Task as Watchman

Ezekiel 3:16-21 - "At the end of seven days the word of the Lord came to me:¹⁷ “Son of man, I have made you a watchman for the people of Israel; so hear the word I speak and give them warning from me.¹⁸ When I say to a wicked person, ‘You will surely die,’ and you do not warn them or speak out to dissuade them from their evil ways in order to save their life, that wicked person will die for their sin, and I will hold you accountable for their blood. ¹⁹ But if you do warn the wicked person and they do not turn from their wickedness or from their evil ways, they will die for their sin; but you will have saved yourself.
²⁰ “Again, when a righteous person turns from their righteousness and does evil, and I put a stumbling block before them, they will die. Since you did not warn them, they will die for their sin. The righteous things that person did will not be remembered, and I will hold you accountable for their blood. ²¹ But if you do warn the righteous person not to sin and they do not sin, they will surely live because they took warning, and you will have saved yourself.”

In this passage we see two types of people, we see the wicked and the righteous man who has turned from his righteous ways.

Let us first look at the unrighteous man or the sinner. God told Ezekiel that he was responsible to show them their sinful ways and seek to persuade them from their ungodly way. If he did not, he will be held responsible for their blood. It means that he will be held responsible for the innocent blood he sheds or the crimes and evil deeds he does. It would be as if he had committed them himself because he did not try to persuade the person from them. The Bible says we will be judged for our sins and if we don't know Christ, we will be condemned. God is not simply saying to Ezekiel. It is your fault if you don't try to persuade them from their evil ways, but you will have to give account for your non action. Interesting, God doesn't only require an accounting for our action, but non actions as well. If God would not take some action against our disobedience, then God doesn't hold us responsible. So what action would God take against Ezekiel? I don't think I am knowledgeable or wise enough to say, but it suffices to say that he will pay for his non action in some way.


God calls us even as he called Ezekiel to be a watchman. We must in love show the sinner the evil of his way and try to persuade him from continuing in his sinful way. We are to exhort him to give his life to Christ and the very least to discourage him in his ungodly ways. We can't fall to the worlds philosophy that says, everyone can do what he feels and it is not any of your business. Yes, it is our duty to show the sinner the evil of his way and the destruction that it will bring him and those around him. We can't remain silent to be politically correct. We can't remain silent with the intent of not offending them or possibly being rejected. If we do, God will not be pleased and we will be held accountable. God will take some disciplinary action against us.

God told Ezekiel, to warn the righteous man who has turned from his righteous ways. If he didn't, he will  be held responsible for their ungodly action and possibly even for them losing their salvation. We find a shocking statement in this passage. When the righteous turn away from the God, their righteous acts will no longer be remembered by God. In other words, our previous righteous acts can not cover our later unrighteous acts. In actuality they nullify our previous righteous acts if we fall away from Christ. We must not in the name of Christian love and unity not seek to reconcile the believer who has fallen back to Christ. When we see a believer going down the wrong path, and fallen into sin, we must exhort him to forsake their sinful way. 


This is scary stuff. Yet, the upside to all this is that if we persuade the person from his sinful way and bring them unto Christ, we save ourselves. We don't save ourselves from condemnation, but we save ourselves from the discipline of God and his disfavor.


In all this, we need the wisdom and grace of God that we do this rightly.