Sermons

Second Sunday of Epiphany
Sunday 16 January 2005 at 6.30pm

Simon Cowling
Readings: Ezekiel 2. 1 - 3.4; Galatians 1. 11-2

If I were to be asked to relate the various books of the Bible to our national newspapers, I think I should have to compare Ezekiel to The Financial Times. I don't mean that you'll find up to date financial information in Ezekiel. Rather that, on grounds both of length and complexity of material, the prophecy of Ezekiel is definitely a broadsheet making it immediately the preference of a minority. But even as a broadsheet its content is so specialised that only a minority of that minority will ever simply open it, far less begin to understand it. If any book of the Bible were to merit the pink sheets of the FT to differentiate it from the rest, Ezekiel would have a pretty strong case. It seems that even the writers of the New Testament would have agreed with this assessment of Ezekiel. Consider just one statistic: whereas the prophecy of Isaiah is quoted nearly seventy times in the New Testament, the prophecy of Ezekiel, which contains virtually the same number of verses as Isaiah, is quoted only twice - and both those quotations appear in virtually the same form in other Old Testament books. And in case you think I am attempting to give myself preacher's airs, I should perhaps add that I am not an FT reader myself: I find Ezekiel difficult and not altogether inviting. Although his prophecy is full of powerful imagery and visions, Ezekiel's wordiness and complexity can be off-putting. One of the very few passages in Ezekiel that has entered the popular religious consciousness is the vision of the valley of dry bones in chapter 37. Let's put a bit of flesh on the dry bones of Ezekiel the man tonight and ask how he can speak to our condition.

Ezekiel is a prophet of the exile. According to the very precise information he gives in chapter 1 Ezekiel was called by God not far from his home in Babylonia in 593 BC. This means he must have been amongst the first wave of deportees from Jerusalem after it was attacked by Nebuchadnezzar in 597 BC. Ezekiel was married, although in chapter 24 he describes the death of his wife, probably around 586 BC. Shortly after his calling Ezekiel describes how God deprived him of the power of speech; he is only given back his tongue after the second and devastating attack on Jerusalem in 586. He describes himself as a priest and throughout the book there is a great emphasis on the importance of the Jerusalem Temple: the final eight chapters of the book consist of an extended vision of a Temple rebuilt and its worship fully restored. And Ezekiel is given to some strange behaviour: at one point he lies on his left side for 390 days; at another he shaves off his hair and beard - burning some of it, chopping some of it up with his sword, scattering some of it to the winds and sewing the rest up in his clothing; and he pretends to set off from his home like an exile, complete with traveller's bundle, breaking out of his house through the wall rather than going through the door.

How, we might ask, can a man such as this possibly speak to our condition. By any modern assessment Ezekiel's behaviour was strange and, at times, quite repulsive. Today his behaviour would be considered at the very least highly deviant and, given the fact that he considered himself to be called by God, quite possibly dangerous. Yet Ezekiel did not live in our times. He lived in a time when the very existence of the Jewish nation was under threat. Without a homeland and without the place of worship that had become central to their religious self-identity, the people of God were asking the question: is God still with us? Ezekiel was called in such a time, called to proclaim through word and through action that a vision of God, a relationship with God, was still possible even in a time of exile. The whole of his prophetic book is an exercise in keeping hope alive, keeping the people's vision of God alive, asserting the presence of God in the midst of the crisis.

Is all this so very different from some of the personalities of our own time whose fierce commitment to keeping a vision alive leads them to behave in ways that are challenging or difficult for society, for us? Think of Bob Geldoff, swearing like a trooper out of television screens during the 1985 Live Aid concert; think of Brian Haw, whose three and a half year protest in Parliament Square first about the UN sanctions against Iraq and subsequently the 2003 war has disturbed the peace - and the temper - of MP's just across the road in the House of Commons; or think of one of my own colleagues here in Leeds, Ray Gaston, who lay down in the middle of the road in a peaceful protest against that same war in 2003 and who was prosecuted for his pains.

What is our vision as Christians? How will we seek to keep a vision of God alive in the midst, not of physical attack and exile, but of indifference and apathy? How will we assert the presence of God in our community, in our neighbourhood? How will we respond to what God is calling us to do?

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