Ezra 8 - Faith Filled Leaders

Well, we are in Ezra again.

Ezra chapter 8 this morning.

Ezra 8 · chapter mention

And we see in chapter 8 how God continues to bless Ezra as Ezra demonstrates faithfulness in his leadership and how he calls others to faithful leadership.

This is a chapter a lot to do with leadership.

And the term leadership is kind of confusing because it can be very broad.

It can mean anyone who has influence.

And I think that's that's fair to say.

I mean, if you have influence over people, there's an aspect, an element of that you're kind of leading them in a certain way.

You're impressing upon them.

And then there's those who have a title, an authority.

Like it's a distinguished thing.

Everyone knows this is their position, this is the authority they have.

And those there are those kinds of leaders.

When we think about leadership, we typically think about those who have a title and a position and authority.

And this morning, I kind of want to look at a little bit of both dynamics.

As we go through chapter 8 of Ezra, Ezra is preparing the people to go back to Jerusalem.

Now, if you haven't been here for a little while, you might think, man, didn't we just do this like eight chapters ago?

Like, what's going on in this book of Ezra?

Well, going back to the beginning, there was a first wave of exiles.

It came from Babylon back to Jerusalem.

50,000 people, Jeroboam and Jeshua lead this, these people, they go back and they, remember, they start to build the temple.

There's a delay because they're disobedient.

There's some opposition and they get rebuked and they start building the temple again.

And then we have this big gap of time from when the temple is complete to when Ezra kind of comes on the scene and begins to lead a second wave of Jews back to the promised land, back to Jerusalem.

And so he's preparing in chapter 8 to do these things to gather these people.

We see what leadership looks like.

The different kind of ways he begins to kind of influence and call people to be good leaders.

We see that there are those who have titles, as I mentioned, in authority.

Ezra mean he's been given this authority as a governor, he's been given a title, and he's going to lead the people.

He's a scribe.

He's going to lead.

And then we see other people who are called to serve as well and to lead in the temple.

And these are people without titles.

They don't have a whole lot of influence per se, but they do have some influence.

See, for me, my title and my authority is somewhat clear.

This is, I'm the lead pastor of our church.

I'm one of the pastors, one of the elders.

It's a side note in case you don't know.

We really believe that when the Bible says the term elder or pastor, it means elder, pastor, overseer, shepherd.

That's one word.

So you can say elder, you can say pastor.

Typically in our culture, a pastor is the guy who gets paid, and the elders are the guys who don't get paid.

Right?

So the reality is in Scripture, though, it's the same thing.

So I do get paid.

The church lovingly, graciously pays me a good salary.

I'm grateful for that, so that I can spend the best hours of my day shepherding and teaching and caring for the church.

Now the other elders don't get that benefit, but they still work hard and shepherding and teaching.

They have the same title and the same authority as I do.

And my wife, Candace, she has a title.

Mom.

It doesn't pay very well at this point.

There's not a whole lot of kind of hubbub about the title.

People aren't kind of like, wow, good to meet you.

I've heard that you're, you know, a great mom.

I've been wanting to come to your house and visit.

But she has tremendous influence.

She has tremendous influence.

She's spending the best hours of her day influencing our children.

Being with them, caring for them, teaching them.

So she's working her influence in the position that God has given her.

Now I don't say this to say, well, leadership, it's vague.

Everyone's a leader, so no one's a leader, or everyone has titles, or no one has titles.

But it's good for us to acknowledge, man, the Lord has called people to positions of leadership formally.

It's clear to everyone.

And then the Lord has called other people to positions of influence.

Where they get to influence what's going on around them, with their children, or their co-workers, or their family, or their boss, or whatever position they're in, most people, almost everyone here, is in a position of influence.

And sometimes we think, well, I just have to wait until someone kind of acknowledges this before I can begin to influence people.

And I would say that is not true or accurate at all.

Especially if you're a young person and you're in school and you have your friends around you, and you have a wonderful ability as a Christian in school to influence those who are around you.

To share Christ, to walk out your faith, to influence others.

If you have children or you're married, again, tremendous opportunities to influence people toward Christ.

We need not neglect that or feel like it doesn't matter.

So, yes, in one sense, we're all leaders because we're all influencing people.

But we should steward well the abilities and the opportunities and the influence that God does give us.

But then there are those who are, again, called to a formal position of leadership.

And we're going to kind of talk through this first chunk of Ezra 8 about God, how God has called some of these leaders.

So I'm going to skip around a bit in chapter 8, these first few verses, and you will see there's a lot of names in here that I'm not going to try to repeat.

But beginning in verse 1, it says, These are the heads of their father's houses.

And this is the genealogy of those who went up with me, as we're speaking, from Babylonia, in the reign of Artaxerxes, the king.

And they go through, they start listing out men.

And they list out kind of their names and how many went and their names and how many went and their names and how many went.

It's pretty remarkable.

Now it's interesting about this, again, we're I'm not going to read through all of these names, but by the end, there's only one family out of all these people who have descendants who did not go in the first wave back to Israel.

So in verse 9, and the sons of Joab, right there, yes, and the sons of Joab, list as sons, the men 218, they didn't have any descendants that were listed back in the genealogy earlier in the verse or in the book.

So everyone who's like thinking about going with Ezra, when Ezra's like, hey, we're gonna go, and he's talking to the heads of the households and saying, Man, are you guys gonna go?

Are you guys gonna go?

And they're like, yep, we're gonna go.

These are all people who 60 years ago or 80 years ago, 80 years ago, had family who went.

But for some reason, they stayed.

Or their their grandparents or their parents stayed.

So there's this interesting question.

Like, why didn't some go and why are they going now?

Why didn't so many of these families go and then go not go the first time and they're going now?

We don't know.

It could have been for, who knows what?

It could have been because they were comfortable in Babylon, it could have been because they weren't sure what was ahead.

You know, this is what we see with immigrants.

This is the story of America, right?

So just some families would come, they kind of check it out, and then they go back, and more families would come, and you begin this kind of trickling in of people.

That's how it seems that just as people spread over the earth, it kind of trickles, and then others follow.

Like, is this good?

Is this gonna work?

Well, maybe they've made it there for 80 years, so if they've been for 80 years, like it's probably gonna work.

And they go through all this, and then they realize something in verse 15.

I gathered them to the river that runs to Ahebah, and there we camped three days.

As I reviewed the people and the priests, I found their none of the sons of Levi.

Then I sent for Eliezer and Ariel and Shemiah, El Nathan, Jereb, El Nathan, Nathan, it's a popular name apparently.

Zechariah, Meshelem, leading men.

And for Jerod, I don't even know how to say that name, and another El Nathan, who are men of insight.

And we sent them to Ido, the leading men of the palace, telling them what to say.

And his brothers and the temple servants at the palace.

I'm skipping some names as you can tell.

And they send them a message.

Oh, excuse me.

In verse 17, the second part of verse 17.

To send us ministers for the house of our God.

So here's something if you don't know, it's good to know this.

When we talk about the Old Testament, we're talking about priests and Levites, and you've heard this term.

All priests are Levites.

Okay?

If you're a priest, you had to be a Levite.

You had to be of the tribe of Levite, tribe of Levi.

Not all Levites were priests, though.

There were plenty of men who were of the tribe of Levites, but they were not priests.

So we know when John the Baptist was born, his father was a Levite priest.

Right?

John the Baptist wasn't a priest, he was a prophet.

So there's a kind of quick example there.

You can be a Levite and not be a priest, but all priests are Levites.

So when Ezra is looking around and he's saying, okay, we're gonna make this journey, he's kind of checking it out, it's taking three days, what's going on?

And he says, Well, we have our priests, but there's no Levites.

All these people, there's not a Lev around.

5,000 people and no Levites.

Now, why is this significant?

Well, one, the Levites who weren't priests, it was their job to still serve in the temple.

Right?

So their job is to, they were gatekeepers, they were musicians, they were craftsmen, they were judges, they had these roles and these responsibilities within the temple.

In Numbers chapter 3, this is when God calls the Levites and said, Listen, you're gonna be my priests and the temple servants.

Numbers 3 · chapter mention

So Ezra's looking around, he's saying, Well, we got our priests, that's good.

Where's the rest of the people we need to serve in the temple?

Like, we're gonna take all this money that we've got from King Artus Xerxes, we're gonna take all these people and all these provisions, and we're not gonna have the people to help staff the temple.

So then he starts to think as a leader.

He says, Okay, listen, we've got to convince some Levites to go with us.

Now, the issue was it was pretty cushy in Babylon for the Levites.

They weren't, they didn't have to fulfill their Levitical role.

There was no temple, they didn't have to do all the ceremonial stuff, they could just kind of be like an average guy, just kind of blend in and do their thing.

Not that they didn't love the Lord, but it was just easier.

If they go back to Jerusalem and serve in the temple, they gotta obey all these laws because there's the temple.

They had to do their job in the temple.

The requirements were strict and high and heavy for the people, for the Levites.

So you can kind of sympathize with them.

Like, man, that's, I get why they're kind of reluctant.

They don't want to go and kind of be beholding to this super rigid system anymore.

But this was what God had designed for them.

This is what God had called them to.

In their service was the blessing of God.

So Ezra's sending these leading men.

These are men who are who are priests and who are diplomatic to kind of convince some of these people to come.

And they do.

They bring them.

It says in verse 18, and by the hand of our God on us, they brought us a man of discretion.

It goes on to list him and his descendants, and 18 of them, and these men who come and to serve in the temple.

So what's interesting is Ezra, as a leader, is thinking, man, I think we need to obey the Lord and prioritize.

We've got to get some Levites in here, because this is their job to do.

We can't take other brothers from other tribes because that's not what God has commanded us to.

I mean, how easy would it have been to say, well, we've got, you know, we've got like a super long journey ahead.

I think it's like nine months, we got plenty of time.

Like, we'll figure it out on the way.

We'll figure it out.

Don't worry about it.

Or, like, hey, you know what?

Um, I think if we get some guys from the tribe of Manasseh, like, they were kind of close to Levi and they could work well.

Like, we'll just get some of them to fill in.

That's not what Ezra does.

He's in charge of leading these people, in charge from the king of Babylon, and in charge from Jesus Christ, from God the Father, saying, Listen, lead my people.

So he doesn't cut any corners.

He doesn't say, well, we'll just figure it out.

It's no big deal.

Or you know what?

Hey, it's God.

Like he's gonna be grace, he's gonna be graceful, we'll just do it, we'll figure it out.

He says, we need Levites.

So then he's finding men who are good leaders, who are diplomatic, who can who can really not just, this isn't about like persuasion, the sense of I'm gonna talk you into it, I'm gonna kind of give you a sales pitch.

And these are men who are wise, they're careful with their words.

They're not just kind of throwing around accusations.

What are you guys lazy?

You don't want to go?

What's up with that?

How's this gonna look in the history books of Israel?

Then you guys stayed here.

Right?

They weren't accusing them of these things.

They were gracious and kind.

And then when it does come to fruition, the Lord does provide these things.

Israel's not like, well, yeah, I'm a pretty good leader.

You know, I went to this leadership academy thing in Babylon and I got my certification and the thing, and I did the classes, I'm ready.

So when he says it all, he says, by the hand of our God on us.

He gives credit and attention to God for his work and bringing these brothers with them.

So again, I think it's easy for us to relate.

When God calls us to something, especially in leadership positions, it's like, man, that's gonna require a lot.

That's gonna require a lot of time, that's gonna require a lot of energy, that's going to require a lot of conversations, some good, some not good.

That's gonna cost me something.

It's much easier to just step back and say, you know, somebody else is gonna do that.

Somebody else can do that, it's gonna be fine.

They'll figure it out.

Just, it's alright.

They'll figure it out.

I I just don't have the capacity or the desire anymore.

It's alright.

So you see this kind of in, I think, in our own hearts.

Or there's a situation maybe with your coworkers or your friends, it's like, man, someone needs to step into this and say something.

Someone needs to step in and say, hey, we're not gonna do that because I just don't think it's right, or that's not ethical, or I'm not okay with that.

We're gonna we're gonna stay out of that.

But instead of creating the tension in the team and or frustrating people, we just kind of step back.

Hey, you know what?

I didn't condone it.

My hands are clean of it.

That's our mentality.

Instead of stepping and saying, hey, you know what, guys, I think I'm not okay with this.

I think we should do these things.

We should go this way.

Doesn't usually go well at first, but you're taking a step of faith saying, I need to show some influence here that's gonna point to Christ.

Sometimes when we're with people and people start talking, and um, if you know me, you know I enjoy, I really enjoy talking politics.

Good, robust political conversation.

I'm there for that.

It's a good time waiting to happen, in my opinion.

But sometimes you're in a conversation and it's just like people are just going way off, and you're like, hold on a second.

I just want to be the voice of reason and say, you know, God is good and he's sovereign.

And there's a lot of terrible things happening.

That all these things are wicked, and we need to acknowledge those things, and we need to do things about that, and we shouldn't be ignorant, and we shouldn't be apathetic.

But let us not forget who reigns, who sits on the throne, who holds, literally holds tomorrow.

So we should not be reluctant to step in to leadership, but rather follow the Lord's calling on us.

Whether that's in a capacity that's like official and formal, or that's a capacity of influence.

So leadership, there's a calling to leadership.

But leadership requires something.

It requires humility, diligence, and obedience.

We see in this next passage, verse 21 through 30, these things kind of listed out.

First of all, there's humility.

Ezra begins with a fasting.

Then I proclaimed, verse 21, a fast there at the river Ahaba, that we might humble ourselves before our God to seek from him a safe journey for our children for ourselves and our children and all our goods.

For I was ashamed to ask the king for a band of soldiers or horsemen to protect us against the enemy on our way, since we had told the king, the hand of our God is for good on all who seek him, and the power of his wrath is against all who forsake him.

So we fasted and implored our God for this.

And he listened to our entreaty, he heard their prayers.

So they figure out the leadership thing with the Levites, and they're getting ready to go, and they're like, okay, that's what we're gonna do.

We're gonna fast.

We're gonna show humility, we're gonna humble ourselves and say, Lord, if you don't take us there, if you don't provide for us, if you don't keep us safe, we're not getting there.

We can't get there.

And so often in leadership, people think, well, you have to know, you have to know the plan.

You've got to know how you're getting from A to B.

Most leaders just know they're trying to get to B.

They don't know how they're gonna get to B, but they're heading to B.

That's where they're going.

They're trusting the Lord to get them there.

And here, Ezra feels this way.

I told the king, I said, man, God's gonna deliver his people.

So we don't need your soldiers to protect us.

And this is a great demonstration of faith by Ezra.

Saying, we're gonna humble ourselves, we're gonna ask the Lord, and if he provides for that, wonderful.

Because humility provides clarity.

Humility, being humble, being able to step back, says, isn't about me, this isn't about my reputation, it's not about those things, it brings clarity.

So Ezra humbles himself and asks God for help.

What's interesting is Nehemiah in the next book does the same thing almost, but instead of saying we can't take any soldiers, he's saying we're trusting the Lord and we're gonna take the soldiers.

So who has more faith?

Ezra, who's like, hey, we don't need the soldiers, don't worry about it.

Or Nehemiah, who says, we're still trusting in the Lord and we're gonna use their soldiers to protect us.

And this kind of brings up an interesting thing in our faith and how we work out our, how we live our lives.

Like, are we trusting the Lord, saying, okay, it has to be like this divine direct line from the Lord?

Or can the Lord use other means to also provide?

And I would submit to you that the Lord graciously, gladly, lovingly does both.

When our heart can acknowledge in rest that it comes from Him.

So if you sit out and you have no provisions and you have no army and you have no security, trust the Lord will secure you and take you to where you need to go.

If you sit out and you have your savings and you have your reputation, you have all these things to kind of keep you safe and buffer you in from the world's perspective, you better trust and know that it's God providing for you.

It is not your own work, it is Him.

So whether you go like Ezra or you go like Nehemiah, you're resting in God's provision.

Now we need to acknowledge, and we'll talk more about this when we get to Nehemiah, Lord willing.

It's in the in the second situation where you're like, hey, I'm gonna go and I'm gonna take the army, it's much easier in that situation to give lip service to the Lord.

Oh, the Lord's gonna protect us.

Well, yeah, you have an army with you.

It's easy to be confident in the Lord when you got an army from Babylon.

So it's just be mindful of that.

There's a temptation there to give lip service.

I'm trusting the Lord, but really your heart is leading and trusting in some other thing.

So be aware of that.

But this there's a humility that Ezra shows, and it provides clarity.

Unless the Lord does this, we are hopeless.

Leadership requires diligence.

Just working diligently.

And this is an interesting, I think, lesson here in this passage because they start weighing out in verse 24 and 25 all this stuff from King of Babylon.

The silver, all the stuff.

And they start making records of this.

They're like, okay, let's be good about this.

Okay, let's, you know, and I'm not um, I'm a details person, but I'm not like a really detailed person, right?

So this kind of stuff, I mean, I'm just like, oh my goodness.

Like we're gonna count all the gold.

This is gonna take forever, you know?

Where I imagine those who are like number counting people in the room, like, yes, we need to, we're gonna do this, you know?

And they're excited about that.

And I'm just like, oh, Lord.

But Ezra's being diligent.

He has been entrusted with something.

This isn't his.

The Lord has provided this for his people, and he says, we're gonna be diligent with what with what the Lord gives us.

Because at the end of the trip, guess what we're gonna do?

We're gonna weigh all this again.

And we're gonna make sure that what was entrusted to us we have when we return.

So he sets apart these men to carry these things.

So let me find this passage here.

It's always terrible when you get lost in your own notes.

So then there's this diligence and the record keeping, and then he's calling these men to obedience.

See, there's there's in the diligence part, there's rest in that.

If you're a leader and you're diligent with your task and you're being diligent with your work, you can rest at night.

It doesn't mean you've kind of solved all the problems and nothing can go wrong, but it means you've done your due diligence.

If something happens, it happens, but you can rest because you've been diligent with what God has entrusted to you.

And then he calls these men to obedience in verses 26 through 29.

He says, I weighed out the silver.

I said in verse 28, and I said to them, You are holy to the Lord.

And the vessels are holy, and the silver and the gold are a free will offering to the Lord, the God of your father, your fathers.

Guard them and keep them until we weigh them before the chief priests and the Levites and the head of the fathers' houses in Israel at Jerusalem.

So preserve these things.

He's saying, listen, you have been given a task.

This isn't just like, hey, no big deal, kind of get some groceries on the way home, make sure you keep the receipt, or give me the change when you get back.

These things are holy unto the Lord.

Not because the elements themselves were like this magical thing that was holy, but rather God had given these things to his people and he left them in charge, these men in charge.

And as they're saying, listen, you are going to literally give an account for this.

One commentator said, you know, their coinage back then wasn't exactly consistent.

So it would be easy for someone to take a thousand shekels and kind of just scrape off some silver.

Do that with a thousand coins and like you're doing pretty good for yourself.

And Ezra's like, listen, uh, the Lord has called us to this.

So just as the humility brings clarity and the diligence brings rest, when you are obedient to the Lord, there's joy in that.

There's just joy and obedience.

These men have nine months ahead of them, and they're in charge of all this wealth, and they're not even taking an army.

They got nothing.

And they're gonna have to give an account for these things.

And as we're saying, listen, be obedient.

If you're gonna serve as leaders, you must obey God.

You must obey God.

Israel's history was plagued with men who did not obey God and led the nation into wickedness.

And then leadership brings honor to God and blessings to the community.

Brings honor to God and blessings to the community.

So, one, in verse 31, we see that they're delivered.

They travel the whole way.

The hand of our God was on us, and he delivered us from the hand of the enemy and from ambush by the way.

So God sustained them.

This faithful leadership.

They're just being obedient to the Lord, they're following the Lord, the Lord provides.

Faithful, faithful leadership brings blessing to the community.

The Lord took care of us.

Verse 34, everything was delivered.

Right?

The whole was counted and weighed.

And the weight of everything was recorded.

They gave an account for all these things.

And what do they do then?

They start to sacrifice to the Lord, acknowledging God's goodness and provision for them.

That they weren't kind of holding back and feeling like, well, man, we did a good job here.

We're some great leaders.

We should start a seminar or a conference.

Let's praise the Lord.

Let's sacrifice and acknowledge this was the Lord's doing and his goodness to us.

And then the last passage, we even see Ezra, who has now left our Xerxes.

He's out of Babylon, he's in Jerusalem, and he still fulfills the commission that the king gave him.

He delivered to the king's commissions, to the king's satraps and the governors in the province beyond the river.

And they aided the people in the house of God.

So he literally takes these things from the king, these edicts and the collections for the leaders, and he says, Hey, this is from King Arnaxerxes, a wicked king, king who doesn't love God.

And even in that, Ezra's obedience to take care of what may seem as small things, God uses to build his house, to grow his kingdom.

So leadership brings honor to the people.

I don't know how many kind of different ways or dynamics of leaders you've you've served with or you've been under, whether it's with churches or companies or whatever.

But a good leader should bring honor to those who are they are leading.

If you're leading an organization of 5,000, or if you're leading your family, just your wife or your wife and children.

Good, faithful leadership brings honor to the family.

We had a passage that we started with our scripture reading this morning.

I want to close with this passage.

That's what Paul is telling Titus to tell the church.

This is what the work the church is supposed to do.

Teach what accords with sound doctrine.

This is Titus 2.

Older men are to be sober-minded, dignified, self-control, sound in the faith, in love, and in steadfastness.

Older women likewise are to be reverent in behavior, not slanderers, or slaves to much wine.

They are to teach what is good, and so train the young women to love their husbands and children, to be self-controlled, pure, working at home, kind and submissive to their own husbands, that the word of God may not be reviled.

Likewise, urge the young men to be self-controlled.

Maybe you're in a formal position of leadership, maybe you're not, you have a lot of influence.

You're thinking, okay, so Ezra leads these people thousands of miles, good deal for him.

What do I do?

What does this really mean for me?

One, I just wanted you to see the goodness of God in providing for his people.

He sustained Ezra, he sustained the people, he will always sustain his people.

But here is what he's his instruction to you.

Older men, older women, young women, young men.

God has called you to something.

To seek after him, to live away, to use your influence and your leadership to bless others, to bring him honor, and to serve the body of Christ.

We are not left with this charge, this charge of do these things and then just go figure it out.

Just go have at it.

Rather, Jesus Christ has come for us, died for our sin.

Not so that we can just feel good about ourselves and pitch in here and there and not live like the world, but so we could lay down our life for others, so we could serve others, so that we no longer have to walk in sin.

So I encourage you this morning, church.

God has not called you to a place of complacency or just to be reluctant or to hold back, but rather to step into what He has called you.

If that's a position of great authority, be faithful to that.

If it's a position of low authority and little influence, be faithful to that.

If that is a position where you're going to spend the vast majority of your time praying for others in ways that they're never gonna know, be faithful to that.

Whatever God has called you to, be faithful and trust in Him.

Let's pray.