Sustained Freedom Part 1

Sustained Freedom

A Study in the Book of Ezra

            As we experience the freedom of forgiveness and restoration, we need help to sustain that freedom. We can find this help in the book of Ezra. In 539B.C. the Persians defeated the Babylonians. A year later in 538B.C. The Persian King Cyrus released Judean exiles who return to Jerusalem under the leadership of Zerubbabel. Returning to Jerusalem they found their city destroyed and their temple in ruins. Under the leadership of Zerubbabel they rebuilt the foundation of their temple (515 B.C.) following the teachings of the prophets Haggai and Zechariah. Then in 458 B.C. Ezra led a second wave of exiles home to Jerusalem. By this time the people had fallen back into sin. Ezra’s reaction to the sin of the people reveals much about the severity of sin and the hold that it has the heart of man. The way Ezra leads the people in chapter ten is a source of much heartache and confusion and shows the difficulty in dealing with continued sin. This post will focus on chapters 1-6.  

     As the people of Ezra’s day, when it comes to striving towards a God given goal, it seems easier to give up. However, the consequences of doing so are unacceptable. It seems easier to give up because it feels like a God sized goal has been dropped in our not so God sized laps. As much as we desire restoration and healing, we become discouraged with God’s process and naturally slip back into what got us in trouble in the first place. Part of this slip backwards is the human tendency to make the same mistakes repeatedly from generation to generation. With this in mind, I want to turn our attention to the book of Ezra with the hopes that we will grow in our understanding of how God directly guides who He is restoring.     

     In the first two chapter, we see God restoring through the stirring of hearts. Commentator John Gill sheds light of this issue by stating: "Who has the hearts of all men in his hands, and even of the kings of the earth, and canturn them as he pleases; he wrought upon him, put it into his heart, enlightened his mind, showed him what was right, and his duty to do, and pressed him to the performance of it; so that he could not be easy until he had done it, and he was made thoroughly willing, and even eager to do it".

     God stirred the heart of Cyrus toward what He had prophesied 100 years prior (Jeremiah 25). A general reading may call for a reminder that Cyrus was a pagan king. He was under no relational obligation to obey God. God directly moved him to do His specific will in fulfillment of His promises. When it looks like God is not working, our faithful patience is required, believing that He can move any heart. Though this is the case in many situations, the paradox of God’s sovereignty and the free will of man remains.

     The third and fourth chapters of Ezra take us through three common seasons. Here we see that it is through the new and old that God restores. First God restores appropriate worship. It seems that all restoration and freedom start with worship (3:1-7). The second season is one that moves us into a free future by connecting old and new. This is not easy because the new is not exciting for many who remember a more glorious past (3:8-13). The third season is the seemingly common and re-occurring season of discouragement (Ch.4). Through all these seasons, God leads through his stirring hand.  

      Moving to into the fifth and sixth chapters of Ezra, we see that He restores through His watchful eye. This is directly applied to our efforts of freedom through the support of spiritual leadership (5:1-2). As we saw in chapters 3-4, the old plays a part in the new. Here we see that the support of a past has a powerful effect in moving God’s people into their future (5:3-17). Finally, Ezra teaches that God works through the support from unforeseen sources to complete the work (Ch. 6).     

     In conclusion to this section of Ezra we can say that God slowly guides who He restores. The prophet Habakkuk prophesied around the year 600 B.C. when he said, “For still the vision awaits its appointed time; it hastens to the end--it will not lie. If it seems slow, wait for it; it will surely come; it will not delay" (2:3). This prophecy was fulfilled in 539 B.C. and became the motivation for the Apostle Paul’s teaching on the righteous live by faith (Rom. 1:17; Gal. 3:11; Heb. 10:38).