REUNITED AGAIN

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In Christ, Mark

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The scriptures. May God bless the reading of His holy word.

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, to Ephraim) and all the Israelites associated with him.’ Join them together into one stick so that they will become one in your hand.”

“When your people ask you, ‘Won’t you tell us what you mean by this?’ say to them, ‘This is what the Sovereign Lord says: I am going to take the stick of Joseph—which is in Ephraim’s hand—and of the Israelite tribes associated with him, and join it to Judah’s stick. I will make them into a single stick of wood, and they will become one in my hand.’ Hold before their eyes the sticks you have written on and say to them, ‘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. I will make them one nation in the land, on the mountains of Israel. There will be one king over all of them and they will never again be two nations or be divided into two kingdoms. They will no longer defile themselves with their idols and vile images or with any of their offenses, 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.”

“‘My servant David will be king over them, and they will all have one Shepherd. They will follow My laws and be careful to keep My decrees. 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, and David My servant will be their prince forever. I will make a covenant of peace with them; it will be an everlasting covenant. I will establish them and increase their numbers, and I will put My sanctuary among them forever. My dwelling place will be with them; 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.’”

Ezekiel 37:15-28

This ends today’s reading from God's holy word. Thanks be to God.

Here’s what can happen in a nation when people rely on themselves instead of the wisdom of God?

Rehoboam went to Shechem, for all Israel had gone there to make him king. When Jeroboam son of Nebat heard this (he was still in Egypt, where he had fled from King Solomon), he returned from Egypt.

So they sent for Jeroboam, and he and the whole assembly of Israel went to Rehoboam and said to him:

“Your father put a heavy yoke on us, but now lighten the harsh labor and the heavy yoke he put on us, and we will serve you.”

Rehoboam answered, “Go away for three days and then come back to me.” So the people went away.

Then King Rehoboam consulted the elders who had served his father Solomon during his lifetime. “How would you advise me to answer these people?” he asked.

They replied, “If today you will be a servant to these people and serve them and give them a favorable answer, they will always be your servants.”

But Rehoboam rejected the advice the elders gave him and consulted the young men who had grown up with him and were serving him. He asked them, “What is your advice? How should we answer these people who say to me, ‘Lighten the yoke your father put on us’?”

The young men who had grown up with him replied, “These people have said to you, ‘Your father put a heavy yoke on us, but make our yoke lighter.’ Now tell them, ‘My little finger is thicker than my father’s waist. My father laid on you a heavy yoke; I will make it even heavier. My father scourged you with whips; I will scourge you with scorpions.’”

Three days later Jeroboam and all the people returned to Rehoboam, as the king had said, “Come back to me in three days.” The king answered the people harshly. Rejecting the advice given him by the elders, he followed the advice of the young men and said, “My father made your yoke heavy; I will make it even heavier. My father scourged you with whips; I will scourge you with scorpions.” So the king did not listen to the people, for this turn of events was from the Lord, to fulfill the word the Lord had spoken to Jeroboam son of Nebat through Ahijah the Shilonite.

When all Israel saw that the king refused to listen to them, they answered the king:

“What share do we have in David, what part in Jesse’s son? To your tents, Israel! Look after your own house, David!”

So the Israelites went home. But as for the Israelites who were living in the towns of Judah, Rehoboam still ruled over them.  2 Kings 12:1-17

And with that, the kingdom of Israel became divided. The northern kingdom, which would retain the name Israel, consisted of ten of the twelve tribes (Asher, Dan, Ephraim, Gad, Issachar, Manasseh, Naphtali, Reuben, Simeon, and Zebulun) while the southern kingdom, Judah, would consist of the two remaining tribes (Judah and Benjamin). They would war against one another until each met their fate at the hands of God’s judgment for their respective sinfulness, the north at the hands of the Assyrians and the south, the Babylonians. God’s people became scattered with many lost and never to return to their homeland again.

The sad part about this story is that it was all avoidable. None of it even had to happen in the first place. All the king of Israel had to do was listen to the wisdom of the elders who had served with Solomon, the king we know had been endowed with special powers of discernment by God. Had Rehoboam listened to his elders who were devout men of the Lord, or better yet consulted God Himself, division and strife could have been averted.

But that’s not what happened. The people of Israel divided, separating from one another before they gradually separated from God Himself in the way they lived their lives, an action that we know resulted in heavy consequences.

Fast forward from that point to today’s scriptures from these closing verses of Ezekiel 37 where we see God intervening to make things right again with His people, reuniting them together again:

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, to Ephraim) and all the Israelites associated with him.’ Join them together into one stick so that they will become one in your hand.”

“When your people ask you, ‘Won’t you tell us what you mean by this?’ say to them, ‘This is what the Sovereign Lord says: I am going to take the stick of Joseph—which is in Ephraim’s hand—and of the Israelite tribes associated with him, and join it to Judah’s stick. I will make them into a single stick of wood, and they will become one in my hand.’ Hold before their eyes the sticks you have written on and say to them, ‘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. I will make them one nation in the land, on the mountains of Israel. There will be one king over all of them and they will never again be two nations or be divided into two kingdoms. They will no longer defile themselves with their idols and vile images or with any of their offenses, 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.”

“‘My servant David will be king over them, and they will all have one Shepherd. They will follow My laws and be careful to keep My decrees. 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, and David My servant will be their prince forever. I will make a covenant of peace with them; it will be an everlasting covenant. I will establish them and increase their numbers, and I will put My sanctuary among them forever. My dwelling place will be with them; 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.’” Ezekiel 37:15-28

The analogy is pretty simple to understand. Two sticks, each representing a part of God’s divided kingdom, being conjoined again to live as one people. The people under each stick would be gathered from all around and brought back to their own land where they would once again be ruled by one king. God vowed that they would never again be two nations or divided into two kingdoms. The people would live in peace because of the covenant God made with them, a covenant which He said would be everlasting. And together again, the people would be fruitful and multiply within the dwelling place God provided.

As we look at the end of Ezekiel 37, we find hope for us today for in many places, we have become a divided nation in the United States. A look at other parts of the world would find similar problems within other nations.

So what do we do in the midst of these matters of divisiveness?

The answer is always going to be a found in turning toward the Lord, the Author and Sustainer of unity. For in Him and Him alone, we find the common ground He wants us to stand on, the foundation on which to build all our relationships, whether personal or in community with one another.

As He did with the Israelites, God can reunite people again and restore them to a place where they can co-exist in peace and love, a place where instead of focusing on their differences, they can focus on the only thing worth focusing on, the Lord God Almighty.

It’s time for all of us to put our differences aside and seek the Lord who has promised this for any nation in discord:

If My people, who are called by My name, will humble themselves and pray and seek My face and turn from their wicked ways, then I will hear from heaven, and I will forgive their sin and will heal their land. 2 Chronicles 7:14

Amen.

In Christ,

Mark
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