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Hello, my ‘Walking with Jesus’ friends,
Have you ever stood in a place which has a dramatic history? Did you stand there looking around awed by what you understood had taken place there many years, perhaps centuries before? Join me again in Jerusalem 2000 years ago as the wonderful and traditional Jewish “Shavuot” (Pentecost) festival had become a radical, chaotic, spiritual revolution!
For the past few days, we’ve joined that dramatic, historic event recorded for us in Acts 2. The Holy Spirit of God had come from heaven in great power and anointed the followers of Jesus, who then spoke the Gospel of Jesus in languages they did not know, but languages well known by the Jewish pilgrims who had come to Jerusalem from the far reaches of the Roman empire.
3000 of those people had responded to Peter’s explanation and placed their full trust in Jesus as their Messiah and been baptized as their declaration of allegiance to Jesus Christ as their Savior and Lord! (Acts 2:1-41)
Yesterday we looked closely at what the Holy Spirit did, in these new followers of Jesus, to launch a spiritual movement in Jerusalem as they gathered together often, driven by a passion to learn from the apostles, all they could about Jesus. (Acts 2:42-47)
They shared generously with each other whatever was needed and enjoyed an outpouring of God’s blessing upon them. I think it’s fair to say nothing like this had been seen in Jerusalem for a very long time! At least not for about 500 years.
But I wonder if some people in that wonderful, chaotic, spiritual revolution of Acts 2, were thinking back to what their ancestors told them had happened in that very same place, Jerusalem, about 5 centuries before?
Today, let’s go back in time to 538bc and join another great, historic experience. Let’s resume the remarkable story where I left you about 6 weeks ago. Daniel the prophet of God in Babylon was a very old man and discovered God’s promise through Jeremiah that thousands of Jewish captives in Babylon would be set free and permitted to return to broken down Jerusalem, to rebuild their home city!
Daniel wrote: “In the first year of Darius the Mede who was made ruler over the Babylonian kingdom, I Daniel understood from the Scriptures, according to the word of the LORD given to Jeremiah the prophet, that the devastation of Jerusalem would last seventy years. So, I turned to the LORD in prayer and petition, in fasting and in sackcloth and ashes…” (Daniel 9:1-3)
In addition to his profound prayer, which Daniel recorded in Daniel 9:4-20, Daniel also requested an audience with King Cyrus, the Persian emperor over the entire Medo-Persian empire, which covered a vast amount of the known world at that time. The Babylonian Kingdom was but a small part of the vast Medo-Persian empire.
Evidently, Daniel explained to King Cyrus that Almighty God, the God of Israel, had named King Cyrus, by name, in Isaiah’s prophecy more than 150 years earlier! (Is. 44:24-28) Furthermore, Isaiah prophesied that Cyrus would release the Jewish captives, allowing them to return home to Israel and rebuild their city Jerusalem. In addition, the prophet Jeremiah had also predicted God would lead the released Jewish captives back to rebuild God’s great Temple in Jerusalem which had been demolished by King Nebuchadnezzar about 70 years earlier! (Jeremiah 29:10-14) Can you imagine Cyrus’ excitement as Daniel opened God’s Scriptures to him?
King Cyrus did issue that historic decree as recorded in the closing words of 2 Chronicles. “In the first year of Cyrus, king of the Persian empire, in order to fulfill the word of the LORD spoken by Jeremiah the prophet, the LORD moved the heart of King Cyrus to make a proclamation throughout his realm and also to put it in writing: ‘This is what Cyrus king of Persia proclaims: ‘the LORD, the God of heaven, has given me all the kingdoms of the earth and He has appointed me to build a temple for Him at Jerusalem in Judah. Any of His people among you may go up and may the LORD their God be with them!” (2 Chronicles 36:22,23)
Ezra the priest, in his record of this event adds this to the historic, miraculous proclamation of King Cyrus: “And in any locality where survivors may now be living, the people are to provide them with silver and gold and with goods and livestock, and freewill offerings for the temple of God in Jerusalem!” (Ezra 1:4) Can you imagine, as news of this edict spread across the Babylonian kingdom, how the excitement of the Jewish captives would have been very similar to what we’ve witness in Jerusalem, when the Holy Spirit launched the city changing spiritual movement we’ve looked at in Acts 2?
And for any Jews who had remained in or been born in demolished Jerusalem during those 70 years, can you imagine their excitement to hear both Jerusalem and God’s Temple were about to be rebuilt with God’s blessing and the supply of resources from King Cyrus’ edict!?
We’ll end today with this one verse which gives us a little insight into their excitement: “Then the family heads of Judah and Benjamin, and the priests and Levites – everyone whose heart God had moved – prepared to leave Babylon and go up and build the house of the LORD in Jerusalem! All their neighbors assisted them with silver and gold… and valuable gifts…” (Ezra 1:5,6)
Let’s pause and watch with breathless excitement as these Jewish captives prepare for the long journey, perhaps 700 miles, back to Jerusalem! Finally, new hope had come! In those exciting days I wonder if they were singing a song like this one in their excitement to get going with God! Let’s celebrate with them and tomorrow we’ll join them in their journey…
Today’s Scripture: Daniel 9:1-3; Ezra 1:1-5.
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Daniel 9:1-3
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Ezra 1:1-5
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Bible images provided with attribution to www.LumoProject.com.
Have a comment or question about today’s chapter? I’m ready to hear from you, contact me here.
Pastor Doug Anderson
“Let us run with perseverance the race marked out for us, with our eyes fixed on Jesus…” (Heb. 12:1,2)
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