Ezekiel 9:9-11, 10:18-19

⁹ Then He said to me, “The iniquity of the house of Israel and Judah is exceedingly great, and the land is full of bloodshed, and the city full of perversity; for they say, ‘The Lord has forsaken the land, and the Lord does not see!’ ¹⁰ And as for Me also, My eye will neither spare, nor will I have pity, but I will recompense their deeds on their own head.”

¹¹ Just then, the man clothed with linen, who had the inkhorn at his side, reported back and said, “I have done as You commanded me.”

¹⁸ Then the glory of the Lord departed from the threshold of the temple and stood over the cherubim. ¹⁹ And the cherubim lifted their wings and mounted up from the earth in my sight.

To me, this is one of the saddest scriptures in the Old Testament, where the glory of the Lord left the Temple. The sins and idolatry of the Israelites had gotten so bad that the Lord gave them over to their enemies and His glory left the Temple. The Temple is where the Israelites would meet God and where they sacrificed to God their offerings and where they worshipped the true Living God, and His glory had departed from the temple. This was a desperate measure on God’s part, but the people had driven Him to it. They were so caught up in the world around them and all the other gods in that world that it called for desperate measures.

So, how does this story relate to us as followers of Christ today? Our temple is our body and God’s presence is the Holy Spirit within us. I think we can become so caught up in the world around us and the “other gods”, (money, possessions, materialism, etc.), that we can push the Holy Spirit out because there is no room for Him.

We are at risk of the very same horrible circumstance if we don’t make room in our heart first for the Lord. I don’t think He would be far away, as “He is standing at the door and knocking”, but we have to let Him in. It requires action on our part!

Later in Ezekiel God gives the prophet these words, “I will give you a new heart and put a new spirit within you; I will take the heart of stone out of your flesh and give you a heart of flesh. I will put My Spirit within you and cause you to walk in My statutes, and you will keep My judgments and do them (Ez. 36:26-27).”

This is speaking of the New Covenant God has given us through Jesus Christ, but we have to accept it and not push the Spirit out by filling our heart with the things of this world.