The Blessing of Costly Obedience

1:07Because at 6 a.m., who doesn't want to do a chemistry experiment to earn their coffee? We all have things that we are willing to pay extra to enjoy. The blessing that we experience is worth the extra cost to us. Well, friends, last week in Ezra 7, we learned that God blesses a. Obedience. When we seek to know his word, when we seek to obey it, when we seek to teach it to others, God blesses that obedience.

1:38But there's another important part, another important truth that comes along with that, and it comes out of Ezra 8. And that truth is that obeying God is often costly. See, many times we know what God has called us to do, but why do we hesitate to do it? Or why do we fail to do it at all? It's because we know it's going to cost us something. And so what we're going to see here in Ezra chapter 8 is that obedience, even an especially costly obedience, is worth it because God blesses it. So let's look together at the text where we're going to see that God blesses the costly obedience of his people.

2:23Ezra begins this chapter by identifying all of the families that returned to Jerusalem with him. And you see in these first 14 verses that there are 15 heads of households represented, oftentimes with the men in their families who accompanied them. And so this list represents about 2,000 men plus women and children. And so you've got about 5,000 people or more who are returning this time with Ezra. Now, if you remember back at the beginning of the book, the group that left with Zerubbabel about 100 years ago at this point, 80 to 100 years ago, they were about 50,000 in number. So this is only 10%. The size.

3:02And as we noted in chapter 2, careful record keeping was very important. And that's why these lists of names were so important, because these people are returning back to the land that God had promised them and had allotted out to the different tribes. So these folks are going home to claim inheritances that belong to their ancestors. So all of these names, all this careful record keeping is very important. So a good question that arises is: why now?

3:30Why is it now that these people, this group of 5,000 or more, why is it that they finally decide to leave the only life they ever knew and return to a land and a city that they had only heard about? Why would they do that? Well, I want you to remember that God commanded their ancestors to teach the coming generation the glorious deeds of the Lord and his might and the wonders that he has done. So every time we gather as a church for one of our members' meetings, we take that line from the Psalm, Psalm 78, and we say that together as a reminder of our own task to teach the coming generation the glorious deeds of the Lord and His might and the wonders that he has done. Now, if they were faithful to do this, what that means is that these people had heard all about these things from their childhood.

4:22They heard about God's faithfulness to Abraham and how he brought him into the promised land. They heard about the captivity and then the exodus from Egypt. They heard about the rise and the fall of the kingdom of Israel and then God's promises before and during the exile. So, either through the teaching of their parents or through the faithful teaching of spiritual leaders like Ezra, these people came to the conviction that they needed to return to Jerusalem.

4:50Now, the situation was obviously better than it was for Zerubbabel and the 50,000 people who came back with him about 80 years ago, but their decision to return at this time was still going to be costly. It's not like Jerusalem had a lot of infrastructure even at this point, 80 years later. And so, this is going to become especially clear in verses 15 and 20, this cost that they have to pay in order to go back, because this is where Ezra gathers the whole group by the river to take account of who is actually coming with him. And what he finds when he begins to take account in verses 15 through 20 is that there is not a single Levite in the entire group. Not one.

5:33Now, remember, since the northern kingdom was conquered and exiled by Assyria, those nine tribes basically ceased to exist. They were forced to relocate. Many of them were forced to intermarry. And so those tribes basically ceased to exist. So in both the first and the second wave of returning exiles, there were only three tribes that were coming back: Judah, Benjamin, and Levi. And so, as we learned in Ezra 2, of those 50,000 people who returned, just three tribes are represented, and only 350 of those people are Levites.

6:13350 out of 50,000. That means you got about 25,000 from Judah, about 25,000 from Benjamin, and almost no one from the tribe of Levi. Does that seem odd to you? You got three tribes that are supposed to be coming back, and only 350 Levites. Why would they make up less than 1% of the first wave of returning exiles, and why would there be none of them in the second wave? I want you to look on the screen at Deuteronomy 18. I think we get some clues from the rest of the Old Testament. Look at this command that God gives to the Levites: the Levitical priests, all the tribe of Levi, shall have no portion or inheritance with Israel.

6:55They shall eat the Lord's food offerings as their inheritance. They shall have no inheritance among their brothers. The Lord is their inheritance, as he promised them. So what we learn here is that by God's own command, the Levites were the only tribe of the 12 tribes that was not given an allotment of land. They had no earthly inheritance. Why was that? Well, it's because their job was to serve the Lord and to lead the people in worship.

7:26They were supported by offerings so that they could give their full time and energy. And investment and attention to the work of God. That was the plan all along. So, is it possible that the Levites who didn't have an earthly inheritance coming to them had grown comfortable in the exile? Is that possible? I mean, many of them probably owned land at this point. They had become farmers or ranchers or they owned businesses. And these people were raised in Babylon and in Persia, and so were many generations before them. Remember, the first exiles left 150 years before. The last exiles came over 130 years before this.

8:15So imagine for a second if I walked up to you and you're a medical professional here in Texas. And I say to you, you know, back in the 1800s, your family owned a grocery store in Connecticut. I really think you should move back there and reopen the family business. What are you going to say to me? You're going to say, look, buddy, I might get back into the grocery business, but I ain't never moved into Connecticut.

8:46That's just not happening. You're going to say, so what if my ancestors 130, 150 years ago or more did this other thing? That's not what we do anymore. We live here. Our lives are established here. We're farmers, ranchers. Businessmen and women. That's what we do now. So it's not hard to understand why the Levites didn't want to go back to Jerusalem. And on top of all of that, going back would mean going back to their original calling. You just need to read Leviticus to understand what a strict life of service this was going to mean for them if they returned. Obedience was going to be very costly. But also, by refusing to return, they were going to be missing out on the blessings that come with obedience. And I want you to consider where you and I might be missing out on the blessings that come with obedience. Because we, just like these Levites, have grown comfortable in our exile here on this earth.

9:47That's why, again and again, in both the Old Testament and the New Testament, we have so many reminders to us that this earth, this world, is not our home. Look up on the screen at Hebrews 11. This chapter is talking about the faithful men and women of old, and it says, These all died in faith, not having received the things promised, but having seen them and greeted them from afar, and having acknowledged that they were strangers and exiles on the earth. For people who speak thus make it clear that they are seeking a homeland. If they had been thinking of that land from which they had gone out, they would have had opportunity to return. But as it is, they desire a better country. Country, that is a heavenly one. Therefore, God is not ashamed to be called their God, for he has prepared for them a city.

10:40So, after Ezra realizes that he has no Levites coming back with him, what does he do? He assembles a delegation, features nine leading men, two men of wisdom, and he sends them to Ido at Cassiphia. Well, who is Ido and what's Cassiphia? I have absolutely no idea. And apparently, neither does anyone else. But from the context, it seems that there were faithful Levites living there and perhaps training there for later temple service. And so the delegation asks Ido to send these ministers to the temple. And look at verse 18. Here's what we read. And by the good hand of our God on us, they brought us a man of discretion, Sherebiah, with his sons and kinsmen.

11:29So in all, Ido ends up sending over 250 Levites to minister with Ezra in the temple. It's still a very small percentage of the whole group, but it's also better than zero. And what we see here is that God is faithful to provide for his people. I mean, they needed qualified, godly men to lead them in worship and to instruct them in daily living that honored the Lord. They had Ezra, but no leader can effectively lead alone.

12:01He needed a team of godly leaders, other faithful priests to minister, other faithful Levites to carry out the daily and weekly and seasonal worship services in the temple. And these Levites knew that they would pay a price for returning to Jerusalem. It would be costly. Again, look at Leviticus just to get an idea of how strict their life was going to be. But God blesses costly obedience. And this is a theme that Jesus talked about all the time in the New Testament. Look on the screen at Matthew 19.

12:35Jesus said to them, Truly I say to you, in the new world, when the Son of Man will sit on his glorious throne, you who have followed me will also sit on 12 thrones, judging the 12 tribes of Israel. And everyone who has left houses or brothers or sisters or father or mother or children, don't miss this, or lands for my name's sake, will receive a hundredfold and will inherit eternal life. God blesses costly obedience. When we walk away from things that the world says that we need or that we say that we need, God blesses that costly obedience. And so now Ezra has the people camped by the river, and he's recruited a few hundred Levites to return with him to serve, but they're not ready to begin the journey just yet. So look with me now at verse 21.

13:33Then I proclaimed a fast there at the river Ahava, that we might humble ourselves before our God, to seek from him a safe journey for ourselves, our children, and all our goods. For I was ashamed to ask the king for a band of soldiers and horsemen to protect us against the enemy on our way, since we had told the king, the hand of our God is for good on all who seek him, and the power of his wrath is against all who forsake him. So we fasted and implored our God for this, and he listened to our entreaty. Then I set apart twelve of the leading priests, Sherebiah, Hashabiah, and ten of their kinsmen with them. And I weighed out to them the silver and the gold and the vessels, the offering for the house of our God that the king and his counselors and his lords and all Israel there present had offered. I weighed out into their hand 650 talents of silver and silver vessels worth 200 talents, and 100 talents of gold, 20 bowls of gold worth 1,000 derricks, and two vessels of fine, bright bronze, as precious as gold. And I said to them, You are holy to the Lord, and the vessels are holy. And the silver and the gold are a free will offering to the Lord, the God of your fathers. Guard them and keep them until you weigh them before the chief priests and the Levites and the heads of fathers' houses in Israel at Jerusalem within the chambers. Of the house of the Lord. So the priests and the Levites took over the weight of the silver and the gold and the vessels to bring them to Jerusalem to the house of our God.

15:12So before they set out on this journey, Ezra proclaims a fast to humble themselves before God and ask for a safe journey through the wilderness for them and all their goods. Remember, they're going on a 900-mile journey. It's going to take them four months through the wilderness. They've got men, women, and children with them, and also tons of silver and gold. No, literally, 25 tons of silver and gold, 50,000 pounds of silver and gold. So let me ask you something. Humanly speaking, how likely is it that a priest can lead a caravan of 5,000 people and 25 tons of silver and gold through the wilderness in 458 BC? This priest could not do that.

16:01But the king had already given his blessing for them to go. And not only that, he had sent them with all of this money, this small fortune. So surely he would be happy to send a detachment of soldiers along with them to make sure that they got there safely. But I want you to look back again at verse 22. Why doesn't this happen? For I was ashamed to ask the king for a band of soldiers and horsemen to protect us against the enemy on our way. Since we had told the king, the hand of our God is for good on all who seek him, and the power of his wrath is against all who forsake him.

16:44Now, wait a minute here. Is Ezra saying that if you're a believer, accepting military protection is sinful? I don't think so. In fact, in Nehemiah chapter 2, Nehemiah accepts military protection from this very same king when he makes this very same journey back to Jerusalem. So why is it that Ezra in particular concludes that faith in God in this particular instance would look like not accepting military protection? Well, I want you to think about the context here. Back in Ezra chapter 7, verse 19, King Artaxerxes called God the God of Jerusalem. He called him the God of Jerusalem. And that statement is reflective of almost all ancient Near Eastern theology. So most people in the ancient Near East, what did they believe? They believed that there were many gods, not just one true God, many gods, and each God only ruled over a very small part of creation.

17:57You see a great example of this in 1 Kings 1. Chapter 20. Look on the screen. Israel defeats the Syrian army in battle, and this is what we find after that. And the servants of the king of Syria said to him, Their gods are gods of the hills, and so they were stronger than we. But let us fight against them in the plain, and surely we shall be stronger than they. Well, how do you think that went?

18:23Look at verse 28. And a man of God came near and said to the king of Israel, Thus says the Lord: Because the Syrians have said, The Lord is a God of the hills, but he is not a God of the valleys, therefore I will give all this great multitude into your hand, and you shall know that I am the Lord. So, back to our passage. What does Artaxerxes think about God? He thinks he's the God of Jerusalem. There's no way that the God of Jerusalem can protect people on a 900-mile trek across the wilderness. That's completely absurd. He doesn't have jurisdiction over that wilderness. He only has jurisdiction in Jerusalem, so they're going to need military protection. So, why does Ezra refuse it? He refuses it because he knew that God could protect them, and he knew this would be a powerful witness to King Artaxerxes. So, what do they do? They fast and they pray because they're like, I can't believe we just said this.

19:30It's exactly what I would have done in that instance. What were we thinking? They fast and they pray because there's no way they're going to arrive safely with 50,000 pounds of silver and gold marching through the wilderness, steal me, please. You know? There's no way they're going to arrive safely without God's divine protection. And so, church, we need to adopt the same or recover the same kind of humility before the Lord that we see here. A humility that says, God, we cannot obey you apart from your grace and the power of your Holy Spirit.

20:09In the 21st century American church, we are entirely too dependent on our own wisdom, our own skills, our experience. And what that means is that we don't humble ourselves before the Lord to implore him to do what only he can do because we've become convinced that we can do it without him. Remember, Jesus Himself said, Apart from me, you can do nothing. So, if we're not crying out to him in prayer, then one of two things must be true.

20:49Perhaps we don't really believe that we need God's grace and power. But I don't think there's anybody in this room. Or, not many, anyways, who are going to say, I don't believe that I need God's grace and power. So, maybe the problem is that we're not doing anything that requires divine intervention. Maybe the reason that we don't humble ourselves and fast and pray before the Lord is because we're not really trying anything that would actually require divine intervention.

21:30Listen, if your life is to get through, if your goal in life rather is to get through this world as comfortably as possible, with as little hassle as possible, you don't have to get on your knees and beg God to move. You can have a comfortable life without acknowledging God at all. Millions of people do. But if your goal is to see men and women come to faith in Jesus, children come to faith in Jesus, to see people made into mature disciples who are following Him, if your goal is to honor the Lord by living a holy life from the time you wake up in the morning to the time you go to bed at night, then we're going to have to get down on our knees and beg God to move.

22:18To live holy lives, to see people saved, to see disciples made, that requires costly obedience. It looks like what we see here. It's costly. To fast and pray, isn't it? It's costly to invest your time sharing the gospel. It's costly to invest your time in younger believers to see them grow in maturity, but it also comes with great blessing. Remember what Jesus said: whatever you give up in this life, whether that's security or reputation or opportunities for career advancement, whatever you give up in this life, you're going to receive a hundredfold, and with that, eternal life.

23:03Obedience is costly, but it's also blessed by God. So I want us to think on those things. I want you to really ask yourself that question as you leave today, as you go throughout this week. Am I doing, are we as a church doing anything that requires God's intervention? If so, we'll beg him to move. So let's conclude with verses 31 through 36. Join me in verse 31. Then we departed from the river Ahava on the 12th day of the first month to go to Jerusalem. The hand of our God was on us, and he delivered us from the hand of the enemy and from ambushes by the way. We came to Jerusalem, and there we remained three days. On the fourth day within the house of our God, the silver and the gold and the vessels were weighed into the hands of Merimoth the priest, the son of Uriah. And with him was Eleazar, the son of Phinehas. And with them were the Levites, Josabad, the son of Jeshua, and Noadiah, the son of Binui. The whole was counted and weighed, and the weight of everything was recorded. At that time, those who had come from captivity, the returned exiles, offered burnt offerings to the God of Israel: 12 bulls for all Israel, 96 rams, 77 lambs, and as a sin offering, 12 male goats. All this was a burnt offering to the Lord. They also delivered the king's commissions to the king's satraps and to the governors of the province beyond the river, and they aided the people and the house of God.

24:43So, once again, at the close of this chapter, we see that God's hand is upon his people. We see that phrase again and again in Ezra, don't we? God's hand is on the people. And they safely complete this four-month journey. So imagine what kind of a witness this was to King Artaxerxes. They send him a letter, hey, we got there safe with the 50,000 pounds of silver and gold. He'd be like, really? Maybe he's not just the God of Jerusalem. I mean, what an amazing thing. And so they arrive, they rest for three days, and then they weigh out and record the silver and the gold, which probably took a while. And then all the returned exiles gather together to worship God. Now you have the descendants of these 50,000 who came back 80 years ago, and you also have this 5,000-plus people who just recently arrived. And in this moment, we have a picture of what God has been doing all throughout history, where he is purifying and calling a people for his own possession to come and worship him.

25:46It's a continued fulfillment of the promises that were made through Isaiah and Jeremiah and Ezekiel, but this is also a picture of what life is going to be like in the new heavens and the new earth. Look on the screen at Revelation chapter 7, a beautiful passage. After this I looked, and behold, a great multitude that no one could number from every nation, from all tribes and peoples and languages, standing before the throne and before the Lamb, clothed in white robes with palm branches in their hands, and crying out with a loud voice, salvation belongs to our God who sits on the throne and to the Lamb.

26:32Now you notice that when these people who have been gathered from all over the world to worship, when these people gather to worship, they offer burnt offerings to the Lord, over 200 animals, a costly sacrifice. And if you look back at the previous chapters, when they worshiped before, they weren't offering burnt offerings, which is fine. Most offerings are not burnt offerings. But in this particular case, they're offering burnt offerings, which means there's nothing left. Over for the priests or the Levites to take home.

27:06And these offerings symbolize two important realities. For the people who are offering the burnt offering, what it symbolized was whole life devotion to the Lord. The whole entire offering was consumed, just as our whole lives are to be consumed with worship of the one true God. And for the Levites and the priests, remember, these are people who sacrificed so much, just like these people did, to come back here to serve. And so for them, it symbolized faith in God's provision. Because with every other offering, the priests were allowed to take a large portion of that offering home with them. That's how they fed their families. That's how they ate dinner. But when you offered burnt offerings, there was nothing left over. And so for them, it communicated: our trust is not in any human thing. Man does not live by bread alone, but on every word that proceeds from the mouth of God. And so you see that here. This symbolism is so important because the people are called to be holy and obedient to God, offering their whole lives. And these priests and Levites are to be filled with faith that God is going to continue to provide for them and for the people.

28:24And these costly sacrifices also point forward to God's ultimate. Provision in Jesus Christ, who saved us from our sin and set us free to live holy lives through his own costly obedience. Look on the screen at 1 Peter chapter 1. I love this passage. As obedient children, do not be conformed to the passions of your former ignorance. But as he who called you is holy, you also be holy in all your conduct, since it is written, you shall be holy, for I am holy. And if you call on him as Father, who judges impartially according to each one's deeds, conduct yourselves with fear throughout the time of your exile, knowing that you were ransomed from the feudal ways inherited from your fathers, not with perishable things such as silver or gold, but with the precious blood of Christ, like that of a lamb without blemish or spot. He was foreknown before the foundation of the world, but was made manifest in the last times for the sake of you who through him are believers in God, who raised him from the dead and gave him glory, so that your faith and your hope are in God.

29:45You see, friends, we are not ransomed by perishable things like silver and gold or by animal sacrifices or anything else. We are ransomed by the precious blood of Christ alone, our spotless Lamb, who is Slain for us. His own costly obedience in his life, death, and resurrection purchased our forgiveness, our righteousness before God, and our adoption into his family through faith. And now, because of that, our faith and our hope are not in ourselves. They're not even in our costly obedience. Our faith and hope are in God.

30:24And so last week, guys, we talked about God blessing our obedience. And I want you to walk away with that idea. God blesses obedience. But I want you to remember as well that obedience is oftentimes going to cost us something. And so, just as Jesus said to us again and again in his ministry, we have to count the cost of discipleship and be willing to pay the cost of discipleship. Because while obedience is costly, it also leads to great blessing. Let's pray.

30:58Father, we are so thankful that Jesus, our perfect high priest, lived a life of costly obedience before you. As we've saying many times here, in his living, in his suffering, never trace nor stain of sin. Our lives can't be described that way. In our living and in our suffering, there is, there are many traces of the stain of sin. And we know that there is no way for us to be redeemed with our money or our things. There's no way for us to be redeemed by our own religious efforts or our own costly obedience. The only way for us to be redeemed is through Christ. And we celebrate that and we thank you for that, God. We look to him.

32:04And so, God, I pray today that we afresh would count the cost of discipleship and that we would say again, or for some of us for the first time, that we would say, yes, it's worth it. Costly obedience is worth it. So, God, make us a church, make us a people who are willing to pay the price of obeying you so that you may be glorified in our lives and that you may be glorified, as we read about today, by people from every tribe, tongue, and nation around the world. In Christ's name we pray. Amen.

32:44Thank you for listening to the sermon audio from New Life Baptist Church in College Station, Texas. For more information or to support our ministry, visit us online at newlifecs.net.