Lusting after what destroys

Ezekiel continues his rebuke of Israel and Judah here by telling a parable about two prostitutes named Oholah and Oholibah.

Oholah represented Samaria, the capital of the former northern kingdom of Israel.

After breaking off from the southern kingdom, they had set up their own places of worship, supposedly for God, but in reality, they were for idols. (Oholah literally means, “Her own tabernacle.”)

Oholibah represented Judah, which actually had the temple of God residing there. (Oholibah means, “My tabernacle is in her.”)

And here, we have a very graphic story of how these two women were prostitutes of Egypt before being brought out by God.

This, of course, refers to how the people of Israel started worshiping other gods while in Egypt before God called them to leave their idols behind and to follow him out of Egypt.

But then, Oholah started lusting after the Assyrians, committing adultery with them, and eventually was killed by them, with her children taken away as slaves.

This refers to how the northern kingdom started to ally themselves with the Assyrians and worship their gods, only to have the Assyrians take them into exile, leaving their nation in ruins.

Oholibah didn’t learn from her sister’s mistakes and started lusting after the Assyrians too.

Not only that, she started to lust after the Babylonians.

When she became disgusted with them, she turned her heart back to the Egyptians from whom she had first come.

But in the end, her spurned lover (the Babylonians) would come back for her and destroy her, taking her children captive as slaves.

This, of course, refers to Judah’s alliances with the Assyrians, then the Babylonians, and then the Egyptians again. The end result of which would be their exile to Babylon.

There are two things that I think we can get from this.

First, God will not force us to follow him. If we choose to walk away from him, he will let us. He will hand us over to the things that we lust after.

But second, these things that we lust after will destroy us. We may think that they will bring us pleasure, or security, or blessing. But they will enslave us and ultimately destroy us.

The apostle Paul puts it this way,

Don’t you know that when you offer yourselves to someone to obey him as slaves, you are slaves to the one whom you obey—whether you are slaves to sin, which leads to death, or to obedience, which leads to righteousness…

When you were slaves to sin, you were free from the control of righteousness. What benefit did you reap at that time from the things you are now ashamed of?

Those things result in death! (Romans 6:16, 20–21)

That’s what happened to the Israelites. That’s what can happen to us.

How many husbands have destroyed their families by cheating on their wives? How much damage has this caused to their wives and children? They know what they’re doing is harmful to their family and yet they can’t stop.

Or how many people destroy their lives through alcohol or drugs?

How many people destroy their lives in pursuit of money or by making their work their god?

So many people think that they find freedom in living for their lusts.

But is it freedom when you can’t stop? Is it freedom when your lusts are destroying you?

Jesus died that you might be set free from the things that are destroying you. He died that you might find life.

The only thing you need to ask is, “Do you want to be set free?”