Title: Sunday Night-Ezra’s Shame
Place: BLCC
Date: 5/8/16
Text: Ezra 9
CT: We must humble ourselves before God.
FAS: It is awful easy to get hung up on ourselves. Especially when things are going good and we are being blessed. We can begin to think pretty high about our own successes and like to hear people brag on us. This can even happen to a preacher. When things are going well it is easy to say wow I must be doing something right.
The thing is all of our success comes from one place. God.
I found an old transcript from the 1500s that was written by Martin Luther. Very wise words for any preacher or any of us.
Qualities the world looks for in a preacher: He must have a fine accent. He must be learned. He must be eloquent. He must be a handsome person. He must take no money, but have money to give. He must tell people what they like to hear.
Qualities and virtues of a good preacher: Able to teach in a right and orderly way. A good head. A good voice. A good memory. Know when to stop. Be sure of his material and be diligent. Stake body and life, goods and honor on it. Suffer himself to be vexed (Annoyed, much talked about) and flayed (criticized) by everyone.
LS: Pretty tall order. But really true. As a preacher or as a follower of Christ we become a servant to Christ and his people. Ezra shows us how to lead this way.
I. This week I am going to try and pull a sermon out of Ezra. Ezra was a priest. He is the one who leads the second group out of Babylon. He is authorized to finish the temple being rebuilt by the king of Persia. God has given Ezra the job of not only rebuilding the temple but also to rebuild the remnant of Israel spiritually.
On their return, Ezra finds that many of the people had left the ways of God to intermarry with foreign women. They took on their ways and “gods”. This is not a sermon on race. This is a sermon about people going against the will of God. God was trying to maintain a remnant of His people to bring in a messiah. It had fell upon Ezra to accomplish this revitalization of the people to return their hearts to the One God.
Ezra returns. The temple has been restored. Ezra must have been feeling pretty good to be in the Holy City of Jerusalem. He was dedicated to ministering to peoples needs.
He would have certainly had an easier life back in Babylon just serving as the priest in exile. It was an easy gig without any real purpose or challenge. But God had a different plan for Ezra. Just as he often does for us when get content and comfortable with where we are. God called him to serve the Jewish remnant in Jerusalem. But when he returns he finds things not so good.
Read Ezra 9.1-2… 1 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.”
Ezra was facing a problem. Sin was taking over the people. They were turning from God and taking up with other “gods” by intermarrying with the people God had tried to rescue them from.
Something had to be done. The sin had to be uncovered. The men were allowed to marry these foreign women if they, the women, renounced their old life and accepted God. Remember Ruth and Moab. But these women had not done this. It was blatant disobedience to God.
I am sure these folks tried every way they could to justify their disobedience. They made excuses for their action. Not enough Jewish women? Had to keep their families going. Just as we often try to justify our disobedience with excuse of why there was no other way we could go. Why did they not go back to Babylon to get wives from the women still in Babylon?
God had given them the marriage law to Israel to protect the nation from defilement from other gods. The Jews were not called a Holy nation because they were necessarily better than other nations. It was that God had set them apart to do His will. To be a witness to the other nations so they might be redeemed as well.
To be a light to the rest of the nations.
There were three things that would eventually come from the nation of Israel. The knowledge of the one true God, the written Word of God, and the Savior, Jesus Christ.
So let’s see how Ezra dealt with this. Read 9.3-15
3 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.
5 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.
How privileged was the remnant to have a spiritual leader like Ezra. Ezra had been given special authority from the king. He could have dealt harshly with these people who had disobeyed God. He could have banished them, took their wealth or even had them executed.
But Ezra was first of all a man who wanted God’s ideal for his people. He took their burden as his own. That’s big. He was a devout man of prayer. He knew where to go first. He prayed to God.
He didn’t preach a fiery sermon though they needed to be reminded of God’s will. Neither did he seek out the sinners and immediately call them to repentance as important as that was. No, he went straight to the temple to pray to God. He mourned as if he had lost a loved one. He pulled his hair and tore his clothes to show his despair.
The people had been so blessed by God in their being freed from their captivity and now they were rebelling from the One who saved them. Even the leaders of the church were guilty.
The leaders. The problem with our world today is leaders are not worried or shocked by sin. If anything, it is lifted up as good and admirable. Even praised. Character and morality are way down on the list of things we look for in leaders in our society today.
Even the church doesn’t seem to live up to this. Are we more worried about numbers and power than dealing with the sins of our times? Have we forgot as followers of Jesus that we are to be the salt and earth to all those around us. I pray we haven’t here at BLCC.
Matthew 5.13-16 “You are the salt of the earth. But if the salt loses its saltiness, how can it be made salty again? It is no longer good for anything, except to be thrown out and trampled underfoot.
“You are the light of the world. A town built on a hill cannot be hidden. Neither do people light a lamp and put it under a bowl. Instead they put it on its stand, and it gives light to everyone in the house. In the same way, let your light shine before others, that they may see your good deeds and glorify your Father in heaven.
Christians often study and know their Bibles but forget to live as it says. True followers of Christ do their best to do what it says.
Continue with Ezra
8 “But now, for a brief moment, the Lord our God has been gracious in leaving us a remnant and giving us a firm place 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.
No wonder Ezra was ashamed. For all that God had done (point out), and yet they had turned their back on God to serve other “gods”.
Continue with Ezra.
10 “But now, our God, what can we say after this? For we have forsaken the commands 11 you gave through your servants the prophets when you said: ‘The land you are entering to possess is a land polluted by the corruption of its peoples. By their detestable practices they have filled it with their impurity from one end to the other. 12 Therefore, do not give your daughters in marriage to their sons or take their daughters for your sons. Do not seek a treaty of friendship with them at any time, that you may be strong and eat the good things of the land and leave it to your children as an everlasting inheritance. ’
Do not be taken in by other gods.
13 “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.”
Ezra stands a humble man before God. There is no excuse for their behavior. Ezra admits and confesses their guilt. Ezra is much like his predecessor Moses here. He is seeking forgiveness for his people.
They were a guilty people. Some because they had disobeyed and others because they stood by and let it happen.
They stood at the mercy of God. God is a righteous and holy God and must protect His holiness. He must punish sin. But the great and wonderful thing is our God is a God of compassion and grace as well.
The first thing we need to do when we are guilty of disobedience is to take it in pray to God before we try to deal with it ourselves.
Ezra’s shame brought him to his knees. Are we ready to go to our knees for our sins and those of our people? Our family, our nation, our church.
God is holy. To atone for our disobedience he sent His Son to be the receiver of the punishment we deserve. Ezra in his shame showed what Jesus was called to do in a much bigger way. Ezra took on the shame of his people before God, just as Jesus would do the same for all people.
