Ezekiel 4:17

That they may want bread and water, and be astonied one with another, and consume away for their iniquity. That they may ... be astonied one with another - mutually regard one another with astonishment - i:e., with the stupefied look of despairing want.

Remarks:

(1) Ezekiel by a vivid representation pourtrayed prophetically the coming siege of Jerusalem, and the wall of separation which God had placed between Himself and the people who once had been so closely united to Him (Ezekiel 4:1). Iniquity and apostasy separate between a people and their God () so that, instead of encompassing them with His favour as with a shield (), He gives them up to be environed by their enemies. Let us he warned by the "sign" which the house of Israel is to us, to know that faithfulness to our God is the only path of security and peace.

(2) The prophet also symbolically bore the iniquity of Israel and Judah for the respective times appointed to both (Ezekiel 4:4). The severe and lengthened discipline of chastisement was designed for their good at last, God having mercy in store for His ancient people in their latter end, when He has first thoroughly pleaded with them in "the wilderness of the people" (). Similarly God "hath laid on Christ the iniquity of us all" (; ; ); but in the case of those who have a saving and lasting interest in the atonement of the great Sin-bearer, God sees fit to put them through a discipline of chastisement, that they may be made partakers of His holiness, and heirs of His blessedness at last.

(3) The long sojourn of Israel among the Gentiles, in the midst of pagan defilements, and this in hunger, in thirst, and in want of all things (), is represented by Ezekiel living on a very coarse and stinted diet; his bread, moreover, being baked with dung (Ezekiel 4:9). The famine at the siege of Jerusalem also is foreshadowed. Such are the evils which sin begets. When the people of God, in soul and spirit, have become assimilated to the people of the ungodly world,it is in righteous retribution appointed that the external condition of the former also shall be brought down to the same low level as the latter. Nothing but a close and consistent walk with God can raise us unequivocally to a sublime elevation above the world.

(4) Ezekiel was more concerned at being required to eat what offended his conscience, than at being required to eat what was not pleasing to his palate (). Let us always seek to have this testimony of our conscience, that in all, even the least things, our desire is to walk religiously before God and before man.

(5) In the abundance of our food, and even of luxuries, we are too apt to forget the miseries from which we are exempt, and to which others are exposed who have not a sufficiency of provisions. May God give us, besides His other countless gifts, a truly grateful heart!