Giving Gifts for the Temple aka Gifts for the Temple
Ezra 8:24-35 or 24-30
International Sunday School Lesson
July 28, 2013
Commentary
By
Jed Greenough
Hundreds and hundreds of talents of gold and silver weighing tens of thousands of pounds! The best I can see is that a talent of gold was probably around 75 pounds and if you figure the ounces and consider the scarcity of gold you get a pretty good idea at the vast amount of wealth we are talking about.
Choosing men of trustworthy character would be of vital importance if you consider this almost unimaginable treasure that was being transported. The temptation to take even just a little would weigh upon so many people’s minds that it would be truly important to take the selection process to the highest level of discernment.
12 priests were chosen and they were made interestingly enough of two named men and their brothers. I am not sure if this is one or two families but still, I find it very interesting that they were from at most 2 families.
When the time came and these articles were delivered, the delivery wasn’t to just a small group who likewise could come under temptation or recrimination or so that the deliverers would be accused later of something but there were many witnesses. The receiving witnesses were not just priests but the other Levites and heads of the families of Israel.
Did any of this treasure matter to God? Not in the sense that so many of us first think of when we consider this vast gold and silver. This aspect was meaningless to Him. What did matter to God was that it certainly mattered to men.
Just as with last week when I talked about how God knows we are fueled by the food we eat and how we are driven by our need to replenish. When we give up this need for food to draw close to God, He can see our sincerity and we are rewarded. We don’t do it for the reward we do it to be earnest. But God being God does this for us and the scripture makes this plain.
So too does God know how we are so driven by money. We are driven by a notion that money will make life easier or better. But when we give up our drives and give things up to God, He again sees the sincerity in our hearts and we are once more blessed.
I’d rather stop there with my comments as I think this idea and the lessons about fasting are integral to come away with but I would be remiss not to mention how the example from this scripture need apply to the church today.
All too often those who serve in areas dealing with the funds are there because no one else will serve or because they are in some aspect of finance in their secular lives or because they knew someone who did the selecting. This is not grounds for the selection process and is no different from having people fill other roles within the church when they do not meet the Biblical guidelines.
What is important is that their character and their discernment are above reproach. God must be first in their lives if they can be trusted with this responsibility to care and use the funds that have been given up for God.
God is no more taken with gold or silver than He is for certain choices that are made with regard to how today’s gold and silver are spent within the church. Let’s make accountability of how these funds are used truly important and have them weighed out before the whole church.
For Discussion:
1. Discuss the parallels of fasting with this giving and stewardship
2. Discuss choosing those who should be in charge
3. Discuss problems that have arisen with examples from the past where temptation won with church or ministry monies
4. Discuss accountability
5. Look into and discuss these treasures and their values
6. Discuss choices that are made with your church’s “freewill offering to the Lord”
Upcoming Lessons
7-28-13: Giving Gifts for the Temple aka Gifts for the Temple Ezra 8:24-35 or 8:24-30
8-4-13: Feast of Tabernacles aka Festival of Booths Nehemiah 8:2, 3, 13-18 or 8:13-18
8-11-13: Community of Confession Nehemiah 9:2, 6, 7, 9, 10, 30-36
8-18-13: Dedication of the Wall Nehemiah 12:27-38, 43 or 12:27-36, 38, 43
8-25-13: Sabbath Reforms Nehemiah 13:10-12, 15-22
Scripture taken from the HOLY BIBLE, NEW INTERNATIONAL VERSION®. Copyright © 1973, 1978, 1984 Biblica. Used by permission of Zondervan. All rights reserved
No comments:
Post a Comment