Bible in a Year · Day 265 of 365
Today’s reading: Ezekiel 35–37 (3 chapters)
Read the passage below, or open your own Bible and follow along. The text here is the World English Bible, a public-domain translation, printed in full so the day’s reading is all on one page.
About Ezekiel
Ezekiel was a priest taken to Babylon, and his book is full of visions that are hard to picture and hard to forget. He sees the glory of God by a river, then watches that glory leave the temple, and later watches it return. He acts out the siege, lies on his side for weeks, and shaves his head as signs for a people who will not listen. The book also holds the valley of dry bones and the promise of a new heart of flesh. Much of it is dated, which gives the reader a timeline through the exile.
What to watch for. Watch the movement of God's glory, out of the temple and back again, and notice how the promise of a new heart in chapter 36 answers the diagnosis of chapter 36. Read the dry bones as a promise to people who think they are finished.
Ezekiel 35
1Moreover Yahweh’s word came to me, saying, 2Son of man, set your face against Mount Seir, and prophesy against it, 3and tell it, Thus says the Lord Yahweh: Behold, I am against you, Mount Seir, and I will stretch out my hand against you, and I will make you a desolation and an astonishment. 4I will lay your cities waste, and you shall be desolate; and you shall know that I am Yahweh. 5Because you have had a perpetual hostility, and have given over the children of Israel to the power of the sword in the time of their calamity, in the time of the iniquity of the end;
6therefore, as I live, says the Lord Yahweh, I will prepare you for blood, and blood shall pursue you: since you have not hated blood, therefore blood shall pursue you. 7Thus will I make Mount Seir an astonishment and a desolation; and I will cut off from it him who passes through and him who returns. 8I will fill its mountains with its slain: in your hills and in your valleys and in all your watercourses shall they fall who are slain with the sword. 9I will make you a perpetual desolation, and your cities shall not be inhabited; and you shall know that I am Yahweh. 10Because you have said, These two nations and these two countries shall be mine, and we will possess it; whereas Yahweh was there:
11therefore, as I live, says the Lord Yahweh, I will do according to your anger, and according to your envy which you have shown out of your hatred against them; and I will make myself known among them, when I shall judge you. 12You shall know that I, Yahweh, have heard all your insults which you have spoken against the mountains of Israel, saying, They are laid desolate, they have been given us to devour. 13You have magnified yourselves against me with your mouth, and have multiplied your words against me: I have heard it. 14Thus says the Lord Yahweh: When the whole earth rejoices, I will make you desolate. 15As you rejoiced over the inheritance of the house of Israel, because it was desolate, so will I do to you: you shall be desolate, Mount Seir, and all Edom, even all of it; and they shall know that I am Yahweh.
Ezekiel 36
1You, son of man, prophesy to the mountains of Israel, and say, You mountains of Israel, hear Yahweh’s word. 2Thus says the Lord Yahweh: Because the enemy has said against you, Aha! and, The ancient high places are ours in possession; 3therefore prophesy, and say, Thus says the Lord Yahweh: Because, even because they have made you desolate, and swallowed you up on every side, that you might be a possession to the residue of the nations, and you are taken up in the lips of talkers, and the evil report of the people; 4therefore, you mountains of Israel, hear the word of the Lord Yahweh: Thus says the Lord Yahweh to the mountains and to the hills, to the watercourses and to the valleys, to the desolate wastes and to the cities that are forsaken, which are become a prey and derision to the residue of the nations that are all around; 5therefore thus says the Lord Yahweh: Surely in the fire of my jealousy I have spoken against the residue of the nations, and against all Edom, that have appointed my land to themselves for a possession with the joy of all their heart, with despite of soul, to cast it out for a prey.
6Therefore prophesy concerning the land of Israel, and tell the mountains and to the hills, to the watercourses and to the valleys, Thus says the Lord Yahweh: Behold, I have spoken in my jealousy and in my wrath, because you have borne the shame of the nations: 7therefore thus says the Lord Yahweh: I have sworn, Surely the nations that are around you, they shall bear their shame. 8But you, mountains of Israel, you shall shoot out your branches, and yield your fruit to my people Israel; for they are at hand to come. 9For, behold, I am for you, and I will turn into you, and you shall be tilled and sown; 10and I will multiply men on you, all the house of Israel, even all of it; and the cities shall be inhabited, and the waste places shall be built;
11and I will multiply on you man and animal; and they shall increase and be fruitful; and I will cause you to be inhabited after your former estate, and you will do better than at your beginnings: and you shall know that I am Yahweh. 12Yes, I will cause men to walk on you, even my people Israel; and they shall possess you, and you shall be their inheritance, and you shall no more henceforth bereave them of children. 13Thus says the Lord Yahweh: Because they say to you, You are a devourer of men, and have been a bereaver of your nation; 14therefore you shall devour men no more, neither bereave your nation any more, says the Lord Yahweh; 15neither will I let you hear any more the shame of the nations, neither shall you bear the reproach of the peoples any more, neither shall you cause your nation to stumble any more, says the Lord Yahweh.
16Moreover Yahweh’s word came to me, saying, 17Son of man, when the house of Israel lived in their own land, they defiled it by their way and by their doings: their way before me was as the uncleanness of a woman in her impurity. 18Therefore I poured out my wrath on them for the blood which they had poured out on the land, and because they had defiled it with their idols; 19and I scattered them among the nations, and they were dispersed through the countries: according to their way and according to their doings I judged them. 20When they came to the nations, where they went, they profaned my holy name; in that men said of them, These are the people of Yahweh, and are gone out of his land.
21But I had respect for my holy name, which the house of Israel had profaned among the nations, where they went. 22Therefore tell the house of Israel, Thus says the Lord Yahweh: I don’t do this for your sake, house of Israel, but for my holy name, which you have profaned among the nations, where you went. 23I will sanctify my great name, which has been profaned among the nations, which you have profaned among them; and the nations shall know that I am Yahweh, says the Lord Yahweh, when I shall be sanctified in you before their eyes. 24For I will take you from among the nations, and gather you out of all the countries, and will bring you into your own land. 25I will sprinkle clean water on you, and you shall be clean: from all your filthiness, and from all your idols, will I cleanse you.
26I will also give you a new heart, and I will put a new spirit within you; and I will take away the stony heart out of your flesh, and I will give you a heart of flesh. 27I will put my Spirit within you, and cause you to walk in my statutes, and you shall keep my ordinances, and do them. 28You shall dwell in the land that I gave to your fathers; and you shall be my people, and I will be your God. 29I will save you from all your uncleanness: and I will call for the grain, and will multiply it, and lay no famine on you. 30I will multiply the fruit of the tree, and the increase of the field, that you may receive no more the reproach of famine among the nations.
31Then you shall remember your evil ways, and your doings that were not good; and you shall loathe yourselves in your own sight for your iniquities and for your abominations. 32Nor for your sake do I this, says the Lord Yahweh, be it known to you: be ashamed and confounded for your ways, house of Israel. 33Thus says the Lord Yahweh: In the day that I cleanse you from all your iniquities, I will cause the cities to be inhabited, and the waste places shall be built. 34The land that was desolate shall be tilled, whereas it was a desolation in the sight of all who passed by. 35They shall say, This land that was desolate has become like the garden of Eden; and the waste and desolate and ruined cities are fortified and inhabited.
36Then the nations that are left around you shall know that I, Yahweh, have built the ruined places, and planted that which was desolate: I, Yahweh, have spoken it, and I will do it. 37Thus says the Lord Yahweh: For this, moreover, will I be inquired of by the house of Israel, to do it for them: I will increase them with men like a flock. 38As the flock for sacrifice, as the flock of Jerusalem in her appointed feasts, so shall the waste cities be filled with flocks of men; and they shall know that I am Yahweh.
Ezekiel 37
1Yahweh’s hand was on me, and he brought me out in Yahweh’s Spirit, and set me down in the middle of the valley; and it was full of bones. 2He caused me to pass by them all around: and behold, there were very many in the open valley; and behold, they were very dry. 3He said to me, Son of man, can these bones live? I answered, Lord Yahweh, you know. 4Again he said to me, Prophesy over these bones, and tell them, you dry bones, hear Yahweh’s word. 5Thus says the Lord Yahweh to these bones: Behold, I will cause breath to enter into you, and you shall live.
6I will lay sinews on you, and will bring up flesh on you, and cover you with skin, and put breath in you, and you shall live; and you shall know that I am Yahweh. 7So I prophesied as I was commanded: and as I prophesied, there was a noise, and behold, an earthquake; and the bones came together, bone to its bone. 8I saw, and, behold, there were sinews on them, and flesh came up, and skin covered them above; but there was no breath in them. 9Then he said to me, Prophesy to the wind, prophesy, son of man, and tell the wind, Thus says the Lord Yahweh: Come from the four winds, breath, and breathe on these slain, that they may live. 10So I prophesied as he commanded me, and the breath came into them, and they lived, and stood up on their feet, an exceedingly great army.
11Then he said to me, Son of man, these bones are the whole house of Israel: behold, they say, Our bones are dried up, and our hope is lost; we are clean cut off. 12Therefore prophesy, and tell them, Thus says the Lord Yahweh: Behold, I will open your graves, and cause you to come up out of your graves, my people; and I will bring you into the land of Israel. 13You shall know that I am Yahweh, when I have opened your graves, and caused you to come up out of your graves, my people. 14I will put my Spirit in you, and you shall live, and I will place you in your own land: and you shall know that I, Yahweh, have spoken it and performed it, says Yahweh. 15Yahweh’s word came again to me, saying,
16You, son of man, take one stick, and write on it, For Judah, and for the children of Israel his companions: then take another stick, and write on it, For Joseph, the stick of Ephraim, and for all the house of Israel his companions: 17and join them for you to one another into one stick, that they may become one in your hand. 18When the children of your people shall speak to you, saying, Will you not show us what you mean by these? 19tell them, Thus says the Lord Yahweh: Behold, I will take the stick of Joseph, which is in the hand of Ephraim, and the tribes of Israel his companions; and I will put them with it, with the stick of Judah, and make them one stick, and they shall be one in my hand. 20The sticks whereon you write shall be in your hand before their eyes.
21Say to them, Thus says the Lord Yahweh: Behold, I will take the children of Israel from among the nations, where they are gone, and will gather them on every side, and bring them into their own land: 22and I will make them one nation in the land, on the mountains of Israel; and one king shall be king to them all; and they shall be no more two nations, neither shall they be divided into two kingdoms any more at all; 23neither shall they defile themselves any more with their idols, nor with their detestable things, nor with any of their transgressions; but I will save them out of all their dwelling places, in which they have sinned, and will cleanse them: so shall they be my people, and I will be their God. 24My servant David shall be king over them; and they all shall have one shepherd: they shall also walk in my ordinances, and observe my statutes, and do them. 25They shall dwell in the land that I have given to Jacob my servant, in which your fathers lived; and they shall dwell therein, they, and their children, and their children’s children, forever: and David my servant shall be their prince for ever.
26Moreover I will make a covenant of peace with them; it shall be an everlasting covenant with them; and I will place them, and multiply them, and will set my sanctuary among them forever more. 27My tent also shall be with them; and I will be their God, and they shall be my people. 28The nations shall know that I am Yahweh who sanctifies Israel, when my sanctuary shall be among them forever more.
Next · Day 266: Ezekiel 38–41 →
Scripture quotations are from the World English Bible (WEB), a public-domain translation. Day numbering follows the calendar year; you can start at Day 1 on any date.
