Are you familiar with the phrase “waste your breath”? When used in reference to a person, it means that a person is not worth the effort of instruction, explanation, correction, or rebuke because no matter what you say or how you say it, they will not listen. You might as well save your breath and the words it creates for someone more receptive. In effect you are saying the person is a lost cause.
I wonder if Ezekiel thought the Israelites were a waste of breath. Today we are going to take a closer look at Ezekiel 2:1-7. In this section of scripture Ezekiel receives his call into the public ministry. Ezekiel receives his call into the public ministry five years after he has joined his fellow Israelites in Babylonian captivity. He was 30 years old at the time. According to tradition, 30 was the age at which Israel’s priests began their duties. (It happens to correspond to the age Jesus began his public ministry and is close to the age that many pastors in our church body receive their calls into the public ministry.) Ezekiel was probably thinking, “If I were back in Jerusalem, I’d be starting my life’s work as a priest”. But Ezekiel was in exile, a thousand miles from Jerusalem.[1] However, regardless of these circumstances, Ezekiel writes in 1:1, “In the thirtieth year, in the fourth month on the fifth day, while I was among the exiles by the Kebar River, the heavens were opened and I saw visions of God.” In this vision the LORD God appears to Ezekiel in a spectacular display of glory and extends to him a call into the public ministry.
To receive a call into the public ministry is a humbling honor. To be chosen by the LORD God to be one of His spokesmen… it is not at all an exaggeration when I tell you that, personally speaking, receiving a call into the public ministry from the LORD God was one of the most exciting days of my life. I have no doubt Ezekiel was excited to receive a call into the public ministry. However, I wonder if his excitement diminished a little when the LORD God described the people he was going to be ministering to. 3 He said: “Son of man, I am sending you to the Israelites, to a rebellious nation that has rebelled against me; they and their fathers have been in revolt against me to this very day.” The Hebrew word “rebellious” is used twenty-five times in Scripture; five of those times the word is used in these seven verses by the LORD God to describe the people Ezekiel was called to serve. Rebellious seems to be the primary characteristic of the people Ezekiel has been called to serve, but it is not their only characteristic. The people Ezekiel was called to serve were also as stubborn as a mule and as hard hearted as an Egyptian Pharaoh. In verse 4, The LORD God uses the words “obstinate and stubborn” to describe them. Additionally, we learn the people Ezekiel was called to serve were going to mistreat and abuse him. In verse 6 the LORD God says ministry among them will be like walking through a briar patch full of thorns; He tells Ezekiel it will be like living “among scorpions”. Finally, back in verse 5 and then again in verse 7, the LORD God tells Ezekiel it is likely the people he has been called to serve will “fail to listen”. It is likely they will stick their fingers in their ears and shout “lalalalala I’m not listening, I’m not listening!” These are the kind of people Ezekiel was called to serve.
Over the next few Sundays, all across our church body, young Seminary graduates who have been called to serve will be installed into the public ministry. They will be sent all over the country and throughout the world. The late Lutheran theologian Dr. C.F.W. Walther once advised such young men, “When a place has been assigned to a Lutheran candidate of theology where he is to discharge the office of a Lutheran minister, that place ought to be to him the dearest, most beautiful and most precious spot on earth. He should be unwilling to exchange it for a kingdom. Whether it is a metropolis or in a small town, on a bleak prairie or in a clearing in the forest, in a flourishing settlement or in a desert, to him it should be a miniature paradise.” When Ezekiel thought about the place he had been assigned to discharge the office of minister, I am not so sure he saw a miniature paradise. I wouldn’t at all be surprised if Ezekiel looked at the Israelites he was called to serve and wonder if his ministry among them was a waste of breath.
Ezekiel isn’t the only one who has felt that way. Four years ago, I received the call to serve as the pastor here at Messiah. As I deliberated the call, I spoke with many of you on the phone. Thankfully none of you described my ministry here the way the LORD God described Ezekiel’s ministry to the Israelites. With the exception of one person, all of you described Messiah as a miniature paradise. Your descriptions were so persuasive that I accepted the call, and I am pleased to say for the most part you were right. Messiah has become to me the dearest, most beautiful and most precious spot on earth. To me Messiah has become a miniature paradise. But still, if I am honest, there have been times when it felt like I was wasting my breath. I have extended worship invitations to hundreds if not thousands of people who never show up. I have made a multitude of phone calls and sent many an email to delinquent members that never get returned. And for the past four years, from this very pulpit I have been telling all y’all to stop sinning, yet each week you show back up again and confess that you are still altogether sinful from birth and have continued to sin against God in countless ways; by your own confession you are a rebellious people. I am fully aware that I get to serve in a drastically more desirable place and serve a profoundly more agreeable people than Ezekiel, but still sometimes there is this little voice inside of me that says, “don’t waste your breath”.
And I know I am not the only one who has felt that way. Turns out, you don’t have to be a called public minister of the gospel to feel like you are wasting your breath. The average Christian who has been commissioned to make disciples of all nations can feel that way, chances are you have felt that way; you have felt like you have wasted your breath. Maybe it was after you spent years training a child in the way they should go only to have them grow up, wander from the path, and head off down the road to ruin and destruction. Maybe you have spent so many hours talking on the phone counseling a sibling during a spiritual crisis that your phone starts to overheat in your hand, but two weeks later you find out that all your suggestions were ignored and none of your advice was followed, and surprise surprise your sibling is right back in the midst of another crisis. Maybe you used to invite friends, neighbors and coworkers to go to church with you but after years of repeated rejection you have finally given up on that. Be honest, sometimes there is a little voice inside of you that says, “don’t waste your breath.”
The LORD God must have known that Ezekiel would be tempted to look at the people he was called to serve as a waste of breath. I say that because in verse 7 the LORD God tells Ezekiel, “7 You must speak my words to them, whether they listen or fail to listen, for they are rebellious.” The LORD God recognized that some, if not many, of the rebellious people Ezekiel was called to serve would fail to listen. But still the LORD God told Ezekiel, “You must speak my words to them”. Likewise, the LORD God says the same thing to me and to you. Regardless of the path your children have currently chosen, no matter how many times your sibling ignores your advice, despite the regular rejection of friends, neighbors, and coworkers, the LORD God commands me, and He commands you, “You must speak my words to them”.
Why? Why does the LORD God insist we speak His words to them; why does the LORD God insist we waste our breath? The reason why the LORD God commanded Ezekiel and commands us to speak His words is because the LORD God did not consider the words that Ezekiel spoke to the rebellious Israelites to be a waste of his breath and the LORD God does not consider the words you speak to your family, friends, neighbors, and coworkers to be a waste of your breath. The LORD God commands us to speak His words because the words of the LORD God have the power to bring rebellious people to repentance. The LORD God commands us to speak His words because the words of the LORD God have the power to bring those repentant people to redemption in Christ Jesus. The LORD God commands us to speak His words because the words of the LORD God have the power to bring the redeemed in Christ Jesus into righteousness before God in heaven. The LORD God wanted every single one of those rebellious Israelites to turn from their sin and find salvation in their savior. God wants that for me, He wants that for you, He wants that for the whole world. That is why even if it takes a hundred words to return a child to the way they should go, even if it takes a thousand words to free your sibling from a spiritual crisis, even if it takes a million words before your friend, neighbor, or coworker accepts your invitation to worship, as far as the LORD God is concerned not a single one of those words are a waste of breath.
I know it can be tempting to feel like the words you speak to your family, friends, neighbors, and coworkers are a waste of breath. When I am tempted to feel that way, I try to imagine how much breath has been “wasted” on me. I don’t know if you have noticed this or not, but every single week you are not the only ones who confess that you are altogether sinful from birth and have continued to sin against God in countless ways. I too share that confession. Yet each week the LORD God sends a prophet like Ezekiel to share the Word of God with us so that we may repent of our rebellion, so that we may receive redemption from our Savior Jesus, so that we may be declared righteous before our God in heaven. I don’t think any of us would consider a single word the LORD God spoke to bring us from rebellion to righteousness to be a waste of breath. Therefore, regardless of the reception from our family, friends, neighbors, or coworkers, let us not consider the words the LORD God commands us to speak to others to be a waste of our breath. Rather, let us speak the words of the LORD God to the rebellious so that they too may repent of their sins, find redemption in their savior Jesus, and stand among the righteous before our God in heaven. As long as you are speaking the word of the LORD God, you are not wasting your breath. Amen.
[1] People’s Bible Commentary