S42 || For the Glory of His Name: Why God Restores the Undeserving || Ezekiel 36:1-20 || Session 42

A single claim reframes everything: restoration arrives not because the nation of Israel finally deserves it, but because God refuses to let His name be profaned among the other nations. We walk through the first half of Ezekiel chapter 36 step by step—why the prophet speaks to mountains and ravines, how neighboring nations like Edom misread Israel’s desolation as opportunity, and what Israel's exile broadcast to the world about God's strength and character. The result is a rigorous, grounded look at land, judgment, and hope that’s as historically concrete as it is spiritually piercing.

We revisit Israel’s entry into the land, the descent into idolatry and bloodshed, and the measured justice that scattered them among the nations. Then we confront the hard edge of the text: when the exiles arrive in foreign streets, the surrounding world sneers, “These are the Lord’s people, yet they’ve left His land.” That line becomes the turning point. God acts—not to reward improved behavior, but to vindicate His reputation and keep promises spoken long before any revival or reform. It’s a counterintuitive logic of grace that shatters pride and centers divine fidelity over human effort.

Join us for a clear, candid exploration of Ezekiel 36 that steadies faith, sharpens discernment, and widens awe. If this conversation challenges or encourages you, share it with a friend, subscribe for the next installment, and leave a review with your biggest takeaway.

Chapters

• 0:00 Setting the Stakes: Ezekiel 36
• 0:41 Reading Verses 1–7 Aloud
• 3:46 Land Addressed, Nations Rebuked
• 20:34 Israel’s History: From Exodus to Land
• 21:50 Idolatry, Bloodshed, and Judgment
• 23:23 Scattered Among Nations, Name Profaned
• 26:29 Modern Implications of the Land
• 27:41 God’s Motive: For His Name Alone
• 28:04 Tease for Next Study & Closing

Transcript

SPEAKER_00: 0:16

Today on reasoning through the Bible, we come to what I believe is the most important chapter in the entire book because God is very clear and very lengthy with what He's going to do. He's very plain and so clear that it really takes going to school a very long time to try to deny it, but some people do. So we're going to go through it in detail. Hi, my name's Glenn. I'm here with Steve. We're going to do our regular practice, which is to read these sections and then go through them in detail and talk about the implications of them. And if you have your copy of the Word of God, turn to Ezekiel chapter 36, which again, I think it's the most important chapter in the entire book. Simply because if you remember the flow of the book, God called the prophet Ezekiel and he spent the first 24 chapters condemning Israel, Jerusalem, and the Jewish people thoroughly and completely. God then spends several chapters pouring out his wrath and condemnation on the nations around Israel for their disobedience. Up to this point, no one in the entire story has done anything worthy of pleasing God. Yet here we have a very clear explanation that God is the one who is going to bring about a restoration of Israel. This is quite profound simply because of the long, heavy, and blunt condemnations that have come prior to this. God makes it very clear in this passage that He has plans to restore Israel to their land. It's quite amazing. So let's go ahead and get into it. Steve, if you can read the first seven verses of Ezekiel chapter 36.

SPEAKER_01: 2:04

And you, Son of Man, prophesy to the mountains of Israel and say, O mountains of Israel, hear the word of the Lord. Thus says the Lord God, because the enemy has spoken against you, aha, and the everlasting heights have become our possession. Therefore, prophesy and say, Thus says the Lord God, for good reason they have made you desolate and crushed you from every side, that you would become a possession of the rest of the nations, and you have been taken up in the talk and the whispering of the people. Therefore, O mountains of Israel, hear the word of the Lord God. Thus says the Lord God to the mountains and to the hills, to the ravines and to the valleys, to the desolate wastes and to the forsaken cities which have become a prey and a derision to the rest of the nations which are round about. Therefore, thus says the Lord God, surely in the fire of my jealousy I have spoken against the rest of the nations and against all Edom, who appropriated my land for themselves as a possession with wholehearted joy and with scorn of soul to drive it out for prey. Therefore, prophesy concerning the land of Israel, and say to the mountains and to the hills, to the ravines and to the valleys, thus says the Lord God, behold, I have spoken in my jealousy and in my wrath, because you have endured the insults of the nations. Therefore, thus says the Lord God, I have sworn that surely the nations which are around you will themselves endure their insults.

SPEAKER_00: 3:46

In this section, God is speaking very directly to the mountains of Israel. It's speaking to the land itself, giving a message to all the people about the land. He spoke to the mountains of Seir, the last chapter where the Edomites were. Now he's speaking to the mountains in the land of Israel. God is to be very clear that he's speaking of the physical geography of the land of Israel, not some spiritual or figurative application. And we'll draw that point home as we go through in some detail. God had judged Israel and removed them from the lands so that nations like Edom came in and took it. We saw that in the last chapter. God is saying that because the land had become a possession of the rest of the nations, verse three, then God will speak, quote, against the rest of the nations in verse five, and ensure these nations, quote, will themselves endure their insults in verse 7. That's the structure of what we just read. God has taken Israel out of the land as punishment, but he is still in control of it, and the land is his.

SPEAKER_01: 20:28

According to their ways and their deeds, I judge them. When they came to the nations where they went, they profaned my holy name, because it was said of them, These are the people of the Lord, yet they have come out of his land.

SPEAKER_00: 20:44

The entire account is bad. Every bit of it. He's giving a summary of Israel's sin, his own punishment, and then Israel's response to that punishment. Verse 17, God starts out when Israel was in the land. So, Steve, when did Israel first enter the land?

SPEAKER_01: 21:04

Whenever they came out of Egypt. Now, before that, they went through a wandering of 40 years in the wilderness. But then we pick up in the book of Joshua when they went into the land. That was back in the 1100s or so BC of when they went into the land the first time.

SPEAKER_00: 21:24

Exactly. Uh, God gave Moses the law on Mount Sinai. He then sent Joshua in to conquer the land. Here in the middle of verse 17, how did Israel react once they get to the land?

SPEAKER_01: 21:39

They went off and they worshiped other idols. That's the main theme that we saw earlier in this book as the condemnation of why they're being put out into exile from Nebuchadnezzar and the Babylonians. God says there in verse 17, the house of Israel was living on their own land, but they defiled it by their ways and their deeds. And before me they were unclean, like the impurity of a woman. So through their idol worship and their other things that they were doing, of not following the ordinances' statutes and not following God, that is the way God looked at it. They were unclean.

SPEAKER_00: 22:23

The last half of verse 18, he gives two specific examples of the sin: the shedding of blood and the worshiping of idols. So he is saying here again, the land that I set out for you, the land flowing with milk and honey, I provided it for you. Once you got in there, you defiled it. It was very ugly. You've were shedding blood, killing people, and worshiping idols. The beginning of verse 18, how did God react to Israel's gross sin?

SPEAKER_01: 22:56

He says that he poured out his wrath on them. We saw that depicted when the northern kingdom of Israel was taken off by Assyria, and now the southern kingdom of Judah and Jerusalem itself.

SPEAKER_00: 23:10

Exactly. God poured out his wrath on them at the beginning of verse 18. Then in verse 19, he scatters them amongst the nation. So the scattering was additional punishment. Israel disobeyed, God poured out his wrath on them and scattered them amongst the nations. And look at the end of verse 19. Quote, according to their ways and their deeds, I judge them, unquote. The Lord is a righteous and fair judge. He gives out fair punishment based on their deeds. Then look at the middle of verse 20. When Israel went into captivity into the foreign lands, how did this event reflect on God and God's name?

SPEAKER_01: 23:57

It says that God's name was profaned because all of the other nations were saying, Why are these people here? Why aren't they living in the land? God has put them out. And so it's a reflection on God. He wasn't able to protect his people or take care of his people. That's the way the other nations looked at it. Therefore, God's name was profane because of the actions of the people.

SPEAKER_00: 24:23

The sense here is that everything in the world, people, objects, and animals are either holy and set apart to God for his holiness, or they are common and profane. That's the sense of the word here. So the nation of Israel had been set apart. They were set apart for holy use. They were set apart for righteous use. But here, once they were pulled out of the land, everybody would say, well, God wasn't able to protect them. God was too weak to protect them. Therefore, God's name was profane. That was the sense here. The sense is that things dedicated to God, he should have been powerful enough to have protect them and set them apart as a holy people. But look at them, they were just as sinful as everyone else. Now they've been taken off. So God must not be a very good God. While in exile, the Jewish people were no longer being used by God for his purpose. So at this point in the account, God has given Israel a land flowing with milk and honey. Israel responded with horrible sin. God punished them by scattering them amongst the nations, and Israel responded by profaning God's name to the nations. Has Israel done anything in here that has deserved a blessing?

SPEAKER_01: 25:42

No, they haven't. And as in earlier session, we talked about whether or not Israel deserved to be in the land. The answer was no, they don't deserve to be there. But it's not up to us to decide that. That's up for God to decide that. And I wanted to point out that at the very last part of 20, he says, These are the people of the Lord, yet they have come out of his land. This is what the other nations were saying. God connects that with profaning his name. When they're out of the land, God's name is profaned. It was true then, and it's true now, and it will be true in the future. So the people that we have in our modern day, Glenn, that want to push Israel back out of the land again to extinguish the Jewish people from their land once again, they are going up directly against God. This gives us a picture of how God thinks about the land and who should be there. So it's a cautionary tale to the people today that want to split up the land and want to push the Jewish people out of the land. They need to understand that they're fooling with God as well. Yahweh, it's not just the Jewish people themselves.

SPEAKER_00: 27:01

We've said this before, but just to reiterate the point because it's it's so critical, there's nothing in here that made Israel deserving of being in the land. Matter of fact, everything they did, they didn't deserve to be in the land. There's nothing in here that makes Israel worthy in any way, shape, or form. All they did was disobey and fall under God's wrath and get punished for it. God is the sole reason why he says he's bringing them back. And we're gonna see once we get to the last part of this, he's doing it because of his name, not because of anything that they've been doing. That is what's critical here is the senses that God is going to bless them because he is good and not because anything in them where they are good. Right here is a critical place. We've reinforced that God is about to do something. So please tune in next time as we're gonna see what is arguably the most important part of the entire book of Ezekiel.

SPEAKER_01: 28:05

Thank you so much for watching and listening.