THE PREACHER:
J. A. Motyer is Vice-Principal of Clifton Theological College, Bristol. Born in Ireland, he won many prizes during his studies at Dublin University, of which he is a graduate in Arts and Divinity. He was ordained in the Church of England in 1947 and was engaged in parish work for several years before joining the Clifton staff as tutor in 1950. Mr. Motyer is well known as a preacher and as a lecturer, and is the author of two books: The Revelation of the Divine Name and Introducing the Old Testament.
THE TEXT:
Ezra 7:10
For Ezra had set his heart to seek the law of the LORD, and to do it, and to teach in Israel statutes and judgments.
THE SERIES
This is the eleventh sermon of our 1962 series in which CHRISTIANITY TODAY has presented messages from preachers in the United Kingdom and on the continent of Europe whose public proclamations God has greatly blessed. A sermon next month by the Rev. James Philip, Minister of Holyrood Abbey, Church of Scotland, Edinburgh, and known particularly in Britain to evangelical student audiences, will conclude the series. In 1963, CHRISTIANITY TODAY will publish sermons by Asian Christian workers.
It is the ambition of every citizen, whether God has placed on him the special responsibility of the ordained ministry or the inescapable responsibility of service and testimony, to know the power of God, honoring and blessing his work. This was the happy experience of Ezra. Did he seek to interest others in the work of God? God prospered him (7:6). Did he engage in some specific act of service? God prospered him (7:9). Did he require special endowment for special service? God gave it to him (7:28). Did he seek gifted colleagues? God called them out (8:18). Did he need the presence and power of God to face dangers in God’s work and to be brought through victoriously? God was with him and kept him (8:22, 31). The words the Book of Ezra uses to describe this experience of God’s power in life and ministry are these: the hand of God was upon him. As with us, so in the Bible, the “hand” is not vague power, but power specifically applied to chosen tasks. God saw to it—so we learn—that his power was deliberately made available to this man. He knew the reality which we covet so much for ourselves, and which we need so desperately for our Christian testimony.
The Precondition Of Blessing
The story of Ezra, however, is not set in the Bible merely to illustrate the fact of a divinely empowered life, but also to tell us the reason why Ezra was so blessed by God. The explanation is given in the words of our text. Reading through from verse 9, we see that this is indeed so: “… The good hand of his God was upon him. For [because] Ezra had set his heart.…” We are taught, to be precise, that the blessing of God resting upon a man is no accident. However much we rejoice in that independence of divine action which the Scriptures exalt (such that God cannot be coerced or cajoled into distributing his favors but, on the contrary, bestows them with absolutely sovereign freedom), nevertheless there is a “because” written into the story of Ezra in order to warn us that we are by no means permitted to relapse into any slothful complacency if we discern a lack of power evident in our service for God. We dare not sit back and say, “God will bless as and when he will”—true though that statement is in its own place. Ezra was blessed by God “because” certain things were true in his life, and this fact has been written by God in Holy Scripture for our learning.
The blessing of God, as Ezra knew it, was related, not to certain techniques, but to a certain character. In the work which he was called to do, it was open to Ezra to achieve his objectives through external equipment. A word to the king would have brought every needful worldly guarantee of power and security (8:22). Ezra deliberately rejected this procedure. It was not in terms of techniques or external methods that he was to know the reality of God’s power, but rather this truth proved itself in his experience, that the blessing of God attends a man of a certain character. We read of him (7:10), that he “set his heart.” The blessing of God which openly rested upon him, which gave him every ability for the task, which provided him with helpers, and protected him from foes—this all-embracing divine empowering was related to the hidden factor, the state of Ezra’s heart.
This is a general truth of Holy Scripture, and not an exclusive experience of Ezra, and it will be worthwhile to step aside from the history of one man to see the same principle at work on a broader canvas. Gideon was a man whom God blessed mightily. He was raised up by God to rid the land of a pestilential foe; he knew the power of God resting upon him to such an extent that an army too great to number fled in terror and confusion. And yet the latter end of Gideon was a personal disgrace, and a public tragedy. He made an ephod (Judges 8:27) which “became a snare unto Gideon,” and “as soon as Gideon was dead, … the children of Israel turned again, and went a whoring after Baalim” (Judges 8:33). The explanation is contained in the same passage. The people offered Gideon the throne after his great victory, and his refusal was a mighty testimony to the kingship of God (Judges 8:23). Outwardly there was not any reason why the power of God departed from this man, but inwardly? What of the state of his heart? Sometime after his refusal of the throne, Gideon had a son (8:31), and called his name “Abimelech”—“My father is king.” The testimony of the lips found no echoing response from the hidden man of the heart, apparently, and the power of God ceased to be a reality of experience.
Again, David was a man whom God blessed marvelously. But the same principle of divine working is evidenced. On the day of David’s initial anointing to be king, Samuel was impressed by other candidates, but he learned by what assessment the Lord measures a man: “… The LORD seeth not as man seeth; for man looketh on the outward appearance, but the LORD looketh on the heart.… And the Spirit of the LORD came upon David from that day forward …” (1 Sam. 16:7, 13). The Lord found David “a man after my heart” (Acts 13:22). Is it any wonder, therefore, that the wisdom of God commands a special watchfulness over the heart: “Keep thy heart with all diligence; for out of it are the issues of life” (Prov. 4:23)?
A Purposeful Heart
Returning now to take up the study of Ezra, we notice that it is specifically the purposeful state of his heart that is mentioned. We might rephrase the literal translation “set his heart,” and read as follows: “Ezra had adopted it as his deliberate purpose.” The “heart” does not stand only for the general character of the man in its inner aspects, but also and particularly for the whole set and direction of his life as determined by those inner factors. Ezra was bent to a deliberate purpose. It is definitely worth noting that it was because of divine approval of the purpose that the blessing followed. The hand of God was upon him because he so made it his determination. God does not bless people because of their accomplishments, but because of their aspirations.
What was Ezra’s purpose? The verse (Ezra 7:10) sets it out as possessing three facets.
1. Ezra purposed a mind instructed in God’s Word: “Ezra … set his heart to seek the law of the LORD.…”
We do well to pause when we see the Bible using a word which we would not normally employ in the given context. We might have said here, for example, that Ezra purposed to study, or to read, or to understand, the law of the Lord, but the Bible says “to seek” it. The same verb is used of people coming deliberately and purposefully to a certain place, and returning there time and again (Deut. 12:5, ff.); likewise it is used of people setting out to “inquire” into mysteries and to find the solution (2 Chron. 32:31); and also it is used of peoples “inquiring” of the Lord so that they may order their lives aright (1 Kings 22:5). This is surely all involved in Ezra’s attention to the law of the Lord: the time he deliberately and purposefully set aside in order to be found there; the intensity of enquiry whereby his reading was no superficial glossing of the surface but a penetration into its meaning in depth; the submissiveness whereby his life was ordered by its precepts. Ezra purposed to seek the law of the Lord. The same recipe for spiritual prosperity was given by the Lord to Joshua: “… Meditate therein day and night, … for then thou shalt make thy way prosperous …” (Josh. 1:8), and Scripture exalts it into a general principle of godly life, for we read in Psalm 1 that the “blessed” man not only possesses the negative characteristics of verse 1, but also possesses as his sole positive distinguishing mark that “in his law doth he meditate day and night,” with the result that (verse 3) “whatsoever he doeth shall prosper.”
2. Ezra purposed a will submissive to God’s Word: “Ezra … set his heart … to do it.…”
We noted that, in principle, this submission of the will was involved in a true “seeking” of the law. But here it is plainly stated. Ezra triumphed where we so frequently fail. He possessed that true knowledge of God which, far from remaining a mere item in the contents of his head, powerfully conditioned his manner of life. How often our plea, on our knees, is that God will not allow his Word to return void, and how often our testimony is that the Word of the Lord is quick and powerful, and how often our lives are standing denials of this truth! The primary mark of the outward life of the man of God, the mark of obedience, was found upon Ezra. He purposed no trifling with God. He came before the law of the Lord to be briefed for the day, and he purposed solemnly and deliberately that what he found there he would practice.
3. Ezra purposed a tongue filled with God’s Word: “Ezra … set his heart … to teach … statutes and judgments.”
He apparently wanted to have the reputation for spiritual conversation. The statutes of the Lord, the categorical commands which God has set for the unconditional obedience of his people, and the judgments of the Lord, the particular applications of the law to special situations—these would exhaust the contents of Ezra’s vocabulary. On this he set his heart. The sequence in which Ezra’s ambitions are placed before us is notable: first, there is the mind stocked with divine truth, and then, secondly, the life conformed to divine truth, and then, thirdly, the testimony. The spoken word demands a double foundation: a hidden foundation in the biblically tutored mind; and a public foundation in the biblically framed life. Do we wonder that the blessing of God attended Ezra, and that the blessing of God is so often absent from our public utterance? Have we secured the necessary double undergirding for our testimony? We may say that these are the absolute essentials for authoritative and convincing declaration of God’s truth.
Dangers Avoided
We have concentrated so far on a positive examination of the text. We have seen that it sets out to explain why it was that God blessed Ezra as He did; we have noted that God’s scrutiny is directed towards the inner man of the heart; we have been taught that it is the purpose of the heart which, humanly speaking, explains the setting of the hand of God upon a person’s life and work; and the contents of that purpose have been Clearly stated for our warning and learning. But in conclusion we may profitably turn to a negative examination of the verse, and ask this question: By adopting this as his deliberate purpose, what dangers did Ezra avoid? They are three in number:
1. Ezra avoided the danger of neglecting what was familiar.
He had a great and covetable reputation, which is accorded to him six times over in this chapter (verses 6, 11, 12, 14, 21, 25): he was thoroughly versed in the law of God. This was the reputation which lived on, so that when the book of Ezra was written this was what the historian recorded of him; the same reputation was his in the presence of the king whom he served in Babylon. And it was this man, with all that store of knowledge of God’s Word, who made it his deliberate purpose “to seek the law of the LORD.” Without question, it would have been easy—indeed “natural,” according to the bent of our sinful nature—to say: I know all that; why bother any further with it? Not so with Ezra. He knew the Word, and he gave himself to the study and absorption and obedience of the Word.
It would be easy to overpress small indications here, but as a matter of fact the verses which speak of Ezra’s knowledge of the law of God also speak inferentially about the law itself: that it had its origin in the Lord (verses 6, 11, 21), and that its content was nothing less than the wisdom of God (verses 11, 14, 25), a book supernatural in its inception and in its teaching.
Was this why Ezra valued it so, and why, in the abundance of his knowledge of it, he yet “sought” it? Since this is our testimony about Scripture also, let us follow Ezra in avoiding the danger of neglecting what is familiar.
2. Ezra avoided the danger of mere head knowledge.
The Bible would refuse the name “knowledge” to anything which merely resided in the intellect and was not carried over into daily life. Ezra surely could have boasted of “head-knowledge” of the law, and even have contented himself with it. But he purposed for himself a knowledge properly so called, the knowledge which leads to “doing” the law. In a striking verse (1 Sam. 2:12) we read that “the sons of Eli were sons of Belial.” What a condemnation of the home of that godly man! What a challenge and warning to Christian parents! But why were they of such a character? We read that “they knew not the Lord.” Yet they were the priests of their day. They were full of information about the Lord; they were the teachers of their generation; they “knew” more than anyone else. But they did not know the Lord; they lacked that which the Bible would recognize as knowledge, for what they “knew” exercised no influence on their lives. When a man is not a hearer only but a doer, then he truly knows.
3. Ezra avoided the danger of novelty.
We read that he purposed to teach “in Israel” statutes and judgments. It was his earnest purpose to take to people who knew it already the same old teaching about God and his law. Ezra ministered in a critical day. The people of God stood at a real turning point in their history. They were an oppressed, downcast minority. They needed above all things some new enthusiasm, some injection of new vigor, some fresh vision. And Ezra came to apply the old balm. He purposed to say nothing new, but faithfully to minister “truth unchanged, unchanging.”
The spirit of the age, and the spirit of the carnal church, is always that of Athens, “to tell, or hear some new thing” (Acts 17:21)—surely this point of view did not lack exponents in Ezra’s time. If it did, then the moment was indeed unique! There are always voices crying out for a new law anew morality, a new God (e.g., Isa. 30:9–11); there are always those to urge that new situations cannot be solved but by new solutions. This is the constant pressure on the worker for God, and the constant danger he undergoes. Fail here, and we fail everywhere. Our message must never be dictated by the situation, or by pressures arising from the situation. Rather, like Ezra, and Ezekiel, and everyone who has stood in the succession of true servants of God, we must say, “… Thus saith the Lord GOD; whether they will hear, or whether they will forbear” (Ezek. 3:11).
END
