Posts
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Certain times in our lives
everything seems to be humming along wonderfully; we face a few hurdles and get
over them, but just when we think we find our groove, that healthy rhythm of
being productive and successful, something happens to bring that groove, that
rhythm to a standstill.
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We can arrive at that place of
inactivity and immobility at any point in our lives. Arriving at a standstill
can have points of entry from anywhere.
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Something happens and we are afraid;
something happens and we get frustrated; something happens and we get
discouraged; something happens and our plans come to a screeching halt.
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In Ezra chapter 3, we saw renewal in
worship as the first wave of exiles returned to the Promised Land. After months
of keeping the feasts, regular sacrifice and worship, they laid the foundation
of the Temple in 536 BC.
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They worked faithfully building that
foundation for two years until 534 BC, then we come to chapter 4 and something
happens.
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Something happens to stop the work
on the Temple and throughout the reigns of four Kings of Persia, spanning 14
years, nothing happened, no work was done on the Temple.
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The rebuilding project was
abandoned.
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Let's take a look at what happened.
o The enemies of Judah and Benjamin heard that the exiles were
rebuilding a Temple to the Lord, the God of Israel. So they approached Zerubbabel and the other leaders and said,
“Let us build with you, for we worship your God just as you do. We have
sacrificed to him ever since King Esarhaddon of Assyria brought us here.” (Ezra 4:1-2, NLT)
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Like in the first return to the
Promised Land under Joshua, Israel faces a challenge from the Canaanites again.
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Israel returns from Babylon to
experience trouble from the people who inhabit the land.
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Right in the middle of this glorious
renewal the enemies of God's people show up because they want a piece of the
action.
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They want to be involved in the
rebuilding project.
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Now the Jews were vulnerable. They
perceive their need to have a positive influence among the people of the land.
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Jerusalem was not yet a walled city
and in those days a city without walls was no city at all.
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It would only be natural for the
Jews to want friends among the people of the land and not hostile neighbors.
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The offer to help rebuild the Temple
sounds like a really good offer but that is not what was going on in the hearts
and minds of the people of the land, and the Jewish leaders understood that
these folks weren't really there to help, they were wolves in sheep's clothing.
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Before we go any further we need to
ask a question.
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What
are the tactics that the enemy of God's people uses to keep them from
completing or focusing on their God-given mission?
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But Zerubbabel, Jeshua, and the other leaders of
Israel replied, “You may have no part in this work. We alone will build the
Temple for the Lord, the
God of Israel, just as King Cyrus of Persia commanded us.” (Ezra 4:3, NLT)
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The Jews felt it was more important
to please God than their neighbors who worshiped the Lord, but also worship the
gods of their ancestors with many wicked practices.
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Although the people of the land
claimed to worship the Lord, the truth was the people of the land did not
worship God as the Jews did at all.
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So what was their motive in offering
to help? They wanted influence, power, and control.
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If the people of the land had wanted
to worship the Lord, then they would have worshipped and served only him as the
law requires, but they did not.
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We need discernment because we need
to be wary of those who come to offer help when inwardly they are looking for
influence, power, and control.
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We need to be able to discern
between those who genuinely want to be of service and help to God's people and
those who have their own personal agendas.
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The
first tactic the enemy uses is deception.
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He will try to get us to compromise
just a little bit and give in to social pressure so that he can get his foot in
the door and exercise influence, power, and control.
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What if that doesn't work and like
Zerubbabel and Yeshua we stand our ground?
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That's when the enemy's gloves come
off. They were about to come out from behind their ruse and show their true
colors.
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The
second tactic the enemy uses is intimidation.
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4 Then the local residents tried to discourage and frighten the
people of Judah to keep them from their work. 5 They bribed agents to work against them and to frustrate
their plans. This went on during the entire reign of King Cyrus of Persia and
lasted until King Darius of Persia took the throne. 24 So
the work on the Temple of God in Jerusalem had stopped, and it remained at a
standstill until the second year of the reign of King Darius of Persia. (Ezra
4:4-5, 24).
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The local people opened
up their bag of tricks filled with intimidation and they caused discouragement
and fear.
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The
third tactic the enemy uses is governmental or political influence.
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They then bribed local
officials who delayed and upset their plans.
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Bribery is a means of government or
political influence, and it is obviously corrupt.
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This first wave of Jews who returned
from exile were so intimidated by what these people did that the work on the
temple stopped until the second year of the reign of Darius.
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On this end, it seems pretty obvious
that for the people of the land the Temple was about them, and not about the Lord.
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Do
our attitudes ever reflect those of the people of the land who frustrated the
Jews and the mission of God?
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Is
what's happening in the church about God or is it about us?
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When
we don't get what we want, do we support the ministry anyway or do we
discourage others and frustrate the ministry?
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Is
the ministry a way to gain influence and control or is it an opportunity to
serve God and others?
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If we envy, discourage, and
frustrate others, it shows we are more interested in promoting ourselves than
in building up Christ's church.
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The people of the land could have
chosen to put God first and become qualified to work with the returned Jews,
but they did not.
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They chose instead power, influence,
and control.
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What
qualifies us to work for the Lord? What qualifies us
to work for the Lord is our relationship
with and worship of Almighty God through Christ and our character in Christ.
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If we want to build God's house, the
body of Christ, his church, then we need a living, growing, thriving
relationship with Christ.
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If we are envying, discouraging, and
frustrating others in ministry, then it shows our relationship with Christ is
anything but thriving and that we need repentance and renewal and to trust
Jesus rather than ourselves.
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The newly returned Jewish exiles
refused to compromise with the people of the land and it didn't look like they
received the blessing of God for their faithfulness.
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The Jews faithfulness endured
lengthy opposition, opposition which refused to go away; their enemies just did
not give up even though the Jews would continue the work God gave them to do.
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When we are faithful, worldly people
who hate God and are only out for their own influence, fame, and control will
also hate us.
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Their offer of help is merely a
friendly, happy faced mask.
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Refuse their help and they'll no
longer pretend to play nice, the happy faced mask will come off.
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Satan, the enemy of our souls, hates
God and hates God's people.
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It's better to be faithful and
refuse to compromise our character and relationship with God, than to start
playing church the world's way.
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Even if it looks like evil is
winning, in the end those victories will mean nothing. God's mission will
not fail because of opposition.
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The people of the land kept the
returned Jews from rebuilding the Temple until 520 BC when the prophets Haggai and
Zechariah showed up and encouraged God's people to finish the work of
rebuilding the Temple and, in 516 BC, the work was complete.
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As for Ezra himself, he did not
return to Jerusalem until 458 BC, 58 years after the second Temple was
completely rebuilt.
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He knew that the earlier opposition
to the rebuilding of the Temple had failed to thwart God's plans.
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God's mission will not fail
because of opposition.
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God will carry out his plans even
through opposition, often despite opposition.
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You may have noticed that we haven't
looked at verses 6 to 23
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Ezra has the benefit of hindsight.
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He's 60 years in the future and the Temple
is finished so he's looking back at what happened before and then flashing
forward.
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He uses verses 1 to 5 and verse 24
like brackets or bookends to highlight the later opposition that happens under
Xerxes and Artaxerxes.
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Verses 1 to 5 and verse 24 are about
the work stoppage on the Temple. Verses 6 to 23 are about the work stoppage on
the wall of Jerusalem.
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Ezra did this to show how long the
tactics of Israel's enemies continued.
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Their adversaries were not afraid to
show that they had political clout and since Cyrus's decree to rebuild the
Temple said nothing about rebuilding Jerusalem's walls, these enemies felt free
to persuade King Artaxerxes that he should make a proclamation that the city
not be rebuilt until the king decreed otherwise (i.e., over his dead body, i.e.
never at least in his mind).
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Again, we see the third tactic the
enemy uses: governmental or
political influence.
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Rehum,
Shimshai, and their associates wrote a letter that played on the King's fears
and influenced him to make a decree.
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Artaxerxes had no interest in Israel
entering another golden age like it had seen under David and Solomon when the
nations around them paid tribute, custom and toll to Israel's Kings.
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In Ezra's mind, just as the
opposition to rebuild the Temple was overcome, so also the opposition to
rebuilding the city and its walls would be overcome.
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God's mission will not fail
because of opposition.
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How
else did the enemies of the returned Jews show their true colors?
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Rehum and Shimshai's letter to King
Artaxerxes reveals a few things:
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First, they saw the Lord's Holiness
as rebellion and evil (verse 12).
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Second, they warned Artaxerxes that
if the Lord's city is rebuilt, then the King will lose money (verse 13).
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Third, they point out that they love
the King more than they love the Lord, implying that the Jews are disloyal to
the King (verse 14).
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Fourth, they urged the King to look
into the matter and see for himself that Jerusalem is a rebellious,
troublesome, and defiant city (verse 15).
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This letter put a worldly spin on
some of the details of Jerusalem's past, twisting the truth for their purposes
and that convinced King Artaxerxes.
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People of our society are
increasingly seeing faithfulness to God as rebellion, evil, and a threat to economic
prosperity.
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Worldly people in our society make
the same sorts of claims about Christ, Christians, and Christianity.
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They twist the truth and put a worldly
spin on it, but under its solid looking veneer is a cheap falsehood.
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Worldly enemies cover up Christians,
Christ, and Christianity with a veneer that satisfies many who don't take the
time to examine what they've heard or read.
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Jesus said, "If you continue in
my word, then you truly are my disciples, and you will know the truth, and the
truth will make you free" (John 8:31-32).
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It is easy to instill fear in those
who are unaware or uninformed, but those who know Jesus and obey him cling to
the truth of his Word.
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God's mission will not fail
because of opposition.
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We often experience fear because we
lack knowledge and the knowledge we do have we have not allowed to impact our
hearts.
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Life is filled with uncertainties,
uncertainties which can take over our lives if we allow them, uncertainties
that can paralyze us with fear, discouragement, and frustration.
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Do
we need to have all the answers before we trust God with today and tomorrow?
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Do
we have to know why and how before stepping out in faith with God?
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Faith
is not trusting our knowledge or understanding, rather faith is trusting and
believing in God and in his word.
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Will God's enemies continue to use
the tactics of deceit, intimidation, and governmental and political influence?
Yes, they will.
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Our enemy will do everything he can
to get us to fall for his deception, to create terror in our hearts, to buy off
and influence those in authority over us in order to stop the work of God.
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He can use circumstances, natural
disasters, money, he can even use us against ourselves!
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The important question is: will we
continue to follow God's directions and carry out his mission? Will we keep our
focus on God's glory or will we allow ourselves to be frozen by fear?
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God's
mission will not fail because of opposition.
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Don't
let the enemy keep us from doing the work God has for us.
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