Ezekiel 5.2: God Leaves Planet Earth

Meanwhile back at the northern gate The woman spent their days with words of hate Mourned the passing seasons and the sun’s depleted rays
And slaughter of John Barleycorn in summer’s golden haze Deeper in the sanctuary twixt altar and the porch Their men lay prostrate to summer’s fiery torch Backs toward the temple, faces to the east Intent upon the vicious acts on which they all would feast
Then the glory of Jehovah spoke to me with strident voice ”I will crucify all pity, let them live with their own choice. Though they cry to me for sustenance and shelter from the storm I will turn my back upon them til their spirit be reformed.”  The one defining element of the Hebrew religion is that it is monotheistic
In other words, “The Lord your God is ONE God”
Idolatry was condemned from the outset
And yet by the time the prophets Jeremiah and Ezekiel were foretelling the destruction of Jerusalem, the temple was playing host to the fertility cults that had been specifically forbidden by Moses’ Law.

Women were worshipping Astarte, one of the fertility cult deities that God had forbidden the people of Israel to worship, and men were worshipping the sun. All this was happening within the temple in Jerusalem.
The way to prosper, according to Moses’ Law was to be righteous.
There was no way that offering sacrifices or building temples and other sanctuaries for the gods would allow the ‘worshipper’ to influence God.
God tells Ezekiel he is going to require the people of Israel to make atonement for their evil ways. He is about to leave the temple. He is about to leave Jerusalem. So the next time this vision of God is reported it is by John, in the book of Revelation, and God is in heaven.
The atonement is going to be very violent. But the righteous Jews - those who are sealed by the servant of God - will escape this slaughter
Then he called his guards to order, each with weapon in his hand And his glory left the temple, and departed from that land His linen clad offsider, not a soldier but a scribe Bearing nothing but a writing kit, the guards all by his side Placed a seal upon the righteous heads of all of them that mourn And grieve at all the evil done, await the righteous dawn Then he summoned all his guards to go forth into the city And kill without compassion, and slaughter without pity And visit death upon the heads of all of them that did not bear the seal Who criticized the destitute and pity did conceal Filled the country with their bloodshed and the cities with the lust Piled the corpses in the temple left them bleeding i the dust
So Ezekiel’s vision of God ended with instructions being given to a man dressed in white linen and carrying a writing pad to go into Jerusalem and place a mark on the heads of all those who grieved at the evil they saw all around them, rather than joining in and accepting it as “just the way it is”
Later in the book of Revelation, the famous “666” mark of the beast is given to all those who do not grieve at all the evil they see around them, who join in and accept that it is “just the way it is”
When God and his retinue leave the temple, Jerusalem and planet earth, the man in white tells his men to go and kill all those who do not have his holy mark, (could we say “777”) on their heads. It is the ongoing atonement, the Tribulation of Israel, and it has been going on ever since. But the good news is, it culminates in the Day of the Lord, when God intervenes in human history by sending a messiah to redeem Israel. The Tribulation (atonement) of Israel and the Day of the Lord (redemption). They are the two themes to which the Hebrew prophets return again and again
That did not happen in 70 or 138 CE when the Roman Empire repeated the Babylonian destruction of Jerusalem. So the prophecies still await their fulfilment.

I’ve been thinking ‘bout Isaiah and the children that he spawned There was “speedy prey, quick spoil” and “a remnant shall return”

And then there was the virgin whom a child did bring to birth Emanuel, God with us, and a comfort to the earth.

God Leaves the Temple, Jerusalem & planet earth