Today through Ezekiel our Lord condemns Israel for their unfaithfulness. Why? Because it is destructive to them? Only in part. See that our Lord's complaint is that Israel in bondage brings shame to the name of God. Just look at these people. They are sinful and in bondage, and they are supposed to be God's people. He must not be the kind of God they say he is. He must not be the kind of God I'd want to depend on.
We see very much the same situation in modern Western society. One of the prime reasons I've run into that people don't wish to believe in Christ is quite frankly the way Christians act. And it isn't because of their genuine piety, faithfulness, longsuffering, and desire to seek the truth in Scriptures. It is because of the way our cultural Christianity acts. It is because of the stereotype of Christians as people who are selfish, lazy, narrow-minded, and concerned primarily with looking good and overeating at their fellowship dinners. Alas, this stereotype comes from somewhere. It comes from actual practices of our cultural Christianity.
Let us flee this kind of behavior. It brings shame to Christ. Yet in our flight, let us look to the promises God gives through Ezekiel near the end of today's reading. Do we flee this idiocy in our own strength? Not at all. Our Lord is giving us a heart to understand, a heart to repent, a heart to turn to him in faith. We flee this culture which brings shame to Christ not in our own power but in the power our Lord has promised us. We flee this Christian ghetto by the power of the Holy Spirit, living and active in us. We flee it through the power of the resurrected Christ, who has borne our sin and shame to his death, giving us life. Will our world criticize us for our love and faithfulness? Yes. Let them criticize away. They criticized our Lord and Savior for the very same things. But if we incur reproach, let it be for a genuine Christian life, that life which does actually bring honor to our Lord.
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