Solid Foundation

Introduction

Our passage this morning builds off of our passage from last week Isaiah 43:19. God is doing something new. Do we have eyes to see it?

This passage began to speak to me in a new way as we exited our stay home stay safe order. From mid march to mid may we were in what felt like an exile. We were not able to physically gather with friends or family members that didn’t live with us. We also were not able to physically gather together in our specific places and times for worship. Thanks be to God that even during our time of exile he made a way for his people to worship him through virtual online church services.

As restrictions on gatherings lifted God began to bring his people back to their physical times and space for worship.

After 80 days of exile God brought his people back to the very foundations of their worship. As we gathered for worship things weren’t the same as we remembered. Whether it was gathering space, order of service, singing, or how we can safely come to communion things had changed.

The more things change, the more they remain the same. The rock solid foundation of our worship remains the same.

This morning we see the people of God after 70 years in exile returning to the foundations of their physical place of worship. A couple key takeaways from this is 1) The people gathered in this place united in worship. 2) The foundation to their worship is the same generation to generation. The people of God gather in this space to lift their voice in shouts of joy, praise and worship because God is good and his love endures forever. God saved His people from slavery in Egypt, and is saving them now from the Babylonian exile. 3) The people of God can’t long for what was so strongly, that they can’t embrace what God is doing now.

May we remember the unchanging foundation of God’s saving grace as we stand around the foundation and give thanks to God. Let us also be open to how God is calling each one of us to build on His foundation.

Ezra 3:10-13

-United in Worship Ezra 3:1, all the people assembled with a unified purpose, to worship God. To rebuild the ruins of the Temple on the newly poured foundation. As they gathered together they remembered God’s goodness and unfailing love for his people. Perhaps responding together to Psalm 136.

Ezra and Nehemiah: A Commentary in the Wesleyan Tradition 2. Rebuilding the Temple Foundation (3:7–13)

The attribute of good (ṭôb) encompasses the whole range of the Lord’s gracious activity toward his creation. The term love (ḥesed) emphasizes God’s unwavering commitment to bring blessing into the lives of his people.

-70 years of exile. Daniel prayed in his house three times a day towards Jerusalem.

-The Scene of weeping and shouts of joy. Is a sad refusal, by the generation that remembers Solomon’s temple, to welcome what God is doing and what he is going to do. It also serves as a reminder to those who grew up in exile that there is a lot of work to do to achieve the Temple’s former glory.

-While some wept in disappointment, many others shouted for joy because the temple generated renewed hopes of better days (Ezra 3:12). So a mixture of voices rose from the worship service. The cacophonic sound of weeping and shouts of joy blended together and carried for some distance into the hills surrounding Jerusalem (v 13).

Edlin, J. (2017). Ezra and Nehemiah: A Commentary in the Wesleyan Tradition. (A. Varughese, R. Hahn, & G. Lyons, Eds.) (pp. 64–65). Kansas City, MO: Beacon Hill Press.

-Worship draws upon previous generations. The returning exiles did not have to reinvent patterns of worship for their day. No generation has to do this. They can always look to the past for direction. The exiles adopted times, structures, and liturgies that had been used for centuries, since the times of David and Moses. Undoubtedly these patterns needed to be updated in language and other ways. But the essential elements of regular times of worship as well as timeless words of worship remained instructive to them.

Edlin, J. (2017). Ezra and Nehemiah: A Commentary in the Wesleyan Tradition. (A. Varughese, R. Hahn, & G. Lyons, Eds.) (p. 65). Kansas City, MO: Beacon Hill Press.

Conclusion

Brothers and sisters we gather today after 80 days of exile. We gather with a single purpose to lift our voice, to lift our hearts up to the Lord, because he has saved us through our Lord Jesus Christ and brought us out of the darkness of exile and into his marvelous light. We gather today with the stone the builders have rejected being our chief cornerstone.

What have I learned from this passage through this pandemic? While having a physical space and time to gather to worship God is important, worship of God is not contained in a building. While where and how we worship may change the rock solid foundation that almighty God who is good, who’s love endures forever has saved us through the shed blood of our Lord Jesus Christ does not change. How are we the people of God going to work with God to let others know about his saving grace?

As we recognize God working in new ways, it is also important to remember that moving forward we don’t have to reinvent the wheel. The church of the past provides a solid foundation for the church of the future to join God’s work of building His church. This is the rock solid foundation that God is going to build his church on that Jesus Christ is the Messiah, the son of the Living God.

The question about building on this foundation is this, how do we work with God to communicate this to a new generation.