Hope From the Word

Bill Luebkemann: Contrary to what some think, God is not distant, but still involved in the affairs of men. That’s next on Hope From the Word with Pastor Bill Luebkemann.

The Lord who is active and alive and well and active in the affairs of men. And He caused this thing to happen. But I think we see here a recognition that this comes from God. And we seem to have lost this today. Today it’s random chance and possible permutations and how we possibly got here by accidentally evolving through the survival of the fittest and whatever, and God’s just not involved in it. The Lord here stirring up the spirit of Cyrus, so much so that he made this proclamation throughout all his kingdom.

Guest (Male): The Lord is able to speak to His people, to stir their hearts to do what He is calling them to do. We’ll observe a great example and its implications today on Hope From the Word. But first, let me welcome you to the broadcast. This is an outreach of Calvary Chapel of Marlton, and our teacher is Pastor Bill Luebkemann.

Just yesterday we began a study of the book of Ezra, and we’ll pick up where we left off. This recalls a time in history when God stirred the hearts of His people to accomplish His purpose. He still does so today, I’m happy to tell you. Here’s Pastor Bill in chapter one, verse five.

Bill Luebkemann: I think we can see here very clearly the Lord is active in the affairs of men. When things happen, maybe not everything, of course, but the Lord can stir up our spirits, the spirits of any one of us here, the spirits of the leaders of our country or church, our nation, whatever, to guide them in the direction that they want to go.

I don’t know that when the Lord stirs up someone’s heart, they necessarily always know it was the Lord. When the Pharaoh king of Egypt, when the Lord hardened his heart—and by the way, first it says he hardened his own heart, and then after it says that a few times, then it begins to say that the Lord hardened his heart, confirming the direction that he chose to go.

When the Lord hardened his heart, I don’t think Pharaoh would say to you, "I can’t change my heart because the Lord hardened it." I’m not sure he was aware that the Lord was doing that. Cyrus seemed to be aware of it here, but it was the Lord who stirred up his heart. It’s the Lord who is active and alive and well and active in the affairs of men. And He caused this thing to happen.

This doesn’t mean He causes everything to happen that happens, and there’s certainly a lot of bad things happen that the Lord didn’t cause. But I think we see here a recognition that this comes from God. And we seem to have lost this today. Today it’s random chance and possible permutations and how we possibly got here by accidentally evolving through the survival of the fittest and whatever, and God’s just not involved in it.

The Lord here stirring up the spirit of Cyrus, so much so that he made this proclamation throughout all his kingdom. And he also put it in writing, so it was given verbally and it was sent out around the whole kingdom, but it was also written down. And we’re going to see in a few chapters that it was written down in the archives because in a few chapters they have to search in the archives, a few kings come and go, and they make a search to see this record of it.

So he wrote it down in some fashion that it would be distributed throughout the kingdom. It was proclaimed publicly, but at the same time it was stored in the official archives of his kingdom. And what did he say? "Thus says Cyrus king of Persia: All the kingdoms of the earth the Lord God of heaven has given me, and He has commanded me to build Him a house at Jerusalem which is in Judah."

Now, all the kingdoms of the earth, not exactly true, but he did have the biggest kingdom at that point. But for example, it did not include North America or China or most of what we now call Europe or even all of Africa. But it was all the kingdoms of the known world to these people at this time. This guy reigned everywhere. So his proclamation here may be prone a little bit to exaggeration on his own part, but which king can you find that doesn’t exaggerate things in his favor?

"And here I am, the great one," they called him Cyrus the Great. "And aren’t I so wonderful? And the Lord God of heaven has given me every kingdom there is, and He’s commanded me to make Him this house at Jerusalem, which is in Judah." Again, you could almost believe the guy was a real believer if you didn’t also know that he was setting up all the other gods in their own houses, hoping they would all be happy where he sent them.

"Who is among you of all His people?" So who here is descended from these people, to the congregation, to his country, to the population of his country? "Who is among you of all His people? Which of you are from the Lord God's people? And for those that are, may his God be with him." If you're descended from the Israelites, then may your God be with you and may you go up to Jerusalem. "Let him go up to Jerusalem, which is in Judah, and build the house of the Lord God of Israel (He is God) which is in Jerusalem. You can go. Whoever is here who wants to go, can go."

Now, they didn’t all go. They’ve been in captivity for 70 years. So there’s a whole new generation of people here who don’t know anything about the old promised land. Anybody less than 70 years old probably has never been there. And there were Jews in Babylon that were doing perfectly fine. They had a farm, they had a business, they had friends, they had relatives. They were making a living.

They didn’t want to go to some place that was all bombed out and beat up and run down and overgrown and a real mess. This was not all the Jews that went. It was those that the Lord caused to go, those who were called by God, those who had an interest in returning to the things of the Lord. "Who is among you," he said, "of all His people? May his God be with him and let them go and rebuild this house."

And whoever is left, verse four, in any place where he dwells, let the men of his place help him with silver and gold, with goods and livestock, besides the freewill offerings for the house of God which is in Jerusalem. So anybody who doesn’t go, if some of you go and some of you decide not to go, the ones that don’t go should help the ones that are going.

I think you can also read this to say that even other people who weren't Jews that you knew, if you were leaving, the ones the Jews who didn’t go back, but also the non-Jews in your town, they should help them also. It’s not like a tax. He doesn’t tell them how much they have to give, but he just says, "Whoever’s left, somebody leaves, whoever’s left in the place where that person dwells, let the people who are left give the one who’s leaving silver and gold and goods and livestock" to help them out, to provide for their needs as they journey.

And also let them give him freewill offerings for the house of God which is in Jerusalem. It sort of brings to mind what happened with Pharaoh and leaving Egypt and how it is said that they plundered the Egyptians because the Egyptians were made to feel beneficial, they were made to feel good towards the Israelites and they gave them lots of things to take with them, lots of going away presents.

I wouldn’t say the word here is plundered, it just reminds you of how God provided for the Jews when they went out from Egypt into the desert. He provided for them, and here He is providing for these people as well. He doesn’t just send them back empty-handed and say, "Be of good cheer, brother, we’ll pray for you that you’re able to find enough food to eat and clothes to wear." God always providing beneficially more than we could ask for, hope for, or imagine.

And they were loaded up with silver and gold and goods and livestock, not to mention the gifts that they could bring back to the house of God in Jerusalem. Verse five: "Then the heads of the fathers' houses of Judah and Benjamin, and the priests and the Levites, with all whose spirits God had moved, arose to go up and build the house of the Lord which is in Jerusalem. And all those who were around them encouraged them with articles of silver and gold, with goods and livestock and with precious things besides all that was willingly offered."

So they did that which was commanded them by the king. The heads of the fathers' houses of Judah and Benjamin and the priests and the Levites. Notice it doesn’t mention any of the other tribes. It mentions Judah, Benjamin, and the Levites, which included the priests. But it does say with all whose spirits God had moved. So there were other people from other tribes going, but it would seem to be predominantly Judah, Benjamin, and the tribe of Levi that were going, including the priests. But others with them, whoever God’s spirit had moved.

We shouldn’t look down on the guy who said, "I think I’m going to stay here because I got a business here and I’m doing well and don’t really want to go there and do that." Well, maybe God just didn’t move that guy’s spirit. I wouldn’t want to blame the people who didn’t go, but what we want to say here is that this was all the people whose spirits God had moved. So we see again God doing the leading, and maybe they didn’t even realize that God was leading them.

I heard Joe Focht share a number of years ago how he was on a plane flying to Israel just as a tourist. And there was a Jewish American family with them, a husband, a wife and some kids. And he said, "So are you going to tour Israel?" "No, we’re moving there." "Oh, so are you Jewish?" "Yeah, we’re Jewish." "So are you like believing Jews? Do you believe in a personal God? Are you religious?" "Oh, no, not religious at all." "Well, why are you going then?" "Just feel drawn. Just feel drawn."

Anybody who says that the reinstitution of Israel in 1948 wasn't a God thing hasn't read much about it. That God could stir people’s hearts and draw them back to Himself and maybe they don’t even realize it yet. These people, they were the people who God had moved their spirits. They got up to go. They told everybody, "We’re leaving."

Now, this could have taken months or years to pack up their things, but those who were around them encouraged them, giving them articles of silver and gold, goods and livestock, and the things to be willingly offered to God. Provisions for the journey. Now King Cyrus wasn’t going to be outdone. King Cyrus also brought out the articles of the house of the Lord which Nebuchadnezzar had taken from Jerusalem and put in the temple of his gods.

And Cyrus king of Persia brought them out by the hand of Mithredath the treasurer and counted them out to Sheshbazzar the prince of Judah. This is the number of them: 30 gold platters, 1,000 silver platters, 29 knives, 30 gold basins, 410 silver basins of a similar kind, and 1,000 other articles. All the articles of gold and silver were 5,400. All these Sheshbazzar took with the captives who were brought from Babylon to Jerusalem.

So you remember when Nebuchadnezzar had conquered Jerusalem and carried everybody off into captivity, he cleaned out all the articles in the house of God. And by the way, there’s a scripture that says he cut them up. Some people look at this and say, "Well, the Bible’s not true. It says, I forget what book it says it in, that he cut them all up." So how could he be returning them?

But the Hebrew word for cutting them up is similar to the Hebrew word for cutting them off, which could very easily mean that he removed them from the temple. So they were cut off from where they belonged. They weren’t in the place where they belonged. He took them out. They were cut off from where they should have been.

So King Cyrus going all out here, letting the people go, encouraging people to give them gifts, and even doing it himself, going into the temple of his gods and taking all these items which Nebuchadnezzar had carried off some 70 years before and giving them also to Sheshbazzar to take back with them, so that when they set the temple up again, they’ll be equipped with these articles. And he brought them out by the hand of the treasurer, so they had an official inventory here. They counted them out.

Another thing people say: "Oh, look, the Bible’s not wrong, that number doesn’t add up. If you add that up, it doesn’t give the total." Well, it doesn’t claim to be an exhaustive list of everything. It could very easily just be listing the major items, and there could have been any number of smaller items that went along with it.

How you interpret the Bible is largely a matter of what you believe about it. If you believe it’s a book of lies, you can probably look on every page and find something that you think is a lie. But if you do, you’re just working in a state of ignorance. When you believe by faith that it’s the word of God, then you can also know that not necessarily every detail is recorded here. What’s recorded is what He wants us to know.

So Cyrus equipped them all. Verse one of chapter two: "Now these are the people of the province who came back from the captivity, of those who had been carried away, whom Nebuchadnezzar the king of Babylon had carried away to Babylon, and who returned to Jerusalem and Judah, everyone to his own city. Those who came with Zerubbabel were Jeshua, Nehemiah, Seraiah, Reelaiah, Mordecai, Bilshan, Mispar, Bigvai, Rehum and Baanah."

These here was the first group of people that went with him. We’re going to see all these people went together, some 50,000 or so people. But these are the people who came back from the captivity of those who had been carried away. Of all the ones that had been carried away, which was more than this, these are the ones that went back.

Mostly their descendants, although it was 70 years, it’s not out of the question that some of these people had been there when they got carried away and also went back again. And it lists a few names here of individuals. By the way, the Nehemiah you see here is not going to be the same Nehemiah who’s featured in the book of Nehemiah because we saw that takes place some 90-something years later. So this is a different Nehemiah.

Same with Mordecai here, probably not the same Mordecai that’s spoken about in the book of Esther. A lot of these names are common names. It’s like saying Tom, Dick and Harry. There’s a lot of Toms and Dicks and Harrys. The number of the men of the people of Israel: the people of Parosh, 2,172; the people of Shephatiah, 372; the people of Arah; the people of Pahath-Moab; the people of Elam, Zattu, Zaccai, Bani, Bebai, Azgad, Adonikam, Bigvai, Adin, Ater, Bezai, Jorah, Hashum and Gibbar.

Up to verse 20 here, using family names. The people of these families and how many there were in each family. Beginning in verse 21, it uses the names of cities: the people of Bethlehem, the people of Netophah, Anathoth, Azmaveth, Kirjath Arim, and all the way down Chephirah, Beeroth, Ramah, Geba, the men of Michmash, Bethel and Ai, the people of Nebo, Magbish, the people of the other Elam, the people of Harim, the people of Lod, Hadid, Ono, the people of Jericho and Senaah.

Look, those were the people of the different cities. So we had some people were identified by their family names and some people by their cities. It may have been that their records were not good enough that they didn’t even know anymore what their clan was, but maybe they knew what city their family used to live in. Maybe their grandmother had told them when they were young, "This is the city we came from," but perhaps the genealogical records weren’t precise enough to know what family they were from.

Verse 36, we have the priests: the sons of Jedaiah, of the house of Jeshua, the sons of Immer, the sons of Pashhur, the sons of Harim. And then you have the Levites. The priests were a subsection of the Levites, a subset. The Levites was the tribe of Levi. The priests were those specifically descended from Aaron, who was of the tribe of Levi. Then you have the singers in verse 41. You have verse 42, the sons of the gatekeepers. Then you have verse 43, the Nethinim. That’s the temple servants.

You could read this here and wonder why is it important to have all these names here. People today that read the Bible may very well skip this chapter and say, "Well, how does it matter to me that the people of Zattu were 945?" And I want to say to you, it mattered a lot to the people of Zattu that they could look at this and say, "We come under that line. We’re part of this nation."

It matters a lot to establish their identity. There was a very important point here of continuity between the old kingdom before the exile and now the returning one afterwards. We had to have continuity between the two. We have to show that the one is descended from the other one. And when we see our names on a list, it makes us feel good.

When you go to a wedding and you’re going to sit at a table, they have a table out there with all these little cards and your name’s on it with a table number. You say, "Where are we going to sit? I hope they have our name here. I hope they didn’t forget it. What are we going to do if they forgot our name? Oh, great, here it is, we found it." It’s encouraging to find your name on a list. Then we say, "Who else is at our table? Oh, I don’t want to sit with him." There’s some kind of encouragement when we see our name on a list.

It turned out to be a source of pride in the New Testament, by the way. In many ways in the New Testament, the Jews were proud of their heritage. "Aren’t we something? We’re descended from so and so." In Romans 9, it says, "But it is not that the word of God has taken no effect, for they are not all Israel who are of Israel, nor are they all children because they are the seed of Abraham." That is, those who are the children of the flesh, these are not the children of God, but the children of the promise are counted as the seed.

It became a source of spiritual pride to them in New Testament times. "I’m descended from Judah or Benjamin, aren’t I something? A legend in my own mind." But at this point here, everyone is significant and everyone is important and they need to know that there’s continuity, that we belong here to this place, that this is our nation, and we’re a part of it. And it was very important for them to see their family listed here.

The sons of Giddel, Gahar, Reaiah, Rezin, Nekoda, Gazzam, Uzza, Paseah, Besai, Asnah, Meunim, Nephusim, Bakbuk, Hakupha, Harhur, Bazluth, Mehida, Harsha, Barkos, Sisera, Temah, Neziah and Hatipha. It goes through all these sons here who were the temple servants. Then the sons of Solomon’s servants in verse 55.

Verse 59: "And these were the ones who came up from Tel Melah, Tel Harsha, Cherub, Addan and Immer, but they could not identify their father’s house or their genealogy, whether they were of Israel." These people here we’re going to read now came up, but they couldn’t prove they were really Israelites: the sons of Delaiah, the sons of Tobiah, the sons of Nekoda, 652; and of the sons of the priests: the sons of Habaiah, the sons of Koz, and the sons of Barzillai, who took a wife of the daughters of Barzillai the Gileadite and was called by that name.

There’s a story there, I’m sure, about a guy who was a son of a priest but would rather be known not as the priest but as someone from a different tribe, perhaps giving up his rights as a priest. "These sought their listing," very interesting verse in 62 here, "these sought their listing among those who were registered by genealogy, but they were not found. Therefore they were excluded from the priesthood as defiled."

They thought, "We’re entitled to be priests," but they could not prove their genealogy. Nowadays it’d be simple. They’d go to ancestry.com and they could prove their genealogy no problem, back to the Civil War even. They said, "We’re priests," but "Sorry pal, your name’s not on the list." These lists were very important because God had a plan here.

When you think about it, a community, a nation that’s only 50,000 people, the size of Marlton even at this point in time, so many thousands of years from the time of Adam and Eve and of Noah, through this relatively small number of people is going to be descended the Savior, Christ the Lord. And the governor said to them, these are the ones whose names could not be found.