Increasingly, Jan and I are turning off TV shows we began to watch on Netflix or Amazon in hopes of enjoying some simple entertainment. Some of these shows began to reveal content that left us feeling slimed. If we didn’t make a choice to stop watching it would soil our spirit and desensitize our moral fiber. The Lord has also called us to change some of our speech patterns that were faithless. Even how we eat has come under the discipline of the Spirit. Sin takes many forms and requires a confrontation to stop its influence on our lives.

Ezra was a scribe who was familiar with the laws of God. As the Scripture repeatedly said of him, “The gracious hand of God was on him” (Ezra 7:6). He would need God’s grace to accomplish his calling – to awaken the people of Israel to the sins that had caused the decline of their faithfulness to God.

The Israelites had married pagan wives and were producing offspring outside the will and commands of God. Their disobedience was polluting the purity of their relationship with the Lord. When Ezra discovered the depth of this interbreeding, he prayed to the Lord and confessed the sins of the nation. He understood why Israel’s interbreeding had made them vulnerable to hordes of invaders, “That is why we and our kings, and our priests have been at the mercy of the pagan kings of the land” (9:7).

No matter how bad it gets, the Lord always has a remnant, and that remnant, once they realize their sin, is willing to repent and make things right with God, “But now we have been given a brief moment of grace, for the Lord our God has allowed a few of us to survive as a remnant” (9:8). 

Ezra knew that interbreeding with a worldview contrary to the will of God would derail His intent for the future of Israel, to “leave this prosperity to your children forever” (9:12).

Ezra didn’t wait for anyone to join him, immediately after his confession, “While Ezra prayed and made this confession, weeping and lying face down on the ground in front of the Temple of God, a very large crowd of people from Israel—men, women, and children—gathered and wept bitterly with him” (10:1). A national repentance began when one person recognized the error of their ways. Voices rose from those gathered around Ezra declaring “But in spite of this there is hope for Israel” (10:2). Only after confession and repentance is hope possible for an individual or a nation.

Today, the Church stands at a historic crossroads. The culture is influencing the Church instead of the Church influencing the culture. We have interbred with the sins of the world thinking it will make us more appealing and acceptable when it will rob us, and the offspring of our faith, of the inheritance we were called to leave behind. The return to a life of purity requires a remnant willing to make defining choices now that will determine how their history will be recorded and remembered.