What is the significance of Ezekiel 21:26-27 to us today?

Originally posted 7-14-13:

Ezekiel 21:26-27, “26 Thus saith the Lord God; Remove the diadem, and take off the crown: this shall not be the same: exalt him that is low, and abase him that is high. 27 I will overturn, overturn, overturn, it: and it shall be no more, until he come whose right it is; and I will give it him.

King Jeconiah, a descendant of King David through Solomon promoted idol worship and other deeds which out-raged our righteous God. So God pronounced a blood curse on the line of Jehoiachin/ Jeconiah, saying that none of his descendants would ever sit on the throne of David. This meant that no Messiah could come from a male in the line of David as there was now a blood curse pronounced on the only males left in the royal line.

So the problem was how to get around this blood curse and yet to fulfill Jacob’s prophecy. Genesis 49:8-9, “Judah, thou art he whom thy brethren shall praise: thy hand shall be in the neck of thine enemies; thy father's children shall bow down before thee. Judah is a lion's whelp: from the prey, my son, thou art gone up: he stooped down, he couched as a lion, and as an old lion; who shall rouse him up?"

Jesus was the Lion of Judah and in the line of David however, through His mother who was in the line of King David’s son Nathan. Jacob’s prophecy continued with the Genesis 49:10, “The scepter shall not depart from Judah, nor a lawgiver from between his feet, until Shiloh come; and unto him shall the gathering of the people be.” The term “Shiloh: he whose it is,” was understood by the early rabbis and Talmudic authorities as referring to the Messiah.

In 7 AD Caesar Augustus appointed Caponius Procurator who in turn removed judicial authority from Judea. The scepter refers to tribal identity and self-determination when applying capital punishment, jus gladii, “The right of the sword.” So the temple leaders beat their breasts, etc. and cried that God broke His word in Genesis 49:10; that the scepter had departed Judah.

If the Sanhedrin had really believed God's Word they would have known that Shiloh had come and was a child living in Israel in 7 AD. By the time that child was a man sharing His ministry with the people and undermining the cash cow of the temple the Sanhedrin wanted Jesus dead!

As for what the significance of the subject verses are to us today, while there may still be time there is a crying need for repentance to avoid God’s wrath. Perhaps it is too late to repent and shortly God’s words, “I will overturn, overturn, overturn it: and it shall be no more,” will happen. However this also carries the promise, “until he come whose right it is; and I will give it him;” the return of Christ to set up His millennium Kingdom.