September 16, 2010 Ezekiel 28:11-31:18

Then the Lord had Ezekiel sing a funeral song for the king of Tyre. At one time he was the model of perfection, wisdom and good-looks. He was beautifully adorned as a cherub in the garden of Eden. He was so good and then he started sinning. He became conceited because of his good looks; because of his fame he started acting like a fool. Then the Lord told Ezekiel to tell Sidon their fate. The Lord would send disease to kill them all and Israel would no longer have to put up with them. Then God said that someday He would gather Israel together and they would live in the land He gave to Jacob. They would be happy and build houses and plant vineyards.

Ten years after king Jehoiachin's imprisonment, the Lord gave this message to Ezekiel for the king of Egypt. The Lord condemned the king of Egypt like a crocodile covered with fish and dragged out of the water and into the desert. He would be picked clean by the birds and wild animals. They had refused to help Israel when they needed it. They were like a brittle stick instead of a aturdy cane. They had claimed that they made the Nile and had control of it, but the Lord would change that arrogant belief. For forty years Egypt would be desolate and empty and after that the people would return, but they would never again be the world leader they had once been. Israel would wonder why they ever thought to rely on them. Twenty seven years after king Jehoiachin's imprisonment the Lord told Ezekiel that Nebuchadnezzar had attacked the city of Tyre and would destroy Egypt next. Nebuchadnezzar and his army had been following the Lord's orders.

The Lord told Ezekiel to tell the Egyptian people that Nebuchadnezzar was coming to destroy them. The Lord would send messengers to Ethiopia too and tell them destruction was coming to them as well. Egypt would become a wasteland. Eleven years after the imprisonment of king Jehoiachin, the Lord told Ezekiel that He had broken the arms of the king of Egypt and would strengthen the king of Babylon to destroy Egypt. Everyone would know that the Lord had punished them.

The king of Egypt would be chopped down like a cedar tree. This tree was the largest and most beautiful of any tree ever. But it thought it was that way because of itself, not because of God. So the tree would be punished for its arrogance. Every tree must die just as humans die and go down to the world of the dead. On the day the tree dies, God would command all the streams to stop flowing, the tree would crash to the ground and God would send it to the world below. Egypt would be like the tree and die and be sent to the world below and join the godless and others who die by the sword.

Tomorrow read 32-34:24