Relationship, Faithfulness and Obedience to God

Ezekiel 24:18

So I spake unto the people in the morning: and at even my wife died; and I did in the morning as I was commanded.

No question, this is a difficult passage. Verse sixteen says that God told Ezekiel that He would take away "the desire of thine eyes". It is his wife and the Bible says God took her away. His wife died. Whether this means that God in some way smote her or that God, knowing she was ill, allowed her death, either works out the same. God removed Ezekiel's wife from him.

Life on this earth is never guaranteed. It is but a vapor that appears for a little time and then vanishes away. it is true that count our own lives as precious and it is true that we can derive great comfort from the lives of others:

·       Parents

·       Spouses

·       Children

·       Friends

God gives us the gift of loved ones and we count it a grear blessing. But those loved ones, even as ourselves, are destined to one day go to the grave - some sooner than others. It should never be viewed as a cruel act on God's part that one dies. It is, after all, appointed unto man once to die.

The lesson of verse eighteen come from the final phrase; "... I did in the morning as I was commanded." As difficult as the death of his beloved was, it was no excuse to disobey the Lord. Nothing is to "trump" 

• Our relationship
• Our faithfulness 
• Our obedience to God

When we do as we are commanded

·       God's name is honored

·       God's strength is manifested in us and

·       God's Word is more fully comprehended among men

Don't let anything prevent you from doing as God commands.