Ezra: The Lord Helpsናሙና

Ezra has been traveling around the country delivering the king’s orders to all the officials of Trans-Euphrates (8:36). Then comes a bombshell. Leaders in Judah tell him devastating news: ‘The people of Israel … have not kept themselves separate from the neighboring peoples with their detestable practices’ (v. 1). They should have kept themselves pure and distinctive. Instead, they have ‘mingled the holy race’ (v. 2), becoming like every other nation, most obviously by marrying people from other faiths. 

This is not a racist comment. Intermarriage is not an issue of race or ethnicity. The issue is theologically relational, impacting our relationship with the Lord. If our closest human relationship is with someone who does not follow the Lord but has a completely different worldview, our wholehearted commitment to the Lord will be challenged. This is why it is wise not to marry unbelievers. We may argue that we will influence them for Christ, but the truth is that they are likely to pull us away from Him. 

But while the presenting issue is intermarriage, the underlying problem is that the people of God are not putting the Lord first. The nations listed in verse 1 remind us that this is clear disobedience against God’s Word. As the Lord led His people out of Egypt, ready to enter Canaan, He instructed them not to make a covenant with the people around them, not to follow their customs and practices, and not to worship their gods (Ex. 34:11– 16). But now God’s people, by marrying those from other nations, have entered into covenants with them and inevitably begun to follow their practices. They are compromising their position as the pure, distinctive people of God. 

Living distinctively Christian lives is an issue for God’s people at every age. It’s often expressed like this: ‘We are to be in the world, but not of the world’, yet we will always be tempted to go one way or the other. We may not live in the world for fear of becoming like the world – but we then become exclusive, staying away from any real engagement with others. Or we may become immersed in the world, in order to win the world – but we then become like the world and are tempted to keep quiet about anything that might offend people or put them off following Jesus. So desperate to live in a way that doesn’t look weird, we don’t decisively and distinctively put the Lord first. 

When Ezra hears what is happening in Jerusalem, he is appalled (vv. 3–4). Are we that appalled when the church and Christians are not distinctive? Are we horrified when the church becomes like the world? 

Reflection

Ask the Lord to help you see where you or your church family are failing to be distinctive. Pray for a desire to be positively holy and the strength to continue to be a witness in the world.