STRENGTHENED BY GOD

“I will make you as unyielding and hardened as they are. I will make your forehead like the hardest stone, harder than flint. Do not be afraid of them or terrified by them, though they are a rebellious people.” —Ezekiel 3:8, 9

If we imagine the most difficult and complicated context, calling, or task, we can never imagine—or encounter—something so challenging that God’s action and intervention cannot overcome it. In a sense, the greater the challenges we undertake, the greater will be our understanding and appreciation of the potential and reality of God’s power and care. In effect, this was God’s calling to Ezekiel. As difficult as it would be, Ezekiel was not to take it personally. “The people of Israel are not willing to listen to you because they are not willing to listen to me, for all the Israelites are hardened and obstinate” (Ezekiel 3:7). Instead, Ezekiel was to insist upon and recognize that God’s capacity and ability are larger than the greatest challenges he could imagine—able to melt the hardest hearts. Ezekiel’s name means “strengthened by God,” and that was the experience to which he was called and that he was to share with others. God was saying to Ezekiel that if the people’s heads and hearts are hardened, your divine determination must be harder still. If they are stubborn in their rebellion, you are to be stubborn in your ministry. If the challenges seem great, your God and His power are all the greater.

As Isaiah had expressed it, “Because the Sovereign LORD helps me, I will not be disgraced. Therefore have I set my face like flint, and I know I will not be put to shame” (Isaiah 50:7). When it was Ezekiel’s turn to take up the prophetic ministry, he did not need to be afraid. God was his strength, always stronger than any opposition, uncertainty, or fear that he could imagine or encounter.