Sermon preview, week of June 24, 2025
God's Power to Rebuild
"It's over now." Those were my thoughts in the fourth quarter as the score slipped further and further out of the Pacer's favor in Game 7 of this year's NBA finals.
This Sunday’s order
- Sunday
- Reading
- Ezra 1:1-8
- Preaching
- Jonathan Balmer
The readingEzra 1:1-8
This sermon preview is part of "Pardon the Interruption: An Advent Series."
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"Then the family heads of Judah and Benjamin, and the priests and Levites, everyone whose heart God had moved, prepared to go up and build the house of the Lord in Jerusalem." - From Ezra 1:1-8
Read Ezra 1:1-8
1In the first year of Cyrus king of Persia, to fulfill the word of the LORD spoken through Jeremiah, the LORD stirred the spirit of Cyrus king of Persia to send a proclamation throughout his kingdom and to put it in writing as follows: 2“This is what Cyrus king of Persia says:
‘The LORD, the God of heaven, who has given me all the kingdoms of the earth, has appointed me to build a house for Him at Jerusalem in Judah. 3Whoever among you belongs to His people, may his God be with him, and may he go to Jerusalem in Judah and build the house of the LORD, the God of Israel; He is the God who is in Jerusalem. 4And let every survivor, wherever he lives, be assisted by the men of that region with silver, gold, goods, and livestock, along with a freewill offering for the house of God in Jerusalem.’” 5So the family heads of Judah and Benjamin, along with the priests and Levites—everyone whose spirit God had stirred—prepared to go up and rebuild the house of the LORD in Jerusalem. 6And all their neighbors supported them with articles of silver and gold, with goods and livestock, and with valuables, in addition to all their freewill offerings. 7King Cyrus also brought out the articles belonging to the house of the LORD that Nebuchadnezzar had carried away from Jerusalem and placed in the temple of his gods. 8Cyrus king of Persia had them brought out by the hand of Mithredath the treasurer, who counted them out to Sheshbazzar the prince of Judah.
Berean Standard Bible, public domain
***
"It's over now." Those were my thoughts in the fourth quarter as the score slipped further and further out of the Pacer's favor in Game 7 of this year's NBA finals. This is one of the things which I dislike about basketball compared to baseball. There is a timer in Basketball. If the leading team is too far ahead, you can see people get up and start to celebrate before it's over. There is an air of inevitability.
In baseball, by contrast, something may seem unlikely, but there is always a turnaround possible. The number of outs, not the clock, determine the end of the game. In 1901, the Detroit Tigers came back to beat the Milwaukee Brewers by one run, 14-13. At the beginning of the bottom of the 19th inning, they had been down 13-4. In 2001, the Cleveland Indians took a game to extra innings, overcoming a 12-run deficit. That tied the league record for the most substantial comeback in American professional baseball history.
To paraphrase the prophet's words in Isaiah 43, there was a way out made out of of no way. God making a way out of now way is exactly what we see in the book of Ezra. The Lord has the power to rebuild.
In Ezra, the people of God find themselves in the time of the exile. The warnings of previous prophets like Jeremiah, Ezekiel and Isaiah, which before seemed alarmist, had come true. The people had been taken away from Jerusalem. But just when there seemed to be no way, God made away for some to return. God made a way for them to rebuild.
A select group of people came back: to worship, to rebuild the temple, to start new. When there had seemed to be no way an opportunity opened.
As we begin this series through Ezra (and a little of Haggai), we'll explore how God uses his people to courageously follow him to serve as priests and ministers of his goodness and grace in uncertain times.
There is not an inevitability about events: God's providential power, not events, have the last word.
Christ's Peace,
-Jonathan
