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Ezekiel 29 Devotional

A Staff That Splinters

“When Israel took hold of you with their hands, you splintered, tearing all their shoulders; when they leaned on you, you broke, and their backs were wrenched.”Ezekiel 29:7 (BSB)

Pharaoh is pictured as a great monster lying in the streams of the Nile, claiming the river as his own creation (29:3). God promises to put hooks in his jaws and drag him out onto dry ground (29:4-5). Then the chapter turns to Israel. Egypt had been a staff of reeds to them, and whenever they leaned on it, it snapped and left them injured (29:6-7). God will humble Egypt so that Israel never trusts it again, and it becomes only a reminder of the sin of turning there (29:15-16).

Nebuchadnezzar's army labors against Tyre, and God gives him Egypt as wages, because the work was done for God (29:18-20). Empires are instruments in his hand, not rivals to him. The real danger was leaning on anything other than the LORD. The psalmist warns against relying on mortal rulers, and calls happy the person who looks to the God of Jacob for help (Psalm 146:3-5). Unlike the reed, the LORD does not give way under your full weight.

To think about: What have you been leaning on for support that has started to splinter, and what would it mean to put your weight on God instead?

About Ezekiel 29: Judgment on Pharaoh and Egypt

God sets Himself against Pharaoh, pictured as a river monster boasting that he made the Nile, and against Egypt, a weak reed for Israel. Egypt will lie waste, then return as a humble kingdom; God gives it to Nebuchadnezzar as pay for his army’s work against Tyre and promises to make a horn grow for Israel.

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