Dr Paul Allen

How goes the world? Answering that question tends to lead to discouragement. Everything seems upside down. Evil is considered good; good is considered evil. Truth has fallen in the streets and is trampled by academic processions, political machinery, and populous parades.  It seems that Christianity is an ever-shrinking minority with less influence than numbers. Who is in control? How can these things be? Although we may not know why things are the way they are, we must believe that the Bible is true and that there is a throne secluded from natural sight that governs absolutely with an agenda of self-glory and salvific good—God’s throne. It may seem that the world is out of control, but it is not. Throughout biblical history, God assured His people of His unfailing purpose at times when they needed that assurance most. Ezekiel lived when it appeared that hostile powers would successfully have their pagan way against God’s redemptive plan.  Since he was a priest, Ezekiel knew that the s

 “UFOs are real; they’re even talked about in the Bible!” Those words blew my thirteen-year-old mind when I heard them from my friend Jason. He and I would sometimes discuss many of the religious topics of concern to science-fiction-loving thirteen-year-old boys—you know, aliens, space travel, and so forth. Although I had attended church and Sunday school regularly since I was about seven, I had never heard this about UFOs before.  And where did Jason find accounts of humanity’s encounter with UFOs? In the book of Ezekiel, of course. After all, what else could explain the four-faced creatures and the eye-covered wheels within wheels that the prophet sees in the opening chapters of the book of Ezekiel? More than three decades have now passed since that eighth-grade conversation. If I ever really believed that Ezekiel saw UFOs, I don’t any longer. But that hasn’t stopped many others, often people outside the church, from posting on webpages and writing books about Ezekiel’s encounter wit

Can you imagine what Ezekiel went through when he heard the words God uttered to him in Ezekiel 3:7 But the house of Israel will not be willing to listen to you, for they are not willing to listen to me: because all the house of Israel have a hard forehead and a stubborn heart. Can you imagine? Here is a man who was simply minding his own business when God intervenes. He is one of the few to interact with God, he survives the encounter, and God raises him up as one of His prophets. But then after tasking him with the job of being a preacher to his own people, the people of Israel, he leaves him with a bomb. By the way, they’re not going to listen to you! What in the world? Then why bother? Ok, then send me somewhere else! Those are some of the statements I’d be tempted to make if I were in Mr. Ezekiel's shoes.  Can you imagine telling a believer this?  If someone had told you, as you made plans to go to UK or France or Italy, that you would spend 50 years preaching but no one would

EZEKIEL 33:1–20 “As I live, declares the Lord GOD, I have no pleasure in the death of the wicked, but that the wicked turn from his way and live; turn back, turn back from your evil ways, for why will you die, O house of Israel?” (v. 11). Ezekiel is known for his vivid descriptions of sin and the unthinkable idea among many ancient Jews that God would abandon the Promised Land and the temple (10; 16:1–58). It is incredible, then, that the prophet also clearly displays the Lord’s commitment never to abandon His people utterly (Gen. 15). The fact that God continued speaking to His people in Babylon through Ezekiel proves that He would not allow His chosen nation to pass away. The prophet went into exile with the group of leading Judahites who were taken to Babylon with King Jehoiachin of Judah in 597/598 B.C. (2 Kings 24:1b–17). One might think that this exile, which confirmed the Lord’s promise to punish the impenitent nation, would have convinced the people who were exiled a

“Would You Rather…?” has become a very popular game in the past few years. One of my favorite “would you rathers” of all time is: would you rather have fingers the size of your legs, or legs the size of your fingers? The Bible seems to present many different “would you rathers”, such as: would you rather live on the corner of a roof or with a contentious wife? But mostly the Bible isn’t very good at the game. It asks questions like: would you rather spend eternity in hell or in heaven? With Jesus or the Devil ? I found one of the Bible’s most devastating “would you rathers”. As I was reading through the Bible I came across a passage in Ezekiel 3:17-21 that completely changed my life. Here God is speaking to the prophet Ezekiel. He has just picked him to be his prophet, and has already told him that he is going to be a messenger to Israel , and now he is going to make him his ambassador. 17  “ Son of man , I have made you a watchman for the house of Israel. When

Some people have pointed to two texts that may shed light on the age of Jesus at the time of his baptism. We are told in Luke 3:23 that Jesus “was about thirty years old” when he began his public ministry. Some have suggested that perhaps Luke used the round number thirty in order to draw a parallel between Jesus and David, whose kingship began at that age (2 Sam. 5:3–4; cf. also Joseph in Gen. 41:46 and Ezekiel in Ezek. 1:1). In John 8:57 we read that the Jews said to him, “You are not yet fifty years old, and have you seen Abraham?” Stein points out that “this should not be taken as an exact reference by Jesus’ opponents to his actual age. The statement seeks rather to emphasize the difference between Jesus’ age and the time of Abraham more than fifteen centuries earlier. How could Jesus and Abraham have known each other, as Jesus claimed (Jn. 8:56)? Fifty years is most probably a generous exaggeration of Jesus’ age for the sake of argument. Even if Jesus was attributed an age old

Before we can appreciate this truth, we must get our bearings. Ezekiel was a prophet to the people of Judah during their years of captivity in Babylon. This captivity came about in three stages. In 605 B.C. when Daniel and his friends were taken. In 597 B.C. when ten thousand more of Judah’s citizens, including Ezekiel, were taken. In 586 B.C. when Nebuchadnezzar and his forces dealt the final blow to Judah by destroying the city of Jerusalem and carrying away even more captives. Ezekiel seems to have begun his prophetic ministry around 592 B.C. and continued it until the year 570. It was there in Babylon that Ezekiel received this vision of the cherubim. What did this mean? Many of the Jews had a tendency to believe that God was present only in the temple. On the basis of this vision, Ezekiel could assure his fellow captives that God was present there in Babylon just as he was in the temple of Jerusalem. Our circumstances can be such that we can also be tempted to belie

English: Solomon Dedicates the Temple at Jerusalem, c. 1896-1902, by James Jacques Joseph Tissot (French, 1836-1902) or followers, gouache on board, 10 5/16 x 7 1/2 in. (26.2 x 19.2 cm), at the Jewish Museum, New York (Photo credit: Wikipedia ) “In visions of God he brought me to the land of Israel , and set me down on a very high mountain, on which was a structure like a city… . There was a man whose appearance was like bronze, with a linen cord and a measuring reed in his hand. And he was standing in the gateway” (vv. 2–3).- Ezekiel 40 Let us take a moment to put ourselves in the shoes of the exiles to whom Ezekiel first addressed his prophecy. These people knew their ancestral history, how God saved them from Egypt and dwelt with them in a beautiful tabernacle ( Ex. 26 ; 40 ). Moreover, they remembered the glorious temple in Jerusalem , a structure so impressive and important that the Bible devotes eighteen chapters to its layout, construction, and dedication, and the appointm

English: Scan of a Gustave Doré engraving "The Vision of The Valley of The Dry Bones" - 1866 (Photo credit: Wikipedia ) “Above the expanse over their heads there was the likeness of a throne , in appearance like sapphire; and seated above the likeness of a throne was a likeness with a human appearance” (v. 26).- Ezekiel 1:4–28 Immediately after describing the historical circumstances of his prophetic call, Ezekiel describes his first vision of the Lord. This incredible vision has perplexed many people in the modern world, for the imagery is indeed strange to us. More sensational readings of Ezekiel 1:4–28 have even suggested that the passage describes an encounter that the prophet had with extraterrestrials. Such theories impress upon us the importance of paying attention to the historical and literary context of the Bible so that we might escape ludicrous speculation, for Ezekiel’s vision makes perfect sense in his own setting. The prophet’s vision concerns “ four li

Tetramorph. Fresco, Meteora. (Photo credit: Wikipedia ) “ Son of man , take up a lamentation upon the king of Tyrus , and say unto him, Thus saith the Lord GOD; Thou sealest up the sum, full of wisdom, and perfect in beauty.” ( Ezekiel 28:12 ) This prophecy against the King of Tyre is very similar to the prophecy given over a century earlier against the King of Babylon ( Isaiah 14:3-28 ). Both are ostensibly addressed to earthly kings, yet both are impossible to apply to any mere human monarch. In both instances, it becomes obvious that an evil spirit—in fact, none other than Satan himself—had possessed the bodies of these kings. Thus God , through Ezekiel, is here speaking primarily to Satan. Satan had been “full of wisdom, and perfect in beauty,” but he became proud instead of thankful. “Thine heart was lifted up because of thy beauty, thou hast corrupted thy wisdom by reason of thy brightness: I will cast thee to the ground” ( Ezekiel 28:17 ). He had been “the anointed cheru

John Piper (theologian) (Photo credit: Wikipedia ) A Commanding Invitation Psalm 119 stands as an invitation to us to approach God ’s word with our whole minds (Psalm 119:113) and our whole hearts (Psalm 119:2). It commands us to think rightly and feel deeply about God’s word. It leaves no room for a clean division of the intellect and emotions , but rather demands a response from both the mind and the heart. Whether we hear God’s word in a call to worship , a confession of sin , an assurance of pardon, an exposition, or in the benediction — every time we hear the words of Scripture, God is speaking to his people. There is no space for yawning when God is speaking. His word commands our attention, our affection, and our obedience. We see in the 176 verses of Psalm 119 an unbreakable chain of knowing and feeling. The psalmist has tasted the word of God, and has developed an unquenchable appetite for it. His passions have been fixed on knowing and experiencing God’s word. He has