CONFRONTING SIN. Ezra 9:1-4 The belittling of sin happening today is nothing new. All around us, the world system—including national governments—deals with declining morals and a departure from righteousness by changing laws instead of confronting the real problem. This occurred in Israel and was accepted as normal among the general population. But when it affects God's people, specific steps must be taken. The core issue then and now is spiritual, not prejudice. Intermarriages led the Lord's people into idolatry, and that rejection of God and His word is why Ezra was so deeply affected. The same applies today to those who recognize the dangers of unequal yokes. Potential failure is nearby when restoration happens. Restoration follows confusion, remorse, and repentance. Faithfulness to God and His word is seen in family life. Disobedience to God brings the risk of a family being destroyed. When a family’s life is dysfunctional, society suffers. When society becomes unruly and changes laws to suit the lifestyle of the people, the nation suffers and is in danger of being destroyed from within. Ezra leads in identifying himself with God’s sinning people.
Four months after Ezra arrived in Jerusalem, it was brought to his attention that some of the priests and Levites had broken God's law by marrying women who worshipped pagan and foreign gods. This may have been due to a shortage of unmarried Jewish women or for financial and social benefits. When they did this, they combined devotion to pagan gods with their worship and service of the Lord, which was an abomination to God.
Malachi prophesied around the same time and provided further insight into this great problem, which was returning the Israelites to their state before the captivity. Marrying those who did not belong to the Lord’s people was an act of infidelity to God. This same issue had been ongoing since the time of the judges and was even practiced by Solomon.
This was not a matter of racial prejudice because all those tribes were from Shem. The reasons behind this separation were spiritual. Those who chose to do what they wanted rather than what God wanted were inclined to go further and adopt their spouse’s idolatry.
The people of Israel had grown accustomed to the sinful lifestyle of those who shared the land with them. The list of tribes shows that the removal of pagan idolaters was never fully completed. When Israel was taken captive, other peoples were resettled in northern Israel by the Assyrians, and about 150 years later, when the people of Judah were taken to Babylon, some were left behind to maintain the land. Approximately sixty years before Ezra arrived, the temple was rebuilt under the leadership of Zerubbabel and Jeshua. However, it wasn't long before even the returnees became used to temple worship and were drawn to pagan women.
When two people of different religions marry, it is not long before a man may follow his wife's influence to live in peace. That has happened in the past, and it still occurs now. Promising young Christians, who in their teenage years had a desire for the things of God, often, when they meet attractive people in college, university, or the workplace, fall prey to subtle temptation and turn away from the Lord.
Someone who belongs to God may lose sight of God’s will for them and choose to disobey His word for selfish reasons. They will soon accept what is wrong and try to justify their disobedience to God. Sometimes, when discouragement occurs because things didn’t turn out the way we wanted, the devil takes advantage of us. When we have unrealistic expectations and they aren’t fulfilled, all kinds of bad thoughts enter the minds of those who aren’t focused on the Lord.
The paganism of the past persists today, affecting not only leaders but society as a whole, which suffers and declines into moral decay. It's bad enough when it affects society at large, but when it invades the local church, it becomes apostasy.
Ezra arrived in Jerusalem sixty years after the first returnees. What initially startled and grieved him had become commonplace and accepted by many of the people. The fact that some still understood who they were and why they were there was a positive sign that there were still righteous people who feared God. The effect of that information on Ezra must have awakened the consciences of those people as they watched him tear his clothes and pull out his hair. He didn’t launch into a tirade against the people or throw a temper tantrum, but for several hours he openly grieved over the people's sins until the time of the evening sacrifice.
Gathering around him were those who feared God and trembled at His word, with humbled and contrite hearts. They took the word of God seriously. When they saw how shocked Ezra was by the news of such a serious departure, it so affected them that they feared and trembled. They seemed to understand the seriousness of sin in God’s eyes, not just their own.
It was likely that Ezra's dedication to, and understanding of, God's word became widely known. He probably taught the people for about four months before the awakened consciences of their leaders prompted them to inform Ezra about this serious problem. Priests, Levites, and ordinary people were intermarrying with idolaters. This sinful practice had become commonplace and accepted. The people they were marrying were enemies of God's people.
We can fall into the trap of tolerating evil and hardly realize the consequences of that attitude until it's too late to change the inevitable outcome. The challenge for us is, “Do I seriously believe God’s word? Is sin really all that serious? Do I really want to obey God’s word? Do I love God enough to keep His commandments? Am I really ready to fall on my knees, spread my empty hands out, and take my place with God’s people?” Will I pray, lifting up holy hands without wrath and doubting?
This same problem has troubled God's people throughout history. Solomon, despite his God-given wisdom, fell into the trap of loving "strange women," even marrying the daughter of the Pharaoh of Egypt and building a place for her to practice idolatry. There is a strange idea among many who claim to be saved—that we should not "come out from among them, and ye separate," but instead adopt a spirit of tolerance and kindness to accept anyone who says they believe in God. Some even argue that Allah of the Muslims is the same as the God of the Bible.
Those who teach that we can earn our own salvation by "doing the best we can" or through other human efforts do not truly understand who God is. Others will belittle the Holy Spirit and claim He is merely an influence. The counterfeit Christianity of our day is a form of idolatry because it reduces God in people's minds to a figure of their own making. They accept their personal definition of God, saying, "I believe that God is ..." and have turned Him into a god of their own imagination.
Such people would have seen Ezra as a fanatic for taking such a serious stance on a common practice. He was so stunned and appalled that he sat down where he was, tore open his priestly garment and his outer clothes, and pulled hair from his face and head as a sign of his broken heart and humility. This display of remorse, guilt, and humiliation would have moved others who saw him, and they probably would have said, "What's wrong with him? Who died? Why is he so shaken?"
People can become so accustomed to sin that they no longer see it as sin. The widespread acceptance of abortion, the increasing normalization of euthanasia, and the fact that nearly half of the population has been divorced or is living with someone they are not married to, or cohabiting with someone of the same sex, are now common social norms. Speaking out against these sins often leads to criticism from those who reject the relevance of the Bible's standards in today's society.