Many people today feel very vulnerable. You don't know if you can trust the past. You don't know if you can trust the future. The past—and maybe many people—have made promises to you in the past and have broken them. Politicians promise that if we elect them, they will fix things, and yet all the problems that we labour under—whether it's housing or inflation or whatever—there's always something. Your employer promises you a promotion or job security, but then they let you down. Your landlord promises you that you can stay where you are, and then they serve notice that you have to leave. Promises today seem cheap, and it becomes hard to trust promises that people make to us.
Or take the future. Nothing seems to last. Every time we have something good, it seems to just slip through our fingers. We live in fragile times. In ten years’ time, will I still have the house, the job, the friends, the family that I have now? I don't know.
Well, the people of God in exile in Babylon, to whom Ezekiel was speaking, knew what that felt like. They had watched the things that God had promised them over the centuries unravel in recent years, and everything that God promised them for the future they had had once before—but now they have lost it. Which means, if God is to promise them something again for the future, will it last this time, or will that too disappear before their eyes?
And this passage is designed to take them back—to take us back—to God's promises, to show us that God is faithful, that God's promises are precious, and that God's future is permanent.
Let's just make sure we've got the historical situation here straight in our minds. Ezekiel was exiled from Jerusalem to Babylon in the year 597 BC, along with other leaders in Jerusalem at the time. Ezekiel ministered to his fellow exiles in Babylon until, ten years later, the Babylonians returned to Jerusalem, destroyed the city, and destroyed the precious Temple as well.
And we are in the second half of the Book of Ezekiel, after the news of the fall of Jerusalem has reached Babylon. And now is the time for God to start to promise that he's going to build something wonderful in the future—a better future.
But the background for this week's passage actually starts earlier than the exile in 597 and 587. King David was the great first king at the head of the line of kings through Israel's history. After him came his son Solomon, and after Solomon, in the year 922 BC, the kingdom split in two. Solomon's son ruled over the tribe of Judah in the south, and the rest of the tribes in the north were ruled over by various other rulers. Ezekiel never calls them kings. The northern kingdom was the first one to be judged. In 722 BC, the Assyrians swept in, destroyed the people, and scattered them everywhere—so that by the time Ezekiel insisted, for 135 years there hasn't been a northern kingdom.
And to those broken bunch of exiles, Ezekiel speaks to say that God's promises are precious, and God's future is permanent.
So we're going to look at the wonderful things here that God has prized and see that they can be depended upon. And because God's promises are permanent, these are things that we can enjoy today and in the future as well—they're for us. And we're going to look at how that is so.
But I want to show you, just as we start to do this, that I'm not making stuff up. It's really important that you know that what I'm telling you today from Ezekiel 37 is what Ezekiel 37 is wanting to communicate—that I'm saying what the Bible says. That's why I always encourage you to have a Bible open. You need to see that this is what is actually in the text.
So I just want to show you quickly why this passage is about God showing that he will keep his promises, and that the things he promises are permanent.
What we have here is what's called a sign-act. We get a number of them in the Book of Ezekiel, in which he does something that is symbolic, and then he explains the thing that he's just done.
So here's the thing he's asked to do in verse 15:
"The word of the Lord came to me: Son of man, take a stick of wood and write on it, 'Belonging to Judah and the Israelites associated with him.' Then take another stick of wood and write on it, 'Belonging to Joseph (that is, Ephraim) and all the Israelites associated with him.' Join them together into one stick so that they will become one in your hand."
The two kingdoms reunited into a single kingdom.
Now, as I looked at this, I noticed a couple of things that were really odd about this particular sign with its explanation compared to the other ones in Ezekiel.
Those who will benefit
So here's the first thing that's a bit odd: the people who are his are not the people who will benefit.
The particular enacted sign with the sticks is that the northern tribes, who were lost for 135 years, will not lose out when God acts to remake his people. They will be part of what God will do.
Now, this is tremendous news—for who? For the northern tribes of the people of God. Who knows where they are? Ezekiel is ministering to people deported from the south, from Judah. So why do they need to know that God's going to include the north? What's that got to do with anything?
What's happening is God is taking them back much further. He's not just showing the people of Judah that he's going to reverse the damage of the exile—he's going back to promises of God that stretch much further back than that, and showing that all the things that God has promised, that appear to have unravelled, will be brought to pass.
And there are hints in this passage—and we will see some of them—of promises made to Jacob, to Moses, to David. This is all the promises of God coming together.
It's odd.
Explanation doesn’t match the sign
As Ezekiel explains what he's just done with these two sticks, he goes really off-topic—I mean really off-topic. He starts off talking about bringing together the two kingdoms, and in the first half of this passage the key word that is repeated again and again and again is the word one. I think we get it about eight times—there'll be one nation, one kingdom, one king, one shepherd.
But then in the second half, we no longer get the word one at all. He's moved on to talk about all the other wonderful things that God will do. He's just used this as a launchpad for all of God's blessings. And the key word in the second half of our reading is the word forever. We get it five times—you may have noticed, actually, as Sam was reading it for us: they will live there forever, he will be prince forever, I will make them an everlasting covenant, a covenant forever, my sanctuary will be among them forever.
So God is going back to his oldest promises, and he's showing them that they will all come true, and that the future he brings to his people—to us—will not be there for a short time and then lost. It will be forever.
So let's look at the things that God promises. Let's see how these promises are for us, and how they are for us forever.
I've got three headings for you, and if either in life groups or the women's Bible study you've done the God's Big Picture Bible overview, you will recognise these categories. They are there on the page: people, land, and blessings.
Promises of people
So, first of all, let's look at people.
So God's ancient promise was that the people of God would include all of the twelve tribes, and that promise looks lost. But God says he will join the twelve tribes together again. There'll be one nation, one kingdom under one king, united under God's rule and blessing.
How did that promise go? Well, in Jesus' day, we have to look at some people called the Samaritans. We met them in John chapter 4—we'll get there.
The Samaritans were descended from the northern tribes of Israel—that old kingdom. Slightly more complicated than just descended from—they were kind of halflings. What happened was the Assyrians resettled the land with Canaanite tribes they had deported from elsewhere. They intermarried with the Israelites who were left behind, and you had people who were half-mixed—mixed-race people, half-Canaanite, half-Israelite—and who were mixed-religion too. They wanted to worship the true God and other gods and mix it all up. You can read 2 Kings 17 later if you want to.
And the Samaritans were descended from that kind of half-northern-tribe mixed-race group that comes from there.
Now, the Jews of Jesus' day hated the Samaritans. John tells us, in case we didn't know: "The Jews did not associate with Samaritans." They really didn't—to the point where, for Jesus to be talking to a Samaritan woman, was just—what is he thinking? You don't do that.
But Jesus began keeping the promise that is here, because he finds himself sat at a well in the midday sun in Sikhar in Samaria, talking to a woman. He asks her for a drink, tells her everything she ever did, tells her he could give her living water, and as a result, he stays two more days, and many Samaritans believe.
But the story does not end there, because in John chapter 10 Jesus says that he must bring other sheep that are not of this sheepfold. He must bring Gentiles—non-Jews completely—must join his people, and they will, he says, be one flock.
We get the same story worked out in the Book of Acts. So in Acts chapter 1 verse 8, Jesus tells his first disciples: "You will be my witnesses in Jerusalem, Judea, Samaria, and to the ends of the earth." And sure enough, in Acts chapter 8, Philip goes, witnesses to some people in Samaria, and many Samaritans become Christians.
What happens next is Peter and John come to Samaria to make sure that these new Samaritan Christians know that they are part of the one Church, and that there are not two rival churches—Samaritan and Jewish. You can see now from the history what a disaster that would have been. They have to tie the whole thing together.
But then the story doesn't end there, because in Acts chapter 10, Cornelius the Roman becomes a Christian—the first of many, many Gentiles as well.
You see, God has kept this promise. God has united together the people of God. But he's kept it—and more. He's not just united the southern tribe of Judah with the northern tribes. He's done that—and then people from every tribe, language, tongue, and nation. United us all into one big people of God.
Multinational people
Here are three things about the wonderful people of God that God has created. The first is we are a multinational people. We've talked about that. Look around the room and you can see it as well.
Undeserving people
Second thing is, it includes the undeserving. It includes the undeserving. The Samaritans were hated. Nobody thought they could be numbered amongst the people of God, and yet the Christian church is wonderfully, in the right sense, inclusive.
So maybe you think, sat here today, that you are not the kind of person that God could possibly want in his kingdom. Let me tell you that Jesus is all about finding people who are on the margins, people that others write off, and including them in his people. Anybody here can give their heart to Jesus and join that people. It is about integrating people in.
United people
And then the third detail is that we are a united people. We fall out so easily today. If you're not on Twitter, don't we just? People fall out about the tiniest things. We find our tribe and we know they're not my sort. Much easier to identify who is not yours than who is one of yours. And we just fragment and fall out all the time.
Whereas Ezekiel takes two sticks and makes them one in his hand, because God will take two kingdoms and make them one in his hand, because God plans to build a people that is one nation, one kingdom, with one king and shepherd. And if what you want and long for is true unity — unity in diversity — you need to join the people of God.
Promises of land
People. Second one is land. It's the second area that God is promising here. God promised a land to Jacob.
25: "They will live in the land I gave to my servant Jacob, whose other name was Israel, the land of Canaan."
And this builds on earlier promises to Abraham that are echoed in these verses. But at the exile, that all looks lost. They've lost their land — until verse 21:
"This is what the Sovereign Lord says: I will take the Israelites out of the nations where they have gone. I will gather them from all around and bring them back into their own land. And I will make them one nation in the land, on the mountains of Israel."
Or verse 25:
"They will live in the land I gave to my servant Jacob, the land where your ancestors lived. They and their children and their children's children will live there forever."
Another promise that's forever. The land is forever.
What happened to that promise? Well, land is actually a big theme in the rest of Ezekiel. We've got four more sermons after this one planned in Ezekiel, God willing, and in each of the remaining chapters, the theme of land is big. But as the land is described, it's a kind of description of the land of Canaan — only not. It's kind of a bit like a sort of caricature, or a cartoon, or sort of impressionist.
You know how impressionist art works? What you do is you end up with a picture that looks a bit like what it is, but it's not that every line and detail is exactly — it's not a photo. Everything's not exactly right.
It's not exactly — it's big brush strokes. But if you step back and look at it: yeah, that's it. Quite. So you've got a wonderful painting of Scarborough and you can see the harbour, and you can see the castle, and then you're going, "One minute, there’s 3,000 yachts in that harbour — how did they fit those in?" And the castle's got lovely living quarters and there are flags — it’s not a ruin, it’s an actual castle. And who stuck Flamborough Head lighthouse on South Bay? It's not there. But it’s definitely Scarborough. It's not anywhere else. It is Scarborough. It's kind of bigger, it's richer, it's fuller — it's kind of "it is but it isn't".
And it's like that as we read through the rest of Ezekiel. It's definitely Canaan, and yet somehow it's bigger, it's richer, it's fuller. It's like Canaan, but not. It's more. All the hopes for the land are tied up in the chapters of Ezekiel that follow — and yet without being tied to the exact postcode in which they originally played out.
And as we get to the New Testament, as we've seen, the people of God is not just the twelve tribes of Israel — it's people from every nation. And when people became Christians in Antioch — I'll tell you what they didn’t do: they didn’t sell their house and go and buy one in Jerusalem so they could live in the right plot of land. No — they stayed in Antioch, because that land — that's included too.
The promise that God would give his people a land to live in was not — it's not just been kept, it's been exceeded. God did not just give his people 8,500 square miles to the east of the Mediterranean. He’s given us the whole world to inherit. Jesus said, "Blessed are the meek, for they will inherit the earth."
Or remember, the devil had the cheek to offer Jesus all the kingdoms of this world and their splendour — as though they were his to give. But Jesus resisted the temptation — not because he didn’t want them — no, because he had a plan, to do with the death and resurrection of Jesus, whereby he would take those kingdoms by force. And now the kingdoms of this world have become the kingdom of our Lord and his Messiah, and he will reign forever and ever.
God has promised a beautiful land to live in — and that promise is one that God is keeping. And returning a tiny remnant to their homeland is just the beginning. The world belongs to Jesus and is ours to inherit. And the climax will be when Jesus returns, and a new heavens and new earth are created — a wonderful, perfect place for all the people of the Lord Jesus to live in forever.
That's land.
Promises of blessing
And then blessing. Here's verse 26:
"I will make a covenant of peace with them."
Here is the goal that God has for creating all of these promises: he's going to make a covenant with them that will be a covenant marked by peace.
Now when we talk about peace, we often just mean the absence of warfare, or the absence of conflict. In the Bible, peace is much richer. Peace is about everything being well — in harmony, working as it's meant to, thriving, healthy. That is peace — shalom.
We long, do we not, for peace in Ukraine — and peace between Russia and Ukraine. Now obviously, at a minimum, that will not happen until people stop firing missiles and shooting guns. But that's just the minimum.
Peace in Ukraine means people have their land to farm and enjoy the produce and sell it. Peace between Russia and Ukraine means the kids can go for sleepovers in each other's homes without the parents worrying that anything might go wrong. People can take jobs and marry and build friendships across the border. And there are barbecues to be had. And that is peace.
Now God’s covenant of peace focuses here on two ancient promises to God’s people. The first is that God will live among his people. Verse 26 says:
"I will establish them and increase their numbers, and I will put my sanctuary among them. My dwelling place will be with them, and I will be their God and they will be my people. Then the nations will know that I the Lord make Israel holy, when my sanctuary is among them forever."
This goes back to the time of Moses, when the people lived in a tented camp, and God pitched his tent right in the middle of the rest of them, and said, "I will live with them." God is not distant. He wants to live among us and know us — which he did when Jesus came as Emmanuel, God with us — which he does as the Spirit comes and God's Spirit lives in the heart of every Christian believer — and which he will do when Jesus returns, and the throne of God and of the Lamb will be in the city, and we will see his face.
God promised that he would live among his people, and Ezekiel wants us to know that promise has not been forgotten. God will keep that promise — and it will be forever.
But then the second nature promise of God's blessing is that God will change our hearts — to love him, to follow him, to live his way. Verse 23:
"They will no longer defile themselves with their idols and vile images or with any of their offences, for I will save them from all their sinful backsliding, and I will cleanse them. They will be my people, and I will be their God."
This also goes back to something that God promised to Moses. Here's Deuteronomy chapter 30, verse 6:
"The Lord your God will circumcise your hearts and the hearts of your descendants, so that you may love him with all your heart and with all your soul, and live."
God does not just tell us what to do without lifting a finger to help us to do it — so it just remains a standard that we can never meet. No — he changes us from within. He transforms us so that we love the things God loves, and we hate the things that God hates.
That was God's promise. And when someone turns to Jesus, he lives in us by his Spirit — to turn us into the beautiful people that he wants us to be, to reflect his character and his ways. Until Jesus returns, and all of his people never sin again, and we are good and consistently good and only good.
People often ask me, "When Jesus returns and there is a renewed earth, is there a danger that somebody will eat the wrong fruit, and the whole thing will unravel again and have to be rescued all over again?" And the answer is: no. For thousands of reasons. But it’s right here. God will cure us of our backsliding — and he’ll do so forever.
Conclusion
So if life feels fragile, if promises feel cheap, if the future seems uncertain, then Ezekiel is saying this to us. He's saying: you can depend on God — on the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ. His promises are precious. His future is permanent. And when he says "forever", he means forever.
You can depend on him when he says that everyone who comes to Jesus will be part of a multinational, united people of God; will have a wonderful land to live in that belongs to them forever; will enjoy the blessings of new hearts that love God and all that is good; and will have God live among them forever.
Then he will do it. And when he says that future will be like that forever — he means forever.