READING: Ezekiel 22:17-23:49, 2 Kings 24:20-25:2, Jeremiah 52:3-5, Jeremiah 39:1, Ezekiel 24:1-14
Just one person.
Just one person walking in righteousness, kneeling in prayer, and lying prone before the Father can make a difference.
Just one person is all it takes.
In today’s text in Ezekiel, God was looking for just one person to “repair the wall and stand in the gap” (a reference to the coming collapse of Jerusalem) – but He could not find that person. Some scholars point out that Jeremiah was still in Jerusalem, but one commentator put it this way:
“God looks in vain for just one man who will try to interpose himself to stop the national ruin. But there was no-one with the moral courage to stem the tide: the leaders were ungodly and those who should have been godly had compromised their position. Presumably Jeremiah was an exception to Ezekiel’s general condemnation, but he had no kingly status and few listened to his words. Any nation which lacks godly leadership, as Israel did at that time, must surely be on the way out.”
That latter statement—“any nation which lacks godly leadership . . . must surely be on the way out”—grabs my attention as I think about our contemporary context in America. May it be that we who are God’s shepherds are always willing to stand in the gap.
Even if we are the only one.
PERSONAL REFLECTION: Does your track record show that you’re willing to stand alone for God?
DAILY PRAYER: “God, grant me spiritual courage to stand in the gap.”
TOMORROW’S READING: Ezekiel 24:15-25:17, Jeremiah 34:1-22, Jeremiah 21:1-14, Ezekiel 29:1-16, Ezekiel 30:20-31:18
Taylor, J. B. (1969). Ezekiel: an Introduction and commentary (Vol. 22, pp. 167–168). InterVarsity Press.