A human wilderness.
I. WHAT IT IS. Israel is to be brought "into the wilderness of the peoples." The wanderings of their fathers was in "a waste howling wilderness" (Deuteronomy 32:10), among the wild beasts and far from the cities and homes of men; but the exile of the nation in Ezekiel's day was a transportation into the midst of the settled populous country of Babylon. ChaLdea was no Siberia. Banishment from Canaan did not lead to a return to the freedom and the hardships of a nomadic life. The captive Jews were planted among other nations. Although a strange blight has since fallen upon the scene of the exile, and the ruins of the great cities of the Euphrates have now become a veritable wilderness, haunted by lions and hyenas, those cities were at the height of their prosperity and splendour when the prophet lived and wrote. How, then, could he speak of them as a wilderness?
1. A great city is a human wilderness. The greater the city, the more desolate is the wilderness. The social life of small cities like Jerusalem and Athens must have been strong and pleasant. But this life is swamped in the myriads of unknown faces that one sees in a vast city. Great Babylon, Rome, and London?봳he modern Babylon?봦ave the character of a wilderness.
2. There is no banishment so terrible as that of being lost in a human wilderness. People who could be tracked over Dartmoor and among the fells of Yorkshire may be utterly lost in London. Every year there are many broken lives that go down in the awful misery that floods the lower parts of a great city, and no one misses them. Their individuality has been drowned in a sea of humanity. The most heart-rending loneliness is that of a friendless man in a crowd?봲o many fellow beings, and not a spark of fellow feeling!
II. HOW IT IS USED. The city wilderness is used for the punishment of the Jews; but not for that only.
1. God meets his people in the wilderness. Success blinds us to the presence of God. Society makes us deaf to his voice. Adversity and solitude prepare us to remember him and to hearken to his Word. We need not flee to the wilderness of a John the Baptist?봳o the seclusion of a hermitage among the silent rocks?봧n order to meet with God. He will visit us in the crowded city. When the heart sinks, sad and faint at its own loneliness amid the din of a crowded life in which the lost wanderer has no share, God is ready to whisper words of comfort. He can find his poor suffering child in the crowd, and draw near to him there as well as in the field, the chamber, or the temple. God comes into most intimate relations with his people in their hour of desolation. He meets them "face to face." In the old wilderness of Sinai the Jews shrank from such near contact with God, so that it was reserved for Moses alone (Exodus 33:11). Now it is to be for all Israel. Thus deep distress has its privileges.
2. God pleads with his people. He desires to save; he urges repentance. "Come now, and let us reason together, saith the Lord" (Isaiah 1:18). When men are most cold and repellant, perhaps our heart may be open to the sympathy of God. Then we can see that he seeks us in a great, undying love.
Note, it is a shame to Christendom that there should be a human wilderness among us. Heathen cities were cruel. But brotherhood is essential to Christianity. May we not say that, after pleading with us for our own sakes, God also pleads with us that we may save our lost brothers and sisters?