Study the Word

Guest (Male): Some people hold back the truth because they think it's loving to do so. Others will speak the truth but lack love. The scriptures command us to speak the truth in love. Today Study the Word with Pastor Thom Keller will encourage us in this holy calling.

It's not long after becoming a Christian before you discover the enemy of the truth has a strategy to undermine our calling. He will seek to bring confusion and undermine the truth. How does he go about implementing his devious plan? You'll find the answer in Ezra chapter four. We invite you to join us there as Pastor Thom begins with a story pointing to the need for clarity when it comes to the truth.

Pastor Thom Keller: The minister of a Swedish covenant and one day they're seen pounding a sign in the ground near their churches which says, "The end is near. Turn yourself around now before is too late."

As a car speeds past them, the driver leans out the window and yells, "Leave people alone, you Scandihoovian religious nuts!" A few seconds later, the pastors hear screeching tires and a big splash. Shaking his head, Reverend Olle says, "That's the third one this morning." Sven agreed and then asked, "Do you think maybe the sign should say Bridge Out?"

It lost something in the translation, didn't it? Well, or maybe the sign should say fiscal cliff ahead. You know, we will probably get through this fiscal cliff, either some last minute deal or an extension. But there is something at work within our government that is much more insidious.

We're going to discover what that is this morning as we read Ezra chapter four. So if you have your Bible, Ezra chapter four. In the beginning of Ezra, we discover that the King of Persia, Cyrus, sends a decree saying to the Jews, you can go back and rebuild the temple. All that want to, all that would like to go back, you can go back and rebuild the temple.

Today we're in chapter four, and the main part of today's chapter concerns a group of very powerful, political, non-orthodox Jewish people who are opposing the work of the temple, and it deals with a letter that these powerful politicians send to the king in an attempt to get the king to force them to stop building the temple.

That's kind of the background. Let's pick up in chapter four, verse one. It says, "The enemies of Judah and Benjamin," those are the two tribes of the South of Judah. "The enemies of Judah and Benjamin heard that the exiles were rebuilding a temple to the Lord, the God of Israel. So these enemies approached Zerubbabel, who's the governor of the Jews, and the other leaders and said, 'Let us build with you, for we worship your God just as you do. We have sacrificed to him ever since King Esarhaddon of Assyria brought us here.'"

So they say, let us build with you. What we're going to see from the beginning of chapter four all the way through the book of Ezra, and the book that follows Ezra is Nehemiah, which is a story of Nehemiah going back to rebuild the wall. Ezra's about rebuilding the temple, Nehemiah's about rebuilding the wall.

Starting in chapter four, all the way through Ezra, all the way through Nehemiah, the very center thought of all that happens, a central theme, is this conflict that Ezra had and Nehemiah had with the enemies of God as they're trying to stop the work. These next chapters all center on the conflict. It's the major theme of those that are trying to stop the work.

As a good starting point this morning, it's probably wise to identify the very center or the source or the fountain springs where adversity and opposition originates. Where does opposition and adversity originate? Well, in Ephesians chapter 6:12, we're told clearly, "For we are not fighting against flesh and blood enemies, but against evil rulers and authorities of the unseen world, against mighty powers in this dark world, and against evil spirits in the heavenly places."

What Paul tells us in Ephesians is that when we're in a situation where there's conflict or adversity, we need to get our eyes off of that person. They are not the source. They are not the headwaters of that conflict. It's the enemy. We don't war against flesh and blood, but against evil spirits in the unseen world, against Satan.

He is the one that allows us to be used as pawns, tries to allow us to be used as pawns, in this battle to destroy us. He's at the root of it. That's why when we get into a conflict, if we're focused on the person, our attention's in the wrong place. If that's where we're thinking of lobbing our grenades or shooting our darts, wrong place.

They're not the source of that conflict. We do not fight against flesh and blood. Satan is using that person to try to destroy you, to try to bring injury or harm to you. He's trying to put you as a pawn on that table and get you involved in that as well. Know the source. It's critically important.

Note that Satan's first attempt here in chapter four is a brilliant one. It really is. The enemies of the Jews say, "Let us build with you, for we worship the same God you do." They don't take a position that we're going to come from outside and start throwing grenades over the wall. No, no, no, no. We want to help you. We want to work with you. We want to assist you.

It's seen through. Look at Ezra chapter 4:2. He says, "So they approached," these enemies, approached Zerubbabel, who's the governor of the Jews, and the other leaders and said, "Let us build with you, for we worship your God just as you do." Now there is some truth to what they say here.

These local non-Jews had worshipped the Jewish God Jehovah for nearly 200 years. These enemies of the work here that's taking place in chapter four are Samaritans from the north, and then they were exiled again. The South was exiled and the North was exiled off into the Babylonian and the Assyrian Empires.

In around 730 B.C., again Cyrus is about 530 B.C., so about 200 years before that, when Assyria conquered and carried away the Northern Kingdom, Israel's 10 tribes, the King of Assyria took the Jews and dispersed them all throughout the kingdom. Then he brought people from other nations, other cultures, and brought them into Samaria, into that region.

So 200 years before this chapter we're reading today, in Second Kings, we read this little vignette that explains clearly how and why these transported in, these people that were transported in, how they started worshipping Jehovah God. It says the King of Assyria transported groups of people from Babylon, Cuthah, Avva, Hamath, and Sepharvaim and resettled them in the towns of Samaria, replacing the people of Israel.

So we see there the King of Assyria brought people in and replaced the people of Israel, the North, the Northern tribes. Then verse 25 says, "But since these foreign settlers did not worship the Lord when they first arrived, the Lord sent lions among them, which killed some of them."

Did you get it? In other words, these foreigners come into Israel and they're not worshipping Jehovah God, the God of that nation. In order to get their attention, God sends lions and they start killing some of the people, and they figured it out. Isn't that interesting?

So a message was sent to the King of Assyria, the people you have sent to live in the towns of Samaria do not know the religious customs of the God of the land. He has sent lions among them to destroy them because they have not worshipped him correctly. And so as a result, it says, "But these various groups of foreigners also continued to worship their own gods."

In the verses between, it says that the King of Assyria sent priests, Jewish priests that he had exiled. He sent priests back into Samaria to teach these foreigners how to worship Jehovah. The response, though, was not good. It says, "But these various groups of foreigners also continued to worship their own gods."

In town after town where they lived, they placed their idols at the pagan shrines that the people of Samaria had built. Verse 33, "And although they worshipped the Lord, they continued to follow their own gods according to the religious customs of the nations from which they came."

So, as they said, for 200 years they did worship Jehovah, but they also worshipped all the other gods that they brought with them before they came into that nation. When Sue and I went to Russia, this was in the early nineties, we were in a school and a young man approached us. He was in college and he was very excited to talk with us.

I can still picture the hallway where he greeted us, huge smile, which you didn't see a lot of smiles in Russians at that time. Huge smile. He said, "Hey, I'm a Christian. I believe in Jesus." I was very impressed by his boldness and his enthusiasm and I went up and I hugged him.

I don't remember what I said, probably something like you're a brother. Then as I was still in that proximity, he followed very closely by saying, "Yes, I believe in Jesus and Buddha and reincarnation and Muhammad." My smile started to kind of fade a bit. What did he believe?

If you have not faced this yet, you probably will. It's the same attack that Satan uses here on Ezra. Let us join you. You know, they were, the world, and many times even liberal denominational leaders will say, and I've heard this, I've been in meetings where this was said. Listen, we accept you under our umbrella, why don't you accept us?

We want to include you, but you exclude us. It's on a feeling level, it feels bad, but it's true. It's just the reality. Jesus is the only umbrella that saves. He said, "I am the way, the truth and life, no one comes to the father but by me." Jesus is the only umbrella of truth. Jesus said those that have come before me are thieves and robbers.

Jesus is the only umbrella that enables us. "I am the vine, you're the branches, apart from me you can do nothing." Jesus is the only umbrella that brings lasting love, joy, peace, contentment, fulfillment. Jesus said, "I have come that you might have life and have it abundantly." The word abundantly means the super abundant life. He's the only one that brings that in a lasting fashion.

But know that under this umbrella you will many times stand alone and be hated by those who demand that you get under their big broad inclusive umbrella. What do those church leaders look like that take on this big umbrella, this big umbrella strategy? This is what they look like. They're wolves in sheep's clothing.

That is exactly what Satan is doing here in Ezra. Let us join you. The plan is a strategy which is demonic. We do not war against flesh and blood. It is to undermine their work, to destroy their work, and the same is true in that big umbrella strategy. Zerubbabel's response, Zerubbabel said, "We have sacrificed to him ever since King Esarhaddon of Assyria brought us here."

Then we read in verse three, "But Zerubbabel, Jeshua and the other leaders of Israel replied, 'You may have no part in this work, for we have nothing in common. We alone will build the temple for the Lord, the God of Israel, just as King Cyrus of Persia commanded us.'" Ezra says what we need to say in those settings.

We have nothing in common. I wish that all Christians, I'm sure you feel the same way, that all Christians would wake up to this great truth that you cannot be pluralistic and be saved. If you doubt that, let me ask you a question. How faithful can you be to your wife if you have three others?

How faithful can you be to your wife if you have three other wives? You can't be faithful to Jesus and live in a world, a pluralistic world where there are many ways to God. We need to be as Peter, when Jesus turned to Peter and said, "Are you going to?" to the twelve, "Are you going to?" Peter said, "Where would we go? No one else has the words that lead to eternal life."

If that is the price that we pay, forfeiting eternal life for getting under that umbrella or conceding that we want to be under that or on a feeling level we jump and join and run under that all-inclusive umbrella, there are going to be a lot of people that don't make it to heaven because we led them into error thinking that that was a safe umbrella to be under. It is not.

Going on then to verse four, "Then the local residents tried to discourage and frighten the people of Judah to keep them from their work. They bribed agents to work against them and to frustrate them. This went on during the entire reign of King Cyrus of Persia and lasted until King Darius of Persia took the throne."

So the period of time they're talking about here is eighteen years. For eighteen years, these enemies discouraged, frightened and bribed agents to conspire against them. They're doing everything they can to stop the work of God, to frustrate it, to render the new leaders ineffective. Eventually, one of these adversaries suggested the nuclear option, and this will always be the nuclear option.

It's in the next verse. Now as we read this, I'm not going to go into the chronology of the kings because it's really not, doesn't add to this understanding. What it says is that Xerxes was the king of Persia as this takes place. This is a king or two after Cyrus. Verse six says this, "Later when Xerxes began his reign, the enemies of Judah wrote him a letter of accusation against the people of Judah and Jerusalem. And even later during the reign of King Artaxerxes of Persia, the enemies of Judah led by Bishlam, Mithredath and Tabeel, sent a letter to Artaxerxes in the Aramaic language, and it was translated for the king."

Aramaic language is a close relation to the Hebrew language and was used by both the Babylonians and the Persians as their international language, diplomatic language, in much the same way English is used throughout the world today as the diplomatic language. In this way the bureaucrats of Persia in every part of the Persian kingdom had a common language that they could use to carry about the king's business.

And this is what happens. In verse eight it says, "Rehum the governor and Shimshai the court secretary wrote the letter telling King Artaxerxes about the situation in Jerusalem. They greeted the king for all their colleagues, the judges and local leaders and people of Tarpel, the Persians, the Babylonians and the people of Erech and Susa, that is Elam. They also sent greetings from the rest of the people whom the great and noble Ashurbanipal had deported and relocated in Samaria."

Now that's key, relocated in Samaria. Don't lose this. And throughout the neighboring lands in the provinces west of the Euphrates River. Now again, some background is helpful here. We've said this before, but when the Assyrians carried off Israel, the North, and they transported them into the Assyrian Empire, those Jews did not stay true to the command to marry only Jews and they intermarried with non-Jews.

Because the South was carried over many years later, they saw what Israel did, what the ten tribes did, and when they were carried off, they vowed they would stay pure. So when they were carried off by Babylon, for the most part, they stayed pure, they only married within themselves.

When they were allowed to come back and regather in Israel, the Jews in the South, the tribes of Judah and Benjamin, hated, hated the other ten tribes, the Samaritans. The reason this background is so important is because of this, because of this rift between the North and the South, the Samaritans in the North actually built a rival temple on Mount Gerizim.

There's some references to this in the New Testament in John chapter four. This is the story about the Samaritan woman. She says, "So tell me, why is it that you Jews insist that Jerusalem is the only place to worship while we Samaritans claim it is here in Mount Gerizim where our ancestors worshipped?"

The woman of Samaria is pointing to a truth that we need background to understand. The ten tribes of the North had a temple, a rival temple at Mount Gerizim which is outside of Shechem, which is near Nablus today in Israel. In Joshua 24, right before Joshua dies, this encounter takes place.

It says, "Then Joshua summoned all the tribes of Israel to Shechem," this is where Mount Gerizim is. He gathered all the tribes of Israel, the ten tribes, to Shechem including their, these are all twelve tribes, they weren't split yet, including their elders, leaders, judges and officers, so they came, presented themselves to God.

And there's a long litany that takes place and this is the famous line where Joshua says, "Choose ye this day who you will serve. If it be Baal, follow Baal. If it be God, follow God. You decide, but as for me and my house, we will serve the Lord." That's in this section.

Then in Joshua, same chapter, verse 22, this is said, the people say we will do it, we will do it, we will follow, we will obey. I think something that's real funny is they say, "We will obey you just like we obeyed Moses." Boy do I get a kick out of that because they did not obey Moses.

You could see Joshua sitting there. Are you going to obey? Are you going to obey? Come on, are you going to obey? Just a big pep rally. Are you going to obey? Yes, we're going to obey just like we obeyed Moses. And you can picture Joshua's face going, "Oh no, they don't get this because they did not obey Moses."

But after all that said and they say we're going to obey, we will follow Jehovah. Joshua says, "You are a witness to your own decision. You have chosen to serve the Lord. Yes," they replied, "and we are witnesses to what we have said."

And then going on to verse 25 and 26, "So Joshua made a covenant," this is to make the point why they build a temple at Mount Gerizim. This is it. "So Joshua made a covenant with the people that day at Shechem, committing them to follow the decrees and regulations of the Lord. Joshua recorded these things in the book of God's instructions. As a reminder of their agreement, he took a huge stone and rolled it beneath the terebinth tree beside the tabernacle of the Lord."

It was just a tabernacle then, in the tent. Joshua said to all the people, "This stone has heard everything the Lord said to us. It will be a witness to testify against you if you go back on your word to God." So the idea was because this is where this commitment was made, because this is where this stone was, because it's recorded this is where the tabernacle was when this took place, and the temple was just an outgrowth of the tabernacle.

The Samaritans claim and still claim, even to this day, that the true temple of God is in Samaria, is at Mount Gerizim. According to Josephus, this rival temple that was built in Samaria was built by none other than, get this, if you've read Nehemiah you're going to know this name, this rival temple in Samaria was built by none other than Sanballat, who's the governor of Samaria, who shows up in the book of Nehemiah as trying to stop them from building this temple.

So there's a lot of history. If you think it's somebody that they're trying to stop this work just because they don't like this temple or they've got, you know, they just don't like somebody building the city back up, that's not it. There's a lot of history to why they're trying to stop. They see this as an untrue rival temple to what the Samaritans felt was the true temple that was supposed to be only on Mount Gerizim.

Guest (Male): Fascinating history Pastor Thom Keller has given us, pointing to the tendency of God's people to stray from his word and do so to their own peril, making them vulnerable to increased opposition. Let's not make the same mistake. You're listening to Study the Word in a part of our series in Ezra.

To hear this message again, simply go to ccleb.com and look at our resources. We're at ccleb.com. If you'd rather have a CD copy, call 717-507-7862. That's 717-507-7862. And for those that give to the ministry this month, we'll say thanks by sending you a book by Andrew Murray called The Blessings of Obedience.

Maybe your view of obedience is more along the lines of an inconvenience, something you have to do but don't want to do, and it takes all the fun out of life. But the truth is God has our best interest at heart. He loves us and it's truly a blessing to get in line with his will for our lives.

Again, we'll send this your way for a gift of any amount to Study the Word. Call 717-507-7862 or write Study the Word, 740 Willow Street, Lebanon, Pennsylvania, 17046. And if you live close by or will be visiting the area soon, we hope you'll join us for worship.

For our service times and more information about Calvary Chapel Lebanon, turn to ccleb.com and download our free Android app, search Calvary Chapel Lebanon in the Google Play Store. We'll get back into Ezra next time on Study the Word with Pastor Thom Keller, and may God richly bless you as you study the word and discover the blessings of obedience as you apply it to your life.