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Ezekiel dated the events and message in this chapter to the year 591 B.C.E. The elders of Israel came to Ezekiel to inquire of the Lord, to get a message from God through Ezekiel. On reading the words of that message, it is clear that the elders received much more than they had bargained for.
Probably no other passage in the Bible better illustrates the meaning of God’s repenting, or changing his mind (Ge 6:6-7; Ex 32:14; 1Sa 15:1-35; 2Sa 24:16; et al.). Beginning with his initial choice of Israel (20:5), God recited the whole history of Israel’s disobedience and how they ignored his plans and purposes for them. How often Israel’s sin had broken his heart so that he decided to “pour out [his] wrath on them and spend [his] anger against them” (v.8; cf. vv.13, 21). “But,” he said, “for the sake of my name I did what would keep it from being profaned in the eyes of the nations” (v.9; cf. vv.14, 22, 44), and so he spared them. He changed his mind and spared them not because they deserved it, but for the sake of all that his name stands for and is. He spared them because he loved them (see Dt 7), and his love would not let them go.