The Unfairness of God and Other Slanders Text: Ezekiel 33:10-20
Introduction: The Accusation
We live in an age that prides itself on its sense of fairness. We have fairness creams, fair trade coffee, and fair play in sports. We demand fairness from our employers, our governments, and our neighbors. And when the circumstances of life do not seem to align with our internal ledgers of what we think we deserve, our first instinct is to find someone to blame. And for many, both inside and outside the church, the ultimate blame for the perceived unfairness of the cosmos is laid squarely at the feet of God.
The people of Israel in Ezekiel's day were no different. They were in exile, their nation was a ruin, and their lives were unraveling. And in their despair, they leveled a charge against the Almighty. They looked at their miserable condition, and they looked at the sins of their fathers, and they looked at the word of the prophet, and they concluded that God's accounting system was crooked. "The way of the Lord is not right," they said. It's not fair.
This is the oldest accusation in the book, is it not? It began in the Garden, with the serpent's insinuation that God was holding out, that His rules were arbitrary and unfair. And it continues down to our own day, whenever a man shakes his fist at the heavens because of some tragedy, or some unfulfilled desire, or some moral command that chafes his lusts. The charge is always the same: God is not just. His ways are not equal.
But in our text today, God meets this accusation head-on. He does not ignore the slander. He does not dismiss the complaint. He condescends to reason with His people, to dismantle their arguments, and to vindicate the perfect justice of His character and His ways. And in doing so, He lays down for us the foundational principles of divine justice, individual responsibility, and the nature of true repentance. This is not just an abstract theological debate; this is the very ground of our salvation. If God is not just, then the cross is a meaningless tragedy. If we are not responsible, then repentance is a foolish game. We must get this right.
The Text
"Now as for you, son of man, say to the house of Israel, ‘Thus you have spoken, saying, “Surely our transgressions and our sins are upon us, and we are rotting away in them; how then can we live?” ’ Say to them, ‘As I live!’ declares Lord Yahweh, ‘I take no pleasure in the death of the wicked, but rather that the wicked turn from his way and live. Turn back, turn back from your evil ways! Why then will you die, O house of Israel?’ Now as for you, son of man, say to the sons of your people, ‘The righteousness of a righteous man will not deliver him in the day of his transgression, and as for the wickedness of the wicked, he will not stumble because of it in the day when he turns from his wickedness; whereas a righteous man will not be able to live by his righteousness on the day when he commits sin.’ When I say to the righteous he will surely live, and he so trusts in his righteousness that he does iniquity, none of his righteous deeds will be remembered; but in that same iniquity of his which he has done he will die. But when I say to the wicked, ‘You will surely die,’ and he turns from his sin and does justice and righteousness, if a wicked man restores a pledge, pays back what he has taken by robbery, walks by the statutes of life without committing iniquity, he shall surely live; he shall not die. None of his sins that he has done will be remembered against him. He has done justice and righteousness; he shall surely live. Yet the sons of your people say, ‘The way of the Lord is not right,’ when it is their own way that is not right. When the righteous turns from his righteousness and does iniquity, then he shall die in it. But when the wicked turns from his wickedness and does justice and righteousness, he will live by them. Yet you say, ‘The way of the Lord is not right.’ O house of Israel, I will judge each of you according to his ways.”
(Ezekiel 33:10-20 LSB)
Despair's Logic and God's Oath (vv. 10-11)
The people begin with a question soaked in a kind of fatalistic despair.
"Surely our transgressions and our sins are upon us, and we are rotting away in them; how then can we live?" (Ezekiel 33:10)
On the surface, this sounds like a moment of clarity. They are acknowledging their sin. They feel its weight. They see the consequence: they are "rotting away," a vivid picture of decay and death. But this is not true repentance. It is the sullen resignation of a prisoner who has been caught and sees no way out. They are saying, "Alright, we're guilty. We're doomed. What's the point?" This is the logic of despair. It assumes that the past is an iron cage that determines the future. Because they have sinned, they must rot. Because they are guilty, they must die. There is no hope, no exit.
Into this dark cell of fatalism, God shines a brilliant light. He answers their question not with a formula, but with a solemn oath, grounded in His own eternal existence.
"As I live!’ declares Lord Yahweh, ‘I take no pleasure in the death of the wicked, but rather that the wicked turn from his way and live. Turn back, turn back from your evil ways! Why then will you die, O house of Israel?’" (Ezekiel 33:11)
God swears by Himself, because there is no one greater to swear by. And what is the substance of this oath? It is that His essential nature, His divine pleasure, is not found in condemnation but in redemption. This is earth-shattering. The God against whom they have rebelled, the God whose laws they have broken, does not delight in their destruction. He delights in their repentance. He desires their life, not their death.
This demolishes the pagan caricature of God as a vindictive, bloodthirsty deity who enjoys crushing sinners. No, our God is a God of life. His desire is for restoration. But notice, this is not a sentimental, universalist desire that overlooks sin. The path to life is explicitly stated: "that the wicked turn from his way and live." The pleasure of God is not just in life, but in life that comes through turning. The word is shuv in Hebrew. It means to repent, to turn around, to go in the opposite direction.
And so God issues a passionate, urgent, repeated command: "Turn back, turn back from your evil ways!" This is not the detached statement of a philosopher; it is the cry of a father pleading with his prodigal son. The responsibility is laid squarely at their feet. "Why then will you die?" God is saying, "I have opened the door. I have told you the way out. I have sworn that I desire your life. If you die, it is not because I delight in it, but because you refuse to turn." The fault is not in their stars, or their fathers, or in God's unfairness. The fault is in their stubborn will.
The Principle of Present Standing (vv. 12-16)
God now moves from the general call to repentance to the specific principle that governs His judgment. And this principle is radical individualism. He will judge each man based on his present spiritual state, not his past record.
"The righteousness of a righteous man will not deliver him in the day of his transgression... as for the wickedness of the wicked, he will not stumble because of it in the day when he turns from his wickedness..." (Ezekiel 33:12)
This cuts both ways, and it is a direct assault on two deadly forms of false security. First, He addresses the man who trusts in his spiritual resume. This is the man who has a long history of good deeds, of church attendance, of respectable living. He has a spiritual trophy case. But God says that if this man turns to iniquity, if he apostatizes, his past righteousness is worthless. It will not be remembered. He cannot build up a savings account of good deeds to draw upon while he lives in sin. His present rebellion nullifies his past record. "He shall die" in his iniquity (v. 13). This is a terrifying warning against coasting on past glories. The Christian life is a marathon, and how you are running now is what matters.
But the second edge of the sword is glorious gospel. God addresses the wicked man, the man with a rap sheet a mile long. God says that if this man turns from his sin, his past wickedness will not be held against him. The moment he repents, his past is wiped clean. "None of his sins that he has done will be remembered against him" (v. 16). This is the doctrine of justification. When a sinner turns to God in faith, God does not just forgive his sins; He forgets them. He treats him as if he had never sinned.
Notice the tangible evidence of true repentance in verse 15. It is not just a feeling of remorse. It is practical and active. He "restores a pledge, pays back what he has taken by robbery, walks by the statutes of life." True repentance bears fruit. It makes things right. It is Zacchaeus in the tree, promising to pay back fourfold. It is a changed life, not just a changed mind. And the promise is absolute: "he shall surely live; he shall not die."
The Slander Refuted (vv. 17-20)
Having laid out the clear, consistent principles of His justice, God returns to the people's original complaint.
"Yet the sons of your people say, ‘The way of the Lord is not right,’ when it is their own way that is not right." (Ezekiel 33:17)
The accusation is repeated, but now it sounds hollow and foolish in light of what God has just explained. Their slander is based on a profound misunderstanding of how God operates. They wanted a system of corporate, generational guilt that excused their own choices. They wanted a system where their fathers' sins were the real problem. Or, they wanted a system where their own past good deeds gave them a license to sin in the present. Both are ways of avoiding personal, present responsibility.
God's response is devastatingly simple. The problem is not with His way, but with theirs. They are the ones whose ways are unequal, crooked, and unjust. They are projecting their own moral deformity onto the character of God. This is what fallen man always does. We create gods in our own image. Because our ways are fickle, we imagine God to be fickle. Because our justice is tainted with self-interest, we imagine His is too. Because we hold grudges, we cannot fathom a God who truly forgets confessed sin.
God reiterates the principle one more time, like a judge summing up the case. The righteous man who turns to sin will die in it (v. 18). The wicked man who turns to righteousness will live by it (v. 19). The standard is clear, it is applied equally to all, and it is based on the present reality of a man's heart and life.
The final verse is the gavel coming down.
"Yet you say, ‘The way of the Lord is not right.’ O house of Israel, I will judge each of you according to his ways." (Ezekiel 33:20)
The very principle they are protesting is the principle by which they will be judged. God will not judge them by their fathers' ways, or by their neighbors' ways, or by their own past ways. He will judge each one of them, individually, according to his present ways. Their complaint against God's justice is ironically the very definition of the justice they will face. God is saying, "You find my standard of individual accountability unfair? Then prepare to be held individually accountable." It is the ultimate vindication of His righteousness and the final silencing of their slander.
Conclusion: The Scales of Justice and the Cross
So what does this mean for us? This passage is a strong repudiation of any cheap grace or easy-believism that says a past decision is a guarantee of future salvation, regardless of a life of subsequent rebellion. The doctrine of the perseverance of the saints does not mean that a man who professes faith can then live like the devil and still be saved. It means that a man who is truly saved will not ultimately and finally turn away. He will persevere, because God preserves him. A man who does turn away and dies in his sin proves that his initial righteousness was never the true, saving righteousness of Christ in the first place.
But the glorious heart of this passage is the promise to the wicked. No matter how long your rap sheet, no matter how deep the stain of your sin, if you turn, you will live. Your past does not have the final say. God's grace does. The slate can be wiped clean.
How is this possible? How can a just God simply forget sins? Is that not, in itself, unfair? If a wicked man robs and cheats his whole life and then repents on his deathbed, is it fair for him to receive the same life as a man who walked faithfully for fifty years? The Israelites would have screamed, "The way of the Lord is not right!"
And they would be right, if there were no cross. The reason God can "remember no more" the sins of the repentant is because He remembered them all, in full, on His Son. The justice of God was not set aside; it was satisfied. God did not grade on a curve; He poured out the full measure of His wrath for every one of those forgotten sins upon Jesus Christ. At the cross, the fairness of God was perfectly vindicated. He remained just, and became the justifier of the one who has faith in Jesus.
Therefore, we must silence our foolish accusations against God. His ways are not our ways, and His ways are perfectly just. The question is not whether His way is right, but whether we will walk in it. He has sworn by His own life that He desires our life. He has commanded us, pleaded with us, to "Turn back, turn back." The door is open. The past is pardonable. Life is offered. Why then will you die?