We saw earlier in Ezekiel the aching reality that the glory of God had departed from the temple in Jerusalem (Ezekiel 10:1-19). Then the city of Jerusalem had fallen (33:21), resulting in the destruction of the city and the temple. But in the vision of redemption God gave him, Ezekiel had seen that Israel would be restored to the land (39:21-29), and that a new temple would be built, measured out in every detail (40:48-42:20).

And then he saw that the glorious presence of the Lord would return to the temple once more: “the glory of the God of Israel was coming from the east; the sound was like the sound of mighty waters; and the earth shone with his glory” (43:2). “As the glory of the Lord entered the temple by the gate facing east, the Spirit lifted me up, and brought me into the inner court; and the glory of the Lord filled the temple” (43:4-5).

And how would the people of Israel respond to the return of God’s glorious presence? They would need to establish their hearts and lives in holiness once more. A lot of that establishing-in-holiness is a matter of attitude, exemplified by Ezekiel falling to the ground in worship (43:3); but it also works out in practical applications, both in terms of the way we act on our religious preferences and also in terms of the way we do business. Thus the restored people of Israel would need to reject idolatry (43:7-9), and they would also need to reject using dishonest weights and measures in trade (45:10).

In theory it might seem easy enough to meet these challenges: don’t cheat on God, don’t cheat on each other. But in practice they are hard. We have such devoted love for the things that we have made – money, houses, cars, and more – and by now we really do expect to find the meaning of life in these things, rather than in God Almighty. And we are so often tempted to find the way to take advantage of others in business: we’re just looking for an edge, we’d say, just trying to find a way to get ahead of the other guy. It will not be trivial for us to turn away from these practices.

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We pray that your glory would move in our souls, O Lord, to transform us to live in holiness in this present day. Turn us from the worship of this vain world’s gold, so that we may live in honesty and integrity with one another, as our hearts serve you in holy devotion all our days.

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