Month: June 2018

This chapter begins an accounting of all those who headed back to Jerusalem after the Babylonian captivity.  The Persians were meticulous note takers, even to the point of counting how many from each family left the region now under Persian control to head to Jerusalem, also under Persian control.  

I love the detail about those priestly families whose records over time had been lost and so they were no longer considered clean.  They were considered no longer in the priestly class so could no longer serve the priestly duties.  There was nothing about ordination, it was all about in what family you were born.  It just takes us to a place where we do have to recognize that this was a sort of caste system.  This system was one where certain families had certain responsibilities and that could not be changed.  

Of course that is no longer the case in the church.  It is not a family run business, but there are certain responsibilities that certain people need to have.  

As we begin a new book of the Bible it is important to know where we are historically in this book.  A great link which gives you some background can be found here: https://www.esv.org/resources/esv-global-study-bible/introduction-to-ezra/

I find it amazing that the leader of a pagan nation would allow the Israelites to go free after years of captivity.  Granted that the captivity was under the Babylonians and that the Persians had just conquered the Babylonians so this people were not really their people.  But it goes further than that.  The king of Persia, Cyrus, is said to have his spirit stirred by the Lord.  As a  result he not only lets the people go but gives them a particular task which is to rebuild the temple of the Lord.  Now Ezra may have written this book of the Bible but he was not alive when this happened.  According to the timeline on the link above he does not enter Jerusalem until 458 BC and Cyrus gives out his decree in 586.  

The people of Israel were exiles and were brought out of Babylon, which is now Persia in this writing, and sent to Jerusalem not only to inhabit it but actually primarily to rebuild the temple.  The entire book of Ezra is a recounting of this building.  In this portion the king of a foreign nation, a pagan king at that, takes the initiative in ensuring that the work of the Lord be done.

This chapter deals exclusively with those things in our lives which we dedicate and devote to the Lord.  I know, I hope all of you are saying that you thought everything that we have and all that we are should be from the get go dedicated to the Lord.  Actually, that is more than correct.  But back in Moses’ day there were specific things that were actually dedicated to the work of the temple and for the well being of the priests, including people.  So they were actually given over to the Lord.  When we say that Jesus is Lord of our lives we mean that he rules that which we do.  Here in this instance the people would actually hand over certain things so that the religious priests would take ownership of it.  Not just metaphorical ownership, but actual ownership.

This chapter begins by explaining that those people who are dedicated to the Lord are worth a certain amount if you wanted to redeem them, if you wanted to get them back from the work of the temple.  If for some reason you gave back a blessing to the temple and you wanted that blessing back, there was a provision for that.  You could pay a certain amount and redeem, or reclaim that person, that animal, that field, or whatever it may be.  But it did come at a cost.  

This brings Leviticus to a close and it takes us to the end of the book and we are going to dive into the prophets now, Ezra will start us off.  Leviticus can get a bit heavy, but not nearly as repetitive as Numbers which we will not be looking at for this study.  On to the prophets.

The basic premise in this chapter is the Lord telling the people that if you do what you are supposed to do then I will reward you.  If you do not do what you are supposed to do then you will be punished.  Jesus comes at it with a bit of a different perspective when he says in Matthew 5:45: that the rain will fall on the good and the bad.  That has always been my theological approach.  I know that if we make bad decisions and we sin consistently in a way that is unremorseful then we are going to have to deal with the issues that come around because of those decisions.  

That is a bit different from saying that if we sin then God is going to punish us.  That would be a God that is definitely more hands on, but not really a God that I see as being consistent in the New Testament.  I agree that we do see that message promulgated in the Old Testament.  If you obey me then I will give you victory in battle, I will bless your crops, I will bless your families.  If you disobey me then I will abandon you as you have abandoned me.  This kind of direct correlation between the grace of God and the obedience of humanity would exclude the act of grace on the cross.  

Remember we read Paul tell us that even while we were yet sinners, even then God died on the cross and was involved in the most redemptive act, and undeserved act on the part of the receivers, ever known in human history.  God treats us as we don’t deserve is a strong underlying theme in the New Testament.  But that breaks pretty directly from what we read here in the Old Testament.

The year of Jubilee is described in this chapter.  This was a big deal back in Italy when the Roman Catholic Church declared a year of jubilee for the year 2000.  The door into St. Peter’s Basilica was opened and then closed again.  Here is the door that I am talking about.

The year of Jubilee is not just a party.  It is a time to set the slaves free, it is a time to forgive debt, it is a time to return home after you have been away.  If you go through this chapter you see that there are very specific rules on what is to happen on the year of jubilee.

Now, we don’t follow the year of jubilee any longer, but what would happen if we forgave everyone’s debt on the year of jubilee.  What if every 50 years lending institutions said: “Okay, this year, we are going to wipe the slate clean.”  Yeah, I don’t see it happening either.  But do you notice that in this chapter there was also a provision, or it was more of a commandment, that you are not to lend to a member of the tribe with interest.  You are simply to help them out and not expect anything in return.  Again, that would be something significant if we were able to enact that as well.  

We find the law of Moses again being spelled out but this time in a particular example.  We read that back then if someone took the Lord’s name in vain then they were to be stoned to death.  It is interesting that Moses makes sure that the people knew that there is a same  law for those who are part of the tribe of Israel and those who are outside of it and happen to be living within the Israelite community.  So regardless of who you are, there is no one above the law and the law is applied equally. 

We find in these verses, and elsewhere in the Old Testament, the saying an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth.  The significance is that back then there was a state sponsored death penalty which would be enacted if someone murdered another.  If someone maimed them, then they were to receive the same punishment and the same maiming by the authorities.  I wonder how that would be carried out.  But Jesus, when he comes upon the earth, institutes another law.  He says: “You have heard it said…but I say to you.”  That happens frequently when he is about to change something that the law had commanded all along, but now with Jesus and the covenant in place there is a new law.  

For this law Jesus says turn the other cheek, offer another cloak, walk another mile.  Capital punishment is no longer Scriptural, it is against the will of God.  It also just makes so much more sense for the nature of God to be one that he is a God of grace and glory and forgiveness, and everlasting love, and …  That is just who God is.

I’ll never forget in college where there was a week when students would go out on the grass and live in straw huts outside the dorms.  I knew them and they were friends of mine and they stayed in the huts because they were practicing their Jewish faith.  This chapter gives us a whole assortment of festivals, or holy days, that the people of Israel were to follow.  The main emphasis is on the Sabbath and how we are to take the Sabbath as a time unique and different from every other time of the week.  The emphasis seems to be that we are not to be involved in our occupations on that day.  

If you look at vs.39 and following you see the festival of booths and it is the same one that Jesus and his disciples would have encountered when he rode into Jerusalem.   The branches they would have taken from the huts and people would have been out in force because they were celebrating that festival.  We find in vs.44 Moses telling the people of Israel that these were actually festivals, and so they were instituted.  

This chapter moves from the previous purity of the priests to the purity of that which is offered to the Lord.  Not only is what is offered to the Lord supposed to be pure, but those who eat of what is offered to the Lord has be of that class of people who are pure.  So what is this all about?  Interestingly enough this was in place in order to ensure that the priests were able to survive.  They were not able to grow crops or do other tasks as occupations since their primary and singular task was that of priest of the Lord.  A portion of the food that was donated to the Lord went to the priests, and as this chapter explains, to their families as well.  

We find in the New Testament mixed examples of this.  We see Peter who was a fisherman, but then we have to assume that he ceased this practice when he moved to Jerusalem to rule the church with the other apostles.  We also see Paul who consistently throughout Scripture is described as a tentmaker and his ministry overlapped with his occupation.  We find the same true today.  There are some churches where the Peter model is followed, the pastor is full time and this is his/her occupation.  There are other churches where the pastor is bi-vocational and is not paid as a full time pastor.  We find those combinations even in our town of Strasburg.  The model which Scripture gives allows for both.  But it is encouraging to see how the Lord does provide for those who work for Him.  

It seems like God only wants the perfect and the unblemished to serve him as priest according to this Scripture in Leviticus.  I am perfectly comfortable in pastor’s being held to a higher standard.  If we are going to be standing in front of people and giving them recommendations on how to live and if we are going to interpret Scripture and give what is our understanding of God’s word for that time and place, then we should be held to the standard, and probably even above that one, that we profess.  I have no problem with that.  I say this not because I am confident that I will live up to expectations, I know I will fall short, but simply because that is what leaders need to do.  They need to be held to higher standards.

What we must be aware of is when you hold people to higher standards then the temptation is to think that this person is better, or for our case as Protestants, that this person has a closer walk with Jesus.  That is not our understanding.  In our thinking where we uplift the priesthood of all believers, we say with confidence that every single person is called to be a disciple of Jesus Christ and no one calling is higher or more important than another.  As a pastor I do not have a more important role to serve  than the teacher in the public school.  You can carry that out as far as you would like.

So this chapter deals with the physical requirements for a priest of the people of Israel and who he is allowed to marry or not marry.  Boy, I’m glad to be a Presbyterian.

A few things of interest here.  Look first at vs. 26  and you will see the purpose of these laws: “You shall be holy to me; for I the Lord am holy, and I have separated you from the other people to be mine.”  God has separated his people from those around to be a different type of people.  He does not want his people to sacrifice animals to other gods.  He does not want his people to worship other gods.  He does not want his people to act like other people in the world, they are to be different, they are to be pure.

So in order to understand what that looked like, he gives the people of Israel a set of regulations so that: “You shall not follow the practices of the nation that I am driving out before you.”  So these regulations and rules were adopted to serve as a foil for what was happening around them.  Apparently for the Egyptians and the Canaanites incest was not that big of a deal, it was actually practiced pretty regularly.  Well, not so much if you were an Israelite.  This chapter underlines incestual relationships as being an abomination and one that ought to result in the death of the parties involved.  

The next thing that I want you to look at is vs. 27 and see that it is from here that the Salem witch trials took their Scriptural backing.  You can absolutely find anything in Scripture to support a twisted agenda.  I thought you might like this clip since it deals with witches.