God is Fair in His Judgments (Ezekiel 16-19)

• An unfaithful and promiscuous wife (Ezekiel 16).
  
• Judgment based on sins of the present, not the past (Ezekiel 17). Eagle, ceders and a vine.
• Basic common sense responsibility (Ezekiel 18). Each individual is responsible for himself/herself. The accountability of the individual.
  
• The end of an era: the Davidic dynasty (Ezekiel 19).

Ezekiel 16. Having likened Israel as a bad vine (Ezekiel 15), it is almost as if Ezekiel heard someone say that it was not fair since Israel was the chosen vine, and thus God should care for her. Ezekiel answered through an allegory that God had always and continually cared for Israel (Ezekiel 16). Having found her as a castaway infant, God rescued, wooed, married and adorned her. But she became unfaithful. As a harlot, she prostituted herself with other nations in following after their gods as her lovers. Throughout her history she had rebelled against God. Her wickedness had become even worse than that of Sodom and Samaria before her. Therefore, God was perfectly just in bringing judgment upon her. He promised at her birth that she would be judged if she disobeyed His covenant with her (Leviticus 26, Deuteronomy 30). Though the situation looks extremely bleak at this point, God reminded the exiles that He would be faithful to His promise of restoration in the future (Deu 30), just as He would be faithful to His threats of judgment.

Ezekiel 17. In light of the allegory of Ezekiel 16, one might have complained that the present generation was being judged for Israel's past rebellions. So Ezekiel presented a riddle which emphasizes that the rebellion of the present generation against God was by seeking security and help from Egypt (Ezekiel 17). There is no hope in seeking help from Egypt nor in following Zedekiah. There is only a hope in the restoration of God's kingdom and His righteous King, the Messiah. Zedekiah would fall, and the remnant would be scattered.

Ezekiel 18. Ezekiel treats another prevalent major misconception. "Are we judged because of our father's sins?" Ezekiel refutes this by emphatically stating that each man or woman is responsible for his or her own deeds. It is the principle of individual responsibility. Each individual is responsible for themselves as to whether they would live or die. A person lives or dies according to their own decision to obey or disobey God's ways (Dt 30:15-20). But God declares that is is His desire that everyone lives. This is why He gave the Law. It is so that everyone would know how to live as God meant life to be lived. If one lives according to the righteous ways of God, they would be declared righteous and live. But if they disobeyed God's righteous ways and broke the covenant, God promised that they would die as a result of their unrighteous deeds.

The penalty here was physical death, not eternal death. One's eternal salvation was not the issue. Eternal salvation was by faith in the Messiah in OT times, just as it is today. Salvation was never attained by keeping the stipulations of the Law, nether then nor now. The Law of Moses/Mosaic covenant demonstrated how one who already had entered into a relationship with God was to continue to live.

Ezekiel 19. The section (Ezekiel 12-19) concludes with a final dirge/funeral lament for the recent rulers of Judah: Jehoahaz and Jehoiachin/Jehoiakim. The genuine rules were gone. They last one was Josiah. Since the ruler Jehoiachin was already exiled in Babylon (597 BC), the peopole were not to look to unofficial rules such as Zedekiah. Judgment was imminent.

Alexander, Ralph. Ezekiel. Moody Bible Institute, 1976.