Devotional: Personal Responsibility: Ezekiel 18

“‘The person who sins will die. The son will not bear the punishment for the father’s iniquity, nor will the father bear the punishment for the son’s iniquity; the righteousness of the righteous will be upon himself, and the wickedness of the wicked will be upon himself’” (Ezek. 18:20, NASB).

When our father died, the second oldest brother gave advice to the family. He told us that we should not allow the death of our father to cause us to become separated from one another. We should not allow this death to cause us to stray away from the way of life that our father had lived and taught his children to live. Although daddy was gone each of us was responsible for our own decisions about how we would live. Daddy had given us an example to live by and we had no reason to abandon the teaching that he had provided to us as a family as well as individually.

In America today there are a lot of people doing what is not right. They do not take full responsibility for their behavior. It seems that those that do wrong have an excuse for their actions. Several reasons are given for their behavior. These include poverty, discrimination, lack of education, and coming from a family that is dysfunctional because of past behaviors in the family, community, and the nation.

Ezekiel 18 is a message from a young man who has been taken captive into exile. His country is under military attack by a superior army. God had raised the Chaldeans up to punish Israel because of their sins against their fellow citizens. Added to their social sins they were guilty of worshiping idols. The people were blaming their forefathers for their defeat and exile to a foreign land.

Ezekiel says that the downfall of Israel was not the responsibility of the fathers. Those in exile and those under siege in Jerusalem were guilty of sin. God does not punish or reward a son because of what his father has done. No, God punishes us because of our own sins. There are righteous fathers whose sons do not do what is right. There are fathers who are not righteous, yet they have sons that chose to live righteously. Ezekiel says that each person is responsible for their own choices; and the Lord rewards each person according to their own deeds.

Prayer: Teach us Lord to take responsibility for our own decisions. Amen.