======================================================================== DO YOU SEE AS GOD SEES by Richard Owen Roberts ======================================================================== Summary: This sermon delves into the powerful imagery in Ezekiel chapters 8 and 9, emphasizing the need for the church to see things from God's perspective. It highlights how God revealed abominations to Ezekiel, urging believers to earnestly desire to see what God sees and feel what He feels. The passage describes the marking of those who mourn over sin and the consequences for those who do not. It challenges listeners to align their hearts with God's and seek His intervention for the nation. Topics: "God's Perspective", "Mourning Over Sin" Scripture References: Ezekiel 8:3, Ezekiel 9:4, Ezekiel 9:6, Ezekiel 9:8, Isaiah 1:17, Isaiah 59:15, Psalm 51:17, James 4:8, 2 Chronicles 7:14 ------------------------------------------------------------------------ DESCRIPTION ------------------------------------------------------------------------ This sermon delves into the powerful imagery in Ezekiel chapters 8 and 9, emphasizing the need for the church to see things from God's perspective. It highlights how God revealed abominations to Ezekiel, urging believers to earnestly desire to see what God sees and feel what He feels. The passage describes the marking of those who mourn over sin and the consequences for those who do not. It challenges listeners to align their hearts with God's and seek His intervention for the nation. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ CONTENT ------------------------------------------------------------------------ There's a very powerful picture portrayed in Ezekiel chapters 8 and 9, which is extraordinarily pertinent to the life of the church. Let me read portions of it. It came about in the sixth year, on the fifth day of the sixth month, as I was sitting in my house with the elders of Judah sitting before me, that the hand of the Lord God fell on me there. Then I looked, and behold, a likeness as the appearance of a man, from his loins and downward there was the appearance of fire, and from his loins and upwards the appearance of brightness like the appearance of a glowing metal. And he stretched out in the form of a hand, and he caught me by a lock of my head, and the Spirit lifted me between the earth and the heaven, and he brought me to the visions of God, to Jerusalem, to the entrance of the north gate of the inner court, where the spirit of the idol of jealousy, which provokes to jealousy, was located. But what an incredible thing, that God himself must take hold of the locks of the hair of a prophet and drag him to those positions where he can see what God sees. The great difficulty we're facing in the American church is we're not looking at things from God's perspective, but from our own. Things look a lot brighter and better from our angle than they do from God's. Now God does not normally force anyone to see what he sees. He can, he did in the case of Ezekiel, he probably won't in our case. But we ought to have a heart for God that is so devout and so absolutely earnest that we desperately yearn to see what he sees. You know, you never do feel what God feels unless you see what he sees. And I fear that by and large the American church is feeling things are a whole lot better than they really are. And we're not going to have any drastic change of feelings until we begin to see things the way God sees them. Now this is a lengthy passage and it would be inappropriate to read it in its entirety. But in essence what happens in chapter 8 is that, as I already stated, God drags Ezekiel by the locks of his hair to several portals where he is forced to see what God sees. He's drawn to the altar gate where the idol of jealousy is found. And he sees abomination that he had no idea existed. He's then dragged again to another portal and once more he sees things that are shocking and grievous to him. And again God drags him to yet another portal where once more he sees things that are utterly shocking. The church from God's perspective is vastly more soiled and corrupted than we're willing to admit. And we can't admit it until we see it. If somehow we would earnestly vow before God to see things the way he sees them, we would undoubtedly change radically in our entire approach. In the ninth chapter, which I shall read in its entirety, the picture changes dramatically. Verse 1, And he cried out in my hearing with a loud voice, saying, Draw near, O executioners of the city, each with his destroying weapon in his hand. And behold, six men came from the direction of the upper gate, which faces north, each with his shattering weapon in his hand. And among them was a certain man clothed in linen, with a writing case at his larynx. And they went in and stood before the bronze altar. Then the glory of the Lord God of Israel went up from the cherubim on which it had been to the threshold of the temple. And he called to the man clothed in linen at whose larynx was the writing case. And the Lord said to him, Go through the midst of the city, even through the midst of Jerusalem, and put a mark on the forehead of the men who sigh and groan over all the abominations which are being committed in its midst. But to the others he said in my hearing, Go throughout the city after him. Strike, do not let your eyes have pity, and do not spare, utterly slay, old men, young men, maidens, little children, women. But do not touch any man on whom is the mark. And you shall start from my sanctuary. So they started with the elders who were before the temple. Now you would certainly hope that that numbers of people were marked on their forehead. Isn't this a truly vivid picture? God is simply saying to the man with the writing pot on his larynx, you put a mark on the forehead of every person who sees what I see, who feels what I feel, who is moaning and groaning over the abominations of men. You would hope that he would be busy for hours marking people. And then following him, the sick men with implements of death in their hands destroyed all those who are not marked. And you live in hopes that somehow many were spared because they sighed and cried over the abominations of the land. But the whole episode ends by Ezekiel looking around him and on every side seeing the heaps of the dead and realizing that out of all of those who were there, he alone had the mark. He only sighed and cried over the abominations in the land. What is the hope of a nation who does not even try to see what God sees? Who cry peace, peace when there is no peace? That pretends that all is well when God himself is on the verge of destroying the whole business. Ought we not to set our hearts to see what God sees and to feel what God feels? Is this not the true task of the genuine believer? To perceive everything from God's perspective. To be so deeply stirred and moved by what they see as God himself sees it that they are overwhelmed with mourning, with weeping, with anguish, with crying out to God. And isn't it remarkable that even though it's late and though there may be at the moment but a few who bear the mark of those who sigh and cry over the abominations in the land, it's not too late. It is still possible for all of us to invest every ounce of energy, every portion of zeal we possess in discovering for ourselves what is breaking the heart of God and in weeping and in mourning and in seeking his grace and his blessing and his intervention until the whole of the nation is awakened to its plight and with honest hearts and total zeal they give themselves to the Lord God almighty. What about you? Do you see what God sees? Do you feel what God feels? And if not, will you give yourself unceasingly to perceiving everything from his perspective? ======================================================================== Video: https://sermonindex2.b-cdn.net/eOqNoD8tZdg.mp4 Source: https://sermonindex.net/speakers/richard-owen-roberts/do-you-see-as-god-sees/ ========================================================================