Question: what connects cow dung, siege rations and prostitutes?

Bit of a rush of posts this week! I must be bored or something...

Last night at the theology course I'm doing we were looking at Ezekiel. We'd already looked at some of the other prophets and I was struck by their obedience to God, even when asked to do things that must have made other people think they were mad- eg Hosea was told to marry a prostitute and call his children "not loved" and "not my children" while Ezekiel had to lie on one side before a model of Jerusalem and eat only siege rations, cooked on cow dung. And God seems to have caused (or at least used) personal tradgedy in their lives and relationships as a way of getting his message across to the people of Israel, for example Ezekiel's wife dies at the time of the fall of Jerusalem and Hosea's wife leaves him. I find that hard to understand. Being obedient to God is never an easy task at the best of times, but for him to put his prophets through that...I don't understand completly. Couldn't he have created a world where it wasn't necessary? I suppose that's where our free will come into it- the people wouldn't listen, so they needed the demonstration of what would happen to them, so God had to use the people who were obedient to him as that demonstration. But it's still not easy to accept.
I wonder at the prophets' obedience, and wonder too if I'd be as willing to be obedient. No wonder some, like Elijah, had crises of confidence, and were close to giving up or that others, like Jeremiah, tried to get out of their calling. But you can't run away from God- I know that only too well. And the amazing things that the prophets did- bringing drought, bringing rain, demonstrating God's power to a reluctant people, prophesying what was going to happen, writing the wonderful if enigmatic books that make up a major part of the Old Testament were only possible because the prophets were willing to obey God, whatever the cost. There was nothing special about the men (and women) who became prophets. What made them able to do all these things was that they trusted God and were willing to obey him. "The Spirit of the Lord" was with them.
So if we today trust God and are willing to obey him, what can we expect to happen? Our life, like theirs, won't be easy; we may be called on to make fools of ourselves or to suffer, although I would say that this is more likely to be a result of trying to live God's way in a world that doesn't want to know than God bringing trouble on us. Like the prophets, our faith may slip from time to time, we may not think we are worthy or capable of doing what we have been called to do, but God will equip us, as he equipped them, with his Spirit. In the end, the prophets achieved some great things, because they were willing to be obedient. If we obey God, I believe we can to.