Ezekiel 2:1-5; 2 Cor. 12:1-10; Mark 6:1-13
When God called Ezekiel to be His prophet He made it clear that Ezekiel was going to have a difficult and challenging audience for the message he would be sharing. God describes the people to whom He was sending Ezekiel as a “rebellious nation” and as being “obstinate and stubborn.” Compounding the problem of having an unreceptive audience, God gave Ezekiel a message that the target group was certain to object to and likely to reject. Ezekiel was to proclaim to these people who loved to sin and had no use for God a message of repentance.
On the
surface, it appears as though God was setting Ezekiel up for failure. God was
sending the prophet to a people who were not interested in or receptive to his
message. Successful ministry leaders today have found ways around this problem.
Carefully analyzing the people whom they are targeting for ministry, they
either choose a target group that will be receptive to their message or they
craft a message that will be embraced by the target group. By employing these
tactics, ministries in our culture have recorded remarkable success — at least
in numbers. But what about the groups of people who have been by-passed because
they were “obstinate and stubborn”? How will they hear the message of
repentance if they are excluded because they are not receptive? Or how will
people come to repentance if what is proclaimed to them is a tailor-made,
watered down message that they are able to accept as they are? God wasn’t
setting Ezekiel up for failure. He was sending him to the people who most
needed to hear the message that God had given him.
We might
be tempted to follow the modern methods of ministry in order to be successful.
By picking and choosing our audience or our message, we might accomplish some
impressive things. But that would be rebellion against God’s call. He has set
us apart to both live in repentance and to call our dying world to repentance.
It’s a message that is often rejected by the “obstinate and stubborn” people
who are comfortable in the sins and think they have no use for God. But it is
the only message we are called to proclaim and it is precisely the message that
they need to hear if they are to leave their rebellious ways, repent, and
rejoice in God’s grace and mercy.
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