https://biblehub.com/nkjv/ezra/7.htm

We are now finishing up the book of Ezra. We know Ezra was one of the minor prophets, and in a nutshell, he was one who was taken captive to Babylon, and now he was charged with rebuilding the temple.

I know we are getting nearer to the life of Jesus, and I certainly do not want to get ahead of myself, but I believe one of the reason Jesus came was because we didn’t listen to anything else.

In the beginning, Cain knew it was a sin to commit murder, so either God gave His commandments down verbally, or perhaps He put them in our moral compass when He made man. Regardless, either sin broke the moral compass or man simply refused to obey the commands of God.

So God put His commandments on stone, etched with His own finger, so man wouldn’t forget them. That didn’t work either; even though the commands were on stone and the Mosaic Law was written and store in the ark of the covenant, man still sinned.

So God sent prophet, after prophet, after prophet, to remind us that we were sinning and to warn us of the natural consequences of sin. And that didn’t work either.

And in these last few chapter of Ezra, we see that unfolding before our eyes. The children of Israel had strayed from God, turned their backs on Him and were living as they pleased, and the natural consequences of their sin was to be taken captive to Babylon for 70 years.

If you follow me, you’ll recognize this analogy, if not, I compare our relationship to God the same as a child with their earthly father. Our father tells us to go play in the yard, but he establishes a rule that we stay in the yard, and we don’t leave the fence. That was the law…not an oppressive law, but rather a law to ensure we were happy and safe playing in the yard. And he tells us the natural consequences if we disobey him; we could stray into the street and get hit by a car, or we can go somewhere dangerous where we get hurt, or worse, we could be abducted.

If we obey father, we’ll be safe in the yard. But if we disobey, if we open the gate and leave the yard, we are exposing ourselves to danger, to the natural consequences of our actions.

It is the same with God. He gave us the law, the rules to keep us safe and happy. If we say close to God and obey Him, all will be okay. But if we disobey and go our on our own, naturally bad things will happen.

So God gives the law verbally or builds it into us and that doesn’t work, He writes the law on stone and that doesn’t work, and He sends His prophets to remind us, and that doesn’t work. And while we were busy away from God, the Babylonians abducted us and stool all of our toys. And they kept us for 70 years.

By now, you would think that we would get the hint, that we would get the message through our thick skulls. But as we read in Ezra, even being taken away from our homeland for 70 years didn’t work either, and the children of Israel once again began to marry outside of their heritage.

And it isn’t a matter of race, that’s not the reason God wanted them to stay within their own people. But if you marry outside, you will very slowly, but likely start accepting their practices, something that was true from the start. When God led the children of Israel to the promised land, He warned them against intermarrying with the Canaan’s who were pagan, and they ignored Gods word, and guess what happened. They started accepting and participating in pagan practices like idol worshiping.

And already, fresh at home, they’re doing it again.

Will we ever learn?