The Geography of Abomination: Text: Ezekiel 8:5-6
Introduction: When the Rot is in the Sanctuary
We live in an age that is allergic to the concept of jealousy. In our therapeutic culture, jealousy is seen as a petty, insecure, and altogether toxic emotion. And when applied to our fellow sinners, there is certainly a great deal of truth to that. But the Scriptures are not embarrassed to tell us that our God is a jealous God. In fact, His name is Jealous. This is not a flaw in His character; it is the blazing heat of His holiness and love. God's jealousy is not like a suspicious, insecure husband rifling through his wife's phone. It is the righteous, covenantal zeal of a husband who has every right to the exclusive affections of the bride He has purchased with His own blood.
This divine jealousy is the essential backdrop for what we encounter in Ezekiel chapter 8. God is not some distant, deistic landlord, indifferent to what His tenants are doing in the building. He is the husband, and Israel is His wife. He had brought her to a special place, His sanctuary, the very heart of His presence on earth, and she was entertaining other lovers right in the foyer. The issue here is not merely that Israel was sinning. The issue is where they were sinning. They had brought the idols, the abominations, into the very house of God. They were not content to sin down by the river; they had to drag their filth up to the altar.
This is a profound diagnostic for our own time. When the world is worldly, we should not be surprised. That is its nature. But when the church becomes worldly, when the sanctuary itself becomes a place where idols are honored and abominations are tolerated, then we are in a far more dangerous place. This is when the jealousy of God begins to burn, and He prepares to act. Ezekiel is given a spiritual tour, a divine exposé, of the rot that had set in at the very center of Israel's worship. What God shows him is not for the faint of heart, but it is necessary. Because before God cleans house, He first shows His prophets exactly why the cleansing is so desperately needed.
The Text
Then He said to me, “Son of man, raise your eyes now toward the north.” So I raised my eyes toward the north, and behold, to the north of the altar gate was this figure of jealousy at the entrance. And He said to me, “Son of man, are you seeing what they are doing, the great abominations which the house of Israel is doing here, so that I would be far from My sanctuary? But yet you will see still greater abominations.”
(Ezekiel 8:5-6 LSB)
The Figure of Jealousy (v. 5)
God begins Ezekiel's tour with a specific instruction and a specific sight.
"Then He said to me, “Son of man, raise your eyes now toward the north.” So I raised my eyes toward the north, and behold, to the north of the altar gate was this figure of jealousy at the entrance." (Ezekiel 8:5)
The Lord directs Ezekiel's attention with military precision. "Raise your eyes...toward the north." The north was often associated with invasion and judgment in the Old Testament. The great enemy, Babylon, would come from the north. But here, the enemy is not outside the gates; it is inside. The threat is not external, but internal. The corruption is homegrown.
Ezekiel looks, and he sees a "figure of jealousy." The Hebrew is literally an "idol of jealousy." What does this mean? It means it was an idol that provokes jealousy. Specifically, it provokes the holy and righteous jealousy of God. This idol was placed "at the entrance" of the altar gate. Think of the audacity. This was not hidden in some back room. It was set up in a place of high traffic, a place of public honor, right next to the place where sacrifices were to be made to Yahweh alone. It was a public declaration of spiritual adultery.
They were attempting a grotesque syncretism. They wanted to have Yahweh and their idols too. They wanted the security of the covenant without the demands of covenant faithfulness. This is the constant temptation of the human heart: to try and serve two masters. We want to worship God, but we also want to keep our little idols on the side, our idols of security, or comfort, or reputation, or sexual license. We bring them right into the sanctuary, setting them up next to the altar. We sing praises to God on Sunday morning, and then we bow to the idol of our career on Monday. We take communion, and then we feed our lusts on the internet. This is setting up an idol of jealousy at the entrance. It is a public affront to the God who has demanded, and who deserves, our exclusive worship.
The Divine Indictment (v. 6)
God then turns to Ezekiel and drives the point home. He doesn't just show, He interprets.
"And He said to me, “Son of man, are you seeing what they are doing, the great abominations which the house of Israel is doing here, so that I would be far from My sanctuary? But yet you will see still greater abominations.”" (Ezekiel 8:6)
God asks a rhetorical question: "Are you seeing what they are doing?" Of course Ezekiel is seeing it. But God wants him to comprehend it, to feel the weight of it. These are not minor infractions or slight missteps. God calls them "great abominations." An abomination is something that is utterly detestable to God. It is spiritually nauseating. Idolatry is not just a different religious preference; it is a profound betrayal, a cosmic treason. It is attributing to a created thing the glory and honor that belong to the Creator alone.
And notice the location again: "which the house of Israel is doing here." The sin is compounded by the zip code. To commit this sin in Babylon was one thing. To do it "here," in the sanctuary, in the very place consecrated to His presence, was an entirely different level of rebellion. It was like a wife bringing her lover into the marital bed. The defiance could not be more explicit.
Then God reveals the logical and necessary consequence of their sin: "so that I would be far from My sanctuary." This is one of the most terrifying phrases in Scripture. God's people were acting in such a way as to drive Him out of His own house. They loved their idols more than they loved His presence. Their actions were creating a spiritual environment so toxic, so polluted, that the holy God could not remain. This is a crucial principle. God does not abandon His people arbitrarily. They, through their persistent and unrepentant sin, force Him away. They defile the sanctuary to such an extent that He withdraws His glory. This is the ultimate judgment: not the sword, not the famine, but the departure of God Himself.
And yet, the horror is not over. God tells Ezekiel that this is just the appetizer. "But yet you will see still greater abominations." This is a recurring refrain in this chapter. The depravity is not shallow; it has deep and descending levels. It is a spiral of corruption. When a people, and particularly the church, begins to compromise with the world and tolerate idols in its midst, the slide does not stop with the first offense. One abomination leads to a greater one. A little leaven leavens the whole lump. This is a stark warning against all forms of compromise. The moment we decide that some part of God's house can be given over to an idol, we have started down a path that leads to the utter dereliction of that house.
Application for Today
It is easy for us to read a passage like this and thank God that we are not like those ancient Israelites with their carved figures. But we would be fools to do so. The human heart is an idol factory, and it is just as capable of setting up abominations in the sanctuary today as it was in the sixth century B.C.
Our idols are simply more sophisticated. We don't erect a statue of Asherah, but we might erect an idol of "relevance" or "cultural acceptance" at the altar gate. We might not bow to Baal, but we bow to the idol of pragmatism, where the success of our programs matters more than the holiness of our people. We set up an "idol of jealousy" when our worship services are designed to please the unchurched seeker more than the holy God. We commit great abominations "here" when we allow the sexual ethics of our culture to redefine marriage and gender within the church, when we ordain men who should be disciplined, or when we twist the gospel into a self-help message that drives no one away because it confronts no one's sin.
And the result is the same. We are acting in such a way as to drive God far from His sanctuary. We wonder why our churches are powerless, why our prayers seem to bounce off the ceiling, why there is no tangible sense of the presence of God among us. It is because we have polluted His house with our abominations. We have become so comfortable with our idols that we no longer even see them as such. We call them "ministry strategies" or "being missional."
The call of this text is for us to be like Ezekiel. We need to ask God to give us eyes to see what is really going on in His church. We need to be willing to look at the "great abominations" without flinching and to call them what they are. And we must understand that judgment begins at the house of God. Before God can use His church to take the world, He must first purify His church from the world. This is a painful process, but it is a necessary one. The good news is that our God is not only a jealous God, but also a merciful one. He exposes the rot not simply to condemn, but to call us to repentance, so that He might cleanse His sanctuary and fill it once again with His glory.