Contemplative Bible Reading

Ezra 6:19-22 (New International Version)

¹⁹ On the fourteenth day of the first month, the exiles celebrated the Passover. ²⁰ The priests and Levites had purified themselves and were all ceremonially clean. The Levites slaughtered the Passover lamb for all the exiles, for their brothers the priests and for themselves. ²¹ So the Israelites who had returned from the exile ate it, together with all who had separated themselves from the unclean practices of their Gentile neighbors in order to seek the LORD, the God of Israel. ²² For seven days they celebrated with joy the Feast of Unleavened Bread, because the LORD had filled them with joy by changing the attitude of the king of Assyria, so that he assisted them in the work on the house of God, the God of Israel.

In Ezra, some of God’s chosen people had returned to Jerusalem after 70 years of exile in Babylon. They came to rebuild the Temple and re-establish their Temple worship. They faced hardships and outright opposition from people in the region. This opposition was understandable as these people had their run of the place for a couple generations. They weren’t welcoming of another people to return and take back all the land.

Back in chapter 4, King Artaxerxes ordered that work on the Temple be stopped – and it was. The Jews then sent letters to the King(s) (they seemed to change kings often), asked for a search of kingly memos (good thing they had a good paper-producing bureaucracy even back then) about this. The search found just what the Jews knew existed, a blessing to rebuild the Temple.

On the surface, this all looks like good record keeping and simple justice. A king had written a memo, the memo was found, and the policy stood. Nothing special happening here, right? Wrong. Things don’t work that simply in politics today and they didn’t work that simply several thousand years ago.

God swayed the mind of the King. God changed the attitude of the King. The King blessed the efforts of the people.

God can still change the attitudes of Kings, Presidents, Prime Ministers, dog catchers, and School Board Members. Prayer helps. Let us never forget this.