Son of man, the Israelites are saying, 'The vision he sees is for many years from now, and he prophesies about the distant future.' – Ezekiel 12:27

Today's Scripture Reading (August 5, 2026): Ezekiel 12

As I write this, the conflict between Russia and Ukraine continues. This news might surprise some, because the war has been largely excluded from most of our news cycles by other events, primarily at the United States' behest. But the war in Ukraine continues, and there are still a lot of unanswered questions. Not surprisingly, one question that still hasn't been answered is what this means for the rest of the world. Of key interest is whether the situation in Ukraine can be contained in Eastern Europe and Asia, or whether it will spill over into other countries; will this remain just a Russian/Ukrainian issue, or will it lead to a broader world conflict? The nations have worked hard to contain the conflict, but every day it seems we are a step closer to, at the very least, a struggle in the European-Asian theater. As Vladimir Putin continues to dream of putting the band back together and forming a revised Soviet Union, some Russia watchers point to an East/West conflict that the world has been anticipating since the end of the Second World War. However, the fear of an East/West conflict has never really gone away. The expectation of conflict was just somehow delayed. And now, with the Ukraine/Russia war, the possibility of this major conflict has been brought back into the forefront of the world's consciousness. The message of many is that world trouble is no longer a distant possibility; the events in Ukraine have made it an immediate probability.

Ezekiel has revealed everything that God has told him to the exiles. The news is overwhelming. But far from the intended effect of showing that God is still on the throne, God says the people have instead claimed the prophecies refer to the distant future. And because the prophecies are so distant, there is nothing that needs to be done now. Actions can wait until later, closer to the time revealed in God's prophecies. God responds that the people are wrong and that the prophecies are not about the distant future but about a much closer time. The words of the Prophets are about the immediate, so a response is also required now, not later.

God still expects his people to react to his prophecies with an eye to the near future. The "when" of a prophecy is ultimately unimportant; the expected reaction is always supposed to be in the now. The reality is that we can do nothing about the past, but the future is shaped by the actions we take in the present. So, God expects us to take the present very seriously. For the exiles, there was a path they needed to take to return to where God wanted and needed them to be, and to where they themselves desired to be. But that path started in the now. Ezekiel's prophecies were not something that could be procrastinated into the distant future because even the distant future begins in the eternal now.

The most important time of your life is the now. The past is dead and buried, but the future will be written by the actions we take today. The only hope the world has is that we can agree on what the future should look like, so that we can also agree to take action in the present.

Tomorrow's Scripture Reading: Ezekiel 13