Ezra 7 - Preparation of Heart

In Ezra 7, Ezra leads a second return from Babylon to Jerusalem and reveals what faithful leadership shaped by God’s word looks like. As a ready scribe, he is not only skilled in the law of Moses but deeply formed by it, showing that spiritual heritage is not something to inherit passively but to embrace personally and faithfully. The chapter highlights how the hand of the Lord was upon Ezra as he prepared his heart to seek the law of the Lord, to do it, and to teach it in Israel.

The message traces how true spiritual strength is rooted in a heart that is intentionally prepared before God. Ezra’s life shows a progression from devotion to obedience and then to instruction, where knowing the word of God naturally leads to living it and passing it on to others. Even his success before the king is attributed not to strategy or skill alone, but to the gracious hand of God.

Ezra 7 calls God’s people to examine whether their hearts are prepared before the Lord, to pursue His word with sincerity, to obey what He reveals, and to depend fully on His hand for strength and fruitfulness.

Thanks for listening to the Living Faith St. Louis podcast. This episode is part of our weekly sermon ministry from Pastor Blade Sbisa, with occasional guest speakers and special series.
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Transcript

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We are in Ezra chapter 7 this morning, and we're looking at Ezra's life, and we're learning about Ezra leading a remnant back to Israel. Now, when you look at Israel's history in this little window of time, what we find is that there are three waves of Israelites that return from captivity out of Babylon back to Jerusalem. And we've already been talking about the book of Ezra, but it's kind of unique. In chapter 7, we actually find Ezra in Jerusalem for the first time. And we'll learn more about that in his journey in chapter 8. But when you're looking at Israel's history, right, God calls out a man by the name of Abram, makes of him a great nation. We find that nation in bondage at the end of the book of Genesis, right? They're in captivity. We can say that in bondage in Egypt, God raises up Moses, delivers them from the bondage of Egypt, calls them into the promised land. They wander for 40 years. They rebel against the commandments of God. They make their own gods. They want a king like the other nations. They get that king. The kingdom rises. We get it all the way to the pinnacle of the Old Testament. Solomon's temple. And then it all falls apart. It all falls apart because of some wickedness that was in the heart of Solomon. The kingdom's divided. And through many years, God sends prophets to Israel. This is really your old old, your whole Old Testament. God sends prophets to Israel saying, Repent, turn, judgment's coming. Well, they don't. And Israel is taken captive. Both the northern kingdom, the ten tribes that go to the north and the two that go to the south. And for 70 years, Judah, the southern two kingdoms, Judah and Benjamin, I'm sorry, the southern two tribes, Judah and Benjamin, are in captivity in Babylon. Okay, now focus with me here just for a moment as we kind of build some context. This remnant returns to Jerusalem, this believing remnant, yet they don't do it all at once. The first wave of Israelites that return to Jerusalem after the captivity are under the leadership of Zerubbabel. Okay, or Zerubbabel, however you want to say that. Maybe in the last few weeks, as we've worked through the first six chapters, you've you've heard me say the Zerubbabel the son of Sheeltio, the governor. Well, that that's the man who leads about 10,000 Israelites back to the land. But here this morning, what we're learning about is Ezra, another gentleman, a man of God, a man that we're going to look at for just a moment and see some godly characteristics from. This is a man in a second wave, some 60 years later, who leads about a thousand people, a thousand men, about five to six thousand families, or men and children and women. And this is just the second part of three. So you have three, kind of three individuals. Zerubbabel, you find his story and kind of that timeline in the book of Haggai, very short, minor prophet. Then you find Ezra, kind of recording more of the spiritual reformation of Israel at this time, and then the book of Nehemiah. So a third wave under Nehemiah, and you're probably really familiar with that text. Nehemiah leads a third wave of Israelites back to the land to rebuild the wall. Okay? So there's some context for our story. We find ourselves today in Ezra chapter 7, learning about Ezra on the cusp of heading back to Jerusalem, receiving the blessing of King Artaxerxes, and then seeing some spiritual reform take place as he goes to the Lord in prayer. This morning I want you to see, as I mentioned already, godly characteristics from the life of Ezra. In Ezra chapter 7 and verses 1 through 5, what we find is Ezra's lineage and godly and priestly line. Unlike the priest that we learned about in chapter 2, who could not prove their heritage, that's verses 61 through 63, Ezra could trace his line all the way back to Aaron. This was a man who came from a godly family. And I think it leads us to our first character quality in the life of Ezra, and that is that he was a man that did not abandon or neglect his spiritual heritage. And the question, right, rhetorically, setting on our minds this morning is do I have a spiritual heritage? Maybe in my physical family or spiritual one. Have I been invested in? See, Ezra grew up in a family that was rich spiritually. And he didn't squander or waste the investment that was given to him. Unlike so many today that rely on their spiritual heritage for favor with God, Ezra was a man that discovered his own purpose according to the will and plan of God, and he got in submission to that. There are some people who squander what has been invested in them, some people who rely too heavily on the spiritual heritage that they have, and that's just sad to think that somebody would waste the good thing that they've been given. Ezra didn't walk away from his upbringing, or vainly hope that mom or dad's or grandma's faith would automatically make him a man of God, or have a life that's pleasing to God. He discovered what God wanted for his life, and he made his faith his own. And you can see that in the life of Ezra, a man uniquely gifted, a ready scribe in the law of Moses, a man able to teach the law and do that effectively, and he stepped into that calling. Ezra chapter 7 in verse 6. In verse 6, we are told this in the beginning of that verse. This Ezra went up from Babylon. There's the context that I was just giving you as we began this message. Ezra went up from Babylon. He here is leaving the captivity some 60 years after that first wave. For whatever reason, up until this point, Ezra had not left Babylon. It makes you wonder, why didn't he go with the first group? And maybe that reveals some ungodly characteristic of this man to not be zealous for the things of God right away. Okay, that's a fair assumption. Between chapter 6, where we were last week and chapter 7, there are about 60 years of waiting or delay. And that first remnant would have been about 80 years prior to this. And so it's fair to make an assumption to say that Ezra would have been really young. If here in Ezra chapter 7, he's in his 80s, he would have been zero years old in the first wave. And so maybe Ezra didn't go because he was young. That's a real possibility. Maybe it was, though, that he was old enough. We don't know. The Bible doesn't tell us. But it makes us wonder. Why did Ezra wait? Was he doubtful? Was he hesitant? Was he faithless? Is that why he didn't go with the first wave? Again, we don't know, but we do know that Ezra was a ready scribe and he was skilled in the Word of God, as Romans chapter 10 and verse 17 says, faith cometh by hearing and hearing by the word of God. So if this is a man who gave his life to studying the law of God, surely he was a man of faith because of his conviction about that. Maybe, though, this delay or this hesitancy to not join that first wave was evidence of Ezra's temperance. Maybe it manifests some good qualities about him. It was his willingness to wait on the Lord and do things in his timing, to not make a hasty decision. Maybe it was his discernment and wisdom to know how to use the gifts that God had given him best. If you remember, as I mentioned in setting up the context, the first wave, the first wave was led under Zerubbabel, and the people go back, and if you remember in our study in Ezra, they build an altar and they lay the foundation of the temple. That's why they're initially given a bunch of resources to return. Maybe it was that Ezra knew that he wasn't uniquely gifted for the task of construction. And he said, Okay, I understand my spiritual gifts and my responsibility in this congregation, and I'm going to apply those accordingly. And so he waits. Ezra was gifted in the law of God and as a teacher, and how could it, how could he instruct or teach if there's no temple or place to do that in? So maybe he waits for that reason. Maybe he cared for those that wouldn't return right away. Maybe. Maybe. Maybe. We don't know. And that's all I really have to tell you this morning in this little section is that we don't know why he's going in the second wave, but what we do know is that regardless of the timeline, regardless of the delay, he returned. And that, does that not say something about Ezra's character? This was a man who was willing to leave the comforts he had in Babylon as he was assimilated there and go and do the thing that God called him to do in an uncomfortable place. At a time that maybe didn't make sense. The second character quality in this that I want you to see from Ezra's life is that Ezra was a man that led and provoked others to return and obey God with him. He wasn't doing his spiritual life alone. He wasn't just living his best Christian life and learning a bunch of stuff about the Bible and enjoying God and the pleasures of his private life. Now, this was a man who followed God and called people to follow him. He led a couple thousand people back to the land. That says something to me about Ezra. His effectiveness as a leader, but also his desire to do that. So before, again, I move too fast this morning, I just want to ask you: have you neglected that spiritual heritage that you've been given? Or have you taken what have you received and invested it in others? That's a really important question this morning. Ezra came from a great godly line and a great heritage, and he did something with what was invested in him. To much is given, much is required, the gospels tell us. Let me ask you, what's been given to you? What's been invested in you? Have you had a spiritual father or mother in the Lord who's equipped you in understanding God's word? If so, what have you done with that? Have you squandered it? Or are you like Ezra? Are you stepping in and continuing to invest that in the next generation? This same verse in chapter 7 and verse 6, it tells us that Ezra, yes, he went up from Babylon, but he was a ready scribe in the law of Moses, which the Lord God of Israel had given. Note this is not merely signifying that Ezra was a good writer or effective in his penmanship, but if you look into this word and its usage, you find that it was acknowledging his exceptional skill and expounding the law of God. He was a teacher of God's law. He was a ready scribe in the law of Moses. In harmony to this text, what we find about 14 years later is Ezra standing up before the congregation of Israel and teaching them the law distinctly. Nehemiah chapter 8 and verse 13. It says, And on the second day were gathered together, the chief of the fathers of the people, the priest, and the Levites unto Ezra the scribe, even to understand the words of the law. And when you read Nehemiah chapter 8, it's actually a great passage to learn about expositional preaching and the purpose of the preacher. And that is, the preacher's job is to give understanding to the people. It's like Acts chapter 8, when Philip's giving insight into Isaiah 53. What meaneth these things? I, you know, the Ethiopian eunuch there is reading from Isaiah 53, learning about a prophecy regarding the Lord Jesus Christ, and he's saying, How should I know these things except some man should guide me? God sends Philip. God sends Ezra to the nation of Israel when they didn't understand what they were to be doing according to the law. And he has the unique task in gifting to instruct the people distinctly and give them, this is the word, understanding in the law of God. That was his job. Ezra was a teacher and an instructor of the law, and he helped people understand it and make sense of what was expected from them. Sadly, today, and this is not in any way, I have no desire to proclaim my own goodness. I don't think I'm a good teacher of God's word. Uh I know God's uniquely gifted me for certain tasks. I'm standing in the position I think I'm called to. I'm not talking about myself right now. I just want you to know this: that a lot of people stand in pulpits today and they give comedy shows, they give self-help talks, they pat people on the back, they help their itching ears. That's not what the preacher's job is. The pastor is a teacher of God's word, and he's there to feed the sheep of God. Right? That's the whole goal. Give people an understanding in God's word. And Lord willing, over time, the Bible says we get to all do that with one another. Right? I can be corrected. I'm not above anything. And so we can just maintain the word of God is true, and every man's a liar, and we just come together and learn the Bible together and sharpen one another in the word of God. I can look at multiple people in this room. Sean's instructed me in the word of God. Kelsey's done that in Bible study. Luke's definitely done that. Isaiah's done that. Braden's done that in my life. Just in conversation, I've learned things from the Word of God by learning from them. Okay, so what a beautiful thing, though, to look at the life of Ezra and think this was a man who didn't just learn God's word to understand it for himself. He wanted to give understanding to other people. The verse goes on. In verse 6, it says, And the king, King Artaxerxes, granted him all his request. That is to go back to the land, to Jerusalem, to kind of reform the people. And this was done according to the hand of the Lord his God upon him. And that was true. Ezra had the favor of God. If you read this chapter and all of its details, what you find is that just like with Ezra chapter 1 and Zerubbabel and Cyrus giving all these blessings and a decree to allow the people to go back, so too, Ezra. Ezra was given a great blessing through King Artaxerxes and a great gracious commission to get to work and allow these people to return. Ezra chapter 7, now in verse 11. And in verse 11, what we find is the kind of the conclusion of that matter. The king giving a gracious commission to Ezra. Now, I believe that this was for a number of reasons. I think that Ezra had favor with the king because of his exceptional ability to communicate, but also his boldness to make a request. Even if this guy was super skilled in communication, he was really slick, he was able to talk the talk, he was able to persuade the king. If he didn't ask the king, he didn't get anything. So there you go. The first reason he found favor with the king was because he was bold with him. You have not because you asked not. We ought to be bold with our king too, and ask him to give us favor in building this house. But more importantly, I think that Ezra had favor and success because he was living a life in submission to Christ. And submission and humility before God. And the reason I believe this is because the text says at the end of verse 6, the hand of the Lord his God was upon him. And the question lingers in my heart and mind. Why? Don't you want the hand of the Lord upon your life? I desperately do. I want God to look at my life and say, I'm pleased with that. Do you think why was God pleased with Ezra? Why was his hand upon him? I think it's because Ezra's character and behavior pleased God. You know, Proverbs chapter 16 and verse 7. It says, When a man's ways please the Lord, he maketh even his enemies to be at peace with him. Now the king here isn't an enemy of Israel, but he certainly could have been, as the king over Persia. In a moment's notice, as we already saw in this book, there are plenty of kings that wanted to come against Israel. Yeah, that's that's very, very clear in the text. But this man, Ezra, his ways pleased the Lord, and he found great favor and a great and gracious commission from King Artaxerxes. And so I want to just call your attention here to a third quality in Ezra's life, and that was that he was a man who prepared his heart to seek the Lord. He was a prepared man. That was a characteristic of Ezra that was critical. He found favor because he was a man prepared to seek the Lord. And the law of the Lord, the text says. And I believe it was in this pursuit of seeking the Lord and the law that brought God great pleasure. Hebrews chapter 11 and verse 6. Familiar text to us, it says, but without faith it is impossible to please him. For he that cometh to God must believe that he is. It begins there. You've got to just believe that God exists. You want to live a life pleasing to God? Believe that he is. He is. He's real. It's not just a religious act that we go through to make ourselves feel better. God is real. There's a living God, and I get to pursue him. It begins there. You want to please God, believe him. Come to him believingly. And that he is a rewarder of them that diligently seek him. I think Ezra knew this God. I think he knew that he was, and that he would be a rewarder of them that diligently sought him. I believe that because if you study the Bible, like Ezra did, you would learn over and over again of God's faithfulness to those that yielded themselves to his power and his strength and his goodness. Ezra chapter 7 now and verse 10. Ezra chapter 7 and verse 10. It says, For Ezra had prepared his heart to seek the law of the Lord. That's where it begins. The preparation of his heart was first to seek the law of the Lord. Now, another question as we read that verse is why? Why is preparing the heart so important? Why is preparation of heart so important? Psalm 119 in verse 10 says, With my whole heart have I sought thee. Oh, let me not wander from thy commandments. The reason why preparation of heart is so important in the Christian life is because our tendency is to wander, to drift, to float away, to lose our ground, to not know where we're going, to wander off the path that God has called us to. Why is that? Why does the heart wander? Well, Jeremiah chapter 17 and verse 9, it says the heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked, who can know it? Well, God can know it, He can search out the deep things. And that's why we have to be first seeking the law of the Lord, so that the light of the law of the Lord, as a lamp under our feet, can direct our path. We have to be able to see. We have to be able to know how to walk. And so we have to have that pursuit of God's word to have a light onto a dark place. Our heart. Mark chapter 7 and verse 21 through 22, it says, For from within, out of the heart of men, proceed evil thoughts, adulteries, fornications, murders, thefts, covetousness, wickedness, deceit, lasciviousness, and evil lie, blasphemy, pride, and foolishness. If you've ever thought, should I trust my heart today? The Bible says don't do that. Don't do that. Don't trust the way you feel about something to do or make a moral decision. You gotta make decisions in the Christian life on the basis of what God says, not how you feel. Because the heart is the issue. There's something messed up in us, in the flesh. Proverbs chapter 28 and verse 26, it says, He that trusteth in his own heart is a fool. And by the way, that's not a good thing. That's not like foolishness of preaching, as 1 Corinthians 1 says. God says, Don't do this. Don't trust your own heart. For whosoever walketh wisely shall be delivered. It makes me think of Rehaboam. Right after Solomon has found out in 1 Kings chapter 11, and the kingdom divides, in chapter 12, what we find is that Rehaboam did evil in the sight of the Lord. In 2 Chronicles chapter 12 and verse 14, it says, He, Rehaboam, did evil because he prepared not his heart to seek the Lord. That's a strong statement, right? When we think of evil, maybe we think of like stealing, murder, lying, adultery. The Bible says we can be evil if we fail to prepare our heart to seek the Lord. Doesn't God always raise the standard and we're like, oh gosh, Lord, I failed to prepare myself on a daily basis for what you've called me to. Rhabom did evil because he prepared not his heart. So that's one thing, right? To say, okay, why does our heart need to be prepared? But the next question should be what does it mean to prepare our hearts? When we look at the word prepare through the scriptures, we find it transliterated. Number of ways, 85 times as prepare, but the next most usage of this transliteration would be the word establish. It was brought out of the Hebrew into the English 85 times as prepare, but 58 times as establish or establish, right, to be fixed, to set three times as direct, to order three times. And many other variant variations here. So what does it mean to prepare my heart? It means to set or determine in advance where my affection will be set. What does it mean for me to prepare my heart to seek the Lord? It means that in advance, I'm going to determine how I behave. Don't a lot of us, right, would say, I'm going to seek the Lord. And then we never do that. The alarm goes off, and then we never actually end up doing that. We're not predetermined or prepared to do that. We love the idea of seeking the Lord. We're just not doing it. And that's probably because we didn't prepare our heart to be predetermined or established or fixed on the idea of obedience. Proverbs chapter 4 and verse 23 doesn't just tell us, though, to prepare our heart. It says to keep thy heart with all diligence, for out of it are the issues of life. Once again, the Bible doesn't have much great to say about the heart. We've got to prepare our heart because it's messed up, otherwise we'll wander away. But we've also got to do the work of protecting our heart in the ongoing process of seeking the Lord. We've got to keep it. We've got to protect our heart with all diligence, with all strength. Right? You first seek the Lord, as I mentioned earlier, and you please the Lord by believing that he is, but you also have to acknowledge that he's a rewarder of them that diligently seek him. You've got to keep your heart with all diligence. Okay, so why? Why do we need a prepared heart? What is a prepared heart? But how does a prepared heart in seeking the law of the Lord affect us? Psalm chapter, or Psalm 105, not chapter, verses 3 through 4, it says, Glory ye in his holy name. Let the heart of them rejoice that seek the Lord. Seek the Lord in his strength, seek his face forevermore. One outcome of pursuing or seeking the law of the Lord is a heart of joy. It is rejoicing. Psalm 119 in verse 45, it says, And I will walk at liberty, for I seek thy precepts. One positive outcome of seeking the law of the Lord is rejoicing. The second is learning how to walk in liberty. You seek the law of God, you get intimate with the Word of God, what you learn is that God is trying to liberate you from your sin to walk in liberty. Seek the law of the Lord, rejoice in him, rejoice always. Again I say rejoice and walk in liberty. But Proverbs 18 and verse 1 also says, Through desire, a man, having separated himself, seeketh and intermedleth with all wisdom. So another positive consequence of seeking the law of God is having the opportunity to intermeddle yourself with all wisdom. What a great privilege we have, isn't it? God says, Come come speak to me, come, reason with me. Come, let me give you some treasure. Come, I want to show you things in my word, things about me, things about my character. Ezra was a man who was prepared to seek the law of the Lord. But also to do it. And this is our fourth quality that I want to express this morning, and that is that Ezra was a man that pursued the word of God, and he was predetermined to live it out. Okay, he was prepared to seek the law of the Lord, but he also prepared himself to do it. And that's a big difference. There's one thing for a man or a woman to give themselves wholly to the study of God's word. That is necessary. The Bible tells us that in 2 Timothy chapter 2 and verse 15. Study to show thyself approved unto God, a workman that needeth not to be ashamed, rightly dividing the word of truth. Study. Seek the law of the Lord. Do that diligently. But what the heck? What if we prepare our hearts to do that, but we are not also predetermined to respond to the things we learn? God forbid, right? We ought to be a people. We ought to be Christians who say, I want to go deep in God's word. I want to learn the word of God, but I do not want to do that unless I am also going to obey it. Lord, give me grace to do your word, to obey your word, to be a doer, not a hearer only of your word. Ezra was yielded to the word, to learning things about the word, but also to doing him. This was a man whose mind was saturated in the Bible, but whose heart was as well. That's important. The passage didn't say he prepared his mind to seek the law of the Lord. It says he prepared his heart to do that and to do it. And that's important. The heart needs to be in submission to Christ, because it's proud. To do it, the text says. And this is so radical than so many Christians in their pursuit of God. Right now, what I find online is that so many people are interested in learning a new doctrine or learning a new fact about the Bible, and yet they have no interest in living it out. And I see that because of the fruit of their life. Why? Well, because it is impossible, I'm sorry, because it is possible to serve the flesh while learning the Bible. Did you know that? The pursuit of knowledge alone will puff you up. And the flesh, the carnal man, actually loves learning things about God and doing nothing with him. So you can serve, I can serve my flesh by learning a new thing in the Bible, but you can only live the Bible if you are abandoned of self and empowered by the Spirit of God. Why are you seeking the law of the Lord? That's my simple question to you devotionally this morning. Do you seek the law of the Lord? Why not? You should do that. You could rejoice because of that. You could walk in liberty because of that. You could intermedle yourself with all wisdom because of that. Seek the law of the Lord. You are doing that? Great. Why are you doing that? Are you doing it for yourself? To learn a thing? Or do you want to obey God and please Him with the whole of your life? People will spend hours and hours unpacking doctrinal points all while serving sin secretly. I don't know if you've caught any content online, maybe Facebook or another platform, maybe another context. But it seems that a lot of people who have really strong and precise exposition of certain doctrines, or they're really good at teaching nuances in church history or church polity or some other theological category, they're also kind of jerks. You ever notice that? It's like everyone's arrogant about the positions they hold. Nobody has a grace in their mouth. It's like, what the heck? Like we we ought to be a people who go deep in the Word of God, but we also have words and speech that people are profounded. Like they look at and they think, how is how? What is that? I want that. I want that spirit of grace. Lord help us. Because it seems that in the church today, people are much more interested in being right than being righteous. Seems people are more interested in having the right position on any given doctrine, and then yet what they forfeited the one thing that they're to do. Live a life of charity. It should be both. And I just want you guys to know my long-term desire for this church is to go deep doctrinally. Deep doesn't mean talking about fringe topics and weird, unique things like what are the colors of the toenails of the statue of Nebuchadnezzar and Daniel's prophet. Who cares? I'm not talking about that. That's not deep, talking about some strange thing. I want to go deep in studying the words of God and learning what God says and cross-referencing scripture and understanding doctrine and making sense of that, right, rightly dividing the word of truth. I want that. But you know what? I'd forfeit it all. If that is going to be the same church that doesn't obey God. I would never lead the church to that if I know the outcome is just going to be a bunch of people who are puffed up and big jerks about holding the right truths. Who cares? I'd rather us go around saying, save Christ than him crucified, like Paul did to Corinth. Corinth was a pretty messed up church, weren't they? They didn't really have any interest in obeying God. At least initially they didn't. And Paul said, I come to you not with excellency of speech, but knowing this one thing: Christ has been crucified. And there's power in that message. He forfeited it all. I'd rather be a church that just every single Sunday morning said, A, B, C, Jesus loves me, and he loves you too. Then be a church that pretends like we're going deep and we have no interest in spiritual life. Now, by faith, by the grace of God, we're going to be a church that does both. We're going to go deep in the Word of God, we're going to learn the Word of God, and we're going to be a people who say, I'm going to obey by His grace everything that He gives me. I'm going to learn how to evangelize, learn all the nuances of apologetics and how to share my faith, and I'm going to do it. And y'all, I'm guilty. I'm a guy who can listen to someone talk about apologetics for Islam or to like the gospel to Muslims. I can learn about those things and be interested. And then how effective would I actually be in ministering to someone like that? Probably not super effective. Because I liked getting the Bible fact or the apologetic question or detail or fact to be right, all while I'm not actually actively pursuing people for that purpose. It's just to know something. And God forbid we just know things. Who cares if we just know things? You think God's impressed with that? He's not. God takes great pleasure in us seeking Him and seeking Him diligently. Ezra was a man that pursued the Word of God and lived it. He was a ready scribe. You've heard that enough from me, haven't you? James chapter 1 and verse 22, it says, Be ye doers of the word and not hearers only, deceiving your own selves. See, the pursuit of doctrine and understanding the Bible makes us feel spiritual, all while it doesn't actually make us any more spiritual. And that is the danger of being a part of a good Bible-teaching church, is the whole church can be deceived, that they're more spiritual than they actually are. And I'd rather us have milk the rest of our lives and be strong than choke on meat and die, spiritually speaking. Deuteronomy chapter 5 and verse 29, it says, Oh, that they were such, that there were such a heart in them, speaking of Israel, that they would fear me and keep all my commandments always, that it might be well with them and with their children forever. Jesus said in John chapter 13 and verse 17, If ye know these things, happy are ye that do them. You know some things great. You want to be happy in Jesus? Do the things you know. The most miserable men in life, the most miserable women in life are the Christians who know what to do and aren't doing it. They have all the right answers, but then they're not living according to it. We need help in these areas, don't we? Let me just ask you a basic question. What do you know that you're supposed to do as a Christian? Think about that. What was the first thing that came to mind? Why aren't you doing that? And would you just trust the Lord to take that step of faith to do it today? To do it tomorrow? Let's just begin there. We ought to obey the things we know rather than seeking a new thing that we don't care to obey. Ezra not only prepared his heart to seek the Lord and to do it, but as you can see in the verse, if you read ahead, he was also prepared to teach Israel in statutes and judgments. And this is our fifth quality that I want to call out this morning, amongst many others we could in Ezra's life, and that was that he was a man who pursued God's word for the sake of others. Why do you pursue God's word? Is it for yourself or is it for the next person? It's an important question. God gives us the great privilege of pursuing him and his word, to know him, to have a life and an intimate relationship with him. But if it ends there, if our spiritual life is just about us, we've completely missed why we're here on earth. God wants us to do everything we can to invest in everyone we can. To seek the law, to do it, to teach it. Now, understand something about Ezra and just a spiritual principle in general. People are able to teach and instruct because they've been gifted by God, but Ezra was also prepared to do this. Okay, so believe it or not, teaching requires a lot of preparation. I don't know if there's any teachers in the room. I don't know if you've ever been put in a position, maybe in your life or with children in the church, possibly in your workplace, in a school where you have to teach. But I'm just curious, who's ever been kind of shoved in a position in a moment where you've been required to teach? You've been teached. You've been teached. You've taught. And maybe the first time you were asked to do that, it was really uncomfortable, wasn't it? You had no clue what you were doing, and you realized in a moment, I thought I knew what I was doing, and I have no clue. Like I thought I knew what I was talking about, and I understood this topic, and now that I'm talking about it, I don't know what the heck I thought I knew. What was wrong with me? I don't know anything. And that's what teaching does, and that's why it requires a lot of preparation. It's one thing to know things, it's a whole nother thing to know why you believe certain things. A lot of Christians today know what they believe, don't they? You could ask most people, do you believe the gospel? Yeah, I believe the gospel. Um I believe that I'm going to heaven on the basis of what Jesus has done. Okay, great. Um can you teach that to my friend over here? Or can you can you relay that back to me? I know I just shared the gospel with you and you agreed with what I said. Can you relay that back to me? And all of a sudden they're like, wait, like their mind gets erased and they don't know anything that you just told them for like an hour. It's just how we are. We have to do the hard work of learning not only how to know things and why we know them, but how to communicate them. It's really an important task as a Christian. You've got to you've got to be able to communicate and answer people when they ask you the reason for why you have hope. You've got to think about how am I going to communicate why my life is different because I have a relationship with Jesus? What's actually affected because I call myself a Christian? Is it just because it makes me feel good? Kind of gives me some peace to not have to go to hell? That is not a good answer. There should be some real substance to why you believe what you believe. And you ought to do the work of preparing some statements for how you might communicate that to other people. My deepest desire for us as a church over the next year is for us to learn how to take the things we know about the gospel and begin being bold to challenge the people that we come in contact with the gospel. Not brash, not mean about it, not mean-spirited, not condescending or condemning, but bold, plain. Learning how to share our faith with people, learning how to communicate the things we say are so important to us. You know, by illustration here in closing, I want to can I want you to consider the last time you tried to learn something, maybe it was a new skill, a new technology, maybe it was a new program, a new instrument, a foreign language. And through that process of learning, maybe the instruction was given through a teacher in a classroom or a booklet or a manual or an instructional video. I watch a lot of YouTube for little construction projects, and I'll watch a guy and I'll be like learning. I'm like, I got this. This makes total sense to me. And then I like I shut off the video and I like put my phone in my pocket and all of a sudden my mind is erased. And I'm like, what do I need? How do I do this? What was that product again? And I'm like, I don't know even what I just learned. I mean, think about that skill for you. What was the last, genuinely, the last thing that that you know you like attempted to learn? And then that moment you were like, I think I got it. And then when you actually went to try to do it. It's one thing to know something, isn't it? Know some things that are true about the Bible. It's a whole nother thing to to do it. That's true. It's even more of a task to teach it to others. Because in teaching something to others, you don't only have to know what's right, you have to know when it's wrong. You have to know when when something is a little bit off that that's that's not actually what the Bible teaches. You have to know not only what's wrong when you see it, oh, I see that that doctrine isn't right. Isn't that pretty easy to do? Be critical of things that don't seem right. It's very easy to do. It's very difficult, though, to be constructive. As a teacher of God's word, you have to know what's right. You have to know what's wrong, but you also have to know how to correct something when it's wrong. And that is very difficult, and that's exactly why God has called Ezra to the task of being the spokesperson to the nation of Israel in a time of near apostasy. And he's there to be broken over the people, he's there to pray for the people, he's there to fast for the people, and he's there to instruct them in the law of God distinctly to give them an understanding of what God intended for their life. Ezra chapter 7 and verse 25, it says, Thou Ezra, after the wisdom of thy God, that is in thy hand. God's hand was upon Ezra, and because of that there was wisdom in the hand of him. Set magistrates and judges, the text says, again, verse 25, which ye may judge all the people that are beyond the river, all such as know the law of thy God, and teach them that they I'm sorry, that teach them that know them not. Okay, so Ezra here once again was given the distinct task of taking the wisdom he had and his knowledge of God and giving that to others that they might teach others also. That's 2 Timothy chapter 2 and verse 2. That is discipleship. That is taking what God's given you, giving it to somebody else, that they might give it to the next generation. That's what God wants from us. Now finally, in verses 27 and 28 of this chapter, what we find is that Ezra blessed the Lord and acknowledged some things about why he was successful. In verse 27, it says, Blessed be the Lord God of our fathers, which hath put such a thing as this in the heart, in the king's heart, to beautify the house of the Lord which is in Jerusalem. Now I just want to pause here and remind you of 2 Timothy chapter 3 and verse 16 and 17, which tells us for what? All scripture is given by inspiration of God and is profitable for doctrine, what is right, for reproof, what is wrong, for correction, helping somebody see what is wrong and getting it right, and instruction in righteousness, keeping it right, that the man of God may be perfect, thoroughly furnished unto all good works. To beautify the house of the Lord, ye are the temple of the living God, the New Testament says. 1 Corinthians chapter 3 and verse 16, 1 Corinthians chapter 9 and verse 19, ye you we are the temple of the living God, and by the word of God we get beautified. We get furnished, we get perfected. That's what God has allowed Ezra to be a part of. And the king's blessing, the house of the Lord is beautified, which is at Jerusalem, verse 28, and hath extended mercy unto me. This is Ezra's plea or confession, acknowledgement of God's goodness in his life, he says, and hath extended mercy unto me before the king and his counselors, and before all the king's mighty princes. And I was strengthened as the hand of the Lord my God was upon me. And I gathered together out of the house out of Israel chief men to go up with me. That phrase gets repeated here a number of times in chapter seven and chapter eight, the hand of the Lord was upon me. And so this is our fifth key point this morning, and character quality in the life of Ezra, and that is that Ezra was a man. That acknowledged his strength and success was all because of God. I think I got my numbers mixed up there, and I apologize for that. But this last quality in Ezra's life that we see is that Ezra was a man that acknowledged his success and strength was because of God. A lot of people who are skilled and being a teacher of God's word or effective as leaders and multiplying what God's given them. People that come from a strong spiritual heritage, a lot of times, they're proud. A lot of times, people that know a thing about the Bible kind of look at their own strength and their study habits, and you ask them, why do you know so much about the Bible? And they give you their pedigree and what college they went to. Ezra was a man who knew the Word of God, understood the law of God, and here he is at the end of this chapter, acknowledging that he was strong or he was strengthened because of the hand of the Lord upon him. Are you strong in the Word? If I was to ask you why are you strong, what is your initial reaction? Because I've learned a lot. Because I've really given my life to studying God's Word, because I'm pretty smart. Or is it because God's been good to me? He's given me some great people in my life, He's given me favor with certain leaders in my life who have invested in me and poured into me. Big difference, isn't it? Ezra was a humble man. He quieted himself, he intermeddled himself with all wisdom, and because of this, we look at his life and we can find some great characteristics that we can learn from. A man who did not neglect his spiritual heritage, a man who provoked others to return and obey, a man who prepared his heart to seek the Lord, to do it, and to teach others to do it. This was a man who learned the Word of God and pursued it for others' sake. And finally, as we just read, this was a man who understood and acknowledged his strength and success was because of God. What about your character this morning? What about mine? Maybe we can just quiet ourselves as we close and continue our service in one final song. Just asking the Lord, Lord, would you continue to sanctify me this morning? Would you correct any attitude or maybe behavior in my life that's off? I want to have a character more like Ezra's.