Ezra
The book of Ezra is about the return of God’s people from exile in Babylon to rebuild the temple in Jerusalem. They return first under the leadership of Zerubbabel. It is like a second exodus, but this time only with a remnant of the people - there are just under fifty thousand out of an estimated 2 million Israelites who were in Babylon. This journey could only be for those who were committed as it would involve leaving the comforts of Babylon for a nine hundred mile trek and for the hardship of rebuilding a temple and a city.
Restoration of Worship
When the people get back to Jerusalem the first thing they begin to restore is the worship - they build an altar, they make sacrifices and the singers and the musicians are appointed. Worship is primary; it has to be the first thing that is put in its place if the rebuilding and restoration of the church is going to happen. The worship had to be carried out according to the Law and to the instructions given to King David. In other words it had to be worship as God desired it; the equivalent for us who are now under the new covenant, is worship that is in spirit and in truth.
Foundations
The next thing they did was to get the foundations in place. If we are going to build something lasting for God it has to have right foundations. The city of God is a city with foundations and Jesus Christ is the foundation stone (Hebrews 11:10; Ephesians 2:20). As the foundations were being laid there was both joy and weeping at the same time; the weeping was because of the glory of the former temple. When involved in a programme of restoration there will often be both real joy at what God is doing but also a real sense of loss and longing as we yearn to recover some of the things that we once had.
Apostles and Prophets
The rebuilding of the temple was led by Zerubbabel - a descendant of David and therefore in the line of Christ - and Jeshua. They gave a very clear lead and they pre-figure the apostolic ministry of the New Testament. They were concerned with foundations and they were builders. Apostles are wise master builders. We see, from what they did, the importance of administering the work of God well; we also see that the leaders did not just tell others what to do - they were part of the workforce. They had to deal with opposition of course as God’s people always will when they want to do God’s work. In fact the opposition stopped the building for a time. There was a fourteen year gap when there was no building, until a new foreign king arose called Darius. God used a man from the world to restart his work. Those among his people who encouraged them to start building again were the prophets Haggai and Zechariah and we see here the importance of the prophets working alongside the apostolic leaders to help them with the building of the temple.
Teachers
The second part of the book from chapter seven onwards is about a second return from Babylon to Jerusalem under the leadership of Ezra. Only two thousand made the trip this time and Ezra was particularly concerned in gathering leading men. Now Ezra was a priest and as such was a teacher; he represents for us the important role of the teacher in building the church. The New Testament tells us it is first apostles, second prophets and then teachers (1 Cor.12:28). As a teacher we note that Ezra was devoted to study the word of God, then to obey the work of God and then to teach the word of God. It was not enough for him to study and teach it - he had to obey it for himself. Ezra was concerned with building the people just as the temple had been built and therefore he addresses spiritual and ethical issues in the people. It is great to see that Ezra is not this dusty dry teacher but is full of passion and a zeal for God. He is spontaneous and free in his teaching. As well as teaching, Ezra intercedes for the people of God and he ensures that the people follow through in radical obedience. It is not enough for him just to teach the principles of God’s word; he wants to ensure that the people radically obey God’s word, and so he addresses that very important issue of inter-marriage.
In Ezra then, we see represented something of the restoration and the rebuilding of God’s house, the church, and especially the importance of worship, of foundations, of the foundational ministries of apostles and prophets and of the role of teachers.
This background has been written by Trevor Lloyd who is the leading elder of Community Church Huddersfield and the founder of the Bible Tour