Let’s just see a show of hands: Who likes to get bad news?

Come on, don’t be shy, let’s see those hands. What? You don’t love to get bad news? Of course not. Nobody likes hearing that you just lost your job, or the paint you so carefully chose is the wrong color, or that the little nut and bolt that you took off to remove your license plate somehow now won’t go together, no matter how many times you try and try and try to make it work, in the hot sun, while you sweat, and think nasty thoughts about the DMV and the makers of nuts and bolts everywhere.

Hypothetically speaking, of course; that has nothing to do with how I spent my time yesterday afternoon.

No one likes getting bad news. We’d rather hear about the weather or a heart warming animal story on our evening news than the latest crisis in the middle east.

And because no one likes getting bad news, no one really likes giving bad news, either; not even the prophets, who seemed to have to do it often.

In chapter 33, the message God gives to Ezekiel tells why he has to be the bearer of bad news.

God tells him he’s a watchman. He’s the sentinel. He’s the guard who looks out and sees the enemy coming, and sounds the alarm. Something bad is coming, and I want people to know about it. Ezekiel, I want you to bring them the bad news.

This must have been a difficult message for Ezekiel to receive, because he’s getting it for the second time. Back in chapter three, God told Ezekiel the same thing. You, Ezekiel, are the watchman. You’re watching carefully, you’re listening to me, and I’m telling you that trouble is coming. I want you to warn people about what is coming.

The good news, Ezekiel, is if you do your job and speak the bad news, you’re off the hook no matter how people respond. But if you don’t say what I’m showing you, whatever happens will be on your head.

Prophets have a hard job.

But it’s an important job. A message like the one Ezekiel gets here, though, is the kind of message that makes a person wish they never heard from God in the first place.

It is possible to hear from God; this is one of the very important truths the prophets remind us about. We can hear from God! In today’s world, we need more people to do it–more people to listen, more people to speak God’s words.

We need people to serve as watchers, watching and listening to God, watching the world around us…and then sounding the alarm when it is necessary.

It’s not an easy job, but it is really, really important. No one wants to hear bad news. But if a car is heading towards my daughter while she’s having fun playing in the street, I’m going to yell to her to move, even though it disrupts her fun!

Sometimes God’s words come to us out of the blue, like a warning shout when we’re playing in the street.

Isaiah was going about his business in the temple when he had a powerful vision of God, high and lifted up. Peter was on the roof napping before lunch. Ezekiel himself was sitting by a river with a bunch of other exiled Jews when he had a profound vision of God.

There are times in our lives where we’re surprised by God, and it’s a wonderful thing. Hearing from God is this weird mix of making the time to listen, and also of being caught off guard.

Several months ago, I had a lot of different things on my mind. I was sitting in my office, and after I’d been worried and stewing and anxious for quite some time, I finally began praying, and asking God for some direction. Was this thing I was worried about true? I was literally in the act of asking God to help me know the truth, when my cell phone rang.

It was Ron Thomason, my friend who is the pastor of Godsong Community church. He didn’t say hi, he didn’t chit-chat at all. He said, “What’s going on over there?”

I said, “Funny you should ask that right about now. I’m really wrestling with something.”

He said, “It’s not a coincidence, I was working on something else entirely, when God brought you to mind and told me to pray. It was so strong, I had to call.”

To make a long story short, I told him what I was worried about, and that I was wrestling with whether I was seeing it accurately or not.

He helped me sort it through. “Yes, that’s it exactly, and here’s what you need to do about it.” He confirmed that my fear was true. It was bad news…but the way it came to me, the way God worked through Ron and me so I would know what to do, made the bad news worth hearing and incredibly important.

God really does speak. When we make it a habit to listen to God, to ask for God’s input, we find that we hear from God more and more often. It’s not a magical thing; God is never a tool or an automatic vending machine kind of God. But when we make it a habit of making the time to listen to God, we learn what his voice sounds like.

When we make a habit of acting on what we hear from God, like Ron did by calling me, the next response becomes easier. They build on each other.

God reminded Ezekiel how important it is to act on everything that we hear from God.

It’s not just the good things from God that are important to share. Everything is important. Making a regular habit of seeking God, expecting that God is going to speak, is an essential part of life with God.

God’s reminder to Ezekiel shows us that everything God speaks is worthwhile, whether words of encouragement or warning.

Sometimes we get to the point where we think God enjoys giving out the bad news.

Ezekiel 33 challenges that head on. If I put myself in Ezekiel’s place, if I heard something like chapter 33 myself, I would be groaning and convinced that God is an angry God who always wants to focus on the bad stuff.

He’s talking with Ezekiel about warnings, and enemies, and death and destruction. He’s telling Ezekiel that “If I announce that some wicked people are sure to die and you fail to warn them about changing their ways, then they will die in their sins, but I will hold YOU responsible of their deaths.”

If I were Ezekiel, I’d be thinking, “I didn’t sign up for this! This can’t be good. God must be getting ready to blast all of us into oblivion!”

The setup is perfect!

But God doesn’t follow through as expected.

[READ v. 10-11]

“I take no pleasure in the death of wicked people.”

Even bad news from God must not warp our view of what God is like.

God loves us! And love sometimes speaks bad news out loud. Love sometimes brings correction.

Even from a man like Ezekiel, even in one of the strangest books in the bible, full of visions and wheels in the sky and angels, even with Ezekiel doing weird activities to communicate Gods’ message…even in the middle of all these strange, harsh messages, there is good news in the midst of the bad.

God does not hate even the ones who rebel against him. God does not sadistically enjoy filling our lives with bad things. God is not the kind of God who on a whim sends us horrible experiences “just because.”

No, here in Ezekiel 33: 10 and 11 is a picture of a loving and yearning God who desperately wants people to turn away from wickedness and towards himself.

Is your image of God warped?

God does sometimes speak bad news to us. Being all-loving does not mean that God only speaks the things we enjoy and want to hear. In Ezekiel’s time, the prophets who only spoke what people wanted to hear had a name: they were the false prophets.

Is your image of God twisted?

Do you think God enjoys the horrible parts of your life, the things that hurt you and wound you? Do you think God maybe secretly is having fun at your expense?

Let God speak for himself.

Make space in your life to listen to God. Seek him, listen for his voice. Bring him your concerns and fears and doubts. Be ready to be surprised by God, and remember that everything, good or bad, which we hear from God is supremely valuable.

God wants you and me to live. God is not afraid to ask you to turn away from things that are wrong, from things that hurt us, from things that turn us away from God.

Will you listen for his voice today? Will you turn, and live?