not even Noah, Daniel or Job...

I've been reading through Ezekiel this week and read this passage this morning:

"Then the word of the LORD came to me saying,"Son of man, if a country sins against Me by committing unfaithfulness, and I stretch out My hand against it, destroy its supply of bread, send famine against it and cut off from it both man and beast, even though these three men, Noah, Daniel and Job were in its midst, by their own righteousness they could only deliver themselves," declares the Lord GOD. "If I were to cause wild beasts to pass through the land and they depopulated it, and it became desolate so that no one would pass through it because of the beasts, though these three men were in its midst, as I live," declares the Lord GOD, "they could not deliver either their sons or their daughters. They alone would be delivered, but the country would be desolate. "Or if I should bring a sword on that country and say, 'Let the sword pass through the country and cut off man and beast from it, 'even though these three men were in its midst, as I live," declares the Lord GOD, "they could not deliver either their sons or their daughters, but they alone would be delivered. "Or if I should send a plague against that country and pour out My wrath in blood on it to cut off man and beast from it, even though Noah, Daniel and Job were in its midst, as I live," declares the Lord GOD, "they could not deliver either their son or their daughter. They would deliver only themselves by their righteousness. "For thus says the Lord GOD, "How much more when I send My four severe judgments against Jerusalem: sword, famine, wild beasts and plague to cut off man and beast from it! "Yet, behold, survivors will be left in it who will be brought out, both sons and daughters. Behold, they are going to come forth to you and you will see their conduct and actions; then you will be comforted for the calamity which I have brought against Jerusalem for everything which I have brought upon it. "Then they will comfort you when you see their conduct and actions, for you will know that I have not done in vain whatever I did to it," declares the Lord GOD.

- Ezekiel 14:12-23

Ezekiel wrote to Israel during a time of exile. God exiled Israel from the land He promised his beloved people because, even in the midst of promise, they rejected God. For a nation steeped in sin, the righteousness of the great men that they once upheld, men whose stories are trumpeted in the Old Testament as examples of faithfulness...even the righteousness of such great men could do nothing on Israel's behalf. Consider Daniel stepping into a den a lions because he refused to worship anyone other than the Lord, and Job, who even in the midst of suffering greater than anything that I can imagine, did not reject the Lord. What great faith! Still, not enough to save anyone but themselves from the wrath of God.

But the righteousness of Jesus Christ, IS enough. Having resisted all temptation (rest assured, He faced temptation head on as a man, but unlike us, he struggled well against it, and won), Christ offered himself as a perfectly righteous sacrifice to save us from our self-imposed destruction and narrow-minded rebellion.

Christ alone can rescue. Love His righteousness.