1. Modified by Brother Bob 5/8/2016 PowerPoint by Brother Bob
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2. THERE ARE DISASTROUS RESULTS FROM FAILING TO STUDY GOD’S WORD.
The people’s ignorance of Scripture had led to the captivity in Babylon (Isaiah 5:13) from which Ezra leads a return.
Isaiah 5:13King James Version (KJV)
13 Therefore my people are gone into captivity, because they have no knowledge: and their honourable men are famished, and their multitude dried up with thirst.

3. 1. THERE ARE DISASTROUS RESULTS FROM FAILING TO STUDY GOD’S WORD.
When we fail to study and apply the Bible, we are causing ourselves grief and struggle (Hosea 4:6).
Do we read and study the Bible daily in our homes and with our families, or have we forgotten to let God speak to us? 

4. 2. THERE ARE GRAVE CONSEQUENCES FOR MARRYING THE WRONG PERSON.
In Ezra 10, we read about the children of Israel putting away their foreign wives.
Malachi also condemns the Israelites for marrying foreigners (Malachi 2:10-16), and there is no wonder why he would do so: The ungodly wives of pagan people often turned the hearts of God’s people away from Him, as in the case of Solomon’s wives (1 Kings 11:1-8).

5. 2. THERE ARE GRAVE CONSEQUENCES FOR MARRYING THE WRONG PERSON
The Christian today must exercise great caution to marry someone who will help him go to heaven (Ephesians 5:22-33).  
Ephesians 5:22-23 (NKJV)
22 Wives, submit to your own husbands, as to the Lord. 23 For the husband is head of the wife, as also Christ is head of the church; and He is the Savior of the body.

6. 3.THERE IS GREAT POWER IN GODLY PREACHING TO PRODUCE PENITENCE.
Ezra was not only a priest before God, but also a faithful preacher and writer:
“He was a scribe skilled in the Law of Moses that the Lord, the God of Israel, had given, and the king granted him all that he asked, for the handof the Lord his God was on him” (Ezra 7:6).

7. 3.THERE IS GREAT POWER IN GODLY PREACHING TO PRODUCE PENITENCE.
When preachers today speak the “oracles of God” (1 Peter 4:11), then God is with them. 
1 Peter 4:11 New King (NKJV)
11 If anyone speaks, let him speak as the oracles of God. If anyone ministers, let him do it as with the ability which God supplies, that in all things God may be glorified through Jesus Christ, to whom belong the glory and the dominion forever and ever. Amen.

8. 4. SIN ALWAYS BRINGS SORROW.
Ezra and the people recognized that God had punished them because of their sin: “And after all that has come upon us for our evil deeds and for our great guilt, seeing that you, our God, have punished us less than our iniquities deserved” (Ezra 9:13).

9. 4. SIN ALWAYS BRINGS SORROW.
Sin is always hurts us even if it brings temporary gratification (Romans 6:23). 
Romans 6:23 (NKJV)
23 For the wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.

10. PROVIDENCE ARE DECISIVE.
5. GOD’S PROPHECY AND
PROVIDENCE ARE DECISIVE.
Jeremiah had foretold that a remnant would return to Judah after 70 years of captivity in Babylon (Jeremiah 25:12, 29:4-10).
About 200 years before Cyrus the Great was born, Isaiah named him as the king who would allow the Jews to return (44:28-45:1).

11. PROVIDENCE ARE DECISIVE. End of The Babylonian Captivity
5. GOD’S PROPHECY AND
PROVIDENCE ARE DECISIVE.
The book of Ezra begins with the fulfillment of these prophecies (Ezra 1:1). God is in control of human events, even on the grandest political scale.
Ezra 1:1 (NKJV)
End of The Babylonian Captivity
1 Now in the first year of Cyrus king of Persia, that the word of the Lord by the mouth of Jeremiah might be fulfilled, the Lord stirred up the spirit of Cyrus king of Persia, ……

12. May we never fail to study the Old Testament and draw its lessons for our lives (Romans 15:4).
Romans 15:4 (NKJV)
4 For whatever things were written before were written for our learning, that we through the patience and comfort of the Scriptures might have hope.

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