Ezekiel 32:14 - Homiletics

Still waters of death.

The waters of Egypt are to settle and so to be clean. From being a highway of commerce the Nile is to become an undisturbed inland river. The water-wheels shall be still, the splash of the oar shall be no more heard. The silent river shall be left to its own peace—the peace of death.

I. SIN DESTROYS CIVILIZATION . The river is the busy scene of Egyptian life and activity. Its waters will be quiet because Egypt will lose its energy. This is represented as the consequence of the nation's wickedness. Consider how the process works.

1. Sin is anti-social . Civilization is the art of city-life. It is dependent on co-operation, division of labor, mutual ministries, and mutual confidence. All these things are shattered by the selfish and untrue conduct of sin.

2. Sin, is unaspiring . Civilization presses forward; essentially it seeks an advance. Sin may be greedy and grasping, and may incline men to seize much for themselves, but it does not inspire energy for general progress. It is depressing and discoursing.

3. Sin is essentially opposed to the laws of God . Now, no civilization can be secure and lasting that is not based on those laws. All corrupt civilization bears within it the seeds of its own destruction. The only "city which hath foundations" is the city of God, and this is "let down from heaven," i.e. it is a city of which the constitution is Divine, and which embodies the idea of "the kingdom of heaven."

II. IT IS WELL THAT A SINFUL CIVILIZATION SHOULD BE SHATTERED . The East is scored with the ruins of ancient empires. Today the scene of decay is melancholy and oppressive. Yet the sight of those old, bad empires in their flourishing days was far more sad to behold. They were seats of cruelty and haunts of vice. It is well that they have ceased to be. The hyenas and jackals that now infest their neglected temples and palaces are clean and innocent inhabitants compared with the lustful and murderous men who formerly lived there. The running sore of modern Christendom is in the condition of its great cities. The broken-down wrecks of civilization are far more degraded than the simple savages of the forest. It was good for the world that Sodom and Gomorrah were destroyed, that great Nineveh became a lonely resort of lions of the desert, that the Egypt of the Pharaohs fell from her proud and wicked splendor. It wilt be well for modem civilization to be swept away if it becomes only secular, atheistic, and immoral.

III. THE RESULTS OF A SHATTERED CIVILIZATION WILL BE A PREPARATION FOR A BETTER FUTURE . The old foul Nile is to settle quietly and so become clear. Its once disturbed waters are to run smoothly like oil. These facts which occur in the list of calamities for Egypt—and rightly, because they indicate the departure of the old, busy, populous life from its banks and its surface—are nevertheless in themselves good. It is well that the river should be clear and run smoothly. The destruction of empires brings deliverance to oppressed subject races. The loss of civilization may be the gain of naturalness. There may be less wealth, but more welfare; less pleasure, but more peace. In silence and sorrow of soul people learn to look beneath the surface of life, the Egyptians in their desolation could look deep down into the still, smooth waters of the Nile. This may be a preparation for a holier new life in the future.