Ezekiel 13:8-16
More than Whitewash

Therefore thus says the Lord God: Because you have uttered falsehood and envisioned lies, I am against you, says the Lord God. My hand will be against the prophets who see false visions and utter lying divinations; they shall not be in the council of my people, nor be enrolled in the register of the house of Israel, nor shall they enter the land of Israel; and you shall know that I am the Lord God. Because, in truth, because they have misled my people, saying, "Peace," when there is no peace; and because, when the people build a wall, these prophets smear whitewash on it. Say to those who smear whitewash on it that it shall fall. There will be a deluge of rain, great hailstones will fall, and a stormy wind will break out. When the wall falls, will it not be said to you, "Where is the whitewash you smeared on it?" Therefore thus says the Lord God: In my wrath I will make a stormy wind break out, and in my anger there shall be a deluge of rain, and hailstones in wrath to destroy it. I will break down the wall that you have smeared with whitewash, and bring it to the ground, so that its foundation will be laid bare; when it falls, you shall perish within it; and you shall know that I am the LORD. Thus I will spend my wrath upon the wall, and upon those who have smeared it with whitewash; and I will say to you, The wall is no more, nor those who smeared it -- the prophets of Israel who prophesied concerning Jerusalem and saw visions of peace for it, when there was no peace, says the Lord God.

New Revised Standard Version

"That's tellin' 'em, preacher!"

Ezekiel carried a fierce message of condemnation for the religious leaders of his day who made promises of peace to the children of God. These religious leaders must have been well-loved and richly rewarded for telling the people what they wanted to hear: They were in no danger from the surrounding nations. There was nothing wrong with the sinful lives they were living. Everything was fine! No worries!

But to tell those lies, those who called themselves God's messengers had to ignore the message God was giving to them. They had to overlook the warnings from God that faithful prophets like Jeremiah and Ezekiel were spreading, warnings that the destruction that had happened to the Northern Kingdom of Israel could happen to the Southern Kingdom of Judah as well. These false prophets had to pretend that the people's idolatry and callousness towards Yahweh God was insignificant. They had to convince themselves that the Will of God was just not as important as the desires of the people. Their lies covered the underlying social and religious malignancy like whitewash on a crumbling wall.

But are we all that different?

We, too, want what the people of that time wanted. We want peace for our country, so we can enjoy safety, freedom, and prosperity. We want peace for ourselves, so we can live in happiness and comfort. We want to believe that everything will be just fine!

If we do that by painting over a crumbling wall, we're dangerously delusional. If we depend on our country's military might and police presence for peace and safety, we will be disappointed and disillusioned. There is no amount of external force that can guarantee our peace. If we depend on the assurances of other people that we are living the kind of good life that will earn us peace, we have acquired weak substitutes for God, and we will fail.

We don't want to think that the peace we want may be unattainable. We don't want to live in a world where terrorists destroy buildings, where our young people are wounded by makeshift roadside bombs, where lunatic dictators fire missles, and where prudent safety measures involve arrays of metal scanners, explosive detectors, and x-ray machines. We don't want to live a life that has to do without pleasures, possessions, and gratifications. We want peace--as we define peace.

God's peace is different. God's peace replaces the crumbling wall with a strong wall built on the Cornerstone. God's peace is found in the coming of God's Kingdom, even though bringing about that Kingdom may mean strife, war, difficulties, hardships, rejection, conflict, and death. However, God doesn't wait for the Kingdom to arrive to give us peace. God provides peace inside us now, filling our souls as we commit to God. Out of this reality comes the paradox seen by Christian heroes through the ages--consider Stephen in Acts 7, even while being stoned by the Sanhedrin, looking with joy at the face of Jesus and filled with peace because of his part in the Kingdom.

We instinctively desire peace. We should pray that the peace we want and seek is the only perfect, permanent peace, built on the sure foundation that God alone provides.