The Call to Ministry

OT accounts of individuals' calls to divine service has been cast in two forms:

1. the protested call and 
2. the overwhelming call [Moses (Exod 3:1-4:17); Gideon (Judg 6:11-24); Jeremiah (Jer 1:4-10)].

Ezekiel's call is generally classified among the latter with the following typical features:

1. The person called receives a vision of Yahweh in all his splendor and majesty.
2. The person demonstrates verbally or non-verbally an overwhelmed response to the vision.
3. The person is reassured, prepared and equipped by Yahweh to fulfill his or her prophetic responsibilities.
4. The person receives a special commission from Yahweh [Isaiah (Isa 6:1-13); Micaiah ben Imlah (1 Ki 22:19-21); Paul (Ac 9:3-39; 22:3-21; 26:12-18)].

Yet several features suggests that Ezekiel was not a willing prophet, at least in the beginning:

• the extra-ordinary length and detail of the account (exceeding the call of Moses by almost 50%), 
• the intensity of the opening vision, 
• the duplication of the commissioning speech, 
• the prescribed physical ingestion of the scroll, 
• the stern watchman charge, and 
• the threefold binding combine, which all combine to soften Ezekiel's resistance and prepare him for the role into which he is conscripted by the sovereign Lord.
  

Several additional general observations of the OT call narratives are:

1. The prophetic call was not an ecstatic or trance-like experience. The divine confrontation occurred when the person was engaged in the normal activities of life
2. The accounts are punctuated and controlled by dialogue between Yahweh and his prophet. The commissioning of a prophet was a very personal experience and issued in direct imperatival form.
3. The call of the prophet was a private affair initiated by Yahweh alone and without third-party involvement. The call seems at times to have been quite arbitrary, irrespective of personal faith (Gideon), interest in the divine agenda (Moses), or personal gifts (Jeremiah).
4. The function of the prophet was mediatorial. The call was not for the prophet's own sake, but that a divine message might be communicated to a third party, usually the nation of Israel, and also to foreigners.
5. When the prophets went forth they went with a divine message and with divine authority. Yahweh, the great divine king, conscripts into his service human ambassadors, messengers carrying his proclamations to their intended audiences.

Reference: Block, Daniel I. The Book of Ezekiel Chapters 1-24, NICOT (New International Commentary on the Old Testament). Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing Co, Grand Rapids, Michigan, 1997, 78-79.