HOLE IN THE WALL

Thorns and snares are in the way of the froward: he that doth keep his soul shall be far from them – Proverbs 22:5

“…Ezekiel was taken then to the entrance of the inner court where he discovered a hole in the wall, as though someone had been trying to gain entrance. He was told to start digging – and there he discovered a secret door. God said, “Go in and see what they’re doing in there.” Ezekiel peeked into the room.

First he saw dirty pictures scrawled all over the walls, like the graffiti you see on cubicle walls in public restrooms. Then he saw a group of men on their knees worshipping the drawings on the walls and saying to themselves, “The Lord does not see us…” (8:12).

The Lord said to Ezekiel, “Have you seen what the elders of the house of Israel are doing in the darkness, each at the shrine of his own idol?” (8:12), using a word for idol that is often translated “imaginations” in the Old Testament.

Imagination is the image-making function of our minds, the remarkable ability we have to form mental images with thoughts even though actual objects are out of sight. It’s a promising faculty, but one we can prostitute, making the pictures pornographic, playing at sex in our heads, bedding down in that secret boudoir in our brain.

The first images tend to be ill-defined, but we have the capacity to sharpen the focus and portray the pictures in vivid color and live action on the wall of our minds. Then they become memories, indelibly inscribed drawings to which we return again and again for worship. With each visit the pictures gain greater definition. All this goes on in those secret places from which we have excluded God.

Sexual fantasies are sins we readily excuse. Who knows, who cares, and who gets hurt? A victimless crime – or so we think. But sin always bears bitter fruit in us and in others. We cannot long contain its effects; it always breaks out in greater defilement. As the angel said again to Ezekiel, “You will see them doing things that are even more detestable!” (8:13). The result, as Ezekiel went on to see, is a slow sort of dying.

There is deliverance from this. We must choose whether we’ll serve God or Phallus. It’s a choice we make every day. And then we must invite God into every part of our life, even into those darkened rooms in our minds where we have our own four walls – rooms which we have staked out for ourselves, and from which we have excluded Him. He will enter in, the entrance of His words will give light, the images on the walls will begin to fade, and He will write His own thoughts in their place….”