Strangers & Aliens

Go read Ezekiel 16. It's a shocking and graphic picture of the way God took a young orphan girl (Israel) from an awful background and made her into his beautiful bride. That's not the shocking bit of course (though Israel may not have enjoyed having her parentage so roundly judged - Ezek 16.3). The shock is that she quickly descends into prostitution - although prostitution is hardly the word to describe what she does - she pays others to have sex with her (Ezek 16.34). On the way God describes his errant bride with the most graphic language found in the Bible:

• Ezek 16.25, Israel "offers herself" (ESV) to other nations, but more literally she "spreads her legs for them." In other words, she invites them provocatively.
• Ezek 16.36, Israel pours out "her lust" for other nations, but more literally her "sexual lubrication" flows for others - in other words, prostitution is not her job, it is her joy!
• Ezek 16.37, though she was once naked and God covered her, she nows displays her "nakedness" or, more literally, "pudenda" for all to see. She is brazen in her rejection of her covenant husband YHWH offering her sex for all who want it.

All this is meant to shock, and it does (not entirely sure how you would do justice to this in a sermon, it's probably not the best chapter for your next all age...). But what is more shocking than this graphic language is God's judgment on his errant bride. The chapter is numbing in its condemnation and description of judgement. Like a submariner who endures constant depth charging, the judgement keeps coming and coming. There is no let up.

And who can say it is undeserved?

Which brings me to the most shocking part of this chapter. God wants his girl back. "...yet I will remember my covenant with you in the days of your youth and I will establish for you an everlasting covenant" (Ezek 16.60).

Ultimately membership of the covenant is at God's instigation, God's purpose and God's empowering.

Given what we are/were, this is the MOST shocking of all. But also the BEST.