Throughout the book of Ezekiel there are a couple of statements that are repeated frequently and those statements appear a number of times in chapter 20. They are statements explaining why God does what he does. For example, Ezekiel 20:14: “For the sake of my name I did what would keep it from being profaned in the eyes of the nations.” And the other statement more frequent still: “Then you will know that I am the Lord your God.” Self-revelation is at the centre of what God wants to do. He does not want to remain hidden, but neither does he want the truth of who he is to be distorted or diminished in any way. God wants to be known for who he is. He will not be reduced to anything less than the infinite sovereign Lord besides whom there is no other. To know God therefore you have to be willing to be overshadowed by his greatness and sovereignty. You cannot pursue independence and autonomy and know God because to pursue these things is to shut yourself off from his reality. You have to be willing to know God as he is, as God, or not at all. What you need, therefore, in order to know God, is not some enlarged intellectual capacity but simply a willingness to let God be God. You cannot grasp God, he is too great to be known as we know other things. We can only know God if we are willing to be grasped by him. This knowledge is not like scientific knowledge where we ‘master’ the subject matter. We know God only inasmuch as we are mastered by him.
Pray that God would help you to know him.
Read Ezekiel 20:30-49
