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Man, the title of my sermon this morning is infiltration by the enemy. Infiltration by the enemy. In this chapter, Ezra chapter 4, the Jews are coming back from the Babylonian captivity and they're going to rebuild the house of the Lord and you've got some enemies that don't want to see God's house prospering and being built and thriving. And so these enemies, they're following the old adage, if you can't beat them, join them. So they want to infiltrate and try to destroy the work of God from the inside. Now if you look at verse number 1 of Ezra chapter 4, it says, Now when the adversaries of Judah and Benjamin heard that the children of the captivity builded the temple unto the Lord God of Israel, and let me just stop right there and show you that the narrator of the Bible here is telling us immediately that these people are bad. They are adversaries. They are enemies. They are not actually sincere in what they're going to say. Even from the beginning, that's what the narrator is telling us. These people are enemies and they have this idea to come in and infiltrate. And so look what they say in verse number 2, Then they came to Zerubbabel and to the chief of the fathers and said unto them, Let us build with you, for we seek your God as ye do, and we do sacrifice unto him since the days of Esarhaddon king of Asher, which brought us up hither. So these people, they're talking a good talk. They're saying the right things. They're using the right terminology about worshiping the Lord, the God of Israel, and they're going to make sacrifices unto him and so forth. So they're talking a good talk, but in reality, we know from verse number 1 that these people are fake. These people are not legitimate. And you know, the Bible tells us in the New Testament that there are people out there and I'll just quote this for you, but Romans 16, 18 says, For they that are such serve not our Lord Jesus Christ, but their own belly and by good words and fair speeches deceive the hearts of the simple. And so a lot of times the words that are coming out of their mouth are good, but they're wicked. They're not serving Jesus Christ and they will deceive the hearts of the simple. But those that are a little wiser can sometimes see through these phony infiltrators for what they really are. Now let me just give you a little bit of the historical background about who these people actually are based on what they said here in verse number 2. At the end of verse number 2, they said, Since the days of Esarhaddon, king of Asur, which brought us up hither, they're saying, We've served your same God going way back to that time. Now who is Esarhaddon and what is Asur? Well, that is just a different spelling or a different name for Assyria, okay? When you see that A-S-S-U-R, okay? That is the person who is the ancient ancestor of the Assyrians and where they get their name. So just like sometimes you'll refer to a place by the name of the person, like you'll call it Edom or Israel or whatever, based on their ancient ancestor, then the Assyrians are often known by their ancestor Asur. And so this is the king of Assyria. Now if you remember that after the days of Solomon, the nation of Israel was divided into two kingdoms. You have the northern kingdom of Israel with Samaria as its capital ultimately and then you have the southern kingdom of Judah with Jerusalem as the capital. Well the northern kingdom was always more wicked than the southern kingdom. They turned away from the Lord way sooner and they were always more idolatrous and messed up than the southern kingdom and so they went into captivity sooner, okay? Long before the southern kingdom of Judah was taken captive by the Babylonians, the northern kingdom of Israel was taken captive by the Assyrians, a different empire that came before the Babylonians. The Assyrian empire was the one who came in and conquered the northern kingdom. They tried to conquer the southern kingdom of Judah but God protected the southern kingdom because at that time they were right with God and they were able to last longer and it wasn't until the Babylonians that they got taken captive. So when the northern kingdom of Israel went captive into Assyria, well then what the Assyrians did is they want to put foreigners back into that northern kingdom in order to populate the land. So it's like they want to take the Israelites out and then they're going to replace them with other people, other foreigners. And in the book of 2 Kings, you have this record of that taking place and when they put the people back in, God is cursing the people of the land and people are getting attacked by wild animals and just bad things are happening and so therefore they decided, you know, we better worship the Lord so that these bad things stop happening because obviously we don't know this God of the land because they're pagan polytheistic people who think that like each geography has a God and so, oh no, we moved to a new area and we don't know how to worship the God here. So then they call some bogus phony Israelite priest who's going to teach them how to worship the Lord. And what they do is instead of switching from paganism to worshiping the Lord, they basically just do both. So in the book of 2 Kings, it records that the Samaritans, as they eventually come to be known, the Samaritans, which are basically these people of the northern kingdom that are sort of a mix because, you know, most of the Israelites have been taken out captive. You've been brought in all these foreigners mixed in and they bring all their paganism, but then they're like, well, we better worship the Lord too since this is the Lord's area geographically. They end up doing this hybrid religion where they're like mixing paganism with the worship of the Lord. Well, that's not how worshiping the God of the Bible works. You know, there's 10 commandments in the Old Testament, right? Out of the Old Covenant, you've got that 10 commandments. And the very first one is, thou shalt have no other gods before me. And so you are not allowed to worship other gods while you worship the Lord. You have to worship the Lord God only, him only shalt thou serve, the Bible says. And so these people are not actual true believers because they're just mixing the paganism with the worship of the Lord, okay? So they're talking a big talk like, oh yeah, we worship God, worship the Lord, but are they actually saved? No, because today if someone says, well, I'm a Christian, but I'm also a Hindu, they're not saved, okay? People who try to mix Christianity with other false religions, other pagan religions, and they think they can do both. We would all look at that person and say, you're not really saved because the true believer in Christ has all of their faith in Jesus Christ. They're fully trusting the fact that Jesus Christ died and was buried and rose again for them as their only way to heaven. They're not trusting something else or someone else. They're not mixing other religions with Christianity, it's just the Bible. Because this is the thing about God, he's a jealous God. And God said, my name is jealous, I am a jealous God. And so you will not have any other gods before me. I am the only God you're gonna worship. That's what God says over and over again throughout the Old Testament, that's reiterated in the New Testament, that in order to be saved, all of our faith and trust has to be in Jesus. And so these people are saying, well, we serve the same God as you, we worship the Lord, but if we know the background, if we know the history, these people are not actually saved, okay? And by the way, Jesus, when he talks to the woman at the well, rebukes the Samaritan religion as well, because she says, well, you know, you guys, the Jews say that we have to worship in Jerusalem, but this mountain is where our fathers worshiped. And he basically says, you worship, you know not what? We know what we worship for salvation is of the Jews, that's what Jesus says. So on this thing of southern kingdom religion, Judah, Jerusalem versus northern kingdom Samaritan religion, Jesus comes down real hard on the line of the southern kingdom and says, hey, this northern kingdom Samaritan hybrid garb, you know, you don't even know what you're talking about, okay? Salvations of the Jews. What does that, what does that mean? He's basically saying the Samaritans aren't saved, right? Now eventually a lot of them do convert and get saved and believe on Jesus, and of course we see Philip in the book of Acts, you know, winning a whole bunch of Samaritans to Christ. We see Jesus in his ministry getting a lot of Samaritans saved. Obviously the individual has always been saved in various nations throughout history, but in general the Samaritans are not saved. In general they're following a false religion, and in general the God of Jerusalem, the God of David and the southern kingdom and that house, that's the true God, that's the true religion. So anyway that's just a little background to see what's going on, but what was the first thing we saw? We saw number one, the narrator, the omniscient narrator of the Bible tips us off, these people are enemies, they're bad. But then they come and say, we want to work with you, we want to build with you, we want to help you, which doesn't really make sense because they're enemies, right? But it's because they're trying to infiltrate and destroy the work from within. They talk a good talk, fair speeches and good words, but are they actually saved? Well if we know our history we know that they're part of a false religion, because notice they're not saying, hey we just got saved, you know, in the last few years. They're saying, well we've been worshipping God all the way since the days of Esarhaddon king of Asher. Well Esarhaddon king of Asher, Esarhaddon took power right after the Israelites went captive. So that's that time when they made this bogus pagan fake religion. Oh yeah we've been, you know, yeah of course I've been saved since I, you know, whatever joined whatever the pagan, you know, East Orthodox, Roman Catholic, Mormonism. It's like whoa buddy, you know, that's different, okay? And so let's move on here. Verse number three. It says, but Zerubbabel and Jeshua and the rest of the children, or excuse me, the rest of the chief of the fathers of Israel said to them, you have nothing to do with us to build a house unto our God, but we ourselves together will build unto the Lord God of Israel as king Cyrus, the king of Persia, hath commanded us. So in verse one, the narrator tells us they're bad. In verse two, they talk a really good talk, it sounds good, it sounds like they're friendlies, but then in verse three, the leadership identifies them for what they really are, right? The leadership of the Jews says, wait a minute, you guys are bogus, you have nothing to do with this work, we're going to do this work, we don't want fellowship with you. And the shepherd, right? In the New Testament, he sees the wolf coming, and he protects the flock. He defends the flock. This is part of the job of being a pastor, right? Because pastor and shepherd are synonymous. And so basically, Zerubbabel and Jeshua are like the shepherds of the flock here, and they see the wolf coming. And let's face it, the wolf often comes in sheep's clothing, right? The Bible says, beware of false prophets, which come to you in sheep's clothing, but inwardly, they're ravening wolves. The Bible warned us in Second Peter chapter two, verse one, but there were false prophets also among the people, even as there shall be false teachers among you, who privily, privily means secretly, they're not going to do it openly, who privily shall bring in damnable heresies, even denying the Lord that bought them and bring upon themselves swift destruction. The job of being a leader in the church, being a pastor, is being able to identify these false prophets and false teachers and these wolves in sheep's clothing. And God says, look, these people are going to have good words, they'll deceive the hearts of the simple, people that are new, people that are inexperienced, people that haven't been saved very long, people that are a little bit naive, they're going to get sucked in. But it's, it's the job of the leadership to basically point these people out sometimes say, wait a minute, this guy's not here for the right reasons. You know, this guy's an infiltrator, this guy is bogus, okay? And a person who's too naive and too gullible and too trusting is not fit to be a pastor because this is part of the job is to be able to protect the flock and defend the flock from these type of people. So it's important for a pastor to understand this doctrine that there are infiltrators out there, that there are people who creep into churches and it's not that they might be among you, it's that they shall be among you according to second Peter chapter two verse one. So this is not just theory, this is going to happen, okay? So the leadership, they see through these people and they call it out for what it is. Now look at verse number four, you're there in Ezra chapter four, it says, then the people of the land weakened the hands of the people of Judah and troubled them in building and hired counselors against them to frustrate their purpose all the days of Cyrus, King of Persia, even until the reign of Darius, King of Persia. The word frustrate there means to make it vain, to make it of no effect. So they're frustrating their purpose. Basically they're making them unable to fulfill the mission of building God's house. So isn't it interesting, these people just said in verse number two, let us help you. We want to build with you. As soon as they're told no by the leadership, no, we don't want you around, hit the road. Now all of a sudden they're in the business of fighting against the work of God, weakening the hands of the people of Judah. And notice that they get other people to do their dirty work for them because it says in verse five, they hired counselors against them, maybe because they're still trying to put on an outward show of, Oh, poor us. I mean, can you believe how, you know, that mean spirited Zerubbabel, the hateful Jeshua just, you know, here we are just trying to serve God and he just, he just shuts us down and well, but then in the background, they're hiring people to speak against the work. They're hiring people to fight against the work of God. So these people are very two faced, they're fake and they're getting other people to do the dirty work for them. Okay. So then it says in verse number six and in the reign of Ahasuerus, so this is a little bit later. So first they're just kind of hiring people and doing this more covertly. But then in verse six it says in the reign of Ahasuerus in the beginning of his reign wrote they unto him an accusation against the inhabitants of Judah and Jerusalem. So now they get to a point where they're just openly opposing God's house, openly fighting against the work of God's house and just, just, they're not even doing it, you know, as a pretense anymore. Now again, it'd be tempting to look at this and say, well, you know, these people just wanted to serve God, but it's just that the leadership was so mean. That's why they then turned into enemies. You know, you know, it's, it's, it's preachers like you, why people don't go to church. You're pushing people away from Christianity or something like that. But here's the thing. We know from verse one that these people were already bad. They didn't get pushed away because somebody was rude to them or mean to them. No, no, they were evil infiltrators. And because Zerubbabel and Jeshua were experienced and knew they spotted, because what? They knew the background of this false religion. They don't want to bring in this pagan Christian hybrid into the house of God. They knew that they know about what the Samaritans are up to. They know what the doctrine is from that crowd. They know what these people are like and they know that they're enemies. And so that's why they said, Nope, you guys aren't welcome. And then they're, you know, going to play a victim or whatever. But at the end of the day, they ultimately just openly oppose the work of God and write these accusations against Jerusalem. So it says that in verse seven, in the days of Artaxerxes wrote Bishlam, Mithradath, Tabeel and the rest of their companions unto Artaxerxes, King of Persia and the writing of the letter was written in the Syrian tongue and interpreted in the Syrian tongue for Syrian is another word for Aramaic. That's usually what we would call that language. And this is where the text actually switches from Hebrew to Aramaic. So in the original language, when you get to verse eight, it starts being in Aramaic. That's why it's making a point to tell us, Hey, this is in the Syrian language. And then it gives us the actual historical document in Aramaic. But let's just, you know, for sake of time, let's just jump down to verse 12 to get to the meat of this, of what their accusation is against the people of God. It says in verse 12, be it known unto the king that the Jews which came up from thee to us are coming to Jerusalem. Watch this building the rebellious and the bad city and have set up the walls thereof and joined the foundations. So notice that these people who said, we want to help you build it are now saying, oh man, it's a rebellious bad city. And not only that, but a little bit later, they're going to say, you know, in verse 15 that if you search in the book of the records, you're going to see it's always been a bad city. It's always been a rebellious city. So then why were you trying to help build it? Here's the lesson. People who just turn on a dime like this, guess what? They never loved the church in the first place. People who come to the church and they're so gung ho and they love the church and then all of a sudden they're just the bitterest enemies of the church. They just hate the church and so bad. Guess what? If the Bible were being written today about these people, verse one would be like, then there were adversaries of the church that came to make trouble, to infiltrate, to fight against the work of the Lord. We know, obviously we don't have the luxury of having a narrator telling us that, but when you see people that just do this 180 from, oh man, this is great, we're going to help you build, let's build Jerusalem, let's build the house of the Lord, to just this thing of just, oh, it's such a bad city, oh, it's such a wicked city. In fact, look at a history book, it's always been bad. They never loved the church in the first place. They never loved God's house in the first place. Here's a great scripture for you to remember. Very important. In fact, let's turn there. Keep your finger in Ezra, because obviously that's the main text this morning. But flip over to 1 John chapter two, because this is such an important verse, you should underline these verses, you should memorize these verses, because if you're in church long enough and saved long enough, you're going to see this play out over and over again. And here's what you need to understand, that people who've been in church for a year or two may not understand this phenomenon, because this is kind of one of those things that you almost have to experience firsthand before it really becomes real to you. But those of us that have been in church for decades, we've seen this so many times where people will turn out to be phonies. People will turn out to be bogus. People will turn out to be infiltrators. And it's shocking until you've seen it over and over again, then it kind of stops being shocking after a while. And there are so many Bible verses warning us that it's hard to be too shocked when there's that many scriptures pointing us to this. But look what the Bible says in 1 John 2 18, this is so important. Little children, it is the last time and as you've heard that antichrist shall come, even now are there many antichrists whereby we know that is the last time. Verse 19 is the one that you really want to focus on, underline, memorize. They went out from us, but they were not of us. For if they had been of us, they would no doubt have continued with us, but they went out that they might be made manifest that they were not all of us. Okay. It's not that, Oh, these people are fighting against the work of God because Zerubbabel offended them because Jeshua offended them. Nope. They were never of them in the first place. They never were saved in the first place. Okay. They went out from us, but they were not of us just because people go to church and say the right things. That doesn't really tell you what's going on in their heart. Does it? And it doesn't mean that they're legitimate. And so when you see people go out from us and when we say us here, we're not talking about faithful word Baptist church here. We're not saying, Hey, if they leave faithful word, you know, they were never of us. That's not what we're saying because this is not the only legitimate church. Okay. There are lots and lots of legitimate Bible believing churches in the Phoenix area, in Arizona, in the United States and across the world. But even in the Phoenix area, there are lots and lots of churches where people love the Lord. They're serving God. We're not the only game in town. Okay. So if someone switches to another Bible believing church, then Hey, great. Amen. More power to them. God bless them, right? Nobody's forcing anybody to go to a certain church. I believe that we have the freedom as Christians to switch churches. I'm not one of these people that says like, you know, Hey, you know, you got to stay with that church until you die and, and, and be loyal to it and whatever. Now look, I do think that people make a mistake when they're just hopping churches and not planted anywhere, not settled anywhere. But if there's actually a legitimate reason or a compelling reason to switch, or maybe you just move geographically, then switching churches can definitely be appropriate. There's absolutely nothing wrong with switching churches, but when we talk about, they went out from us, but they were not of us. Okay. We're not talking about them leaving a certain congregation or a certain church. What we're talking about is them leaving the faith, leaving the faith in general. We're talking about people who they leave and now all of a sudden they're joining another religion. Okay. So if somebody leaves our church and goes and joins the Mormon church, we would, I believe all agree based on this scripture and other scriptures, we would say that person was never saved in the first place, period. Because if they'd been of us, they would no doubt have continued with us. You know, Jesus talked about how his sheep, they hear his voice, they know the shepherd, a stranger will they not follow, a stranger will they flee from for they know not the voice of strangers. And of course the LDS church, that's the voice of strangers. That's not the voice of the shepherd. That's not biblical Christianity. You know, once you're saved, you have the Holy Spirit living inside of you to guide you into all truth. You're not going to sit there and just join a false religion. I'm a Hindu now. I'm a Buddhist now. We would say, Hey, you were never saved in the first place. If somebody said, I'm an atheist now, I'd say you were never saved in the first place. If somebody said, you know, Oh, well, I'm Roman Catholic now. I'm Eastern Orthodox now. We had, look, we had a family that came to our church for almost a year and then left and joined the Russian Orthodox church. I have zero doubt in my mind that those people were not saved because no saved, born again Christian is going to go join the Russian Orthodox church, which is way, way out there from biblical Christianity, super pagan and not even close to being the gospel of Jesus Christ. Salvation by faith, not even close, way, way off the mark. I would look at that situation and say, they went out from us, but they were not all of us for if they had been of us, they would no doubt. How much doubt is there? No doubt that they would have continued with us. And again, we're not talking about physically continuing with us. We're talking about spiritually. They would continue believing the gospel of Jesus Christ. They would continue believing that salvation is by faith. They would continue believing that the Bible is the word of God. They're not just going to switch religions and deny the word of God, deny salvation by faith. Does everybody see the difference? But they went out that they might be made manifest that they were not all of us. So what does manifest mean? Manifest means it's open, it's exposed, it's obvious, it's public. That's what manifest means. So here's the thing. They were never of us in the first place, but them going out, all it did was just make public what was already in their heart all along, what they already were all along, which is a false brother. They were not actually a real Christian. They didn't actually have Jesus Christ in their hearts. They're false brethren. And by departing from the faith, they're basically showing that to everyone. And the wise person would know, okay, this person was never saved because they've studied scripture. They know this verse. They know lots of other. And again, I could spend a whole sermon just looking up other verses that would reinforce the teachings of 1 John 2 19. But just put this one in your computer, 1 John 2 19 and just let it sink in and just realize that this is a thing that people are going to depart from the faith and they were never saved in the first place. And all that's happening is just that that's being revealed now, what they really were. And look, I've seen people come to our church and they're so gung ho for the King James Bible and they love the preaching and then they leave and a week later they hate our church. We had a family that literally turned against our church to the point where the sermon that they said was their favorite sermon that actually got them listening to me in the first place. They were attacking that sermon within a week of being thrown out of the church and saying that that was a bad sermon. The sermon that was supposedly their favorite. And then within a week they're quoting other Bible versions. Within a week they're just, they're just against everything that they've supposedly stood for the last few years and there's just like turned on a dime. We've had people just go get cast out of our church and less than a week later they're promoting gay pride on the Internet. It's like, wait a minute, hold on a second. You've been going to faithful word for years and you're gung ho and you loved it. Now all of a sudden it's just as bad rebellious city, you know? And so when these people turn on a dime, it's because they never were with it in the first place. Okay. They didn't love the church in the first place. That's why they just turn on a dime like that. And when you see people departing from the faith, it's because they were never in the faith in the first place. Because once you're saved, you're always saved. And not only that though, once you're saved, you have the Holy Spirit living inside of you. You're not going to stop believing in Christ. You might have doubts. I think every single believer has had doubts and doubted their salvation or doubted the word of God or doubted Christ or doubted God. But there's a big difference between having doubts and just not believing it. And just saying like, I don't believe in Jesus or I am this other religion now or something. And look, I grew up in church with people that now say that they're Buddhist or agnostic or whatever. Those people were never saved. I have no doubt about it because of what the scripture teaches. So let's go back to Ezra chapter four, where we were here. And so now they're saying it's a rebellious bad city. Verse 13, be it known now unto the king that if this city be builded and the walls set up again, then will they not pay toll, tribute and custom. And so thou shalt and damage the revenue of the kings. This is a false accusation, okay? They are loyal to the Persian empire. They have no issue with the Persians. They're not trying to rebel and break off and be their own kingdom and have their and break. They're not because this accusation comes up again later in the book of Nehemiah and Nehemiah denies this and says, no, you know, so this is a false accusation that's made up. And it says in verse 14 now because we have maintenance from the king's palace and it was not meet for us to see the king's dishonor. Therefore have we sent and certified the king. So they're trying to kind of paint this in a noble light. Like they have a moral high ground. Like we don't want to see the king dishonored, you know? So they're kind of flattering the king like, Hey, we're doing this because we love you because we care about you and we don't want you to get dishonored. But the truth slips out because people can't help but speak what's in their heart. In verse 14 they say, we have maintenance from the king's palace. So at the end of the day, they're worried about themselves, you know, because the king is basically, you know, they, they get some, some, uh, welfare or something, you know, they're getting some kind of a subsidy from the king. And so that's why we don't want the king to be damaged here that, uh, and so it says, therefore have we sent and certified the king at the end of verse 14 that search may be made in the book of the records of thy fathers. So shall thou find in the book of the records and know that this city is a rebellious city and hurtful unto kings and provinces and that they have moved sedition within the same of old time for which cause this city was destroyed. We certify the king that if the city be builded again and the walls there have set up by this means thou should have no portion on this side of the river. And then look what it says in verse 24. It says, actually let's read verse 23. Now when the copy of King Artaxerxes letter was read before Rehem and Shimshai the scribe and their companions, they went up in haste to Jerusalem unto the Jews and made them deceased by force and power, then ceased the work of the house of God, which is at Jerusalem. So it ceased under the second year of the reign of Darius, king of Persia. So we see here that their goal ultimately becomes the total destruction of the church, the total end to the work of the house of God. That's what they want to accomplish here. And it seems for a moment that they have accomplished that at the end of verse 24 of chapter four. It's like, well, it ceased. So it seems like they won, right? Because basically they write these letters, they make these false accusations. First they tried just the propaganda campaign, that didn't work. So then they try to sic the authorities on them. And then finally they get the work to stop. But that shows what their goal is. The total destruction of the church, bringing God's house and its work to an end. And again, I've seen examples of this. For example, you know, there were some people that got, there was a guy who got thrown out of steadfast Baptist church, a friend of ours, uh, pastor Shelley pastors church called steadfast Baptist church in Texas. And there was this guy who was a flat earther, you know, so he's, he's spreading that stupidity and garbage. He's flat earth and, and anyway, long story about this guy, total bozo, total idiot infiltrator. He ends up getting thrown out of the church and then he just makes it his mission to just fight the church, hate the church, attack the church. And then ultimately he openly said that his goal was that this church would close its doors and cease to exist. You know, supposedly this was a church that he had loved and been a part of for years, but then when he gets busted, sowing discord, false teaching, whatever, and gets thrown out of the church. Now all of a sudden he's this enemy of the church and now all of a sudden he openly just says, I want the church to close its doors. I want the church to cease to exist. And he literally, you know, uh, well it's a long story, but the bottom line is as you read this, you'll see if you stick around long enough, you'll see these things play out in real life. Exactly what you're reading in Ezra chapter four. But just because their goal is the ultimate destruction of the church or ceasing of God's work and that God's house would not thrive, God always gives the victory unto his servants in the end. Okay. They will never succeed at this. They may seem like they succeed in the short term. They may be able to do a little damage to the church and you know, when they have their little blow up or whatever. But in the end, God is always going to give the victory to his servants because look at verse number one of chapter five. Then the prophets Haggai the prophet and Zechariah the son of Edo prophesied unto the Jews that were in Judah and Jerusalem in the name of the God of Israel, even unto them. Then rose up Zerubbabel the son of Shealtiel and Jeshua the son of Josadak and began to build the house of God, which is in Jerusalem. And with them were the prophets of God helping them. So even though the work ceased temporarily through the preaching of God's word, things are able to get going again, get fired up again. It was just a temporary setback and they get back to building. Okay. Then of course they go to the authorities again and complain to the authorities again. They try to do the same thing that they tried in chapter four that worked in chapter four, but this time it doesn't work. It backfires and go if you would to chapter six, you can see what the answer is from the Persian government. It says in verse seven, let the work of this house of God alone. So Ezra chapter six, verse seven says, leave the work of God's house alone. Just leave this church alone. Stay away from it. It says, let the governor of the Jews and the elders of the Jews build this house of God in his place. Moreover, I make a decree what you shall do to the elders of these Jews for the building of this house of God that of the King's goods, even of the tribute beyond the river forthwith expenses be given unto these men that they be not hindered and that which they have need of both young bullocks and Rams and lambs for the burnt offerings of the God of heaven, wheat, salt, wine, and oil, according to the appointment of the priest, which read Jerusalem, let it be given them day by day without fail. Now look, this isn't what they had in mind when they wrote to the Persian government getting money and fines and resources poured into this project. And so what it goes to show you is that the enemies of God, when they fight against the work of God, ultimately they will not prevail. And ultimately all things will work together for good to those that love God. Even the attacks, even the infiltrators, the attacks, the assaults on the work of God that maybe are a temporary setback in the long run, they actually do good for the house of God, the house of God thrives more like an Exodus chapter one where it says the more they afflicted them, the more they multiplied and grew. And so even this persecution, although it's a temporary setback in the long run, gets them all these resources to help them build God's house even better and to thrive even more. And so this is not what the enemies had in mind, but when the enemies attack the house of God, it ends up backfiring their faces because of God before us who can be against us. You know, Jesus said upon this rock, I will build my church and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it. And so the enemies can huff and puff, but they will never blow this house down because of the fact that God is going to ultimately give his servants the victory. We are more than conquerors through him that loved us and nothing can stand in the way of the church moving forward with God's work. As long as we don't quit, as long as we don't allow ourselves to be destroyed from within, as long as we don't get discouraged, we're going to keep going and God's going to keep on blessing. And it's through the preaching that we can all stay motivated like Haggai and Zechariah motivated them in verse one, you know, to stay motivated, to keep going because really the only way to fail is to quit as long as we don't quit, we're not going to fail as long as we stay with it, stay the course, keep pushing, keep fighting. God's going to bless and all things are going to work together for good to those that love God and it's going to backfire on the enemies. That's what the Bible shows us here. And it says in verse 10 that they may offer sacrifices of sweet savers unto the God of heaven and pray for the life of the king and of his sons. Also I've made a decree that whosoever shall alter this word, let timber be pulled down from his house and being set up, let him be hanged thereon and let his house be made a dung hill for this. And the God that had caused his name to dwell there, destroy all kings and people that shall put to their hand to alter and to destroy this house of God, which is at Jerusalem. I Darius have made a decree, let it be done with speed. And so what is the Bible telling us here? It's telling us here that the enemies of the Lord, the enemies of the house of God, those who fight against a Bible believing church, a soul winning church, a church that's trying to do the work of God, they ultimately get cursed royally by God. They get majorly cursed. God's house continues. Are there setbacks? Are there battles? Of course. But in the end the church thrives and they get smoked because the curse of God is on those who would fight against the work of God. You know the Bible talks about in the book of Psalms, you know how God would protect his people. He would protect Abraham and Isaac and Jacob. He would even rebuke kings for their sake, right? And say, touch not mine anointed and do not my, do my prophets no harm. You know, so God's people, he's going to go to bat for them and the enemies are going to be cursed. You know, people who try to twist God's word, people who try to fight against the work of the Lord, they end up getting destroyed. Okay. And not only that, you know, it says, uh, let his house be made a dung hill for this. Okay. Because he says, first of all, they're going to be hanged, which not only does that mean that they die, but being hung is a particularly shameful way of dying because the Bible says cursed is everyone that is hanged on a tree. So it's a special curse associated with that. That's why Jesus Christ part, part of the reason why Jesus Christ died on the cross was that he basically, you know, he who, uh, who knew no sin became sin for us and he basically took upon himself that shame of the cross and the curse of the law. He took all that by being hanged on a tree, right? By being, and when the Bible says tree, it's not like a tree tree. That means wood basically, cause he's, cause the cross is made out of wood. So when it says he's hanging on a tree, it's saying basically it's a poetic way of saying that he was, you know, hanged on wood, wooden cross. And so we see here that they die. They are cursed. They are destroyed. And also that their house be made a dung hill, you know, and, and basically the, the, the churches that they end up going to are typically, you know, dung hills. Okay. So anyway, they're full of whatever. And so God in verse 12 here is allowing the King of Persia to place these curses upon the enemies of God's house and blessings upon those who are seeking to actually build God's house. And so it says, and the God that have caused his name to dwell there, destroy all Kings and people. And what this, what this is basically saying to put it in our modern vernacular, we would say like, may the God that caused his name to dwell there, destroy them. May God destroy them, right? That's what it's saying there. It says the God that had caused name to dwell there, destroy all Kings and people. Cause it doesn't say destroys with an S it's subjunctive with no S it's like, let it happen. May they be destroyed. That these people that, that shall put to their hand to alter and to destroy this house of God, which said Jerusalem, notice the enemy doesn't just want to destroy God's house. They're okay. If they can just alter God's house, you notice that they're putting to their hand to either destroy God's house or to alter God's house, because here's the thing, you know, let's say faith forward Baptist church or other good churches continue to thrive, but if they get altered, it could get to a point where it's like, well, you don't even care if it survives anymore. Cause it's not the same. If it's not soul winning, if it's not preaching the Bible, if they've changed on salvation, if they've changed on their Bible that, you know, what's the point. And so he says, don't destroy it and don't try to alter it. Don't try to change it and corrupt it into something that is no longer legitimate. And by the way, this is also telling you don't tamper with God's word. You know, if anybody alters this word, they're under a curse. We see that in revelation 22, but we see it back here, don't we? In Ezra chapter six as well. And so the bottom line is that we, as Christians, we love God's house. We're part of a team here. We're part of a church. We're serving God together. Our mission is to win souls. Our mission is to edify the body of Christ and to edify one another and to have a community here of Bible believing Christians, where we can grow in grace and the knowledge of our Lord and savior Jesus Christ, as well as reach a lost and dying world with the gospel. Okay. This is who we are. This is what we're doing. There are people that are going to come along and give lip service that they want to do the same thing, but these people are going to be infiltrators. People privately coming in wolves and sheep's clothing. Don't be super shocked when this happens, because God said that they shall be among you. Not maybe. And even in the first church with Jesus and his disciples, what was one of Jesus's disciples name? Judas Iscariot, right? And so Judas Iscariot is an example that even when Jesus is the pastor, you have an infiltrator there, okay, who seeks to destroy the church. But did it work for Judas? No, it backfired, didn't it? Temporary setback that lasted for three days and three nights, right? Okay. As far as, Oh, you know, Jesus has died on the cross three days and three nights later, the work of God's house is ready to pick up again when Jesus rose from the dead. And that's the pattern. My friend, the same thing you see in Ezra here, it's the same thing you see with Judas Iscariot. Yeah, the infiltrator does damage. Yeah, there's a setback, but ultimately it ends up working out all together for good. You know, when Satan and his minions killed the Prince of life, ultimately that ended up working out for good, didn't it? Because of the resurrection. And so don't be discouraged. Just understand this is a part of the Christian life. This is a part of being in a church. There are going to be these infiltrators. Don't let it disillusion you. Don't get discouraged. Say, Oh, that's it. There's phonies. I'm done. I'm quitting on the church. I'm quitting. God already told you going in that it was going to happen. Do you really think that you're just going to go out there as a church and just get thousands of people saved, witness to thousands and thousands of people knocking every door in city after city, across the Valley and across Arizona. And the devil is just going to kind of just sit back and just let it happen. And sure, they're going to be the external attacks, but obviously they're, he's going to send the internal attacks as well. It's a no brainer, my friend, that if you're doing a lot of work for God, obviously the devil and his minions are going to seek to pull this number that they pulled in Ezra chapter four. So don't be shocked by it. Don't be disillusioned by it. Don't be discouraged by it. Just understand it's part of the Christian life to experience this. You're going to experience disappointments where you think people were legit and they turned out to be phony. Look, my parents talked about it when I was a kid. I mean, my parents have been in church for the last 60 some years and they've seen this play out over and over again. And I've seen it play out in my short life over and over again. Stick around long enough. You're going to see it. Why am I preaching this sermon? Because if you know about it in advance and you understand these concepts in advance, then when it happens, you're not going to freak out and be like, what is happening? What, what, how can this be? It's like the Bible says, think it not strange concerning the fiery trial, which is to try you as though some strange thing happened to you. He's warning you, look, you're going to go through trials and tribulations because if you know that going in, you can handle it. And then when you know not everybody's real, not every pastor is real, not every church member is real, not everybody who claims the name of Christ or even is a gung ho member of faith forward Baptist church is going to turn out to be real. Then as you see this happen, you're going to be like, okay, I can remain calm because we knew this would happen. We knew this was coming. It's always easier to handle things when you know that they're coming. I find that I have a worse reaction to things when they catch me off guard than if I was kind of mentally, emotionally, psychologically, spiritually prepared for stuff. It just makes it easier to deal with. And so I'm trying to educate you this morning that the Bible has this theme. It's in the Old Testament, it's in the New Testament about these Judas Iscariots. What are they like? What's going to happen? How's it going to go down that way when you say, are we dealing with this right now? No, we're not. You say, is our church having problems right now? No, but it's better to just calmly talk about this now and have a sermon like this now when everything's great and when there are no attacks happening and when there is no fighting going on because then you can just calmly evaluate what is the scripture saying and not be emotional about it and not be all worked up about it. Just look, the Bible says this, this is the pattern. And then two years from now, three years from now, four years from now, when there's a battle, you'll remember, Oh yup, there it is. There's Ezra four playing out right before my eyes. And so I hope that this sermon will help you to understand what is happening when those types of things do happen and just give you a better understanding of scripture in general and understanding the book of Ezra, second Peter. What do these things mean? What are we talking about? Well, here's what we're talking about. We're talking about infiltration by the enemy. Let's bow our heads and have a word of prayer. Father, we thank you so much for your word, Lord, thank you for warning us about some of the enemies that are out there, the pitfalls that we're going to face in this world, Lord. And I pray that you would just help us all to realize that we are on the winning side. We are more than conquerors and that nothing can separate us from your love, which is in Christ Jesus, our Lord, and help us to be able to weather whatever storms and battles are coming. And in Jesus' name, we pray. Amen.