Where is who?

“The word of the LORD came to me: “What do you mean by repeating this proverb

concerning the land of Israel, ‘The fathers have eaten sour grapes, and the children’s teeth

are set on edge’? As I live, declares the Lord GOD, this proverb shall no more be used by you in Israel. Behold, all souls are mine; the soul of the father as well as the soul of the son is mine the soul who sins shall die.” (Ezekiel 18:1-4 ESV)

The Israelites frequently used the above proverb to indicate the belief that the father’s sins were passed down to his children. We also find it in Jeremiah 31:29. In Ezekiel, God asks Ezekiel why Israel still uses this proverb and tells Ezekiel that it is to stop.

What is significant about this is that God controls His people. Both father and son, mother and daughter, those who worship the Lord God belong to Him. It is the one who sins who pays the price for their sins. It is not shared in a lineage fashion.

In the time of Ezekiel, the sacrificial system was still in place and was to cleanse the Israelites of their sins. Priests slaughter lambs brought to the altar by sinners. The lambs were slaughtered as a substitute for the one who sinned.

You get where this is going. At the crucifixion and resurrection of Christ, Christ destroyed the sacrificial system. Christ is the lamb of God, the propitiation for our sins. As God pointed out to Ezekiel, the soul who sins dies. Sin and the sinner’s rebellion of God will be settled one way or another. Either in the heart of the sinner who receives eternal damnation as a punishment for their rebellion against God or that sin will be borne by the blood of Christ.

We who are God’s elect need only accept Christ as our savior, repent our sins, and begin our walk with Christ, and we pass from death to life right then and there.

I love finding Jesus in the Old Testament; it is much better than playing Where’s Waldo because finding Christ is not a game. A time will come when the one hand of Christ stops holding back our sins and the other stops beckoning us to him. I hope when that happens, you have already chosen Christ.