When God Reforms You

Last Sunday, we left the Israelites worshiping with joy at the temple. The second temple had been built from the rubble left from the destruction of the first temple. It wasn’t as grand or as beautiful as the first, but it served its purpose well. Today we will finally meet the man who wrote this book which we have been studying.

Ezra left Babylon 60 years after the temple had been completed and returned to Jerusalem. King Artaxerxes, the King of Persia at that time, sent Ezra and any others who wanted to return back to Jerusalem with many valuable items and money for the temple.

The journey took 4 months. Very little is mentioned of the journey itself, other than the gracious hand of Ezra’s God was on him. They were traveling with a large load of valuables from Babylon. The king had donated gold and silver, along with money to purchase sacrifices once the group arrived in Jerusalem. The king appointed Ezra to lead the people and make sure all of this was done so that the God of Israel would continue to bless Persia. The four month journey back to Jerusalem was not an easy one. The roads were usually filled with robbers and looters. And this band of pilgrims were carrying precious cargo, and a lot of it. They would have been prime targets, but Ezra chose to establish his faith in God’s provision and protection early on.

Ezra 8:21-23

“There, by the Ahava Canal, I proclaimed a fast, so that we might humble ourselves before our God and ask him for a safe journey for us and our children, with all our possessions. 22 I was ashamed to ask the king for soldiers and horsemen to protect us from enemies on the road, because we had told the king, “The gracious hand of our God is on everyone who looks to him, but his great anger is against all who forsake him.” 23 So we fasted and petitioned our God about this, and he answered our prayer.”

This will not be the first time we see Ezra and the word humble used in the same sentence. He began this journey fully reliant upon God.

Ezra was also asked to use the wisdom of God to appoint magistrates and judges to administer justice to all the people of Trans-Euphrates. The king went as far as to say, “appoint all who know the laws of your God. And you are to teach any who do not know them. 26 Whoever does not obey the law of your God and the law of the king must surely be punished by death, banishment, confiscation of property, or imprisonment.” Ezra 7:25-26

What a huge responsibility Ezra had in leading this group back to Jerusalem. Why would the king of Persia choose an exile to take money from the royal treasury, precious items for the temple, and the power to appoint government officials?

Ezra was specifically chosen because he had, “devoted himself to the study and observance of the Law of the Lord, and to teaching its decrees and laws in Israel.” Ezra 7:10

Those three things set Ezra apart and made Him the best man to lead this second wave of exiles back home. Ezra is known as the reformer. Whereas Zerubabel was tasked with the project of building the physical temple, Ezra was sent to build up the people of God. “He is a model reformer in that what he taught he had first lived, and what he lived he had first made sure of in the Scriptures.”

There’s something to be said about a leader who listens to the authority of Scripture, lives by that authority and then teaches others to do the same. Ezra was a man of integrity who made sure he was abiding by the laws he was teaching to others. This is why he was chosen to do the job King Artexerxes entrusted to him.

After four months of traveling they arrived in Jerusalem at the temple safe and unharmed. After resting for four days from their pilgrimage, they began the process of making sacrifices and placing things back in their rightful positions in the temple.

This is when Ezra’s ministry began. All of the traveling and sacrifices were just a precursor to what he was about to step into.

Most people who are given a leadership role spend a lot of time dreaming about the way they are going to lead and the changes they are going to make. If it’s a new position, they daydream about the people who will be under them and what their team will accomplish together. In a leaders heart lies dreams of the future. Most of the time those dreams are very idealistic. They think that the changes they will make will be easily accepted and implemented. They have big picture dreams and often forget about the little pieces that need to come together to accomplish those dreams. And they easily forget that they are going to be leading people who have their own ideas, past experiences and issues. Sometimes it takes a while for the leader to realize that they themselves are imperfect and that they are working with imperfect people who refuse to make the dream a reality.

Ezra chapter 9 is a wake up call for Ezra, our fearless reformer. “After these things had been done, the leaders came to me and said, “The people of Israel, including the priests and the Levites, have not kept themselves separate from the neighboring peoples with their detestable practices, like those of the Canaanites, Hittites, Perizzites, Jebusites, Ammonites, Moabites, Egyptians and Amorites. 2 They have taken some of their daughters as wives for themselves and their sons, and have mingled the holy race with the peoples around them. And the leaders and officials have led the way in this unfaithfulness.”

What a rude awakening. Ezra had come to Jerusalem assuming that his people had been faithful to the covenant God had established with them. He quickly learned they had not been faithful at all.

The law that God gave His people in Deuteronomy 7:1-4 says, “When the LORD your God brings you into the land you are entering to possess and drives out before you many nations—the Hittites, Girgashites, Amorites, Canaanites, Perizzites, Hivites and Jebusites, seven nations larger and stronger than you—2 and when the LORD your God has delivered them over to you and you have defeated them, then you must destroy them totally. l Make no treaty with them, and show them no mercy. 3 Do not intermarry with them. Do not give your daughters to their sons or take their daughters for your sons, 4 for they will turn your children away from following me to serve other gods, and the LORD’s anger will burn against you and will quickly destroy you.”

The seven nations they were to destroy did not acknowledge the sovereignty of God, in fact they devoted themselves to many other gods whom God could not tolerate in his presence. The reason why God did not want his people to intermarry with these other nations is because those who believed in other gods would weaken the faith and allegiance of the Israelites to God alone.

The marriage covenant is the closest thing we have that exemplifies the covenant God made with His people. When His people married foreigners who worshiped other gods, it was inevitable that Yahweh, the One true God, would be pushed aside and the pagan gods would take His place.

Say your child brought home a Hittite spouse, that Hittite spouse would bring his/her gods with them and make sure to make space on the shelf where those idols would be set. Their spouse would worship those idols and abide by their rules. Your child may stand their ground for a while and only worship God, but soon their spouse would have them convinced that there could be more than one god and they are better off covering their bases. Eventually this polytheistic mindset would infiltrate every area of their lives, including child rearing. So the next generation would be raised believing in multiple gods, which would then be passed down to other generations. This is a common theme in the Old Testament.

When Ezra realized that in those 60 years after returning to Jerusalem, his people had taken foreign wives, he was devastated. Ezra 9:3-4, “When I heard this, I tore my tunic and cloak, pulled hair from my head and beard and sat down appalled. 4 Then everyone who trembled at the words of the God of Israel gathered around me because of this unfaithfulness of the exiles. And I sat there appalled until the evening sacrifice.”

He had been sucker punched by the fact that his people had so quickly returned to the thing that got them into trouble in the first place. His first response was terrified shock. “Then, at the evening sacrifice, I rose from my self-abasement, with my tunic and cloak torn, and fell on my knees with my hands spread out to the LORD my God 6 and prayed: “I am too ashamed and disgraced, my God, to lift up my face to you, because our sins are higher than our heads and our guilt has reached to the heavens. 7 From the days of our ancestors until now, our guilt has been great. Because of our sins, we and our kings and our priests have been subjected to the sword and captivity, to pillage and humiliation at the hand of foreign kings, as it is today.”

Ezra confessed the sins of his nation. He didn’t try to excuse them or sweep them under the rug. He confessed them before God and before his people. And he, himself, owned up to them. Ezra had not married a foreigner, he hadn’t broken the law of the Lord, but his prayer was personal and he repented for the sins of his people.

“Willy Brandt was Germany’s Chancellor from 1969 to 1974. In 1970, he made an historic visit to Poland. Brandt came to the site of the Warsaw Ghetto—an open-air walled prison where the Nazis forced Jews to live before “liquidating” it in 1943. Brandt came to acknowledge Germany’s culpability in the murder of 3 million Polish Jews—90% of the country’s Jewish population and nearly half of the 6 million Jews killed and burned to ash by the Nazis.

Brandt was there to lay a wreath. But as he approached the memorial, he fell to his knees in anguish. It was an act of deep humility and courage. At the time, there were older Germans who hated it. Who saw it as a sign of weakness. Brandt’s gesture could not bring back 6 million murdered Jews or the millions of European civilians also murdered. But it was the beginning of Germany’s true reckoning with the past.

It’s important to add that Willy Brandt fled Nazi Germany as a young man and survived the war in hiding as a dissident. He was a marked man by the Nazis often escaping capture and death. So if anyone had an excuse to say “I’m not responsible for what my country did”—it was him. But Brandt understood that he was part of a society that committed mass murder on an unimaginable scale. And he had to act.”

These two men aren’t the only ones who have ever confessed the sins of others, Jesus said on the cross, “Father, forgive them, for they do not know what they are doing.”

1. Acknowledging sin begins the process of breaking spiritual strongholds.

Acknowledging our individual sins breaks spiritual strongholds. Acknowledging the sins of a nation breaks spiritual strongholds. Admitting to the wrongs that have been done in our own lives brings healing through the redemptive power of Jesus Christ. The same is true when we admit the wrongs that have been done in our nation. It Brings Healing when we expose it and allow the forgiveness of Christ to sweep over us and our land!

It takes humility to own up to our own sins and it takes humility to own up to the sins of a nation. To confess them as if they were our own. But when this happens it begins a gigantic shift in the spiritual realm. It breaks down walls that have been built due to suffering and pain.

The next part of Ezra’s prayer focuses on the loving-kindness of God. “But now, for a brief moment, the LORD our God has been gracious in leaving us a remnant and giving us a firm place k in his sanctuary, and so our God gives light to our eyes and a little relief in our bondage. 9 Though we are slaves, our God has not forsaken us in our bondage. He has shown us kindness in the sight of the kings of Persia: He has granted us new life to rebuild the house of our God and repair its ruins, and he has given us a wall of protection in Judah and Jerusalem.”

Ezra did not take lightly the captivity and bondage he had just been freed from. God had sent his people back to the land He had given them. He had freed them from the rule and reign of kings who did not value their God. By reflecting back on what God had done, he was reminded of the glory they had betrayed. And it shows that he was acutely conscious of God’s mercy. He knew that they deserved death, but God showed them mercy.

He again acknowledges the sins of his people and recalls God’s law from Deuteronomy 7:1-4. Then he closes his prayer saying, “What has happened to us is a result of our evil deeds and our great guilt, and yet, our God, you have punished us less than our sins deserved and have given us a remnant like this. 14 Shall we then break your commands again and intermarry with the peoples who commit such detestable practices? Would you not be angry enough with us to destroy us, leaving us no remnant or survivor? 15 LORD, the God of Israel, you are righteous! We are left this day as a remnant. Here we are before you in our guilt, though because of it not one of us can stand in your presence.”

“His prayer was naked confession, without excuses, without the pressure of so much as a request.”

The difference between Ezra’s prayer and Willy’s prayer is that Ezra was not so dignified. Ezra 10:1, “While Ezra was praying and confessing, weeping and throwing himself down before the house of God, a large crowd of Israelites—men, women and children—gathered around him.”

His prayer affected the entire congregation. They too wept bitterly. And then they jumped into action and wanted to make it all right. They acted swiftly to correct the wrong that had been done. And they called on Ezra to take courage and do it. They gathered everybody and sent off all of the foreign wives and children. This was not an easy thing to do and I can’t imagine the anguish people felt. But they took action to obey what God had commanded them to do.

I am so incredibly thankful that we live in the New Covenant. I am so incredibly thankful that Jesus was the perfect and final sacrifice and that we can go directly to God to make things right. But I believe there are some powerful lessons we can learn from Ezra’s confession and repentance of sin.

2. Remaining humble is the only way to lead.

Whether you’re leading in your home, your workplace, the church or community, humility keeps us in check at all times. It reminds us Who is in charge and that we are just His vessels to establish His Kingdom on earth.

One lesson we can learn from the Israelites is that (Prov. 16:18)

18 Pride goes before destruction,

a haughty spirit before a fall.

As a leader be very careful how you live, and as a follower be very picky about who leads you.

3. The prayer of confession and repentance shouldn’t be taken lightly.

Whether its individual or cooperate, we should feel conviction to the core of our being. Our sin should bring godly sorrow. 2 Corinthians 7:10-11

“Godly sorrow brings repentance that leads to salvation and leaves no regret, but worldly sorrow brings death. 11 See what this godly sorrow has produced in you: what earnestness, what eagerness to clear yourselves, what indignation, what alarm, what longing, what concern, what readiness to see justice done.”

We become hardened to conviction when we excuse our sin and the sins of our nation. If we excuse it and blame others for it we will never feel the depth of pain, that godly sorrow, that our sin brings God.

4. We should always focus on what God has done for us and the forgiveness we have in Jesus.

His loving kindness and patience with us should continually fuel in us a desire to be obedient to the things He has laid out for us to obey.

Today we are living in a time in history that is unlike any other. I just received a message of a preacher preaching hot and heavy about his feelings regarding the shut downs. People want to pull us every which way. Everyone is trying to lead and force us to believe that we should do this or do that.

Ezra was a reformer and I believe that God is reforming His church today. He is in the business of reforming people all the time. What will His church look like in the future? What will our nation look like in the future? Only God has those answers. What I know is He is looking for people who will humble themselves, who will be willing to confess their sins and the sins of their nation. People who will love Him and others wholeheartedly. And people who will be Jesus in every area of their lives, making disciples who will change the world for God’s glory.

Will you allow God to reform you and make you into a reformer for His Kingdom?

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Kidner, D. (1979). Ezra and Nehemiah: An Introduction and Commentary (Vol. 12, p. 71). Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press.