Old Testament - Ezra 1; 3-8; - July 18, 2022

 7/18/2022 - Ezra 1; 3-7; Nehemiah 2; 4-6; 8

(We are heading to Redmond OR for a Waits’ Family Reunion! I thought I better do my weekly scripture study now because I want us to be able to spend every minute with all our children and grandchildren.)

Ezra 1

The book of Ezra provides an account of the return of two groups of Jews from Babylon to Jerusalem, and how they began to rebuild the temple and their community. We can learn much about how the Lord helps His people to overcome opposition and accomplish His will. 

After so many years of captivity “the Lord stirred up the spirit of Cyrus king of Persia, that he made a proclamation throughout all this kingdom, and put it also in writing…” (v1) letting the Jews go back to Jerusalem in order to build the temple once again. This happened after the Jews had been held captive in Babylonia for about 70 years. The Lord’s promise is found in Jeremiah 29:10:  I will visit you, and perform my good word toward you, in causing you to return”. 

This is the beginning of helping the Jews to come back to their original covenants with the Lord.  President Ezra Taft Benson taught, “The word of God…has the power to fortify the Saints and arm them with the Spirit so they can resist evil, hold fast to the good, and find joy in this life.”

Ezra 3

When the Jews begin to arrive back in the ruins of Jerusalem, they began by rebuilding an alter. And when it was built, they offered burnt offerings. (v 2) They began and continued their work, even though they were worried and fearful about other countries who might come and attack them once again.  But they continued on in returning to the Lord’s commandments: They kept the feast of the tabernacles (v 4) and offered the continual burnt offerings. (v 7) And then they began to lay, once again, the foundation of the temple that had been knocked down.

This was not a quick, nor easy, job. V 8 tells us that it was in the second year of work that they were able to get the Levites to step in and help them in their cause to completely rebuild the temple. V 11 describes their work attitude: “And they sang together by course in praising and giving thanks unto the Lord: because He is good, for his mercy endureth for ever toward Israel….”

Ezra 4

It’s here that we learn more of the Samaritans who were “people who lived in Samaria after the northern kingdom of Israel was captured by the Assyrians. The Samaritans were partly Israelite and partly Gentile. Their religion was a mixture of Jewish and pagan beliefs and practices” (Guide to the Scriptures) Unfortunately the Samaritans were not there to help, as they had said, but instead they were there to hinder the work. “Then the people of the land weakened the hands of the people of Judah and troubled them in building.” (v 4) Then reading v’s 6-24 we find additional accounts of ways in which the Samaritans worked to oppose the Jews’ efforts to rebuild their temple and Jerusalem. The continual slowing and even halting the reconstruction was mostly because of the opposition of the Samaritans. After years of so much time when nothing could really be done on the reconstruction, some Jews lost interest in rebuilding the temple (see Haggai 1:2–6).  V 24 “Then ceased the work of the house of God which is at Jerusalem. So it ceased unto the second ear of the reign of Darius king of Persia.”

I think it’s a good thing to learn from the scriptures. We should be watchful of those we are with, reminding ourselves that opposition and discouragement are real tools of the adversary. 

Ezra 5-6

After some time, the prophets Haggai and Zechariah told the Jews that they were to get back to the re-building of the temple, and that the Lord would help them. (v’s 1-2).  But when the local Persian-appointed governors learned that the Jews had resumed building the temple, they questioned the Jews’ authority to do so and opposed the Jews’ renewed efforts. And that’s when the red tape began, and the worked stopped. The Jews said they had the right to build the temple because of the earlier declaration of King Cyrus to start rebuilding their temple, and that he would help provide them with resources they might need. But the trouble is that there is no more King Cyrus (he is dead), it is now King Darius. So the non-Jewish governors write a letter to King Darius, who then ordered that King Cyrus’ records were to be searched.  Cyrus’s decree is finally found, but King Darius needs time to review the old decree. King Darius will allow the Jews to go forward now. He even decrees that the Jews will have even more help even than King Cyrus had promised. King Darius also gives a strong testimony concerning His reality and great power—he does not want to be on the wrong side of the God of the Jews. 

Not only has King Darius given the immediate go-ahead on the temple, and has promised so much help for the Jew’s in this huge endeavor, but he strongly reminds the Jews of their God and His proven help to them throughout their history.

V 14 tells us how the Jew’s reacted to King Darius’s go-ahead: “And the elders of the Jews builded, and they prospered through the prophesying of Haggai the prophet and Zechariah the son  of Iddo. And they builded, and finished it according to the commandment of the God of Israel, and according to the commandment of Cyrus, and Darius, and Artaxerxes, King of Persia.”  

They dedicated the completed temple with great joy. They offered sacrifices to their Lord. They kept the Passover. And best of all, “…the children of Israel, which were come again out of captivity, and all such as had separated themselves unto them from the filthiness of the heathen of the land, to seek the Lord God of Israel…And kept the feast of unleavened bread seven days with joy; for the Lord had made them joyful and turned the heart of the king of Assyria unto them, to strengthen their hands in the work of the house of God, the God of Israel” (v’s 21-22).

Ezra 8

Ezra is taking a group of Israelites to return to Jerusalem from Babylon. They are taking treasures up to place in the temple. They have fasted and prayed for their safety and the safety of those treasures they are taking to Jerusalem. But before they leave, they take the time to fast and to pray. Ezra reminds them all that “The hand of our God is upon all them for good that seek Him; but his power and his wrath is against all them that forsake him.” (v 22) 

As they made their way to Jerusalem, they came upon a group who had laid in wait for them, but Ezra records that “the hand of our God was upon us, and he delivered us from the hand of the enemy, and of such as lay in wait by the way.” (v 31).  

We will probably not be asked to carry treasures through enemy territory and find that we do indeed need help from the Lord. But every day we can come into situations in which Satan and his angels lie in wait for us. These are the times we need to have prepared to have the Lord with us through our morning prayers and scripture studies; these are the times that when we kneel at the side of our beds at night, that we thank the Lord for His presence in our hearts and minds as we successfully made our way through difficult times---finding that these situations only brought us more strength.