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This Sunday, we explore how Israel responded with the renewed efforts to rebuild the temple, was met with yet another challenge that threatened to halt their progress yet again. Join Pastor Wei as he preaches from Ezra chapter 5, verses 3 to 17.

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I'm sure many of you can relate to that. Many of us who have picked up hobbies like baking or you start to cook a little bit more. And one of the things I've always wanted to try at that time was to get an iron wok. You know, one of those Chinese iron walks. Yeah, because I wanted to make proper fried rice. And I didn't get one until I met Beth, and then we subsequently got married, and we had our own place. And I thought in this time, I have my own place now, I have my own kitchen, I'm gonna get myself a wok.

unknown 1:04

Right?

SPEAKER_01 1:04

So I got one. Uh followed the instructions as closely as I could, I guess. Uh I seasoned it a few times, and then I fired up the stove and I started cooking. And lo and behold, food was getting stuck to the wok. Right. Uh if you use it properly, if you season it properly and all, it should not stick. But food was just getting stuck, right? And an iron wok is not something that you should always use soak to scrub uh uh food, right? So you know what do I do? I try again, like you know, I try to scrape off the the bits that were stuck. I try to season it again, I cooked it again, and you know, no dice. Like it just keep uh food just keep getting stuck to the walk. And um, after a few times, I just kind of give up. You know, I I it's just sitting somewhere in a corner of my house right now, and I tell myself one day, one day I will revisit the walk. Um, but I don't know if I'll ever try it, to be honest. Because it's kind of you know discouraged. Right? Um have you ever started something enthusiastically, only to be met with obstacles, challenges, and then just kind of give up? Right? Maybe it's a hobby, maybe you tell yourself, I'm gonna start uh uh uh doing something, I'm gonna start exercising more, I'm gonna watch my diet or I'm gonna do this or that. And then you just kind of hit a roadblock and then just kind of stop uh and never got back on to it. Yeah, keep that in mind. Have you have we ever given up on something uh after we have met, uh we are met with challenges? Right? Because as we study, uh as we continue our study of Ezra Nahimaya, we are learning about the people of Israel who were at one point greatly discouraged by oppositions from people around them. And uh, if I can, the next slide, just a very quick recap. In Ezra chapter 4, we read about how the people of the land started opposing the rebuilding project. Uh they were coming to frustrate their plans, and we get that from our memory verse, actually, right? They were trying to frustrate their plans. Um, the the man from the province of Trans Euphrates, which in our text is called the beyond the river, right? People from the province beyond the river came, challenged them, opposed them, then went to complain to the king, right? They sent a letter to the king. And long story short, they were told to stop working. And facing this challenge or this opposition, the the Israelites gave in and they completely stopped their work because they thought they hit an obstacle that was insurmountable, so they gave up. And 16 years passed between Ezra 4 and Ezra 5.

unknown 3:42

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SPEAKER_01 3:42

Since then, they have settled down, they have started building up their own houses, and they got complacent and they forgot about the house of God. And so, in the beginning of Ezra chapter 5, uh, I think it was on in a sermon preached two weeks back, uh, the prophets Haggai and Zechariah admonished and encouraged the Israelites. That's in verse 1 and 2 of chapter 5. Um, and the word of God, spoken through the prophets, woke their spirits up and they renewed their commitment to rebuild the temple. This time we are gonna try again, right? And that's where we are at this morning. We're gonna continue that that uh trajectory, and and so now they have restarted the project, and it is not long before the same thing happens to them, right? And just as a side note, what we read in Ezra chapter 5 and 6 follows the pattern of Ezra chapter 4, in how the story unfolds, in the words used, and then as we will see, five Ezra 5 and 6 now reverses the trend of Ezra chapter 4. And so we read in verses 3 and 4 of today's passage. At the same time, Tatanai, the governor of the province beyond the river, and Shetar Bozinai, and their associates came to them and spoke to them thus. Who gave you a decree to build this house and to finish this structure? They also asked them this what are the names of the men who are building this building? Uh this time is another governor now, it's the governor Tatanai and his associates, the whole gang coming down to meet the Israelites building. Um we don't know why they decided to come and at this time, right? Maybe the Samaritans were making noise again, maybe the governor was just doing their job, right? Uh whatever, whatever it is, this must have given the Israelites flashback from 16 years ago. Right? They just started building on it and then suddenly the same people coming from beyond the river to come and challenge us. Anyone with a defeatist mindset would probably think, man, this again, right? We just re it looks like we should not have restarted at all. Right? We should just pack it up and go home. Um but this time it was different, right? If we read on, we see that there was a change. Verse 5, and and this verse 5 is really quite key to this entire passage, right? Verse 5 says, but the eye of their God was on the elders of the Jews. Right? Importantly, God was watching over the elders. There was a special care for them as they were confronted by Tetanai. God protected them and they were able to stand firm in their conviction to rebuild the temple. And we are not told what really happened between them at this moment, right? Because at this moment, it is not an important thing for us to know what transpired. What is important for Ezra is to say that because God was watching over them, uh, the rest of uh verse 5, they did not stop them until the report should reach their ears, and then an answer be written by letter concerning it. Right? This is the most important thing for them to grasp. That because God was watching over them, God led them to a positive outcome, which must have been a huge encouragement to the Israelites, right? They responded to God's word with conviction and action, and now they can respond to Tatanai with confidence because God watched and acted on their behalf so that his purposes may be fulfilled in his people. So what did they exactly uh what did they tell Tatanai exactly? What got you know uh them the approval, right? We read about that in uh verses 11 to 16, right? It is a letter from Tatanai sent to Darius. Um it is a copy of the letter that they got, right? So they got the the word for word that Tatanai submitted to King Darius, and it was a very well-crafted response. One commentator says that it is a model for religious and political diplomacy, right? Um, it is really a testimony of their faith, first and foremost, and it also relied on historical documents that legitimizes uh their rebuilding project. So we'll we'll go into verse 11. Um and we read this was the the elders' reply to Tatanai and the officials. We are the servants of God of heaven and earth. They start by saying, We are the servants of the God of heaven and earth. And we are rebuilding the house that was built many years ago, which is which a great king of Israel built and finished. In their response, they start off with their primary or with their true identity. The servant of God.

unknown 9:02

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SPEAKER_01 9:02

They were sending a message to the officials that this is first and foremost about their devotion to the God whom they serve. And they proceed to give uh a history of their nation, but from a theological point, uh viewpoint, right? In verses 12 and 13, and because our fathers had angered the God of heaven, he gave them into the hand of Nebuchadnezzar, king of Babylon, the Cordion, who destroyed this house and carried away the people to Babylonia. However, in the first year of Cyrus, king of Babylon, Cyrus the king, made a decree that this house of God should be rebuilt. And so again, they make a theological point first, right? It is because their ancestors angered God that they were punished and handed over into the hand of Nebuchadnezzar. But also, we can notice that they were replying with a lot of tact and a lot of respect towards the Persian officials. Uh, they they were very clear and very careful with their words. It was Nebuchadnezzar who was the instrument for the destruction of their temple, right? But it was King Cyrus, the king of Persia, that was the instrument for the reconstruction of the temple. And the key issue here is that Cyrus made a decree that this house of God should be rebuilt. Right? Cyrus made a decree. And later on it becomes a very important detail for them because Tatanai will ask the king, please go and check your records and make sure that there was really a decree, right? And this will be their legal basis for rebuilding the temple. But for now, um the elders were explaining these things to them, right? And this explaining also that you know the gold and the silver vessels that Nebuchadnezzar brought out of the temple, you know, Cyrus gave us back, so we're gonna we uh we are we are kind of bringing them back in as well. And um that that spans 14 and 15, but I kind of want to focus now on on the last uh verse here uh on 16. Uh then this Shizbazar came and laid the foundations of the house of God that is in Jerusalem, and from the time until now it has been in building and it is not yet finished. And it's it's a very nice way to just end everything, you know. From the time of Cyrus, uh we started building already, and we just never finished, you know, 16 years later, we are still at it, but technically it is true. Technically, it is still in progress, and and it's it was it was a brilliant move, right? Because they were not just saying, Oh, of course, we are the people of God and we need to build a temple, you know. They were also saying, look, we understand we are under your uh rule, we got permission from King Cyrus, right? Go and check your records, and and we are just continuing this work, it has not been finished, it is now yet completed. Let us finish the work that your king uh has given us permission for. Right? They did not shy away from their identity as God's people, but they made it front and center in why they were rebuilding the temple. And yet at the same time, they were showing deference to the Persian officials. They understood that politically they were under the Persian rule and they knew how to appeal to them. They advocated for themselves on a legal and historical basis, and importantly, this time they stood firm in the face of questioning and opposition. And all this was done with the assurance that God called them to rebuild, and God will see to it that they will carry it through. And so, what can we learn from this passage this morning? And I really just have one point, but it's one really big point, which is which is uh that this passage passage this morning encourages us to press on amidst challenges, right? To press on when we face uh challenges. In Ezra chapter 5, we see Israel pressing on amidst challenges to their work. And the truth is the faithful people of God um have faced challenges of many kinds all through the ages. In the fourth century, there was this man by the name of Athanasius. Uh, he was a Christian theologian and he served the church in Alexandria. And he will later become the bishop of Alexandria. Uh during Athanasius' time, there was a huge controversy kicking up. Uh, this controversy was called Arianism, um, which held that Jesus was simply the first and greatest creation by God and not actually divine. Jesus is merely a creature and not God himself. Um, it was a heresy, right? And it was detrimental to the church at that time. Um and yet it was gaining foothold on many believers in the church, right? Uh it were it was supposed to have been settled in a council, uh, the council of Nicaea. And uh this is a council that produced the first version of what we now know uh as the Nicene Crete, right? When you talk about Nicene Creed, uh the first version of it came from this council, right? So that's why we have uh we believe in Jesus Christ, uh the only son of God, God from God, life from God, life, true God from true God, begotten, not made of one being with the Father, right? They were trying to battle Arianism, they were trying to stamp out this heresy. Um, so Barray is settled. The council of bishops came together and said, No, this is what we believe about Jesus. And yet, Arianism continued to spread within the church, and it was getting really bad. And Athanasius is at that time almost like the lone voice as a bishop speaking really loud against this heresy. Um, he wrote against it, he argued against it, and he defended the Orthodox faith that believes in the divinity of Jesus Christ. And because of that, and imagine, as a bishop for 48 years, he was exiled five times from his own city and not allowed to uh pastor his church as a bishop, exiled for five times. And each time he was exiled, he wouldn't give up. He will continue his devotion to the Lord, he will write letters to churches, he will meet up with leaders, and he will keep trying to return into Alexandria to establish orthodoxy there. And he did not allow oppositions. Um and these oppositions were at times coming from church leaders, even church members, sometimes from the emperor himself. Um, sometimes they were just saying uh lies about him, about how he he he uh molested a nun or something, you know, they were just coming out with all sorts of things to discredit him, right? He did not allow any of these oppositions to stop him from defending the faith as formulated in the Nicene Creed.

unknown 16:50

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SPEAKER_01 16:51

It's a man who pressed on in the face of challenges, and today we too face various challenges that uh hinder our faith. Right? Christians who come from a non-Christian uh family would know this that we that that you know uh at least the initial period is always full of uh oppositions and sometimes even persecution from family. We may be subjects of mockery to our friends, to our colleagues, who think that only fools will believe in a God. We may be deceived by the lies of the devil who tells us all the time that we are not good enough, that we don't deserve God's love, that we really should just give up on faith, we really should just give up on life, or at least just shut up about it. Don't speak a word, don't be an embarrassment to Christ. Or the devil tempts and distracts us so that we lose focus on God, we become complacent with our faith. We don't want to follow God's will for our lives, we just rather live the way we want to. Through all of this and other many challenges we may face, God calls us to stand firm and to press on. And verse 5 gives us the assurance and the encouragement to persevere, right? Because we know that the eye of God is on us. God has never lifted his eyes off any of us, and he is in fact always keeping watch over us, he's always involved in all the different areas of our lives. And because he's always keeping watch, we can have courage to live out his will, we can have confidence in his call for us. The sovereign Lord will lead us through the highs and lows of life and see to it that his purposes for us is fulfilled. And it is by this faith in the sovereign and vision of God that we can live faithfully and be present in the world today. And that's really why we want to press on. That is really why we don't want to just merely have this personal or private faith, right? Why we want to press on in our in our Christian walk out in this world so that we may be faithful and we may be present in the world. Um, and this was actually a huge lesson for Israel in the time of Ezra.

unknown 19:39

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SPEAKER_01 19:39

So coming back to this whole thing, why why press on? Why uh why continue something? Why why kind of make them restart this whole building project? Right? Let's remember, they in Ezra 4, they shrunk back from opposition. They were contented to just build their own houses, they were contented to just live their lives, right? Don't bother me with this church thing. You know, I don't I don't really want to, I mean, I just want to do the bare imam in church. Other than that, please don't ask me to do more. Um and just let me live my life, please. Just let me live my life, right? Um, they were neglecting the temple, the place of worship, the defining feature of their identity as God's people. They were leaving all of that aside. So God wakes them up with his word, right? And then allowed them to go through the same challenge again. Right? I I mean, previously I was saying Ezra 4, parallels Ezra 5 and 6. God essentially woke them up, and okay, you guys are gonna go through this yet again, right? Um, and why? Why is that this the case? They have to face opposition and come up with a response that is faithful and yet made sense to the officials, right? And there's a balance here between divine providence on the one hand and human agency on the other. Uh if I can have the next slide. Yeah. And they needed to essentially mature through the challenge that they will face uh from the Persian official. And yeah, if I can have the next slide. Um, if you all don't know, uh this is my daughter, Sage. Um so grown up already, right? I mean, I'm sure the many parents say, oh, so still, so still so young, still so cute. Like to me, wow, she's so grown up already, so fast. Uh, I'm getting quite scared. Um and I I I genuinely genuinely and and and quite quite quite fearful, to be to be uh honest with you. Um because deep down I I I keep asking myself this question like, how much should I control what Sage is exposed to? Um I used to tell this joke, I don't know whether it's a is a is a I mean I say this half jokingly. I used to say that it is actually quite easy to. It is quite easy to keep a baby alive, right? But it is very difficult to raise a child. Keeping her alive wasn't the difficult part. I was not scared of that. What worries me is how I am as a father am going to raise my child. And I mean there's this there's this innate need to try to control her environment. And when she was a little baby, you have to control her environment, right? We control almost every aspect of her life. What she is exposed to, what toys she plays with, make sure that she doesn't watch TV, what kind of food she eats, and all that, right? And she just started school this year, right? So already we've got to relinquish some control. Now she's going to school in the morning. Which, I mean, to my horror, she she picked up this song Baby Shark from school. So some days we have to play it on repeat for her, baby shark, uh, 2222. Oh, I cannot. And but you know, I mean, we love her, so uh what to do, right? Um and like, you know, honestly, as a parent, deep down there's this anxiety, almost almost an anxiety or a worry, um, about how to bring her up. And this this came into my heart even before she was born. Um and now I'm I'm already thinking that as she grows older, she'll need to exercise more and more of her agency. Because she will be the one interacting with the world and with the people around her. I cannot do that for her. She has to do it herself. And the thing on the top of her mind is always this: what can I impart to her to help her navigate, navigate through this world faithfully and wisely? How do I do that? Oh, by the way, that's why we name her Sage, right? Which means wise, right? How do we help her to be wise? You know, uh, such a huge burden for parents, right? Um, how do I help her mature and become a confident person? Right? It will not come by me sheltering her. It will not come by by me being a bulldozer parent, right? Just clear all the obstacles, make sure she has all the success in her life, and and then that she will show uh she will show live a happy life, right? Because that is not what the real world is. There will come a point where I cannot shelter her. I cannot keep her from being exposed to certain things. I cannot clear obstacles for her. She is bound to face these challenges, oppositions, and obstacles, and she will have to figure out her faith for herself, figure out what her core values, what she believes in, and whether she has the conviction and the will to stand firm and to press on. And it is what God was really doing with Israel in Ezra chapter 5, right? And what he's doing with us today. Because on the one hand, we know he watches, he intervenes, right? He provides, he strengthens. God is there and he works in us and through us and for us, right? And on the other hand, he lets Israel go through the same thing that got them so discouraged in the first place. Right? Israel had to go through the process of learning how to be God's people, especially in a place where they were not an autonomous people. They were not their own nation. They have to navigate their life as a nation and as a people of God in a country where they were ruled by foreign gods, uh, foreign, well, foreign powers, and there are foreign gods around. There are competing religious perspectives around them. And so God needed them to mature, needed them to learn how to navigate through such a world, how to press on when challenges come from this world. Right? And it is only by the struggles, by the opposition, that they grew spiritually and their faith deepened as they came to focus and rely more and more on God. And today we should be thankful that our nation is multireligious, and there's religious freedom in Singapore. We should really be thankful about that. But we also remember that this is a secular state. Societies like ours and elsewhere in the world, um, they are in fact trending towards being irreligious, right? As we see uh this sustained increase in the uh number of people who associate themselves with uh uh having no religion. This we call them the rise of the religious nuns, N-O-N-E, not N-U-N-L, N-O-N-E, the rise of the religious nuns, right? Um societies all across the world, this is getting more and more secular, right? Um and the reality is we we can simply we can just be content, we can just be complacent, we can just live out our lives, you know, building our own houses, right, and call it a day. But that's not what God has called us to do. As if faith really should be just a privatized affair. We are to build the house of God, we have to demonstrate our faith and our worship uh invisible ways through our living. And the more we try to do that, the more obstacles, challenges, roadblocks, and oppositions we will face. And so the word of God in Ezra 5 reminds us today to stand firm and to press on amidst these challenges, but to do so uh in a very wise way, to do so reasonably, right? So that we may be winsome, so that, and so that others may be charitable to our faithful perspective. Um, very quickly, Jesus gives us a similar warning and encouragement in Matthew 10. Um in Matthew 10, he says that you know, I'm sending out uh sending you out uh as sheep in the midst of wolves, and persecution is to be expected. And so he says this uh in verse 16 we are to be wise as serpents and innocent as doves, right? Wise as serpents to know the playbook well, to understand our legal rights, to know how to appeal to other to the other who don't share our perspective. Right? We are taught to be wise as serpents, but to be innocent as doves, never antagonizing, never harming others. Jesus continues to tell his disciples to not fear those who can kill the body but cannot kill the soul.

unknown 29:08

Right?

SPEAKER_01 29:09

Part of the fear is always like, well, what if they do this to me? What if they do something to my career? What if they do something to my family?

unknown 29:15

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SPEAKER_01 29:16

But do not fear what can kill the body but not kill the soul. Rather, fear him who can destroy both body and soul in hell. And so we do well to remember, as the Israelites did, that we are servants of the God of heaven and earth, the one who can destroy both body and soul in hell. And that this Almighty God keeps a watchful eye on all our lives. So have no fear. You know, just as uh God tells Joshua repeatedly in the book of Joshua, have I not commanded you, be strong and courageous, do not be frightened and do not be dismayed, for the Lord your God is with you wherever you go. So, church, may we see all our challenges and our circumstances through the eyes of faith, having the assurance that God has called us to do his will and is keeping watch over us. May we have the courage to press on and persevere, to have the zeal to testify our faith without fear or shame, and the wisdom and wit to navigate the challenges in ways that are above reproach, witness and glorify to God.

SPEAKER_00 30:33

We pray that you've been ministered to by the Word of God today. If you'd like to know more about each Christian church, please visit our website at yccanglican.com. Have a blessed day.