EZEKIEL 2:8
But you, son of man, hear what I say to you. Do not be rebellious like that rebellious house; open your mouth and eat what I give you.” [Ezekiel 2:8 NKJV]
And you, son of man, listen to what I tell you. Do not be rebellious like that rebellious house. Open your mouth and eat what I give you. [BSB]
God preached to His Messenger, whom He was sending to preach to a rebellious house (church). All preachers need to first preach to themselves before preaching to others; but even more than so, a preacher needs to hear God preaching to him first before being used by God to preach to others. It's part of God's training and preparing His messengers by preaching to them to make them different from those to whom they are sent to reform and convert. Do not be unequivocally yoked with them, but be you separate or different, to neither be nor do like them
*1* To Ezekiel, God preached saying, "You, son of man, do not be rebellious like that rebellious house. Open your mouth and eat what I give you."
*2* To Isaiah, God preached saying, "Do not walk in the way of these people, neither call a confederacy what these people call a confederacy, nor should you fear what they fear; but sanctify the Lord God, and let Him be your Fear and your Sanctuary…" (Isaiah 8:11-14).
And Isaiah confessed:
[Isaiah 50:4-5] — "The Lord GOD has given me the tongue of the learned, that I should know how to speak a word in season to him that is weary: He wakens me morning by morning, He wakens my ear to hear as the learned. The Lord GOD has opened my ear, and I was not rebellious, neither turned away back."
*3* To those whom He's Chosen, God preached saying, "Do not be unequally yoked with unbelievers. For what partnership can righteousness have with wickedness? Or what fellowship does light have with darkness? What harmony is there between Christ and Belial? Or what does a believer have in common with an unbeliever? What agreement can exist between the temple of God and idols? For we are the temple of the living God. As God has said: “I will live with them and walk among them, and I will be their God, and they will be My people.” “Therefore come out from among them and be separate, says the Lord. Touch no unclean thing, and I will receive you.” And: “I will be a Father to you, and you will be My sons and daughters, says the Lord Almighty.”" [2 Corinthians 6:14-18]
Therefore we say, "Do not try to preach to people to turn away from the same life you yourself are living among them." As Paul rebuked Peter:
[Galatians 2:14-18 BSB] — When I saw that they were not walking in line with the truth of the gospel, I said to Cephas in front of them all, “If you, who are a Jew, live like a Gentile and not like a Jew, how can you compel the Gentiles to live like Jews?” We who are Jews by birth and not Gentile “sinners” know that a man is not justified by works of the law, but by faith in Jesus Christ. So we, too, have believed in Christ Jesus, that we may be justified by faith in Christ and not by works of the law, because by works of the law no one will be justified. But if, while we seek to be justified in Christ, we ourselves are found to be sinners, does that make Christ a minister of sin? Certainly not! If I rebuild what I have already torn down, I prove myself to be a lawbreaker.
The fact that God sent a messenger to speak to rebellious people does not mean the messenger himself would not be rebellious to God's words. There are preachers, prophets, pastors, teachers, who preach reformation to rebellious house (church), and yet even those Messengers themselves are rebellious to God like those people they are trying to reform. They themselves do not heed or hear the Word of God they speak to others. Moses himself could not enter the Promised Land for being rebellious to God's Word, even when the House or Church in the wilderness were rebellious. The Young Man of God from Judah could not return into Jerusalem or Judah for being rebellious as those in Samaria were.
Somehow, we who correct or preach to others must be careful to not end up being like them or even worse than them in hypocrisy:
***** [Romans 2:21] — "you, then, who teach others, do you not teach yourself? You who preach against stealing, do you steal?"
***** [1 Corinthians 9:27] — "No, I discipline my body and make it my slave, so that after I have preached to others, I myself will not be disqualified."
***** [Galatians 6:1] — "Brothers, if someone is caught in a trespass, you who are spiritual should restore him with a spirit of gentleness. But watch yourself, or you also may be tempted."
Rebellious people were they who provoked Moses into rebellion against the Word of God, by provoking Moses into anger that he disregarded the Word of God and struck the Rock.
[Psalms 106:32-33] — "They angered him also at the waters of strife, so that it went ill with Moses for their sakes: Because they provoked his spirit, so that he spoke unadvisedly with his lips."
[Proverbs 22:24-25] — "Make no friendship with an angry man; and with a furious man you shall not go: Lest you learn his ways, and get a snare to your soul."
Rebellious or seductive people were they who turned the man of God from Judah away from the path of God's Word to him, and he too became as rebellious as the old prophet and the company of prophets there.
In the top Bible verse above:
God said to Ezekiel, "son of man listen or hear what I tell you; Do not be rebellious like that rebellious house. Open your mouth and eat what I give you."
Though He is sending him to that rebellious house church, He was not sending him to be like them but sending him to be in their midst as the "Opened Mouth" or "Oracle" that eats and speaks what God gives.
If you cannot eat certain things God gives your mouth to eat and digest, you cannot speak certain things God gives your mouth to speak in the way He gives the utterance.
Many disciples of the Lord Jesus Christ could not eat His Message or digest His Flesh and Blood as Bread of life and life giving Drink; for they became rebellious and went back from ever following Him. But Peter with the rest of the twelve apostles did not become rebellious (except Judas), and they were willing to eat what He gave them to eat to have the Word of Eternal Life (John 6:52-71). Ezekiel too was not rebellious like that rebellious house, and Ezekiel ate and digested what God gave him to eat.