Skipping The Hard Parts....Not A Good Idea!

One of the things that I really look forward to each week is getting together on Wednesday mornings with the ladies in my Bible Study group.  We are a small group, only about 5 of us, at the most.  We meet at the home of one of the ladies and we sit in her cozy living room enjoying a break from our daily routines.   We get together each week to support one another,  to share the joys and our sorrows of lives and to dig into God's word together.    We have been meeting together for over a year and we have completed two different Bible Studies.  Last week we began a new study on Ezra, Haggai, Esther and Nehemiah by Anne Graham Lotz.  I have completed other Bible Study series by Anne Graham Lotz and one of the things that I have really liked about her Bible Studies is that she doesn't give you all the answers   She guides you to read the scripture, list the facts, think about what it is saying and then listen to what God is saying to us through His word.   I was really looked forward to this Bible Study on Ezra, Haggai, Esther and Nehemiah because I have never studied the books of Ezra or Haggai in the Bible and so I was eager to delve into these unfamiliar books.  

To get myself started on this new study, I gathered some brief background information on the Book of Ezra.   Ezra tells the story of the Jewish people who are in exile in Babylon.  They had been carried away to Babylon after Nebuchadnezzar had destroyed Jerusalem.  Nebuchadnezzar died and following his death there was a very relaxed policy towards the Jewish captives.   The book of Ezra opens with Cyrus, the King of Persia, issuing a proclamation, in writing, which allowed the Jewish people to return to Jerusalem in Judah to rebuild the temple.  The rest of chapter one in Ezra is about the preparations that the Jewish people began to undertake in order to begin their journey back to Jerusalem.   It lists the inventory that had been taken from Jerusalem by Nebuchadnezzar and now King Cyrus was returning these items to the Jewish people to be used in the rebuilding of the temple back in Jerusalem.  

I really liked the first chapter of Ezra because King Cyrus, although he was not Jewish, was obedient to God's voice and was helping the Jewish people to be successful in their return to Jerusalem.  He was an organized, generous, wise and fair king and did quite a bit to ensure that the Jewish people would be successful in their  efforts to rebuild the temple.   After reading the first chapter of Ezra, I was even more excited to keep reading in the book of Ezra to see how the story continued.  I turned the page in my Bible to the 2nd chapter in Ezra and there it was.... a HUGE stumbling block to my enthusiasm.  There were 30 verses of names that I could not pronounce and numbers listed after each name!!! I was so disappointed!  Just so you get a good picture of what I was confronted with in the 2nd chapter of Ezra, I decided to write it out for you.  This is from the Bible, the 2nd chapter of Ezra, verses 3 through 35.

"the descendants of Parosh 2,172
of Shephatiah 372
of Arah 775
of Pahath-Moab (through the line of Jeshua and Joab" 2, 812
of Elam 1,254
of Zattu 945
of Zaccai 760
of Bani 642
of Bebai 623
of Azgad 1,222
of Adonikam 666
of Bigvai 2,056
of Adin 454
of Ater (through Hezekiah) 98
of Bezai 323
of Jorah 112
of Hashum 223
of Gibber 95
the men of Bethleham 123
of Netophah 56
of Anathoth 128
of Azmaveth 42
of Kiriath Jearim, Kephirah and Beeroth 743
of Ramah and Bega 621
of Micmash 122
of Bethel and Ai 223
of Nebo 52
of Magbish 156
of the other Elam 1,254
of Harim 320
of Lod, Hadid and Ono 725
of Jericho 345
of Senaah 3,630".

Good grief! What in the world was I suppose to get out of that!?! Now I knew why I had never studied the book of Ezra!! How was I ever suppose to apply this to my life?!!!  My plan was to skip over all these meaningless names and numbers and jump ahead to the good parts of Ezra.  So I looked ahead and was even more discouraged because verses 36-63 were just more of the same....ugh!!!!  I couldn't just keep skipping through the book of Ezra so I decided to deal with this long list of names that I couldn't pronounce.  I reviewed the guidelines given to us by Anne Graham Lotz for this Bible Study.  In the introduction she encouraged us to take our time, not to rush, not to get hung up on things that we didn't understand, to list the facts and to take the time to pray and to think about what God is trying to teach us through His word. 

So I said a quick prayer and asked God to help me with this long list of names and numbers and to help me apply it to my life.  I began by listing the facts.  There weren't many facts to list about these 332 verses but I wrote down that the largest group of descendants was from Senaah, with 3,630.  The smallest group was from Azmaveth with 42.  There were 33 different lines of descendants listed.  The finally fact that I gleaned from these verses was that these names are recorded in the Bible.  That last fact was the one that got me thinking. I believe that everything in the Bible is important so what was it about these names that were so important to be recorded in the Bible?  Why did the Jewish people take the time to keep such detailed records of their descendants? And then a light bulb went on in my brain, the Jewish people kept detailed records of their descendants because .......PEOPLE MATTER!!!! People are important, especially family.  Family was important back in 400 BC when the Jewish people were returning to Jerusalem and family is still important today.   Family is important because it gives us our roots. Our family roots are important because it tells us who we are,  where we came from and who we belong to.  Each one of the names listed in Ezra 2:3-35 and the number of descendants listed after each name was a record of an individual person.  Each person listed in the 2nd chapter of Ezra knew exactly where they came from, they knew their identity and they knew where they belonged.   

My next step in studying this list of names and numbers was to apply it to my life.  I asked myself several questions.  Did I know that I was important and that I mattered? Yes.  Did I know who was in my family? Yes.  Did I keep track of my family like the Jewish people did?  Hmmm....maybe, but there was some family that I potentially could lose track of unless I invested some time into preserving the relationship.   Was my name recorded somewhere? Yes. I had a legal birth certificate that was proof of who I am, where and when I was born and who my parents were but more important than answering yes to having a birth certificate with my name on it, I answered yes to this question because I know without a doubt that my name is recorded in the Lamb's Book of Life.  

Just in case you don't know what I am talking about when I say that my name is written in the Lamb's book of life, it is from the book of Revelation in the Bible, chapter 21 verse 27.  The 21st chapter in Revelation is a beautiful and glorious description of living for eternity in heaven with God.  It tells us that there will be no more tears, death, pain or sorrow.  It also describes the beauty of the City of God built with pure gold, precious jewels, gates made of pearls and streets of pure gold, like transparent glass.  There is no temple in the city, as the Lord God and Jesus are the temple.  The city doesn't need the sun or the moon for light, as the Glory of God gives the city light and Jesus is the lamp.  The chapter ends in verse 27 where it says, "Nothing impure will ever enter it, nor will anyone who does what is shameful or deceitful, but only those whose names are written in the Lamb's Book of Life".  It is this Lamb's Book of Life that has my name recorded in it and my name being recorded in this book gives me complete and total access into this glorious City of God for eternity.   

In the next chapter of Ezra, I read that some of the Jewish people leaving Babylon could not find their family records.  Their names were not recorded.  Even though they searched for their family records, they could not be found,  so they were excluded from the priesthood as unclean which meant that, as priests, they would not be allowed to enter the temple.  In Revelation, God and Jesus are the temple, so, having my name written in the Lamb's book of life is very important.  If my name was not recorded in this book then I would be excluded from entering into the Holy City of God  just as some of the Jewish people were excluded from entering the temple in Jerusalem because there was no record of their family name.  

Wow!!! So that list of names and numbers in the 2nd chapter of Ezra is not meaningless after all!!! Quite the opposite....that list of names is VERY IMPORTANT!!!  HUGELY  IMPORTANT as a matter of fact!  People and families are important to God and from reading this Bible passage of names and descendants I knew that God expected me to also view people, especially my family, as important.   I thought about some family members that I have begun to lose contact with and I knew that God was directing me to reach out to them.  I was also filled with a renewed joy of knowing that my name is recorded for eternity in the Lamb's Book of Life and that I will not be excluded from spending eternity with God in heaven.  I also thought about the homeless people that are living on the streets, in cars or in shelters and I wanted to shout out to them.....YOU MATTER!!!! YOU ARE IMPORTANT!!!!!  YOU ARE LOVED BY THE LORD GOD WHO CREATED HEAVEN AND EARTH!!!!!  Quite a few homeless people do not have any record of their name.  They have no mail with their name and address on it or they don't have a drivers license that proves who they are.  Their names are not recorded anywhere and yet these homeless people are a precious jewel.  Our desire here at Soaring Wings Ministries is to give homeless people a sense of belonging, to give them an address, to give them some roots and to love them like God loves them and the best and most important thing would be to guide them into a personal relationship with Jesus so that their names will also be recorded in the Lamb's Book of Life.   

I will never again look at Ezra 2:3-35 and skip over it.  I will forever and always see people who matter, who were precious, who were important and who knew where they belonged.  I will always see names of people who were recorded as belonging to God.   So, do you know that you are important?  Do you know that you matter?  Is your name recorded somewhere? Is your name recorded in the Lamb's Book of Life?  I hope that you can answer yes to all these questions.  There is great peace, hope, joy and celebration in knowing where you belong and I pray that each one of you will find your belonging in a personal relationship with Jesus Christ.

With all glory to my heavenly Father,
Anita Rennells
499 Trinity Lane
Wellington, Colorado