SPIRITUAL DIARY FOR 7/21/2011 9:00:30 AM
My Worship Time Focus:
“We
are Unworthy of Your Blessings”
Bible Reading
& Meditation Reference: Ezra 9:8-12
Message of the verses: “8 "But now for a brief moment grace has
been shown from the LORD our God, to leave us an escaped remnant and to give us a peg in His holy place,
that our God may enlighten
our eyes and grant
us a little reviving in our bondage. 9
"For we are slaves; yet in our bondage our God has not forsaken us,
but has extended lovingkindness to us in the sight of the kings of Persia, to
give us reviving to raise up the house of our God, to restore its ruins and to give us a wall in Judah and
Jerusalem. 10 “Now, our God, what shall we say after this? For we have
forsaken Your commandments, 11 which You
have commanded by Your servants the prophets, saying, ’The land which you are
entering to possess is an unclean land with the uncleanness of the peoples of
the lands, with their abominations which have filled it from end to end and
with their impurity. 12 ’So now do not
give your daughters to their sons nor take their daughters to your sons, and
never seek their peace or their prosperity, that you may be strong and eat the
good things of the land and leave it as an inheritance to your sons forever.’”
In
verses eight and nine I have highlighted five different images to picture what
God’s grace had done for the people who had returned to the land.
1.
In
His Grace God persevered a remnant. As
one looks at the Bible in general and in particular the nation of Israel, it
can be seen that there were times when because of their sin that God would
destroy part of them but would always keep a remnant. One example of this is when Elijah thought he
was the only one left in Israel who was serving the Lord; the Lord told him
that He had 7000 who had not bowed their knee to Baal. There are other examples that can be found,
and the one that sticks out in my mind is when the Lord sent the world wide
flood to cover the earth and the remnant that was left was Noah and his family.
2.
Next
Ezra speaks about a peg in His holy place.
This speaks of the foothold that the Jews now had in the land, the land
that was taken away from them. The peg
in the holy place speaks of the Temple and now that it was rebuilt because of
the grace of God the Jews were more secure in the land.
3.
God
enlightens their eyes. This speaks of
the Jews returning to their homeland.
The enlightened eye speaks of new life, new joy, and dawning of a new
day. Here are two verses from the book
of Psalms that help explain this: Psalm 13:3 “Consider and hear me, O LORD my
God: lighten mine eyes, lest I sleep the sleep of death; Psalm 34:5 “They
looked unto him, and were lightened: and their faces were not ashamed.”
4.
Grant
us a little reviving in our bondage is the forth picture of God’s grace
bestowed upon the returning Jews. This
actually pictures the resurrection from the dead for these returning exiles,
for how could this have happened if not by the grace of God.
5.
To
give us a wall in Judah and Jerusalem is the final picture of God grace to the
returning exiles. I spoke of it a bit in
the last picture of Grace. When one
reads the history that is found in the OT they will see a lot of
bloodshed. The people during this time
of history had very little value for human life and so when you come to look at
four different kings from the empire of Persia and they just send their
captives back to where they came from and not only that but they paid their
way, gave back all of the articles for temple worship, which amounted to tons
of gold and silver, there is only one answer to how this happened and that is
the grace of God. God foretold this in the
44th and 45th chapters of Isaiah and actually gave the
name to Cyrus who was the first king to let the exiles go back.
I
think that when you look at all of these acts of grace that the Lord had
bestowed upon these exiles and then to have them completely go against the Law
of God by marrying pagans it is now wonder that Ezra was speechless before the
Lord for a while and unreservedly ashamed.
How
did Ezra pray to the Lord about this situation?
John 15:7 will give the answer to this question: “If you abide in Me, and My words
abide in you, ask
whatever you wish, and it will be done for you.’” The highlighted portions of John 15:7 are the
key to the answer on how Ezra prayed, for we have already learned from Ezra
7:10 “For Ezra had set his heart to study the law
of the LORD and to practice it, and to teach His statutes and ordinances
in Israel.” The key to praying is to know the Scriptures and
to abide in the Lord or remain in the Vine, and when this happens in a
believer’s life then the last portion of John 15:7 will happen. It is clear that Ezra knew the OT Scriptures
and this was the reason that he was so upset because by knowing them he knew
that the exiles were sinning against the Lord and His Law.
In
his prayer from verses 12-13 one can see why the Lord had destroyed the
Canaanite people, but do not think that they did not have a chance to repent
for the Lord gave them four hundred years to repent before Israel came in to
conquer the land. Genesis 15:16 has long
been a verse that has been near to my heart because it shows the grace of
God. Here is how I picture this verse;
God has a bottle in heaven and in this bottle is stored the sins of the
nations, and in this case the Canaanite nations, and when that bottle is filled
the wrath of God will be taken out on them.
The wrath or judgment of God is part of His attributes, just as the love
of God is and all of God’s attributes bring glory to Him. It is part of His character that He has justice
and love and grace are also part of His character. Genesis
15:16 “"Then in the fourth generation they will return here, for the
iniquity of the Amorite is not yet complete.’” This verse is part of a conversation that God
had with Abraham. Chapter 15 is a large
part of the covenant that the Lord had with Abraham and his descendants that
has not been fully completed yet.
Dr.
Wiersbe writes the following about what these men who had sinned were
doing: “These men were sacrificing the
future and paying a great price to do it.
It wasn’t worth it. No wonder
Ezra was speechless and asked, ‘What shall we say after this.’”
Spiritual meaning for my life today: Prayer is what is on my heart this
morning. My sister has a practice that
she learned from a Beth Moore bible study of praying Scripture out loud to the
Lord about different circumstances that she faces. It is good to learn something from your
sister. This practice goes along with “abiding in the Vine,” and also can be
seen in Ezra’s prayer in this section of Scripture. I am concerned about the usefulness of my
prayer life and it surely seems to me that the Lord has answered this prayer.
My Steps of
Faith for Today:
1.
Continue to have a more useful prayer life that will
bring glory to the Lord.
2.
Continue to learn contentment.
3.
Proverbs 3:5-6.
4.
Psalm 139:23-24.
7/21/2011 10:41:54 AM
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