A Crash Course Through The Old Testament, Part 4 (Chronicles & Ezra)

A CRASH COURSE THROUGH THE OLD TESTAMENT, PART 4 (Chronicles Ezra Esther)

Welcome to the Something To Gnaw On podcast, a short – parable style devotional for the Christian with a short attention span…. Usually!   Right now we’re doing a crash course through the Old Testament, designed to give a basic understanding of how it is laid out and hopefully pique your curiosity enough to take the initiative to gnaw on scripture on your own without being intimidated by such a big book.  And if you are a seasoned student of the Bible, just look at this as a refresher course, and hopefully you’ll begin to dig deeper into the Word.

This episode is Part 4 in the series, covering Chronicles Ezra 

The following story is my personal reflections from the Book “Counting Coup”, an autobiography of a Crow Warrior Chief.

At the Battle of the Little Bighorn the Crow scouts advised against engaging the Sioux, highlighting the fact that the Sioux had more warriors than the U.S. Cavalry had bullets (not to mention the facts that the U.S. Cavalry had been riding all night, the Sioux had been rested up in the valley below, and Custer had lost the element of surprise when spotted by Sioux scouts).  Custer rejected their counsel and dismissed the 6 scouts when they shed their scout uniform and donned their warrior garb – they were certain they were going to die, ‘better to die a warrior than a soldier.’  Custer paid for this decision with his life and the life of the men under his command.  The scouts lived to tell the story.  They were the last of the Warrior Chief’s.  Well, except for Joe.  

Joe was the step-grandson of White Man Runs Him (one of the six scouts with Custer at the Little Bighorn), and grew up in the sunset years of the Warrior Chiefs … listening to their first-hand accounts of valor.  While Joe was secretly being trained in the warrior tradition, the philosophy of Plenty Coup emphasized the use of a new weapon – education.   "Education is your most powerful weapon. With education, you are the white man's equal; without education, you are his victim, and so shall remain all your lives."  

Joe would begin his education by getting his Associates Degree from Bacone College in Muskogee, Oklahoma.  Next, he earned his Bachelor’s Degree from Linfield College in McMinville, Oregon.  Joe would then proceed to the University of Southern California where he earned a Masters Degree in Anthropology, the first of the Crow to earn such a degree.  His masters thesis (from the 1930’s) is used to this day as an authoritative account of Crow history.  This academic momentum carried on to a Doctoral program, where, Joe completed his coursework, but, due to World War II, did not complete his dissertation.  

·         In 1943 Joe enlisted and became a scout for the Army’s 103rd Infantry Division, and, in keeping with warrior tradition, Private Joe Medicine Crow went into battle with red war-paint under his uniform, and a yellow feather under his helmet – holding firmly to his heritage.

·         World War II is not exactly the forum for a Crow to earn the four ‘coup’s’, especially as a Private.  What Private leads a war party?  The only horses in Europe were the engines measured in horsepower, right?  Besides, Medicine Crow didn’t seem to have any eye on such accolades.  Staying alive is more than half the battle.  That said, at a battle on the Siegfried Line Joe would get an opportunity to lead a group of seven men … on a suicide mission.  His commanding officer commented ‘if anyone could do it, its probably you’ (Joe).

·         An American position had been bombarded and abandon leaving significant amount of dynamite  behind.  Private Medicine Crow and the seven dodged bullets across the snow covered field, secured the dynamite, and proceeded to move toward the wall.  They successfully blew a hole in the wall large enough for the infantry to pass through.  Some have suggested that Medicine Crow was the first to enter Germany.  Although it would be given years later (2008) Joe earned the Bronze Star for this act of heroism.   Upon his return to the Crow Reservation, the Warrior Chief’s would point out that this fulfilled one of the ‘Coup’s’:  Leading a successful raiding party.

·         The exploits would continue.  As the 103rd worked their way through the wall and through the town, Joe got separated from his unit.  Rounding a corner at a brisk pace he collides with a German soldier.  They both hit the ground, the German lost his gun, Joe did not.  While Joe had his rifle trained on the soldier, he wouldn’t pull the trigger.  It didn’t seem fair to shoot an unarmed man, so Private Medicine Crow put his rifle down and started into a scrapping match with the German.  The fight went back and forth some, but, after nearly being pinned Joe reached out and grabbed the German by the throat with a Crow-death-grip.  Nearing death, the German managed to scream out the word ‘mama’.  Joe relented, confiscated his weapon, and took the soldier captive.  In the moment it was life, it was survival, but on arrival back at the Crow Reservation  the Warrior Chief’s would point out that Medicine Crow had fulfilled two of the ‘Coup’s’:  touching your enemy and letting him live, and taking your enemy’s weapon.

·         It’s quite impressive to accomplish the three ‘Coup’s’, but who has horses in World War II to cover the fourth coup?  

·         While on a recon mission deep in German territory, Joe and his scouts discover a farmhouse where a large group of German officers were meeting.  The corral held their horses, 50 fine thoroughbreds.  Armed with a 1911 side-arm and a rope, Medicine Crow sneaked past the German guards – tied a makeshift bridle – picked a horse for himself – and stampeded the other 49 with a Crow Warrior cry.  As he rode off he sang a Crow song, accentuated with gunfire from the German officers – most of whom were standing in front of the farm house in their underwear lobbing 9mm bullets from their Luger pistols.  What kind of panic went through their mind when they heard the Crow Warrior Cry in the middle of REM sleep?  Nonetheless, the fourth ‘Coup’ wasn’t just achieved, it was obliterated!   50 of the enemy’s horses!   What an accomplishment.  Upon his return to the Crow Reservation the Warrior Chief’s would assess the exploits and make Joe what would be known as “the Last Warrior Chief”.  

·         In the years that followed the war Medicine Crow would serve in several capacities for the tribe (including tribal historian), three college’s would confer Honorary Doctorate’s upon him, and in 2012? He would be awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom.  

·         Joe grew up in this legacy.  He spent his early years at the feet of the Warrior Chiefs learning the warrior tradition.  He pursued higher education like no Crow before had.  He represented his country and his tribe with honor, respect, and many ‘coup’s’.  He spent his post war years of his life educating people, especially his people, and serving as a tribal historian (NEED MORE OF HIS POST WAR ACTIVITIES).  He didn’t just learn the legacy, he lived the legacy.  And in living the legacy, he left the legacy for the next generation of Crow.

Legacy.  That characteristic or quality that weaves through history and keeps us anchored.  For some it is a characteristic of faith, or service, or occupation, or generosity, or a familial or cultural pattern, and I could go on and on on this issue, but you get the point.  

This idea of legacy, or holding on to the history of your bloodline is at the center of Medicine Crow’s life, and at the same time -  it is seen at the center of the works of a Priest named Ezra around 450 BC.

In todays episode, we are going to look at the books of Chronicles,  Ezra.

Remember at the end of Kings, God had finally executed judgment against the Israelites and some died, some remained unprotected and overrun in Jerusalem, and a contingent was carried off to a 70 year exile in Babylon.

 As much as the exiles complained about their situation, they are experienced the best situation that this timeframe of Jewish history has to offer.  Life in Babylon is better than death, or living in a defenseless Jerusalem… being constantly harassed by surrounding people groups.

Now, with all that said, it is after this 70 year time out  is up that Ezra writes Chronicles.   You might say that Ezra is writing a “Crash Course Though Jewish History” because the book starts with genealogy that connect the exiles in Babylon with Adam, and the Patriarchs, and David, and a special amount of time is devoted to the Levites, which leads many to say that while Jews in Babylon were the general audience, there is a specific focus in both of these books that are geared toward priests and Levites (and if you are wondering, a Levite is from the tribe of Levi, one of the twelve tribes, which is where the priestly line comes from.  Moses, Aaron, and Miriam were Levites.)  You can see the focus in tribal legacy in that he focuses three chapters (or nearly 100 verses) on the tribe of Judah, which would be the bloodline of  King David from whose line the messiah comes, He has one chapter to the Levites that is 81 verses long, and the genealogy of the other 10 tribes are jammed into 4 short chapters.  

When we covered the book of Kings, I made the observation that there was not only a King that ruled over Israel, but there was a check and balance in place, and it was the Priest, or Prophet.   Ezra’s work in capturing the history solidifies this.   

As a matter of perspective, if a person was 30 or older when they went into exile, they were probably dead or close to it at the time of the end of the exile.  If a person was 20 of age at exile, they would be 90.  I often question if these people actually made the trip back to Jerusalem.  I will not belabor this point, but you can see that much of Ezra’s audience would be largely unfamiliar with life in Jerusalem, the temple, the altar, and potentially out of touch with their heritage or legacy. 

And in the same way we looked at the sin cycles in Judges, Ezra not only uses the genealogies in Chronicles to connect them to their past, he tells the stories of the kings… ALL THE KINGS…, beginning with Saul and highlights their behavior, both good and bad, right up to the time of the exile.

Reading the books of Chronicles so far after the fact, it may seem a bit laborious and insignificant to dig into some of the genealogies, it’s tempting to read them as insignificant.   Nothing could be further from the truth.

There are some golden nuggets to be found here.   But the bigger question is what would the Jew’s in exile have thought of these genealogies?  I don’t know that I can say with absolute certainty, but it certainly seems that this would re-establish or reinforce the Jewish legacy, in the same way that a child like Medicine Crow sitting at the feet of the war-chief’s would connect with his heritage.  And in the same way that Medicine Crow turned his educational experience as a youth into his masters thesis that is used to this day as a means of connecting the Crow to their historical legacy, that is exactly what Ezra is doing in Chronicles.

This dynamic of reestablishing or reinforcing legacy will flow into the books of Ezra and Nehemiah, but as I round out Chronicles let me just add a couple of trinkets with regard to bible study in general.:

First, the accounts of the actual kings are great secondary sources for what you read about them in Samuel or kings…   These books have the same relationship to each other that the gospels have to each other.   They are covering the same topics, but from a different perspective, and Ezra’s perspective is from that of a Priest, and it is written to a group of people getting ready to reoccupy the promise land, and reestablish the worship of Jehovah in Jerusalem.    

As an example of this, I recently caught a sermon online that my little brother did  regarding worship…. And I will resist the urge to launch a bunch of story’s about my brother, cuz that could really get fun in a not so fun way, but his sermon was regarding worship and he highlighted a story that is covered in Samuel and Chronicles where King David is bringing the ark of the covenant into Jerusalem and a guy named Uzza touches it, dies, and the party comes to an end.  

You can dig into it for yourself, but I’ll post a link of the sermon so you can see how the telling of the same story from Ezra’s point of view (being communicated to people who may not have had any experience with the Holiness Of God, and the seriousness of walking in his ways).  Ezra, from his priestly point of view,  points out some details of the episode that Samuel doesn’t expand upon, details that are important for Ezra’s audience, an exiled audience that will soon be reintroducing the Ark and the temple furnishings to Jerusalem…  My guess is that he probably doesn’t want another Uzza situation on their 900 mile journey from Babylon to Jerusalem.  

And these kind of stories will parallel those in both Samuel and Kings.   I would encourage you, that when you read stories in Samuel and Kings, see if there isn’t an account in Chronicles… reading it this way just brings a bit more clarity and depth to the stories.

And lastly, before we jump into the book titled Ezra, I have mentioned before that there are times you read stories in scripture and between sentences you have a major gap in time.  400 years between Genesis and Exodus, for example.   And in 2 Chronicles 36:21-22 you have a gap of 70 years, the period of the exile…. And what’s interesting about this is that the book of Ezra begins by restating the last verses in Chronicles.  

Now let’s get into Ezra

So far in this series  I have tried to keep the historical books in a section all its own… but we have a situation here that causes us to take a quick look at a couple of prophets from the 4th section of the Old Testament.    In the weeks to come we will take a quick look at where the prophets fit in the timeline of the kings, in fact with the exception of Daniel Haggai  Zecharia and Malachi, all the prophets serve in the time of the kings, after David up to the first years of the exile, and  what they prophesy is written to the Israelites in those periods of time, and understanding the circumstances in the reign of each king helps to understand the prophecy.   And we’ll get into that deeper at another time.

Today, however, lets go back to 2 chronicles 36:21 which provides a validation of prophecy, and then Ezra 1:1, which provides another validation of prophecy from years prior.

“So the message of the Lord spoke through Jeremiah was fulfilled.  The land finally enjoyed its sabbath rest, lying desolate until the seventy years were completed, just as the prophet had said.” Verse 21

Now in Ezra 1:1 “in the first year of King Cyrus of Persia, the Lord fulfilled the prophecy he had given through Jeremiah.  He stirred the Heart of Cyrus to put this proclamation in writing and to send it throughout the kingdom.”  And that message is to let the Israelites return to Jerusalem and rebuild the temple.  

And Verse 5 is also key to understanding the whole book… “Then God stirred the hearts of the priests and the Levites and the Leaders of Judah and Benjamin to go to Jerusalem to rebuild the temple of the Lord.”  Remember what we previously mentioned about the tribal legacy……..     Judah representing the Royal line – responsible for funding the building of the original temple has a legit interest and legacy in rebuilding the temple, and the Levites have a tribal legacy and responsibility of reestablishing and leading the nation proper worship within the temple.  It’s no wonder that he spent so much time in Chronicles with the genealogy of levites and descendants of Judah.  

I honestly do wonder if the other tribes got comfortable in Babylon as it doesn’t appear that many of them left in the first wave……   just thinking out loud…. Anyhow…. 

One of these passages reinforces what the prophetic accuracy of Jeremiah’s word in Jeremiah 25 and 29, and the span of time between Nebuchadnezzar and the fall of Jerusalem  to Cyrus is 70 years. Pretty cool in my opinion.

Of additional interest, this reference to Cyrus, king of Persia is worthy of conversation.  Not only did God say that the exile would be 70 years (and it was), but God spoke through Jeremiah in chapter 51:20 that the one who would bring the deliverance from Babylon was Cyrus of Persia, and this name was written down many years prior.  And if that isn’t cool enough for you, around 150 years previous to this God speaks through Isaiah (see chapters 45 and 48) to prophetically state that not only would they be delivered from a Babylonian captor by a Persian they didn’t even know at that time, but his name would be Cyrus.   I’m not sure what the statistical probability of someone guessing the name of a president years from now, but I think its better to call it a divine prophecy….. as opposed to a guess.

In his book, Ezra he will maintain the importance of their heritage, but he begins the book with a stark call to action, that they are living in a prophetic time, a time where 2 revered prophets from 2 different era’s would name their deliverer.   And not only are they delivered, Cyrus says in short:   you are free to go, take anyone with you, rebuild the temple, I will finance the trip, and we are giving you back all that was taken from you.

I see Ezra in a place of divine tension, it’s like graduation.   For years he has sat at the feet of his elders, listening to the stories from the past, taking in the teachings, reading the prophecies of Jeremiah and the others… and now the reality has set in that they will be going back.   There is excitement in the dream becoming a reality, and there is a reasonable degree of apprehension… the concern that they will repeat the cycle so common in Jewish history.

Where 1 & 2 Chronicles are written to say “this is your heritage, learn from it, replicate the good, and run from evil”, Ezra (and Nehemiah for that matter) are written as more of a “Now is your time, now it’s your turn” moment.  Now it’s your time to take what you’ve learned and apply it.  It isn’t a moment in time, it is a moment that a couple of hundred years of prophecy have pointed to, a moment that will forever be looked at throughout history as a benchmark of time.  

And in true Ezra fashion, the book starts in again with the lists.   Lists of items, lists of names, categories of people. The number of animals, the kinds of animals.   And the building of the altar and temple begins pretty quick.  

In practical outline form there are a few key elements to understanding the flow of the book of Ezra.    

·         The exiles come back to Jerusalem in 3 waves

o   The initial wave under a guy we haven’t talked about yet, Zarubabel.

o   A second wave under Ezra in Chapter 7

o   And the third wave comes under Nehemiah, and we’ll get to him next week.

·         As I have stated before, Ezra is a priest.   After the lists of who’s who, the first acts recorded are the beginning of the sacrifices on the altar.  Which begins to happen daily. 

·         And immediately after worship begins, the rebuilding of the temple begins.

·         And immediately there is opposition.  Any guesses who that group of people is?   

o   You Guessed it!! The Samaritans,  they come in, and want to be a part of the building party  using the phrase “We Worship  the Same God!”  You can find this in Ezra 4. You can catch up on the significance of this in the previous episode. 

§  At first glance it looks like the Israelites are totally overreacting by the way they slam the door on the Samaritans, but you have to keep in mind that these guys just came out of 70 years of exile for not honoring God properly, and are living in a historic moment…  and the question, assuming they have read Ezra’s work on Chronicles, is ‘how are you going to interact with other people in the land’?  Are you going to keep God number 1, or are you going to get soft or are you going to keep the Law?  They understand the consequences of going against God’s ways.  This group isn’t messing around, and they slam the door.

o   While the Jew’s passed the first test, it infuriates this people-group, and conflict and opposition begins.  

§  Accusations are sent to Cyrus, then Darius, then Artaxerxes.

§  It stretches the completion of the temple out about 25 years from the initial return of the first wave.

·         About 45 years after the completion of the temple we have the 2nd wave returning from Babylon. And this is found in Chapter 7. 

o   I want to take a moment and just run the numbers.   

§  The 70 year exile is over, if you are in Babylon….. you can leave 536 BC

§  The first wave left and built the altar and the temple, in the first 25 years 

§  The second wave doesn’t leave Babylon under Ezra till almost 90 years later (457 BC)

§  So what’s the point?

·         There is no way that Ezra had any first-hand knowledge of life in Jerusalem.

·         Everything that he writes about would come from his familial priestly legacy or heritage.   From sitting at the feet of his Elders, soaking up the stories and teachings that flowed through a priestly line, like Joe Medicine Crow did as a kid, and as a student at USC.

o   And according to Chapter 7, Ezra comes from quite a line of Priests… much like Medicine Crow came from a great line of Chief’s

o   Ezra’s was such a noteworthy line that Artaxerxes gives him a quite a send-off letter, and entrusts him with money and authority.

·         So as he writes, chronicles and up thru chapter 6 of EZRA, it is from a perspective of educational heritage and history, that is to say it’s academic…. Kind of like that Joe Medicine Crow scenario sitting at the feet of the Warrior Chiefs, 

·         When we get to chapter 7, Ezra is beginning to live the legacy.  

o   Think back to Medicine Crow’s story… it’s the same thing.  At some point the learning ends, the studying ends, and the opportunity is presented to step up and see if you have what it takes to sustain the legacy.   Medicine Crow went to Germany and solidified the legacy.  And Ezra will do the same in Israel.

·         For the sake of time I will abreviate his ministry in the last 4 chapters, and that is to say he gets to Jerusalem and leads a revival.   The Israelites, in the 90 years after the first wave had left Babylon, had managed to drift…… and Ezra was the man for the Job, and he gets them back on track, and I need to leave enough out of this for you to read, but for the Israelites to need revival you need to know that their drifting included some pretty bad stuff…. Bad enough for Ezra to do two things…….. In agony and lament he tears his cloths and rips his beard out before the Lord……… and in true Ezra form… he puts the names of the culprits on another list….   I am sure he’d be an accountant, or an inventory clerk  if he were alive today.

·         One key I want you to walk away with today is that when it comes to legacy and heritage, especially your spiritual legacy or heritage, be like an Ezra or a Joe Medicine Crow,  hold it high and pass it on, don’t die with you

·         I am going to put a stake in it for today, and pick up next week with the transition into Nehemiah and hopefully Esther (there is some really cool stuff there!)

·         Anyhow, I pray that you will take the time and dig into this yourself, dig deeper and spend some time gnawing on scripture ….mentally.

·         Lastly, I want to take a moment and thank a family friend, and a man I think of as a brother.  Dean Buffalo is a Crow Indian and a pastor on the Flathead Indian Reservation.  When I first heard of Joe Medicine Crow I had the honor of talking with Dean about it, and he pointed me in the direction of the book.   This has been years ago, and I am just now working this in to the podcast, it is long over due.   That phone call with Dean was truly epic…  you are blessed if you ever get these moments to connect with someone in this way…  and the term brother may sound odd for as short a call as that was in light of eternity, but it was powerful.  Thanks Brother!!  May God richly bless you and your family and the ministry on the Flathead Reservation.

·         Until Next Week

·         God Bless