“Opposed & Complacent” – FBC Morning Light (9/13/2024)

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Well, a good Friday morning to you. Here we are looking forward to the weekend. I hope you're anticipating a gathering with God's people on the

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Lord's Day, and I hope it'll be a spiritually refreshing time for you. Well, today in our

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Bible reading, we're reading the book of Ezra, chapters 3 and 4, and a couple of verses in chapter 5, and then jumping to the prophet

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Haggai, and reading both chapters in the prophecy of Haggai. Well, one thing

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I want us to learn from what we read in Ezra is that any—it's almost axiomatic—that any positive effort to advance the work of God and to endeavor for that work to prosper is going to be met with some form of opposition.

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And you see this in Ezra, as God's people have come back to Jerusalem, they've been given the freedom to do so by Cyrus, and here they are endeavoring to rebuild the temple.

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And they lay the foundation of the temple, that restoration work begins, and then no sooner does it begin, but opposition arises.

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And there are a variety of forms in which that opposition can come. We're going to see this, by the way, also in the book of Nehemiah, with the rebuilding of the walls around Jerusalem.

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But this is just the temple. This is just the temple. And so the opposition comes first in chapter 4, verses 1 to 3, with an enticement to compromise.

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It says, When the adversaries of Judah and Benjamin heard that the descendants of the captivity were building the temple of the

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Lord God of Israel, they came to Zerubbabel and the heads of the fathers' houses, and said to them, Let us build with you, let us build with you, for we seek your

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God as you do, and we have sacrificed to him since the days of Esarhaddon, king of Assyria, who brought us here.

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Let us join you in this. Well, there's no way they're going to let them join. Zerubbabel and Jeshua, the rest of the heads of the fathers' houses of Israel, said to them,

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You may do nothing with us to build a house for God, because you're really not true worshipers of God.

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So the answer is no. But then opposition can come from another way.

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There can be such a persistent effort on the part of the people of the land. Verse 4 says,

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The people of the land tried to discourage the people of Judah. They troubled them in building, and hired counselors against them to frustrate their purposes all the days of Cyrus, king of Persia, even until the reign of Darius, the king of Persia.

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There are always the naysayers. There are always some who want to do everything they can to make people discouraged and quit, whether it's through criticism, belittling, whatever it is.

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That's what's going on here. So it can be, you know, discouragement of the people, or they just want to quit.

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It could also come, opposition, through the form of slander, false accusation. Like in chapter 4, verse 6, says,

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In the reign of Ahasuerus, in the beginning of his reign, they wrote an accusation against the inhabitants of Judah and Jerusalem, saying.

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So here's false accusation. Verses 11 to 16 lays out the false accusation that they're just going to rebel against you, king, which is not the case.

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It was not of the intention. It wasn't going to be, wasn't going to happen at all. And then, if all else fails, then just use force.

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Use power. That's what happens in chapter 4, verses 23 and 24.

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It says, When the copy of King Artaxerxes' letter was read before Rihem, Shimshi, the scribe, and their companions, they went up in haste to Jerusalem against the case, against the

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Jews, and by force of arms made them cease. Thus the work of the house of God, which is at Jerusalem, ceased, and was discontinued until the second year of the reign of Darius the king of Persia.

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So if all else fails, we'll use brute force. What are God's people to do?

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What are God's people to do? Carry on. This is what happens in chapter 5, verses 1 and 2, as a result of the prophets

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Haggai and Zechariah coming to the people and challenging them to keep on keeping on in the building of the temple.

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But you have to go to the book of Haggai to see the message that Haggai delivered that motivated

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God's people to get back at building the temple. And he challenged them with their complacency.

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That's often the effect of opposition, isn't it? You just kind of shrink back and just get comfortable and complacent.

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You don't want to do anything to upset the cart, or to use a different metaphor, to rock the boat, if you will.

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So the people become complacent. They actually use materials from the building of the temple to build their own houses and just let the temple lie in waste.

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Haggai comes and says, is this time for you to dwell in your paneled houses while the house of the

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Lord lies in ruins? No, it's not, he says. No, it's not. Why is it, he asked the people, that you seek to earn wages but you put it in a bag full of holes?

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Or you plant your crops but you have nothing to show for it? Why is that? Because of my house that is laid waste.

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And in the response to the preaching and the prophetic ministry of Haggai and then also of Zechariah, verse 12 of Haggai 1 says,

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Rehoboam the son of Shealtiel and Joshua the son of Jehoshadak the high priest, with all the remnant of the people, they obeyed the voice of the

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Lord their God, and the words of Haggai the prophet, as the Lord their God had sent them. And the people feared in the presence of the

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Lord, and they started work on the temple again. So what we can learn from this passage in Ezra and Haggai is that any effort to move forward in the work of God is likely to bring forward some kind of opposition, but we need to keep on keeping on.

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May we do so. Our Father and our God, we thank you for this challenge from your Word today. Encourage us to be faithful and persistent in the carrying out of your work, we pray in Jesus' name and for his sake.

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Amen. All right, well listen, have a good weekend, and gather with God's people on the

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Lord's Day. Enjoy that time of worship and service with Him. Good weekend. God bless.