Ezekiel 13:23

Therefore ye shall see no more vanity, nor divine divinations: for I will deliver my people out of your hand: and ye shall know that I am the LORD.

Ye shall see no more vanity. The event shall confute your lies, involving yourselves in destruction (; ; ; ).

Remarks:

(1) The leading characteristic of the false prophets, who are denounced in this chapter, is, they prophesied "out of their own hearts," and "followed their own spirit" (Ezekiel 13:2). The communications which they affected to give as if from God were what they and the people wished, not What the Spirit of God suggested. The minister who frames his preaching merely to please men is not a true minister of God; as Paul saith (), " If I yet pleased men, I should not be the servant of Christ." The faithful servant of God speaks only as the Spirit and the Word of God direct him. Hence, let us beware of the error of many in our day, who, boasting themselves of their rationalistic wisdom, while in the sight of God they are "fools" (; ), set up their own inward light above the outward light of God's Word and receive as true only so much of objective Revelation as they subjectively choose and approve.

(2) Self-seeking is at the root of much of the false teaching that is in the world. The teachers of error in Israel are compared to "foxes in the deserts" (), where, from the want of food, the voracity and the cunning of that wily animal are stimulated in a more than ordinary degree. So where there is a moral desert, the Vineyard of the Lord, the Church, having been spoiled () alike by foes without and traitors within, self-seeking preceptors are sure to abound, whose aim is, not the glory of God and the good of His Church, but to win for themselves either gain or fame.

(3) The true defense of a people is righteousness: and every national breach of the law of God is a breach in the wall wherewith God protects His people from their enemies outside (cf. ; ). The righteous vengeance of God breaks in upon a people through "the gaps" () which their transgression makes in their heavenly defenses. Those are the truest defenders of their country who would lead their countrymen to repentance, and by faithful reproof check those who, in doctrine or practice, or in both, set the Word of God at naught.

(4) Prayer and intercession is another way whereby the believing minister or layman can "make up the hedge for" his church and his country "to stand in the battle in the day of the Lord" (). God has a controversy with the Church and with the nation for their sins: as, then, "Moses stood before God in the breach to turn away His wrath" (; ), so our duty as praying Christians, if we are indeed so, is to plead with God for our country and our church, in the all-prevailing name of Him who, as our great Intercessor, hath made up the hedge, and stood in the gap before God for ourselves (cf. ).

(5) Such is the infatuation of men, that many false teachers believe their own lie, and presumptuously "hope" that the event will make good their word (). This proves that we ought to reject all teachings, however in earnest the teachers may be, which are at variance with the infallible Word of God.

(6) The Lord is coming to punish with His heavy hand all propagators of vanity and lies (Ezekiel 13:8). The thought of His coming should make us very jealous for the truth as it is revealed in His Word, lest we, like them, should not be numbered in "the general assembly () and church of the firstborn which are them, should not be numbered in "the general assembly () and church of the firstborn which are written in heaven"

(7) Woe be to those who promise peace to the sinner without repentance, flattering him with delusive hopes of "life" (), and so strengthening his hands that he should not return from his wicked way. The false prophets of Israel, indeed, made a bustling show of anxiety to repair the moral breaches in the wall of the nation's defenses (): for one of them built a wall, but it was not the wall which God requires; it was a loose wall (note, ), which others of them daubed with untempered mortar. Instead of the true and uniting cement of God's Word, the false teachers substituted their own lie, claiming the inspiration of the Lord (), to give seeming consistency and firmness to the loose wall of their prophecy of peace to the city and nation. But they and their dupes shall awfully undeceived, saith Ezekiel, when God, with the stormy wind, rain, and hail (; ) of His fury, shall break down the wall, lay bare its foundation, and bury the lying builders in its ruins (Ezekiel 13:14): so that they who made into a proverb (Ezekiel 12:22) the delay in the rudiment of God's word of prophecy, shall have their own false prophecies turned into a proverb, "Where is the daubing wherewith ye have daubed it?" () Such shall be the doom of all who rear spiritually a wall well-daubed but ill-built-that is, who, as teachers set forth, or as hearers depend, for salvation upon pleasing lies rather than unpleasant truths.

(8) How sad it is when women also, whose powerful influence over the stronger sex was designed to be exercised on the side of good, employ all their arts and fascinations to decoy souls into sin, and then lull the victim into a state of fancied security, as Delilah lulled Samson to his ruin! (Ezekiel 13:17. ) Vanity, love of admiration, and selfishness are the commonly-prompting motives of women who throw their whole influence on the side of errors of doctrine and practice. Such was Jezebel in her evil-influence over Ahab; and her antitypes have exercised a similar influence for evil, not only in the church of Thyatira (Revelation 2:20), but in all places and ages of the Church. The Lord, however, will not allow them to succeed in their efforts to seduce to their ruin His elect people: He will tear His children from their arms, and let the souls go free which they had almost entangled in their snares (). Let us beware of being seduced by any teacher to entertain hopes which are not warranted by God's Word: and, on the other hand, let not the righteous suffer their heart to be made sad () by the discouragements which professors who make high pretensions throw in their way; but let them ever rejoice and shout for joy because the Lord defends them ().