Rebuilding the temple of God

Transcription

1 Dia 1 Rebuilding the temple of God Ezra chapter 3 In the previous 2 chapters of the book of Ezra we learned how a number of Jewish people returned to the Jerusalem and Judah after king Cyrus of Persia had called upon the Jewish people in his empire to return to their home country in order to rebuild the temple of the Lord. The Book of Ezra does not tell us when the first group did exactly arrive in Jerusalem. But it does tell us when they started rebuilding the temple. And the first thing they did was rebuild the altar for the burnt offerings. We see that in the next verses.

2 Dia 2 Ezra 3:1-3 When the seventh month came, and the children of Israel were in the towns, the people gathered as one man to Jerusalem. Then arose Jeshua the son of Jozadak, with his fellow priests, and Zerubbabel the son of Shealtiel with his kinsmen, and they built the altar of the God of Israel, to offer burnt offerings on it, as it is written in the Law of Moses the man of God. They set the altar in its place, for fear was on them because of the peoples of the lands, and they offered burnt offerings on it to the LORD, burnt offerings morning and evening. Maybe you think: why did they set up the altar first? Would it not have been more logical to rebuild the temple first? But rebuilding the temple of God doesn t start with constructing a physical place to meet. It starts with turning back to God in sincere repentance and a sincere desire to worship God in spirit and in truth. And that is what started to happen when they set up the altar again. That this happened in the seventh month of the year is actually quite interesting. The Lord had commanded the Jewish people to celebrate several feasts annually. Several of them were actually celebrated in the first month of the year, including the Passover and the feast of the first fruits. However, there are also a lot of special days in the seventh month. We will see them on the following sheets

3 Dia 3 Leviticus 23: Speak to the people of Israel, saying, In the seventh month, on the first day of the month, you shall observe a day of solemn rest, a memorial proclaimed with blast of trumpets, a holy convocation. You shall not do any ordinary work, and you shall present a food offering to the LORD. This day is now known as Rosh Hashanah, or the beginning of the year. It is the start of the so called 10 awesome days culminating in the day of atonement. During this period the Jewish people are supposed to forgive and ask forgiveness for all things in which they have sinned against one another. This is done in order to prepare themselves for the Day of Atonement. That day is mentioned in the following verses of this chapter from Leviticus.

4 Dia 4 Leviticus 23:26-29 And the LORD spoke to Moses, saying, Now on the tenth day of this seventh month is the Day of Atonement. It shall be for you a time of holy convocation, and you shall afflict yourselves and present a food offering to the LORD. And you shall not do any work on that very day, for it is a Day of Atonement, to make atonement for you before the LORD your God. For whoever is not afflicted on that very day shall be cut off from his people. The Day of Atonement is the day on which the Jewish people humble themselves before God in order to get forgiveness for sins they committed unintentionally and unknowingly towards God. It is still considered a very special day during which they will fast all day long, starting the fasting even 1 hour before the official start of this day. The fact they start the fasting a bit earlier is related to the following verses of this chapter.

5 Dia 5 Leviticus 23:30-32 And whoever does any work on that very day, that person I will destroy from among his people. You shall not do any work. It is a statute forever throughout your generations in all your dwelling places. It shall be to you a Sabbath of solemn rest, and you shall afflict yourselves. On the ninth day of the month beginning at evening, from evening to evening shall you keep your Sabbath. The Jewish people are called upon to take this day very serious. And we too should be careful to repent from all the things in which we may have sinned against God and against people and always repent from them and ask forgiveness for them. We might even wonder why, as Christians, we have abandoned all the special days God commanded for the seventh month. The next celebration in the Jewish calendar then starts on the 15 th day of the month, as we see in the following verses from this chapter.

6 Dia 6 Leviticus 23:33-36 And the LORD spoke to Moses, saying, Speak to the people of Israel, saying, On the fifteenth day of this seventh month and for seven days is the Feast of Booths to the LORD. On the first day shall be a holy convocation; you shall not do any ordinary work. For seven days you shall present food offerings to the LORD. On the eighth day you shall hold a holy convocation and present a food offering to the LORD. It is a solemn assembly; you shall not do any ordinary work. This celebration reminds the people of Israel about the 40 years they wandered through the wilderness and how God took care of them. The reason why they had to wander through the wilderness for 40 years was the fact that the first time God brought them to the border of the promised land they refused to go in. And so a whole generation had to die in the wilderness. At this time they had come back from Babylon after having lived there 70 years due to their continuous rebellion against God. As disciples of Christ we are citizens of the Kingdom of Heaven. Therefore Jesus says that, even though we are in the world, we are not of the world. Or in other words: we are strangers in this world. However, our behavior in this world should reflect our true citizenship. Let s go back to the chapter of Ezra.

7 Dia 7 Ezra 3:4-5 And they kept the Feast of Booths, as it is written, and offered the daily burnt offerings by number according to the rule, as each day required, and after that the regular burnt offerings, the offerings at the new moon and at all the appointed feasts of the LORD, and the offerings of everyone who made a freewill offering to the LORD. As is written here we see that they were celebrating the feast of Booths in accordance with the commandments God had given for that celebration. Here is a very important lesson for us also. We too can only approach God on His terms. As a local church we have to function according to His rules and for His purpose. And the same is true for each one of us as an individual disciple. In rebuilding the temple of God we need to go back to the Word of God and earnestly study it and meditate on it in order to be changed by it so we may apply it in our lives under the guidance of the Holy Spirit. Let s continue.

8 Dia 8 Ezra 3:6-7 From the first day of the seventh month they began to offer burnt offerings to the LORD. But the foundation of the temple of the LORD was not yet laid. So they gave money to the masons and the carpenters, and food, drink, and oil to the Sidonians and the Tyrians to bring cedar trees from Lebanon to the sea, to Joppa, according to the grant that they had from Cyrus king of Persia. So the worship of God had truly started even though the rebuilding of the temple had not even started yet. As disciples of the Lord Jesus Christ we are living stones in a spiritual temple. And that is a temple that is not made by human hands. Therefore it can not be destroyed by Satan, no matter what he tries. But just as the physical temple had to be build on a solid foundation so the spiritual temple needs to be build on a solid foundation. We ll see later what that foundation is! While all the people contributed towards the construction of the temple some people got a special responsibility in rebuilding it. We see that on the next sheet.

9 Dia 9 Ezra 3:8-9 Now in the second year after their coming to the house of God at Jerusalem, in the second month, Zerubbabel the son of Shealtiel and Jeshua the son of Jozadak made a beginning, together with the rest of their kinsmen, the priests and the Levites and all who had come to Jerusalem from the captivity. They appointed the Levites, from twenty years old and upward, to supervise the work of the house of the LORD. And Jeshua with his sons and his brothers, and Kadmiel and his sons, the sons of Judah, together supervised the workmen in the house of God, along with the sons of Henadad and the Levites, their sons and brothers. In these verses we see that the Levites, that had come back from Babylon also, were entrusted with the task of overseeing the rebuilding of the temple. For the spiritual temple God has also appointed certain groups of people to take upon themselves the responsibility for overseeing the work of building up this temple. In the Bible we find the following categories that are specifically mentioned: The elders (who are also called overseers, shepherds and pastors) are especially responsible for the spiritual development of the disciples entrusted into their care. The deacons, who are responsible for the oversight of the more practical aspects of the functioning of the church. Let s continue in the next verses.

10 Dia 10 Ezra 3:10-11 And when the builders laid the foundation of the temple of the LORD, the priests in their vestments came forward with trumpets, and the Levites, the sons of Asaph, with cymbals, to praise the LORD, according to the directions of David king of Israel. And they sang responsively, praising and giving thanks to the LORD, For he is good, for his steadfast love endures forever toward Israel. And all the people shouted with a great shout when they praised the LORD, because the foundation of the house of the LORD was laid. The people considered it a great event when the foundation for the physical temple had been laid and we see that there was a big celebration. The foundation of the Spiritual temple is the Lord Jesus Christ. We see that in the following verses from 1 Corinthians:

11 Dia 11 1 Corinthians 3:9-11 For we are God s fellow workers. You are God s field, God s building. According to the grace of God given to me, like a skilled master builder I laid a foundation, and someone else is building upon it. Let each one take care how he builds upon it. For no one can lay a foundation other than that which is laid, which is Jesus Christ. This is a very important statement of the apostle Paul. He makes it very clear that the Lord Jesus Christ is the foundation of the spiritual temple. And just as He is the foundation of that spiritual temple He is also our only way towards salvation. There is no other way we can come before the throne of God than in and through the Lord Jesus Christ. The apostle Paul talks a lot about this in the first 2 chapters of his letter to the church in Ephesus. At the end of the second chapter of this letter to the Ephesians Paul compares the Lord Jesus Christ to a cornerstone, a stone that basically holds the whole construction together. In the church the focus of every thing that is done needs to be on the Lord Jesus and the mission He entrusted to us. But let s go back to the chapter of Ezra.

12 Dia 12 Ezra 3:12-13 But many of the priests and Levites and heads of fathers houses, old men who had seen the first house, wept with a loud voice when they saw the foundation of this house being laid, though many shouted aloud for joy, so that the people could not distinguish the sound of the joyful shout from the sound of the people s weeping, for the people shouted with a great shout, and the sound was heard far away. Especially the old people in the group that had come back from Babylon still could remember the splendor of the first temple build by Solomon. And they got the idea that this new temple might not get the same stature as the old one. The same is in a certain way true for us at CBF. Some of us have been there from the beginning and we have seen many things God has done. But those people also have seen and experienced what has happened over the years following the first years. They have witnessed great troubles and pain. We need to realize that the present and future CBF will never be the same as CBF was before. But that is not necessarily wrong. Let s take a look at the following verses:

13 Dia 13 Haggai 2:2-5 Speak now to Zerubbabel the son of Shealtiel, governor of Judah, and to Joshua the son of Jehozadak, the high priest, and to all the remnant of the people, and say, Who is left among you who saw this house in its former glory? How do you see it now? Is it not as nothing in your eyes? Yet now be strong, O Zerubbabel, declares the LORD. Be strong, O Joshua, son of Jehozadak, the high priest. Be strong, all you people of the land, declares the LORD. Work, for I am with you, declares the LORD of hosts, according to the covenant that I made with you when you came out of Egypt. My Spirit remains in your midst. Fear not. Here s God speaking to the group of people involved in rebuilding the temple in Jerusalem. And most likely some considered it to be as nothing compared with the previous temple. But God encouraged them to be strong and to continue. And He promised to be with them. And listen to what He promised them in the following verses:

14 Dia 14 Haggai 2:6-9 For thus says the LORD of hosts: Yet once more, in a little while, I will shake the heavens and the earth and the sea and the dry land. And I will shake all nations, so that the treasures of all nations shall come in, and I will fill this house with glory, says the LORD of hosts. The silver is mine, and the gold is mine, declares the LORD of hosts. The latter glory of this house shall be greater than the former, says the LORD of hosts. And in this place I will give peace, declares the LORD of hosts. No matter how the situation looks now, we need to keep in mind that God can do more than we can imagine. That was true for the people that were witnessing the rebuilding of the temple in Jerusalem. And it is also true for us. We do not depend on what we can do, we depend on what God can do. And as we work together to realize the purposes of God for us as a local church we must realize that we are not alone in that neither. Let s keep in mind what the Lord Jesus Christ promised us in Matthew 28:18-20

15 Dia 15 Matthew 28:18-20 And Jesus came and said to them, All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you. And behold, I am with you always, to the end of the age. I can not tell you what our Lord Jesus Christ exactly is going to do. But He promises to be with us as we faithfully carry out the great commission. The last year and a half we have focused on teaching disciples of the Lord Jesus Christ all that He has commanded us. And we trust and believe that He will carry us through, because after all, it s about His church, His Body, His Bride. The rebuilding of this part of the temple of God requires that we all are involved in that process. And together we must build on that one foundation that there is: the Lord Jesus Christ Himself. Shall we pray?