Ezekiel 2:1-5 - A Different Kind of Vocation - July 3, 2022

It’s something you probably don’t think about too often as you go about your life. It’s something that you may have never really considered at all. But it’s something that every single one of us in this room (and in this world) have in common (Acts 17:26). Every single one of us has a vocation. (Vocation is a fancy word for the place to which God has called us in this life.) For example, being a child or parent, a man or woman, a husband or wife, an employer or employee are all vocations. And yet, even though God has given each of us a unique calling in this life, there is one vocation that is particularly unique. One which is not given to everyone and yet does have application for every Christian. As we consider a portion of the LORD’s call to Ezekiel to be his prophet this morning, we will see that the Gospel ministry is a different kind of vocation.

The first difference has to do with the origination. Most earthly vocations are chosen or applied for – they originate in you: you choose a career path, to get married, to have a child, etc. However, if you read through Ezekiel 1-3, there is no evidence that Ezekiel was seeking or had applied for the job of prophet. Ezekiel’s call did not originate in him but in the LORD who appeared to him on the shore of the Kebar Canal while he and many of his fellow Israelites were in exile in Babylon. The LORD appeared to Ezekiel in a glorious vision of his majesty which forced Ezekiel to fall flat on his face in fear (Ezekiel 1:28). Immediate destruction was what Ezekiel knew he deserved for his sin, but God gave him the opposite of what he deserved: Son of man, stand up on your feet, and I will speak with you. The Spirit entered into me as he spoke to me and brought me up to my feet. Then I heard him speaking to me. Clearly, Ezekiel’s call into the ministry originated in God and his grace and was delivered through his spoken Word.

Now, I’ve never been to the Kebar Canal and the LORD has never appeared to me or to any other WELS pastor in a majestic vision of glory (that I’m aware of). But any and all of you who have ever participated in the Call process (specifically the WELS process of assigning and moving pastors from church to church) know that the Call to a particular congregation does NOT originate in the pastor – it originates in God (every Call meeting begins with prayer and petition) and is mediated through you, the members of the congregation. This is comforting for both pastor and people. The pastor can be absolutely sure that this Call has come from God and the people can be absolutely sure that the pastor has not appointed himself but is sent from God.

And yet, while the Divine Call is clearly unique in many ways, the same is true for every Christian – no matter your vocation. Whether you were baptized as an infant or an adult – the sacrament which initiated you into the Christian faith didn’t originate with you – it was instituted by our Lord 2000 years ago as the instrument through which he promised to gather disciples from all nations (Matthew 28:19). Regardless of how you remember or feel you came to believe in Jesus, Jesus himself says definitively: you did not choose me, but I chose you (John 15:16). I don’t say this to be condescending but first of all because it’s true – faith is a gift of God, not the result of human effort (Ephesians 2:8-9); and then second, to comfort you with the knowledge that the Lord was thinking of you, wanting to save you, even when you couldn’t or wouldn’t or didn’t want to think about him – and the fact that you believe today is evidence of that (Ephesians 1:4).

The second difference has to do with the audience. While every vocation has its difficult people that we’d rather not serve, most vocations generally involve willing participants. Whether you’re a nurse, a salesperson or a mechanic, you’re generally dealing with people who want your help. Consider Ezekiel’s call: Son of man, I am sending you to the people of Israel, to disloyal nations, who have been disloyal to me. They and their fathers have rebelled against me to this very day. These children of mine are brazen-faced and hard-hearted. By way of contrast, in chapter 3, the LORD tells Ezekiel that if he were sending him as a missionary to a foreign people, they would listen (Ezekiel 3:5-6). But Ezekiel was called to preach to God’s chosen people – a people who seemed to have rebellion embedded in their DNA. They had rebelled and been unfaithful over and over and over – to this very day. What makes this even more tragic is that they had tasted and seen that the LORD is good (Psalm 34:8) in the Promised Land – and yet still rebelled and rejected him. They were stubbornly defiant of the LORD who had graciously chosen to save them. They were an audience which the Lord told Ezekiel beforehand would not receive or believe his message.  

I’ll let you in on a little “pastoral” secret: the LORD has revealed something to me about you that you either may not know or may choose to suppress or ignore: You are a sinner. You have been sinful from the moment of your conception (Psalm 51:5). You – like me – are incapable of not sinning (Romans 7:14-25). While I don’t think any one of us would put “rebellious,” “disloyal,” “brazen-faced,” or “hard-hearted” in our social media descriptions, that’s precisely how Scripture describes us (Romans 3:9-18). Even after our conversion, who of us doesn’t have to confess with Paul: what a miserable wretch I am (Romans 7:24)? The LORD knows this. Others around us know this. But we often try our best to ignore this fact. That’s why the LORD calls his ministers to preach the Law in all of its wrath and fury faithfully and regularly – yes, even (and especially) to “good” Christians. The hard truth is that you and I are natural born sinners and will remain so until the LORD buries this flesh in the ground and takes us to heaven.

According to God’s Word, I know this about you. But you are also know this about the people the LORD has placed in your life. No matter who you’re dealing with, you’re dealing with a sinner. Parents, don’t be surprised when your children rise up in rebellion against you – they are only being what you made them: original sinners. Children, don’t be surprised when your parents lose their tempers – that’s their nature as sinners. It doesn’t matter how wonderful your spouse seemed while you were dating, never forget that you willingly married a sinner. No matter your occupation, never forget that your customers, clients, coworkers and employers are all natural born sinners. And, while this comes as no surprise to those of you who know me, I, your pastor, am a sinner. And what do sinners do? The point is that whether you’re a pastor, parent, child or church member, you can fully expect that the people you’re dealing with are a rebellious, disloyal and hard-hearted people – people who by nature are opposed to God and his will. That’s the audience.

Now that we’ve ripped the ugly scab of original sin off, we can turn to the third difference: the message. I am sending you to them, and you are to tell them that this is what the LORD God says. As unappealing as Ezekiel’s call may have seemed – at least he could find peace in the fact his message would not be his own. And yet, the LORD’s message through Ezekiel to the people of Israel was not exactly what anyone would consider to be “good news.” The Babylonians had attacked Jerusalem and carried Israelites off into exile several times before the final destruction of the city in 587/586 BC. Ezekiel had been carried off in one of those earlier attacks. The LORD commanded Ezekiel to tell the people that they should not hold out hope for Jerusalem, that things would get worse before they would get better, that the people remaining in Jerusalem would starve (Ezekiel 4:17), that the land would be devastated and her people would be brutally and savagely killed (Ezekiel 5:17); that terror is coming. They will seek peace, but there will be none (Ezekiel 7:25); and that the Temple of the Lord will be desecrated (Ezekiel 8). This message that the people wouldn’t want to hear was precisely the message the LORD wanted them to hear through Ezekiel.

You probably didn’t wake up this morning hoping to be reminded of the original sin that you inherited from your parents. You probably didn’t expect to be called out as rebellious, disloyal and hard-hearted in public. Many in our world would consider such preaching to be repugnant and offensive. They would call me arrogant and bigoted. In fact, many pastors would never lay down the law in such a blunt fashion out of fear of offending his listeners. But here’s the thing: like Ezekiel, the LORD has not called me to preach my own ideas or a message that tells people what they want to hear, the LORD has called me and every other Gospel minister to preach only what the LORD God says – no more and no less (Revelation 22:18-19). While the dual truths that we are damned sinners who are saved only by the grace of God in Christ doesn’t seem to scratch itching ears (2 Timothy 4:3) – it is what the LORD God says. The fact that the message is not my own gives me comfort and confidence and it should for you too.

And the same is true of you who have been called into his kingdom of priests. No matter your vocation, the LORD does not expect you to come up with your own ideas, to tailor the message to your audience, to adjust your words based on your feelings – he expects you only to declare “what the LORD God says.” In other words, don’t talk about yourself or your faith; talk about God. And there is probably no simpler summary of who God is than what is found in what we refer to as the Conclusion to the 10 Commandments, found in Exodus 20:5-6: I the LORD your God am a jealous God. I follow up on the guilt of the fathers with their children, their grandchildren, and their great-grandchildren, if they also hate me. But I show mercy to thousands who love me and keep my commandments. Whether you’re a pastor, a parent, a friend or an employee, the call is the same: declare only what the LORD God says.

The final difference involves the measure of success. The world measures success in purely external terms: grades, income, likes, retweets, job titles, etc. How are we to measure the success of the Gospel ministry? One of the more common questions I hear when someone learns that I am a pastor is: “Is your church growing (meaning numerically)?” Ezekiel likely would have been tempted to judge the success of his ministry based on how many Israelites listened to and believed his message, but the LORD simply wouldn’t allow it. He told Ezekiel whether they listen or do not listen – for they are a rebellious house – then they will know that a prophet has been among them. There are two key points here: 1) first, when what Ezekiel proclaimed to the people came to pass – namely, the complete destruction of Jerusalem and the Temple – then the people would know beyond all doubt that he was a prophet of the Lord. And, second, 2) until then, Ezekiel was called not to measure his success by the response of the people, but by his faithfulness to God’s Word.

When someone asks me if Risen Savior is growing, do you know how I respond? I say, “Yes, every week we are proclaiming the Word of God and administering the Sacraments and God has promised that wherever his Word is proclaimed, it will achieve the results he desires (Isaiah 55:10-11).” The world measures success in visible, numerical terms – but not the LORD! Success in his Church is measured by faithfulness to his Word. When we baptize infants and adults, teach and catechize, preach and absolve, distribute and eat and drink according to God’s Word – then this little corner of God’s Kingdom is growing, whether it can be measured numerically or not. Faithfulness to his Word is what God demanded of Ezekiel, what he demands of all Christians, and what you should demand of me.

So where is Jesus in all of this? Everywhere! His vocation was and is the most unique and important of all! Where did Jesus’ vocation originate? His Father sent him to be the Savior of the world (1 John 4:14). Who was Jesus’ audience? To a world that preferred the darkness of unbelief over the light of the Gospel (John 1:9-12). What message did he proclaim? Not his own, but only what his Father commanded him to speak (John 12:48-50). Was he successful? Well, he got himself hung on a cross. Does that count as success? Yes! For those of us the LORD has called to faith through the means of grace, Jesus’ suffering, death and resurrection are the only measure of success that matters – because through him we have been forgiven for all the times we’ve failed to faithfully carry out our vocations and can be certain that when this life ends the LORD will call us straight to eternal life with him in heaven.

How do you measure success in your life? How do you measure the success of a pastor or our success as a congregation? This morning God redefines success and replaces our standards and measures with his. The Gospel ministry is different not only in regard to the origination, audience, message and measure – but most importantly, in the fact that our ultimate success – our salvation – doesn’t depend on us, but on the fact that Jesus carried out his calling, his vocation as the Savior of sinners perfectly. Amen.