"How to Find Your Identity"

INTRODUCTION

We are continuing our “New Beginnings” sermon series and this week we are finishing up chapter 5 of the book of Ezra. We have one more chapter in Ezra before we are even introduced to Ezra.

This week we are looking at the letter that Tattenai wrote to King Darius regarding Israel and the rebuilding of the wall. Israel has gone through 3 kings in this transition since coming back to Israel, Cyrus, Artaxerxes, and now Darius.

ILLUSTRATION

Has anyone every heard of Diamond Dee? Diamond Dee says when he was 16 got saved but got sucked into X-rated movies from a guy who he was selling stuff to. The guy then sexually assaulted him. He was married at 17 years old and had 2 kids to avoid the draft. He cheated on his wife and divorced her. He had been married 5 times throughout his life. He was a sex addict. He got into transgender x-rated films and his addiction continued to get worse and worse. That then pulled him into homosexuality and into doing adult films. He wasn’t happy doing anything, he even said in his interview he was a slave to his addiction. He then started a transition to be transgender, he eventually had a sex change to look more feminine.

Everything he did was to find happiness in the now. He completely ruined his life by the decisions he made. Even when he did the sex-change people said, “if that is what you want to do, go do it” and “if that makes you happy, go ahead and do it.” His identity was in what he thought would make him happy.

Have you thought about your identity?

Are you true to yourself?

Do you have support with what you are doing?

Is it the right support?

English Standard Version Chapter 5

Tattenai’s Letter to King Darius

6 This is a copy of the letter that Tattenai the governor of the province Beyond the River and Shethar-bozenai and his associates, the governors who were in the province Beyond the River, sent to Darius the king. 7 They sent him a report, in which was written as follows: “To Darius the king, all peace. 8 Be it known to the king that we went to the province of Judah, to the house of the great God. It is being built with huge stones, and timber is laid in the walls. This work goes on diligently and prospers in their hands. 9 Then we asked those elders and spoke to them thus: ‘Who gave you a decree to build this house and to finish this structure?’ 10 We also asked them their names, for your information, that we might write down the names of their leaders. 11 And this was their reply to us: ‘We are the servants of the God of heaven and earth, and we are rebuilding the house that was built many years ago, which a great king of Israel built and finished. 12 But because our fathers had angered the God of heaven, he gave them into the hand of Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon, the Chaldean, who destroyed this house and carried away the people to Babylonia. 13 However, in the first year of Cyrus king of Babylon, Cyrus the king made a decree that this house of God should be rebuilt. 14 And the gold and silver vessels of the house of God, which Nebuchadnezzar had taken out of the temple that was in Jerusalem and brought into the temple of Babylon, these Cyrus the king took out of the temple of Babylon, and they were delivered to one whose name was Sheshbazzar, whom he had made governor; 15 and he said to him, “Take these vessels, go and put them in the temple that is in Jerusalem, and let the house of God be rebuilt on its site.” 16 Then this Sheshbazzar came and laid the foundations of the house of God that is in Jerusalem, and from that time until now it has been in building, and it is not yet finished.’ 17 Therefore, if it seems good to the king, let search be made in the royal archives there in Babylon, to see whether a decree was issued by Cyrus the king for the rebuilding of this house of God in Jerusalem. And let the king send us his pleasure in this matter.”

PRAY!

I. Examine Yourself

English Standard Version Chapter 5

11 And this was their reply to us: ‘We are the servants of the God of heaven and earth, and we are rebuilding the house that was built many years ago, which a great king of Israel built and finished.

If you remember last week we read at the beginning of that Tattenai and the other governors asked the leaders in Israel a question.

“Who gave you a decree to build this house and to finish this structure?” “What are the names of the men who are building this building”

DO YOU NOTICE WHAT WAS SAID IN THE LETTER?

“This was their reply”

“We are the servants of the God of heaven and earth”

Instead of doing as they were requested, and giving in a long list of names and titles of office, the elders merge their individuality in this general phrase

It’s like saying, “As individuals, we are nothing

As men of mark in our nation, we are nothing

What we do, we do simply as servants of God

Bound to obey him, answerable only to him for our conduct

They were UNIFIED together with each other

They were also confessing where their loyalty lies

When they said, “the God of heaven and earth” they were making a huge statement as well

This is a statement that shows that there is no other being greater than God

That they don’t serve any lower being

They have already been in that situation before

8 Therefore at that time certain Chaldeans came forward and maliciously accused the Jews. 9 They declared to King Nebuchadnezzar, “O king, live forever!

Before Israel wanted to play both sides

They have examined themselves and found their identity

They have examined theirselves

They are going to do what the Lord tells them

English Standard Version Chapter 1

8 Go up to the hills and bring wood and build the house, that I may take pleasure in it and that I may be glorified, says the LORD.

Have you found your Identity?

You have to examine yourself

ILLUSTRATION

That is what Diamond Dee did. He was so far down the rabbit hole of sexual immorality he changed his body completely to be like a woman. To be someone completely different than what God made him.

He had to examine himself and search. To stop trying to be a people pleaser and a sin pleaser and to please the creator of the universe.

Diamond thought he was saved but he was separated from God and began to examine what he was taught when he was younger.

2  but your iniquities have made a separation between you and your God and your sins have hidden his face from you so that he does not hear.

between you and your God,

and your sins have hidden his face from you

When we continue on the sinful path that is what happens

so that he does not hear.

We feel alone and try to find approval in man but really from what Diamond said, is people would “approve” of his lifestyle because they were afraid of rejection

Like he said, the same people who he THOUGHT had his best interest at hand

HOW DO WE FIND OUR IDENTITY?

EXAMINE YOURSELF

II. Be Truthful About Yourself

English Standard Version Chapter 5

12 But because our fathers had angered the God of heaven, he gave them into the hand of Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon, the Chaldean, who destroyed this house and carried away the people to Babylonia.

“But because our fathers had angered the God of heaven”

This is their testimony

To be honest about what happened to them and where they came from was a humbling thing

This letter being read back to Darius revealed their testimony

What God did to them and where they came from

Normally in ancient Near East if one nation took over another nation, that nation’s god or gods were considered the more powerful

But the great prophets of Israel had warned God’s people that if they did not turn back to God, Jerusalem would be destroyed

They would be carried into captivity

That is what happened to them

They are giving God the credit for what happened to them

Using the name Nebuchadnezzar and explaining what happened

This showed Persia that Israel’s God

The God of heaven and earth is the God that brought judgment

The God that allowed what happened

The judgment of God is a reality

His judgment may come immediately

Or, He may choose to delay His judgment

No one should think that God is indifferent to sin

As believers, God’s people are held to this standard

God expects more from His people

English Standard Version Chapter 4

17 For it is time for judgment to begin at the household of God; and if it begins with us, what will be the outcome for those who do not obey the gospel of God? 18 And

“If the righteous is scarcely saved,

what will become of the ungodly and the sinner?”

God brings judgment to our lives to straighten us out

He does it because He loves us

He allows things to happen because He loves us

He gave us free will because He loves us

Because we have free will though we often make the wrong decisions

Through those decisions

We may experience God’s judgment

ILLUSTRATION

Diamond Dee struggled with that. He made choice after choice. Went down a sinful path that just kept getting worse and worse. He got into adult films and just went to the far end of the path.

He destroyed his body by plastic surgery and getting a sex-change. Then once that happened the adult film industry didn’t want him.

He contemplated suicide and wanted to take his own life. Nothing he did made him happy.

He gave his life to Christ, fully submitted it. He actually has a more in depth testimony where the truth just spills out of him.

He says, “If you look at me now, I am a man again, the way God wanted me to be,” he then said, “I was reading my bible everyday and I could hear God saying, ‘you really need to go back to being what I made you and your story is great....but don’t do it as a girl’”

That is what being truthful about yourself does

The Holy Bible: English Standard Version. (2016). (). Wheaton, IL: Crossway Bibles.

It is a step-by-step process

First we have to examine ourselves

Then we have to be truthful about ourselves

Truthful about where God has brought us

Submitting to Him and who He is

If we can’t do that then our lives won’t get easier

God’s judgment will continue throughout our lives

Eventually we will take a final breath and then we will have to face judgment for eternity

INVITATION

Do you want to find your identity?

The best way to start is to examine yourself

Are you trying to live a life for God but also calling something else king of your life?

Just like the Jews did with Nebuchadnezzar

Are you trying to identify with the sin you have?

Constantly trying something new

Putting your feelings above what is right

No one knows you better than you

You have to be truthful about yourself

About the sin in your life

You are only hurting yourself by not telling your testimony to people

Your hurting your relationship with God as well

God already knows the sin you struggle with

Our Identity should be in Christ

If you

The Holy Bible: English Standard Version. (2016). (). Wheaton, IL: Crossway Bibles.