“When I say unto the wicked, Thou shalt surely die; and thou givest him not warning, nor speakest to warn the wicked from his wicked way, to save his life; the same wicked man shall die in his iniquity; but his blood will I require at thine hand” (Ezekiel 3:18).

Ezekiel had been called as a prophet and “watchman” (Ezekiel 3:17; 33:7) to warn the sinning Israelites of impending judgment because of their persistence in compromising their worship of the true God with the pagan pantheistic evolutionism of the Canaanite nations around them. Soon they had adopted the immoral life styles that almost invariably develop from diluted confidence in God as Creator/Savior.

One could easily draw a sharp parallel between ancient Judah and the apostasy and moral degeneration of modern Christendom. The wicked (that is, “the nations that forget God”) are surely going to be “turned into hell” (Psalm 9:17) if they do not soon repent, whether or not they hear the warning of any watchman. They have already rejected the evidence of God in creation and conscience, so they are “without excuse” (Romans 1:20).

Nevertheless, the Lord does call us who have His word to do all we can “to warn the wicked from his wicked way, to save his life” (that is, in the present context, to tell them that their Creator and Judge has died for them, to become their Savior). If we fail to do this, then we become, in effect, their executioners with blood on our hands. Even the “righteous” need to be warned, “that the righteous sin not” (Ezekiel 3:21). “Nevertheless, if thou warn the wicked” and he ignores or rejects the warning, “thou hast delivered thy soul” (Ezekiel 33:9). We have a great responsibility, as well as a wonderful privilege, to warn men of impending judgment, and then to tell them of the Savior. HMM