Unlike much of Ezekiel, the context of chapter 18 is surprisingly easy to grasp. He opens thusly, "The word of the Lord came to me: "What do you people mean by quoting this proverb about the land of Israel: "'The fathers eat sour grapes, and the children's teeth are set on edge'?"
We see here that God is concerned that those in Israel were holding onto a belief that the children pay for the crimes of the preceding generations. God then goes on to expound on the inaccuracy of this view. He speaks for 30 verses and tells Ezekiel that if an unrighteous person repents and turns from evil, they will be accepted. Likewise, if a righteous person turns from good and practices evil, he will be rejected by God and die.
Given the fact that we all face physical death, perhaps the word "die" in Ezekiel 18 is meant to convey God's rejection of a person. Emmet, could you help me with the Hebrew here and let me know if this strikes you as accurate?
As to how this relates to a person being saved by faith, my opinion is that someone only turns from sin when faith is present. In Zeke's day, they didn't have the light of Messiah. However, everyone knows when they've offended their conscience by wronging someone. If this isn't repented of it's probably due to the fact that their faith is empty. If they do repent and choose to do good, it's only because they believed that doing so would be pleasing to God and somehow "restore order." God doesn't have to accept repentence because he can still justly hold our past crimes against us like our current legal system does. However, I believe that Christ's sacrifice makes faith/repentence acceptable to God, through the remission of past sins.
Anyone following Ezekiel's mandate, given by God, would have been accepted by God. One might then wonder why sacrificial mediation is needed at all since God tells Ezekiel that anyone who turns from evil will live. My counter-question would be... did God still require the Mosaic laws pertaining to animal sacrifice at that time?
