In this post you will find our 2 download or streaming audio files available to you:

“To Be Like Ezra” Which is an Expository Study of encouragement and application, to be like Ezra the ready scribe.  

Aswell as Our Call to Worship, congregational prayers and readings are primarily from the KJV.

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Message:

To Be Like Ezra

OR

Page for Streaming Message – You can follow along with study notes below!

Delivered on grego. 8-24-2023

Our Call to Worship, congregational prayers and readings are primarily from the KJV.
and
Our Praise and Worship
is from
The 1650 Scottish Metrical Psalter (SMP)
What does our church’s Reformed Worship look like?

• A Call to Worship the LORD YHWH together
• Prayer guided by the direct words of Scripture
• The Singing of the Psalms and Hymns contained in God’s Words (and none other)
• Responsive and joint Scripture readings
• A convocated Reading of the Law / Torah / Pentateuch (Old Testament Lesson)
• The Hearing of the Gospel (New Testament Lesson).
• A Message from the Elder (Bible study teaching sermon)
• Confessions and creeds from the scripture directly,
• Frequent use in recital of the 10 Commandments and Lord’s Prayer
• An affirmation of the fellowship and instruction which we have through the acknowledgment and forgiveness of sin from scriptures such as 1 John and Psalm 103 which teach forgiveness of sin and fellowship with Father Son and Spirit through repentance.
• The use of the Historical Apostles Creed to confirm our commitment to the historically United Christian Gospel every mid-month service
• The use of the Historic Athanasian Creed to confirm our functional trinitarian faith and knowledge at the beginning of every month at our evening New Moon Service.
• Liturgical biblical calendar remembrances in time as recorded in scripture

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These Study notes below are Interactive with E-Sword! – FREE DOWN LOAD HERE

THEN: Just cut and paste into you E-Sword topic notes

Compiled by JS LOWTHER
renewedcovenantministry.com
renewedcovenantministry@gmail.com 

 

Ezr 7:6  This Ezra went up from Babylon; and he was a ready scribe in the law of Moses, which the LORD God of Israel had given: and the king granted him all his request, according to the hand of the LORD his God upon him.
Ezr 7:7  And there went up some of the children of Israel, and of the priests, and the Levites, and the singers, and the porters, and the Nethinims, unto Jerusalem, in the seventh year of Artaxerxes the king.
Ezr 7:8  And he came to Jerusalem in the fifth month, which was in the seventh year of the king.
Ezr 7:9  For upon the first day of the first month began he to go up from Babylon, and on the first day of the fifth month came he to Jerusalem, according to the good hand of his God upon him.
Ezr 7:10  For Ezra had prepared his heart to seek the law of the LORD, and to do it, and to teach in Israel statutes and judgments.

Now of the underappriciated charicters of the Bible, I believe Ezra is certainly one.

But of all the people of Scripture he has a liturgical rememberance assigned to him for this month, and while his day could be the last new moon, the first day, I would like to focus upon him today rather, as this statement concerning Ezra’s dispossition is such a testamony for all days of all ages in Christian adversity.

The 2 statements I’d like to exercise are these:
Ezr_7:6
1. ..he was a ready scribe in the law of Moses, which the LORD God of Israel had given:

2. the king granted him all his request, according to the hand of the LORD his God upon him.

Ezr_7:10
3. For Ezra had prepared his heart to seek the law of the LORD,
4. and to do it,
5. and to teach in Israel statutes and judgments.

What a sticking statment every one of these 5 points concerning this charicter Ezra that we have.

1. Point that Ezra… was a ready scribe in the law of Moses, which the LORD God of Israel had given.
Is a statment in and of it self concerning Ezra’s charicter, and Ezra’s doctrine

a. Ezra is said to be ‘ready’ H4106 or skilful in the sense of prepared and this is applied to the work of a scribe,
The LXX says takh-oos’ G5036 or quick, swift, no differently than we se the word today in speaking of an intelligent fast witted, sharp thinking person ‘he’s quick’
and this is applied to the work of a scribe.

Now a scribe is a writer and a reader of scripture. especially one who copied the the Law, and Prophets and Israel’s history and wisdom books. And so Ezra was not only gramaticly sharp or quick and ready, prepared for such a task as a scribe, but he was especially focused in his grammatical readiness as devoted to “the law of Moses, which the LORD God of Israel had given”

Now this is important because this distinguishes Ezra’s doctrine.

Ezra is not interested in the traditions of the elders, of the oral traditions of the Babylonian Jews of Judah who would lay the foundation for the Talmud, no, the focus of Ezra’s ministry is one of devotion to the Law of Moses, specifically “which the LORD God of Israel had given”.

Ezra was not just a leader and pioneer he was a reformed.
This statement isolates his readiness and focus as one who cares about only what YHWH God spoke to Moses, and purity of it transcribed. But as we see that was not all Ezra had done with his readiness, as Ezr_7:10  points out in 3 points we will handle alone also.

3. Ezra had prepared his heart to seek the law of the LORD,
4. and to do it,
5. and to teach in Israel statutes and judgments.

So, Ezra’s doctrine systematically and infectiously affected his person, his heart, his deeds and his intentions.

We’ll get back to this.

Let’s look at the wholistic Ezra’s life, and how Pro_21:1 is here exercised upon King Artaxes
Pro_21:1 The king’s heart is in the hand of the LORD, as the rivers of water: he turneth it whithersoever he will.
as our 2nd point is:
2. the king granted him all his request, according to the hand of the LORD his God upon him.

Here we do not see Ezra with our God’s help, but here we also do not see the willingness and reediness of Ezra to request a granting.
In other words, Ezra was not sitting around doing nothing. No he petitioned, and pled before the king and ‘the king granted him all his request.’

Yet this was done only “according to the hand of the LORD his God upon him.”

Now what the following letter tells us is that the King acknowledges the readiness and holiness of Ezra and grants him money and stock and people to return to Jerusalem to establish the law and to offer sacrifices.

What a thing for a Babylonian king to do, and what an upright man Ezra must have been.
And yet the testimony of Ezra is not one of deception but of a man who undoubtedly was seen to direct his ways in the site of the king as one who was devoted the Law of his God:

Ezr 7:12  Artaxerxes, king of kings, unto Ezra the priest, a scribe of the law of the God of heaven, perfect peace, and at such a time.
Ezr 7:13  I make a decree, that all they of the people of Israel, and of his priests and Levites, in my realm, which are minded of their own freewill to go up to Jerusalem, go with thee.
Ezr 7:14  Forasmuch as thou art sent of the king, and of his seven counsellors, to enquire concerning Judah and Jerusalem, according to the law of thy God which is in thine hand…

 

Ezr_7:10
3. For Ezra had prepared his heart to seek the law of the LORD,
4. and to do it,
5. and to teach in Israel statutes and judgments.