Ezekiel 36:22-32 acknowledges God's disappointment in His people. They have allowed his name to become "profaned among the nations." God says he will act, in order to "sanctify my great name."
The nations (the people of the world) know what they know of God as a result of the way the people who follow God live their lives. The nations (your classmates and friends) form impressions of what God must be like based on the things that you say, and do. God's name, on this campus, is interpreted by what it is that we, God's followers, do.
What do those who watch you come to believe about God?
Ezekiel 36 says that God has grown weary of the impression left by the way ancient Israel was living. Ezekiel 36 says that God is going to act in a new and decisive way. God is going to "sprinkle water upon you, and you shall be clean from all your uncleannesses, and from all your idols I will cleanse you. A new heart I will give you, and a new spirit I will put within you."
Would that God would give us this new heart now. Would that we were already in possession of this promised spirit. Perhaps that our words and our actions would more accurately reflect our desire to love and serve God.
There is an often repeated prayer, in our worship booklets, which goes something like this: "You, O Lord, are always more ready to give than we are to receive." Might this be coupled with Ezekiel 36 to suggest that God is ever ready to give us this new heart/spirit, but that we are unprepared to receive it?
Consider this day how it is that those around you see God. Is God's name honored by your words, by your actions. Make it an expressed petition in your prayers that God would continue to offer to you a renewed heart, a renewed spirit. One which would allow you to more faithfully reflect your love and devotion. Then we can rejoice together, at the expressed desire of our God: "You shall be my people, and I shall be your God." (Ezekiel 36:28b)
Pastor Chris
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