Seeking the Gospel in the Old Testament Book of Ezra

Just like my keys, I always misplace the book of Ezra. In our English Bibles it’s right after Chronicles and before Esther and Job. This causes me to think that the book is set during the time of David. But it isn’t. It’s after the exile. Ezra and Nehemiah are some of the last books, chronologically, in the Old Testament. With this knowledge in hand, I’ll occasionally find myself trying to find Ezra somewhere around the Minor Prophets. 

Once I’ve answered the question “where is Ezra,” I’m confronted with an even more important question; namely, “how do we find the gospel in Ezra?” It is to this question we now turn. 

How Do You Find the Gospel in the Old Testament?

I suppose before understanding how to find the gospel in the OT, it’d be helpful for us to define the gospel. The simplest definition is one given by JI Packer: God saves sinners. If you’d like to put a bit more meat on your gospel presentation, I use two different frameworks with four points each. The first is God—Man—Christ—Response. The second is more of a story: Creation—Fall—Redemption—Glory. 

The first presentation centers upon God’s character and how humanity fails to meet God’s holy standard, as such the judgment of God is upon us. But the good news is that Jesus Christ fixes this by fulfilling what is required through his life, death and resurrection. Our only fitting response, then, is to respond to Him in repentance and faith. When this happens, we are united to Christ and his record becomes our record. 

The second presentation centers upon the overarching story of the Bible. God lovingly created us to love Him and enjoy Him forever. We were made for rest, rule, and relationship. But we made shipwreck of this, and so rather than having the blessings of obedience we are under the curse of disobedience. Rather than having peace (rest), purpose (ruling), and healthy relationship we often experience the opposite. Ultimately, we are alienated from God. But thankfully God sent His Son, Jesus Christ, to bear our curse and to fulfill what God intended for humanity. As such we now experience the blessings of Jesus’ obedience in our place. He restores the rest, rule, and relationship we were created to enjoy. Someday everything will be ultimately restored and we will live in a new heaven and a new earth. 

We could write entire books focusing on these various themes of the gospel. But every gospel story follows this basic skeleton. No matter where you find yourself in the Old Testament (or the New Testament) you can find one of these various threads. Every place in Scripture is either telling you something about God, something about our rebellion, something about His rescue, or something about our future restoration. If you can spot this, then you can fill out the rest of the story. 

How Do You Find the Gospel in Ezra?

Originally Ezra and Nehemiah were together as one book. It tells of the return of the Israelites to Jerusalem. Ezra begins by focusing – not on Ezra – but upon Zerubbabel. He is the one who leads many of the Israelites back to Jerusalem in order to rebuild the temple. It isn’t until Ezra chapter 7, about 60 years after Zerubbabel, that Ezra comes onto the scene. His focus isn’t upon rebuilding the temple but on restoring their dedication to Torah and rebuilding the fractured community. 

The story of Zerubbabel, Ezra, and Nehemiah follows a pattern. They begin with the call to rebuild, then opposition, then a fulfillment — or maybe better a “thud” of a fulfillment. Ezra begins with Cyrus allowing people to return and Ezra connects it to Jeremiah 25, thus giving hope that the restoration and the promised blessings are beginning to take place. 

As they have the temple rebuilt in chapters 3-6, we would expect to see it inhabited by the fiery cloud of God’s presence, just as happened in the Old Testament. But this doesn’t happen. Does this mean that they have a temple but not God’s presence?

The elders — who knew the earlier temple — cry out in grief. Some of those who had not been taken into exile want to rebuild, but Zerubbabel doesn’t allow them to. It’s an odd ending to his story, but leaves open the possibility for some gospel fulfillment. 

Then Ezra enters the picture. He is a teacher and leader among the Jews. Ezra is under the rule of king Artaxerxes. He tasks Ezra with sending even more of the people back to the land. But when he arrives, he sees that many of those who had come back had married those who weren’t part of the exiles. He, somewhat strangely, calls upon them to divorce the “foreign” wives they had taken. They obey, but only partially. 

The book of Ezra ends with a list of people guilty of intermarrying. (As a side note—none of this should be used as an argument for denying interracial marriage.) The story of Zerubbabel ends in disappointment. The same is true for Nehemiah. To really round out the story of Ezra, we need the final chapters of Nehemiah. Here we see that all of the reforms have basically come to naught. It ends with Nehemiah angry and praying that God would look upon him with favor — even if it seems that his work had ultimately failed. 

If you are tracking with Proverbs 13:12 that “hope deferred makes the heart sick,” you’ll have your fair share of sickness within your heart as this story comes to a close. But that’s really the point of this. They are back in the land, but ultimately they aren’t reformed. Their hearts have not been transformed. You can change the outward circumstances but unless the new covenant comes and changes from the inside out, we’ll never experience the rest, rule, and relationship we were created for. 

It will take One who is greater than Zerubbabel, Ezra, and Nehemiah to bring about the restoration and heart change that is truly needed. The land promise isn’t fulfilled by residing on a little stretch of dirt. It is fulfilled when our hearts truly find rest in Christ. The disappointing end to Ezra points to Jesus.  

Where Is the Gospel in the Tears of the Elders?

Ezra 3 feels a bit like a punch to the gut. Those who had never seen the previous temple are floating on cloud nine. It’s a glorious day. All of their goals have been accomplished. The temple is rebuilt. They are back in the land. 

But suddenly they hear weeping. It’s the old codgers in the room. They are weeping because they saw the previous temple, and this temple doesn’t match up. There isn’t a dynamic display of the presence of God as there was formerly. They are dissatisfied. 

Yes, I believe there is some joy mixed in with these tears perhaps. The birth of this new temple likely led to some of the sadness as they remembered the destruction of the old one. Trauma can work that way. But it’s also a testimony of grace, and so perhaps they experienced a bit of this as well. There might have been some measure of healing in this new temple. 

But the key point of this isn’t that all is well. Their tears are accurate. This story is ending with a thud. And it’s doing this because their desire for place, their desire for the presence of God, will not come by stacking bricks and mortar. Once again, it will only come through the New Covenant. 

The tears of the elders on this day were appropriate. But we have received what they were longing for. It hasn’t come through a glorious temple. It comes through a baby born in a manger, slain for our sins, and resurrected as a foreshadowing of our own resurrection.

The new covenant comes through Christ. And that is what ultimately heals the tears of these elders.

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