17 And the word of the Lord came to me: 18 “Son of man, eat your bread with quaking, and drink water with trembling and with anxiety. 19 And say to the people of the land, Thus says the Lord God concerning the inhabitants of Jerusalem in the land of Israel: They shall eat their bread with anxiety, and drink water in dismay. In this way her land will be stripped of all it contains, on account of the violence of all those who dwell in it. 20 And the inhabited cities shall be laid waste, and the land shall become a desolation; and you shall know that I am the Lord.”
The second enacted word of the Lord is recorded in these verses, in the command to eat and drink with trembling and carefulness (referring to the famine rations that were spoken of in chapters 3 and 4, in the other enacted parables). It is as if God said to Ezekiel, 'Ezekiel, make a show of fearfulness and terror, symbolic of the frightful violence and destruction that is going to come upon My people in Jerusalem; act it out, so that they may see it.' One has only to read some of the later chapters of 2 Kings to realise the fearfulness, confusion, terror and turmoil that came upon Jerusalem when Nebuchadnezzar's hosts crushed it to the ground. Such was Ezekiel's prophesying to these complacent exiles, as they settled down comfortably in Babylon, with their houses and their interests, and as they were beginning to feel that captivity was not so bad after all, and that in any case they would soon be back to their lovely Jerusalem once more. They were to learn, the hard way, that God was the Lord (20).