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Ezra 10:9-44 - The Strange End of Ezra · The Bible Explained with Jenn Kokal

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  Speaker 1: Life Audio. How do thear faithful listeners, and welcome to
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  Speaker 1: the Bible Explained to Podcasts on this lovely morning. My
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  Speaker 1: name is Jen and I'm the host of the podcast
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  Speaker 1: and I'm so thankful that you're here to share a
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  Speaker 1: delicious cup of coffee with me as we finish out
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  Speaker 1: the Book of Ezra today. All right, faithful listeners, before
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  Speaker 1: I begin today's episode, please take a listen to this
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  Speaker 1: sponsored ad. Alrighty, so, now let's dive into the Book
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  Speaker 1: of Ezra Ezra ten versus nine through forty four. Now,
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  Speaker 1: just to let you guys know, I am going to
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  Speaker 1: not read the entire thing today. I'm probably gonna stop
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  Speaker 1: around verse nineteen, and you'll understand why I am stopping
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  Speaker 1: there after you read it with me. So let's go
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  Speaker 1: ahead and grab our bibles out of the versions that
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  Speaker 1: you prefer, and also your cup of coffee this morning.
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  Speaker 1: But as usual, I'll be reading from the web again.
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  Speaker 1: This is Ezra ten nine through forty four. Then all
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  Speaker 1: the men of Judah and Benjamin gathered themselves together to
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  Speaker 1: Jerusalem within three days. It was the ninth month. On
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  Speaker 1: the twentieth day of the month, and all the people
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  Speaker 1: sat in the wide place in front of God's house,
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  Speaker 1: trembling because of this matter and because of the great
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  Speaker 1: rain as are the priest stood up and said to them,
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  Speaker 1: you have trespassed and have married foreign women, increasing the
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  Speaker 1: guilt of Israel. Now therefore, make confession to Yahweh, the
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  Speaker 1: god of your fathers, and do his pleasure separate yourselves
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  Speaker 1: from the people of the land and from the foreign women.
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  Speaker 1: Then all the assembly answered with a loud voice, we
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  Speaker 1: must do as you have said concerning us. But the
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  Speaker 1: people are many, and it is time of much rain,
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  Speaker 1: and we are not able to stand outside. This is
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  Speaker 1: not a work of one day or two, for we
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  Speaker 1: have greatly transgressed in this matter. Now, let our princes
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  Speaker 1: be appointed for all the assembly, and let all those
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  Speaker 1: who are in our cities who have married foreign women
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  Speaker 1: come at the appointed times, and with them the elders
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  Speaker 1: of every city and its judges, until a fierce wrath
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  Speaker 1: of God is turned from us, until this matter is resolved.
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  Speaker 1: Only Jonathan the son of ase Hell and Jaziel the
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  Speaker 1: son of tiki Uh stood up against this, and Meshulam
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  Speaker 1: and Shabbathai the Levite helped them. The children of the
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  Speaker 1: captivity did so as are the priest with certain heads
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  Speaker 1: of the father's households after their father's houses, and all
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  Speaker 1: of them by their names were set apart, and they
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  Speaker 1: sat down in the first day of the tenth month
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  Speaker 1: to examine the matter. They finished with all the men
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  Speaker 1: who had married foreign women by the first day of
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  Speaker 1: the first month. Among the sons of the priests, there
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  Speaker 1: were found those who had married foreign women. Of the
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  Speaker 1: sons of Jeshua, the son of Jozadak, and his brothers Messiah, Eliezer,
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  Speaker 1: Jereb and Gadalia, they gave their hand that they would
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  Speaker 1: put away their wives, and being guilty, they offered a
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  Speaker 1: ram of the flock for their guilt. Okay, So I'm
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  Speaker 1: going to stop right there instead of continuing on through
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  Speaker 1: verses twenty through forty four, because it is all names,
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  Speaker 1: and you guys know how good I am with ancient
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  Speaker 1: Hebrew names. I am just an expert at them, and
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  Speaker 1: that's why I'm not going to read them for you,
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  Speaker 1: so that you can keep on thinking I am an
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  Speaker 1: expert in Hebrew names. But hopefully you remember the context
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  Speaker 1: of this story. We talked about it all on Monday
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  Speaker 1: about how Ezra found out that the Israelites who are
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  Speaker 1: back in the land had gone out and married pagan wives,
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  Speaker 1: and this was against God. You weren't supposed to be
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  Speaker 1: unequally yoked, right Even Paul in the New Testament said
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  Speaker 1: the same exact thing. Do not be unequally yoked. If
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  Speaker 1: you are a Christian, don't marry somebody that is not Christian.
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  Speaker 1: If you are not a Christian, don't marry somebody that
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  Speaker 1: is a Christian because there's going to be a lot
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  Speaker 1: of conflict. Your views are just not going to mesh
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  Speaker 1: with each other, and it's just not healthy overall for
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  Speaker 1: the marriage relationship. You have to walk together. That is
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  Speaker 1: essentially what marriage is is two people joining together in life,
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  Speaker 1: becoming one with each other. So having something like religion
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  Speaker 1: divide you in your marriage, that is going to be
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  Speaker 1: a huge hurdle that is going to be very difficult
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  Speaker 1: to get past. And I know people who this has
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  Speaker 1: happened to them where their partner is just not on
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  Speaker 1: on board with their Christianity, either because they married them
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  Speaker 1: before they were a Christian and then they became a
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  Speaker 1: Christian afterward, or they were a Christian and thought it
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  Speaker 1: would be okay to marry a non Christian because that
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  Speaker 1: person seemed very nice. It is very difficult to walk
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  Speaker 1: side by side with somebody who is just not on
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  Speaker 1: the same page with you. And so that is why
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  Speaker 1: God has been very consistent about this topic from the
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  Speaker 1: very beginning. He told the Israelites do not inter marry
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  Speaker 1: with the Canaanites of the region, because if you do,
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  Speaker 1: your heart is going to be led astray from me.
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  Speaker 1: They are not going to turn to me, you are
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  Speaker 1: going to turn to their idols. And it had nothing
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  Speaker 1: to do with ethnicity. By the way, there are plenty
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  Speaker 1: of mixed marriages in scripture that were blessed, you know.
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  Speaker 1: I think of Ruth and Boaz, for example, they had
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  Speaker 1: a blessed marriage, and there are plenty of other marriages
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  Speaker 1: like that in scripture that we find where it had
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  Speaker 1: nothing to do with race but had everything to do
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  Speaker 1: with the spiritual aspect of marriage. Is your partner on
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  Speaker 1: board with you worshiping Yahweh? And if they are not,
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  Speaker 1: then you should not marry them. And unfortunately Israel just
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  Speaker 1: never really listened to this command. They were always marrying
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  Speaker 1: into the pagan families. They were giving their daughters in
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  Speaker 1: marriage to these pagan men. They were taking pagan wives
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  Speaker 1: for themselves, and these marriage partners were leading them astray.
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  Speaker 1: Ezra finds out that the Israelites are repeating the same
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  Speaker 1: pattern with this that they always have, and he is distraught.
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  Speaker 1: He's distraught because the Israelites have only been back in
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  Speaker 1: the land for seventy years up until this point. So
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  Speaker 1: Ezra goes to the Temple of God and he is
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  Speaker 1: praying in front of it. He is prostrating himself. He
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  Speaker 1: is just crying out to God because of the sin
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  Speaker 1: of these people. And he was doing this all day long,
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  Speaker 1: like this was not a small thing to Ezra, like
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  Speaker 1: he was basically on a hunger strike, and he was
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  Speaker 1: being for real, Like you can tell, well, his grief
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  Speaker 1: is very sincere. It is so sincere that it's actually
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  Speaker 1: causing the people around him to become afraid and also
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  Speaker 1: be distraught and saddened and distressed over the sin of
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  Speaker 1: Israel because they know their parents made the exact same
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  Speaker 1: mistake and that the promised land was taken from them.
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  Speaker 1: They know that it is a fresh wound and they
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  Speaker 1: don't want that again. So finally this guy goes up
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  Speaker 1: to Ezra. His name is Shikhania. He goes up to
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  Speaker 1: Ezra and he's like, look, I have this brilliant idea
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  Speaker 1: as to how we can fix this problem. All we
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  Speaker 1: have to do is just force every single Israelite man
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  Speaker 1: who married a pagan woman to divorce her, and also
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  Speaker 1: to kick out the children, get them far away from
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  Speaker 1: the Israelite homes. That'll take care of all of our problems.
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  Speaker 1: And Ezra, when he hears this, thinks it's a really
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  Speaker 1: good idea. So he finally gets up from prostrating himself
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  Speaker 1: and crying, and he commands the men of the region
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  Speaker 1: to meet with him within three days. And Ezra had
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  Speaker 1: the power to do this. By the way, don't forget
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  Speaker 1: how powerful Ezra was. He had so much power given
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  Speaker 1: to him by the King of Persia that Ezra was
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  Speaker 1: essentially the judge of Israel, and he could enact any
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  Speaker 1: judgment that he wanted, even death if somebody was not
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  Speaker 1: following the Old Testament laws. So Ezra enacts that power
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  Speaker 1: and he tells all of the men of Israel gather
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  Speaker 1: to Jerusalem in three days for a big meeting. If
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  Speaker 1: you don't gather to Jerusalem in three days, then I
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  Speaker 1: will take away all of your stuff. You will own
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  Speaker 1: nothing I will take away all your rights and you
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  Speaker 1: will be kicked out of the community of Israel. So
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  Speaker 1: you can imagine that people were pretty scared when they
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  Speaker 1: hear that Ezra, who's very powerful, is threatening to ruin
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  Speaker 1: their lives if they do not comply to what he
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  Speaker 1: is asking. So now in verse nine, it says all
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  Speaker 1: the men of Judah and Benjamin gathered themselves together to
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  Speaker 1: Jerusalem within three days. It was the ninth month, on
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  Speaker 1: the twentieth day of the month, and all the people
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  Speaker 1: sat in the wide place in front of God's house
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  Speaker 1: trembling because of this matter and because of the great rain.
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  Speaker 1: So they were trembling, is what scripture says. Now, why
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  Speaker 1: do you think they are trembling? It says there was
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  Speaker 1: a big rain that was happening. So this was during
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  Speaker 1: the month of December, and that is one of the
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  Speaker 1: very cold and very rainy months in Jerusalem. Sometimes it
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  Speaker 1: gets so cold that that rain ends up turning to snow.
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  Speaker 1: So this is a very cold, very miserable day that
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  Speaker 1: these men are gathered together in Jerusalem. And I can
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  Speaker 1: imagine this downpour of rain that's going on is probably
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  Speaker 1: making the matter seem so much more discouraging. So they're
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  Speaker 1: trembling because it's very cold, possibly because this rain is
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  Speaker 1: very ominous, And either they are afraid of Ezra and
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  Speaker 1: for their own well being what he might do to
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  Speaker 1: them and what they might lose, or they are trembling
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  Speaker 1: because they actually feel some amount of guilt, and honestly
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  Speaker 1: they should. They directly went against a command of God.
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  Speaker 1: I want to stress that a lot, just because I
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  Speaker 1: am not okay with the solution to the problem. There
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  Speaker 1: really was a problem here. These men and women were
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  Speaker 1: causing themselves to stray away from Yahweh again through their marriages,
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  Speaker 1: and most likely the majority of them were worshiping the
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  Speaker 1: idols that their spouses also worshiped. Not to mention, the
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  Speaker 1: children could have been growing up not even learning about Yahweh,
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  Speaker 1: but learning about these other idols and how to worship
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  Speaker 1: these idols. You know, the majority of these households, probably
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  Speaker 1: the children themselves, were growing up not worshiping Yahweh, and
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  Speaker 1: that was bad. What does God say in Malachi chapter two?
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  Speaker 1: He says, what do I desire of your marriage? I
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  Speaker 1: desire you to have a union with children holy to me,
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  Speaker 1: That's what God does desires from our marriages if he
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  Speaker 1: gives us the gift of children. So, yes, this was
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  Speaker 1: a big problem in Israel, and hopefully a lot of
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  Speaker 1: these men were trembling not just because they were cold,
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  Speaker 1: but because they felt an amount of guilt that they
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  Speaker 1: placed on themselves and on their families and on their children.
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  Speaker 1: So Ezra, the priest stands up and he says to them,
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  Speaker 1: you have trespassed and have married foreign women, increasing the
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  Speaker 1: guilt of Israel. Now, therefore, make confession to Yahweh, the
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  Speaker 1: god of your fathers, and do his pleasure separate yourselves
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  Speaker 1: from the peoples of the land and from the foreign women.
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  Speaker 1: So he is calling the men of Israel to be holy.
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  Speaker 1: That's what he's asking them to do, separate themselves from
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  Speaker 1: all of these pagan nations, from the peoples of the land,
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  Speaker 1: and from the foreign women. However, Ezra was going way
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  Speaker 1: too far with it. Yes, these men should have been holy,
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  Speaker 1: They should have been separated from the other nations. The
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  Speaker 1: men that are or marriageable age that don't have a
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  Speaker 1: wife yet should not marry any pagan because they are
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  Speaker 1: supposed to be holy to Yahweh. But what about the
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  Speaker 1: men that already married these pagan wives. What are they
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  Speaker 1: supposed to do? Well. Ezra's solution was to divorce these women,
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  Speaker 1: and we talked about on Monday why this was wrong.
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  Speaker 1: According to all of scripture, there is not a single
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  Speaker 1: scripture that you will find that tells you to divorce
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  Speaker 1: your wife for any reason other than sexual immorality. Were
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  Speaker 1: these women being sexually immoral? Well, maybe some of them,
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  Speaker 1: but probably not. Probably most of them were in a
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  Speaker 1: genuine marriage relationship with these men. So Ezra had no
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  Speaker 1: right to tell these men to divorce their wives, even
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  Speaker 1: if the marriage was wrong from the beginning. Once two
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  Speaker 1: people make that vow of marriage, then they are bound
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  Speaker 1: to that person forever, and God tells us to keep
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  Speaker 1: our vows. Not to mention, there is more involved here
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  Speaker 1: than just the wife, many of these men actually had
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  Speaker 1: children with these women as well. According to Ezra, this
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  Speaker 1: divorce included the entire family, so it wasn't just the
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  Speaker 1: wife who was getting this divorce, but the children would
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  Speaker 1: no longer be considered that man's children. They would go
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  Speaker 1: off with the mom. They would become fatherless children. That
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  Speaker 1: is what Ezra is expecting these men to do. He's
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  Speaker 1: expecting them to divorce their wives and abandon their children.
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  Speaker 1: Here's a verse from one Timothy five eight. If anyone
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  Speaker 1: doesn't provide for his own and especially his own household,
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  Speaker 1: he has denied the faith and is worse than an unbeliever.
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  Speaker 1: So these men that refuse to provide for their own
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  Speaker 1: households are actually worse than unbelievers, is what Paul says
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  Speaker 1: right here in first Timothy. And this is what Ezra
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  Speaker 1: is expecting these men to do, and stupidly they go
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  Speaker 1: along with it. They're like, yeah, you know what, we
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  Speaker 1: will do it. That's what it says in verse twelve.
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  Speaker 1: Then all the assembly answered with a loud voice, we
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  Speaker 1: must do as you have said concerning us. But the
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  Speaker 1: people are many, and it is a time of much rain,
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  Speaker 1: and we are not able to stand outside. This is
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  Speaker 1: not a work of one day or two, for we
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  Speaker 1: have greatly transgressed in this matter. Now, let our princes
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  Speaker 1: be appointed for all the assembly, and let those who
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  Speaker 1: are inner cities who have married foreign women come at
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  Speaker 1: appointed times, and with them the elders of every city
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  Speaker 1: and its judges, until the fierce wrath of our God
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  Speaker 1: is turned from us, until this matter is resolved. And
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  Speaker 1: I'm sure that this tormenting Rain is probably not helping.
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  Speaker 1: They likely think that God really is angry with them.
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  Speaker 1: And here's the thing. God, I am sure was wrathful
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  Speaker 1: against this. He does not like when people just blatantly
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  Speaker 1: ignore his commands, and he especially doesn't like when families
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  Speaker 1: disregard Him by worshiping other idols and teach their children
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  Speaker 1: to worship other idols. God God is not pleased with that.
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  Speaker 1: So yes, I am sure that God was very displeased
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  Speaker 1: with what these men had done. But divorce and abandoning
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  Speaker 1: your children was not the solution to the problem. And
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  Speaker 1: I keep saying that, so you're probably like Jen, then
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  Speaker 1: what is the solution to the problem. The solution to
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  Speaker 1: the problem was to tell your wife, yeah, we're not
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  Speaker 1: doing this anymore, and to teach your children about Yahweh.
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  Speaker 1: There's actually a lot of verses about men like the
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  Speaker 1: dads teaching their children about God. It's not just a
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  Speaker 1: thing for the moms to do. It is a thing
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  Speaker 1: that the dads should be actively engaged in. But that's
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  Speaker 1: the thing. This was a difficult solution for all of
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  Speaker 1: these men of Israel because they were going against what
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  Speaker 1: their wives and their in laws wanted and a lot
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  Speaker 1: of times men have a tendency to just kind of
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  Speaker 1: throw their hands up in the air and sort of
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  Speaker 1: have this like lase a fair kind of idea where
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  Speaker 1: they're like, you know what you do you if you
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  Speaker 1: just don't bother me. And honestly, that can be a
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  Speaker 1: really good thing in certain circumstances. But when it comes
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  Speaker 1: to the spiritual health of your family, the men need
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  Speaker 1: to step up and start being actively engaged with their children.
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  Speaker 1: Paul actually says that the husband does have a role
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  Speaker 1: in presenting his wife before God. Did he encourage her
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  Speaker 1: and help her spiritually or did he just throw his
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  Speaker 1: hands up in the air and say, you do you
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  Speaker 1: hun and I'm just gonna go do my thing. Ephesians
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  Speaker 1: five twenty five through thirty three talk about that when
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  Speaker 1: it comes to the role of husbands in a marriage relationship,
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  Speaker 1: they are supposed to love their wives. That's what it
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  Speaker 1: says in Ephesians five twenty five, husbands, love your wives,
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  Speaker 1: even as Christ also loved the Assembly and gave himself
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  Speaker 1: up for her. So do you think that these men
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  Speaker 1: in Ezra chapter ten were being loving to their wives
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  Speaker 1: by divorcing them? No, they weren't being loving to their wives.
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  Speaker 1: Neither were they being loving to their children. They were
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  Speaker 1: doing nothing except causing bitterness. What they should have been
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  Speaker 1: doing was shining the light of Yahweh to these other nations.
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  Speaker 1: That was the entire point of Israel. Israel was supposed
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  Speaker 1: to be a treasure to the rest of the world,
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  Speaker 1: a blessing to the world. But Ezra was not blessing
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  Speaker 1: the other nations by forcing these men to divorce their
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  Speaker 1: wives and abandon their children. Absolutely not. And again the
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  Speaker 1: other day when I was reading through this, I couldn't
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  Speaker 1: find a single commentary that disagreed with Ezra. They were
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  Speaker 1: all saying, yes, this was the right move for Ezra
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  Speaker 1: to make. This was a grave sin. Again, yes, it
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  Speaker 1: was a grave sin, But this was not the solution
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  Speaker 1: to the problem. The real solution was the man stepping
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  Speaker 1: up and teaching his children and loving his wife and
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  Speaker 1: encouraging his wife to worship Yahweh and shining the light
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  Speaker 1: of Yahweh. That was the solution to the problem that
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  Speaker 1: Ezra just did not see. But in verse fifteen of
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  Speaker 1: Ezra ten, only four men went against Ezra on this
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  Speaker 1: and said, no, we are not doing this. He says
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  Speaker 1: in verse fifteen Only Jonathan the son of asse Hell
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  Speaker 1: and Jazia the son of Tikva stood up against this,
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  Speaker 1: and Meshulam and Shabbithai the Levite helped them. Only four
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  Speaker 1: men had enough guts to stand up to Ezra and say, no,
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  Speaker 1: this is wrong and we are not doing this. We're
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  Speaker 1: not going to encourage this. Now, Meshalam is listed in
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  Speaker 1: verse where is it, verse twenty nine as being one
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  Speaker 1: of the men who did marry a foreign wife. But
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  Speaker 1: these other three men, Jonathan, Jazi and Shabbathai, they're not
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  Speaker 1: listed actually as any of the men that married foreign women.
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  Speaker 1: So why would three men who didn't marry any pagan
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  Speaker 1: women stand up against this? Because they knew it was wrong,
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  Speaker 1: and these four men were in the minority. Unfortunately, the
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  Speaker 1: rest of Israel just went right along with this. And
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  Speaker 1: you might be like, why did they go along with this?
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  Speaker 1: Didn't they love their wives, didn't they love their children? Well,
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  Speaker 1: I'm sure that they felt some amount of love for
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  Speaker 1: their wife and children, but I think that their fear
• 18:14
  Speaker 1: and their shame was more important to them than actually
• 18:18
  Speaker 1: loving their families. They would have had to move from
• 18:21
  Speaker 1: Israel essentially because they'd be kicked out of the community
• 18:24
  Speaker 1: and considered to be a heathen essentially, not to mention,
• 18:28
  Speaker 1: I'm sure the shaming they felt from their own families,
• 18:31
  Speaker 1: especially as Ezra's going through and writing everybody's names down
• 18:34
  Speaker 1: in verses twenty through forty four, or actually eighteen through
• 18:38
  Speaker 1: forty four. All these people are listed forever as men
• 18:42
  Speaker 1: who disobeyed God. And I'm sure that there was an amount
• 18:45
  Speaker 1: of shame, and that's another reason why they went along
• 18:47
  Speaker 1: with this and divorced their wives. And it could be
• 18:50
  Speaker 1: that some of them genuinely did think that this was
• 18:52
  Speaker 1: the right thing to do. They thought, yes, I did sin,
• 18:55
  Speaker 1: and Ezra says this is the solution to the problem.
• 18:58
  Speaker 1: Could be that some of the men were deceived, believing Ezra,
• 19:01
  Speaker 1: believing the other priests that said they would go along
• 19:05
  Speaker 1: with this. In fact, here are the priests that said
• 19:07
  Speaker 1: they would go along with it. In verse eighteen of
• 19:10
  Speaker 1: the sons of Jeshua, the son of Jozadak, and his
• 19:12
  Speaker 1: brothers Messiah, Eliezer, Jerib and Gadalia. They gave their hands
• 19:18
  Speaker 1: that they would put away their wives, and being guilty,
• 19:21
  Speaker 1: they offered a ram out of the flock for their guilt.
• 19:24
  Speaker 1: So some of Jeshua's sons were actually guilty of marrying
• 19:29
  Speaker 1: pagan women. And these guys were the sons of Jeshua,
• 19:32
  Speaker 1: the high priest, the big wig. And I'm sure when
• 19:36
  Speaker 1: other people see the sons of Jeshua promising to divorce
• 19:41
  Speaker 1: their wives and abandon their children, they're probably thinking, oh,
• 19:45
  Speaker 1: that must be the right thing to do. Even the
• 19:47
  Speaker 1: sons of Jeshua are doing all of this, Ezra is
• 19:50
  Speaker 1: saying it's okay. Jakania is saying it's okay. Jeshua's sons
• 19:55
  Speaker 1: are saying it's okay, So we must do this thing.
• 19:57
  Speaker 1: And it could be that some of them were all
• 19:59
  Speaker 1: so fearful of God's wrath and God's punishment happening all
• 20:02
  Speaker 1: over again, and they thought there was only one solution
• 20:04
  Speaker 1: to the problem. So there could have been multiple things
• 20:07
  Speaker 1: going on here as to why all of these men
• 20:10
  Speaker 1: agreed to do this. But here's the thing. Ezra just
• 20:13
  Speaker 1: kind of ends right here. It ends on a very
• 20:16
  Speaker 1: weird and very sour note, just listing out all of
• 20:19
  Speaker 1: these people who married pagan women, and what we're going
• 20:22
  Speaker 1: to find out as we move into the Book of Nehemiah.
• 20:26
  Speaker 1: This problem never went away. Ezra thinks by telling these
• 20:32
  Speaker 1: men to divorce their wives that he's fixing the problem,
• 20:36
  Speaker 1: that this is the correct solution. But no, this was
• 20:39
  Speaker 1: not the correct solution because it didn't stop. At the
• 20:43
  Speaker 1: very last chapter of Nehemiah, we're going to read about
• 20:45
  Speaker 1: how Neamiyah is dealing with the exact same problem. But
• 20:49
  Speaker 1: to Niamiyah's credit, he goes through it very differently. He
• 20:52
  Speaker 1: just beats people up. No, literally, he beats them up.
• 20:58
  Speaker 1: He doesn't tell them to get divorced or anything. He
• 21:00
  Speaker 1: just rips out their hair and stuff. I don't know
• 21:03
  Speaker 1: if that was a better solution or not. Probably it was, actually,
• 21:06
  Speaker 1: but there was no fixing this problem because guess what
• 21:10
  Speaker 1: this was a heart issue. So what Ezra should have
• 21:13
  Speaker 1: been focusing on was the initial heart sin that these
• 21:17
  Speaker 1: men and women were committing. If Ezra could get to
• 21:20
  Speaker 1: the bottom of that and start training and teaching people
• 21:24
  Speaker 1: God's laws, I mean, he was an expert in God's lass.
• 21:27
  Speaker 1: If he would have used that god given ability and
• 21:30
  Speaker 1: knowledge that he had to get to the root issue,
• 21:35
  Speaker 1: then maybe this entire problem wouldn't have happened. These men
• 21:40
  Speaker 1: wouldn't have committed even more sin on top of their sin.
• 21:43
  Speaker 1: By divorcing their wives and abandoning their children. And maybe
• 21:47
  Speaker 1: probably not, but maybe some people's minds would have changed.
• 21:51
  Speaker 1: Some men in the future when they're looking for wives,
• 21:54
  Speaker 1: wouldn't marry a pagan woman, but find somebody who actually
• 21:57
  Speaker 1: wanted to worship Yahweh. So this ends the Book of Ezra,
• 22:01
  Speaker 1: and on Monday, we're going to dive into the Book
• 22:03
  Speaker 1: of Namiyah. And Namayah is another very interesting, very fantastic
• 22:08
  Speaker 1: book that covers a different aspect of the Israelites coming
• 22:12
  Speaker 1: back into the Promised Land. Ezra focused more on the
• 22:16
  Speaker 1: spiritual side. Nea Mayah is going to focus more on
• 22:20
  Speaker 1: the physical side, physical protection and safety. So I'm definitely
• 22:24
  Speaker 1: looking forward to talking to you guys about the Book
• 22:27
  Speaker 1: of Namayah. Now, faith a listener before I say goodbye
• 22:30
  Speaker 1: for it today, please do me a solid and take
• 22:32
  Speaker 1: a listen to this sponsored advertisement. Okay, So on Monday,
• 22:37
  Speaker 1: like I said, we're going to be in the Book
• 22:38
  Speaker 1: of Namayah. I hope to see all of you guys
• 22:41
  Speaker 1: there six am or whenever you choose to listen to
• 22:43
  Speaker 1: the podcast because they never go away. But also tomorrow
• 22:46
  Speaker 1: we're going to be in the Book of Hebrews, and
• 22:49
  Speaker 1: Hebrews has been so interesting, so fantastic, and we're going
• 22:52
  Speaker 1: to be finishing that up in just a couple weeks.
• 22:55
  Speaker 1: So we are almost done with the Book of Hebrews.
• 22:57
  Speaker 1: In fact, we're almost done with the New Testament. We
• 23:00
  Speaker 1: only have a few short little books to go, James,
• 23:03
  Speaker 1: which I think is going to take some time, and
• 23:05
  Speaker 1: then after that we only have, like I said, a
• 23:07
  Speaker 1: few short books and then the Book of Revelation, which
• 23:10
  Speaker 1: I'm very much looking forward to talking about that book,
• 23:13
  Speaker 1: and hopefully you guys are looking forward to listening to
• 23:15
  Speaker 1: those episodes and studying the book right along with me.
• 23:18
  Speaker 1: All Right, fay for listeners, have a fantastic and wonderful day.
• 23:21
  Speaker 1: I will see you guys tomorrow for an episode from Hebrews.
• 23:24
  Speaker 1: If you have any more questions about the Bible Explained,
• 23:27
  Speaker 1: please take a look at the description, where you're going
• 23:28
  Speaker 1: to find a whole bunch of links about what this
• 23:31
  Speaker 1: podcast is and other things that I do for free,
• 23:34
  Speaker 1: and I usually throw related episodes into the description as well,
• 23:38
  Speaker 1: where you can get more information about certain topics based
• 23:43
  Speaker 1: upon what we talked about today. So definitely take a
• 23:45
  Speaker 1: look at those once you are done with this episode
• 23:47
  Speaker 1: in just five seconds. Happy listening and God bless. I
• 23:55
  Speaker 1: just want to take a second to thank the team
• 23:57
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