Ezekiel 36: Restored for His Name’s Sake
“Where the world saw ruin, the Lord planted life.”
Photo credit: Unsplash | Devotional insight credit: Grace and Truth Study Bible
Ezekiel 36 unfolds as a stunning reversal of judgment. The Lord speaks directly to the mountains of Israel—once ravaged by foreign nations during Israel’s exile—and promises to restore their beauty and productivity. Unlike the judgment on Mount Seir, the message here is one of redemption. Israel’s land will flourish again, its people will return, and the shame brought on by foreign nations will be wiped away.
Yet, this restoration is not based on Israel’s merit. The people had polluted the land and God's name by their disobedience and idolatry. Their exile brought reproach to the Lord’s holy name among the nations, who scoffed at Israel’s downfall. But God, in His sovereign grace, declares that He will act—not for Israel’s sake—but for the sake of His holy name. His redemptive plan will display His holiness and faithfulness.
What follows is one of the most beautiful sevenfold promises of inner transformation in the Old Testament. God will cleanse His people, give them new hearts, place His Spirit within them, and move them to walk in His ways. This passage prophetically anticipates the gospel: that God would do for His people what they could never do for themselves. Finally, God also gives seven promises of national restoration—blessing the land, rebuilding the ruins, multiplying the people, and making His name great again through a restored people. It’s a message not just of return, but of re-creation—inside and out.
Journal Entry – The Voice of the Holy Spirit Through Scripture
I have spoken to the mountains and I have spoken to My people, for I am the One who makes desolate places spring to life again. When the nations mocked, when they scorned My land and My name, I was not silent. I saw the theft, I saw the ruin, and I saw how My own possession was trampled. Yet it was not for your sake, O house of Israel, that I acted—it was for the sake of My holy name, which you had profaned among the nations where you went.
I will sanctify My great name before all eyes. I will gather you from every nation and bring you home. Then I will cleanse you with pure water, and you will be clean from all your impurities and from every idol that entangled your heart. I will remove from you your heart of stone and give you a heart that responds to Me—a heart of flesh. I will put My Spirit within you and cause you to walk in My statutes. You will live in the land I gave your ancestors. You will be My people, and I will be your God.
I will summon the grain and the harvest. I will remove famine and increase fruitfulness. I will rebuild what was torn down. You will remember your former ways and loathe them, but not from fear—from reverence, because you will know that I, the Lord, have done this. The ruined cities will be filled with people like flocks prepared for sacrifice, and the nations will see and know that I, the Lord, have rebuilt what was desolate.
This is My work—not yours. I restore because I am faithful. I renew because I am holy. I dwell within you not because you are worthy, but because I have made you Mine.
Scriptures woven in: Ezekiel 36:1–38
My Prayer in Response
Father, what confidence You give me in knowing that everything You do is grounded in the unshakable foundation of Your name. You didn’t restore Israel because they earned it. You restored them because You are a God who redeems, a God who keeps covenant, a God who cannot deny Himself.
I praise You that You have already placed a new heart within me. You have already poured out clean water upon me in Christ. You have already given me Your Spirit to dwell in me. And I no longer strive to become Yours—I am Yours. I no longer work for renewal—I live from it. Your promises are not wishful hopes—they are finished realities in Christ.
Thank You for moving me—not with guilt, but with grace. Not with fear, but with affection. Let the ruins in my life now stand as monuments to Your restoration, so that all who see will know—it was the Lord who rebuilt, the Lord who renewed, the Lord who gave life where there was none.