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you you you Well good evening everyone welcome back to Mountain Baptist Church Take your song books and turn to song 194 Song 194 in your song books will sing since Jesus came into my heart if you would stand we'll sing song 194 What a wonderful change in my life has been wrought since Jesus came into my heart I have light in my soul for which long I had saw since Jesus came into my heart since Jesus came into my heart since Jesus came into my heart Floods of joy on my soul like the sea billows roll since Jesus came into my heart I have seized from my wandering Stray since Jesus came into my heart And my sins which were many are all washed away since Jesus came into my heart since Jesus came into my heart since Jesus came into my heart Floods of joy on my soul like the sea billows roll since Jesus came into my heart I'm possessed of a home that is set fast and sure since Jesus came into my heart And no dark clouds of down now my pathway obscure since Jesus came into my heart Since Jesus came into my heart Since Jesus came into my heart Floods of joy or my soul like the sea billows roll since Jesus came into my heart There's a light in the valley of death now for me since Jesus came into my heart And the gates of the city beyond I can see since Jesus came into my heart Since Jesus came into my heart Since Jesus came into my heart Floods of joy or my soul like the sea billows roll since Jesus came into my heart I shall go there to dwell in that city I know since Jesus came into my heart And I'm happy so happy as onward I go since Jesus came into my heart Since Jesus came into my heart Since Jesus came into my heart Joy or my soul like the sea billows roll Since Jesus came into my heart Let's pray. Heavenly Father Lord again we just want to thank you God just for a wonderful day you've given us in your house. Lord I want to thank you for the sermon this morning and also Lord for the souls that were saved this afternoon. And I pray Lord that you would just bless now. Help it to be for your honor and glory. We love you for it's in Jesus name we ask all of it. Amen. All right you may be seated and take your Mountain Baptist Psalms hymns and spiritual song books. Turn to page number two. Page number two in your Mountain Baptist song books we'll sing Psalm one hundred and fifteen on page number two. Lord, who shall abide in thy tabernacle, who shall dwell in thy holy hill? Lord, who shall abide in thy tabernacle, who shall dwell in thy holy hill? He that walketh uprightly and worketh righteousness, and speaketh the truth in his heart. He that walketh uprightly and worketh righteousness, and speaketh the truth in his heart. He that backbiteth not with his tongue, nor doeth evil to his neighbor, nor take up reproach against his neighbor. He that backbiteth not with his tongue, in whose eyes a vile person has contempt, but he honoreth them that fear the Lord. In whose eyes a vile person has contempt, but he honoreth them that fear the Lord. He that sweareth to his own hurt, and changeth not, he that putteth not out his money to usury. Nor taketh reward against the innocent, he that doeth these things shall never be moved. Lord, who shall abide in thy tabernacle, who shall dwell in thy holy hill? Good afternoon. Anyway, let's get the soloing numbers in for the week here before we get into the announcements. Lost my pen. Nope, there it is. Somewhere in there. Bear with me. What do we have during the week? Do we have any Wednesday one? And then, what was it again yesterday? Twenty-four. So that's twenty-five. And what do we have today? I know you guys had two, right? Yeah, so two. Are there any others today? So, twenty-seven for the week. Praise the Lord for all the souls saved with the marathon and everything. And then obviously with the soul winning here. And then just be in prayer for those that are still traveling as far as safe travels, all that fun stuff. And then also with all the sicknesses going around, all of that, be in prayer for health in our church. As far as service times are concerned, Wednesday, Lord willing, we'll be continuing our study through 2 Samuel this Wednesday. And so be in your places there. And then the regional soul winning times, just be on the church group there. Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, when it comes to those times. We do have the men's prayer meeting coming up this Friday. And then we have on July 5th, fireworks and food and all that fun stuff. Robinson Ridge. And then we have the upcoming soul winning marathons. Cumberland, Maryland in July. And Moorefield, West Virginia in August. I think, well brother Chris, you had another Cumberland one. And then Moorefield, brother Nick and brother Jim. You guys are kind of heading that one up. So be in prayer for those, those are coming up there too. And then Psalm 32 is our memory chapter for the month. Hebrews 13-4 is our memory verse for the week. And on the pregnancy list there, Crystal McCloy, due in August. Be in prayer for her, the McCloy family and the twins that are on the way there. Is that all I have for announcements? My voice is getting worse, I think, as the day is going on. We'll see how it goes tonight, so anyway. Brother Dave is going to come sing one more song. And then brother Joseph, you're reading right. Ezra chapter 1. All right, take your song books and turn to page number 5. Page number 5 in your song books, we'll sing When I Survey the Wondrous Cross. Page number 5. When I survey the wondrous cross On which the prince of glory died My richest gain I count but loss And pour contempt on all my pride Forbidden Lord that I should boast Save in the death of Christ my God All the vain things that charm me most I sacrifice them to his blood See from his hand, his hands, his feet Sorrow and love flowing go down Did e'er such love and sorrow mean Or thorns composed so rich a crown Were the whole realm of nature mine That were a present far too small Love so amazing, so divine Demands my soul, my life, my all All right, take your Bibles and turn to the book of Ezra chapter 1. Book of Ezra chapter 1, we'll have brother Joseph come and read that for us. Ezra chapter 1. And found your place there, say amen. Now in the first year of Cyrus king of Persia That the word of the Lord by the mouth of Jeremiah might be fulfilled The Lord stirred up the spirit of Cyrus king of Persia That he made a proclamation throughout all his kingdom and put it also in writing saying Thus saith Cyrus king of Persia, the Lord God of heaven hath given me all the kingdoms of the earth And he hath charged me to build him an house at Jerusalem which is in Judah Who is there among you of all his people? His God be with him and let him go up to Jerusalem which is in Judah And build the house of the Lord God of Israel He is the God which is in Jerusalem And whosoever remaineth in any place where he sojourneth Let the men of his place help him with silver and with gold and with goods And with beasts beside the free will offering for the house of God that is in Jerusalem Then rose up the chief of the fathers of Judah and Benjamin and the priests and Levites With all them whose spirit of God had raised to go up to build the house of the Lord which is in Jerusalem And all they that were about them strengthened their hands with vessels of silver, with gold, with goods And with beasts and with precious things beside all that was willingly offered Also Cyrus the king brought forth the vessels of the house of the Lord Which Nebuchadnezzar had brought forth out of Jerusalem And had put them in the house of his gods Even those did Cyrus king of Persia bring forth by the hand of Mithriadeth the treasurer And numbered unto Seshabashar the prince of Judah And this is the number of them Thirty charges of gold, a thousand charges of silver, nine and twenty knives Thirty basins of gold, silver, basins of second sort, four hundred and ten and other vessels a thousand All the vessels of gold and of silver were five thousand and four hundred All these did Seshabashar bring up with them of the captivity that were brought up from Babylon under Jerusalem Let's pray Lord Father thank you again that we are able to gather again this evening Lord I thank you for your pure and holy word you've given to us Lord I ask you to be with Pastor Robinson and advise tonight in Jesus' name, Amen Amen, so you're there in Ezra chapter one and we're doing an overview of the book of Ezra And this book is a historical book so when you think of like Jeremiah, Isaiah, those are prophets Those are the books of the prophets But Ezra, Nehemiah and Esther, these are really historical books And you're kind of going to the tale, once you get to Esther then we get into poetic books So this is very much a continuation after 2 Chronicles In so much that the first few verses are literally what was just stated at the end of 2 Chronicles So I kind of want to show you that, that this is clearly just a continuation so much so that literally the books kind of overlap a little bit So that you know you're starting where you left off So notice what it says here, in Ezra 1 verse 1 it says Now in the first year of Cyrus, king of Persia, that the word of the Lord by the mouth of Jeremiah might be fulfilled The Lord stirred up the spirit of Cyrus, king of Persia, that he made a proclamation throughout all his kingdom And put it also in writing saying, Thus saith Cyrus, king of Persia, the Lord God of heaven Have given me all the kingdoms of the earth, and he hath charged me to build him a house at Jerusalem Which is in Judah, who is there among you of all his people His God be with him, and let him go up to Jerusalem, which is in Judah And build the house of the Lord, the house of the Lord God of Israel He is the God, which is in Jerusalem Now go to 2 Chronicles, just go back a page really or maybe on the same page actually And look at the last couple verses there of the chapter In verse 22 it says, Now in the first year of Cyrus, king of Persia, that the word of the Lord spoken by the mouth of Jeremiah might be accomplished The Lord stirred up the spirit of Cyrus, king of Persia, that he made a proclamation throughout all his kingdom And put it also in writing saying, Thus saith Cyrus, king of Persia, all the kingdoms of the earth hath the Lord God of heaven given me And he hath charged me to build him a house in Jerusalem, which is in Judah, who is there among you of all his people The Lord his God be with him, and let him go up So it's very clearly just overlapping, we're just continuing on with the story if you will So at the end of 2 Chronicles you really have the fact that they go into captivity for 70 years And it even shows you that here's what happens after the captivity So when you think of 2 Chronicles, the last chapter there It was clearly written after the 70 year captivity to know that this was the proclamation of Cyrus, king of Persia So this is where really if you were thinking about Ezra, what is Ezra about? It's about them coming back to Jerusalem after the 70 year captivity and rebuilding the temple So this is what Ezra is about Nehemiah is continuing on in history, but now we're building the wall around Jerusalem So you think about the temple and houses are being built in Ezra, but then there's no wall And the Bible even talks about that, how it's going to be a city without walls But then in Nehemiah they're building the wall So Ezra is building the temple, Nehemiah is building the wall So that's kind of where you're at And obviously we'll get into the details of Nehemiah But there's 10 chapters and really a lot of this is dealing with rebuilding the temple And really this is what Ezekiel, the last 8 chapters or 9 chapters if you will of Ezekiel Is I believe dealing with what happens in Ezra And Haggai the prophet and Zechariah the prophet, these minor prophets that are at the end of the Old Testament They're in this time, they're brought up in Ezra and they are prophesying during this time But go to Ezekiel chapter 40 because I kind of want to put this a bit This temple that's being spoken of in Ezekiel I believe without a doubt is talking about the temple That was built in Ezra to stay and is destroyed now Like it's not there anymore I do not believe that Hezekiah is, I'm sorry Hezekiah If you find the book of Hezekiah, just pull that one out Ezekiel, the book of Ezekiel I do not believe is talking about some third temple that the Antichrist is going to build Now does that mean that the Antichrist isn't going to use that as kind of like the blueprints Of course I mean I believe that the devil is always going to try to imitate and replicate and all that stuff when it comes to that So I'm sure the dimensions and all that stuff are going to be used And they're probably going to use Ezekiel to even say see this is prophecy being fulfilled No doubt I'm sure that's going to be used that way But I want you to think about this when this is being spoken of as far as this temple being rebuilt Look at Ezekiel 40 and verse 1 When was this being stated in Ezekiel's time? It says in verse 1, in the 5th and 20th year of our captivity In the beginning of the year, in the 10th day of the month In the 14th year after that the city was smitten In the selfsame day the hand of the Lord was upon me and brought me thither And in chapter 41 after kind of talking about the vision and everything In verse 1 it says afterward he brought me to the temple and measured the posts Six cubits brought on the one side, six cubits brought on the other side Which was the breadth of the tabernacle And then it goes on to talk about all the different things about the tabernacle and the temple and all these different things But in Ezekiel 40, where are we at in history? 25 years into the captivity and specifically 14 years after the temple was destroyed So that's why it gives you two different time frames there Because there was 11 years that Zedekiah was reigning when the captivity had already started It started when Zedekiah started reigning And then 11 years he rebelled obviously And then the whole city was completely annihilated Because what's 25 minus 14? 11 So 11 years into that captivity The temple and the city was completely destroyed And you're 14 years after that when this is being stated So this is being stated as far as these are the dimensions, here's how this is going to be built This is what's going to happen And you're talking about sacrifices being made and all these different things As far as animal sacrifices Why wouldn't this be the temple that Ezra is talking about? Does that make sense? Like you're literally before it's ever built The idea, now if this was written or prophesied after the second temple was built Okay, you know I'll give you some credence there But this is literally when they're in the middle of the captivity 14 years after the first temple was destroyed And you're talking what? You know you're 25 years in So what? You're talking about 45 years? Until the new temple is being built Which is what he's talking about Okay, so I think it's very clear Ezekiel 40 through 48 Is talking about the temple that Jesus stood in And that is giving specific dimensions, specific things about that And that's the temple that Ezra's mentioned in Ezra It's the temple that's mentioned in Haggai And obviously people are going to try to take Old Testament passages And try to put that to the way future But let me ask you this Where in the New Testament does it say Rebuild this temple Or this temple is going to be rebuilt Now I'll say this, there will be a temple And obviously the Antichrist is going to set up his image and all that But that doesn't mean it's of God That doesn't mean that God ordained that Or God told them to do that Obviously the devil is constantly trying to counterfeit And trying to basically place Cheap imitations in a lot of cases there Go to chapter 2 So the first chapter is really just dealing with the proclamation The fact that God told Cyrus to rebuild the temple To build him a house in Jerusalem And it's very interesting when you think about the book of Daniel And the fact that you had Nebuchadnezzar Who I believe gets humbled And I believe he ends up getting saved And then you have Darius the Mead Who after Daniel survives the den of lions It seems like he is a believer as well after that And in this book you're going to see three different kings Specifically mentioned that Basically are on their side And basically are for the building of this temple And for the children of Israel Is you're going to have in the beginning here Cyrus king of Persia So I believe that you were talking about Cyrus the Great You know that was there from the beginning Basically after the Babylonian reign and all that stuff And Darius the Mead You had the Medo-Persian empire and all of that But Cyrus was like the king of kings Of Persia And then you'll have Darius Not the Mead but Darius the Persian king And then you have Arctic Xerxes And Arctic Xerxes you're going to see being mentioned Brought up at the very beginning of Nehemiah So you can kind of see this line that's going down there Now there's kings in between this And it can be confusing when you're reading through Ezra Because a lot of names are repeated Because you're going to see another Arctic Xerxes Before Darius comes on the scene And what you have to understand If you looked at the timeline of the Persian kings You're going to see Arctic Xerxes the 1st, 2nd, 3rd, 4th So what you don't see here is which one is it So it's like Darius the Mead But then you have Darius the Persian Then you're going to have another Darius There's a lot of Darius's And then there's a lot of Xerxes And Arctic Xerxes And all these different ones But in Ezra you'll see that There's these three Persian kings That basically are crucial in the building of the temple And obviously with the children of Israel Doing what they need to do Chapter 2 is a list Of basically everybody that was coming from Babylon Out of captivity going into Judah So I'm not going to read the whole chapter But there's a list of just different names And they're reckoned by genealogy Now in the New Testament It says to avoid genealogies And endless genealogies But back then when you're dealing with The children of Israel under that 1st covenant Genealogies had a purpose Whether it had to do with The priesthood and different things like that So you'll see genealogies brought up And the New Testament is kind of like That's the genealogy We don't need to know genealogies That's a thing of the past essentially Basically the only genealogy You need to know about in the New Testament Is the genealogy of Jesus So at that point That's all you need Because at Jesus, in Christ There's neither Jew nor Gentile We don't need to worry about any Type of genealogies at that point For any reason Ezra 2.1 just to show you How this chapter starts here It says now these are the children Of that province that went up Out of captivity Of those which had been carried away Whom Nebuchadnezzar the king of Babylon Had carried away unto Babylon And came again unto Jerusalem and Judah Everyone into his city So this chapter is just kind of dealing With a list of people That are coming back into the land Now 70 years have gone by There are still people that are really old That were alive back then When they went in there But a lot of these people And then they're coming back in But they're of the families that went into captivity So chapter 2 is dealing with that Chapter 3 We're going to see that they rebuild They're rebuilding an altar first So when they get to Jerusalem They start off with the altar And Joshua and Zerubbabel are mentioned And Joshua is Joshua the son of Josadeh So Joshua is Who's mentioned in Zechariah As the high priest And you'll see Joshua is kind of like the The equivalent of Joshua In the book of Ezra Because you'll see Joshua the son of Nun Being mentioned in Nehemiah And all that Now that's what it says in verse 1 here It says that when the seventh Month was come And the children of Israel were in the cities The people gathered themselves together As one man to Jerusalem Then stood up Joshua the son of Josadeh And his brethren the priests And Zerubbabel the son of Shealtiel And his brethren And builded the altar of the God of Israel To offer burnt offerings thereon As it is written in the law of Moses The man of God Now the thing that's interesting about this Well one you see some people that are involved in this Right? Zerubbabel is the governor He's going to basically be the governor of Judah Okay Joshua is the high priest And then you have a bunch of prophets Haggai, Zechariah And then you have people like Ezra Who's a scribe But he's also a priest Okay So Ezra is actually of the children of Aaron He's of the priesthood But The thing that's interesting about this Is that they build the altar first And the Jews are always Stating Well we can't do animal sacrifice Because the temple is destroyed You can still do animal sacrifice Actually they did before Before they even built the temple They were getting a hold of God With the altar Because the altar can be made of Just earth Or stones It doesn't have to be fashioned of gold Like with the four horns on the altar To do sacrifice They could just do An altar of stones Now obviously I'm not telling them to do that Because obviously that would be blasphemous Because Jesus Christ is The sacrifice once for all So animal sacrifices are no longer being regarded In any fashion to the Lord But that being said Is that they don't really have an excuse They can just set up an altar And burn sacrifices and all that Let me give you that in Exodus chapter 20 Going all the way back to the Ten Commandments In the beginning of the first covenant But we actually see them doing that It's kind of interesting how They're like well they need the temple Then they can't do sacrifice Because we're always saying Basically the Jews don't keep any of the Old Testament Because they don't Even to keep the Sabbath day They need to do sacrifices And they don't do that So they don't actually keep the Sabbath They're completely disregarding everything That's written in the Old Testament anyway But their argument is always Well we don't have the temple Well literally they didn't have a temple here And what did they do? They built an altar and they did sacrifices But it's also stated in Exodus chapter 20 verse 24 It says an altar of earth Thou shalt make unto me And shalt sacrifice thereon Thy burnt offerings and thy peace offerings Thy sheep and thine oxen And all places where I record my name And I will come unto thee And I will bless thee And if thou wilt make me an altar of stone Thou shalt not build it of hewn stone For if thou lift up thy toll upon it Thou hast polluted it Neither shalt thou go up By steps unto mine altar That thy nakedness be not discovered thereon Which is funny because you know The Baptist is like come up to the old fashioned altar Which is steps Right? They're like these steps right here represent the altar It's like literally was forbidden Like it was literally explicitly said Don't put steps up to the altar Okay so But steps are the altar in the New Testament For whatever reason But they basically do that They do that in Exodus chapter 20 And listen The tabernacle wasn't built in Exodus chapter 20 Like Moses hasn't gone up And seen in the mouth how to build a tabernacle All this stuff but yet they're still doing sacrifices And the covenant has already started The covenant, the first covenant started When they come out of Egypt And so this idea The Jews haven't had an excuse They don't have it as an excuse But it doesn't surprise me They don't follow that Because they don't follow anything in the Old Testament So Chapter 3 We also see Or we just see the starting Of the building of the temple So basically They build this altar but then they start to build the temple And I just want to read a little bit here I should have someone just come up here And read my scriptures off for me So I can get through this But In verse 8 there it says Now in the second year Of their coming unto the house of God at Jerusalem In the second month began Zerubbabel the son of Shealtiel And Jeshua the son of Josadeh And the remnant of their brethren And the priests and Levites And all they that were come out of the captivity unto Jerusalem And appointed the Levites From twenty years old and upward To set forward the work of the house of the Lord So two years later You know basically they don't just go there And just start building immediately Right they're getting things in order They're doing sacrifices For a while before they ever do this It says then stood Jeshua With his sons and his brethren Cadmiel and his sons And the sons of Judah Together to set forward the workmen In the house of God And their sons and their brethren the Levites And when the builders laid the foundation Of the temple of the Lord They set the priests in their apparel With trumpets and Levites The sons of Asaph with symbols To praise the Lord after the ordinance Of David king of Israel And they sang together by course And praising and giving thanks unto the Lord Because he is good For his mercy endureth forever toward Israel And all the people shouted with a great shout When they praised the Lord Because the foundation of the house Was laid but many of the priests And Levites in chief of the fathers Who were ancient men That had seen the first house When the foundation of this house Was laid before their eyes Wept with a loud voice And many shouted aloud for joy So that the people could not discern The noise of the shout of joy From the noise of the weeping of the people For the people shouted with a loud shout And the noise was heard afar off So get the picture here So they laid this foundation But the people that had seen the first building Are actually sorrowful They're weeping So yeah the people that are really excited The foundation is laid The other one is just like thinking about What that past building was And actually remember seeing it And they're weeping because of that Meaning that Solomon's temple was grander Than this one That's what's going on here But go to Haggai chapter 2 Though Solomon's temple was maybe More lavish with the gold And just different things that it had The second temple If I had a choice Which temple I could see I would choose the second And notice what it says here In Haggai chapter 2 and verse 9 It says the glory of the Lord Is the glory of the Lord Is the glory of the Lord Is the glory of the Lord Is the glory of the Lord It says the glory of this latter house Talking about the house of God Shall be greater than the former Said the Lord of hosts And in this place will I give peace Said the Lord of hosts You know why? I'd rather see that one Because that's where Jesus was Jesus was in that temple That's where Jesus threw out the money changers That's where Jesus taught That's where Jesus stood when he was 12 years old That's where Jesus was Where they took Jesus when he was a baby Way more significant than the first Does that make sense? And so And it's interesting too Because you have the Old Testament, New Testament You have kind of that idea of the first temple And the second temple And the fact that the second is better It has more glory Just another just allegory Of the first and the second And the fact that the second is better And Just want you to see that But they start building it So in chapter 3, they've laid the foundation But In chapter 4 There's adversaries Against them building the temple Nehemiah is very similar to Ezra in this In the fact that they go to build the wall And then there's adversaries that are basically Against them building the wall So it's kind of like this rhyme Of Ezra and Nehemiah And the fact that you have They're trying to build something Someone's trying to stop it They get a cease and desist And then they get a decree to keep working And that's literally what happens in Nehemiah as well So similar right It's not exactly the same Now in this case Basically There's people that are stating They're adversaries Of the Lord okay But They kind of come in thinking They're stating we want to help you build this We want to be in this You know Ezra and all of them are like You have no part in this Get away from us right Basically And then they get upset about it And then they start like whining to Like the king and all that stuff So In verse 1 here Hopefully I can get through this I'm just going to have to give a cliff note I'm just going to not read verses anymore I'm just going to explain it Verse 1 here Now when the adversaries of Judah and Benjamin Heard that the children of captivity Builded the temple unto the Lord God of Israel 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 Assur Which brought us up hither Okay so The narrator is saying they're adversaries Okay But they're coming saying Hey let us build And what I see with this is ecumenicism Right we're dealing with people that are like Hey you know we'll build with you But they're not the same stripe Right they're basically kind of like an apostate Think about it an apostate Christianity coming in And say hey let's build that with you Right be like if the catholic church came over and said Hey let's help you build that Let's work together You have no part with us Right that's kind of the idea there That's going on here And then they get upset But notice in verse 3 it says But Zerubbabel and Jeshua And the rest of the chief of the fathers of Israel Said unto them Ye have nothing to do with us To build a house unto our God But we ourselves together We will build unto the Lord God of Israel As king Cyrus the king of Persia Have commanded us Then the people of the land Told Judah and troubled them in building Okay so basically They lay down the law and say Hey listen we're not singing Kumbaya with you Like this is what we're building You know leave us alone We're doing this You have no part in this Okay and some could look at it and be like That seems mean why didn't you let them help you Well listen can two walk together Except to be agreed Are we to just hold hands with people That don't believe like we believe And that is the problem with a lot of churches today Is that they just want to get along with everybody And work together and all of that And listen I want nothing to do with that You know I'm not just going to sing Kumbaya With the Methodist Church down there Hey let's work together and have a You know like a spaghetti dinner No Not doing it Plus your bread sucks Has anyone ever been to the spaghetti dinners It's always just like that really Dry like Italian bread Like give me some sourdough bread Listen if I'm going to pay for your spaghetti dinner At the Methodist Church You better have some good bread Anyway I digress The idea here though Is that there is a lesson to be learned there That You know basically don't We don't want to sing Kumbaya But keep reading there in verse 5 Ezra chapter 4 it says So they go on and they Hired counselors again Against them to frustrate their purpose All the days of Cyrus king of Persia Even until the reign of Darius king of Persia And 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 you can see here that we went from Cyrus to Darius To Ahasuerus right Now this Darius is a different king Than what's going to come up later Because it wouldn't make any sense That Darius would then This would be the same Darius right And you say well how long were they building this thing Well according to the Jews Okay In Jesus day 46 years Okay so it's a stretch of time That's going on here right They didn't even start building it Until two years after they came back into the land So it says 46 years Did I say 42 or 46 46 years was this temple and building Because Jesus says Destroy this temple and in three days I'll raise it up And they said 40 and 60 years was this temple and building Wilt thou rear it up in three days But it said he spake of the temple and his body Obviously he wasn't talking about the physical temple He's talking about his own temple And so there's obviously a time period That's going on here But basically they're just basically at them As they're building this thing And Basically They send They send all these letters to Arctic Xerxes the king of Persia Now this is a different one that comes later I'm not sure what One two three or four whatever Arctic Xerxes this is And I think a lot of people just don't know Right What you have to understand is that in the Bible Obviously we know it's true that that was the king But there's a lot of guess work as far as which one And where you're at in the history As far as secular history is concerned Okay But In verse 21 They convince the king basically saying He's known to rebel against kings And they basically bring up the past with Zedekiah And with Jehoiacham And all these different You know what happened in the past with Babylon They bring that up and it's just like yeah you're right You know and then Basically in verse 21 it says Give ye now commandments to cause these men to cease And that this city be not builded Until another commandment shall be given from me So basically it's kind of like a cease and desist order That happens And Basically it's just Based off the past experience And they finally kind of got Their foot in the door there Okay Chapter 5 We see Haggai the prophet mentioned Which is interesting because Haggai Is dealing with the fact of building the temple Basically Condemning them saying you lived in sealed houses And yet You know the house of the Lord Is not built So Haggai is really picking up where They started building it But they haven't finished it Okay And that's where Ezra chapter 5 is taking place And the fact that They've been given this kind of cease and desist Order And in verse 1 here And I believe what happens really as far as They just start building again Okay And they haven't gotten a commandment from Mark the Xerxes Because I believe he's no longer king anymore Darius is now king Okay So basically if you think about it That king gave the cease and desist Order, he's no longer reigning So they just go back to what they were doing Because they're going off their original commandment From Cyrus king of Persia Okay And in verse 1 here It says 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 The house of God which is at Jerusalem And with them were the prophets of God Helping them At the same time came to them Tatnai Governor on this side the river And Shethar Barzani And their companions And said thus unto them Who hath commanded you to build this house And to make up this wall Then said we unto them After this manner What are the names of the men That make this building But the eye of their God Was upon the elders of the Jews That they could not cause them to cease Till the matter came to Darius And then they returned Answer by letter concerning this matter So basically Tatnai The governor Is now basically saying Who told you to build this Okay And Basically Tatnai writes to King Darius now Of Persia And Darius basically does an inquisition Where he finds out that Cyrus Gave the commandment to build So essentially Tatnai Kind of just It ends up reinforcing them to build it And It says in verse 17 there Now therefore Let there be search made In the king's treasure House Which is there at Babylon Whether it be so That the decree was made of Cyrus The king to build this house Of God at Jerusalem And let the king send his pleasure To us concerning this matter So basically he's like Hey go see if this is true Like Tatnai the governor of Judah At the time Or that area was basically And in chapter 6 King Darius finds out yes it's true And then he makes a decree And basically Gives them a bunch of help So not only does Darius basically say Yes you can build But he actually is calling people out To go build And to like send them supplies And all these different things So now you have another king That's basically helping the building Of the house of God In verse 6 of chapter 6 It says Now therefore Tatnai governor beyond the river Shethar Bosni And your companions Which are beyond the river Be ye far from thence Let the work of this house Of God alone 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 Of this house of God That of the kings goods Even of the tribute beyond the river Forthwith expenses be given Unto these men That they be not hindered So he's basically saying All tribute that's coming to the king Give it to them And what you see is basically Persia not only helps build the house of God But then also later on I believe it's in Nehemiah Where it basically says Like they are not to pay tribute And basically get out of taxes essentially And Chapter 6 we see the finishing of the building In verse 13 there It says Then Tatnai governor on this side The river Shethar Bosni and their companions According to that which the rise the king had sent So they did speedily And the elders of the Jews builded And they prospered Through the prophesying of Haggai the prophet And they builded and finished it According To the commandment of the God of Israel And according to the commandment of Cyrus And Darius And Arctic Xerxes king of Persia And this house was finished On the third day of the month Adar Which was in the sixth year Of the reign of Darius the king Now I mentioned Arctic Xerxes Because he's brought up later He's after Darius' reign But there's also just information there As far as Arctic Xerxes is concerned Where he helps out with some other things Kind of indirectly I mean with the house of God But it's not the building necessarily of it But it's more so the administration of it As far as who's going out there And all this other stuff So When it comes to this They finished the building of the house of God Like I said in John Chapter 2 Obviously that's the Jews saying It was 46 years in building But it's probably pretty close to that As far as The timeline was The original house As far as Solomon when he built it Was 7 years You can find that in 1 Kings Chapter 6 They were 7 years in building that But also they had a lot more resources The kingdom was thriving What you have to understand is They're coming back to a place that's been decimated And they don't have King Solomon and all his riches there To deal with this And obviously it takes a little longer To build it So first 6 chapters You're really dealing with Them coming back into the land After the captivity And then building the temple There's some hiccups there With adversaries And then they don't really get stopped With Tatni But basically Tatni goes to see if this is true It was potentially Going to maybe cause a cease And desist work order And it turns out to actually be helpful That he did that Because then Darius was like yeah He made this decree Let's help them out Chapter 7 This is where Arctic Xerxes is coming in So when it says that They did according to the commandment of God and Israel And according to the commandment of Cyrus and Darius And Arctic Xerxes At this point we don't really see what he's doing Until he gets to Chapter 7 Because in verse 1 here it says Now after these things The king of Persia Ezra the son of Zaria The son of Azariah The son of Hilkiah And it goes down the line We're talking about Ezra The one that's the name of the book It says in verse 6 This Ezra went up from Babylon And he was a ready scribe in the law of Moses Which the Lord God of Israel had given And the king granted him All his request According to the hand of the Lord his God Upon him For a specific purpose So Cyrus gives the decree to build the temple They go in And they're obviously Building temple They have adversaries And then Darius has to come in And Darius basically just kind of comes in afterwards Because you have Arctic Xerxes That basically gives the cease and desist And then Darius after that When he starts reigning He just reinforces it They start building already before he even says anything And then there's another Arctic Xerxes After that Darius And that Arctic Xerxes Is sending Ezra in To Jerusalem And to do certain things Obviously he's a priest But he's going in And specifically to teach them The law and different things like that And it's just very interesting I personally believe that Cyrus And Darius And Arctic Xerxes May even be believers He is the God At the very beginning And you have Darius basically saying Yeah let's do this Build the house All these different things He may be a weaker example But Arctic Xerxes Is like basically go there Teach them law Teach them to do what they need to do Like all this stuff And just like Why would this king care About what's going on in Jerusalem And all this stuff And then obviously he sends Nehemiah in To build the wall around the city Okay so This Arctic Xerxes is a good one Not the one that said stop Okay But it says here in verse 25 It says and now Ezra After the wisdom of thy God That is in thine hand Set magistrates and judges Which may judge all the people That are beyond the river All such as know the laws of thy God So basically Ezra is that ready scribe That's coming in Teaching and Nehemiah he's going to be The one standing on a pulpit of wood Preaching, teaching and giving the sense Of the word of God Okay so This is basically Ezra's role Coming into Jerusalem Okay Chapter 8 You have a list of genealogy Of those that went With Ezra from Babylon Going into Jerusalem Okay So sake of time and my voice I'm not reading that whole list For you But when all these Of Judah are coming in And all these people The Jews that are coming back in He didn't find any Levites Okay That were in that group So then basically he's sending For Levites to come in And all this stuff And basically get a hold of God At the river Ahava And then he appoints priests To watch over the offering Until they get to Jerusalem So basically they're bringing an offering With them right Because he's not only telling Like Ezra to go there But he's like giving him stuff To go there and offer unto the Lord And all this stuff And basically Ezra's kind of like Managing this whole thing Making sure there's people there In verse I just think this verse is interesting That's why I bring it up In Ezra chapter 8 verse 21 it says Then I proclaimed a fast there At the river Ahava That we might afflict ourselves Before our God To seek of him a right way for us And for our little ones And for all our substance And when you think about fasting You're trying to get a hold of God Obviously right In a lot of cases you're seeking Which way do you want me to go Or maybe you're seeking for But basically it's kind of like What direction do you want me to go Lord And I love that it also says For our little ones Right it's kind of like For us but also for our little ones Right and just the idea of fasting there And this is a great example of that So that verse just kind of stuck out to me As I was studying this Serving for another day you know So let's talk about Fasting Okay Chapter 9 and chapter 10 Okay so this is probably the most Controversial portions of Ezra Maybe you want to call it controversial But a lot of people go to Chapter 9 and 10 to try to justify divorce Okay And I know I just kind of preached on this A little bit in the morning But basically what happens here Is when he's getting all these Priests that are coming in And different people Is that he finds out that a lot of them Married people that were not Of their nation Okay And what I believe is specific about that Especially for the priests Is that the priests had a stringent Policy on who they were to marry The priests Not necessarily the Israelites but the priests Okay And they had to marry Of their own tribe All the different things they had to do They took them strange wives And they were committing the abominations So it was very clear I just want to read this because it's very clear That it's not just that they married somebody That was of another nation Boaz marries someone of another nation But Ruth the Moabitess Clearly not of Israel Of Moab Before Boaz marries her Or even talks to her She has already said Thy people are my people See the difference between that As far as understanding like Hey okay that makes sense To marry because Being unequally yoked And what you have here is that basically When they were in captivity They were basically just getting married To a whole bunch of heathens That aren't believers like them And they've corrupted them Because notice what it says in verse 1 Ezra chapter 9 verse 1 it says Now when these things were done The princes came to me To their lands Doing according to their abominations Even of the Canaanites, the Hittites, the Perizzites, the Jebusites, the Ammonites, the Moabites, the Egyptians, and the Amorites For they have taken of their daughters For themselves and for their sons So that the holy seed had mingled themselves With the people of those lands Yea, the hand of the princes and rulers Have been cheap in this trespass So it's like Those are high up or even Or the worst in this It says and when I heard this thing I rent my garment and my mantle And plucked off the hair of my head And of my beard And sat down astonished So obviously Ezra is upset So he finds this out And he's obviously upset about it Well what happens is that Someone comes to him and says Hey here's what we're going to do We're going to have We're going to have all those that took strange wives They're going to put them away And in chapter 10 it's a list And it's basically those that put away their strange wives And basically it will say We'll swear to the Lord You know that we'll do this Like all this stuff So to set this thing right And people will come to this and say Well see you can divorce someone that's not a believer But I challenge you to read Ezra 9 and 10 And show me where God told them to do that Remember this is a historical book It's true they did it It's true they said they did it for the Lord It's true that they said they swear to the Lord It's true that they said Let's set this thing right What you won't find is where God says Thus saith the Lord Put away your strange wives I don't believe that this is what I believe basically they screwed up And they're trying to fix their problem You know Now I'll say this It doesn't say that they all got remarried either Which is really the big thing When it comes to divorce Is remarriage So maybe they put them away And they were celibate Or maybe they had multiple wives Strange I'll just keep the ones that are good Okay So but that being said Is that you have to be careful When you're reading through historical books And things like that Where it doesn't God didn't speak to Ezra and say Thus saith the Lord do this God didn't command them to do that It just states that's what they did Okay And that's just the facts of life So this is not a good passage to go to The New Testament does say That if an unbeliever If you're married to an unbeliever And they don't want to dwell with you And they want to depart You can let them depart Meaning this is that you're not bound To like follow them around Like a puppy dog You can let them go Okay But it doesn't say you can get remarried though That's what you won't find In First Corinthians chapter 7 So you're not bound to basically Go to them So that being said Is that Ezra kind of ends on that note Where Kind of ends on a sour note doesn't it It's just like you know he's just a stone He's pulling off all the hairs of his face And his head And then someone comes in and says Hey here's how we'll fix this You know I don't know if I had On here the man that basically came to him And gave him this idea Um I thought I had it written down Yeah it's Jeconiah Yeah in chapter 10 Because in verse 2 It says Jeconiah the son of Jehiel Jehiel one of the sons of Elam Answered and said unto Ezra We have trespassed against our God And have taken strange wives of the people of the land Yet now there is hope in Israel concerning this thing Now therefore let us make a covenant with our God To put away all the wives And such as are born of them According to the counsel of my Lord And of those that tremble at the The commandment of our God And let it be done according to the law So just because they're saying Let it be done according to the law Let it be done this way or that way Doesn't mean it's right I mean Is Jeconiah the son of Jehiel Like the end all authority As far as how things work How things should be done here Like I don't even know who this person is Like it's just this guy that comes up to Ezra And basically says here's how we're gonna fix this Your counsel, we're gonna do it according to the law It's like And then you just do it Okay So Ezra has them do that but again That doesn't mean it's right Okay there's a lot of times in the bible Where in the history I mean when David does things Is it always right? So I mean just because people are doing things Prophets are doing things I mean Nathan even made a mistake When David says I want to build a house of the Lord He said go and do it, the Lord be with thee And then he's like oh wait just kidding No actually it's gonna be Solomon You can't do that So you find that all the time Where prophets and even though Ezra's a good character You know It doesn't mean that he's just bullet proof With how to deal with situations Okay Which you should always be looking at The commandment will show that to me Show me the commandment that you marry a strange wife And God says put them away I mean obviously it gives you commandment Not to marry them But show me where it says to put them away And I'll show you where it says God hates putting away So Look at the clear commandments When you're dealing with stories When you're dealing with like a historical Kind of like Acts Acts is a historical book right And so there's things that are done There that may not be right Like was Paul right or James right When James is rebuking Paul And all this other stuff It's like well look at the clear Commandments of God That's what you follow And that's how you interpret Whether they were doing right or not So when you're looking through these historical books You have to look at that Now if it says Ezra was filled with the Holy Ghost And he said thus saith the Lord Okay Does that make sense If you read that in a historical book You're like I got it That's right But you don't see that here You don't see God intervening Or God saying to do this Or saying to do that You just see them doing something Actually you don't even see them inquiring of the Lord They're just saying hey We're going to swear to God We're going to do this We're going to do it according to the commandment Let's get it done You know and Sometimes you're just stuck with what you got You know I mean the thing is that Sometimes you can't fix it right It's kind of like hey I know how to fix this It's like well sometimes you just can't fix it And just deal with it Does that make sense like if they're polluted They're polluted and it is what it is What are you going to do And so Ezra Definitely an interesting book When it comes to the building of the temple That Jesus was going to be standing in later Nehemiah Kind of a rhyme to that To Nehemiah as far as that's concerned So The book closing thing happened You know I'm going to get you guys back When it's winter time and you're putting on your coats I'm going for another 30 minutes So Anyway let's end with a word of prayer Heavenly Father we thank you for today Thank you for the book of Ezra And thank you for these passages And Lord help us to know these passages And to understand the history But also just Lord there's so many Things that we can learn about in the book of Ezra And Lord we just pray that you would be with us Heal us from any sicknesses Give us safe travels And Lord we love you In Jesus Christ's name Amen If your brother Dave will come sing one more song And then we'll be dismissed Alright take your song books and turn to song number 20 Song number 20 in your song books We'll sing When I See the Blood If you would stand we'll sing song number 20 Christ our Redeemer died on the cross Died for the sinner, paid all his due All who receive him need never fear Yes he will pass, will pass over you When I see the blood When I see the blood When I see the blood I will pass, I will pass over you Chiefess of sinners, Jesus can save As he hath promised, so will he do Oh sinner, hear him, trust in his word Then he will pass, will pass over you When I see the blood When I see the blood When I see the blood I will pass, I will pass over you Judgment is coming, all will be there Have rejected, who have refused Oh sinner, hasten, let Jesus in Then God will pass, will pass over you When I see the blood When I see the blood When I see the blood I will pass, I will pass over you Oh what compassion, oh boundless love Jesus hath power, Jesus is true All who believe are saved from the storm Oh he will pass, will pass over you When I see the blood When I see the blood When I see the blood