[Chapter 3]

1. Build His Church First

Ezra 3:1
When the seventh month came and the Israelites had settled in their towns, the people assembled as one man in Jerusalem.

Some of the Israelites who were taken away as captives to Babylon, chose to return to their native land to rebuild God's temple. After they returned and settled down, they were not distracted with their lives, instead they all assembled as one man to do God's work. We as God's people must always be ready to do God's will. Building His church must be first in our lives. But many of us loose our first love for God and as we grow, we start to just attend meetings and give less time to build God's church and give more time to build our lives. This is not good. We must build His church first. As we build God's church God will help us in building our lives.

2. Practice the Word of God

Ezra 3:2-6
2 Then Jeshua son of Jozadak and his fellow priests and Zerubbabel son of Shealtiel and his associates began to build the altar of the God of Israel to sacrifice burnt offerings on it, in accordance with what is written in the Law of Moses the man of God.
3 Despite their fear of the peoples around them, they built the altar on its foundation and sacrificed burnt offerings on it to the LORD, both the morning and evening sacrifices.
4 Then in accordance with what is written, they celebrated the Feast of Tabernacles with the required number of burnt offerings prescribed for each day.
5 After that, they presented the regular burnt offerings, the New Moon sacrifices and the sacrifices for all the appointed sacred feasts of the LORD, as well as those brought as freewill offerings to the LORD.
6 On the first day of the seventh month they began to offer burnt offerings to the LORD, though the foundation of the Lord's temple had not yet been laid.

The leaders of the people built the altar and offered sacrifices in accordance with what is written. They studied the bible and did exactly what was written in it. We too must live our life by what is written in the Bible and not stray from it even a little bit. Do you read the Bible regularly? We read and we hear many messages from the Bible. But do you practice what you hear? We must not be mere hearers but practicers. Let's do exactly what is said in the Bible and not compromise here and there.

3. God Needs Leaders

Ezra 3:7-9
7 Then they gave money to the masons and carpenters, and gave food and drink and oil to the people of Sidon and Tyre, so that they would bring cedar logs by sea from Lebanon to Joppa, as authorized by Cyrus king of Persia.
8 In the second month of the second year after their arrival at the house of God in Jerusalem, Zerubbabel son of Shealtiel, Jeshua son of Jozadak and the rest of their brothers (the priests and the Levites and all who had returned from the captivity to Jerusalem) began the work, appointing Levites twenty years of age and older to supervise the building of the house of the LORD.
9 Jeshua and his sons and brothers and Kadmiel and his sons (descendants of Hodaviah ) and the sons of Henadad and their sons and brothers--all Levites--joined together in supervising those working on the house of God.

To do God's work we need leaders. Zerubbabel and Jeshua were the chosen leaders of God. God works through leaders. We need to respect our leaders and submit to their authority. Nothing can be accomplished without leaders leading, and followers following. If each of us has an opinion and we get critical and disobedient to the leaders, nothing can be accomplished. Let's be united and submissive to our leaders. Every able person above 20 years of age was chosen to do God's work. God needs all of us to extend a helping hand. We must not feel that evangelism and bearing fruit is only the work of the leaders. It's everybody's responsibility. We all need to desire to become leaders. How is your attitude about becoming a leader?

4. Always Praise and Thank God

Ezra 3:10-11
10 When the builders laid the foundation of the temple of the LORD, the priests in their vestments and with trumpets, and the Levites (the sons of Asaph) with cymbals, took their places to praise the LORD, as prescribed by David king of Israel.
11 With praise and thanksgiving they sang to the LORD: "He is good; his love to Israel endures forever." And all the people gave a great shout of praise to the LORD, because the foundation of the house of the LORD was laid.

When the foundation of the temple was laid, everyone gave thanks to God, and praised Him with loud shouts. When we praise and give thanks to God, He gets happy. The joy of the Lord is our strength. What is your strength? The joy of your wife/child, your parents, your friends, your leaders, your boss...? The joy of our Lord must be our strength. In our prayers, we must always acknowledge God in everything we do, and pray before any important thing we do and give thanks to God when it is done. In our daily prayers we need to sing and praise God. We need to praise loud.

5. Let us look to a Glorious Future

Ezra 3:12-13
12 But many of the older priests and Levites and family heads, who had seen the former temple, wept aloud when they saw the foundation of this temple being laid, while many others shouted for joy.
13 No one could distinguish the sound of the shouts of joy from the sound of weeping, because the people made so much noise. And the sound was heard far away.

The past temple had a great glory. Older people remembered how glorious the temple and the worship was in the past The enemies destroyed the temple and hence the worship stopped. The older people who remembered the past glory wept loud. Today in our movement, we have seen the glorious way God built His churches in the last few years. It is our responsibility to see that His church will be as glorious in the present and future as it was in the past. It is each of our responsibility to build a glorious future for God's kingdom in Indian region.