Chapter 3

Ezekiel is told to eat the scroll, which tastes like honey.  (as the one John eats in Revelation!)  The commission continues through vs 15.  Ezekiel is not to fear this people with foreheads like flint, and stubborn hearts.  He sits in Tel-abib, by the Chebar canal, overwhelmed, for seven days.  (Wonder if this canal is the other branch of the Euphrates?  Checked online.  No one really knows, much speculation, from Syria to 50 miles SE of Babylon.

2025 - The scroll tastes like honey, but apparently, unlike the book John eats in Revelation, it did not turn bitter in his stomach.

2022 - These verses:

4 And he said to me, "Son of man, go to the house of Israel and speak with my words to them. 5 For you are not sent to a people of foreign speech and a hard language, but to the house of Israel-- 6 not to many peoples of foreign speech and a hard language, whose words you cannot understand. Surely, if I sent you to such, they would listen to you. [Eze 3:4-6 ESV]

There is no message to the Gentiles at this time in history.  So long as God is still working with Israel, the dogs don't get fed.  Even though God absolutely knows that if Ezekiel went to the Gentiles, they would believe and be saved.  But for God's own reasons, they are precluded.  This is not only spiritual election, but physically imposed election, by the direct word of God to a prophet able to preach. 

Ezekiel to be a watchman, and as such, warn the people of what he hears from God.  If he doesn't, those who perish are his responsibility.  But if he warns, and they don't change, they still die, but it is not held to Ezekiel's account.  These verses are, to me, the ultimate commission for witnessing the gospel to others.

vss 18-21, Another phrase - if a righteous turns from righteousness, his good deeds will be remembered no more.  (MSB has notes on this vs but they seem unsatisfactory to me.)

God sends Ezekiel to the valley to receive a message.  The message from God is that he is to go in his house.  There he will be bound, so he cannot go among the people, and he also wont' be able to speak.  For they are a rebellious house!