Latest / Woodlands Church Academy's Podcast / Sunday Bible School- How to read the book of Ezra well- Feb25

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Sunday Bible School- How to read the book of Ezra well- Feb25 · Woodlands Church Academy's Podcast

• 0:00
  SPEAKER_00: Seats, it's always a good move.
• 0:02
  SPEAKER_00: Um great.
• 0:03
  SPEAKER_00: Uh lovely to see you.
• 0:05
  SPEAKER_00: Welcome down to Bible School.
• 0:07
  SPEAKER_00: And um uh we've got about kind of half an hour 35 minutes, and we're gonna try and look at the book of Ezra.
• 0:15
  SPEAKER_00: Um now if you've been to Bible school before, you'll uh know that we it's a kind of different style of talking from upstairs.
• 0:21
  SPEAKER_00: Upstairs, it's kind of uh it's preaching, it's taking a few little verses from the Bible, maybe a topic we're looking at, and we're trying to kind of uh cover everybody from people who aren't yet Christians to people who've been Christians for 70 odd years.
• 0:32
  SPEAKER_00: Uh so it's kind of a certain style.
• 0:34
  SPEAKER_00: Um, Bible School gives us the chance to say, how do we take this book uh seriously?
• 0:40
  SPEAKER_00: This book uh that is given to us by God for Him to speak to us, a book that is quite complex and hard to understand at times.
• 0:48
  SPEAKER_00: Uh it wasn't written uh kind of in our language, it wasn't written in our culture.
• 0:54
  SPEAKER_00: Uh so we have to kind of wrestle with it and uh study it and to find out how it how it speaks to us, speaks to us really powerfully.
• 1:02
  SPEAKER_00: So Bible school is that kind of thing.
• 1:04
  SPEAKER_00: So um we're gonna look at the book of Ezra this evening.
• 1:06
  SPEAKER_00: If at any point I say some stuff either you don't understand or things that you uh don't agree with, you can put your hand up and you can uh ask a question.
• 1:16
  SPEAKER_00: Uh so and you can interrupt.
• 1:18
  SPEAKER_00: So if you interrupt upstairs, you might get walked out by a steward.
• 1:22
  SPEAKER_00: But here you can interrupt and it's fine.
• 1:25
  SPEAKER_00: Is that okay?
• 1:26
  SPEAKER_00: So uh it's a place to try and try and learn, try and wrestle, try and understand some things about um about the Bible.
• 1:32
  SPEAKER_00: Uh so that's what we're gonna do.
• 1:34
  SPEAKER_00: As I said upstairs, I think um there's times when you sense that God's working.
• 1:39
  SPEAKER_00: And when God's working, how do we as people who follow Jesus, how do we respond?
• 1:45
  SPEAKER_00: And and it has been unusual over the last kind of uh year or so to see the number of people who just are wandering off the streets to find out about Jesus.
• 1:53
  SPEAKER_00: Like I said upstairs, uh um if you've seen any things on social media, uh Gen Z are kind of um half as likely to be atheists as their parents and their grandparents.
• 2:06
  SPEAKER_00: Actually, God seems to be doing something.
• 2:07
  SPEAKER_00: And when God's on the move, how do we look at scripture and say, what are some of the distinctives of what God, when God's on the move, what do his people do?
• 2:16
  SPEAKER_00: Um, and we see some of that when Jesus is around, we see some of that in the Acts of the Apostles, when when the Holy Spirit's at work, but actually we do see it through the Old Testament story.
• 2:24
  SPEAKER_00: And the Old Testament story does conveys something of here's a a season, actually, here's a time, Ezra, after 70 years of being in captivity, actually that is two generations, parents and grandparents.
• 2:37
  SPEAKER_00: Actually, God is on the move again, and the book of Ezra kind of shows us how the people respond, some of the challenges they face, and maybe helps us to say how can we live today as Christians uh seeing a bit of a move of God and we're gonna cooperate with it well.
• 2:52
  SPEAKER_00: Is that okay?
• 2:53
  SPEAKER_00: So, Book of Ezra.
• 2:55
  SPEAKER_00: Um how many of you have had the chance ever to read the book of Ezra?
• 3:00
  SPEAKER_00: Okay, how many of you have never read the book of Ezra?
• 3:02
  SPEAKER_00: Okay, yeah, it's about half and half.
• 3:04
  SPEAKER_00: Interesting, isn't it?
• 3:05
  SPEAKER_00: Actually, there's some books of the Bible that just I mean, it it's not that they're super easy, but some of them are easy uh.
• 3:12
  SPEAKER_00: Reading about Jesus, it's always a highlight, isn't it?
• 3:14
  SPEAKER_00: Kind of uh reading some of those stories of Acts the Apostles, it's always great to see what that that first those first Christians got up to.
• 3:21
  SPEAKER_00: But when we kind of have to wrestle with some of the Old Testament books, maybe particularly some of the history books, where there's all kinds of strange things going on, including death, mayhem, and murder, kind of uh oh, how do you understand that?
• 3:35
  SPEAKER_00: And or or some of the the prophets that seem to just kind of be on a kind of a mad rant, kind of how do you understand some of what they're saying and what it speaks to us today?
• 3:45
  SPEAKER_00: So, what we're gonna do with the book of Ezra is going to do um uh three or four things.
• 3:49
  SPEAKER_00: The first thing we want to do is to um understand uh the book of Ezra in the store of the Bible.
• 3:57
  SPEAKER_00: So uh the the Bible uh is sixty-six books, and it's not like uh a history book.
• 4:04
  SPEAKER_00: It doesn't start at the beginning and wander through time to the end.
• 4:09
  SPEAKER_00: Actually, the the books are slightly kind of all over the place.
• 4:12
  SPEAKER_00: Actually, they they are arranged like a library, in that if you go into a library, you might have a history section, a sports section, a cookery section.
• 4:19
  SPEAKER_00: Actually, that the Bible is arranged into sections.
• 4:22
  SPEAKER_00: So there is a section that's a history section, there's a section that's a wisdom section, there's a section that's a prophecy section, there's a section that's a that's a biography of the life of Jesus section, there's a section that is kind of the history of the church, there's a section that's a collection of letters, and then there's a weird thing called apocalyptic book of Revelation at the end.
• 4:40
  SPEAKER_00: That's its own kind of type of writing.
• 4:42
  SPEAKER_00: But so the book is clubbed together in stars of writing, but it isn't necessary in chronological order.
• 4:49
  SPEAKER_00: So when we look at the book of Ezra, Ezra is a history book.
• 4:53
  SPEAKER_00: It's a history book that tells the story of a season when God's people, they'd been they'd come from Egypt into the promised land, uh, they'd taken control of the land that God had promised them.
• 5:05
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, there was then judges and then kings.
• 5:07
  SPEAKER_00: Some kings followed God, some kings didn't follow God, and and uh after there was generation and generation and generation after kings that not only did they not follow God, actually they devoted themselves to worshiping all kinds of awful gods, God eventually said, Enough's enough, and they were taken into captivity.
• 5:25
  SPEAKER_00: First of all, the northern ten tribes, but then uh Judah and Benjamin as well, and they were taken into captivity, and and it looked as though God's purposes had come to a kind of a grinding halt.
• 5:36
  SPEAKER_00: Jerusalem was destroyed, the temple was destroyed, people were carted off into Babylon, um, and uh there was this kind of big question.
• 5:45
  SPEAKER_00: God, what are you gonna do?
• 5:47
  SPEAKER_00: Actually, you'd promised that Jerusalem was going to be a city that was going to be a city of peace, a city like a city on a hill that was gonna show the nations exactly what it should be like for people to follow God wholeheartedly.
• 6:02
  SPEAKER_00: Actually, it was supposed to be a place where the temple was going to be, the God who was everywhere, chose to live somewhere, and Sodom built this magnificent temple, and and yet everything had been knocked down, the walls, the buildings, the temple, all flattened.
• 6:16
  SPEAKER_00: People taken to into exile, and and the and for 70 years there's this big question, God, where are you?
• 6:24
  SPEAKER_00: What are you doing?
• 6:25
  SPEAKER_00: What about all those promises made to to Abraham and to Moses and to and to David and kind of what's going on?
• 6:33
  SPEAKER_00: Here we are, your city's destroyed, your people are scattered.
• 6:37
  SPEAKER_00: It looks as though we're done for.
• 6:41
  SPEAKER_00: And then the book of Ezra starts up with a chance to rebuild, a chance to do something new, a chance with uh one of the kings making an edict to return to Jerusalem from a foreign country, a foreign land where you've been in exile, and the purposes of God could be reignited once again.
• 7:03
  SPEAKER_00: Actually, you go back there and you could rebuild the temple.
• 7:07
  SPEAKER_00: The temple that the God who is everywhere once again could be there.
• 7:10
  SPEAKER_00: The temple where sacrifices for for wrongdoing could be be made, where you could hear God's word being preached in a way that you could understand and put into practice.
• 7:20
  SPEAKER_00: You could rebuild the city to be a place where once again people could be proud to say this is God's city, God's people, people who live within this city, we behave in a certain way because we know who God is and we love who he is.
• 7:33
  SPEAKER_00: So the book of Ezra is is that kind of history, is that kind of history um uh where um uh where people return from exile to fulfil that sense of destiny call purposes of God.
• 7:50
  SPEAKER_00: Now, where does it fit within the Bible?
• 7:52
  SPEAKER_00: Well, um if you've got a Bible and uh you'll know that Ezra comes after two chronicles.
• 7:59
  SPEAKER_00: Umicles finishes with these words In the first year of Cyrus, King of Persia, in order to fulfil the word of the Lord spoken by Jeremiah, the Lord moved the heart of Cyrus, King of Persia, to make a proclamation throughout his realm, and also to put it in writing.
• 8:18
  SPEAKER_00: This is what Cyrus, King of Persia, says The Lord the God of heaven has given me all the kingdom of the earth, and has appointed me to build a temple for him at Jerusalem in Judah.
• 8:27
  SPEAKER_00: Any of his people among you may go up, and may the Lord their God be with them.
• 8:32
  SPEAKER_00: Full stop.
• 8:33
  SPEAKER_00: That's the end of Two Chronicles.
• 8:36
  SPEAKER_00: Now the start of the book of Ezra says this.
• 8:38
  SPEAKER_00: In the first year of Cyrus, King of Persia, in order to fulfill the word of the Lord spoken to Jeremiah, the Lord moved the heart of Cyrus.
• 8:44
  SPEAKER_00: I wonder if you can notice anything between the last few verses of Two Chronicles and the first few verses of Ezra.
• 8:52
  SPEAKER_00: They're exactly the same.
• 8:54
  SPEAKER_00: Um so what's happening is um it's located.
• 8:58
  SPEAKER_00: If you read the book of One and Two Chronicles, Ezra follows on from the from the end of the book of Two Chronicles.
• 9:05
  SPEAKER_00: Actually, it may be that the chronicler that did one and two chronicles also chronicled Ezra.
• 9:12
  SPEAKER_00: Actually, it may have been Ezra, it may have been Nehemiah.
• 9:15
  SPEAKER_00: We're not quite sure who is the author of the book of uh of Ezra.
• 9:19
  SPEAKER_00: But it looks like One and Two Chronicles goes into uh Ezra.
• 9:23
  SPEAKER_00: Um have you ever wondered why when you read through the Bible that you have one and two kings that has all the stories, and then one or two chronicles seems to tell those stories all over again.
• 9:34
  SPEAKER_00: Have you noticed that?
• 9:34
  SPEAKER_00: Have you tried reading through the Bible?
• 9:36
  SPEAKER_00: I mean that's the reality, is that it kind of doubles up.
• 9:38
  SPEAKER_00: Actually, one or two kings, the point of that was a history.
• 9:42
  SPEAKER_00: It was to it was to write down the history, what's in all, of here's what happened from the time that kind of uh Samuel uh anointed the first king right the way through to the exile.
• 9:55
  SPEAKER_00: Here's just I'm just gonna tell you the story, the history.
• 9:59
  SPEAKER_00: What one and two chronicles is trying to do, it was written after the exile, as people returned from Babylon, as they started to build the city of God, as they started to build the temple, actually, they needed to understand the sense of national identity.
• 10:12
  SPEAKER_00: They needed to understand that what the purpose of the temple was.
• 10:16
  SPEAKER_00: Actually, they needed to understand what God's word was, they needed to understand the sense of God's calling on the kingship of the kind of um the descendants of David.
• 10:26
  SPEAKER_00: And so what One or Two Chronicles does, it doesn't tell the whole story, it just picks out specific things from uh the story.
• 10:34
  SPEAKER_00: Actually, it picks out specific themes because it once, as they've returned from exile, this book is trying to say, actually, guys, we're we're making a brand new start here.
• 10:44
  SPEAKER_00: Um, in making a brand new start, you need to know what's important.
• 10:47
  SPEAKER_00: The only way we know what's important is we look at our history.
• 10:51
  SPEAKER_00: And I want you to learn about what the good kings were like.
• 10:54
  SPEAKER_00: I want you to know what the temple was truly like.
• 10:56
  SPEAKER_00: Actually, I want you to know what it is.
• 10:57
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, here's some of the themes.
• 10:59
  SPEAKER_00: I've been was reading through two chronicles and some of the main themes that that when whenever these ups and downs, whenever there seems to be a move of God, what typifies people's response is there's humility.
• 11:11
  SPEAKER_00: They humble themselves before God.
• 11:13
  SPEAKER_00: Actually, there's purity.
• 11:15
  SPEAKER_00: That's that sense of we're going to live wholeheartedly for God, and actually we're going to get rid of foreign idols and worship at high places, and uh, and there's something about obedience that they rediscover the word of God.
• 11:26
  SPEAKER_00: In fact, what one um story is of Joe uh Jo Ash and he actually finds a bit of the Old Testament in the temple, and and they it sounds like they've not seen it for a long time because they read it and they're astonished that this is the word of God.
• 11:40
  SPEAKER_00: And they do you know what they read it out and they decide they're jolly well gonna do it and gonna be obedient to it.
• 11:46
  SPEAKER_00: There's times when God's on the move that people sense that it's not just about living for myself, it's about living for the kingdom.
• 11:53
  SPEAKER_00: There's there's a super generosity as you read through that those times where there's a move of God, it's always kind of uh goes alongside people deciding that they're gonna be generous, they're gonna give generously, they're gonna sacrifice generously, there's gonna be this outrageous overflow of stuff towards God and towards God's purposes.
• 12:10
  SPEAKER_00: And through the story of Two Chronicles, there's times of desolation and there's times of rebuilding, times of desolation, times rebuilding.
• 12:18
  SPEAKER_00: But actually, whenever that there's a move of God, there's always rebuilding.
• 12:23
  SPEAKER_00: There's always something of saying, here's how it should be.
• 12:26
  SPEAKER_00: We're going to be the generation that starts to rebuild.
• 12:29
  SPEAKER_00: And in some ways, those that those themes of of two chronicles actually goes through into Ezra.
• 12:36
  SPEAKER_00: As we read the book of Ezra in a moment or two, you'll see that though those are some of the themes that that still carry on.
• 12:41
  SPEAKER_00: The call to humility, the call to purity, the call to obedience, the call to generosity, the call to rebuild.
• 12:48
  SPEAKER_00: And maybe if we think, well, what's God up to at the moment?
• 12:53
  SPEAKER_00: Actually, what's God doing in our generation, in our city, in our neighborhoods?
• 12:58
  SPEAKER_00: Actually, if God is on the move, like some of us who've been around a long time, actually we think God's doing something now that we've not seen for quite a long time.
• 13:06
  SPEAKER_00: How should we respond?
• 13:07
  SPEAKER_00: I think we should respond with humility.
• 13:10
  SPEAKER_00: A renewed sense of purity.
• 13:12
  SPEAKER_00: What does it mean to to live wholeheartedly devoted to God?
• 13:16
  SPEAKER_00: A sense of obedience to to wrestling with this book and and and hearing it and listening to the prophets and saying, Do you know what we're going to obey that?
• 13:24
  SPEAKER_00: I think it means uh generosity of of time, finances, our gifts and abilities.
• 13:28
  SPEAKER_00: I think it's about rebuilding.
• 13:32
  SPEAKER_00: Our nation that used to once upon a time call ourselves a Christian nation.
• 13:37
  SPEAKER_00: Uh now it isn't.
• 13:39
  SPEAKER_00: Something needs to happen.
• 13:41
  SPEAKER_00: The tide needs to turn.
• 13:42
  SPEAKER_00: Actually, we need to be those that that rebuild.
• 13:45
  SPEAKER_00: And rebuilding is a theme of of Two Chronicles.
• 13:48
  SPEAKER_00: And as we go into Ezra, that that's continues to be the theme.
• 13:52
  SPEAKER_00: So where does Ezra sit?
• 13:53
  SPEAKER_00: Ezra certainly sits at the end of Two Chronicles.
• 13:56
  SPEAKER_00: But most commentators would say that maybe Ezra and Nehemiah originally were one book.
• 14:02
  SPEAKER_00: In the Hebrew Bible, it's it's it's one book.
• 14:05
  SPEAKER_00: Um, maybe that it was split because in the first half of the book there is seems to be some diary entries from Ezra.
• 14:13
  SPEAKER_00: And so he says I on a number of occasions.
• 14:15
  SPEAKER_00: So people think, well, oh, it must have been written by Ezra because he says I.
• 14:19
  SPEAKER_00: But then in Nehemiah, the story of Nehemiah, he says, and I did this and I did this, and think, well, how can there be the same author for this one and for this one?
• 14:27
  SPEAKER_00: How could it be have been one book when one person's talking about I and it's Ezra, and here he's talking about I and it's Nehemiah?
• 14:33
  SPEAKER_00: Kind of surely there were two authors, it must be two books.
• 14:37
  SPEAKER_00: But maybe the chronicler gathered together some of Ezra's writings.
• 14:41
  SPEAKER_00: Actually, maybe you gathered together some of Nehemiah's writings and maybe quotes from their personal journals and their diaries to form these books.
• 14:48
  SPEAKER_00: So maybe when we think of the book of Ezra, maybe we should think of the book of two chronicles, Ezra and Nehemiah.
• 14:55
  SPEAKER_00: There's a continual story and a continual theme.
• 14:58
  SPEAKER_00: So in the book of Ezra, Nehemiah, actually, Zerubaball is in the book of Ezra.
• 15:02
  SPEAKER_00: Ezra is in the book of Ezra, surprise, surprise, and in the book of Nehemiah, and Nehemiah, surprise, surprise, isn't in the book of Nehemiah.
• 15:09
  SPEAKER_00: But those three characters are the three main characters in this story of returning from exile, rebuilding the temple, and rebuilding the city of Jerusalem.
• 15:20
  SPEAKER_00: So, where does Ezra sit?
• 15:22
  SPEAKER_00: Uh comes off the back of Two Chronicles, linked in with uh the book of Nehemiah.
• 15:28
  SPEAKER_00: But also, if you read the book of uh Ezra, actually you'll see that uh at a time when the building of the temple had started, they faced opposition to prophets after sixteen years of inactivity.
• 15:43
  SPEAKER_00: Two prophets started to prophesy.
• 15:45
  SPEAKER_00: So Ezra chapter five says this.
• 15:46
  SPEAKER_00: Now Haggai the prophet and Zechariah the prophet, a descendant of Ido, prophesied to the Jews in Judah and Jerusalem in the name of the God of Israel who was over them.
• 15:55
  SPEAKER_00: And they started building.
• 15:58
  SPEAKER_00: Chapter 6 says this.
• 15:59
  SPEAKER_00: So the elders of the Jews continued to build and prosper under the preaching of Haggai the prophet and Zechariah, a descendant of Edo.
• 16:07
  SPEAKER_00: They finished building the temple according to the command of the God of Israel and the decrees of Cyrus, uh, Darius, Artaxy, kings of Persia.
• 16:15
  SPEAKER_00: So actually, there's two other books of the Bible called Haggai and Zechariah.
• 16:22
  SPEAKER_00: They're what's called the prophet in the in the minor prophets.
• 16:25
  SPEAKER_00: So the book of Ezra is the history, but how do we find out what the prophecies were that started the people rebuilding again and helped them as they rebuilt the temple and rebuilt the walls?
• 16:37
  SPEAKER_00: Actually, we can read the book of Haki and the book of Zechariah, and that gives us the context for the story that we read in Ezra.
• 16:45
  SPEAKER_00: Does that make sense?
• 16:46
  SPEAKER_00: So we can get quite a holistic picture by reading two chronicles, Ezra and Nehemiah, one after the other, and actually we can understand something of what the passion of God was when we see with Haki who challenges them.
• 16:59
  SPEAKER_00: It's not, is it time for you to live in your own paneled houses while the temple of God lies in ruins?
• 17:04
  SPEAKER_00: No, it's not.
• 17:05
  SPEAKER_00: Get building.
• 17:06
  SPEAKER_00: And Zechariah with all these kind of eight weird visions of flying scrolls and women with fruit on their heads, all kinds of stuff.
• 17:16
  SPEAKER_00: Kind of, he's prophesying about, and he prophesies four times about this shepherd character that is obviously refers to Jesus.
• 17:24
  SPEAKER_00: And and they're busy prophesying while the temple's being rebuilt.
• 17:28
  SPEAKER_00: So that that's where the book of Ezra fits in the Bible itself.
• 17:33
  SPEAKER_00: Any little questions or comments on that?
• 17:36
  SPEAKER_00: Or does that kind of make sense?
• 17:41
  SPEAKER_00: Okay.
• 17:42
  SPEAKER_00: We'll move on.
• 17:43
  SPEAKER_00: If you if you have got a question, do do store it up.
• 17:46
  SPEAKER_00: So the second thing about the about reading any book of the Bible is um how do you understand the historical context in which it was written?
• 17:54
  SPEAKER_00: Because it wasn't written in the 21st century in in Europe.
• 17:58
  SPEAKER_00: It was written, well, here it was written back in um uh uh well was recording uh a situation that was in about uh 500 BC.
• 18:09
  SPEAKER_00: Um so, in some ways, if you're going to read the book of Ezra well, you're gonna have to understand the historical context.
• 18:16
  SPEAKER_00: So the historical context um was to do with uh empires that were existing at the time.
• 18:23
  SPEAKER_00: Um so if you were to say, what were the superpowers that we're under at the moment, you might say China, America, Russia, I don't know.
• 18:32
  SPEAKER_00: And for each of those three superpowers, they would probably have distinctives that you could assign to them.
• 18:38
  SPEAKER_00: You probably think, well, China's a bit like this, Russia's a bit like this, America's a bit like this, kind of.
• 18:43
  SPEAKER_00: Well, during the the story of the Bible, there were superpowers.
• 18:47
  SPEAKER_00: There were superpowers that that defined culture, that were defining history, that were making military advances and technological advances.
• 18:55
  SPEAKER_00: So the story of the Exodus and Moses, actually, that the the uh Egyptian empires, the pharaohs, Tutankhamun and all those guys, actually, they were the superpower at the time of the Exodus.
• 19:09
  SPEAKER_00: As you go through history, you then hit the Assyrian Empire.
• 19:13
  SPEAKER_00: The Assyrian Empire was an empire that was defined by cruelty and fear.
• 19:20
  SPEAKER_00: Um uh here's some of their kind of um some Assyrian artifacts that uh you can still see in museums today.
• 19:28
  SPEAKER_00: Um and and the way the Assyrians worked is this is their empire kind of uh before uh AD um 824.
• 19:38
  SPEAKER_00: Actually, this is the empire uh um 6 uh 71 BC.
• 19:43
  SPEAKER_00: Uh and as you can see, they've uh really expanded across the whole of the kind of uh the Middle East there.
• 19:50
  SPEAKER_00: Um and their tactic was this they would invade and then they would um move deport nations from one part of their empire to the others.
• 20:00
  SPEAKER_00: And so they're literally they would kind of mix things up, and a bit like on the day of uh of the Tower of Babylon, if you know the story, the Tower of Babel, if you know the story.
• 20:08
  SPEAKER_00: Actually, if you mixed up the kind of languages, actually they can't form, they can't revolt, they can't form a resistance movement because your neighbors speak a different language to you.
• 20:18
  SPEAKER_00: So although you might all be disgruntled with the Assyrian Empire, actually you're not going to do much about it because that you you're all mixed up.
• 20:25
  SPEAKER_00: And so that's what they did.
• 20:26
  SPEAKER_00: They deported people um uh from one part to the other.
• 20:30
  SPEAKER_00: So when the those northern ten tribes of Israel went into exile, it was the Assyrians, they cutted people off and they moved people in and mixed people up within the empire here.
• 20:40
  SPEAKER_00: They were super cruel.
• 20:42
  SPEAKER_00: Here's a picture of one of the kings poking someone's eyes out and cutting their tongue out.
• 20:46
  SPEAKER_00: That's kind of uh an Assyrian kind of that's what they they did.
• 20:49
  SPEAKER_00: They forced march people, kind of um uh super cruel.
• 20:53
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, but that's how they held their empire together.
• 20:57
  SPEAKER_00: Um uh next up was the Babylonian Empire.
• 21:00
  SPEAKER_00: The Babylonian Empire worked, uh they were kind of they did have military and they did invade, they did siege cities, but actually, if the cities kind of gave in, what they worked on was indoctrination.
• 21:11
  SPEAKER_00: What they would do is they would take people from all the nations they conquered, they'd bring them to Babylon, they'd have these great kind of schools where they'd school people in the philosophy, the religion, uh, the ways of the Babylonian Empire, and then they would send them back to uh the regions they'd conquered, and there would be administrators that would rule rule on behalf.
• 21:28
  SPEAKER_00: They'd understand the Babylonian culture, they'd understand the local culture, and they would hold this uh empire uh together.
• 21:34
  SPEAKER_00: And we read people like Daniel, Shadrach, Meshach, Abednego.
• 21:37
  SPEAKER_00: That's what happened to them.
• 21:38
  SPEAKER_00: Jerusalem was invaded, they were cut it off, and uh Daniel was taught.
• 21:43
  SPEAKER_00: Actually, he was supposed to be taught and sent back, but because the hand of God was so on him, he became really important within the empire itself.
• 21:51
  SPEAKER_00: But that's how the Babylonians kind of held their empire together.
• 21:55
  SPEAKER_00: Um, and they would get all kinds of artisans and architects.
• 22:00
  SPEAKER_00: And musicians and the arts.
• 22:02
  SPEAKER_00: It was a great center of craftsmen.
• 22:05
  SPEAKER_00: This is not a real photograph, but the Hanging Gardens of Babylon was one of the seven wonders of the ancient world.
• 22:11
  SPEAKER_00: Because they wanted to build Babylon, have all the kind of the nations, all the different cultures represented.
• 22:20
  SPEAKER_00: This is the representation of humanity, Babylon, which is why in the book of Revelation, Babylon stands for all that humanity can achieve, because they gather people from every nation to build the city of Babylon.
• 22:33
  SPEAKER_00: Have everybody represented there.
• 22:36
  SPEAKER_00: After the Babylonians, we then have the Persian Empire.
• 22:39
  SPEAKER_00: The Persian Empire kind of they they weren't so aggressive.
• 22:44
  SPEAKER_00: They were a bit more nimble.
• 22:45
  SPEAKER_00: So they kind of, it seems to be the Persian Empire was overrun overnight.
• 22:51
  SPEAKER_00: Writing on the wall, many, many tech of a passing if you read the story.
• 22:53
  SPEAKER_00: Actually, it seems to be that they they just literally swarmed in and they took over.
• 22:58
  SPEAKER_00: But their policy was much more of a policy of religious tolerance.
• 23:13
  SPEAKER_00: But they thought they'd do this, is they'd send people back who've been exiled, back to their shrines, back to their holy places, and they said, What you do is you re you rebuild the temples for your your idols, your gods, we'll send those idols back, we'll reinstate them in their sacred holy places, on the condition that they all pray to Marduk that the king and his sons always have success.
• 23:37
  SPEAKER_00: Always kind of and and so there's this religious move.
• 23:40
  SPEAKER_00: Um now we actually know that's the case because in the British Museum there's this thing called Cyrus Cylinder.
• 23:47
  SPEAKER_00: Have you heard about the Cyrus Cylinder?
• 23:49
  SPEAKER_00: Well, what it was, um, uh when there was an edict from the emperor, uh, before you had kind of um what's happened uh kind of in emails, uh, what they used to do was they used to have uh clay and into into kind of wet clay they would emboss or they would put in their cuneiform uh writing, and then they would bake the clay so it was solid.
• 24:12
  SPEAKER_00: And then they would send these cylinders all around the empire with an edict from the emperor.
• 24:18
  SPEAKER_00: And this is uh what that dates back to the times of of Cyrus that we read about in the Bible, and it's saying this religious policy of reinstalling uh idols back into their native countries and that they should pray to Marduk and uh on behalf of the king and his sons.
• 24:37
  SPEAKER_00: And in fact, that's what when we read the book of Ezra.
• 24:40
  SPEAKER_00: What we read of the book of Ezra was exactly what's reflected on an archaeological uh uh artifact that is in the British Museum at the moment.
• 24:49
  SPEAKER_00: That's exactly what's happened.
• 24:50
  SPEAKER_00: This is what this is his policy to send people back to the holy places.
• 24:54
  SPEAKER_00: Actually, we read in the first book of uh the first chapter of the book of Ezra, actually, he was bemused because there weren't any idols to send back to the temple in Jerusalem.
• 25:05
  SPEAKER_00: Other other temples had had idols and that was of stone or of gold or kind of, but they looked through and they could actually they couldn't find the idol of the God of Israel.
• 25:15
  SPEAKER_00: So all they sent back was some gold and silver plates and and trinkets, because that's all they could find from the temple.
• 25:22
  SPEAKER_00: Why?
• 25:23
  SPEAKER_00: Because God says, make no idols.
• 25:26
  SPEAKER_00: I am just the true God.
• 25:29
  SPEAKER_00: So uh Ezra chapter one, we have uh that that goes that that um fits in with uh Cyrus's edict.
• 25:37
  SPEAKER_00: Um again that edict is is predicted by uh Isaiah and Jeremiah.
• 25:44
  SPEAKER_00: In some ways it says here, uh, in the first year of Cyrus, king of Persia, in order to fulfill the word of the Lord spoken to Jeremiah, the Lord moved the heart of Cyrus to proclaim an edict.
• 25:55
  SPEAKER_00: Now you might say, Well, um Cyrus is prophesied in Isaiah, not Jeremiah.
• 26:01
  SPEAKER_00: So Isaiah says, uh, God who says to Cyrus, here's my shepherd, I and will accomplish all that I uh I please.
• 26:09
  SPEAKER_00: I will say of Jerusalem, let it be rebuilt.
• 26:12
  SPEAKER_00: Of the temple, let its foundations be laid.
• 26:15
  SPEAKER_00: Again, this is 200 years before Cyrus actually did this.
• 26:19
  SPEAKER_00: Actually, it's at the time that Isaiah maybe wrote this, Jerusalem was still there, the temple was still there.
• 26:24
  SPEAKER_00: But there was this prophecy that there would be a time when God would move the heart of this person called Cyrus, and he will see the temple rebuilt.
• 26:32
  SPEAKER_00: Jeremiah, he prophesies and says that actually within 70 years, 70 years from when Jerusalem was destroyed, in 70 years, God will do something.
• 26:42
  SPEAKER_00: So this whole country, uh, Jeremiah 25, 11, this whole country will be a desolate wasteland, and these nations will serve the king of Babylon for how long?
• 26:51
  SPEAKER_00: For 70 years.
• 26:52
  SPEAKER_00: And Jeremiah 29, 10.
• 26:53
  SPEAKER_00: This is what the Lord says when 70 years are accomplished for Babylon, I will come to you and fulfil my good promise to bring you back to this place.
• 27:02
  SPEAKER_00: So the book of Ezra says it's seventy years.
• 27:06
  SPEAKER_00: Maybe people were counting the calendars, counting the years.
• 27:08
  SPEAKER_00: Oh well, it's next year.
• 27:10
  SPEAKER_00: It's kind of this is the 70th year.
• 27:12
  SPEAKER_00: God, what are you doing?
• 27:13
  SPEAKER_00: And suddenly this edict comes out.
• 27:15
  SPEAKER_00: Return to the places of your birth and rebuild the sanctuaries and the sacred places.
• 27:20
  SPEAKER_00: Actually, he says, and and if you if Jerusalem is where you're from, you go back and build your temple too.
• 27:26
  SPEAKER_00: And they've been waiting and waiting and waiting.
• 27:28
  SPEAKER_00: 70 years is up, and on that year, Cyrus gives the edict.
• 27:32
  SPEAKER_00: And so, chapter one, we understand that we see that people understand that God's moving their heart, God's prophesied, God's acted, the kings give given permission, and they head back those 900 miles to leaving behind Babylon, the this city of uh education, of opportunity, entertainment, culture, and they're gonna leave that and travel 900 miles to a city that's burnt out.
• 27:56
  SPEAKER_00: It's a wreck.
• 27:57
  SPEAKER_00: Why would they do that?
• 27:59
  SPEAKER_00: Because it's the purposes of God, it's where God's people should be, it's where God's at work.
• 28:04
  SPEAKER_00: They're gonna leave behind all that the world has to offer because they know that there's something about God's call in the life.
• 28:10
  SPEAKER_00: Is here's what we should be doing, here's where we should be.
• 28:13
  SPEAKER_00: And in some ways, the book of Ezra starts off with that kind of response.
• 28:17
  SPEAKER_00: And when God's on the move, do we have that similar kind of response?
• 28:22
  SPEAKER_00: So, here we go, ten minutes.
• 28:25
  SPEAKER_00: The the main themes of the book of Ezra, I would say there's four main themes that kind of fit in a little bit with two chronicles.
• 28:31
  SPEAKER_00: The four main themes are about rebuilding.
• 28:35
  SPEAKER_00: Um it's interesting when you look at um, maybe if when you get home tonight you want to read the book of Ezra, it's ten chapters, it may take you 20 minutes.
• 28:42
  SPEAKER_00: Um uh, but you'll see that when they rebuild the temple, they were sent to rebuild the temple by Cyrus.
• 28:49
  SPEAKER_00: It's interesting when they rebuild the temple, um they build the altar first.
• 28:55
  SPEAKER_00: Now you might think if you're gonna rebuild a temple, you're gonna check the foundations, you're gonna build the walls, you're gonna put a roof on, and then you start doing the internal decor.
• 29:03
  SPEAKER_00: Actually, they started with the altar first.
• 29:07
  SPEAKER_00: And then they built, started to build the outside.
• 29:10
  SPEAKER_00: And and I think there's such a profound picture there of when God's on the move, what's the most important thing?
• 29:18
  SPEAKER_00: Do you get swept away with the the sense of excitement?
• 29:21
  SPEAKER_00: We're gonna rebuild the temple! Come on, guys, we're gonna rebuild the temple.
• 29:24
  SPEAKER_00: It's gonna look a bit like when Solomon built it, and you can get carried away with the stuff.
• 29:29
  SPEAKER_00: And actually, we need to get carried away with the place of sacrifice.
• 29:33
  SPEAKER_00: Actually, we need to be obsessed with the cross.
• 29:36
  SPEAKER_00: Actually, that you build the altar first.
• 29:39
  SPEAKER_00: When there's any sense of God's on the move, it's the cross first.
• 29:43
  SPEAKER_00: It's the place where Jesus sacrificed his life to bring it.
• 29:46
  SPEAKER_00: Actually, they they knew that it was the place of sacrifice.
• 29:49
  SPEAKER_00: It was, it was, they knew that we had to deal with wrongdoing and sin.
• 29:52
  SPEAKER_00: That had to be dealt with first before we started up with singing our worship and praise songs.
• 29:57
  SPEAKER_00: If we if we haven't got sin sorted out, there's no point in doing the rest of the stuff.
• 30:02
  SPEAKER_00: A move of God starts with a cross, with the altar.
• 30:05
  SPEAKER_00: They build the altar first, the place of sacrifice, the place where wrongdoing can be put right.
• 30:11
  SPEAKER_00: And I think in any move of God, it has to start with the cross.
• 30:14
  SPEAKER_00: It has to start with the acknowledgement that here's where the breakthrough happened, here's where we can encounter uh the mercy and the compassion and the tenderness of God at the cross.
• 30:24
  SPEAKER_00: But rebuilding is part of the theme of the book.
• 30:27
  SPEAKER_00: Um, the second theme is that actually God works with unusual people.
• 30:33
  SPEAKER_00: There seemed to be the heathen kings, the non-Christians, the non-Jewish people, actually, God seemed to be using them to fulfill his purposes.
• 30:42
  SPEAKER_00: Ezra chapter 5, verse 5, chapter 7, verse 6, 9 and 28, chapter 8, verse 22, it all says that the hand of God is at work, and the hand of God's at work, not with the believers, but it's with the unbelievers.
• 30:56
  SPEAKER_00: Actually, God is at work.
• 30:59
  SPEAKER_00: Actually, God isn't working unusual places.
• 31:01
  SPEAKER_00: Actually, do you believe that God's in work?
• 31:03
  SPEAKER_00: Well, we believe God's at work in the church, but he's at work in unusual places.
• 31:07
  SPEAKER_00: He's he's doing things that kind of are outside of the kind of our religious boundaries.
• 31:12
  SPEAKER_00: And and Ezra knew that and saw that and told the story.
• 31:16
  SPEAKER_00: God's at work out there.
• 31:18
  SPEAKER_00: The somehow the favor of God is at work coming to fulfill God's purposes.
• 31:22
  SPEAKER_00: Do we understand that God's at work, even with those who aren't yet Christians, to fulfill his purposes?
• 31:27
  SPEAKER_00: The third thing is about coping with opposition.
• 31:29
  SPEAKER_00: And whenever you do any rebuilding work, there's always going to be opposition that you face.
• 31:33
  SPEAKER_00: And we read through the book of Ezra, they faced opposition.
• 31:36
  SPEAKER_00: And how do they overcome it?
• 31:38
  SPEAKER_00: Well, they overcame it with actually with the prophetic word.
• 31:42
  SPEAKER_00: They overcame it kind of with uh after 16 years of stopping because of feeling oppression, uh feeling that kind of they were being got up, told they shouldn't be doing it.
• 31:51
  SPEAKER_00: What they were doing was rubbish.
• 31:53
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, and after 16 years they started to rebuild because after facing opposition, the prophetic word came, Hekai and Zechariah, and that word somehow spoke into their lives, re-energized them.
• 32:03
  SPEAKER_00: Are we open when there's a move of God, his word speaking to our hearts?
• 32:08
  SPEAKER_00: Not just a nice new idea, but somehow the profound word of God that speaks to you, the prophetic word of God that speaks to you.
• 32:14
  SPEAKER_00: It should change your heart, it should change your mind, it should motivate you for the kingdom of God.
• 32:19
  SPEAKER_00: That's one of the themes of Ezra.
• 32:21
  SPEAKER_00: And uh kind of it's it's it finishes with dealing with worldly standards and purity.
• 32:28
  SPEAKER_00: Actually, when you're going to be the people of God, you need to be a pure people of God.
• 32:32
  SPEAKER_00: Now you might think chapter 10 is super unfair because it starts talking about mixed marriages.
• 32:38
  SPEAKER_00: And it says kind of if your people and and somehow you've you've you've married people who are from uh other nations, actually that's bad.
• 32:49
  SPEAKER_00: And it's not because they weren't they weren't nationalistic, it's because they knew that you need to be wholeheartedly following God.
• 32:55
  SPEAKER_00: They knew maybe that that for Solomon, you might have thought that Solomon, apart from Jesus, was the wisest person who ever lived.
• 33:02
  SPEAKER_00: But do you know what?
• 33:04
  SPEAKER_00: He ended his life in a mess.
• 33:07
  SPEAKER_00: Why?
• 33:08
  SPEAKER_00: Because he had 700 wives and 300 concubines, which were people the women he just wanted to have sex with and not bothered marrying.
• 33:17
  SPEAKER_00: Um and and his foreign wives led him away from worshiping the true God who gave him the wisdom and he who built the profound temple, actually drew him away to to worship foreign gods.
• 33:28
  SPEAKER_00: Why?
• 33:28
  SPEAKER_00: It was the foreign women that done that.
• 33:31
  SPEAKER_00: And so there's something that even in the history, don't align yourself with bad stuff.
• 33:38
  SPEAKER_00: And in this case, it was the people that they'd married, they'd intermarried.
• 33:42
  SPEAKER_00: Now, you might think that's super unfair to get rid of a uh kind of a foreign wife.
• 33:47
  SPEAKER_00: Well, maybe they understood purity, and maybe the way they put it into practice was they were trying to do the best thing, uh, and maybe just kind of it seemed in our world super unfair to say to them, okay, if you've married a foreign wife and you've got kids, send them away.
• 34:06
  SPEAKER_00: We've just got to be this pure, wholehearted, dedicated people of God.
• 34:11
  SPEAKER_00: Now you might have questions about that because it sounds like kind of nationalism, kind of and kind of um, but they that they they were trying to express uh purity and devotion to God.
• 34:25
  SPEAKER_00: Um so um uh run out of time.
• 34:30
  SPEAKER_00: Um if you go through the book, you'll see uh chapter one is about the story of return from Babylon.
• 34:40
  SPEAKER_00: Actually, chapter two, again, if you if you happen to have got your Bible there or you got your phone, um chapter two is one of those uh chapters that you think, what on earth, if God was writing a book, why would he put this chapter in the Bible?
• 34:54
  SPEAKER_00: Because it's a chapter just full of very strange sounding names.
• 34:58
  SPEAKER_00: Um and and it's just like a roll call of all these names which are hard to pronounce, and you think, why are they there?
• 35:05
  SPEAKER_00: Actually, not only are there names that are hard to pronounce, there's numbers of people that were part of that tribal, that kind of family.
• 35:13
  SPEAKER_00: Why on earth would you want there to be a chapter full of people's names, a register, a roll call?
• 35:22
  SPEAKER_00: And I think it's this.
• 35:25
  SPEAKER_00: I think God knew who was prepared to respond to the call on that generation.
• 35:34
  SPEAKER_00: Actually, he knew who prepared to leave all that the world had to offer, the security, uh, the job security, the money, the housing, the big city life.
• 35:43
  SPEAKER_00: Actually, they were prepared to leave that because they knew there was something they should be doing in their lives, which was following the destiny and the call and the purposes of God.
• 35:51
  SPEAKER_00: And God was so proud.
• 35:53
  SPEAKER_00: He was so proud of them that they left that to do this for him in their generation.
• 35:58
  SPEAKER_00: Do you know what?
• 35:58
  SPEAKER_00: You're gonna get in my book because you were the ones who did it.
• 36:02
  SPEAKER_00: Actually, there were some people who couldn't be bothered about God's purposes and they stayed at home.
• 36:07
  SPEAKER_00: They couldn't be bothered that the life as a Jewish person was supposed to be fulfilling the call and destiny that was on the descendants of Abraham, not only to be blessed but to bless the whole world.
• 36:18
  SPEAKER_00: And they were just sitting in comfort.
• 36:19
  SPEAKER_00: And these people, they decided to do it.
• 36:22
  SPEAKER_00: They traveled the 900 miles, they weren't sure what was going to happen, but they had faith and confidence that God was on the move, he was going to do something, which is why you get a mention, you get a mention in the book, because God's proud of you.
• 36:35
  SPEAKER_00: And I wonder if there was a book that God wrote in our generation.
• 36:38
  SPEAKER_00: I wonder if you'd still be in Babylon, still enjoying, or whether you say, Do you know what, God, whatever you're up to now, count me in.
• 36:46
  SPEAKER_00: Count me in to serve your purposes, count me in to lift for you wholeheartedly, count me in to rebuild the society that's gone AWOL, count me in for sharing the good news of Jesus.
• 36:55
  SPEAKER_00: And if there was a little book, maybe you're getting it.
• 36:58
  SPEAKER_00: Because God sees those who cooperate, see those whose heart respond, um, and they returned.
• 37:05
  SPEAKER_00: So chapter two is is about the return.
• 37:07
  SPEAKER_00: Chapter three is to say it's about rebuilding uh the altar first and the foundations.
• 37:12
  SPEAKER_00: And there's something about when we rebuild, first of all, let's get carried away with church, this, that, and the other.
• 37:19
  SPEAKER_00: Let's get excited by the cross.
• 37:21
  SPEAKER_00: Here's the place where where mercy and grace meets our brokenness and forgiveness.
• 37:27
  SPEAKER_00: Let's constantly that's where we start.
• 37:28
  SPEAKER_00: That's the hope we have for the nations.
• 37:31
  SPEAKER_00: Chapter 4 says about how the work stops because of opposition.
• 37:34
  SPEAKER_00: Whenever you there's a move of God and you partake and you join in, actually uh people are going to misunderstand you.
• 37:41
  SPEAKER_00: There's going to be opposition from people.
• 37:43
  SPEAKER_00: They were here.
• 37:44
  SPEAKER_00: Actually, behind that opposition, maybe there's dark forces, dark forces that um of people that uh that are kind of against God's purposes.
• 37:52
  SPEAKER_00: Actually, we need to, they faced opposition.
• 37:54
  SPEAKER_00: Actually, they gave in.
• 37:56
  SPEAKER_00: But with Jesus, we have the chance of on the cross of winning.
• 38:02
  SPEAKER_00: Um 5 and 6 says that um there was the renewal of the work through the prophesying of Haggai and Zechariah, and the temple was complete.
• 38:11
  SPEAKER_00: Actually, when the physical temple was rebuilt, actually that was only half the deal because the spiritual life of the people of God needed to happen.
• 38:18
  SPEAKER_00: So this is when Ezra comes.
• 38:20
  SPEAKER_00: Ezra um Ezra um had great ancestral pedigree.
• 38:27
  SPEAKER_00: Now, ancestry seemed to matter to the people uh here.
• 38:31
  SPEAKER_00: And and Ezra was not just a Levite, somebody who was descended from Levi.
• 38:36
  SPEAKER_00: He was actually descended from Aaron.
• 38:39
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, he was one of Aaron's great great grandchildren.
• 38:42
  SPEAKER_00: So so when um when people came out of Egypt, there was the Levites, which were the descendants of um of Levi, and there was probably a hundred thousand or so of them.
• 38:54
  SPEAKER_00: But there was only one mo one Aaron.
• 38:56
  SPEAKER_00: And and and Aaron was the high priest, and so Aaron's descendants were kind of super important, were kind of like priesthood royalty.
• 39:04
  SPEAKER_00: Um and and Ezra was a descendant of Aaron.
• 39:08
  SPEAKER_00: And the descendant of Aaron, actually, even though he was in captivity, he knew the sense of destiny, he knew that sense of call in his life.
• 39:16
  SPEAKER_00: So actually, he had dedicated himself to studying God's word.
• 39:19
  SPEAKER_00: Although the temple wasn't in existence, he kind of knew what temple worship should look like.
• 39:25
  SPEAKER_00: He kind of knew what it should be, the sacrificial system and and and the wave offerings and the bread offerings and the burnt offerings and the goats, the sheep, the pigeons.
• 39:33
  SPEAKER_00: He knew that stuff.
• 39:34
  SPEAKER_00: So when he comes back, actually, he's the one, when the fabric of the temple is rebuilt, he's the one who comes to make sure that the processes of the temple happen how God fully intended.
• 39:46
  SPEAKER_00: And not only that, he's the one who can bring the spiritual life in renewal.
• 39:52
  SPEAKER_00: So we have his journey in chapter eight, we have him uh confronting mixed marriages in chapter nine, and and chapter ten is this call.
• 40:01
  SPEAKER_00: We must be reconciled with God.
• 40:04
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, that's where we got into the problem in the first place.
• 40:07
  SPEAKER_00: We didn't follow God wholeheartedly.
• 40:10
  SPEAKER_00: Actually, we we turned aside from God to follow foreign idols, foreign gods, go for money and for sex and all that kind of the world had to offer.
• 40:19
  SPEAKER_00: Actually, we lost God.
• 40:20
  SPEAKER_00: Actually, he calls them back and says, actually, we must be reconciled with God.
• 40:25
  SPEAKER_00: Because if we're reconciled with God, the promise to Abraham could be fulfilled through us.
• 40:29
  SPEAKER_00: If we're reconciled to God, the promise to David could be fulfilled through us.
• 40:33
  SPEAKER_00: Actually, if we're reconciled to God, maybe this temple that looks like a pale shadow of the temple that Solomon built, actually, maybe still now God could work.
• 40:45
  SPEAKER_00: And the book of Ezra finishes with this question, Mark, because they build the temple, but we don't hear of God filling it.
• 40:53
  SPEAKER_00: When Solomon finishes his temple, there's this kind of numinous moment where the cloud fills the temple, and the very presence of God fills the temple, and the God who's everywhere is definitely somewhere.
• 41:05
  SPEAKER_00: He's there in the Holy of Holies.
• 41:08
  SPEAKER_00: When they rebuild this temple and when they pray and offer the sacrifices, actually, we don't hear about the glory of God filling the place.
• 41:17
  SPEAKER_00: And there's this question: where is the temple?
• 41:21
  SPEAKER_00: Actually, why isn't the God who's everywhere dwelling somewhere?
• 41:26
  SPEAKER_00: And that question holds in the air for 400 years until Jesus comes.
• 41:31
  SPEAKER_00: And when Jesus comes, the God who is everywhere is somewhere.
• 41:35
  SPEAKER_00: Actually, here there's a new temple, a new temple not built by human hands, but a temple where the very presence of God, his healing, his love, his forgiveness is active.
• 41:50
  SPEAKER_00: And in some way, Ezra does all they can within the purpose of God, within their generation, but it still finishes.
• 41:56
  SPEAKER_00: But there must be more.
• 41:58
  SPEAKER_00: There must be more.
• 41:59
  SPEAKER_00: And we, this side of the cross, we understand that more is the person of Jesus.
• 42:04
  SPEAKER_00: We understand that more is that He is the God who's everywhere.
• 42:07
  SPEAKER_00: There is a temple that He in His body destroyed this temple in three days.
• 42:11
  SPEAKER_00: I rebuild it, he says in John.
• 42:14
  SPEAKER_00: Actually, amazingly, you are the temple of the Holy Spirit.
• 42:19
  SPEAKER_00: We are being built together.
• 42:21
  SPEAKER_00: Actually, what was happening there in Ezra's time, they were rebuilding a physical temple to try and kind of try and be a place where God can dwell.
• 42:30
  SPEAKER_00: Actually, we are spiritual stones being built together to be a spiritual house where God Himself can dwell.
• 42:36
  SPEAKER_00: Actually, that's what this generation needs.
• 42:39
  SPEAKER_00: This generation needs to know that the God who's everywhere, the universe, actually is somewhere.
• 42:44
  SPEAKER_00: As we meet together, as we love one another, as we care for one another, actually we build something here where the presence of God is, where people come into your small group, come into your home, see you, see the kind of on a Sunday here.
• 42:59
  SPEAKER_00: Actually, they come in and they think, do you know what?
• 43:01
  SPEAKER_00: Something's going on here because the God who's everywhere is somewhere in this temple being built together.
• 43:10
  SPEAKER_00: So the book of Ezra speaks to us about purity, it speaks about dedication, it speaks to us about who's prepared to leave behind all that the world has to offer to fulfil the purposes of God in your generation.
• 43:20
  SPEAKER_00: It speaks of rebuilding, of building together a space and a place where the purposes of God can be made known to an inquisitive world.
• 43:29
  SPEAKER_00: And that's our privilege, and that's our joy, that's our response.
• 43:35
  SPEAKER_00: Run out of time.
• 43:36
  SPEAKER_00: Very sorry.
• 43:37
  SPEAKER_00: It's five past eight.
• 43:38
  SPEAKER_00: We probably need to finish.
• 43:40
  SPEAKER_00: But is that interesting?
• 43:43
  SPEAKER_00: Um I th I think the book of Ezra is a fascinating book.
• 43:46
  SPEAKER_00: Uh you have to read it.
• 43:49
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, those of you that put your hands up before say you've never read it, why not go back home sometime this week, give it a little read, and and and wrestle with it.
• 43:58
  SPEAKER_00: It's not all caught, it's not all straightforward, but within it there's some principles for us to live by today.
• 44:03
  SPEAKER_00: Let me pray.
• 44:04
  SPEAKER_00: Lord God, thank you so much for your word.
• 44:06
  SPEAKER_00: Thank you.
• 44:06
  SPEAKER_00: Although it's written many kind of uh yeah, centuries ago, it's something that still speaks for today.
• 44:13
  SPEAKER_00: And God, you you are, I believe you are on the move in this generation.
• 44:17
  SPEAKER_00: And and the question is, how will we respond?
• 44:19
  SPEAKER_00: And I pray we'll respond like Zerubabal and and uh Ezra.
• 44:24
  SPEAKER_00: We'll respond like to those families that that travelled those 900 miles from the security and safety of all that the world had to offer because they knew there was something about your kingdom that was more precious, there's something about your kingdom that was more radical, there's something to to to build, to show a world that this is what God is like.
• 44:42
  SPEAKER_00: Help us in our generation to be those who committed to humility, to purity, to generosity, to rebuilding.
• 44:50
  SPEAKER_00: In Jesus' name.
• 44:51
  SPEAKER_00: Amen.
• 44:54
  SPEAKER_00: Great.
• 44:54
  SPEAKER_00: It's not gonna be one uh uh no, sorry, we yeah, we've got one in March, but uh it's Easter Sunday in April.
• 44:59
  SPEAKER_00: So third third Sunday in March, will we be back here for Bible School?
• 45:03
  SPEAKER_00: Great, thanks so much.