that thou didst also build unto thee a place of debauchery, and didst make thee a high place in every street
Ezekiel 16 tells how God found Jerusalem in misery, cleansed her, and made her beautiful. Verse 24 is one line in the charge that follows: she built her own shrines, and she built them everywhere.
The chapter is not about salvation. It records how God treated one city, and how she repaid Him.
When you read Ezekiel 16, remember that Jerusalem is the subject, not Israel. Also, the subject here is not redemption but God's dealings. He gave life to what was in misery and had no beauty. He cleansed it, adorned it, and anointed it. But Jerusalem used everything Jehovah had given her in the service of her idols. She also used it to buy the help and the favour of the Egyptians and the Assyrians. She had no thought of being independent, of standing alone and leaning on Jehovah.
The ESV calls it a "vaulted chamber" and a "lofty place." Older translations read "a high place in every street."
The term "high places" has another use, under the Hebrew word ramah, which also means "exalted." Israel is charged with making a high place in every street, and at the head of every road. This no doubt points to some shrine or symbol of idolatry tied to detestable practices. Ezek. 16:24-25, 31, 39. They sought the favour of the pagan nations by taking up their idol worship and customs.
These shrines did not appear out of nowhere. The chapter traces where the slide began.
Against this beautiful background of Jehovah's love and mercy comes the dark picture of Jerusalem's prostitution. It stands for her wicked idolatry. It all started with pride (verse 15). Jerusalem did not acknowledge the giver. Instead of worshipping Him, they set up the high places and copied all the wicked Canaanite practices.
A shrine in every square shows more than giving way to temptation. Jerusalem went out looking for it.
Jehovah then spells out the extreme impurity Jerusalem turned to with uncontrolled lust. She did not only let in every unclean idolatry that passed by. She went out and courted idol dealings with the foreigners on every side, and with the most distant Gentiles. She put even her Philistine neighbours to shame, for they were content with their own gods. (Ver. 23-29)
Why would the one city God cleansed and adorned sink lower than nations that never knew Him?
Here is a solemn yet certain truth. When God's people depart from Him, they are apt to go farther astray than all others. They have slighted the One who guarded them, and without His care they become Satan's special plaything and the prime target of his schemes. Through them he works all the more effectively to dishonour the living God... Then Jerusalem was in question, now it is the Church; but it is ever the opposition of the devil to the Son of God.
Her judgment came through the very nations she had courted. Yet that is not where the chapter ends.
In Ezekiel 16 God reminds Jerusalem how He dealt with her in grace. She had been in misery and degradation, and He had washed her, anointed her, and made her beautiful. But she used all His favour in the service of idols, and to gain the support of Egypt and Assyria. She had played the prostitute, and she would be treated as one. God would make her own lovers carry out His just judgment on her. Despite this, His oath and covenant of promise (see Ezek. 16:8) would still be made good (Ezek. 16:62-63).
Few readers today will build a shrine on a street corner. Idolatry still reaches them.
Anything that is put before the Person of Christ is an idol... Take an evangelist who thinks and aims more at popularity — that is, preaching himself and not the Lord. Preaching is blessed work, and God's means for saving souls, but that too becomes an idol. In fact every soul, believer or not, who does not have Christ as the supreme Object of his affections is to that extent an idolater. So idolatry is not limited to bowing to an image of gold or wood. The idol may be only in the imagination, but it is a real idol there.
- Gift. God found Jerusalem in misery. He cleansed her, adorned her, and bound Himself to her by covenant. Everything she later spent on idols came from His hand.
- Pride. The high places began with pride. Jerusalem stopped acknowledging the giver, and then she built.
- Reach. A shrine in every square shows more than idolatry passing by. She went out to court it.
- Danger. When God's people leave Him, they go further astray than all others. The same conflict with Satan now touches the Church.
- End. God made her own lovers carry out His just judgment. Yet His oath and covenant still stand (16:62-63) — judgment on the shrine, grace kept for the city.
thou didst build thy high place at every head of the way, and madest thy beauty to be abhorred, and thou didst open thy feet to every one that passed by, and multiply thy whoredom.
Ezekiel 16 tells Jerusalem's story as the life of an abandoned baby girl whom God rescued, washed, clothed, crowned, and married. Verse 25 turns that story inside out: the beauty He gave her is now on sale at every street corner, and the chapter asks how a rescued people could fall so far.
God gave Jerusalem everything that made her beautiful. That is why her display is so painful: she was spending someone else's wealth, and the gift itself became detestable.
And what was the return? "But you trusted in your beauty and played the whore because of your renown." It is a sad picture, and it is as true as it is sad. The beauty of Jerusalem was for every passer-by... The idolatrous uncleanness of Jerusalem was beyond anything that had been or was to be. And one thing marked it out: she squandered all the countless gifts of her divine husband on the filthy idols of the nations. Her Maker was exactly that to her — a husband.
Commentators trace the collapse to one root: her gifts became the ground of her confidence in herself.
The story of Israel's failure comes next. Sadly, all her privilege and all her wealth of blessing became for her only the means of a deeper and more deadly fall. The root of it all was their self-confidence. How sad that self-confidence can still show itself in people who owe everything they have to grace alone! We may build ourselves up just as Israel did, on privileges that only God's grace could have given us. So we take the glory that is His due and use it to dress ourselves!
The "lofty place" built at the head of every street is not just a picture of shamelessness. It points to a physical structure, and the Hebrew word behind it carries the sense of height.
The term "high places" has another use, under the Hebrew word ramah, which also means "exalted." Scripture charges Israel with making a high place in every street and at every head of the way. This no doubt refers to some shrine or symbol of idolatry connected with abominable practices. Ezek. 16:24-25, 31, 39. They tried to win the favour of the nations by taking up their idolatrous worship and customs.
One writer traces this language to what took place at those shrines. He also sees the same appetite today, in worship that pleases the senses but leaves the heart out.
In Israel, turning away from God showed itself outwardly in the "high places" they made for themselves. It was only a heathen habit. Such worship plays on the imagination and leaves the heart out. Men still try to satisfy themselves the same way, with music, architecture, drapery, and that most typical "dim religious light" — and all to worship a God who is Light itself, and in whom there is no darkness... The language used here is figurative, but it is still drawn from the awful grossness of the heathen abominations, where the lusts and passions of men were let loose as worship offered to the God of nature.
The charge runs wider than one street corner. She went looking, and she outdid nations that were content with the gods they already had.
The Lord then details the excessive impurity that Jerusalem turned to with unbridled lust. She not only admitted every uncleanness of idolatry that passed by; she went out and courted idolatrous dealings with the strangers on every side and with the most distant nations. This shamed even their Philistine neighbours, who were content with their own gods. (Ver. 23-29)
This chapter is not only about the past. One writer draws out why the rescued can fall lowest of all.
It is a solemn but certain truth: when God's people turn away from Him, they tend to go further astray than anyone else. They have slighted Him, so they lose His protection. Then they become Satan's favourite plaything and the victim he wants most for his schemes, so that through them he can bring greater dishonour on the living God... Then Jerusalem was in question, now it is the Church; but it is always the opposition of the devil to the Son of God.
- Gift. Every ornament Jerusalem wore came from her Maker, who was to her a husband; nothing in verse 25 was hers to spend.
- Pride. The root was self-confidence. She built herself up on privileges that grace alone had given, and wore God's glory as her own dress.
- Display. The "lofty place" at each street head was a real shrine. Its Hebrew name means "exalted," and it stood where every traveller would pass.
- Pursuit. She did not just accept the idolatry that came past. She went after distant nations, and shamed neighbours who kept their own gods.
- Warning. Turning from God carries the favoured further down than anyone else. Once it was Jerusalem; now, one writer says, the warning is for the Church.