The Table > Sermons > The Call of God: Courage, Conviction & Celebration

The Call of God: Courage, Conviction & Celebration

Jeremy Erb
May 3, 2009
Series: Ezra: A Time To Build

God's Intent for Our Lives is one of adventure, risk and reward. God creates us and calls us to live lives of purpose and passion, of significance and substance. This is how it's always been.

Last week we began our study of Ezra.

It's a story of the call of God. It's a story of the faithfulness of God. It's a story of redemption. It's a story of God building up His people. It's a story we need to know because it is our story.

God wants to build something in our lives. God IS calling you. God IS calling you to be built up. What does God want to build in your life? How is God calling you?

God Calls Us: To Christ, To Community, To Culture

God's call is not easy. It's not supposed to be. There are obstacles. There will always be obstacles. There are failures.

It's also the story of failure. The story of a people who fail, over and over again.

The message of this story: God does not discard what He has chosen but remakes it when it fails.

With people if one fails, he is out. With God if a person fails, he gets other opportunities. This is how God dealt with Jonah. It is how He dealt with Israel. Moreover it is how He deals with us. This is a great testimony to the eternal security of the believer. When the vessel is unyielding, God crushes it and begins to fashion it into a useful vessel again. That is a greater evidence of God's sovereignty than if He discarded it as hopeless. God's reason for doing this is His loyal love, compassion, and pity.

This revelation brings hope to everyone who fails. It gives hope when our good causes fall to pieces. It gives hope when God's servants fail. It also gives hope when we make a mess. God is still on His throne (cf. Hag. 2:4-5). No matter how you may have failed in the past God will use you if you renounce your sin, re-commit yourself to Him, and return to His Word.⁷

Last week, we learned how God stirred the heart of a pagan King to release God's people and resource their return to the land and rebuilding of the Temple. He then stirred up the hearts of a remnant, a small percentage of the exiles who step out in faith to follow God's call.

I was just reading an article today about the restoration of Ezekiel's tomb in Iraq. I was stunned to learn that until 1948 there was still a huge Jewish population in Iraq. "Prior to the exodus in 1948, Jews made up around a third of Baghdad's population and played a major role in the political, economic, and cultural life of the country. Today the population has dwindled to single digits. Their troubles began in the early 1930s, with the rise and gradual radicalization of Arab nationalism and the simultaneous arrival of Zionism, with emissaries mobilizing Jewish youth and urging emigration to Palestine. The process culminated with the birth of Israel in 1948, the first Arab-Israeli war and Operation Ezra and Nehemiah, which flew more than 120,000 Jews -- 96 percent of Iraq's Jewish population -- to Israel in 1951. "

The majority stayed in exile but the remnant heard and obeyed God's call. Chapter two records in meticulous detail the names of those who stepped out in faith to follow. It ends saying:

⁶⁴The whole assembly together was 42,360, ⁶⁵besides their male and female servants, of whom there were 7,337, and they had 200 male and female singers. ⁶⁶Their horses were 736, their mules were 245, ⁶⁷their camels were 435, and their donkeys were 6,720. ⁶⁸Some of the heads of families, when they came to the house of the Lord that is in Jerusalem, made freewill offerings for the house of God, to erect it on its site. ⁶⁹According to their ability they gave to the treasury of the work 61,000 darics of gold, 5,000 minas of silver, and 100 priests' garments. ⁷⁰Now the priests, the Levites, some of the people, the singers, the gatekeepers, and the temple servants lived in their towns, and all the rest of Israel in their towns.

Ezra 2:64-70 (ESV)

A journey of 800 miles. From prosperity to poverty. From security to suspicion. From friendship to fear. They lay it all out on the line to follow.

We start now in chapter 3.

¹When the seventh month came, and the children of Israel were in the towns, the people gathered as one man to Jerusalem. ²Then arose Jeshua the son of Jozadak, with his fellow priests, and Zerubbabel the son of Shealtiel with his kinsmen, and they built the altar of the God of Israel, to offer burnt offerings on it, as it is written in the Law of Moses the man of God. ³They set the altar in its place, for fear was on them because of the peoples of the lands, and they offered burnt offerings on it to the Lord, burnt offerings morning and evening.

Ezra 3:1-3 (ESV)

They make it. They arrive in the Promised Land and they do not live happily ever after....

They arrive to a city, Jerusalem, which has been devastated.

They arrive to a temple that has been desecrated and destroyed.

They arrive to find other people living in their homes who had been deported from their lands.

And despair begins to seep in. Fear begins to take control.

The Call of God will always bring about opportunities for fear. Following God is about faith. Faith is risky. Risk is terrifying.

The Call of God will Build Courage in Your Life.

You can't be discouraged if you haven't tried.

You can't be dismayed if you haven't dreamed.

You can't be afraid if you haven't stepped out and risked.

Courage is not the absence of fear. Courage is the absence of self.

¹The Lord is my light and my salvation; whom shall I fear? The Lord is the stronghold of my life; of whom shall I be afraid? ²When evildoers assail me to eat up my flesh, my adversaries and foes, it is they who stumble and fall. ³Though an army encamp against me, my heart shall not fear; though war arise against me, yet I will be confident. ⁴One thing have I asked of the Lord, that will I seek after: that I may dwell in the house of the Lord all the days of my life, to gaze upon the beauty of the Lord and to inquire in his temple. ⁵For he will hide me in his shelter in the day of trouble; he will conceal me under the cover of his tent; he will lift me high upon a rock. ⁶And now my head shall be lifted up above my enemies all around me, and I will offer in his tent sacrifices with shouts of joy; I will sing and make melody to the Lord. ⁷Hear, O Lord, when I cry aloud; be gracious to me and answer me! ⁸You have said, "Seek my face." My heart says to you, "Your face, Lord, do I seek." ⁹Hide not your face from me. Turn not your servant away in anger, O you who have been my help. Cast me not off; forsake me not, O God of my salvation! ¹⁰For my father and my mother have forsaken me, but the Lord will take me in. ¹¹Teach me your way, O Lord, and lead me on a level path because of my enemies. ¹²Give me not up to the will of my adversaries; for false witnesses have risen against me, and they breathe out violence. ¹³I believe that I shall look upon the goodness of the Lord in the land of the living! ¹⁴Wait for the Lord; be strong, and let your heart take courage; wait for the Lord!

Psalm 27:1-14 (ESV)

The Call of God will Build Conviction in Your Life.

⁴And they kept the Feast of Booths, as it is written, and offered the daily burnt offerings by number according to the rule, as each day required, ⁵and after that the regular burnt offerings, the offerings at the new moon and at all the appointed feasts of the Lord, and the offerings of everyone who made a freewill offering to the Lord. ⁶From the first day of the seventh month they began to offer burnt offerings to the Lord. But the foundation of the temple of the Lord was not yet laid. ⁷So they gave money to the masons and the carpenters, and food, drink, and oil to the Sidonians and the Tyrians to bring cedar trees from Lebanon to the sea, to Joppa, according to the grant that they had from Cyrus king of Persia.

Ezra 3:4-7 (ESV)

Look at the phrases used here.

As it is written

According to the rule

As each day required

The appointed feasts

A freewill offering

They can't control everything but everything they can control, they do.

God is calling them to a direction, not a destination. It is a process not a product.

Far too often, we want to know the outcome before we will come to Him.

We want to know the end result before we are willing to trust Him with the results.

They start with what they know. What God has revealed. What is required.

But they don't stop there.

They move from duty to delight, from fulfilling an obligation to choosing an outpouring.

⁸Now in the second year after their coming to the house of God at Jerusalem, in the second month, Zerubbabel the son of Shealtiel and Jeshua the son of Jozadak made a beginning, together with the rest of their kinsmen, the priests and the Levites and all who had come to Jerusalem from the captivity. They appointed the Levites, from twenty years old and upward, to supervise the work of the house of the Lord. ⁹And Jeshua with his sons and his brothers, and Kadmiel and his sons, the sons of Judah, together supervised the workmen in the house of God, along with the sons of Henadad and the Levites, their sons and brothers. ¹⁰And when the builders laid the foundation of the temple of the Lord, the priests in their vestments came forward with trumpets, and the Levites, the sons of Asaph, with cymbals, to praise the Lord, according to the directions of David king of Israel. ¹¹And they sang responsively, praising and giving thanks to the Lord, "For he is good, for his steadfast love endures forever toward Israel." And all the people shouted with a great shout when they praised the Lord, because the foundation of the house of the Lord was laid. ¹²But many of the priests and Levites and heads of fathers' houses, old men who had seen the first house, wept with a loud voice when they saw the foundation of this house being laid, though many shouted aloud for joy, ¹³so that the people could not distinguish the sound of the joyful shout from the sound of the people's weeping, for the people shouted with a great shout, and the sound was heard far away.

Ezra 3:8-13 (ESV)