Ezra 1 - 3 (18th September) - Ivy

Ezra 1

Cyrus King of Persia has given a decree to build the temple of Lord God. He urged the people to give to God. Silver, gold, livestock and freewill offering. Note that in verse 4 and 6, freewill offering was mentioned. Verse 6: All their neighbors assisted them with articles of silver and gold, with goods and livestock, and with valuable gifts, in addition to all the freewill offerings.

Ponder: Is there specific offering call freewill or are they actually called to give freely out of their own will? Both of them sounds logical to me though. I would like to think that when we are called to give, we are called to give out of our free will and not out of compulsion. After all, God loves a cheerful giver.

And how the people gave freely to build the temple of God! Are we like this too? Do we dare to put out lives in the hands of God give to God our everything for the building of His kingdom? Do we trust God that as we ‘Seek first His Kingdom and righteous and all others will be added to us as well?)Matt :33)’ Do you dare trust God with your everything?

Ezra 2 – List of returning Exiles

Once again, there are so many names!!!

Here are some of the meanings of the names (Zondervan, 2002):

Parosh – flea (Israelites were often named after insects)
Arah – Wild ox
Pahath – Moab (governor of Moab)
Azgad – Gad is strong
Ater – Left handed
Hanan – God is gracious
Tel Melah – mound of salt

When the exiles arrived at the house of the Lord in Jerusalem, they also gave free will offerings!

Ezra 3

Verse 1: When the 7th month came (this is not the lunar 7th month where the woo woo comes out from hell), this period is actually called Tishri (Sept-Oct) and is one of the most sacred months of the Jewish year)

See verse 3: Despite their fear of the peoples around them, they built the altar on its foundation and sacrificed burnt offerings on it to the LORD, both the morning and evening sacrifices.

I am encouraged by this verse. The people sacrificed despite of the fear of ‘people around them’. This also showed that they probably feared God more than they feared the people.
After the foundations was laid, the people of God rejoiced, sang praised and worshipped God.

Verse 11 With praise and thanksgiving they sang to the LORD :
"He is good;
his love to Israel endures forever."

However, in the midst of the thanksgiving, the people of God have mixed feelings.

Vers12 But many of the older priests and Levites and family heads, who had seen the former temple, wept aloud when they saw the foundation of this temple being laid, while many others shouted for joy. 13 No one could distinguish the sound of the shouts of joy from the sound of weeping, because the people made so much noise. And the sound was heard far away.

For those who has seen the glory of the previous temple and compared it with the new, there would be an inevitable feeling of thankfulness that God restored his temple to a greater glory. For those who have not seen such a beautiful temple, rejoiced and marvel at the beauty of it. As for some of us who attended TC and TCT before moving to Expo. Did we also marvel and thank God for our new ‘temple’? After a few years of restructuring, God finally brought us into a new ‘temple’. There may not be beautiful architecture to marvel at. The sound and lights system is just amazing. But most importantly, the pressure of God is awesome in this place!!

I pray that as we exalt God in our church, His glory would be much greater than ever, always!

Shall we give thanks to those who have labour to build the kingdom of God? Shall we give thanks for the privileged to worship is this house of the Lord?