A week after he was called to be a prophet, Ezekiel learned how serious the work was going to be.

“‘Son of man, I have made you a watchman for the people of Israel; so hear the word I speak and give them warning from me. When I say to a wicked person, ‘You will surely die,’ and you do not warn them or speak out to dissuade them from their evil ways in order to save their life, that wicked person will die for their sin, and I will hold you accountable for their blood. But if you do warn the wicked person and they do not turn from their wickedness or from their evil ways, they will die for their sin, but you will have saved yourself.’” Ezekiel 3:16-19

The same principle held for a righteous person who was falling into sin. If Ezekiel warned them and they turned from their sin, both the prophet and the sinner would be saved. If Ezekiel failed to warn them, and they perished in their sins, God held the prophet accountable for failing to warn them.

It wasn’t just Ezekiel’s words that God was going to control. He was also going to use Ezekiel’s body to create visual expressions of the messages he gave him.

Prophetic Signs

The Lord sent Ezekiel out on the vast Mesopotamian plain where he showed him the same vision of God he had seen earlier. It was as stunning this time as the first time and Ezekiel fell on his face when he saw it.

The Spirit came to Ezekiel and sent him home. He became housebound and was not allowed to go anywhere. He also was unable to speak until God opened his mouth. After that Ezekiel was under God’s control, doing and saying only what the Lord gave him.

The next sign came when God asked Ezekiel to draw a picture of Jerusalem in clay and then build siege works around it, complete with siege ramps, camps for soldiers and battering rams. Then he placed an iron plate between himself and the besieged city and looked at the city over the iron plate. When Nebuchadnezzar besieged Jerusalem God was going to look on, but the people’s sins would be a barrier to him rescuing them.

Jerusalem’s disaster was the result of 390 years of sin and rebellion against God. The Lord required Ezekiel to lie on his left side for 390 days, and then on his right side for forty days, bearing the sin of the people of Israel to illustrate those lost years. God said he would bind Ezekiel so he couldn’t turn from one side to the other during these prophetic acts.

Commentators don’t know whether Ezekiel spent a few hours a day on his side during those days, or whether he was locked into position. They think that the “ropes” God said he would tie Ezekiel up with meant that God would give him the stamina he needed to see his assignment through.

Conditions During Jerusalem’s Siege

God gave Ezekiel a recipe for bread that he was to cook and eat while he lay on his side prophesying about the siege. He told him how much to eat and when to eat it, and told him to drink a good supply of water.

The Lord ordered the prophet to use human excrement as fuel for his cooking fire, but Ezekiel refused to do it because it would defile the food. He had been careful all his life not to put anything impure into his mouth, so God relented and let him use cow dung for the fire instead.

The limited diet, cooked over a dung fire, represented the bad food and eventual starvation Jerusalem was about to face during the siege. The Babylonians were going to cut off the supply of food and water to the Israelites and they were going to suffer severely.

“They will be appalled at the sight of each other and will waste away because of their sin.” Ezekiel 4:17

Jeremiah’s Yoke

The nations of Edom, Moab, Ammon, Tyre and Sidon sent envoys to Jerusalem to discuss with King Zedekiah what they should do about Babylon. They must have hoped to form an alliance to resist Nebuchadnezzar if he attacked.

God sent Jeremiah with another visual lesson to make these nations understand what lay ahead for them. He had Jeremiah make a yoke and put it on his neck to show how Babylon was going to subjugate the nations under its power. The prophet went to the palace and met with the envoys.

“‘This is what the Lord Almighty, the God of Israel, says: ‘Tell this to your masters: With my great power and outstretched arm I made the earth and its people and the animals that are on it, and I give to anyone I please. Now I will give all your countries  into the hands of my servant Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon; I will make even the wild animals subject to him. All nations will serve him and his son and grandson until the time for his land comes; then many nations and great kings will subjugate him.” Jeremiah 27:4-7

There were false prophets, diviners, mediums and sorcerers telling the nations a different story. God warned anyone who listened to them and tried to resist Babylon that he would deal with them himself.

“They prophesy lies to you that will only serve to remove you far from your lands; I will banish you and you will perish.” Jeremiah 27:10

The false prophets painted a cheerful picture of Babylon returning the sacred articles they had stolen from the temple, but God said those things would remain in Babylon until he personally went to retrieve them.

“Then I will bring them back and restore them to this place.” Jeremiah 27:22

Jeremiah and Hananiah

A prophet named Hananiah came from Gibeon to Jerusalem and confronted Jeremiah. He claimed to have a message from God that refuted what Jeremiah had said.

“‘This is what the Lord Almighty, the God of Israel, says: ‘I will break the yoke of the king of Babylon. Within two years I will bring back to this place all the articles of the Lord’s house that Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon removed from here and took to Babylon. I will also bring back to this place Jehoiachin son of Jehoiakim king of Judah and all the other exiles from Judah who went to Babylon,’ declares the Lord, ‘for I will break the yoke of the king of Babylon.’” Jeremiah 28:2-4

Jeremiah said he hoped what Hananiah said was true — and if the peace he prophesied was true, time would prove that he was right. Otherwise, Hananiah was a false prophet.

Hananiah took the yoke off Jeremiah’s neck and broke it, proclaiming that within two years the yoke of Babylon’s oppression would end. Jeremiah went on his way, but God soon sent him back with another prophecy for Hananiah.

“The word of the Lord came to Jeremiah: ‘Go and tell Hananiah, ‘This is what the Lord says: You have broken a wooden yoke, but in its place you will get a yoke of iron. This is what the Lord Almighty, the God of Israel, says: I will put an iron yoke on the necks of these nations to make them serve Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon, and they will serve him. I will even give him control over the wild animals.’” Jeremiah 28:12-14

God had not sent Hananiah, but he had succeeded in persuading the nations with his lies, so God took his life later that year.

Jeremiah’s Final Words

God gave Jeremiah a message for Babylon. He wrote it down on a scroll and sent it with Zedekiah’s staff officer Seraiah to the Euphrates River. Seraiah was to read its contents, then tie a rock to it and throw it into the river. The message was a prophecy that Babylon would eventually sink, never to rise again.

We will read more about Jeremiah’s life in the days to come, but we have now read most of the content of his prophecies. Jeremiah had a hard life, but he also lived in hard times.

If it had not been for Israel’s rebellion Jeremiah might have lived a peaceful life in communion with God. But the Lord needed a strong man to speak the truth to the sinful nations at that time, and the man he chose was Jeremiah.