Reformational Commentary on Ezekiel 38:1
“And the word of the LORD came unto me, saying," (Ezekiel 38:1)
Ezekiel opens this new prophecy with the confident affirmation that what he was about to disclose was the Word of God1
and not a notion of his own,
or an interpretation of another passage, or a message conveyed to him by another prophet.
Rather, this was assuredly a God-breathed missive and one that he alone, Ezekiel, had been authorised and directed to commit to writing,
for the edification of the church and for a witness against the ungodly, throughout all ages in general, and with special application
to the time close to, during and in the aftermath of, its sure and certain fulfilment.
FOOTNOTES
1. Here the "the LORD" in capital letters in the King James Version of the Bible refers to the
Tetragrammaton, i.e., the four Hebrew letters
for the Lord's Name, (יהוה (Yod-He-Vav-He)), i.e., "Yawveh", often Anglicised as "Jehovah") the term appears most frequently (726 times) in the oldest
book of the major prophets, Jeremiah, and here in Ezekiel it appears 434 times.
It is the Name that God used to identify Himself to Moses from the burning bush in Exodus 3:14; accordingly, here in Ezekiel 38:1, it signifies
that the covenant God of the Israelites of old is addressing the wicked man Gog across the millennia through the
faithful prophet Ezekiel (though Gog himself may not grasp this in his lifetime, it being presented for the edification of the church first and foremost).
