The end of time was near for the Jews. The Kingdom of David was in the hands of its enemies. In 587/6 BC Nebuchadnezzar took the Judeans captive after the Israelites were captured and dispersed in 721 BC.
Ezekiel wrote his visions, it is
believed, between 592-570 BC. The captivity of the Jews ended in 538 B.C. Ezekiel
saw the Jewish nation restore at least 32 years before it was restored. The Lord
God revealed to Ezekiel the restoration, not of Judea but Israel:
Thus, saith the Lord God; I will
even gather you from the people, and assemble you out of the countries where ye
have been scattered, and I will give you the land of Israel. (Ezek 1:17)
It might appear that Ezekiel was
revealed the restoration of 538 BC except for one issue: Judea was restored.
Israel was not! The Kuthites of Babylonian had populated Israel, so it was not
restored. The ten tribes of Israel were lost to history.
God showed Ezekiel Israel restored to
its former glory:
They shall come thither, and they shall take away all the detestable things thereof and all the abominations thereof from thence. And I will give them one heart, and I will put a new spirit within you; and I will take the stony heart out of their flesh, and will give them an heart of flesh: That they may walk in my statutes, and keep mine ordinances, and do them: and they shall be my people, and I will be their God. (Ezek 11:18-20)
They
did much of that in the time of Jesus and before in the Maccabean age. They did
out away abominations and such, but again, it was just Judeah (Judah). So, I
submit that Ezekiel saw the coming age in the end.
Even the lost tribes of Israel
began returning to Israel with the end of WWI with the Balfour Mandate that provided
a national home for the Jewish people. In 1948 the mandated territory became
the country of Israel. Ezekiel saw at least 2000 years into the future and
beyond. The Jews have yet to walk in the statutes of the Lord; only about a
quarter of Israelites citizens are worshippers of God.
Someday, God will take away their stoney hearts and they will walk in His statutes. The occasion for that was revealed to John:
And after these things I saw four angels standing on the four corners of the earth, holding the four winds of the earth, that the wind should not blow on the earth, nor on the sea, nor on any tree. And I saw another angel ascending from the east, having the seal of the living God: and he cried with a loud voice to the four angels, to whom it was given to hurt the earth and the sea, Saying, “Hurt not the earth, neither the sea, nor the trees, till we have sealed the servants of our God in their foreheads.” And I heard the number of them which were sealed: and there were sealed an hundred and forty and four thousand of all the tribes of the children of Israel. (Rev 7:1-4)
Ezekiel saw the sealing that John
saw almost 600 years later. On July 13th I wrote about the mark that
Ezekiel saw. [1]
The seal of God on the Jews was the mark that John saw. The two prophets saw
the same seal on the same people. In the end, 144,000 Jews will be changed just
as Ezekiel saw it, “I (God) will give them one heart, and I will put a new
spirit within you; and I will take the stony heart out of their flesh, and will
give them an heart of flesh.”
That new heart is the heart
of a Christian. The number in the end is limited. However, the present number
is “whosoever,” even the Jews just as Jesus said in John 3:16.
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