God's Street Theater Text: Ezekiel 12:1-7
Introduction: The Willful Blindness of a Rebellious People
There is a kind of deafness that has nothing to do with the ears, and a kind of blindness that has nothing to do with the eyes. It is the spiritual condition of a man who has determined in his heart that he will not be told. He has functioning eyes, but he refuses to see what is plainly before him. He has working ears, but he plugs them with the wax of his own rebellion. This is not a failure of the senses, but a failure of the will. It is the settled state of a rebellious heart.
This is the condition of the exiles to whom Ezekiel is sent. We must get the context straight. These are not the pagans in Babylon. These are God's covenant people, the first wave of deportees, living by the Chebar canal. They have already been disciplined. They have been uprooted from their homes and carted off to a foreign land. And yet, they are living in a state of profound denial. They are listening to false prophets who tell them this is all a temporary misunderstanding, that they will be back in Jerusalem in a couple of years. They have eyes to see their own chains, but they do not see the sin that forged them. They have ears to hear Ezekiel's warnings, but they do not hear the thunder of God's approaching final judgment on the city they left behind.
So what does God do when His spoken words fall on deaf ears? He resorts to street theater. He commands His prophet to stop preaching a sermon and to start acting one out. This is not a gimmick. This is a severe mercy. It is God, in His longsuffering, condescending to the spiritual stupidity of His people. He is going to give them a message so vivid, so tangible, so unavoidable, that their refusal to understand it will leave them utterly without excuse. This is a prophetic pantomime, a living parable designed to bypass their stubborn intellects and strike at their hearts. But as we will see, even the plainest picture is worthless to a man who is determined to keep his eyes shut.
The Text
Then the word of Yahweh came to me, saying, "Son of man, you live in the midst of the rebellious house, who have eyes to see but do not see, ears to hear but do not hear; for they are a rebellious house. Now as for you, son of man, prepare for yourself baggage for exile and go into exile by day in their sight; even go into exile from your place to another place in their sight. Perhaps they will see, though they are a rebellious house. Bring your baggage out by day in their sight, as baggage for exile. Then you will go out at evening in their sight, as those going into exile. In their sight, dig a hole through the wall and go out through it. In their sight, carry the baggage on your shoulder and bring it out in the dark. You shall cover your face so that you cannot see the land, for I have set you as a wondrous sign to the house of Israel." I did so, as I had been commanded. By day I brought out my baggage like the baggage of an exile. Then in the evening I dug through the wall with my hands; I went out in the dark and carried the baggage on my shoulder in their sight.
(Ezekiel 12:1-7 LSB)
The Diagnosis of Rebellion (v. 1-2)
The passage begins with the divine commission and a blunt diagnosis of the audience.
"Then the word of Yahweh came to me, saying, 'Son of man, you live in the midst of the rebellious house, who have eyes to see but do not see, ears to hear but do not hear; for they are a rebellious house.'" (Ezekiel 12:1-2)
First, the authority for this strange command is established. "The word of Yahweh came to me." This is not Ezekiel's idea. He is not an eccentric performance artist trying to get attention. He is a man under orders. God is the playwright, the director, and the producer of this drama. Ezekiel is merely the actor.
God addresses him as "son of man," a title used over ninety times in this book. It constantly reminds Ezekiel, and his hearers, of his humanity. He is one of them, a fellow creature of dust, yet he is set apart by the divine word he carries. He is embedded with the problem. "You live in the midst of the rebellious house." He cannot preach at them from a safe distance. He shares their air, their water, and their exile. His ministry is incarnational.
And the diagnosis is stark. They are a "rebellious house." And the primary symptom of this rebellion is a willful sensory failure. "They have eyes to see but do not see, ears to hear but do not hear." This language echoes through the prophets, from Isaiah s commission to harden Israel's heart (Isaiah 6:9-10) to Jeremiah's lament (Jeremiah 5:21). Jesus Himself will pick up this very language to explain why He teaches in parables (Matthew 13:13-15). The problem is never a lack of evidence. The problem is a heart condition. They have all the necessary faculties, but their rebellion prevents them from processing reality correctly. Notice the reason given: "for they are a rebellious house." Their spiritual blindness is not the cause of their rebellion; it is the result of it. Sin always makes you stupid.
The Prophetic Pantomime (v. 3-6)
Because words have failed, God now prescribes a series of symbolic actions. This is a sermon in motion.
"Now as for you, son of man, prepare for yourself baggage for exile and go into exile by day in their sight... Perhaps they will see, though they are a rebellious house." (Ezekiel 12:3)
Ezekiel is to pack. But not for a vacation. He is to prepare the meager, desperate bundle of a refugee. This is to be done "by day in their sight." This is a public act. He is to make a spectacle of himself. His neighbors would have watched him, likely mocking him. "What is old Ezekiel up to now?" God wants them to watch. He wants to provoke their curiosity.
And notice the heart of God in that little word, "perhaps." "Perhaps they will see." This is not an expression of divine uncertainty, but of divine longsuffering. It reveals the depth of Israel's stubbornness. God is giving them one more chance, even though He knows their track record. The phrase "though they are a rebellious house" is a heavy sigh. It's like a father saying to his obstinate son, "I will explain this one more time, though I know you are determined not to listen."
The drama intensifies with specific, humiliating details.
"In their sight, dig a hole through the wall and go out through it. In their sight, carry the baggage on your shoulder and bring it out in the dark. You shall cover your face so that you cannot see the land, for I have set you as a wondrous sign to the house of Israel." (Ezekiel 12:5-6)
This is not a dignified exit. He is to dig through the mud-brick wall of his own house. This is the action of a desperate fugitive, not a man leaving through the front door. This graphically portrays the coming siege of Jerusalem, where the last king, Zedekiah, would attempt a pathetic, furtive escape by night (2 Kings 25:4). Ezekiel is pre-enacting the fall of the city and the shame of its king.
He is to leave in the dark, carrying his burden on his shoulder, a picture of humiliation and sorrow. And then the climactic gesture: "You shall cover your face so that you cannot see the land." This signifies multiple layers of tragedy. It is the shame of a man who cannot bear to look upon his ruined homeland. It is the grief of final departure. And it is a specific prophecy of King Zedekiah's fate. The Babylonians would slaughter his sons before his eyes and then put his eyes out. He would be led away to Babylon, blind, never to see his land again (Jeremiah 52:11).
God concludes the instruction by defining the prophet's role: "I have set you as a wondrous sign to the house of Israel." Ezekiel himself is the sermon. His life is the object lesson. The man becomes the message. This is the costly nature of true prophetic ministry. It is not a detached academic exercise; it is the embodiment of the truth, lived out in the flesh, often at great personal cost.
The Obedient Prophet (v. 7)
The command is given, and the response is immediate and exact.
"I did so, as I had been commanded. By day I brought out my baggage like the baggage of an exile. Then in the evening I dug through the wall with my hands; I went out in the dark and carried the baggage on my shoulder in their sight." (Ezekiel 12:7)
Here we see the stark contrast between the prophet and the people. The people are defined by rebellion. Ezekiel is defined by obedience. "I did so, as I had been commanded." There is no record of him arguing, questioning, or complaining about how foolish this would make him look. He simply obeys. He hears the word of the Lord and he does it.
He performs the entire, laborious, humiliating drama just as God instructed. He packs by day. He digs by night. He carries his burden in the dark. And he does it all "in their sight." His obedience is as public as their rebellion. In this, Ezekiel becomes a type of the ultimate prophet, the Lord Jesus Christ, whose entire life was a seamless garment of obedience to the Father's will, performed in the sight of a rebellious world.
The Ultimate Sign-Act
This entire strange episode is a pointer. It is a sign that points to a greater sign. If God went to these lengths to warn a rebellious people of a temporal judgment, what lengths has He gone to in order to warn the world of an eternal one?
Ezekiel's prophetic pantomime is a shadow of the ultimate divine drama of the Gospel. God did not just send a servant to act out the story of exile and return; He sent His own Son to live it. Jesus is the ultimate "wondrous sign" given to the house of Israel, and to the whole world.
Think about it. The Son of God prepared His baggage, not of an exile, but of incarnation. He emptied Himself and left His heavenly home to go into exile on earth, in our sight (Philippians 2:6-7). He came and lived "in the midst of the rebellious house," and they had eyes but did not see that He was God in the flesh. They had ears but did not hear the words of eternal life.
On the night He was betrayed, He went out in the dark, into the garden of Gethsemane. He carried His burden on His shoulder, not a refugee's pack, but the rough-hewn wood of the cross. They covered His face to mock and strike Him (Mark 14:65). And in the ultimate act of desperation, He broke through the wall, not of a mud-brick house, but the wall of death itself, digging His way out of the tomb with His own hands, so to speak, on the third day.
Ezekiel was a sign of coming judgment. Christ became the sign that absorbed that judgment in Himself. The question that confronted the exiles by the Chebar canal is the same question that confronts us today. God has given us a sign. He has performed His great drama of redemption in the center of human history, in broad daylight. He has given us eyes to see it in His Word and ears to hear it proclaimed. The question is, will we see? Will we hear? Or will we be diagnosed as another generation of the rebellious house, who have all the necessary faculties, but refuse to use them?