In Jason Dohm's sermon titled 'Blessed Be the Lord,' based on Ezra 7:27-8:14, the focus is on the blessings and faithfulness of God as described in the Book of Ezra. Ezra praises God for the favor shown by King Artaxerxes, who grants him requests to beautify the Lord’s house in Jerusalem and provides resources for temple worship. This favor is seen as a testament to God's sovereignty and mercy. The sermon explores the concept of doxology, a formal expression of praise, and emphasizes God's faithfulness throughout history, encouraging believers to recognize God's hand in their circumstances, whether in blessings or challenges. Ezra's recognition of God's work emboldens him to lead a group of Israelites back to Jerusalem. The sermon concludes with a call for believers to meditate on God’s enduring faithfulness, identify areas of obedience that can beautify the church, and trust in God's ability to give favor in seemingly impossible situations.

Open in your Bibles to Ezra chapter 7 We'll begin in verse 27 and going through 814 this morning Blessed be the Lord God of our fathers who has put such a thing as this in the king's heart to beautify the house of the Lord, which is in Jerusalem, and has extended mercy to before me the king and his counselors and before all the king's mighty princes. So I was encouraged as the hand of the Lord my God was upon me and I gathered leading men of Israel to go up with me. These are the heads of their fathers houses and this is the genealogy of those who went up with me from Babylon and the reign of King Artaxerxes. Of the sons of Phineas, Gershom, of the sons of Ithamar, Daniel, of the sons of David, Hattush, of the sons of Shekiniah, of the sons of Parosh, Zechariah, and registered with him were 150 males of the sons of peyhath moab Eliowin I the son of Zarah higher and with him 200 males of the sons of Shekiniah, Ben-Jahaziel, and with him 300 males. Of the sons of Aden, Hebed, the son of Jonathan, and with him 50 males.

Of the sons of Elam, Jeshiah, the son of Athaliah and with him 70 males of the sons of Shephatiah Zebediah the sons of Michael and with him 80 males of the sons of Joab Obadiah the son of Jiel and with him 218 males of the sons of Shalomith been Joseph fire and with him 160 males of the sons of Babi Zechariah the son of Babiah and with him 28 males of the sons of Asgad, Johanan the son of Hakatan and with him 110 males of the last sons of Adonai with the names are these Elifalette, Jiel, Shemiah and with him 60 males. The title of the sermon this morning comes right from the text. It is, Blessed be the Lord. Having described what's happening and the favor that God has given him, our author Ezra rises up to bless God for his goodness and his faithfulness. That's really a summary of the whole text.

In chapter 7, in the beginning of our chapter, verse 6, we see that the king granted Ezra all his requests. This is one of the major reasons why Ezra is rising up to bless God now. This king of an empire granted him everything that he asked for. Later in the chapter, what we studied last week was the letter that Artaxerxes put into Ezra's hand to give him an official document to proceed and to return from Babylon to Jerusalem. The letter is a list of blessings.

It reads just like a list of one blessing after the other. It starts with authorizing any Israelite who is willing to go back from captivity to Jerusalem. If you volunteer, you can go. It's that simple. It proceeds to say that they'll carry back gold and silver.

Some of that gold and silver is going to come directly from the king and his seven closest counselors. Then it says that they can draw on the regional treasury an enormous amount of silver and provisions for use in the temple. Then it goes on to say that anyone who is laboring in the temple, it's unlawful to tax them anymore. Then it goes on to say that Ezra, this Jew, this captive man, is appointed to appoint magistrates and judges. He's given the liberty, he's given the responsibility to appoint magistrates and judges.

So it's just a heaping up of one blessing after another. All good things, all favorable things towards the Lord's people. And then Ezra, having related this literally miraculous set of circumstances, he just stops to worship. That's what's happening in our text. That is what verse 27 and 28 is.

The whole chapter is speaking of the faithfulness and the goodness of God and the particulars of it. And then Ezra just stops and he worships God. As we go to our text, let's go to our text in prayer. Father, we come to you through your Son Jesus Christ so we can come boldly and with confidence before you knowing that he offered himself up and that he was accepted as a substitute for all those who would trust in him. Now we give you thanks for your word, which has been given by a loving Father to His children as a gift.

We thank you for this gift. And we pray for your help. God, I pray that you would help me in the preaching of your word. And I pray for my brothers and sisters as they listen that they would be able to acquire the wisdom that we can only find in your word. We give you thanks for this time in Jesus' name, amen.

So I'd like to take the first sentence, which takes us through verse 27 and halfway through verse 28 as our first section. So let's read that again together. Ezra chapter 7, verse 27 and half of 28. Ezra writes, Blessed be the Lord God of our fathers, who has put such a thing as this in the king's heart, to beautify the house of the Lord which is in Jerusalem, and has extended mercy to me before the king and his counselors, and before all the king's mighty princes." I think a good summary statement of this first section is seeing God at work and blessing Him for it. This is what Ezra is doing.

He has looked out on his circumstances. He has seen what's happening and he has said, God did that and God should be worshipped for that. It's a doxology. A doxology is a statement of praise. It's an official statement of praise.

We have something that we sing quite often and we call it the doxology and it begins, praise God from whom all blessing flows. That helps you understand what a doxology really is. It is an acknowledgement that every blessing that ever flowed came from God and that he ought to be praised for it. Praise God from whom all blessings flow. That helps you understand what a doxology is.

And Paul in the New Testament, in his letters, does this all the time. There are ten doxologies in Paul's letters. And where He's just said something beautiful about God and His works towards His people, or His faithfulness towards His people. He just stops out of nowhere. You can just imagine Him writing these letters.

He writes and he describes the beauty of God and then he sets down his pen and he gets on his face before God and says, God, you are to be praised for these truths that I'm writing about. I can envision Paul doing that. That is the nature of a doxology, just to have your breath taken away by the faithfulness of God and the goodness of God and just to say, stop. We have to stop right now and Get on our faces before God and worship Him for His goodness to His people and His faithfulness. His unending faithfulness towards His people.

Paul does that ten times. You can tell when he's doing it. It's obvious by the words that he says, but then he always punctuates it. Right in the middle of his letters. I'm not talking about the ending of his letters here.

I'm talking right in the middle of a chapter of his letters. He'll just stop and say something that's an official statement of praise to God, and then he'll punctuate it with Amen right in the middle of the letter. He's not Amen-ing the letter at the very end, he just breaks right in the middle to worship God. He praises God and then punctuates it with an Amen and then he's on about his flow of thought in the letters. It's remarkable.

This is what Ezra is doing in Ezra chapter 7. He's pausing to worship God. He begins this way, Blessed be the Lord God of our fathers. Bless you God for all the things that I've just described. There are two points that I want to make from just that phrase, blessed be the Lord God of our fathers.

The first point is this, God ought to be blessed by His creatures. That one is so obvious, It might not even need to be said, but I'm saying it anyway. God ought to be blessed by His creatures. It is good when His creatures bless Him, praise Him. It is fitting when His creatures bless Him and praise Him.

So that's one side. It's good and fitting. What could be more fitting than to stop and worship God for his goodness and his faithfulness. Turn in your Bibles to Psalm 96. Psalm 96 expands on this notion that it's so good, it's so fitting to praise God, and it's a crime not to praise Him, not to bless Him.

Psalm 96. And in Psalm 96 I'll be reading verses 7 through 9. Here's what the psalmist says, Psalm 96 verse 7. Give to the Lord, O families of the peoples. Give to the Lord glory and strength.

Give to the Lord the glory. Do His name. Bring an offering and come into His courts. O worship the Lord in the beauty of holiness. Tremble before him all the earth.

The psalmist calls all the earth to attention And he says, you who are in the earth, you have a debt to pay. That is what the psalmist is saying in Psalm 96, 7-9. You have a debt to pay. And it is to Give the Lord the glory due His name. It is due to Him.

That is your debt to give Him the glory due to His name. That begs the question, how much glory is due to His name? Well, if you're in Christ, He has a double claim to your praise. First is that He's made you, He's given you a life, He's sustained you. All the common graces that everyone in this world enjoys have been given to you.

And if you're in Christ, He's reached down, put His hand on a sinner, called a sinner out of darkness into his marvelous light. That is quite a claim to your praise. That is the glory that is due to his name. So notice these are commands. Give to the Lord a command.

Give to the Lord glory and strength. Give to the Lord the glory due to His name. Bring an offering. These are all imperatives. These are all commands.

These are not optional left to our discretion. We are commanded by God to give him the glory due to his name. So this ought to be our great occupation. Do you want to know how you should spend your time? This should get a lavish allocation of your time, giving the Lord the glory that is due to His name.

This should be your great occupation. How important is it? Here's what Paul says in 1 Thessalonians 5, 18. In everything give thanks. In everything give thanks.

For this is the will of God in Christ Jesus for you. That's how important it is. It is the will of God in Christ Jesus for you. People think of the will of God and knowing the will of God, you usually think of, God should I take the job in Buffalo or not? God gives us his will on a much more basic fundamental level and it's that you would give thanks in everything.

You would give him the glory that is due his name. That's how important it is. That's what Paul says in 1 Thessalonians 5 verse 18. So Ezra opens up by saying, blessed be the Lord God of our fathers. And the first point there is God ought to be blessed by His creatures.

There's nothing more fitting than that. The second point is, God's faithfulness didn't begin with us. God was faithful to somebody, many somebodies, before he was faithful to you. He was kind and merciful to somebody, to many somebodies before he was merciful and compassionate towards you. He's not just your God, he's the God of our fathers, our forefathers in the faith.

If you're born again, if you've passed from death into light, if you've crossed over from darkness to light, then you stand in a flow. You stand as part of a great multitude that God has had mercy on before you, that God has been faithful to before you. The Bible is a gift. The Bible is a gift that gives you 4, 000 years of historical accounts of God being faithful and good to a people. Why is that a gift?

Because it gives you such joy and confidence to know that God will be good and faithful to His people. He always was and He always is and he always will be good and faithful to his people. Amen. And you have four thousand years of archives of the goodness and faithfulness of God. The Bible is a gift to give you confidence and joy to know that the God who never changes, who is the same yesterday, today, and forever, how He is, how he relates with his people.

God is the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, and, and, and, and, and. If you want to know how God is going to treat you if you're his, look here. You'll find him being faithful and good to his people all throughout the history of his people. Ezra identifies a couple of specific things that are praiseworthy. So he starts by praising God, stopping, in view of the circumstances, stopping to worship.

And He identifies a couple of very specific things that are praiseworthy. First, that God had beautified his own house. Ezra thinks That's praiseworthy. Ezra's right. God beautified His own house.

Ezra tells us how He did this. He put it in the heart of a king of an empire to do these things. But it's so clear all throughout the text, today's text and otherwise, it's so clear that the king of the empire is just the tool in the hand of God to accomplish his purposes. And that his purpose is explicit. It is to beautify his own house.

God took up a tool in his hand. The tool was the king of an empire. And he accomplished his purpose, which was to beautify his own house. Now, what exactly did God do through our exerxes to beautify his house? This Hebrew word means to glorify, to beautify, to adorn.

So God did something through his tool, Artaxerxes, to glorify his house, to beautify his house, to adorn and make lovely his house. What did he do? Well, last week's text in the letter of Artaxerxes, it says that he's going to send articles for service. But in the first wave, 5400 articles of service had come back from Babylon. All the articles that had been taken from the first temple, that were taken into captivity and stored in captivity, Cyrus sends back with the first wave of captives.

So they're not lacking for articles of service in the temple. I don't think that's what it's talking about, the beautification of the house of the Lord. So what exactly did God do through our exerxes? Well, He sent a man who had prepared himself to seek the law of the Lord and to do it and to teach it. This is in Ezra chapter 7, this is our chapter, verse 10.

That's how Ezra is described. He's the man that God raised up and he's the man that had prepared his heart to seek the law of the Lord, to do the law of the Lord, to teach the law of the Lord. And this king commissioned Ezra to inquire with regard to the Lord. That's back in last week's letter. Artxerxes commissioned Ezra, go to Jerusalem and Judah and inquire according to the law of the Lord.

Match up what you see when you get there with what is in the law of your God and where they don't match, make them match. That is the mission of Ezra. And then the king provided two years of provisions for the temple worship. Remember, he had authorized Ezra and the returnees to be able to draw upon the regional treasury for this tremendous wealth to serve in the temple. And the ESV study notes said this is This is about two years worth of supplies for temple worship.

So what did God do through art exerxes? He made way for obedience and worship. He paved the way for obedience and worship, or for maybe worship through obedience is the way it should be said. The great commandment, Jesus was asked this, we've talked about it a hundred times. The great commandment is that we love the Lord our God with all our heart, with all our soul, with all our mind, And the demonstration of love for God is obedience.

The top commandment, the most important commandment is that we love God with everything. It's an all-consuming passion. And the demonstration of that all-consuming passion is that you obey God. You demonstrate love for God, gratitude towards God by obeying Him. That beautifies the temple.

Because now we're in the New Testament time, the New Covenant time. Peter told us what the New Covenant temple is. It's living stones, me and you, deriving life from the chief cornerstone, Jesus Christ. So we come to Him as living stones and we derive life for Him and now He's building up a temple and we're offering spiritual sacrifices through obedience. That beautifies the temple.

That adorns and makes lovely the temple. That glorifies the temple. So it's careful, heartfelt worship. It's careful, heartfelt obedience. King Artaxerxes, by giving a leader and the resources for worship in spirit and truth in Jerusalem, is paving the way for a beautiful temple.

So that's the first thing that Ezra identifies as praiseworthy, that God beautified his own house by doing this. Secondly, Ezra said it's praiseworthy that God was merciful to him in a very specific way. Ezra said, God's been merciful to me. Here's how. He gave me favor with the king, and with the king's counselors, and with the king's mighty princes.

He's given me favor with people I have no right to favor with. He's given me favor with a king that before had written a letter saying stop. Don't do any more repairs on this city until I sort this out. And now Ezra finds himself in a position of tremendous favor and Ezra says that's the mercy of God toward me. Now, just turn back a couple of pages to Ezra chapter 5.

I want you to see this. In our text, Ezra is seeing the favor that he had with the king and he's saying, God did that, it's God's mercy towards me, God should be praised for that. Now we're back in chapter 5. And I want to look at chapter 5 verses 11 and 12. The context for this is the regional authorities with authority over Jerusalem have come and said, why are you working on this temple that's in ruins?

Who told you you could do that? And Zerubbabel and Jeshua and the people replied, this is part of that reply in Ezra chapter 5, 11 and 12. And thus they returned us an answer saying, this is what Zerub, Abel, and Jeshua and their brethren said, we are the servants of the God of heaven and earth and We are rebuilding the temple that was built many years ago, which a great king of Israel built and completed. But, because our fathers provoked the God of heaven to wrath, he gave them into the hand of Nebuchadnezzar, king of Babylon, the Chaldean, who destroyed this temple and carried the people away into captivity. In Ezra chapter 5, Zerubbabel and Jeshua and their brethren are looking back in history and they're seeing events of a king who came and brought disaster and destruction upon Israel.

And they're saying God did that. That was God. So it's the flip side. In Ezra 7, Ezra is looking at beautiful, wonderful circumstances that God has brought upon him and the people and he's saying God did that. Back in chapter 5 it was disaster.

It was judgment brought upon the people and they say God did that. Here's the point. This is what the godly do. This is the lenses that the godly see through. Why?

Because the Bible teaches us to do, to look through these lenses. The lenses of the sovereignty of God, that there is a God in heaven who doesn't let a sparrow drop to the ground without his notice, without his permission, without his command. There is a God who governs the affairs of men and governs all things. So when disaster comes to you, you say, God's doing that. That disaster isn't meaningless.

That tribulation and hardship and trial is meaningful. It's full of meaning because God did this. And in this case they were able to look back through what the prophets had said and said. God warned us He would do this. Sometimes you look back on disasters and you say, God was teaching me.

It does not have to be judgment when God brings disaster into your life. Sometimes He's just bringing you to maturity. Sometimes He's just teaching you. Sometimes it is judgment. But in any case, the godly look at what God has brought into their life and they say, because the Bible has taught them to say, God did that.

The disasters and the most wonderful things. The godly say the same thing about them. God did that. God is wise. So my question for you, friends, is Have you been discipled enough by God that you can do this?

Has God had you in His school long enough that you can do this? If you stay in His school for very long, he'll bring you to this point. Because we see over and over again in the scriptures, this is how the godly are trained to think by God Himself. He controls all things and when disaster comes, God brought the disaster for his own good, wise purposes. And when the best, happiest events in life come, it was God who was kind, who was displaying his mercy.

Now let's look at the second half of chapter 28. Ezra chapter 7 verse 28B. Ezra says, So I was encouraged as the hand of the Lord my God was upon me, and I gathered leading men of Israel to go up with me. I think a good summary statement of this part is being emboldened by the faithfulness of God. Ezra says, the Acknowledgement of God's goodness and faithfulness to him, seeing him at work in the circumstances made him bold to obey the Lord.

Being emboldened by the faithfulness of God. Ezra recognized that these things were from the hand of God and it emboldened him to follow through. A lot of hardships involved with leading a wave of captives from Babylon to Jerusalem. Now, at the beginning of Ezra, the people have been in captivity 70 years. Now we're 80 years beyond that.

Now the people have been living in Babylon, those who are still there have been living in Babylon for 150 years. Our nation is not a whole lot older than that. A long time, deep roots in Babylon and there's a lot of hardship involved with going back. But Ezra is emboldened by seeing God at work. He's emboldened to follow through.

The New King James renders this, I was encouraged. Now every week I go phrase by phrase through the text and I line up five good English translations side by side and I'm looking for variation. When I find variation in the translations then I dig into the original language. There's no variation, there's no need to go look at Hebrew and Greek because it means what all five of these good translations says it means. You can go look up the original language if you want to, but it's going to say what they've all translated it as.

So I put the new King James next to the King James next to the new American Standard, next to the English Standard, next to the NIV. So New King James, King James, NASB, ESV, and IV, side by side, just going phrase by phrase and looking at how they render it. Usually, there's lots of commonality between the New King James and at least two or three of the other good English translations have translated it the same way. This phrase, they're the only one of those five who have translated it this way. So I want to give you the other two renderings here.

New King James says, I was encouraged. There's nothing wrong with that translation, but I want to round it out by the other renderings. The King James in the New American Standard renders it, I was strengthened. I was strengthened. I received strength by looking at the hand of God at work.

I was built up and made strong by seeing God's hand in these circumstances. The ESV and the NIV render it, I took courage. I took courage. It made me courageous to see the hand of God in these circumstances. It buoyed me up with courage.

So I was encouraged is a good translation. I was strengthened is a good translation. I took courage is a good translation. And really, rounding them out with the others is the best view. We've seen this already.

Back to Ezra 5 for a minute. Ezra 5 verse 5 is the very beginning of this chapter where the people have taken this long hiatus, this long gap where they haven't worked on the temple at all and that was disobedience. Then God raises up the prophets. Remember He raised up Haggai and Zechariah to prophesy and to call the people, start working on the temple again. And then it says in Ezra chapter 5 verse 5, but the eye of their God was upon the elders of the Jews, so that they could not make them cease till a report should go to Darius.

Remember that? They heard the prophets, they started working on the temple, they encounter opposition, and this time they say, you cannot make us cease. They were emboldened to follow through. They were strengthened by seeing God at work. God raised up His prophets and they say, we're strengthened to keep on with this work.

You can't make us stop. They took courage, just like what we see in our text today. Here's what Matthew Henry says, if God gives us His hand, we are bold and cheerful. If he withdraws it, we are weak as water. Whatever service we are unable to do for God and our generation, God must have all the glory of it.

Strength for it is derived from Him and therefore the praise of it must be given to Him. The people of God affirm this. If there's any good, God is the author of it. If there's anything accomplished at our hands, it's because God's been merciful and He gave us strength for it. So He should have all the glory.

Brothers and sisters, this is what is at stake with our worldview, with how we view our circumstances. If you have meaningless circumstances, you will not be emboldened to obey. You'll live a fearful life, and you'll be too scared to obey Almighty God. It is not a pretty condition to be in. But when we see our sovereign God at work and all the circumstances around us, the good ones and the bad ones, the disaster and the blessing.

It's fuel for the fire of obedience. When you can see the world that way because the Bible has told you that God doesn't let sparrows fall to the ground without him knowing it. It's fuel for the fire of obedience. You can be fearlessly obedient. That's what God wants in His disciples.

Disciples who can be fearlessly obedient. Finally, we have another genealogy. And it's the genealogy in verses 1 through 14 of chapter 8 of those who returned in the second wave. And it gives the family heads who returned. So it gives the head of a household who returns and it names his line.

For instance, a line here in verse 2 is named after King David. So the family line gets a name from a prominent member in the history of Israel. David is more than 500 years before this. He certainly had a father and we know whose father was. It was Jesse.

But David is the most prominent member of this family, so the line is named after him. So we get the head of household who comes from Babylon to Jerusalem in this generation, and The line is named after the prominent person in that line, and then we're given a number who returned. So we get a sense of how many are coming back in the second wave, coming back from captivity. And this compares with Chapter 2. Remember, with the first wave of those who returned 80 years ago, there was a genealogy supplied, a listing of who came back and what their family line was.

So this is to the second wave. Chapter 8, the genealogy here, is to the second wave, what Chapter 2 was to the first wave. So I have five observations about this genealogy in Chapter 8, verses 1 through 14. Number one, the whole point is that these are Israelites. That's why the genealogy, that's why tracing them back in a family line.

It's to prove that they're Israelites. Look at verse 13. This is from last week's text. This is from Art Exerxes' letter. Art Exerxes writes, I issue a decree that all those of the people of Israel and the priests and the Levites in my realm who volunteer to go up to Jerusalem may go with you." Israelites may go.

Not just people who live in Babylon who think it would be great to relocate to another part of the kingdom. It's Israelites who are authorized to go back from Babylon to Jerusalem. So the point of the genealogy is that these are Israelites, they're authorized to go back. Number two, the text doesn't give us a final number. The Text doesn't give us a final number.

If you add up the numbers in verses 1 through 14, you're going to get 1, 496 all men. In chapter 2, we were actually given in chapter 2 verse 64 is a summary verse that tells you what the whole assembly totaled up to and it was right at 50, 000. We don't have a number like that, an aggregate number of everybody who came back. So we had that with the genealogy in chapter 2 verse 64 right at 50, 000 that came back and it called them the whole assembly. So you know that's the big number.

In this we just get the males that come back in these 15 families. So there are 15 families in the genealogy of chapter 8 and we have round numbers. That's different than the genealogy in chapter 2. If you go back to chapter 2 and you look at that genealogy, you're going to find no rounding. 1732 numbers like that.

No rounding. But here, the first three numbers that you come across are 150, 200, 300. Very round numbers. And so we're getting an indication of about how many people came back, but I'm pretty confident these are not the exact numbers. We don't have the same precision as we had in chapter 2 with that genealogy.

So if we make some assumptions of women and children right in our memory verse we know that they're bringing their little ones back with them. There are women and children coming back. It's not just men who are coming back. So if you just make some basic assumptions for women and children, you get maybe 7 to 8, 000 total returning. I think that's about, that's almost everybody married, almost all the men married and three or four kids each gets you in that range, seven to eight thousand coming back.

So the second wave is probably seven or eight thousand coming back. The first wave was fifty thousand. The second wave is much smaller, almost surely less than a fifth coming back in the second wave as opposed to the first wave. Number three, this genealogy begins with priests and then with the royal line in verse 2. So verse 2 is the start of the genealogy, verse 1 introduces, verse 2 is the start, and it begins with priests and then with the royal line.

So the priests are the sons of Phineas and the sons of Ithamar. Ezra is the son of Phineas. We've already gotten his genealogy and he is the son of Phineas, so we know he is a priest. So Phineas is a grandson of Aaron. The priesthood flows from Aaron genealogically.

Phineas is a grandson. Ithamar is a son. So, you have a nephew and an uncle, both directly and closely related to Aaron from which the priesthood line flows. Why wasn't it Eleazar and Ithamar? Those would have been brothers.

Those both would have been sons. Phineas is the son of Eleazar. So why? I don't know. I bet there's a good reason.

I didn't find one. Nothing is thrown away in the Bible. It's all there on purpose, but I just don't know. In 1 Chronicles 3, We have an extensive genealogy. 1 Chronicles 3 is the family line of David through many, many, many generations.

King David, the David is 1 Chronicles 3. Right around verse 17 in 1 Chronicles 3, you get close to the line that we're talking about, and then I think around verse 22, you see Zerubbabel in the line of David. Well, you'll remember when the first wave was coming back and Zerubbabel was leading the first wave, Zerubbabel was a grandson of the last king before Nebuchadnezzar destroyed Judah. So we knew that Zerubbabel was in the line of David. And then if you continue in 1 Chronicles 3, down further, the fourth from Zerubbabel is Hattush, which is the name here in verse 2.

This head of a family is the great-great-grandson of Zerubbabel. It's 80 years after the first wave, and if you give the generations 25 years each, the math works out really nicely. Hattush mentioned as one of the sons of David, King David in verse 2, is the great-great-grandson of Zerubbabel. So his great-great-grandfather led back the first wave from captivity and now he's coming back as part of the second wave. And he's mentioned right away in this second genealogy.

Here I believe the priests are listed first and given priority because it's consistent with the mission. The leader of the mission is a priest, is a son of Phineas. And the whole mission is about reforming worship. So it's right, it's consistent with the mission that the priests should be listed first. In chapter 2, they're listed at the end, the priests are.

Number 4. Of the remaining 12 families, so in verse, there are 15 families total in the genealogy. Verse 2 gives us three families. Two priesthood families, one of the line of David. Of the remaining families, the remaining 12 families, eight of those 12 were also named in chapter 2.

In other words, the family line is named after someone prominent like King David. Well, the family lines are named the same in eight out of the 12 instances as what we found in the first genealogy in chapter 2. We can conclude from that that zeal for the promised land and zeal for prescribed worship which can only take place in Jerusalem, the feast can only be observed in the temple, run strongly in these family lines. What we find is 80 years apart, A family comes back in the first wave and then 80 years later, there's the same zeal for the promised land and for prescribed worship that we found in that same land earlier. So the zeal for the land and the zeal for the prescribed worship of God seems to be running strongly in family lines.

Not completely, but strongly. And I would just say this, brothers and sisters, may the story of time say the same about our families. Time is going to tell a story about our families, about our lines. There are going to be those, look at how many children are in the room, there's going to be a lot downstream. There are going to be big numbers downstream.

And time is going to tell a story about our family lines. May it tell the story of these eight families where The zeal that you find one day in their family line is preserved 80 years later. Their great-great grandchildren have the same zeal for the land, for the prescribed worship of God. Number five. Number five.

Last observation about the genealogies. In the first genealogy for the first wave in chapter 1 verse 5. It says this, Then the heads of the fathers' houses of Judah and Benjamin and the priests and the Levites, with all whose spirits God had moved, arose to go up and build the house of the Lord, which is in Jerusalem. With the first wave, it is explicitly stated that the ones who go are the ones that God's Spirit moved upon them. It's not explicit here, but it must be this.

The whole chapter, the whole context is about what God has done, even in the heart of this king of the empire. So it's explicitly stated in the first wave, but it must be true of the second wave. The people who come back from captivity are the people who are stirred up by God, whose hearts are moved upon by the Spirit of God. I have three applications. Application number one from this text.

Ask yourself this question, do I have a grip on the faithfulness of God? Do I have a grip on the faithfulness of God? Can I look back through the centuries, through four thousand years of Bible testimony and see God's faithfulness in that? Is my faith buoyed up by going to this book and seeing the faithfulness and the goodness of God towards his people. Can I see the same thing in my own life?

Is it not just an academic exercise where I go to the scriptures and I say, wow, it's great that God was faithful to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, but that I take that view and apply it to the circumstances of my life, the disasters and the blessings. I want to ask you to do something today, this today, set aside time to meditate on that question. Meditate on this 4, 000 years of jaw dropping faithfulness and goodness of God towards His people. And then think about your life and how God has been good to you and faithful to you. Just take time.

Take 10 minutes or 15 minutes just to say, okay, this is what I know from the Bible about how God relates to His people. Okay, this is my life. God has been doing this in my life and just lay it at the feet of God, the disasters and the blessings and say God did this, He is wise. And then worship Him. Do like Ezra.

Here's what's been going on, I should stop and worship. Number two, identify an area where the house of the Lord can be beautified through obedience. Identify an area of your life where the house of the Lord, the New Covenant, New Testament, House of the Lord, that's us and our life together, can be beautified through obedience. This is what we see in our text. Ezra said, God used a tool, the king of the empire, to beautify his house.

The best we can tell from the text was it had nothing to do with the physical beauty of the building. It had everything to do with people carefully and in a heartfelt way worshipping God. Obeying God and how he said he wanted to be worshiped. I would suggest that a good place to start is how we spend this day. The Dohm family has been in about a four-year trend of reform in how we spend this day.

Super careless four years ago, semi careless now. So the trend line is good, not satisfied. The head of the house is not satisfied with his own leadership. How do you spend this day? How can the house of the Lord, the new covenant house of the Lord, our life together, be beautified by a better, a more careful, a more heartfelt engagement in this day that God has given to His people as a gift.

If you can't think of anything, drink a cup of coffee. Number three, Think of the relationship where God cannot possibly give you favor. When I say that, the relationship where God cannot possibly give you favor. When I say that, whatever relationship pops into your mind. You know, in the next second after that relationship popped into your mind, then you said, well, there is no relationship.

I know that. Me too. I did that too. Then repent, because that's not true. God can give you favor in that relationship, and then pray.

So that's your assignment. The relationship where God cannot possibly give you favor because they are too hardened against me. I've offended them too many times in the past. They just could never see things rightly enough for this to be made right. There's just too much bad history or, or, and, or.

Now repent. God is bigger than everything you thought of and mentioned. And then pray. Hopefully this text and these exercises will increase your faith. That's why this text is here.

To increase your faith. See God moving the heart of the king of an empire. That should increase our faith. And embolden you to fearlessly obey. That's the point of the text too.

Those are the two big points of the text. Increase your faith by seeing the hand of God in everything, and then to embolden you to fearlessly obey. I want to give Paul the last word. Turn to Romans 8, then we're done. Paul and Romans 8, verses 31 and 32.

Paul concludes us with these verses. What then shall we say to these things? If God is for us, who can be against us? He who did not spare his own son but delivered him up for us all, How shall he not with him also freely give us all things?" Four thousand years of the history of the goodness and faithfulness of God, but none of it compares to the pinnacle of it, which is Jesus Christ. So all of it is there to build our faith and give us confidence that God will be good and faithful to us because he has been good and faithful to all those of his people that he has named in His Word.

But the peak of all of that is Jesus Christ. God loved His Son, but He didn't spare His Son. He sent His Son, and He was pleased to crush his son so that those who would trust him would be reconciled to him, that his blood would wash over their sins and cleanse them and make them as white as snow. You can't fearlessly obey out of that. When we can't fearlessly obey out of that, we're not thinking rightly about these things.

When we think of God and His love for us, the depth of His love for us proved, proved, proved through Jesus Christ coming and submitting Himself to the death of a criminal. God will not withhold from us. God is not stingy with His people. He's not. How could anyone say that He is after they've seen Jesus go to the cross?

Brothers and sisters, be built up in your most holy faith. Be emboldened to obey fearlessly. Let's pray. God, I thank you for this text and the beauty of it and the help of it, the wisdom of it. I thank you for your word that we find so much gold each week as we come to it.

God I pray that you would help us to see all things through your sovereignty knowing that the disasters in our life have been brought to us by you and that you're wise and good in it. And that the blessings in our life have been brought to us by you and that you're wise and good in it. And that the blessings in our life have been brought to us by you and that you're wise and good in that too. God, in all things May we give thanks. This is your will for us.

I pray that we would do your will. In Jesus' name, amen.