1. "God always has a word of hope for His people. God shapes us by His Word. Here His people were in idleness. They were in self-indulgence. They were putting their time and resources into their own comfort. Instead of contributing to the church budget, they were upscaling their houses, getting larger and better bathrooms, better and better paneling, padding their investments."

2. "God's Word opposes our disobedience to Him. God is not satisfied to leave us in the darkness of our own sin. So He enlightens our minds and hearts by sending His Word."

3. "We know that we should worship the Lord and how we should worship Him only because He has told us. If He doesn't tell us, we don't know."

4. "The state surveils so that it can control. Accurate data can become the fingertips of the state's displeasure pretty easily as they find you."

5. "Don't try to determine what's true by what's popular. Islam may equate worldly success with success in God's eyes, but we Christians don't follow Islam's conquistador—we follow the Christ who was crucified. We realize that it is the natural disposition of all of us in this world to hate the truth."

6. "At those times when being a good American means being a bad Christian, we choose to be a good Christian first, trusting God to oversee the fallout."

7. "Christians are not those who think that we have all good things in our present experience, but rather we are those who understand that because of what God has done for us in Jesus Christ, we have all good things coming."

8. "Friend, I would caution you not to mistake His patience for apathy. God's Word tells us that He is patient, being kind and merciful, that all might repent. But His patience is not apathy. He cares and He calls us to turn from our sin to trust in Him."

9. "He is the sovereign God of the ages who has His purposes and will work them out for His people's good and for His own glory. He is not intimidated by hypersonic missiles. He's not intimidated by diplomatic ability or cultural reach."

10. "If you see yourself doing something, making a remark to somebody, about to tweet something for your own honor and fame, stop. That's almost never a good idea. Because neither you nor I are the Creator of all things. We will not be the judge of all. We are not morally perfect beings."

Observation Questions

1. According to Ezra 5:1, who prophesied to the Jews in Judah and Jerusalem, and in whose name did they prophesy?

2. In Ezra 5:2, how did Zerubbabel and Jeshua respond to the prophets' message, and what role did the prophets continue to play?

3. What two questions did Tattenai, governor of the province beyond the river, ask the Jewish builders according to Ezra 5:3-4?

4. According to Ezra 5:5, what prevented the officials from stopping the building work while they waited for Darius's response?

5. In Ezra 5:11-12, how did the Jewish elders identify themselves to the Persian officials, and what reason did they give for the destruction of the original temple?

6. What did the Jewish elders claim Cyrus had decreed regarding the temple, and what did they request Tattenai ask King Darius to do according to Ezra 5:13-17?

Interpretation Questions

1. Why is it significant that God's Word through the prophets Haggai and Zechariah came before the people resumed building, and what does this reveal about how God typically works among His people?

2. What does the phrase "the eye of their God was on the elders of the Jews" (Ezra 5:5) teach us about the relationship between God's sovereignty and human governmental authority?

3. Why did the Jewish elders identify themselves as "servants of the God of heaven and earth" rather than emphasizing their status as subjects of the Persian Empire, and what does this suggest about where ultimate allegiance belongs?

4. How does the Jewish elders' acknowledgment that God gave them into Nebuchadnezzar's hand because their fathers "angered the God of heaven" (Ezra 5:12) demonstrate a distinctly biblical understanding of history and God's purposes?

5. In light of the entire passage, how does God use pagan rulers like Cyrus and governmental processes like Tattenai's inquiry to accomplish His redemptive purposes for His people?

Application Questions

1. The people of Judah had been neglecting the temple while investing in their own "paneled houses" (Haggai 1:4). In what specific areas of your life might you be prioritizing personal comfort or advancement over God's purposes and the ministry of your church?

2. The Jewish elders identified themselves first as "servants of the God of heaven and earth" before any national identity. When you introduce yourself or think about who you are, how prominently does your identity as a follower of Christ factor in compared to your job, nationality, or other roles?

3. The sermon noted that Christians should expect some form of opposition or misunderstanding for their faith. How have you experienced this in your workplace, neighborhood, or family, and how can you prepare to respond faithfully when it comes?

4. The Jewish elders honestly confessed that their ancestors' sins led to their exile rather than blaming others or circumstances. Is there an area of difficulty in your life where you need to acknowledge your own responsibility before God rather than shifting blame?

5. Knowing that God is greater than governments and sovereignly uses nations for His purposes, how should this truth shape the way you pray about current political situations and how you respond emotionally to news and cultural changes?

Additional Bible Reading

1. Haggai 1:1–15 — This passage records the specific prophetic message that prompted the people to resume building the temple, showing how God's Word convicted them of misplaced priorities.

2. Zechariah 4:1–14 — This vision given to Zechariah encouraged Zerubbabel that the temple would be completed "not by might, nor by power, but by my Spirit," reinforcing God's sovereign initiative in the rebuilding.

3. Daniel 5:1–31 — This passage describes the fall of Babylon to the Persians on the very night God's handwriting appeared on the wall, demonstrating God's sovereignty over empires.

4. Isaiah 44:24–45:7 — God names Cyrus as His "anointed" who would accomplish His purposes for Israel, showing that God uses pagan rulers for His people's good and His own glory.

5. Romans 13:1–7 — Paul teaches about the Christian's relationship to governing authorities, providing New Testament instruction on how believers should view governmental power as ordained by God while maintaining ultimate allegiance to Christ.

Sermon Main Topics

I. Introduction: The Challenge of Christians Relating to Government

II. Lesson One: God Takes the Initiative—His Word Precedes and Provokes His Worship

III. Lesson Two: God Is Greater Than Governments

IV. Lesson Three: We Are More Fundamentally God's Servants Than We Are Americans

V. Lesson Four: God Uses Nations for His People's Good and His Own Glory

VI. Conclusion: Living for God's Glory Above All Earthly Loyalties

Detailed Sermon Outline

How confusing it can be for Christians to relate well to government, even in our own land, when we think about ourselves and our own history.

Take, for example, this one president, perhaps the wealthiest man ever to serve in the office. Attacks on him become increasingly personal. He's thought to tend to the extravagant, given to tirades of anger in private. The Congress is asking for his papers relating to certain foreign interactions. He refuses on constitutional grounds.

He is thought by many to use public trust for his own private enrichment. He's accused of surrounding himself with corrupt officials. Key cabinet members resign in protest. The press is as sharply divided as the people. There are even accusations of treason, given how he's acted with foreign powers.

Some in the press are champions of his impeachment. He's given too much money, they say, to the military. He more and more verges on being an open tyrant. And how does he get his name put on everything? We could go on and on.

You understand, of course, I'm describing President George Washington.

In the Bible, we learn that our identity as the people of God can never finally be rooted in holding worldly power or in allegiance to those who do. Such presidents or emperors are always temporary stewards of power. Our identity as the people of God comes from our allegiance to the one unchanging power from whom all temporary earthly power is derived, whose purposes all earthly rulers serve. This has been a challenging issue for God's people from the beginning of time. From Abram figuring out how to speak to the Pharaoh in Egypt, to the Exodus.

From the rulers of God's people, Israel, leading their people into idolatry and to their destruction by the pagan empires of Assyria and Babylon. God's people were and have always been at the mercy of God. Worldly powers of the day, for their own reasons, unwittingly do God's bidding. Assyria and Babylon meant no spiritual rebuke to God's people. But that's why the invasion and the exiles were.

Assyria wiped out the northern tribes of Israel in 727 BC. Just over 100 years later, Babylon destroyed the southern tribes of Benjamin and Judah and laid waste to Jerusalem, taking thousands of Israelites in exile back to Babylon. The temple that had been built under King Solomon in Jerusalem is a place for instruction through sacrifice and as the center of God's public worship, this sign of God's presence with His people was gone. In 587 B.C., Jerusalem fell to the Babylonians. The temple was razed to the ground and many of its articles were taken to Babylon.

Judah was in ruins. Jerusalem and her walls had collapsed. The temple lay in ruins and now all the leading citizens, maybe 10,000 to 15,000 people, were deported. In our study today, we begin studying the book of Ezra. And we come to a record of the time when God caused the Babylonian Empire to be overthrown, not by Israel, but by another pagan empire, the Persians.

Seventy years after Josiah, the king in Judah, had been killed, and the first wave of Jews deported to Babylon, we have the famous story in Daniel chapter 5 of God's handwriting on the wall. Informing the Babylonian rulers that they had been weighed in the balance and found wanting. That very night, Cyrus the Persian defeated Babylon, and the Persian Empire became the dominant empire in that part of the world for the next 200 years until the time of Alexander the Great. Cyrus reigned for about 10 years. And pursued a more humane policy to conquered peoples of resettlement in their homelands.

And that's where we come to. It's that period in history when we come to the end of the history of the Old Testament almost and the end of the prophecies. So the books we'll be looking at are Ezra and Nehemiah, but especially Ezra, and in the prophets Haggai and Zechariah. Now if you take your Old Testaments, I'd like you to find Ezra. If you just go starting in Genesis, they're in roughly chronological order.

All the histories, all the way through, you can just flip through. There's Joshua, there's 1 Kings, there's 1 and 2 Chronicles, and what happens after 2 Chronicles? It's the book of Ezra. That's the book you want to leave your Bibles open to. But then the two prophets who are prophesying during this period are Haggai and Zechariah.

And where are they? They're at the end of the prophets. So if you look at the way our English Bibles are organized, you have Job, Psalms, Proverbs, Proverbs by Solomon. You have them again in chronological order, roughly, going through the prophets into the minor prophets. Well they're not entirely in chronological order, but you'll find toward the end of the collection of prophets, the small book of Haggai and the somewhat larger book of Zechariah.

Because they also are coming near the end of all the prophets' ministries in Israel, Haggai and Zechariah. So if you want to put a bulletin maybe stuck in the air or your finger, we'll go to Haggai and Zechariah a little bit in the first point, just to get some background of the preaching that's going on. But we're going to be studying the book of Ezra. This is the story that we have told in Ezra of the Return of the Exiles. And Ezra, if you look at Ezra chapter 1, you see Cyrus's decree.

It's issued about 537 B.C. And it's part of this policy I've mentioned of the Persian emperor to resettle displaced populations back in their homelands. That meant many thousands of Jews who would take the trek from Babylon back to Jerusalem with the express intention of resettling the land and returning to the ancient practices of worship and sacrifices given to them by God. So this return is a period of great hope and excitement. And for a couple of decades almost, really from 538 BC to 520 BC, work on the rebuilding of the temple waxed and waned.

When they arrived, they started quickly, they rebuilt the foundations, they began sacrifices again, then opposition arose. You can read about that in chapter 3. Chapter 4 is largely a flash out of the order of the story forward to something that was happening in Ezra's time in the 450s B.C. And Ezra is recounting it here in chapter 4 to show them that even as God was faithful to the returning generation, so He would be faithful to them. They arrived, they rebuilt, but we realize that they had stopped the rebuilding.

And if you look there in chapter 4, the very last verse It really functions more like the beginning of chapter 5, 4:24, then the house, the work on the house of God that is in Jerusalem stopped. And it ceased until the second year of the reign of Darius, King of Persia. Ezra returns to recounting how it is that God had provided for His people, even using the authority of pagan governments to restore His people's public allegiance to God Himself. Our passage for today is Ezra, chapter 5. So we have a group of returnees who've rebuilt the altar, they've restored daily sacrifices in Jerusalem.

They did that immediately when they got back in 538, 537, 536. But then for a variety of reasons, it seems the work on the temple basically, as it says here in 4:24, ceased. It came to a standstill, really throughout the rest of Cyrus' reign. The reign of his successor, Cambyses, and really into the beginning of this reign of Darius that's mentioned here. So we read in Ezra 4:24, the work on the house of God in Jerusalem came to a standstill until the second year of the reign of Darius, king of Persia.

Let's begin reading the passage with that verse.

Then the work on the house of God that is in Jerusalem stopped and it ceased until the second year of the reign of Darius, king of Persia. Now the prophets Haggai and Zechariah, the son of Iddo, prophesied to the Jews who were in Judah and Jerusalem in the name of the God of Israel who was over them. Then Zerubbabel, the son of Shealtiel, and Jeshua, the son of Jozadak, arose and began to rebuild the house of God that is in Jerusalem. And the prophets of God were with them, supporting them. At the same time, Tattenai, governor of the province beyond the river, and Shethar-bozenai and their associates, came to them and spoke to them thus, 'Who gave you a decree to build this house and to finish this structure?' They also asked him this, 'What are the names of the men who are building this building?' But the eye of their God was on the elders of the Jews, and they did not stop them until the report should reach Darius, and then an answer be returned by letter concerning it.

This is a copy of the letter that Tatnai, the governor of the province beyond the river, and Shethar-Boz'nai, Boazani and his associates, the governors who were in the province beyond the river, sent to Darius the king. They sent him a report in which was written as follows: To Darius the king, all peace. Be it known to the king that we went to the province of Judah to the house of the great God. It is being built with huge stones and timber is laid in the walls. This work goes on diligently and prospers in their hands.

Then we asked these elders and spoke to them thus: who gave you a decree to build this house and to finish this structure? We also asked them their names for your information, that we might write down the names of their leaders. And this was their reply to us: We are the servants of the God of heaven and earth, and we are rebuilding the house that was built many years ago, which a great king of Israel built and finished. But because our fathers had angered the God of heaven, He gave them into the hand of Nebuchadnezzar, king of Babylon, the Chaldean, who destroyed this house and carried away the people to Babylonia. However, in the first year of Cyrus, king of Babylon, Cyrus the king made a decree that this house of God should be rebuilt, and the gold and silver vessels of the house of God, which Nebuchadnezzar had taken out of the temple that was in Jerusalem, and brought into the temple of Babylon.

These Cyrus the king took out of the temple of Babylon, and they were delivered to one whose name was Sheshbazzar, whom he had made governor. And he said to him, 'Take these vessels, Go and put them in the temple that is in Jerusalem and let the house of God be rebuilt on its site. Then this Sheshbazzar came and laid the foundations of the house of God that is in Jerusalem. And from that time until now it has been in building and it is not yet finished. Therefore if it seems good to the king, let search be made in the royal archives there in Babylon to see whether a decree was issued by Cyrus the king for the rebuilding of this house of God in Jerusalem and let the king send us his pleasure.

In this matter. Friends, let me point out four lessons in this text for us as God's people today. Lesson number one, God takes the initiative. God takes the initiative. His Word precedes and provokes His worship.

Look with me again at these first couple of verses. 4:24 sets out the theme of rebuilding under Darius. In chapter 5. And when you read 4:24, then, that then doesn't really follow in reference to verse 23. It's going back to verse 5, really.

And then in chapter 4:6-23 is the most confusing part of Ezra because it's something that's much later that Ezra is placing there in order to show opposition that he was facing in his own time, but now he's trusting that God will be faithful there like he is in this example from their immediate past that he's giving here in chapter 5. So chapter 5. Now the prophets Haggai and Zechariah, the son of Iddo, prophesied to the Jews who were in Judah and Jerusalem in the name of the God of Israel who was over them. Then Zerubbabel, the son of Shealtiel, and Jeshua, the son of Jehozadak, arose and began to rebuild the house of God that is in Jerusalem. And the prophets of God were with them, supporting them.

So here we have Zechariah and Haggai starting to prophesy in Jerusalem, encouraging the Israelites to recommence the rebuilding. So friends, it had been decades since the voice of God's prophets had been heard in Jerusalem. Never since Jeremiah's day had the words of Yahweh been echoing out afresh again in the city. But now they came in Haggai and then Zechariah. God's prophets were heard in the land.

Haggai delivers his message, we know, between the 29th of August and December in 520 BC. The temple rebuilding recommences on the 20th of September in 520 BC, and then Zechariah's messages began in October of 520 BC. Friends, even after all of his people's sins which had led to their exile, God would speak to them in redemption and love. Brothers and sisters, the whole event of the return from the exile displays that God is a redeeming God. Even as He had called Abram out of Ur, the Chaldees, even as He had called the slaves of the Egyptian empire, the Jews out of Egypt, now here He had called them out of the exile, displaying that He is a God of redemption.

You see in verse 1, Haggai and Zechariah are mentioned. It all begins with this coming of God's Word. God speaks, and it's God's Word that galvanizes them to action. God speaks to His people. That's how it always begins.

God's purpose for His people to be a display of His character and power over all the nations would not change. It hadn't ended with their exile. If you turn over for a moment to Haggai, go again to the prophets, go toward the end, you'll probably run into Zechariah because it's quite large. And Haggai is just right before that, very small.

Haggai chapter 1, beginning at verse 2.

These are the words that echoed out in late August of 520 that got them to start working again. Thus says the Lord of hosts, these people say, 'The time is not yet come to rebuild the house of the Lord.' Then the word of the Lord came by the hand of Haggai the prophet, 'Is it a time for you yourselves to dwell in your paneled houses, while this house lies in ruins?' Then look down to chapter 2, verse 7: 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 Jews were apparently not thinking that the time for finishing this rebuilding had come. But the Lord tells His people that they should set their hand to it and they'll find that He will bless them with prosperity because of their obedience. You see here in Haggai chapter 1 verse 10, Therefore the heavens above you have withheld the dew, and the earth has withheld its produce.

He's withheld it because they've not been obedient. But then you look over in chapter 2 verse 18, Consider from this day onward, from the twenty-fourth day of the ninth month, since the day that the foundation of the Lord's temple was laid, consider. Is the seed yet in the barn? Indeed, the vine, the fig tree, the pomegranate, and the olive tree have yielded nothing, but from this day on, I will bless you. He's telling them about the re-commencement of the building.

That as they show their faithfulness by stepping out, He will provide. Furthermore, this temple that they were building, you realize what temple it would be. This would be the temple that would be more glorious than Solomon's temple. That had been destroyed. Why?

Because it would be larger? Well, no, it wouldn't be as large. Why then? Because this is the temple that the Messiah would come into. This is the temple where His glory would be.

You look in chapter 2, verse 3, 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? And skip down to verse 7. 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.

The newly rebuilt temple would speak well of their future. All of this God promised them through Haggai's preaching. God used His Word to revive His people. And it wasn't only Haggai, but he used Zechariah as well. If you look on your preaching card coming up, the sermons, you'll see that next month, Lord willing, Bobby Jamieson will lead us through a more concentrated study of Zechariah's preaching.

But for now, let's simply note that those ancient promises God had given Abram of the blessing of all nations through His descendants was now being picked up again. You look there in Zechariah at chapter 2, verse 11.

And many nations shall join themselves to the Lord in that day, and shall be My people, and I will dwell in your midst, and you shall know that the Lord of hosts has sent Me to you. He even looked forward to a day when He would remove their iniquities. Look in chapter 3, verse 9: For behold, on the stone that I have set before Joshua on a single stone with seven eyes, I will engrave its inscription, declares the Lord of hosts, and I will remove the iniquity of this land in a single day. That's what the Lord was talking about in the verse right before that in verse 8: Hear now, O Joshua the high priest, you and your friends who sit before you, for they are men who are a sign. Behold, I will bring my servant the branch.

Who's the branch? Well, you don't need to turn to this one, but you can read more about the branch if you want to later in Isaiah. If you mark down just in your notes, Isaiah chapter 11, the whole chapter is on this branch. But let me just read you verses 11 and 12. In that day the Lord will extend His hand, yet a second time, to recover the remnant that remains of his people from Assyria, from Egypt, from Pathros, from Cush, from Elam, from Shinar, from Hamath, and from the coastlands of the sea.

He will raise a signal for the nations, and will assemble the banished of Israel, and gather the dispersed of Judah from the four corners of the earth. That's what the branch will do. Anyway, all of this is beginning to happen now through God's gracious initiative in speaking to his people through his prophets. So back to the book of Ezra, there in chapter 5, verse 2, you see what happened. When Haggai and Zechariah began to prophesy, verse 2, the people began to rebuild.

They set to work. The work that had stopped for years begins again. Zerubbabel, a descendant of David, was leading it, along with the priest, their religious leader, Jeshua. So even in these first two verses of chapter 5, the recommencement of prophecy causes the recommencement of the rebuilding of God's temple. It's all of God's mercy, isn't it?

It's all His kindness. He doesn't give the people what they deserve. He gives the people better in His mercy. Even the way God helps His people to pick up the broken pieces of our lives after we have disobeyed Him, that's what this God is like. This God that we see acting with His people in Ezra is the same God, brothers and sisters, that we know.

And because of what this God is like, we can derive hope from His Word. Brother or sister, if you are struggling, if you are going through a dark time, turn to God's Word. Open His Word. Read His Word. Hide His Word in your heart.

God always has a word of hope for His people. God shapes us by His Word. Here His people were in idleness. They were in self-indulgence. They were putting their time and resources into their own comfort.

Instead of contributing to the church budget, they were upscaling their houses, getting larger and better bathrooms, better and better paneling, padding their investments. And God called them to use their resources even more directly in His purposes for His worship. God's Word opposes our disobedience to Him. God is not satisfied to leave us in the darkness of our own sin. So He enlightens our minds and hearts by sending His Word.

Friends, you see how fundamental this reality is. It formed God's people from the very beginning with a promise that came to Abram, with God's law to Moses, with His prophecies to David, and now these sermons of Haggai and Zechariah, God spoke to to His people. That's why Christians do church as we do. Some of you will have seen a three-minute clip from a recent Francis Chan sermon this past week. In it Francis Chan, in deep and lamentable ignorance, spoke of the sad state of affairs in our churches today, as he put it, men going into rooms to study the Bible for hours and then coming out and giving lectures from a pulpit placed up in front of God's people.

As if this had displaced God's ancient plan of communion being at the center of our meetings. But friends, what Chan said was in deep ignorance, both of the reality of church history and of what we see in the Bible, both the Old and the New Testaments. Jonathan Leeman and I and Bobby Jamieson and Mark Feather did a little pastor's talk on it. It'll be coming out on Tuesday, Lord willing. For our purposes here, simply look at what God has done here in Ezra.

He spoke to his people.

And that speaking is what shaped their hopes, their loves, their actions. That's why sermons have always been at the center of Christians' times together, particularly sermons like this one, which we center on God's Word and which we try to explain what is there in God's Word. We know that we should worship the Lord and how we should worship Him only because He has told us. If He doesn't tell us, we don't know. We wouldn't know of the Lord's Supper, let alone of Christ's sacrifice that it heralds, if God had not told us of it.

His Spirit instructs us by His Word that we are to come to Him with our whole lives and how we are to do that, by hearing and reading God's Word, by preaching it and praying it and singing it and seeing it and baptism and the Lord's Supper and obeying it. And so that's what we do as a church. That's what Christian churches have always done. Thank God for other people that he sees and uses to lead us. Thank God for men of action and politics like Zerubbabel who hears the sermon and he gets up and he goes and he starts the rebuilding again.

Thank God for religious leaders like Jeshua who truly give themselves to obeying God's commands. Thank God for God sent preachers like Haggai and Zechariah who faithfully warn God's people when they're in error and who support us when we're going the right way. So the people here in these first couple of verses in their obedience personify what we read of in James chapter one, verse 22. Be doers of the word, not hearers only deceiving yourselves. For if anyone is a hearer of the word and not a doer, he's like a man who looks intently at his natural at His natural face in a mirror, for He looks at Himself and goes away and at once forgets what He was like.

But the one who looks into the perfect Law, the Law of Liberty, and perseveres, being no hearer who forgets, but a doer who acts, he will be blessed in his doing. That's exactly what we see going on here in these first couple of verses of Ezra chapter 5. God takes the initiative. His word precedes and provokes His worship. Let's go on to a second lesson that we see in this chapter, number two: God is greater than governments.

God is greater than governments. Listen again to verses 3 to 5: At the same time Tattenai, the governor of the province beyond the river, and Shethar-bozenai and their associates came to them and spoke to them thus: Who gave you a decree to build this house and to finish this structure? They also asked them this, what are the names of the men who are building this building? But the eye of their God was on the elders of the Jews, and they did not stop them until the report should reach Darius, and then an answer be returned by letter concerning it. Here we see that Tatanni, this Persian official called here a governor, questioned these rebuilders.

In verse 3 there, he's basically saying, Do you have a permit?

And it's interesting, several years before this in 502 B.C. there's a document that archaeologists have found that have this guy's name, Tattenai, as a governor in this cuneiform document and he was a governor who was doing work like this. We haven't found another copy outside of Scripture of this very letter, but this is the kind of work he did. He was the governor of Syria, which included other areas like Palestine. He lived in Damascus.

He oversaw it for the emperor. You see up in 4:24 it notes that this was during the second year of Darius's reign, and that makes sense because Darius was the deceased emperor's distant relative and he had been placed on the Persian throne by the Persian military. The Persian military was uncomfortable with what was going on. Darius seemed like a solid guy. They grabbed him, put him on the throne, and the first couple of years there were a good number of rebellions or at least threaten rebellions around the Persian Empire.

So that makes sense then that officials like Tattenai would be cautious about a large building project they see going on intermittently like Jerusalem was. In verse 4, Tattenai basically asks them, who are you?

Interesting, when you read that, how do you read that question? Is it a flat question? Is this a fear-inducing question? It doesn't necessarily include any malice. And yet at the same time, that question is being asked for a reason.

The state surveils so that it can control.

That's what's going on here. Accurate data can become the fingertips of the state's displeasure pretty easily as they find you. And limit this, or take that. You'll note that in verse 5 we see that the Israelites could keep building while the verification was happening because we read, the eye of their God was on the elders of the Jews. This shows that God is greater than even the most powerful and coercive governments.

God's providence here is represented here as the eyes of God being on someone. It's a phrase we see elsewhere, Psalm 33:18. The eye of the Lord is on those who fear Him. Or Psalm 34:15, the eyes of the Lord are toward the righteous, and His ears toward their cry. It's interesting, the satraps and other officials of the Persian emperor were called the eyes of the emperor, or the eyes of the king, because they kept watch over his realm.

They reported to him all that was going on. But here we see that it was not the emperor's eyes but it was God's eyes who protected the welfare of His people. Then as now, it was the elders who led God's people who stood in their stead in some ways before the Lord. You see the expression there in verse 5, that it was the elders upon whom the eye of God was. But friends, and the prosperity of the elders is the prosperity of the people they lead.

So do pray for those of us who serve you as elders. Pray for those of us who are called to be pastors. Pray that God would prosper our relationship with Him and with our families, with each other and with the congregation as a whole, because your prosperity is very much tied up with our own. It was in God's great power that all that had happened to the people of Judah had happened to them, from God preserving them to God letting them be captured. To now God returning them to the land.

The question is, would they learn from all this? All of this international activity displaced their families, journeys of hundreds of miles. Would they learn from this? Would they see in all this not simply the actions of Tattenai or Cyrus, but would they realize their prosperity was because the eye of God was on them? That it was the Lord who was providing for them.

Brothers and sisters, this is what we need to see. This is what we need to understand as we read Scripture, as we talk with each other, as we work to help each other here in the church understand God's actions in our lives. Even as God had always watched over and provided for His people, so He continued. And sometimes the means he used to do this were human governors and kings. That's what we see here, isn't it?

But he is the one in whom we trust because God is greater than governments. Lesson number three. And it follows closely along from that last lesson. We are more fundamentally God's servants than we are Americans. We are more fundamentally God's servants than we are Americans.

Look with me again at chapter 5, verses 6 to 11. This is a copy of the letter that Tatnai, the governor of the province beyond the river, and Shethar-BozzeNai, and his associates, the governors who were in the province beyond the river, sent to Darius the king. They sent him a report in which was written as follows: To Darius the king, all peace. Be it known to the king that we went to the province of Judah, to the house of the great God, it is being built with huge stones and timber is laid in its walls. This work goes on diligently and prospers in their hands.

Then we asked these elders and spoke to them thus, 'Who gave you a decree to build this house and to finish this structure?' We also asked them their names for your information, that we might write down the names of their leaders. And this was their reply to us, 'We are the servants of the God of heaven and earth. And we are rebuilding the house that was built many years ago, which a great king of Israel built and finished. So the rest of chapter 5 is a copy of Tattanai's letter to Darius. Archaeologists have found many reports much like this one from the Elamite texts in Persepolis from the time of Darius.

Ezra, whom we're assuming compiled these chapters, shows the typical concern of biblical authors for historical accuracy and the way he copies this down. You see this respectful address to Darius in verse 7, just as one of his officials would address him. Verse 8 is the actual report on the rebuilding of the temple, mentioning the huge stones that were being used, just like when we read that report from 400 years earlier when Solomon built the temple, the huge stones that were used there. He says in verse 8 that this is the rebuilding of the house of the great God. That could be a confession of some kind of faith by Tattnai, or it could be his reporting of this rebuilding of the temple of the deity who is dominantly worshiped in the land of Judah.

Or it could simply be him describing it in the words that Jews had used to him. Whatever way, in verse 9, Tattnai reported that he'd asked the builders who authorized this. And then in verse 10, he reported that he asked for their names. All this fits with what's said up in verses 3 and 4. So we have no reason to think that this official was being unfair in his report to the emperor.

And then in verse 11 we see the mention of a great king of Israel. And that would be who?

Somebody? Solomon. Yeah. Now you know that because you know your Bibles. But these Persian officials wouldn't know that.

And Darius likely wouldn't know his name. So again, if you're somebody who tends to be a little skeptical of the Bible, here is like evidence number 1,462 that this is a very ridiculously historically reliable book. If a Jew were forging this and you're mentioning the great king, you would surely just put in the name Solomon. But see, a Persian wouldn't know that name. That wouldn't be significant.

It's just that it was a great king who built this and a great king is going to do it again. So that even lack of a mention of his name feels right historically. Its absence here seems to be a good indicator of the Persian nature of this letter and therefore of its authenticity. It's also in verse 11 that we see the way they represented themselves to the Persian officials. We are the servants of the God of heaven and earth.

Interesting, they didn't even mention their relation to the highest political authority that they were under. They didn't talk about how they were loyal subjects of the emperor of Persia. There was nothing like that. They just described themselves like this, which to me seems both bold and accurate. Friend, if you're here this morning and you're uncertain about the truth, at least hear this one piece of advice: Don't try to determine what's true by what's popular.

I say that as a member of the largest group, Baptists, among the largest group, Protestants, of the largest religion, Christian, in America. Islam may equate worldly success with success in God's eyes, but we Christians don't follow Islam's conquistador, but we follow the Christ who was crucified. We realize that it is the natural disposition of all of us in this world to hate the truth. Does that sound like an exaggeration? Well, consider what we did to truth incarnate when He came and lived among us.

We crucified Him. Friends, Christians and non-Christians here today, we all must know that votes do not determine what is true and right and good.

For the Christians here, let me ask you to look at these people of old who faced persecution and persevered and so take courage. As you find that you have opponents for no other reason than that you're a Christian, take heart. We must realize that we will face persecution. Paul told Timothy in 2 Timothy 3, Everyone who wants to live a godly life in Christ Jesus will be persecuted. Where did Paul get such an idea?

Well, you remember Jesus' words in John 15, if they persecuted Me, they will persecute you also. I don't know how this sounds to your ears, but I'm confident that Christian friends we know and love in China, in Nigeria, in India, and in the Sudan, in Indonesia, These words don't sound strange at all. The persecutions you face may be less violent like those faced by the people here in Ezra. But from your neighbors and your workmates, from even your family and friends, don't be surprised if you too face persecution for following Christ. Pray that we may be faithful as a church, that we don't gauge our success by how popular we are.

With the community around us. Don't misunderstand me, we want to be good neighbors. But we can't be too surprised if some of our neighbors on Capitol Hill view us with suspicion and even hostility because of what we believe about God the Father, or Christ the Lord, or the Holy Spirit, about what God teaches in His Word, or about how He calls us to live. If we are God's people, we too will face persecution and opposition because at those times when being a good American means being a bad Christian, we choose to be a good Christian first, trusting God to oversee the fallout. As a congregation, we're a gathering of those who mean to wait for the Lord's return, to give ourselves to praying for Him to effect His purposes.

And we are filled with hope because of what we've seen him already do. This book is full of chapters of promise fulfilled, like Ezra chapter 5, where promises that could have seemed old and played out actually show themselves once again true in history. And we trust God and we encourage each other to trust him for what he will do. So Christians are not those who think that we have all good things in our present experience, but rather we are those who understand that because of what God has done for us in Jesus Christ, we have all good things coming.

So we are a group of hope-filled people oriented toward the future. And that doesn't matter if we're 15 or 85, we are those filled with hope in the future that God has for us. One implication that has for us as individuals is that our loyalty to our nation must always be within, as it were, underneath our loyalty to God. Any service which we give to our nation must be a kind of service we ultimately offer to the Lord God Himself.

Whether that's military or judicial or in your job, any service that we give to anyone else in this life, our family, our company, our school, our ministry must be submitted to our most fundamental allegiance, and that is to our God and Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ, and to His heavenly Father and His Holy Spirit. This triune God is the ultimate one to whom we owe allegiance. He alone is our Creator. He alone will be our judge. He alone can be our Savior.

Part of what finding our identity in the Lord like this does is it relativizes the power of the government in our lives. So we can understand that though God sovereignly allows all government, that doesn't mean that all government is always right. And therefore always to be obeyed. The only one who is always to be obeyed is God Himself. How is it our church's statement of faith recognizes this?

Article 16 of Civil Government, We believe that civil government is of divine appointment for the interest and good order of human society, and that magistrates are to be prayed for, conscientiously honored, and obeyed, except only in things opposed to the will of our Lord Jesus Christ, who is the only Lord of the conscience and the prince of the kings of the earth. So as Christians, we can be seen to be good, honest Americans or Chinese citizens or Korean citizens, but only if we are Christians first and last, all other earthly loyalties, family loyalty, company loyalty, must come underneath and answer to our loyalty to the one true God, because we are more fundamentally God's servants, like these Jews here identified themselves, we are more fundamentally God's servants than we are Americans.

Last lesson, number four, God uses nations for His people's good and His own glory. God uses nations for His people's good and for His own glory.

That's verses 12 to 17, chapter 5.

Beginning at verse 12: But because our fathers had angered the God of heaven, He gave them into the hand of Nebuchadnezzar, King of Babylon, the Chaldean, who destroyed this house and carried away the people to Babylonia. However, in the first year of Cyrus, King of Babylon, Cyrus the King made a decree that this house of God should be rebuilt. And the gold and silver vessels of the house of God, which Nebuchadnezzar had taken out of the temple that was in Jerusalem and brought into the temple of Babylon, these Cyrus the King took out of the temple of Babylon. And they were delivered to one whose name was Sheshbazzar, whom he had made governor. And he said to him, 'Take these vessels, go, and put them in the temple that is in Jerusalem, and let the house of God be rebuilt on its site.' Then this Sheshbazzar came and laid the foundations of the house of God that is in Jerusalem.

And from that time until now it has been in building and is not yet finished. Therefore, if it seems good to the king, let search be made in the royal archives there in Babylon to see whether a decree was issued by Cyrus the king for the rebuilding of this house of God in Jerusalem, and let the king send us his pleasure in this matter. So in verse 13 is the Jews' claim to Tattenai that Cyrus authorized this rebuilding. In verse 14, it's recounted that Cyrus even sent back the temple treasures. Verse 15 claims to quote Cyrus' actual command.

And in verse 16 we see that Sheshbazzar laid the foundations, perhaps along with Zerubbabel. The claim that the temple had been in building from then, 536, till now, 520, is plainly contradicted by Haggai's prophecy, saying that they weren't doing anything about it and by their own lack of completing it. But maybe there had just been that long lull that is now ended by the preaching of Haggai and Zechariah. So it had just recently been picked up again. And the Jews in representing it to the Persians were simply not calling their attention to the long pause there had been.

They just wanted to make it seem like the activity had always been going on. There's nothing new here. It's what they've been doing since they came back. It's just taking them a while. They don't mention their own self-indulgence, which Haggai lets us know about, was the real reason why the temple hasn't been finished yet.

Anyway, verse 17, we see the conclusion of the letter where Tattenai requests the search be made in the archives as they await the king's pleasure in the matter. It's all pretty straightforward. But it's up in verse 12 that we see the radically different way the Jews were reading history. They read all of history as the story of the actions of the one true and sovereign God of the world. We see here their God-centered reading of history.

And friends, that's what the whole Bible presents to us, that God uses the nations. Very interesting. There's no bragging of the Jews here about their God because they understand what their God has done was to punish them for their sins. They don't blame shift at all. And they don't give any credence to the common idea that when a nation fights another nation, if nation A wins, that must mean nation A's gods are stronger the nation be?

No, Judah had been defeated, but they're saying it is the God of Judah who had caused His people to be defeated for His own purposes. They realized that it was the only true sovereign God who had engineered His own people's defeat as a punishment of them for their sins. And you know, if you go back to Deuteronomy when they were first going into the Promised Land, The Lord had told them He would do this. If you read Deuteronomy 28 this afternoon, you'll see this is exactly what God promised He would do to His people once they got in the land if they did not continue in His ways. If they gave themselves over to worldliness, if they were going to be just like the pagan nations, God said He would disperse them among those nations.

They were set apart physically in their land in order to be morally holy and religiously observant of the practices and morals and rituals He had given them. And if they weren't going to do that, then the reason for their existence as a distinct nation was at an end. They didn't need to be distinct anymore. So both in their exile to Babylon and then now in their return, whether it was the warrior Babylonian King Nebuchadnezzar taking them, or the peacemaking Persian Emperor Cyrus sending them back, God was simply using the nations and their rulers for His own ends. He would glorify Himself.

He would bless His people, and history was simply the canvas on which He would paint. Now, of course, this would not be a Persian way to understand what had happened. This is a distinctly scriptural way. Taking what the Bible tells us about God, His power and His purposes as all true. So, Tat and I would only have gotten this from the Jews themselves.

He would never have thought this up. This must be the way the Jews had said it. And do you know what that means? That's really good news. That means the catechesis of the exile had worked.

That they had realized that, yes, we have been driven from our land because of our own sins. That's exactly why they've been driven from the land, to teach them that. And here they are confessing that to this Persian official, so it seems like it had worked. They understood. They knew what was going on.

Friend, you'll be helped to understand the Bible and your own life and history. If you realize that the true God is this sovereign God who uses the empires of Egypt and Persia, of Greece and Rome, of America and China and Russia for His own purposes. He is not intimidated by hypersonic missiles. He's not intimidated by diplomatic ability or cultural reach. He is the sovereign God of the ages who has His purposes and will work them out for His people's good and for His own glory.

You see, verses 11 and 12, looking back, are kind of a summary of biblical theology, aren't they? Who God is, how He acts, Whom His people are? As God had said to His people back in Deuteronomy 8, Know then in your heart that as a man disciplines his son, the Lord your God disciplines you. My brothers and sisters in Christ, do you know something of God's loving discipline in your life today?

You see the verb that's used there in verse 12 to describe God's reaction to His people's sins?

Verse 12, angered. God was angered. Why would God hate sin so? It usurps His rights and claims as our only Creator and Judge. And it lies.

Sin always lies.

So it is good and right of God to be angry at our sin. His people then should have feared God supremely, and so should we today. That means that we should look to Him above and before all others to shape our actions, our words, our very loves and desires. Now you may be here today and you may think, well, Mark, I understand what you're reading in the Bible, but I just got to tell you, in my own life it doesn't seem like God cares about my sin at all. Because what you call my sin, I've been in for years.

And He's not doing a thing about it. Friend, I would caution you not to mistake His patience for apathy.

God's Word tells us that He is patient, being kind and merciful, that all might repent. But His patience is not apathy. He cares and He calls us to turn from our sin to trust in Him. I wonder if some of you understand what the good news is of Jesus Christ. God sent His only Son to live a life of perfect holiness and love, perfect trust in His heavenly Father, and then to die on the cross as a substitute in the place of all those who have really deserved to have our own lives sacrificed because of our sins.

He stood as a sacrifice in the stead of all of us who would turn from our sins and trust in Him. So He took God's anger, God's wrath, His good and right wrath against all of us who would turn and trust in Him. God raised Him from the dead, accepting that sacrifice. He ascended to heaven and presented this to His heavenly Father, and we are called now to turn from our sins and trust in Him. Friends, that's what you should do.

If you don't know what it means to be forgiven of your sins, to know God truly, you can know Him through Jesus Christ. Any of the pastors at the door, any of the friends around you today would happily talk to you about this. If you would like to know more about what this could mean in your own life. My Christian friends, if God uses nations for His people's good and His own glory, that he can certainly use smaller things, can't he? Doesn't have to be the whole federal government coming after you.

I mean, he can use other things, other circumstances, of our own health, of our family, our school, our neighborhood, our company. None of these are outside the realms of God's good and complete sovereignty. According to what we see about him here in the Bible, we should always believe God, friends. He told his people through Jeremiah in Jeremiah 25, After seventy years are completed, I will punish the king of Babylon and that nation, the land of the Chaldeans, for their iniquity, declares the Lord, making the land an everlasting waste. That's exactly what he did.

He picked up the Babylonian Empire and he used it for a time as a way to glorify Himself in His own people. And so He would set the empire aside when He was done with it. Friend, as a church, we trust God in His Word. We rely on God's promises. We trust God's love, and we look forward to His return and rule.

Even now, God uses nations for His people's good and His own glory. In conclusion, let's review our four lessons from Ezra chapter 5. Number one, God takes the initiative. His Word precedes and provokes His worship. Number two, God is greater than governments.

Number three, we are more fundamentally God's servants than we are Americans or fill in what nation has your citizenship. Number four, God uses nations for His people's good and His own glory. Now I know the idea of God's glory may seem strange to some, but the Bible is clear that God acts for reasons and that His chief reason is His own honor and fame. And this is appropriate in a way it would not be appropriate for you or me. You and I should not act for our own honor and fame.

If you see yourself doing something, making a remark to somebody about to tweet something, for your own honor and fame, stop. That's almost never a good idea. It's probably never a good idea. There are just enough lawyers here, I'm just going to say it's probably never a good idea. It's almost certainly never a good idea.

Because neither you nor I are the Creator of all things. We will not be the judge of all. We are not a morally perfect beings. We don't perfectly love. We aren't perfectly holy.

But God is all of those things and more. So He is the one to whom all honor and glory should be directed. So who else should all of creation honor? Certainly not our political leaders, certainly not our national identities. When Israel and Judah were in the death throes of struggling with idolatry, God got very clear with them about this through his prophet Isaiah.

We read the Lord's words in Isaiah 42:8, I am the Lord, that is my name; my glory I give to no other. Nor my praise to carved idols. When referring to his people in Isaiah 43:7, he describes them as, Everyone who is called by my name, whom I created for my glory, whom I formed and made. Friends, we draw breath right now for God's glory. That's the reason we're alive, for his fame and honor.

And in Isaiah 48, when he refers to the refining he's about to do to his people, he says that what he does, he does, and I'm quoting here, for my name's sake, for the sake of my praise. 48:11, For my own sake, and he repeats it, For my own sake I do it, for how should my name be profaned? My glory I will not give to another. Here's the way one pastor put it: the creation of the world seems to have been especially for this end, that the eternal Son of God might obtain a spouse towards whom He might fully exercise the infinite benevolence of His nature.

And to whom He might, as it were, open and pour forth all that immense fountain of love and grace that was in His heart, and that in this way God might be glorified.

How do you think that your life is bringing glory to God?

Is your willingness to trust in Christ alone for your salvation, bringing Him honor, showing the sufficiency of His sacrifice, the power of His forgiveness, is your testimony none but Jesus?

None but Jesus can do helpless sinners good.

Let's pray.

Lord God, we pray that yout would turn our minds and our hearts to youo increasingly. That we would see youe honor and youd glory as the supreme end in every act we take, every word we speak, every thought we think.

Lord, work this in us for your glory, we pray. In Jesus' name, Amen.