When I first read this list of names, I remember thinking that this would be a tough text to get anything spiritually nourishing from. I have always believed and taught that every word of the Bible is inspired by God and therefore helpful in revealing the heart of God in the person and work of the crucified, risen and returning Savior to us.
That does not mean that some passages will not require some extra heavy lifting; this is one of those passages that requires some extra heavy lifting. Look at the text with me…
EZRA 7:28 – 8:15…
7:28I took courage for the hand of the LORD my God was on me, and I gathered leading men from Israel to go up with me. 8:1These are the heads of the fathers’ houses, and this is the genealogy of those who went up with me from Babylonia, in the reign of Artaxerxes the king: 2Of the sons of Phinehas, Gershom. Of the sons of Ithamar, Daniel. Of the sons of David, Hattush. 3Of the sons of Shecaniah, who was of the sons of Parosh, Zechariah, with whom were registered 150 men. 4Of the sons of Pahath-moab, Eliehoenai the son of Zerahiah, and with him 200 men. 5Of the sons of Zattu, Shecaniah the son of Jahaziel, and with him 300 men. 6Of the sons of Adin, Ebed the son of Jonathan, and with him 50 men. 7Of the sons of Elam, Jeshaiah the son of Athaliah, and with him 70 men. 8Of the sons of Shephatiah, Zebadiah the son of Michael, and with him 80 men. 9Of the sons of Joab, Obadiah the son of Jehiel, and with him 218 men. 10Of the sons of Bani, Shelomith the son of Josiphiah, and with him 160 men. 11Of the sons of Bebai, Zechariah, the son of Bebai, and with him 28 men. 12Of the sons of Azgad, Johanan the son of Hakkatan, and with him 110 men. 13Of the sons of Adonikim, those who came later, their names being Eliphelet, Jeuel, and Shemaiah, and with them 60 men. 14Of the sons of Bigvai, Uthai and Zaccur, and with them 70 men. 15I gathered them to the river that runs to Ahava, and there we camped three days.
#1: EZRA GATHERS A MINISTRY TEAM (7:28; 8:15)
Verses 28 of chapter seven and 15 of chapter eight tell us that Ezra, filled with courage by the presence of the Lord, gathered a ministry team of “leading men from Israel” (7:28) for a three-day leadership camp on the banks of a river just a few miles outside Babylon before embarking on the one-thousand-mile journey to Jerusalem. Preparation is vital to executing the mission.
#2: EZRA MAKES A LIST OF HIS TEAMMATES (8:1 – 14)
In verses 1 – 14 of chapter eight Ezra makes a list of the leading men that have joined the team. He refers to them as “the heads of their fathers’ houses” (8:1) and then he lists them out in an organized fashion. The organization of the names is structured around priests from the family of Aaron (Phinehas and Ithamar v.2), royalty from David’s family (Hattush v.2), and other lay leaders from ten more Israelite families; all in all, twelve families are listed in Ezra’s ministry team.2
Furthermore, some of the leading men and heads of father’s houses on Ezra’s team, brought more men with them, for a total of approximately 1,496 men not counting women and children.3 It seems as though some of those leading men on Ezra’s team were actually leading other teams of men. Once again, all these leading men, represented 12 families with three divisions: Priests, Royalty, and Lay leaders. Organization in leadership is vital to executing the mission.
#3: EZRA WAS EXECUTING A MISSION WITH A VISION (7:25 – 27)
Once I had examined the text in front of us today (7:28 – 8:15), I started thinking about why Ezra was gathering, preparing, and organizing this ministry team. And the answer is a simple set of words: Mission and Vision. God had provided everything necessary for Ezra to execute the mission ahead of him. The mission in front of him was simple: Restore a community of people centered on the authority of God’s Word and beautify the temple in Jerusalem (7:25 – 27). The vision was simple too: Ezra envisioned a Word-centered community and a beautiful temple.
I can imagine Ezra, taking the letter from the king of Persia in his hand along with the Word of God in his other hand and visiting the houses of the twelve families in Babylon. I can see him sitting in the back yard or at the kitchen table with those leading men, heads of the twelve families, as he explained the mission and the vision and the provision that God had given him.
I imagine that Ezra knew that the mission and the vision that God had provided for him was too big for one man to do alone, but he knew that he must lead forward in the mission and the vision with the provision that God had given to him. Leading forward faithfully meant that Ezra needed to gather, prepare, organize, and lead a massive team of other leading men who would catch the vision and execute the mission. Leaders who catch the vision are vital to executing the mission.
MISSION AND VISION THOUGHTS…
As we have examined the text in front of us, we have learned: 1) Preparation is vital to executing the mission, 2) Organization is vital to executing the mission, 3) Catching the vision is vital to executing the mission. Prepare, Organize, and Catch; those are the three active principles in regards to executing the mission that God has for our lives.
Here are some questions for you. What is the mission that God has called you to? What do you need to do to prepare for that mission? What do you need to organize to execute that mission? What is the vision that your mission is suppose accomplish? Here are a few thoughts that I think are worth considering as we think about how to answer these questions and apply these principles.
#1: Without a clear calling from God, your mission will easily drift into self-centeredness. This happened over and over again with Israel in the book of Ezra. It could be said that Israel had been in mission drift for nearly 80 years at least as they lived in relative comfort building houses, careers, and families in Babylon. And now, Ezra walks into the room with a clear calling from God to execute the mission of restoring a community centered on God’s Word and beautifying the temple. What is the mission that God has called you to?
#2: Poor preparation promotes poor performance and prior preparation prevents poor performance. It appears that no one had really prepared a plan for restoring a Word-centered community in Israel until Ezra jumped out of his seat. Ezra literally heard God’s call on his life, and he took what God had provided and he gathered a team, and he began to prepare them on the banks of the river. The time for poor preparation and poor performance was over. It was now time for some prior preparation that would prevent poor performance. What do you need to do to prepare for the mission that God has called you to?
#3: A mission without organization is merely words on a piece of paper. Can you imagine what things would have looked like if Ezra had stepped up on the stage and said “I have a mission to restore a Word-centered community in Israel and beautify the temple” but then he did not do the hard work of making his list of leaders and assigning them to different roles on the team?
Likewise, he could have made an organizational structure without any names and then he would have a mission on a piece of paper with a pipe dream for an organizational structure that did not include actual people to equip and empower for the work of the mission.
Without organization and people, Ezra would have just been a man running around the community saying he had a mission without any organizational structure to execute the mission on the paper in his hand. He would have continuously showed up in the room looking like someone who did not know what he was doing while claiming to have a mission from God because he did not do the hard work of organizing a list of people.
The book “The Trellis and the Vine” describes this kind of leadership as an organizational trellis in the back of the garage with a bunch of vines laying in a messy heap on the ground.4 The point is clear, a mission without an organization of people is merely words on a paper. What do you need to organize to execute the mission that God has called you to?
#4: A mission without a vision is simply a trip without a destination. There is much to be said about hopping in your vehicle and taking off for a Sunday drive just to relax without much of a destination in mind other than making it back home. This can be quite relaxing and fun, even adventurous. But then even in this case, the vision is obvious, relaxation, unrestricted fun and adventure. Therefore, the mission is going for an unmapped drive so that the vision of finding some relaxation, fun and adventure will be fully realized.
The point is this, vision is the light at the end of the tunnel and mission is what you will do to get to the light. Can you imagine, Ezra calling you and asking you to travel one-thousand miles outside of your comfortable home in Babylon, to preach the Bible to some of your relatives who left eighty years ago?
Logically, we would all ask why. Why are we traveling one-thousand miles to preach the Bible, Ezra? If Ezra’s answer was: “Just to preach the Bible” then we would know that he had no compelling vision. But if he said, “I want to preach the Bible so that we can restore a Word-centered community in Jerusalem” then we would have a compelling vision, a light at the end of the tunnel that makes the mission make sense. A mission without a vision is simply a trip without a destination. What is the vision that your mission is supposed to accomplish?
APPLICATION…
We have learned that: Preparation, Organization, and Vision are vital to executing the mission that God has for our lives. Without a clear calling from God, your mission will easily drift into self-centeredness. Poor preparation promotes poor performance and prior preparation prevents poor performance. A mission without organization is merely words on a piece of paper. A mission without a vision is simply a trip without a destination.
I don’t know about you, but when I think about how Ezra executed the mission that God had given him through preparation, organization, and catching a vision, I feel invigorated on one level, and I also feel like a failure on other levels.
I feel invigorated about the mission God has called me to and the preparation, organization and vision catching that needs to be done to execute the mission. But I also feel a little overwhelmed because I know the ways in which I fail to stay on mission, to prepare for what is ahead, to organize properly, and to maintain a clear picture of the destination ahead.
Sometimes I make excuses, sometimes I get frustrated, sometimes I get worn out, and other times I just get flat out lazy with what God has called me to. Thankfully, God has made some progress in me over the years. When I make excuses, get frustrated, get worn out, or get lazy, He reminds me that I have a perfect Savior who never made excuses, never got frustrated to the point of sin, and never used his weariness as a reason for laziness.
Jesus made it clear that the harvest is plentiful, and the workers are few (Lk. 9-10). He gathered a small team of twelve men, who all abandoned him in his hour of greatest need. He gave his life away as a ransom for many. He left the grave empty on the third day. He gave us the hope of eternity.
Jesus did all of this so that you and I could become saints who are running on a rescue mission within a yard of hell as we proclaim the gospel, plant disciples, train leaders, and multiply missionaries so that the community of Hastings and even the ends of the earth would see a visible representation of what it means to be a family of broken and transformed people from various walks of life who exist for the glory of God and the good of the nations.
CONCLUSION…
Catch that again: Jesus did the work at the cross, in the empty tomb and he gave us the promise of Heaven so that we could live within a yard of hell proclaiming, planting, training, and multiplying. Jesus enables us to pursue that mission. But why are we pursuing that mission as a church family? The light at the end of the tunnel for us, the vision for us, is to be a family of broken and transformed people from various walks of life who exist for the glory of God and the good of the nations. And all of this happens in a sustained way the more we spend time at the foot of a bloody cross, in the doorway of an empty tomb, holding onto the hope of Heaven.
So, I don’t know where you are at with those questions I asked earlier, but I will drop them here again in closing. What is the mission that God has called you to (what are you called to do)? What do you need to do to prepare for that mission (what plan do you need to make)? What do you need to organize to execute that mission? What is the vision that your mission is suppose accomplish (the light at the end of the tunnel)? I think it is good to lay those questions at the foot of the cross!
1 Unless otherwise specified, all Bible references in this paper are to the English Standard Version Bible, The New Classic Reference Edition (ESV) (Crossway, a publishing ministry of Good News Publishers, 2001).
2 Derek W. H. Thomas, Ezra and Nehemiah: Reformed Expository Commentary, (Phillipsburg, New Jersey: P&R Publishing, 2016), 137 – 139.
3 Ibid., 133.
4 Colin Marshall, Tony Payne, The Trellis and the Vine, (Kingsford, NSW Australia: Matthias Media, 2009), 7 – 15.