Therefore tell the house of Israel that this is what the Lord GOD says: ‘Repent and turn away from your idols; turn your faces away from all your abominations.
Parallel translations
- WEB “Therefore tell the house of Israel, ‘Thus says the Lord Yahweh: “Return, and turn yourselves from your idols! Turn away your faces from all your abominations.
- KJV Therefore say unto the house of Israel, Thus saith the Lord GOD; Repent, and turn yourselves from your idols; and turn away your faces from all your abominations.
- NKJV “Therefore say to the house of Israel, ‘Thus says the Lord God: “Repent, turn away from your idols, and turn your faces away from all your abominations.
- NASB “Therefore say to the house of Israel, ‘This is what the Lord God says: “Repent and turn away from your idols, and turn your faces away from all your abominations.
- NLT “Therefore, tell the people of Israel, ‘This is what the Sovereign Lord says: Repent and turn away from your idols, and stop all your detestable sins.
Scripture taken from the New King James Version®. Copyright © 1982 by Thomas Nelson. Used by permission. All rights reserved.
Scripture quotations taken from the (NASB®) New American Standard Bible®, Copyright © 1960, 1971, 1977, 1995, 2020 by The Lockman Foundation. Used by permission. All rights reserved. lockman.org
Scripture quotations are taken from the Holy Bible, New Living Translation, copyright © 1996, 2004, 2015 by Tyndale House Foundation. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers, Carol Stream, Illinois 60188. All rights reserved.
Quick answer
God calls Israel to repent: 'Return, and turn from your idols, and turn your faces from all your abominations.'
Overview
At the heart of this oracle is a gracious summons to repentance. The threefold call to turn underscores that the way back is open if they forsake their idols. It echoes the gospel pattern: God exposes sin in order to call sinners home, a call fulfilled in Christ's own preaching of repentance.
Cross-references & the web
Cross-references · 27
- Ezek 18:30Therefore, O house of Israel, I will judge you, each according to his ways, declares the Lord GOD. Repent and turn from all your transgressions, so that your iniquity will not become your downfall.
- Ezek 36:31–32Then you will remember your evil ways and wicked deeds, and you will loathe yourselves for your iniquities and abominations.
- Isa 30:22So you will desecrate your silver-plated idols and your gold-plated images. You will throw them away like menstrual cloths, saying to them, “Be gone!”
- Jas 4:8–10Draw near to God, and He will draw near to you. Cleanse your hands, you sinners, and purify your hearts, you double-minded.
- Isa 2:20In that day men will cast away to the moles and bats their idols of silver and gold—the idols they made to worship.
- Lam 3:39–41Why should any mortal man complain, in view of his sins?
- Jer 8:5–6Why then have these people turned away? Why does Jerusalem always turn away? They cling to deceit; they refuse to return.
- Matt 3:8–10Produce fruit, then, in keeping with repentance.
- Hos 14:8O Ephraim, what have I to do anymore with idols? It is I who answer and watch over him. I am like a flourishing cypress; your fruit comes from Me.
- Acts 3:19Repent, then, and turn back, so that your sins may be wiped away,
- Rom 6:21What fruit did you reap at that time from the things of which you are now ashamed? The outcome of those things is death.
- Acts 17:30Although God overlooked the ignorance of earlier times, He now commands all people everywhere to repent.
- Ezek 14:4Therefore speak to them and tell them that this is what the Lord GOD says: ‘When any Israelite sets up idols in his heart and puts a wicked stumbling block before his face, and then comes to the prophet, I the LORD will answer him according to his great idolatry,
- 1 Kgs 8:47–49and when they come to their senses in the land to which they were taken, and they repent and plead with You in the land of their captors, saying, ‘We have sinned and done wrong; we have acted wickedly,’
- Acts 26:20First to those in Damascus and Jerusalem, then to everyone in the region of Judea, and then to the Gentiles, I declared that they should repent and turn to God, performing deeds worthy of their repentance.
- Jer 50:4–5“In those days and at that time, declares the LORD, the children of Israel and the children of Judah will come together, weeping as they come, and will seek the LORD their God.
- Hos 14:1–3Return, O Israel, to the LORD your God, for you have stumbled by your iniquity.
- Isa 55:6–7Seek the LORD while He may be found; call on Him while He is near.
- 1 Sam 7:3Then Samuel said to all the house of Israel, “If you are returning to the LORD with all your hearts, then rid yourselves of the foreign gods and Ashtoreths among you, prepare your hearts for the LORD, and serve Him only. And He will deliver you from the hand of the Philistines.”
- Jer 13:27Your adulteries and lustful neighings, your shameless prostitution on the hills and in the fields—I have seen your detestable acts. Woe to you, O Jerusalem! How long will you remain unclean?”
- Jer 31:18–20I have surely heard Ephraim’s moaning: ‘You disciplined me severely, like an untrained calf. Restore me, that I may return, for You are the LORD my God.
- 2 Chr 29:6For our fathers were unfaithful and did evil in the sight of the LORD our God. They abandoned Him, turned their faces away from the dwelling place of the LORD, and turned their backs on Him.
- Jonah 3:7–9Then he issued a proclamation in Nineveh: “By the decree of the king and his nobles: Let no man or beast, herd or flock, taste anything at all. They must not eat or drink.
- Zeph 3:11On that day you will not be put to shame for any of the deeds by which you have transgressed against Me. For then I will remove from among you those who rejoice in their pride, and you will never again be haughty on My holy mountain.
- Neh 1:8–9Remember, I pray, the word that You commanded Your servant Moses when You said, ‘If you are unfaithful, I will scatter you among the nations,
- Ezek 16:63so that when I make atonement for all you have done, you will remember and be ashamed and never again open your mouth because of your disgrace, declares the Lord GOD.”
- Ezek 8:16So He brought me to the inner court of the house of the LORD, and there at the entrance to the temple of the LORD, between the portico and the altar, were about twenty-five men with their backs to the temple of the LORD and their faces toward the east; and they were bowing to the east in worship of the sun.
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Christ at the center
The promise of one Shepherd-King David, a new heart and new Spirit, and the river of life flowing from the temple all stream toward Christ, the good Shepherd who gives the Spirit.
How Ezekiel 14:6 points to him is part of the one story that runs through all Scripture — meet Jesus at the heart of the web, or follow a trail that traces him from Genesis to Revelation.
Original language
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