Nehemiah 4-6

Their enemies taunted those rebuilding Jerusalem and threatened them physically. Nehemiah ensured the safety of the workers by taking precautions so that no one was working without being guarded by someone else prepared for battle. Then in chapter 5 he had to deal with internal strife between the rich and poor. The richer were lending money to those less fortunate with interest rates attached. Nehemiah challenged them to return the people’s property and land and they agreed. Nehemiah also refused to accept his due as governor because the people were hard pressed.

Nehemiah was continually under threat and the schemes of their enemies but he refused to waver from his mission. The wall was completed in 52 days and “When all our enemies heard about this, all the surrounding nations were afraid and lost their self-confidence, because they realized that this work had been done with the help of our God” (6:16).

Nehemiah 1-3

This book begins with Nehemiah’s discovery that Jerusalem still lies in ruins with her gates burned and wall broken down. In serving as cupbearer to the king he appeared sad and King Artaxerxes asked what was wrong. Nehemiah explained the situation and offered a quick prayer to God before requesting that he be sent to Jerusalem to rebuild the city. The king granted his permission and Nehemiah returned with letters authorising him to rebuild.

“But when Sanballat the Horonite, Tobiah the Ammonite official and Geshem the Arab heard about it, they mocked and ridiculed us. ‘What is this you are doing?’ they asked. ‘Are you rebelling against the king?’ I answered them by saying, ‘The God of heaven will give us success. We his servants will start rebuilding, but as for you, you have no share in Jerusalem or any claim or historic right to it’” (2:19-20). The descendants of these various groups are fighting over Jerusalem to this day. I find it very interesting that 2400+ years ago Nehemiah would make the claim that these other parties have no claim or historic right to the city.
Chapter 3 records the names of the various parties who were instrumental in rebuilding the city walls and gates. No doubt those mentioned were very proud of the job they accomplished and the speed at which it happened.

Ezra 7-10

This section records the journey of Ezra and many Jews to Jerusalem as commanded by the king. Ezra makes the frank admission: “I was ashamed to ask the king for soldiers and horsemen to protect us from enemies on the road, because we had told the king, ‘The gracious hand of our God is on everyone who looks to him, but his great anger is against all who forsake him.’ So we fasted and petitioned our God about this, and he answered our prayer” (8:22f). They arrived safely and were aided by the local officials in response to the king’s command.

Chapter 9 deals with the sin of the people who were intermarrying with the local people and taking on their despicable practices as a result. Ezra expresses his dismay at this sinfulness because they have seemingly not learned anything from the exile. The whole group gathered and a decision was made to put away the foreign wives. The problem was quite widespread and chapter 10 concludes with a lengthy list of those engaged in this practice. This seems harsh by our standards especially in light of 1 Corinthians 7 but it seems that the very survival of the people was at stake.

Canadians donated $8.19 billion to charities in 2008

The statistics for 2008 have been released which show that Canadians donated $8.19 billion to charity in 2008. This is a drop of 5.3 per cent from 2007. It was also the lowest annual donation figure since 2005 when $7.9 billion was given. Of course the recession is being blamed for this drop in giving. Personally I think that rising costs for everything from food to gas to housing had a lot to do with it. Here in BC our giving was down 5.6% with the median amount being $340. For a break down by province check out this CBC article.

Quote of the day – Shane & Chris

“The divorce rate of evangelical Christians now surpasses that of the rest of the population in the United States. Evangelicals are getting divorced, and gay folks are wanting to get married, and religionists keep accusing homosexuals of destroying the family. Yikes” (233).

Shane Claiborne and Chris Haw, Jesus for President: Politics for Ordinary Radicals. Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 2008. 9780310278429.

This is a rather controversial book but I think he raises a good point although I have only before heard that the divorce rates are the same, not that Evangelicals are divorcing in even higher numbers than others. If Evangelicals as a whole were forced to choose between NO DIVORCE on any grounds and HOMOSEXUAL MARRIAGE on any grounds I am pretty sure what the result would be. The statistics speak clearly to the fact that we would be willing to accept someone else’ sin before giving up our own. I wonder why 72% of those outside the church think it is full of hypocrites?

Unfortunately, we don’t seem to care that God was pretty clear on his feelings about divorce: “’I hate divorce,’ says the LORD God of Israel, ‘and I hate it when people clothe themselves with injustice,’ says the LORD Almighty” (Malachi 2:16). It isn’t too often in the Bible that God declared he hated things. Many people seem to think that Jesus would be easier going than that but he was pretty clear on the issue of divorce as well: “I tell you that anyone who divorces his wife, except for sexual immorality, and marries another woman commits adultery” (Mt 19:9//Mk 10:11-12; Lk 16:18). I guess only certain verses are supposed to be taken “literally” at “face value.”

Why is there such a disconnect between belief and action in the Evangelical church? In our own lives? If this concerns you read today’s post linking to an article on Francis Chan and read Forgotten God!

Francis Chan in Christianity Today

Brandon, John. “Crazy Passion: Francis Chan keeps pushing and pushing to make more and more disciples.” Christianity Today. 10/16/2009 09:53AM.

A couple of days ago Christianity Today published an article about Francis Chan, author of Crazy Love and Forgotten God, both of which I have reviewed recently. It focuses on his personal story and his current endeavour to start a different kind of church that mixes the house church and large group gathering church together. He is moving from Simi Valley into the more populous regions of LA.

I’m glad to hear that he still believes in the larger church and it will be interesting to see how the two can be combined. I don’t know of any house church movements that have been overly successful in North America but I look forward to something that goes beyond the small group model. What he’s doing kind of sounds like the Korean model which would be good if it can create the passion for God which is his goal.

Quote(s) of the day – William Carey

Today we have a humorous quote from our good friend William Carey and his book that shaped the world of Protestant missions:

“It is well known to require no very extraordinary talents to learn, in the space of a year, or two at most, the language of any people upon the earth, so much of it at least, as to be able to convey any sentiments we wish to their understandings.”

If you believe that I have about 1000 ESL folks I would like to introduce you to. It is well known that they slip back into their native tongue when they have something really sentimental to convey. Perhaps people were just that much more talented back then!

And now for a bonus quote – “If congregations were to open subscriptions of one penny, or more per week, according to their circumstances and deposit it as a fund for the propagation of the Gospel, much might be raised this way” or at least enough for a small coffee every three years.

How well do you see colour?

How well do you see colour?; Or perhaps how good is your computer monitor? This website allows you to arrange colours in order and then scores your ability to distinguish them. It will display which colours you had trouble with and then rate you according to your age and gender. I scored a 24 on my laptop with 0 being a perfect score and 99 being poor. Either me or my monitor has trouble in the green spectrum and the middle of the purple spectrum. Given that I was perfect elsewhere I will blame the monitor .

Happy arranging.

Ezra 4-6

The local people opposed the return of Judah and Benjamin and spoke against them, attempting to discourage them and stop the work. Chapter 4 contains a letter written by them to King Artaxerxes in which they warned that the Hebrews would rebel once Jerusalem was rebuilt. King Artaxerxes was indeed concerned and ordered the work stopped. Later, during Darius’ reign Zerubbabel and Joshua began rebuilding the temple and again the local authorities wrote to the emperor. This time they included the Hebrew response to their accusations which was that Cyrus had ordered the temple rebuilt. The record was found in Ecbatana rather than Babylon because this was Cyrus’ Median capital and the summer palace of later kings.

After reading Cyrus’ original decree Darius ordered that the Trans-Euphrates district pay for the temple construction and provide anything needed, including daily food rations. “Furthermore, I decree that if anyone defies this edict, a beam is to be pulled from their house and they are to be impaled on it. And for this crime their house is to be made a pile of rubble” (6:11). The modern practice of Israel destroying the homes of suicide bombers thus has a long history. The work went ahead and the temple was completed on the third day of the month Adar, in the sixth year of the reign of King Darius. The people celebrated with a dedication and priestly instillation. Then in the first month Passover was again celebrated.

Ezra 1-3

Ezra begins by stating the decree of Cyrus to return the people to Jerusalem and build a temple to God there. To facilitate this he returned 5,400 articles of gold and of silver that Nebuchadnezzar had brought to Babylon along with the exiles. The second chapter lists the totals of the men of Judah who returned, including priests, Levites, and temple workers. It also mentions that there were a number of men who could not prove they were of Hebrew descent, including some from among the priestly families. They were restricted from eating the sacred food until their heritage could be established.

When they arrived back in Jerusalem their first task was to rebuild an altar to God and perform the twice daily sacrifices. They reinstituted the seasonal festivals and holy days and performed the obligatory rites. As they were able they laid the foundation for a new temple. Those who had seen the former temple were apparently distraught at seeing the foundation of the new one while others celebrated wholeheartedly to be in Jerusalem and able to build another temple.