Context for Ezekiel 16
God’s only requirement of His people is faithfulness, yet it is this requirement that His people so often find hard to fulfill. Jerusalem and Judah found this requirement impossible because it required them to turn from their own way. Because of this, God’s wrath destroyed them, just as it will destroy anyone who rejects Christ through the last day.
God’s will for us is really rather simple. He provides us His Word, and through that Word He provides us faith. Through that faith we come to understand our relationship with God, and that relationship causes us to do the things that God wants us to do.
As our faith grows, we come to understand that one of the most important things we can do is share the nature of our faith-that is, to share the Word-with others who have not yet heard it. In fact, that sharing occurs not just through our words, but through our actions, both intentional and everyday. Because of this testimony to our faith, the Word then has the chance to work in another heart, thereby repeating the process.
Yet, somehow, that simplicity of God’s will defies us; or rather, we defy that simplicity. Faith becomes not something given to us by the Word but something we somehow do for ourselves. Then, if faith is something we do for ourselves, then does it matter what kind of faith it is?
This kind of thinking is the very trap the Jews fell into that led to the terrible tragedy of the fall of Jerusalem and Judah. Because the Jews were unwilling or unable to wait on their God and His promises, they turned to their own reason, which led them to their own “faith†that included even sacrificing their own children in their pursuit of worldly gain.
Therein lies the warning for us. God has given us a faith: simple, pure, direct, and contained within the Word. There is nothing we can add to or subtract from that faith that the Word does not support. Therefore, the Word is the measure of faith, just as it is its source. The secret, if one wishes to call it that, is to test one’s faith against its measure by remaining steadfast in the Word.
