When God Rebuilds... Ezra-Nehemiah Part 6 Ezra 2:68-70 "Biblical Giving"

                                                                                                                                     February 04, 2024

From The Series: When God Rebuilds…

Part 06 Biblical Giving

Ezra 2:68-70

Mountain View Evangelical Missionary Church

            This morning’s lesson is a timeless one and is not dependent on this text. It is a subject that a lot of preachers avoid because it is easy for the motives of a message like this can be misunderstood.

            You should be realizing by now that I am the type of preacher who will move through the Bible one book at a time reading and teaching from all of the verses contained in that book. There are three main reasons why I do this. First, I believe that the Bible is the inerrant literal word of God that has been preserved by the Holy Spirit and it is given to us as instruction for our lives. Therefore, I do not have the right to ignore or edit any part of God’s Word. To do so would be a dereliction of my duties as your pastor. I was on X this week, X is what we used to call Twitter, and I watched a short clip from a young female pastor named Elle who is from the Chicago area and a member of the ELCA or the Evangelical Lutheran Church of America. In the clip, Elle is seen explaining why they kipped over a verse from the reading of Corinthians. She said, and I quote, “You may have noticed that we skipped a verse in the reading from Corinthians and that’s because it’s yikes!” She went on to explain that “Paul was being kind of a jerk”.

            Let me repeat that. “You may have noticed that we skipped a verse in the reading from Corinthians and that’s because it’s yikes!” She went on to explain that “Paul was being kind of a jerk”. Do you think that that woman and that church think that the Bible is the inerrant Word of God? I am not brave enough to edit God’s Word, knowing that one day I will be standing before Him on the Day of Judgment.

            The second reason that I chose to preach through the Word of God verse by verse, is to avoid the temptation to skip difficult passages and not teach on difficult or controversial topics. This is something that a lot of preachers do, and a lot of Christians do as well. I have said that there are no contradictions in the Bible. If we see two passages that appear to contradict each other, then the fault is not in God’s Word but in our understanding of what the passage is saying to us.

            When we come across a passage that challenges us, we should be eager to dive deeper into God’s Word and through prayer and consulting trusted sources like Bible Dictionaries, commentaries by trusted authors, more mature Christians, and even your pastor and seek to understand the passage more completely.

            The third reason that I preach verse-by-verse is that it offers me some protection. I trust the perfect timing of my sovereign God. Here are, a month away from our Annual General Meeting, and the presentation of the next budget, and the Lord has deemed that we should preach on giving this morning. Because of this timing, some could accuse me of deliberately choosing this passage to emphasize the level of giving in this church. I’ll let you in on a secret, I have no idea who gives what at this church. This is information that I have made a point not to ask Roxanne or the board simply so that if someone accuses me of targeting them with a message about giving, then I can truthfully inform them that I have no idea what you give.

            I trust that the Holy Spirit will inform and convict you, if needed, on your proper behavior in all aspects of your walk with Christ. My job is not to nag, harass, or cajole even, into changing your behavior. My job is to faithfully read and exegete the text so that I properly understand what the text says and then look for applications that will be relevant to the lives of this congregation, the flock that Jesus has entrusted me to shepherd.

            If you are truly a follower of Christ, then the Holy Spirit will be the one nagging, harassing, correcting, and cajoling you to bring your walk more in line with that of Jesus. So, f you are feeling uncomfortable about this message, or any message that I have given, please come talk to me so that we can discuss this together and maybe I can help determine what God through the Spirit is trying to say to you. I guess what I am trying to say is “Don’t shoot the messenger”.

            You also need to be aware, that as I prepare these messages, God is often speaking to me just as much as He is speaking to you. I too have areas in my walk that I am constantly working on to improve. Sanctification is a process that will continue until we are called home to Glory and the Lord.

            So, having said all that, we will talk about money today and giving. Money is not evil. Wealth in and of itself is not evil. So many passages in Scripture are misquoted and misapplied to money and they have led to some incorrect thinking regarding money.

            God does not desire all His followers to be rich, nor does He require that they be poor. What He does require is that we be good stewards of what He gives us. And since everything we have comes from the Lord, then all that we have is technically His and He allows us to keep the majority of what He blesses us with.

            We just need to honor Him with what He gives us. So, what does that mean? How much should we give? What are the rules regarding money, giving, supporting, and gifting? Are there differences between the categories? Do the Biblical standards still apply to us today?

            Let us begin by reading the passage together, then we will pray for God’s Wisdom and guidance on this subject, then we will examine what it meant to the original audience and then we will extract the applications that are timeless and will therefore apply to us today, here at Mountain View Church.

            Please open your Bibles with me to today’s passage in the Book of Ezra and chapter two starting at verse 68 If you did not bring your Bible with you, there should be a Bible under the chair in front of you. We refer to those books as the Pew Bible and you will find Ezra chapter two on page 375. You can also follow along on your electronic devices.

READ EZRA 2:68-70

PRAY

            Let’s dive into these verses a little deeper, and then we can examine what the original lesson in that context means for us and how it applies to our lives today.

            VERSE 68 begins with the explanation that when these people arrived in Jerusalem, they went to the house of the Lord, or at least to the site of the previous temple, and they began to give freewill offerings to the treasury. This would have been the treasury that was set aside specifically for the Temple. This was not the official government treasury; it was not the reserve that the provincial government would have used to pay for the administration of the government for the area.

            We know this because in the corresponding list in chapter 7 of Nehemiah, in verse 70 we read, “The governor gave to the treasury 1,000 darics of gold, 50 bowls, and 530 garments for priests.” The governor would not be the one giving to the provincial treasury. Those funds would have come from local taxation and initially, it would have been supplied with funds from King Cyrus, who would expect to receive tribute or taxation in return from the inhabitants in the coming years.

            What we just read in Nehemiah we see that it documents what the governor gave out of the government treasury to the Temple treasury for use in the reconstruction and re-establishment of worship at the Temple.

            In the days of Jesus and with the remodeled Temple expanded by King Herod, one of the outer courts even carried the name “the Treasury”. That was where the offerings were received; as in the account of the Widow’s Offering from the gospel of Luke.

            The last three words of this verse can be applied in a couple of different ways. “On its site” could refer to the location of the Temple Treasury, or it may refer to the location of the rebuilding of the Temple, or both. It is clear from Scripture that the site of the rebuilding of the Temple was not in dispute. It was to occur at the top of Mount Moriah, where Solomon built the first Temple, and where David bought the threshing floor and erected an altar to the Lord.

            Verse 69 explains that each gave according to their abilities. We saw last week in verses 64 to 67 that there were indications of differing levels of wealth among those who were returning. Some had the lowly donkeys, others had camels, the slightly more well-off had mules and the wealthiest among them had horses. That’s like going from Kias to Cadillacs, from SUV’s to Limousines in today’s world. Often our level of wealth can be determined by the type and age of the vehicle that we drive. We too can determine these differing levels of wealth from the list given here in Scripture.

            The numbers listed here amount to about 1,100 pounds of gold and 6,000 pounds of silver. The silver would have been used to mint the Temple coins to be used in the treasury and for the offerings. The gold would have been used for the tools and the implements used in the religious rites and ceremonies.

            Notice one other thing here, it wasn’t just money that was given. There were donations in-kind that were also given in the form of 100 priestly garments. We will see more of these types of donations in the coming weeks as we study more of the book.

            None of the sacrificial items like bread or animals were given yet because the altar had not been rebuilt yet. We will see that next week and the significance of that event.

            Verse 70 may have a word missing, or at the very least there is an implied meaning that inserting a single word into the verse would help later readers such as ourselves to understand this passage a little more plainly.

            Look at verse 70 where it says, “⁷⁰ The priests, the Levites, the musicians, the gatekeepers and the temple servants settled in their own towns,” stop right there. Some commentators think that over time a word has become omitted here by the copyists but I’m not so sure of that. The commentary writers feel that the name Jerusalem should be found right here in the verse.

            So, verse 70 should read, “⁷⁰ The priests, the Levites, the musicians, the gatekeepers and the temple servants settled in their own town Jerusalem”. The reason is clear, Jerusalem would have been the town where the priests, Levites, musicians, gatekeepers, and temple servants would have lived so that they could be close to their work.

            I don’t think that we need to explain the absence of the word here by blaming a copyist error. I think it may have been naturally understood by the original audience that these folks lived in Jerusalem. The name “Jerusalem” in this passage may have been redundant to the original audience as they would have been very familiar with the workings of the Temple and the effort required from those who carried out those duties.

            Telling that audience that those temple workers lived in Jerusalem would be like telling an Alberta hockey fan that the Calgary Flames play hockey in Calgary, Alberta. That information at the end is a little unnecessary.

            But notice what follows in the verse, “along with some of the other people,” indicating that it wasn’t just the Temple workers who were living in Jerusalem. We will see in Nehemiah when the families are listed who rebuilt the wall, that many others were living in Jerusalem.

            We see the chapter ends with a similar statement to how it started, “and the rest of the Israelites settled in their towns.” Look at the end of verse one in chapter two where it says, “(they returned to Jerusalem and Judah, each to their own town,”. So, who returned to the other towns that were their own? The other Israelites were the ones who were also returning in these early stages of regrowth and resettlement.

            The use of the term “Israelites” here is a unifying term or a reunifying term even. A bringing back together of the divided kingdoms under one name again.

            While we are here in verse one, look at how Scripture refers to the region that they are returning to. Seventy years earlier, the captives came out of the Kingdom of Judah and now we see Scripture refer to the area as the province. The once mighty region ruled by King Solomon was the seat of the wealthiest and wisest and arguably one of the most powerful rulers in the Middle East. Jerusalem was the capital of the United Kingdom of Israel, then it became a divided kingdom of Israel and Judah, then the Northern Kingdom fell to the Assyrians, and then the Southern Kingdom fell to the Babylonians and now the area is referred to, even by the Bible, as a province, just another province of the kingdom of Persia.

            But we see that God is shining His face upon His people once more and they are about to embark on a powerful and exciting journey of rebirth and rebuilding.

            We have seen so far that giving and offerings have been mentioned a couple of times already, so let’s examine more closely exactly what that means so that we can extract the application for our lives.

            Let’s examine the definitions of the some of these words that we are using here this morning so that we make sure we are all speaking the same language. You will notice that all these definitions come from the Lexham Bible Dictionary.

            What exactly are offerings? Offerings are any type of gift given to a king or a god as an act of fealty, worship, or devotion. Represents a pledge of loyalty between the giver and the receiver. Can take the form of a sacrifice, tithe, firstfruit, or money.

            Offerings are a gift given to a king, or in our case to our God as an act of fealty, worship, or devotion. Do you consider your giving to this church as an act of worship to Jesus? According to Scripture, that is how God the Father sees the giving of offerings.

            Our giving is a way of honoring the sacrifice that Jesus made on our behalf. We bring honor to God through our act of giving. Worship is a way of honoring God. Let’s examine what honor means here.

            For the Israelites, offerings were a way of confirming their acceptance by Yahweh. While they were still in captivity, the LORD came to Ezekiel in a series of visions and prophecies to act as an encouragement to His people that God had not forgotten them in their exile.

            We read in Ezekiel 43, verse 27 what the LORD said to His people, “²⁷ At the end of these days, from the eighth day on, the priests are to present your burnt offerings and fellowship offerings on the altar. Then I will accept you, declares the Sovereign Lord.” This prophecy was for exactly the time that Ezra is describing in chapter 3 of his book.

            For the Jewish people, these offerings were more than a method of acceptance, they were also a means of showing honor to Yahweh. Now, for Christians, we do not need to offer burnt sacrifices to gain acceptance from God. Our acceptance is gained through the acceptance of the atoning work of Jesus on the cross. Christians are not required to bring burnt offerings before the LORD, we have Grace.

            We bring our tithes and offerings as a way of showing the value that we place on this gift called Grace. It is a way of instilling honor on the sacrifice that Jesus made on our behalf. That is one of our primary duties as Believers, is to show Jesus Christ honor. Do you think the unbelieving world is showing Christ honor? Not in the least, as a matter of fact, a large number of them in the West show the highest level of dishonor by using His holy name as a cuss word several times each day.

            It is our duty to bring honor to Jesus Christ and His sacrifice. But what is honor?

            Honor is esteem and respect. To honor God is to give Him reverence and homage, for God alone is worthy of our highest honor. We honor lots of people in our lives, we honor sports stars sometimes, we honor missionaries through our support of them, and we honor volunteers in our community, but are we honoring God enough? Scripture says only God is worthy of our honor.

       First Chronicles 16, verse 29 says this, “²⁹ Ascribe to the Lord the glory due his name; bring an offering and come before him!” This quote from 1 Chronicles is from the instructions that King David gave to the first worship leader Asaph after David had the Ark of the Covenant brought to Jerusalem in preparation for its new home in the soon-to-be-built Temple. This quote comes from one of the first worship songs written for the new Temple duties.

            Revelation chapter 4 contains another worship song that sings of Yahweh being worthy of honor. Chapter four records the song of the twenty-four elders who will be falling before the throne in heaven singing these praises, “¹¹ “You are worthy, our Lord and God, to receive glory and honor and power, for you created all things, and by your will they were created and have their being.”

            We see that we have just answered the question from our first point. Honor, what does that mean? To honor God is to give Him reverence and homage, for God alone is worthy of our highest honor. We show honor by worshipping and learning from Jesus. We worship through singing and giving. We show honor through our giving.

            This next part will seem self-serving, but I cannot omit it just to save me a bit of embarrassment. The Lexham Bible dictionary goes on in its definition of honor to include the following, “Esteem, honor, and respect should also be given to our spiritual leaders in the church. The spiritual leaders are not limited to just the pastor. The spiritual leaders should also include the members of the board. A healthy church will be led by an Elder Board. This lightens the load on the pastor, or teaching Elder so that he may concentrate on studying and sharing God’s Word.

            1 Timothy 5, verses 17 and 18 teaches, “¹⁷ The elders who direct the affairs of the church well are worthy of double honor, especially those whose work is preaching and teaching. ¹⁸ For Scripture says, “Do not muzzle an ox while it is treading out the grain,” and “The worker deserves his wages.”

            I will add this statement and you can take it for what it's worth. I never understood the attitude of some churches that felt that it was their job to keep their pastor humble by keeping him poor. Don’t misunderstand me, I am not complaining about my current wages. I knew what I was getting into when I accepted this call to ministry from this church and I am willing to work to prove myself in this new position.

            I held this view on poverty in the pastorate, even before I entered into ministry. When I was an Elder at our church in Cardston, I was constantly making sure that we were showing our love and appreciation for our pastor. Speaking with my mentor last month, we were discussing budgets, and he mentioned that it has been his experience that the pastor’s salary, or staff wages if it is a larger church with multiple staff members usually accounts for 44-48% of a church's budget. What do you think of that number? That’s not wishful thinking, that is just the reality of the situation of a healthy church. There is so much more effort that is required to maintain, never mind grow a church, than the 90 minutes we spend together on Sunday mornings.

            Honor really is a heart issue, isn’t it? Billy Graham once said, “Give me five minutes with a person’s checkbook and I’ll tell you where their heart is.” Let me repeat that, “Give me five minutes with a person’s checkbook and I’ll tell you where their heart is.” We can often tell what people love the most by what they spend their money on. Is it their house? Their kids? Their car? Themselves? Their God and their church? Take a look at your bank statement and see where your priorities lie.    

            Just one other quick point about honor. One of the Ten Commandments states, “Honor your father and your mother” (Ex. 20:12; Deut. 5:16). Jesus taught that to honor parents means to help them financially. Mathew 15, verses 4 to 6 tell us, “⁴ For God said, ‘Honor your father and mother’ and ‘Anyone who curses their father or mother is to be put to death.’ ⁵ But you say that if anyone declares that what might have been used to help their father or mother is ‘devoted to God,’ ⁶ they are not to ‘honor their father or mother’ with it. Thus, you nullify the word of God for the sake of your tradition.”

            A little context is needed here. The tradition that Jesus is referring to here is the practice of Korban. K-O-R-B-A-N. This was a practice that some people used to get out from under the obligation of looking after their parents as they aged. They would pledge their possessions to the Temple through an oath named korban. The possessions would be turned over to the Temple when they died, the possessions would be sold, and the money would go to the Temple.

            So adult children would take the vow of Korban and claim that their wealth was no longer their own for it now belonged to the Temple and they could not spare any of it to help their parents. Do you see why Jesus is constantly stressing our heart attitudes?

            We see that offerings are a part of honoring God. There are a few other types of offerings that are mentioned in the Old Testament that may or may not apply to us. There was the atonement offering mentioned in Exodus. This seems to have been a one-time Offering for the Day of Atonement that is mentioned in Numbers 29.

            Exodus 29:24-27 talks about a Wave Offering that was to be regularly observed in the Temple. A part of the Wave Offering was also the concept of firstfruits. This offering was the first and best part of the harvest of crops or processed produce, animals, and firstborn sons. “Firstfruits” also refers to ceremonies about the initial portion of the harvest.

            Proverbs 3, verses 9 and 10 talk about offering up the firstfruits. “⁹ Honor the Lord with your wealth, with the firstfruits of all your crops; ¹⁰ then your barns will be filled to overflowing, and your vats will brim over with new wine.” Some of the portions of the firstfruits were also brought to the Temple to provide for the Levites, priests, musicians, servants, and gatekeepers.

            Finally, I’m going to say a quick word about the tithe.

 

            Once again from the Lexham Bible Dictionary. TITHE- One-tenth of a person’s goods, whether agricultural or monetary, that are dedicated to God. The practice of tithing has changed since the Old Testament period, but the concept of setting aside one-tenth of one’s income or goods for religious use has remained the same.

            Some people claim that tithing no longer applies to New Testament Believers, but that simply isn’t biblically accurate. As in so many things, Jesus calls His followers to a higher standard of holiness in the living of their lives. For Christians, tithing is like the bare minimum. Tithing is the training wheels for giving. It is a great starting point in your walk with Christ, but we are called to so much more.

            Your homework for this week is to read the passages that are listed in the bulletin under New Testament giving passages. We do not have time for them this morning.

PRAY

CONCLUSION

            My conclusion this morning is going to be a little longer than usual, that was why I cut the main body of the sermon a little short today.

            We have finished the first two chapters in the Book of Ezra, so maybe here is a good spot to stop and reflect on what we have seen so far. What we have seen is a renewal of faith by God’s people in the promises of God made to Abraham. Did God change His mind about this promise that He made to Abraham? No!

            Did the descendants of Abraham break the covenant with God? Repeatedly! What was God’s response to this breaking of the covenant? He gave them a time-out as it were. He put them out of their land. For seventy years God’s people lived in exile under the brutal reign of the Babylonians.

            Then God moved the heart of King Cyrus and God orchestrated the return of His people to their land to rebuild His house so that He would once again dwell among them. And they responded! They gave up the lives that they had built in the Babylonian towns. God moved the heart of Cyrus and the governor Sheshbazzar to provide the start-up capital to launch this major capital project of rebuilding the Temple.

            But then God also moved the hearts of the people. Not just to move locations and their homes, but God also moved their hearts to give, to fund this undertaking. After suffering under the consequences of their sin for seventy years, these people were willing to resume the practices of worship that Yahweh required of them. This giving was no small feat. It was a real sign of their faith and their commitment to Yahweh.

            Do we have that same level of faith and commitment?

            Does our giving reflect our faith? Do we believe that God can grow and rebuild this church for His glory? Because that truly is the real reason to do any of this. We should be doing all that we do… and all that we offer… to the Glory of God.

            Will our upcoming budget be a faith-based budget or a secular-guided budget?

            Are we going to be more concerned with the balance in the bank account at the end of the year, relying solely on our ways and means, or are we going to be more concerned with ministry opportunities and gospel-sharing opportunities with our lost friends, families, and neighbors and allow God to show up in the midst of these things in spectacular ways? Are we going to try and offer opportunities to others to grow in their faith and find respite from the worries of the world here in this sanctuary worshipping God together as a family of Believers?

            Are we going to act like a church or a business? Let me give you an illustration.

            A pastor friend of mine told me about a denominational conference that he attended that was hosted by the largest church in that area of the denomination. A church that would be deemed to be successful by worldly standards based on the numbers that attend each week. Those are the outward appearances.

            Let me tell you where I think that this church took a misstep. This pastor friend of mine explained that at this conference they were all shown a slide show that was based on the model of this large church. The issue was that the PowerPoint contained business-world terms, the worst of which was that this church viewed its congregants as customers and consumers. They did not use terms like “Lost” to refer to their unsaved neighbors instead, they referred to them as potential consumers or unreached customers. Churches can be different from each other in a lot of ways, but when you start viewing your congregants and unsaved neighbors as consumers and potential consumers, I suggest you have lost your way as a church. A church is an organization, it is also an organism, it is a body of believers, and it is the Bride of Christ purchased at a terrible cost.

            In 1 Corinthians 12:12-14 Paul gives us this instruction, “¹² Just as a body, though one, has many parts, but all its many parts form one body, so it is with Christ. ¹³ For we were all baptized by one Spirit so as to form one body—whether Jews or Gentiles, slave or free—and we were all given the one Spirit to drink. ¹⁴ Even so the body is not made up of one part but of many.”

            What Paul is saying here is that just like the human body, the church body is made up of many parts and each of those parts must be healthy and working together in unity for the whole body to be healthy and function properly. When one part of the body is not working, it affects the performance of the entire body. Did you know that if you lose your big toe on either foot, just one toe, your big toe, you will have to go through weeks of physiotherapy to learn how to walk all over again? Your big toe is that critical to your body to maintain your balance!

            So, if you are on the sidelines, if you are doing less than you can be for the sake of this church if you are giving less or doing less than you could be, let me ask you to go home and examine your actions and ask yourself why. Is it a laziness thing? An unwillingness to commit to your fellow Believers? Or is it an issue of faith on your part and you think God is not showing up here at Mountain View Evangelical Missionary Church?

            I’ll close with these three questions:

Does your level of giving reflect your faith?

Will our upcoming budget be a faith-based budget or a world-based budget?

Do you believe that God can rebuild this church for His Glory?

            A friend this week gave me some wise counsel. He told me that a doxology is more than just a Bible passage or a closing prayer, it is a blessing from God. So let me leave you with this blessing:

“May the LORD bless you and keep you;

The LORD make His face shine upon you and be gracious to you;

The Lord turn His face toward you and give you peace.”

Have a Blessed week.