sense become a "separate people." We may and we should still sympathize with all our fellow-men, send the gospel to every nation and ourselves learn such lessons as a wide view of mankind may teach us. Yet for all the higher efforts of life the inspiration must be found in the retired and secret chamber of prayer.