Ezekiel, Shave Your Head
This chapter contains only a single vision from God. However, this one is a big one. It begins with God telling Ezekiel to shave
his head and his beard. This is a deeply
symbolic act. All throughout the Old
Testament we can see that one shaves their head and their beard when one is
either in mourning or in humility – and most often in both. The people would not miss this sign,
either. A prophet-priest with no facial
hair was going to stand out as a symbolic gesture of the people who are in
mourning for what has happened to their homeland.
Also note the tool that Ezekiel was to use to shave his head. It is a sword. It is not a razor or even a knife. Ezekiel is told to use a sword. This is definitely a symbolic act as the
prior symbolic act of humiliation and mourning comes from the use of the
sword. The people would not miss this
symbol, either. It was the sword – a
weapon of warfare – that would cause all of the bitterness in Jerusalem. The mourning of the Hebrew people comes
because the Assyrians and the Babylonians came against the Hebrew people in
militaristic conquest.
Ezekiel, Divide Your Hair
After Ezekiel shaves his head, he is told to weigh the hair and
divide it into three equal parts. We are
told in this chapter that this is a sign that the Hebrew people would be
punished in three different ways. There
would be fire. There would be the
sword. There would be a scattering into
the far reaches of the world.
The weighing of the hair is also significant. Yes, it is the only way to make sure it is
divided equally. However, weighing is
also a symbol of judgment. God has
weighed the Hebrew people and found them worthy of judgment. God has looked into their hearts and into
their lives and they have come up wanting.
Ezekiel, Leave Your House
Then, Ezekiel is told to leave his house and do some things with
his hair. But before we get to what
Ezekiel does with the hair, let’s pause for a second and reflect that God tells
Ezekiel to leave his house. Remember that
it wasn’t too long ago that God told Ezekiel to go into his house and stay
there. Has God changed His mind?
No. What we have going on
here is the difference between Ezekiel’s daily call and Ezekiel being
specifically sent on a mission.
Ezekiel’s normal ministry would be within his house as a sign against
the stubbornness of the Hebrew people.
However, occasionally throughout this book Ezekiel is sent on a specific
mission from God that takes him out of his normal pattern of ministry. This isn’t conflict. Actually, this is a sign to us that ministry
is contextual at the call of God.
Let me give you an example.
I have been called to a particular congregation to do ministry among
them. However, a month or so back I
traveled to Honduras with a few of my fellow church members to participate in
the ministry of Hospital Loma de Luz.
Was I breaking my call to this congregation when I left for a week to do
ministry elsewhere? Certainly not! Rather, my call was specifically altered for
a precise period of time. When that
mission was completed, I returned with my fellow church members to come back to
normal ministry.
What is neat about this passage is that we can see a need for
flexibility in ministry. We all have a
specific calling from God. But that
doesn’t mean that this is all that God is going to ask us to do. Occasionally He’ll point us in a new
direction and He’ll say, “Do that for a little while, then come back to your
base ministry.” This is acceptable –
even desirable! What is important is
that we are in the habit and practice of determining what God would have us do
each day – and then do that!
The Three Judgments
What is Ezekiel to do with the hair? He is to burn one third. He is to then take another third and strike
it with a sword all throughout the city.
Finally, he is to take the last third and scatter it to the wind. Out of these three groups Ezekiel is to take
some of the hair and bind it into his robe so that he could take some of these spared
hairs and burn them in the fire.
What does all of this mean?
The hair that is thrown into the fire is symbolic of the people in
Jerusalem who will die from pestilence and famine (or pestilence that comes
from practicing cannibalism in the midst of a famine). The hair that is cut by the sword all
throughout the city is symbolic of the people who will survive the pestilence
and the famine but who will die at the hand of the Babylonian siege. The third that are scattered to the wind are
those that will go into captivity chased by the threat of the sword of their
oppressors.
What of the hairs that were bound into the robe? These are the symbol of the remnant that
would remain faithful to God. However,
notice that not even all of these people escape judgment. Some of these hairs are thrown into the fire
and burned. God’s judgment fell upon the
whole of the Hebrew people – the righteous few and the unrighteous many alike.
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