In the twelfth year, in the twelfth month on the first day, the word of the LORD came to me: - Ezekiel 32:1

Today's Scripture Reading (July 4, 2020): Ezekiel 32

There is a paradox that has shone through the days of the COVID-19 pandemic. That paradox is that while we are beginning to understand that we are too interconnected and dependent on each other for everything, there is little ability on any of the nations in our global economy to become less interconnected. While it might be politically correct to want to buy locally, that is a process on which it is almost impossible to follow through. Resources are grown or managed in one part of our World and manufactured and refined in another. The United States might want to declare that the protection of Europe, or even of Canada, is not their concern, and yet they also do not want any further development of nuclear weapons by these nations, even though they are allied to them. And the reality is that any political instability on the other side of the World has genuine repercussions at home in North America. The Second World War seemed to prove that a European War could not be contained in Europe. It would spread throughout the World. We can pretend that we are going to avoid buying anything made in China, but it is too is impossible. And in the same way, China can refuse to sell to the West, but that is also impractical and would severely damage the Chinese economy. We are interconnected as a world in a way that we maybe never dreamed was possible, and that is not likely to change any time soon.

Ezekiel says that this word, directed at the Pharaoh ruling in Egypt, came to him in the twelfth year and the twelfth month. The date indicates that a little more than a year had passed since the fall of Jerusalem. Gone were the days when the nations hoped and dreamed that maybe Egypt would be able to save them from the Babylonians. Egypt probably believed that they were still power brokers in the area, and there is no doubt that that the Egyptians were still a force to be reckoned with, but the Babylonians had been successful at isolating them from the rest of the World. The Egyptians had begun to operate in a political vacuum, and that meant that the nation had become inconsequential. Maybe they believed that by isolating themselves, they had saved their land, but, in reality, they had lost much of what was important in the process.

And so, Ezekiel is commanded to write a lament about the Pharaoh and to weep over the nation. What once had held so much promise would now suffer. The position that the Pharaoh believed that he carried on the world stage had been lost. And a high cost would now be paid by both the King and people. Opportunity had passed them by, and they didn't even realize it. But maybe even more importantly, the people of Judah who had run from Jerusalem to Egypt searching for protection had placed themselves in danger once again. It would have been safer to stay in the defeated lands of Judah rather than the isolated territory of Egypt. But it was a message that the people failed to heed.

Tomorrow's Scripture Reading: Ezekiel 33

And a Happy Independence Day wish to the citizens of the United States of America.