{"id":154,"date":"2007-12-19T14:40:00","date_gmt":"2007-12-19T20:40:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/stephenbarkley.com\/blog\/?p=154"},"modified":"2010-05-21T20:51:21","modified_gmt":"2010-05-22T00:51:21","slug":"ezekiel-4715-23-allotted-inheritance","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/stephenbarkley.com\/2007\/12\/19\/ezekiel-4715-23-allotted-inheritance\/","title":{"rendered":"Ezekiel 47:15-23: Allotted Inheritance"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n

You can’t love people collectively.
\n\u2014 Joseph Cardinal Ratzinger (Salt of the Earth)<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

I don\u2019t play the lottery. I don\u2019t have any biblical justification for my views (other than the implications of stewardship); I just don\u2019t need another way to lose my money!<\/p>\n

One of the things I\u2019ve heard people complain about is the taxation level on lottery winnings.<\/p>\n

\u201cCongratulations!\u00a0You\u2019ve won $1,000,000 dollars!\u00a0(Now give $250,000 to the government)\u201d.<\/p>\n

I wonder how the exiles took the bombshell Ezekiel dropped in vv. 22-23?<\/p>\n

. . .<\/p>\n

Verses 15-20 are awkward to read, because we don\u2019t understand where many of the places referenced were actually located. By deducing what we don\u2019t know from what we do, God was offering Israel roughly the same land they had occupied in the past.\u00a0They would return to the place from where they were exiled.\u00a0Good news.<\/p>\n

Although we can\u2019t accurately chart on a map the various places mentioned, you can be sure that the ear of every exile would be straining to hear these names. Each mention would be a burst of life in the heart of a refugee.<\/p>\n

Daniel Block makes the interesting point that although the English language seems to describe boundaries, the Hebrew language describes the place in between the lines. Where someone lived was far more important than the abstract line that defined the border of her property.<\/p>\n

. . .<\/p>\n

Then Ezekiel drops the bomb:<\/p>\n

You shall allot it as an inheritance for yourselves and for the aliens who reside among you and have begotten children among you.\u00a0 They shall be to you as citizens of Israel; with you they shall be allotted an inheritance among the tribes of Israel.\u00a0In whatever tribe aliens reside, there you shall assign them their inheritance. (vv. 22-23, NRSV, emphasis mine)<\/p>\n

God gave them their land with strings attached. They were to dole it out generously to whoever decided to become a part of Israel. In the Mosaic covenant, foreigners were allowed to live within Israel when they committed themselves to Yahweh\u2014but they were never to own land.\u00a0This is novel and unprecedentedly gracious.<\/p>\n

That revelation struck me in a few different ways.<\/p>\n

    \n
  1. God is generous, and he wants his people to be generous.\u00a0How are we doing?<\/li>\n
  2. I\u2019m thankful that as a Gentile (a non-Jew), God has accepted me \u201cas citizens\u201d of his people. Paul used a horticultural metaphor: grafted into the vine.<\/li>\n
  3. What does it have to say to the leaders of Israel in our current political climate?\u00a0Is there an implicit rebuke of modern Zionism?<\/li>\n
  4. What does it have to say about the West\u2019s increasingly stringing immigration laws and terrorism paranoia? Does it rebuke the Minutemen?<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n

    . . .<\/p>\n

    Lord, give us the grace to consider others more highly than ourselves.\u00a0 In Jesus’ name, Amen.<\/p>\n

    < Ezekiel 47:13-14 | Surprise Inheritance<\/a><\/p>\n

    Ezekiel 48:1-7; 23-29 | Divided Equally ><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

    You can’t love people collectively. \u2014 Joseph Cardinal Ratzinger (Salt of the Earth) I don\u2019t play the lottery. I don\u2019t have any biblical justification for my views (other than the implications of stewardship); I just don\u2019t need another way to lose my money! One of the things I\u2019ve heard people complain about is the taxation level on lottery winnings. \u201cCongratulations!\u00a0You\u2019ve won $1,000,000 dollars!\u00a0(Now give $250,000 to the government)\u201d. I wonder how the exiles took the bombshell Ezekiel dropped in vv. 22-23? . . . Verses 15-20 are awkward to read, because we don\u2019t understand where many of the places referenced were actually located. By deducing what we don\u2019t know from what we do, God was offering Israel roughly the same land they had occupied in the past.\u00a0They would return to the place from where they were exiled.\u00a0Good news. Although we can\u2019t accurately chart on a map the various places mentioned, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[723,724,350],"class_list":["post-154","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-ezekiel","tag-aliens","tag-generous","tag-land"],"yoast_head":"\nEzekiel 47:15-23: Allotted Inheritance - Stephen Barkley<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/stephenbarkley.com\/2007\/12\/19\/ezekiel-4715-23-allotted-inheritance\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Ezekiel 47:15-23: Allotted Inheritance - Stephen Barkley\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"You can’t love people collectively. \u2014 Joseph Cardinal Ratzinger (Salt of the Earth) I don\u2019t play the lottery. I don\u2019t have any biblical justification for my views (other than the implications of stewardship); I just don\u2019t need another way to lose my money! One of the things I\u2019ve heard people complain about is the taxation level on lottery winnings. \u201cCongratulations!\u00a0You\u2019ve won $1,000,000 dollars!\u00a0(Now give $250,000 to the government)\u201d. I wonder how the exiles took the bombshell Ezekiel dropped in vv. 22-23? . . . Verses 15-20 are awkward to read, because we don\u2019t understand where many of the places referenced were actually located. By deducing what we don\u2019t know from what we do, God was offering Israel roughly the same land they had occupied in the past.\u00a0They would return to the place from where they were exiled.\u00a0Good news. 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