What do people really say about you? Join us on a reflective journey through Ezra, Chapter 8, as we explore this profound question. We walk alongside Ezra and his companions as they venture from Babylon to Jerusalem, focusing on the essential roles of Levites and temple servants. Witness the pivotal moment where Ezra, relying solely on God’s protection, fasts and prays for a safe passage without the aid of the king’s soldiers. This episode highlights the faith and trust in God's guidance as Ezra assigns leaders to transport precious offerings for the temple.
Inspired by Ezra's dedication, we challenge ourselves to consider how others perceive us and how we can enhance their lives. Drawing lessons from the scripture, we emphasize the importance of studying, obeying, and teaching God’s law. By centering our lives on knowing God and sharing His teachings, we can transform our communities through selfless service. Concluding with a heartfelt prayer, this episode aims to inspire you to impact others profoundly and make God's presence known through your actions and devotion. Tune in and be moved to make a difference.
What do people really say about you? Join us on a reflective journey through Ezra, Chapter 8, as we explore this profound question. We walk alongside Ezra and his companions as they venture from Babylon to Jerusalem, focusing on the essential roles of Levites and temple servants. Witness the pivotal moment where Ezra, relying solely on God’s protection, fasts and prays for a safe passage without the aid of the king’s soldiers. This episode highlights the faith and trust in God's guidance as Ezra assigns leaders to transport precious offerings for the temple.
Inspired by Ezra's dedication, we challenge ourselves to consider how others perceive us and how we can enhance their lives. Drawing lessons from the scripture, we emphasize the importance of studying, obeying, and teaching God’s law. By centering our lives on knowing God and sharing His teachings, we can transform our communities through selfless service. Concluding with a heartfelt prayer, this episode aims to inspire you to impact others profoundly and make God's presence known through your actions and devotion. Tune in and be moved to make a difference.
Well, hello everybody, welcome back to the Bible Breakdown Podcast with your host, pastor Brandon. Today, ezra, chapter 8, and today's title is a question that, when I read this, it convicted my heart so much, and that is what do people say about you? What do people say? What do they say about you? We're going to get into that in just a moment. It's something that I thought was just so powerful today, but before we do that, I want you to make sure and like, share and subscribe to the YouTube channel. If you're watching this, if you're listening to this on the podcast, make sure you take a moment and leave us a five-star review. Also, there should be a link in the show notes section where you can ask questions, make comments and just engage back and forth, and I love engaging with our wonderful church family and our growing audience of podcast listeners. I just love engaging back and forth with you, and so let's do that together. Also, make sure you're going to the Bible Breakdown Discussion on Facebook. That's the more we dig, the more we find, and I'm curious, as you open up your Bibles with me to chapter eight, if you kind of have some of the same takeaways that I had, or do you have something different, because God's word has a singular meaning. That's what it means. But there's a thousand applications that we can have. And as we're reading this today, we're going to read about how Ezra is starting to head on his way to Jerusalem. And as he's going, there's this moment where it says that God partnered him with somebody else, and I just love the way he described him. But then it also reminded me to think about what do other people say about me? And I wonder what you would say. You know, am I a blessing to others or not? All right, so let's dive into God's word together. Ezra, chapter 8, verse 1, says this here is a list of the family leaders and the genealogies of those who came with me from Babylon during the reign of King Artaxerxes From the family of Phinehas Gershom. From the family of Ithamar Daniel. From the family of David Hattush, a descendant of Shekiniah. From the family of Peros Zechariah and 150 other men who were registered. From the family of Pahath-Morab Ethohanii, the son of Zechariah, and 200 other men. From the family of Zetu Zechariah, the son of Jezael, and 300 other men. From the family of Adin Adeb, son of Jonathan, and 50 other men. From the family of Elam, jeshahiah, the son of Ataliah, and 70 other men. From the family of Shethiah was Zebediah, the son of Michael, and 80 other men. From the family of Joab, obadiah of Jehil and 218 other men. From the family of Benai Shelaometh, son of Jeshaphia, and 160 other men, and from the family of Bebi was Zechariah, son of Bebi, and 28 other men, and from the family of Bebi was Zechariah, son of Bebi, and 28 other men. From the family of Azgad, johanan, son of Hakataan and 110 other men, and from the family of Adonikin that's a hard one who came later Elipheth, jehu, shemaiah and 60 other men, and from the family of Bigvi, uthai, zikar and 70 other men.
Speaker 1:
I assembled the exiles at the Ahav Canal and we camped there for three days. While I went over the list of other people and the priests who had arrived, I found that not one Levite had volunteered to come along. So I sent Eleazar, ariel, shemaiah, ethahanan, jerib, esanan, nathan, zechariah and Mushalam, who were with me. From the leaders of the people I also sent Jeorib and Elthanan, who were men of discernment. I sent them to Iddo, the leader of the Levites of Caspia, and to ask him and his relatives and the temple servants to send us ministers for the temple of God at Jerusalem, and I love this Verse 18. Since the gracious hand of our God was on me, they sent us a man named Sherebiah, along with 18 of his sons and brothers. They were very astute. He was a very astute man and a descendant of Mahali, who was a descendant of Levi, the son of Israel. He also sent Hashbatha and, together with Jeshabiah and the descendants of Merari and the 20 of his sons and brothers, and there were 220 temple servants. The temple servants were assistants to the Levites, a group of temple workers first instituted by King David and his officials, and they were all listed by name.
Speaker 1:
And there, at Hava Canal, I ordered for all the people to fast and humble ourselves before our God. We prayed that he would give us a safe journey and to protect us, our children and our goods as we traveled. For I was ashamed to ask the king for soldiers and horsemen to accompany us and protect us from enemies along the way. After all, I had told the king our God's hand of protection is on us all who worship him, but his fierce anger rages against those who abandon him. So we fasted and earnestly prayed that our God would take care of us and he did hear our prayer.
Speaker 1:
I appointed twelve leaders of the priest, sherabiah Heshbaiah and ten other priests to be in charge of transporting the silver, the gold, the gold bowls and the other items that the king, the gold, the gold bowls and the other items that the king, his council and his officials and all the people of Israel had presented for the temple of God. I weighed the treasure and I gave it to them and found the totals to be as follows 24 tons of silver, 7,500 pounds of silver articles, 7,500 pounds of gold, 20 gold bowls equal to the value of 1,000 gold coins, two fine articles of polished bronze and as precious as gold. I said to these priests you and these treasures have been set apart as holy to the Lord. This silver and gold is a voluntary offering to the Lord, the God of our ancestors. This silver and gold is a voluntary offering to the Lord, the God of our ancestors. Guard these treasures well until you present them, along with the leading priests, levites and the leaders of Israel, who will weigh them at the storerooms of the Lord's temple in Jerusalem. So the priests and the Levites accepted this task and transported these treasures of silver and gold to the temple of our God in Jerusalem.
Speaker 1:
We broke camp at the Havana, uh, hava, ahava, there we go Ahava Canal on April 19th and started off to Jerusalem, and the gracious hand of our Lord protected us and saved us from enemies and bandits along the way. So we arrived safely in Jerusalem and there we rested for three days. Now pause for a second. Can you imagine? Do you imagine? Not only are all these people going, but they have got Fort Knox with them on the way. They have got so many treasures. This would be a great movie on how they travel for hundreds of miles. And they know no telling what all happened. And you imagine how, if the bandits and the different people, if they knew how much money these people were carrying, lord, everybody would have come at them. But God protected them and they made it.
Speaker 1:
Verse 33,. On the fourth day after our arrival, the silver, gold and other valuables were weighed at the temple of our God and entrusted to Merermoth, son of Uri, the priest, and to Eleazar, son of Phinehas, along with Jezebel, son of Jeshu, and Nodiah, son of Ben-Ui, both of whom were Levites. Everything was accounted for by number and weight and the total was officially recorded them, the exiles who had come out of captivity sacrificed burnt offerings to the God of Israel, and they presented 12 bulls for all the people of Israel, as well as 96 rams and 75 male lambs. They also offered 12 male goats as a sin offering. All this was given as a burnt offering to the Lord, and the king's decrees were delivered to the highest officers and the governors of the province west of the Euphrates River all who cooperated by supporting the people and the temple of God. Wow.
Speaker 1:
Well, there's so many things we could take out of this, but what really stood out to me first of all was notice how, over and over again, ezra just is always reminding us as readers, all of this was possible because the hand of God was on us. He's constantly there giving God the credit for everything that happened. But what I love about this is all the way back toward the top of the chapter. It said that because God's hand was on us, he sent us a man named Sherebiah. He was an astute man and he was a descendant of the Levites. And what I love about this is there was something so good about this guy, sherebiah, that when Ezra is recording his name, he said you know why we got this guy Because God was good to us, god was gracious to us and gave us this wonderful person, and it made me think.
Speaker 1:
Do I live my life in a way that people say do you know why this person's in my life? Because man, god's good, god's given me the gift of this person. It reminds me of a good friend of mine who he said that he has a goal in life and that is his goal every day is to double someone's joy and to cut their sorrow in half. Isn't that amazing? His goal in life is every day he gets up, his goal is to do one of two things. Hopefully both is to double someone's joy and to cut their sorrow in half. I don't know about you, but not everybody likes me. I don't like everybody, that's fine, that's the way it goes. But what if we lived our life in a way to go, you know what? I can't help how other people feel about me, but I want to do my best to be a blessing to everybody I come in contact with. What would it look like if we just said every day I get up, I want to do one of two things and if I can, I want to do both, and that is I want to double someone's joy and I'm going to cut their sorrow in half.
Speaker 1:
What do people say about you Now? We don't live for the opinions of others. We don't live to be liked for other people. That's not what I'm talking about. I'm just saying we live our life in a way where the book of Proverbs says live your life in such a way so that even your enemies can't say anything bad about you. It's like I don't like them, but I can't really tell you why because they're a good person. If we live our life in that way, then we're going to realize that God uses us to make a difference in the lives of others.
Speaker 1:
I want to ask you a question how do other people perceive you and what would it look like in your life if you made a decision for the rest of the day today that, before I lay my head on the pillow for one person, I want to double their joy and I want to cut their sorrow in half? Let's pray, god. Thank you so much for today. Thank you, god, for all you're doing in our life. I pray you'll help us to realize we have the opportunity to make a positive difference in the lives of others around us.
Speaker 1:
God, that can be difficult because there's so many things that go on in our life and it's so easy to get preoccupied with the things that are going on. But, lord, I know sometimes one of the greatest things we can do is to get outside of ourselves and to serve others. I pray you'll give us the courage to put ourselves on the back burner and to lift up others to double their joy, to cut their sorrow in half. And watch, god, that as we do that for others, you do amazing things in our life too. We celebrate you today in Jesus name. We pray Amen, amen. Well, god, god is all over Ezra, and he's saying God's hand was on them continually, and why? Well, he tells us why in Ezra 7, verse 10. All of this was because Ezra had determined to study and obey the law of the Lord and to teach those decrees and regulations to the people of Israel. It's to know God and to make him known as keeping the main thing, the main thing. I love you. I'll see you tomorrow. For Ezra, chapter 9.
