A Line by Line Exposition of Ezekiel 39 – Part 10
March 25, 2009
http://www.tribulation period.
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Th is
is the last Part of the Line by Line Exposition from Ezekiel 38:1 to 39:16
Ezekiel 39:7 marks the end of the battle of Armageddon and the Second Advent of Jesus Christ. A massive cleanup of millions of human remains begins across Israel dur ing
the early stage of Christ’s reign beginning in verse 9.
Ezekiel 39:7 – So will I make my holy name known in the midst of my people Israel; and I will not let them pollute my holy name any more: and the heathen shall know that I am the Lord, the Holy One in Israel.
Now, let’s take a look at the aftermath of this attack after God has destroyed Gog’s army by the greatest geological holocaust that has ever occurred in the land of Israel.
Ezekiel 39:8-16 – Behold, it is come, and it is done, saith the Lord God;
this is the day whereof I have spoken.
[9] And they that dwell in the cities of Israel shall go forth, and shall set on fire and burn the weapons, both the shields and the bucklers, the bows and the arrows, and the handstaves, and the spears, and they shall burn them with fire seven years: [10] So that they shall take no wood out of the field, neither cut down any out of the forests; for they shall burn the weapons with fire: and they shall spoil those that spoiled them, and rob those that
robbed them, saith the Lord God. [11] And it shall come to pass in that day, that I will give unto Gog a place there of graves in Israel, the valley of the passengers on the east of the sea: and it shall stop the noses of the passengers: and there shall they bury Gog and all his multitude: and they shall call it The valley of Hamon-gog. [12] And seven months shall the house of Israel be burying of them, that they may cleanse the land. [13] Yea, all the people of the land shall bury them; and it shall be to them a renown the day that I shall be glorified, saith the Lord God. [14] And they shall sever out men of continual employment, passing through the land to bury with the passengers those that remain upon the face of the earth, to cleanse it: after the end of seven months shall
they search. [15] And the passengers that pass through the land, when any seeth a man’s bone, then shall he set up a sign by it, till the buriers have buried it in the valley of Hamon-gog. [16] And also the name of the city shall be Hamonah. Thus shall they cleanse the land.
Verse 8 informs us that the day of the Lord is done. The events daily appearing in the Middle East are presently leading us to that great day of the Lord. Finally, it will be over – God’s wrath will have passed – and a remnant of Jews still in physical flesh will dig themselves out of the ashes of the Great Tribulation Period. They will begin to build a new millennial world with their Messiah, Jesus Christ, as their King.
Verse 9 pictures these Jews gathering the war weapons of Armageddon and smelting them with fire into weapons of agriculture and commerce. It will be seven years before the metals have all been recycled into materials to be used by a nation in peaceful pursuits.
Verse 10 advises us that wood will not be used to provide the fire necessary for smelting the metal in the weapons of war. They will take the oil of the Arab nations that spoiled them in the Tribulation Period. They will use their oil to produce the fire that fires the metal into useful peacetime products.
Verse 11 describes the massive cleanup of the millions of corpses from the Battle of Armageddon that still clutter the hills of Galilee, Samaria, and Judea. They will bury them in a valley they will name “the valley of Hamon-gog.” Hamon-gog means “multitude of Gog,” and Gog is the Antichrist, so this valley can be referred to as “the graveyard of the Antichrist.” The exact location is unknown.
We are merely told it will be to the east of the Dead Sea. You will not find directions listed as being anything other than north, east, west, and south in the Old Testament. Any direction from NE to SE was referred to as east, SE to SW as south, SW to NW as west, and NW to NE as north. So this burial zone could be anywhere from northeast to southeast of the Dead Sea. I rather suspect it will be to the southeast of the Dead Sea near Petra.
Verse 12 gives the length of time required to cover and bury the countless numbers of exposed bodies – seven months. However, many bodies will be buried under massive landslides associated with earthquake activity, and it will be necessary to continue to search for bodies for a much longer period of time.
Verse 13 tells us that all the Israelites will take their turn during the seven-month period of massive burials.
It may be that each Israelite will be required to do one months service during the period. By the end of the seven-month period they will have buried most of the bodies.
Verse 14 advises us the compulsory graveyard service of all the Israelites will end after seven months, but that a new system will be instituted to continue the search as long as is required. It may work something like this: the nation of Israel will take some of its men, employed in other aspects of continuous nation rebuilding, and divert them to a full-time job of overseeing and performing the removal of the remaining bodies from the land. These full-time body disposers will work together with other Israelites (passengers) that travel routinely through the land.
Verse 15 describes how the full-time grave providers and passengers will work together toward a common goal.
After seven months only skeletons will remain, so when a traveler happens across a skeleton, in his normal daily pursuits, he will stick up a clearly visible marker by it.
When the full-time grave providers see the marker, they will carry the bones to the Antichrist’s graveyard for burial.
Verse 16 informs us there will be so many grave provider personnel that a city named Hamonah will spring up by the Antichrist’s graveyard. Since the name Hamonah means “multitude,” it is only natural to assume the city is named in memory of its permanent residents.