Your mother was like a vine in your vineyard planted by the water; it was fruitful and full of branches because of abundant water. – Ezekiel 19:10

Today's Scripture Reading (August 12, 2026): Ezekiel 19

In 2014, the CBS show "48 Hours" decided to use portions of a four-minute voicemail, recorded by Danielle Thomas just moments before she was murdered, on the weekly show. In fact, it might be that the moment of her murder is caught on the audio tape. The decision to air portions of the recording was controversial. Those close to Thomas did not want to hear the tape and wished that CBS would reverse its decision. However, millions of others most likely did want to hear Thomas' final words. Maybe it is a sign of our morbid preoccupation with death (even though death is something about which we seldom speak in Western Culture). But I wonder if the more likely cause is that we want desperately to make sense out of life, and a young woman being killed in the prime of her life doesn't make sense. So, we struggle for details. We want to know the answers to our questions, as if, in the act of knowing, we can make sense of the tragedy. But often it is a fool's chase; some things just don't make sense.

We often play the game at funerals. We like to trace the life; we give eulogies (sometimes very long ones) that attempt to reference the life we are celebrating, a life that has now ended. We tell stories of life that are intended to ease the pain, but sometimes seem to heighten it, especially if the one who has died did so before their time. All of this is just part of what we do, and these words are ways for us to try to move past the tragic ending of a life. I do not think that we ever heal from these times of sorrow (I know that I am often reminded of the people who were important to me who have passed away, and always with a fresh feeling of pain). Still, survival in our world requires that we somehow get past the pain and sorrow so we can get on with life.

In many ways, Ezekiel 19 is a eulogy for a life that was cut short. The princes of Israel may remain, but the nation (the mother of the passage) is now totally gone. In Ezekiel's story, there are no remnants and no life. Ezekiel begins to look back over the life of the nation, and what he sees is a life that began with so much promise. The vine (Mother Israel) was planted close to the water. In ancient times, especially in the heat of the Middle East, a vine had to be planted near water if it was going to produce fruit. And Ezekiel declares that Mother Israel bore fruit, at least for a time.

Ezekiel also describes the vine as full of branches. Israel had been a place where all the tribes, the descendants of Jacob, could find life and, perhaps more importantly, peace. There was no violent breaking off of branches on the vine, at least not until the Assyrian captivity for the Northern Tribes, and now this snuffing out of Judah and Benjamin by Babylon.

However, what had started with such potential had now ended. All that was left were the cries of the princes in a place that was not their own. It was a sad story of a life ending early and of a promise never fully realized. But the story is supposed to be sad, after all, it is a eulogy being given at a funeral, it is the last words being recorded on tape before an untimely death. We are not supposed to find good things here; this passage is all about potential that has ended before its time. And Ezekiel's final words of the chapter remind us of this single-focused reality. "This is a lament and is to be used as a lament" (Ezekiel 19:14).

Tomorrow's Scripture Reading: Ezekiel 20