The Father’s Fivefold Faithfulness

Ezekiel 37:24-28 This wonderful passage contains five references to the unchanging, never-ending, everlasting faithfulness of God. God’s people are promised a forever land for them and their descendants (v25), with a David king who rules forever – presumably the Messiah (v25). God offers an everlasting covenant of peace (v26), with His sanctuary, His holy presence always at its centre (v26), and finally this forever sanctuary will be for the evangelisation of the nations: ” the nations will know that I the Lord make Israel holy” (v28).

I was thinking about the eternity of God and how it links to His faithfulness, and especially so as I worked on my family tree and considered the genealogies of the Bible (see the last blog for more on this). This Ezekiel passage was helpful, but the next day my reading in Psalms was Psalm 61, and amazingly this psalm also has five references to the eternal faithfulness of God! God was clearly trying to get something across to me.

There are three actual “forevers” in Psalm 61, “I long to dwell in your tent forever” (v4), “May he be enthroned in God’s presence forever” (v7), and “I will sing praise to your name forever” (v8 NASB). And there are two other references to eternity: verse 5 says “you have given me the heritage of those who fear your name” and our heritage or inheritance is of course eternal life if we have put our trust in Jesus Christ.

And verse 6 asks for increase of days and years “for many generations“; while not specifically mentioning eternity, it certainly refers to life beyond that normally allotted to humans, and with our New Testament lens we see this as implying eternal life. Here, as in so many other places, David is looking forward to eternal life with the Lord; one friend asked how was it that the Sadducees could read David and not understand about life after death. I don’t know the answer! Here is Ezekiel’s vision of the eternal Davidic Messianic kingdom in full:

“My servant David will be king over them, and they will all have one shepherd. They will follow my laws and be careful to keep my decrees. ²⁵ They will live in the land I gave to my servant Jacob, the land where your ancestors lived. They and their children and their children’s children will live there for ever, and David my servant will be their prince for ever. ²⁶ I will make a covenant of peace with them; it will be an everlasting covenant. I will establish them and increase their numbers, and I will put my sanctuary among them for ever. ²⁷ My dwelling-place will be with them; I will be their God, and they will be my people. ²⁸ Then the nations will know that I the Lord make Israel holy, when my sanctuary is among them for ever.”’

Ezekiel 37:24-28 NIV UK