Bible Commentaries

HOMILETICAL HINTS

On Ch27

Ezekiel 27:1-10. “When Tyre rejoices over Jerusalem, then the prophet raises a lamentation over Tyre: this is the recompense of the pious” (Stck.).—If we must not repay evil with evil, there still is with God a recompensing of evil with evil.—“All human and earthly things go out at last in lamentation” (Stck.).—This is the lamentation of the Spirit, that the world sows to the flesh, and of the flesh reaps corruption.—With kettledrums and flutes the world begins, but it ends with wailing and misery.—“We must profoundly know the gloria mundi, if we are to take to heart the sic transit gloria mundi” (Hengst.).

Ezekiel 27:3-4. “Let no one boast of his strength or worldly elevation; how soon can the Lord, if His judgments should break forth, bring all to the dust of desolation! Jeremiah 9:23; Jeremiah 9:25” (Tüb. B.).—There is a perfection of beauty which is nothing else than ripeness for judgment.—Beauty is a transient splendour, but the knowledge of the Eternal leads from glory to glory.—“In boasting one sees what things the heart is full of” (Stck.).—The contrast between Tyre and the daughter of the king, Psalm 45, who is all beautiful within.—“The security is very different: one is of faith, since we know that we are reconciled through Christ, and, even if the world should fall in ruin, can remain in peace; the other proceeds from unbelief, which has respect to men, walls, etc, and relies upon these” (L.).—“There are many kinds of beauty, but none perfect without godliliness” (Stck.).—“We shall also have to think of that woman who, Revelation 18, says, I am it” (B. B.).—The buildings of men and the building of God, namely, His church, against which not even the gates of hell can prevail.

Ezekiel 27:5-9. Comp. with the splendid ship Tyre the heavenly Jerusalem, Revelation 21—“When people once surrender themselves to pride, pomp, and dissipation, they can hardly lay them aside again; nay, they often know not, from inconsideration and wantonness, what they should do, Deuteronomy 32:15 sq.” (O.)—Trim the lamps !—Every land has its peculiar gift from God, and the gifts of God must thus shamefully minister to the vanity of men!—God forbids the misuse of His gifts as an unprofitable waste.—It is quite right to take into one’s service and pay qualified persons, but woe to him who makes flesh his arm, and whose heart departs from the Lord!

Ezekiel 27:10. The best defence is after all another thing than soldiers, Psalm 33:16-17.—The angel of the Lord encamps round about those who fear Him, Psalm 34:8, 7].—God’s camping host for believers, Genesis 32; 2 Kings 6:17.—We must, according to Ephesians 6:10 sqq, put on the divine armour, which protects land and people.

Ezekiel 27:12-25. Men run through the wide world for the sake of merchandise, while the word of God, which makes rich without trouble, and imparts treasure which neither moth nor rust corrupts, nor can thieves steal, is so near us!—The one pearl of great price Tyre did not make an article of traffic.—What advantages it to gain the whole world if the soul suffers damage?—“Ezekiel writes as little from the point of view of a minister of commerce, as Isaiah in Ezekiel 3does from that of a milliner” (Hengst.).—Covetousness must serve all.—“O how many gifts of God are in the service of sin!” (Right.)—“Great merchant-cities, great cities of sin” (Tüb. B.).

Ezekiel 27:13. How often and in how many ways are men’s souls the object of buying and selling!

Ezekiel 27:24. “With things perfectly beautiful man was certainly to occupy himself. But where are they to be found in the earthly sphere? Colossians 3:2 ” (B. B.).

Ezekiel 27:25. “That Tyre was so full and honoured, while Zion became always poorer and poorer, and sunk miserable—this formed a stumbling-block to the people of God. But what has become of all the fulness and glory of Tyre? Zion, on the other hand, has gloriously blossomed anew” (Hengst.).

Ezekiel 27:26-36. “The glory of the earth shall become dust and ashes.”—The higher we reach, so much the more precipitous, and so much the deeper will be the fall.—The element of our security can so easily become the element of our misery: here the sea, elsewhere gold, one’s position, etc.—A person of high estate when cast down is lower than one who has always been in a humble position.—The wind does not always fill our sails; it often also, and suddenly, tears them short and small.—In prosperity men so rarely consider how vain it is, that in adversity they cry out the more loudly; but, alas! only upon the vanity of earthly things, and not upon the vanity of their earthly hearts.—It is with that which men build for themselves, such that if one stone should fall out of the wall, all the other stones will follow it.—Remember that thou art dust, and bethink thyself that thou hast a soul!—Fear is salutary, but there is also a fear which we again shake off, and which we do not suffer to warn us.—The loss of earthly things gives such trouble and for the loss of heavenly goods men will laugh!—A Christian should not so mourn, but should smite his breast alike in prosperity and in adversity.

Ezekiel 27:32. Michael and Tyre.—Who is as thou? This it is proper to say only of God in reference to glory. In respect to nothingness, on the other hand, one of us is as another.—Mournful times should be times of repentance.—The holy sense of the nil mirari.

Ezekiel 27:33. Our striving should be to become rich in the knowledge of the truth, and to make rich in regard to such knowledge should be our purpose in life.

Ezekiel 27:34. The end of earthly things, their scale, value, and true estimation.—All this world is nothing; how surely must there be what is something!—But faith cries out of the depths to God.—The glory of the children of God, and the world’s glory.—Formerly and now, two resting-points for the consideration of Tyre.

Ezekiel 27:35-36. Fear and shame have their limit only at a throne, that is, where the king reigns, who represents us.—“So one at length becomes an object of the world’s mockery with his pride and his sins” (Tüb. B.).