When we enter the Book of Ezra, we begin the story of the returned captives; we see them in their circumstances, and in their behavior; and from both one and the other, we gather instruction.
In much of their condition we read much of our own; and from their behavior, we are either taught, or encouraged, or warned. As we trace their story, we may well be struck by the resemblance it has to our own; so that, from moral kindredness in their condition and ours, we may call them our brethren in
something of a special sense.
Having accomplished their journey from Babylon to Jerusalem, we find them at once in much moral beauty; they use what they have, they do what they can, but they do not assume or affect what they have not, and what they cannot. They have the Word, and they use it. They do their best with the genealogies, so as to preserve the purity of the priesthood and the sanctuary; but they do not affect to do what the Urim and the Thummim would enable them to do, for they have it not.
This is beautiful; they do not refuse to do what they can, because they cannot do all that they would. Their measure they will use, and not quarrel with it because it is small. And, yet they stretch not themselves beyond it, but wait till another comes with a further and more perfect measure.
They are quick to raise an altar to the God of Israel. They need not build their temple first. An altar will do for burnt-offerings and for the Feast of Tabernacles; -and, as a revived-people, as a people consciously standing on holy ground again, on the mystic day, the first day of the seventh month, they raise their altar, and begin their worship.
This was very fine! It was as the instinct that prompted Noah, as soon as he got out of the ark, to offer his sacrifices; or, as that of David, as soon as he reached the throne, to look after the ark of God.
Israel raised no altar in Egypt-they must go into the Wilderness, ere they could offer a sacrifice, or keep a feast to the Lord. Egypt was the place of the flesh, and of judgment; and deliverance out of it, must be accomplished, ere God could duly receive worship at their hand. And so in Babylon. Israel raised no altar there. One might open his window, and pray towards Jerusalem; three or four of them might make common prayer for mercy and wisdom; in a day of perplexity, they may all together hang their harps upon willows, refusing to sing the songs of Zion there,-but they raised no altar in that land of the uncircumcised. But now again in Jerusalem, the altar is built, and sacrifices rendered; worship is restored, as Israel is revived. The two things which God has joined together, the glory of His name, and the blessing of His people, are at once seen in the returned captives.
But, further. As soon as the foundation of the Temple is laid, a strange thing is heard that which could not but be a discord of harsh sounds in the ear of nature, a harmony of hallowed voices in the ear of God, and of faith. There are weepings and cries for sorrow, there are shoutings for joy. But, weighed in the sanctuary balances, all this was harmony, for all was real, all was " to the Lord."
As now, some may observe a day, and some may refuse to observe it, and this may appear to be disorder; but each doing what they do " to the Lord," the highest order is maintained (see Rom. 14); the Spirit so esteems it.
There is, however, more than this. There is real confusion, and that in abundance, as well as this apparent occasional discord. The condition of things is incurably intricate and confused. What a godly Jew must have felt, when he found himself again in the land where David had conquered,- where Solomon had reigned, where the glory had dwelt, and the priesthood unto Jehovah had waited on its service!
Such an one may, at that moment, have given the first look at himself; and he would have had to recognize in himself a strange sight in the land where he then found himself, a subject of a Gentile power. Then, looking at his brethren, he would have to say, that some of them were with him, but some still far away, among the uncircumcised; and then, taking a wider gaze at the people of the land, he would have to see a seed of corruption, half Jew half heathen, in the place which had once been shared among the seed of Abraham, and them only!
What sights were these! What needed light and energy to deal with and act upon this strange mass of difficulties and contradictions I But that light and energy are beautifully found amongst them. They, who had maintained their Nazariteship in Babylon, would keep it, if need be, in Judea; they, who would not eat the king's meat there, will not have Samaritan alliance in the building of the Temple here. And they distinguish things that differ; they know the Persian, and they know the Samaritan; bowing to the sword and authority of the one, as set over them by ordination of God; refusing the proffered aid of the other, as being themselves untrue to the God of their fathers.
This is like an anticipation of the Lord's own judgment to returned captives in His day; Render unto Caesar the things that are Caesar's, and to God the things that are God's." And it reminds me of their fathers in the wilderness, where they knew the Edomite and the. Amorite in their different relations to them; as here, their children know the Samaritan and the Persian. They do nothing in a spirit of rebellion. They will be subject to the " powers that be," as knowing them " ordained of God." But religious impurity they repudiate. It is full-of instruction all this, and very pertinent to present conditions among ourselves. These things, or the principles which are found and involved in them, re-appear among the saints of this day.
Faith still recognizes, that-'- salvation " is the ground of worship " (John 4). That is, that while we are in the flesh God gets nothing from us; that the place of discipline, such as Babylon was to Israel, is to witness only the service and the rendering of harps hung on willow trees.
Faith still uses the written word in all things; affects nothing beyond its measure, while it does what it can according to its measure. It does not cast away what it has, because it has not more. It does not say, "There is no hope," and sit idle, because power in certain forms of glory does not now belong to us; but it will not imitate power, or fashion the image of what is now departed. And it waits for the day when all will be set in eternal order and beauty, by the presence of Him who is the true light and perfection, and who will settle all things in the kingdom according to God.
Faith, likewise, still listens with a different ear from that of nature. As I have already alluded to it, so here again, I may say, that Rom. 14, like Ezra 3, tells us. that that which is discordance in the ear of flesh and blood, is harmony in the ear of God.
And surely I may add, faith still recognizes confusion. If we see it in Israel, in the day of Ezra, we see it among the saints and churches in the day of 2 Tim.; and the day of 2 Tim. was but the beginning of the present long day of Christendom, or of " the great house." Strange, inconsistent elements surround us, as they did the returned captives. Gentile supremacy in the land; the offered aid, and then the bitter enmity of Samaritans; some of God's Israel still in Babylon, while others have returned to Jerusalem. All this did not afford them stranger, more singular or anomalous materials, to distinguish and act upon, than the present great house of Christendom, with its clean and unclean vessels, some to honor, and some to dishonor, affords to us.
We may, however, be encouraged as well as instructed by these captives; for, while ancient glory and strength are not seen among them, Urim and Thummim gone, ark of covenant gone, the mystic rod and the cloudy pillar no more known and seen, yet was there more energy and light, and a deeper exercise of spirit, in the returned from- Babylon, than in the redeemed from Egypt.
This is so, indeed, as we have now seen.
We soon find, however, that we have more to say; that if we be instructed and encouraged by the returned captives, so surely may we be warned by them. They need a revival, though now returned to Jerusalem, as they had needed it, when they were still in Babylon.
The decree of Artaxerxes had stopped the building of the Temple. Nature, or the flesh, takes advantage of this; and the captives begin to adorn their own houses, as soon as they get leisure, and are free of their labor in building the Lord's house.
What a warning this is I It has been said, that it is easier to gain a victory than to use it. We may conquer in the fight, but be defeated by the victory. The returned Jews had gained a victory, when they refused the offers and the alliance of the Samaritans. They were right to resent any help which would have compromised their holiness. But they now abuse the victory. The Samaritans had got a decree from the Persian king to stop the building of the Temple; and the leisure thus generated becomes a snare to the remnant. They use it in ceiling and adorning their own houses. Very natural. Very humbling to think of it. Abraham had done far better than this. With his trained servants, he gains the day, in his encounter with the confederated kings; but, then, one victory only leads to another, for he refuses the offers of the King of Sodom immediately afterward. But here, leisure conquers them who had but lately conquered the Samaritans. This was more like David, if unlike Abraham. David fought his way nobly from the day of the lion and the bear, to the day of the throne; but he betrays relaxation, carelessness of heart, on the very first occasion which occupies him as a king. He puts the ark of God on a new cart drawn by oxen!
" Is it time for you, 0 ye, to dwell in your ceiled houses, and this house lie waste?" says the convicting; rebuking Spirit by the Prophet Haggai.
This is humbling and yet a healthful warning. Our hearts well understand this-how nature takes quick and earnest advantage of these its opportunities. But though the captives be left under Persian rule, yet the Spirit of God is unbound, and can revive his ancient grace in sending His prophets, to them. For this was His ancient grace. This had been His well-known way all along, from before the day of King Saul, till after the day of King Zedekiah; i.e. from the first of the kings of Israel to the last; from 1 Sam. 1 to 2 Chron. 36 All along that course of time, generation after generation, prophets had been sent again and again, to rebuke, or to instruct, or to encourage kings and their people. Samuel, and Nathan, and Gad, Shemaiah, Jahaziah, and Azariah, Elijah and Elisha, with others, had thus ministered while Israel was a nation; and now Haggai and Zechariah are sent, as kindred prophets with them, to the returned captives. The sweet witness that the old form of the grace of God towards His people was still to be in use, that they might know, in every 'age and in all conditions, that they were not straitened in Him.
God did not come forward to establish them on the original footing. "To do so would not have been morally suitable, either with respect to the position in which the people stood with God, or with regard to a power which He had established among the Gentiles, or with a view to the instruction of His own people in all ages, as to the government of God." This is very just. Things are left as the hand of God, in government, had put them. The Gentile is still supreme in the earth-nor does the glory return to Israel. The throne of David is not raised up from the dust, nor is Urim and Thummim given again, nor the ark of the covenant-but the Spirit is not gone from His place of service. He raises up prophets, and sends them to do the work of prophets, as in other days, when the throne of David was in Jerusalem, and the temple and its priesthood in their glory and beauty.
It would be profitable to mark the way in which these prophets conducted their ministry in reviving the returned captives. But this I do not here. The house, however, is again attended to, under their word-the zeal of the people revives, their faith and service live again; and in about four years, from the second year of Darius, when Haggai and Zechariah began to prophesy, to the sixth, when the house was finished, they work with renewed earnestness.
The dedication of the house then takes place. And this is a beautiful witness of the moral state of this remnant. It is but little they can do-little indeed-but they do it. Solomon had slain 22,000 oxen and 120,000 sheep at the dedication of the first house, while the returned captives can only render a few hundred bullocks and rams and lambs. But they do what they can-and who will say, that the mite of that earlier widow was not more than all the offerings of their richer forefathers? They did what they could, without blushing for their poverty. " Silver and gold have I none, but such as I have give I thee." There is preciousness in such feebleness, something specially acceptable in such sacrifices-when " in a time of affliction, the abundance of joy and deep poverty abounds unto the riches of liberality."
And then they keep their passover; they can do this, and they will do it. The house they can dedicate, and the feast they can keep, and they will; and priests and levites are alike purified now, as they had not been in the royal time of Hezekiah (2 Chron. 29:3434But the priests were too few, so that they could not flay all the burnt offerings: wherefore their brethren the Levites did help them, till the work was ended, and until the other priests had sanctified themselves: for the Levites were more upright in heart to sanctify themselves than the priests. (2 Chronicles 29:34); and Ezra 6:2020For the priests and the Levites were purified together, all of them were pure, and killed the passover for all the children of the captivity, and for their brethren the priests, and for themselves. (Ezra 6:20)). So that indeed, we may say, though the want of all manifested glory, such as shone in the day of Solomon, may be marked here, yet is there more attractive moral grace and power-just as the exodus from Babylon, some twenty years before, had been marked in contrast with the exodus from Egypt. There are features in the second exodus and in the dedication, features of personal beauty, which had not so appeared in the brighter, far brighter, days of Egypt, and of Solomon.
As we enter these chapters, we have passed an interval of about sixty years; and are in company with a new
generation of captives; and are about to witness a second exodus from Babylon.
This portion of the book gives us the story of Ezra himself. It consists of two parts. His journey from Babylon ( 7. His work at Jerusalem ( 9. 10.).
We find him, in each of these, eminently a man of God. He is in ordinary circumstances; no miracle distinguishes the action; no display of glory or of power accompanies it; nor have we the inspiration which filled the prophets, Haggai and Zechariah, on the last revival, as we saw in ch. 5. 6. All is ordinary-his resources are only what ours in this day are-the word and the presence of God. But he used them, and used them well and faithfully, throughout. Ere he began to act, he prepared his heart to seek the Lord:-and had meditated in His statutes, till his profiting, as we may surely say, appears to all of us. And as soon as he begins to act, and all through, to the very end, we see him in much communion and in secret with the Lord. And he will carry the word of God through every difficulty and hindrance.
He leads home from Babylon to Jerusalem, a comparatively small remnant; but he exercises a spirit of faith and obedience in no common measure.
In starting on the journey, he is careful to preserve the sanctity of holy things. In such a spirit had Jehoiada the priest acted, as he was bringing back Joash to the kingdom. He would not sacrifice the purity of the house of God to any necessity of the times (2 Chron. 23). And so now, in leading his remnant back to Jerusalem, Ezra will not sacrifice the sanctity of the vessels of the house to any hindrance or difficulty of his day. He will look out for the Levites to bear them home, though this may delay him on the banks of the Ahava for twelve days. He is far above King David in all this. David, in an hour when he might have commanded the resources of a kingdom, did not keep the Book of God open before him, but hastily set the Ark of God on a new cart. But Ezra is as one who has the Word of God ever before him; and, though in the zeal of David, takes care of the haste and heedlessness of David (1 Chron. 13).
It is very sweet to see a saint thus in weakness of circumstances, with nothing but ordinary resources, so carrying himself before God, and through his services and duties.- -And further, as we next see him, he is one that will not take a backward step. He had boasted of the God of Israel to the king of Persia, and he will not now (beginning a perilous journey) ask help of him, gainsaying in act the confessions of his lips. He will get strength from God, by fasting, rather than from the king, by asking.
There are beautiful combinations in all that we have now traced in this dear man. He used God's word and God's presence. Richly instructed as a scribe, he was much in secret with the Lord. He was a diligent, meditative student at home, but he was energetic and practical, and self-devoting abroad. He would not go behind his conscience or sacrifice the Word of God to any difficulty or hindrance-and if his confession did for a moment go beyond his faith, and he found himself not quite up to the place it had put him in, he will wait on God to have his heart strengthened, and not timidly or idly let his confession be reproached.
And yet all his circumstances were as ordinary as ours of this day. He had God's word and God's presence, as I have said; and so have we. But that was all-he had not even the inspiration of a Haggai or a Zechariah to encourage him. It was simply the Grace of God in the power of the Spirit, awakening a saint to fresh service by the Word.
If other portions of the story of the returned captives have instructed and encouraged and warned us, surely we may now say, this may well humble us. In Ezra's condition, how coldly and how feebly are our souls exercised in his spirit of earnest service and secret communion!
The journey was accomplished, the second exodus from Babylon is performed, and Jerusalem is reached by Ezra and his companions, without any mischief or loss by the way. The good hand of their God was with them, and proved itself enough without help from the king. The treasures were all delivered in the Temple, as they had been weighed and numbered at the Ahava. All that, in the days of Noah, had gone into the ark came out safe and sound. Not a grain falls to the ground of such treasures at any time, and here all arrive at Jerusalem that had left Chaldea.
In due time Ezra has to look around him in Jerusalem. He meets what he was but little prepared for; and the sight is overwhelming.. Decline among the returned captives had set in rapidly, and corruption had worked wonderfully. What a sight for the spirit of such a man! Ezra blessedly illustrates " the godliness of weeping for other men's sins"-a Christ-like affection, indeed; and this sample of it in this man of God may well further humble some of us.
Israel had again married the daughter of a strange god. The holy seed had mingled themselves with the people of the land. The. Jew had joined affinity with the Gentile.
To maintain anything of purity in the progress of a dispensation, reviving power has to be put forth again and again, and a fresh, separation to God and His truth has to take place under that reviving virtue. So is it now with Ezra at Jerusalem. But we here pause for a moment, to consider some divine principles. When sin entered, and the creature and the creation became defiled, the Lord God had to set up a witness to Himself, that there was now a breach between Himself and that which had been the work of His hands, and the representative of His glories. The, ordinance of clean and unclean did this service at the beginning (Gen. 8:2020And Noah builded an altar unto the Lord; and took of every clean beast, and of every clean fowl, and offered burnt offerings on the altar. (Genesis 8:20)).
In the progress of His ways, we find two other operations of His of like character. I mean, His judgments, and His call. He separated defilement from Himself and His creation, by judgment, in the day of the Flood, about to make the earth the scene of His presence and government in the new or postdiluvian world. But when that world defiled itself like the old World, He distinguished between clean and unclean, by calling Abraham to Himself, to the knowledge of Him, and a walk with Him, apart from the world. And these are samples of what He has ever since been doing, and is doing still, and will do still.
Separation from evil is, in a great sense, the principle of communion with Him. The truth, the knowledge of God, life in Christ, is the positive principle or secret of communion; surely; but separation from evil must accompany that. For if we meet the Blessed' One Himself, we must meet Him in conditions suited. to His presence.
Ezra soon finds that the returned captives had practically forgotten all this. They had mingled themselves with the people of the land. They were involved again in that evil from which the call of God had separated them. They were defiled. For sanctification is by " the truth"; the washing of water is ‘.by the word"; and, if holiness be not according to God's word, and God's word as He applies it at the time; or dispensationally, it has no divine quality. There is no Nazaritism in it; no separation to God. The children of the captivity had been marrying, and giving in marriage, with the. Gentiles. Ezra sets himself to the work of reformation, and does so, in the same spirit in which he had set himself to be for, God, before his journey, and on his journey. And this is what we have very specially to mark in Ezra.. He -was, personally, so much the saint of God, as well as a vessel gifted and filled. This spews itself in Ezra more than in any who had served among the captives before him. He was a vessel that had, indeed, purged itself for the Master's use; and the reformation in Jerusalem is accomplished in the like zeal as the journey from Babylon; and the blessing-of God waits upon it. There is no miracle; no displayed glory; no 'mighty energy bespeaking extraordinary divine presence: nothing is seen out of the common measure, or beyond ordinary resources. Service is, if done and rendered according to the written word, for the glory of the God of Israel, and in the spirit of worship and communion. It is but a sample of what service with us at this, day might be, and, as we may add, ought to be. Ezra, throughout, does not listen to expediency, or yield to -a difficulty, or refuse diligence and toil; he maintains principles,. and carries the word of God through every hindrance.
Deeply do I believe, that the saints of God in this our day, may read the story of the returned captives, as very good for the use of edifying; and find plenty to instruct, to encourage, to warn, and to humble them.
"How precious is the book divine,
By inspiration given:
Bright as a lamp its doctrines shine,
To guide us on to heaven."
REST IN JESUS.
Steadfast in thy work of love,
Continue blest,
And through the Spirit from above,
In Jesus rest.
0 ne'er retard thee in the race,
The prize to win;
On, with firm step and steady pace,
And rest in Him.
Forward, toward that bright abode,
Where He is gone;
Onward, supported by thy God,
To wear the crown.
Stand fast, and let the Spirit's sword
Be ever drawn,
Till for a palm, at Jesus' word,
Thou lay'st it down.
Be patient in continuing
The seed to sow,
Have faith although the fruit it bring
Thou may'st not know.
0 leave the issue to His care
Who knoweth best,
And constant still, with watchful prayer,
In Jesus rest.
And may the Spirit's threefold power
On thee be shed;
May God His richest blessings shower
Upon thy head.
May'st thou be blest abundantly,
Above thy need,
And in thy Jesus 0 may'st thou
Have rest indeed!