Ezra 8:1-23
Heads of Families Who Returned with Ezra
1 These are the heads of their fathers’ houses, and this is the genealogy of those who went up with me from Babylon, in the reign of King Artaxerxes: 2 of the sons of Phinehas, Gershom; of the sons of Ithamar, Daniel; of the sons of David, Hattush; 3 of the sons of Shecaniah, of the sons of Parosh, Zechariah; and registered with him were one hundred and fifty males; 4 of the sons of Pahath-Moab, Eliehoenai the son of Zerahiah, and with him two hundred males; 5 of the sons of Shechaniah, Ben-Jahaziel, and with him three hundred males; 6 of the sons of Adin, Ebed the son of Jonathan, and with him fifty males; 7 of the sons of Elam, Jeshaiah the son of Athaliah, and with him seventy males; 8 of the sons of Shephatiah, Zebadiah the son of Michael, and with him eighty males; 9 of the sons of Joab, Obadiah the son of Jehiel, and with him two hundred and eighteen males; 10 of the sons of Shelomith, Ben-Josiphiah, and with him one hundred and sixty males; 11 of the sons of Bebai, Zechariah the son of Bebai, and with him twenty-eight males; 12 of the sons of Azgad, Johanan the son of Hakkatan, and with him one hundred and ten males; 13 of the last sons of Adonikam, whose names are these—Eliphelet, Jeiel, and Shemaiah—and with them sixty males; 14 also of the sons of Bigvai, Uthai and Zabbud, and with them seventy males.
Servants for the Temple
15 Now I gathered them by the river that flows to Ahava, and we camped there three days. And I looked among the people and the priests, and found none of the sons of Levi there. 16 Then I sent for Eliezer, Ariel, Shemaiah, Elnathan, Jarib, Elnathan, Nathan, Zechariah, and Meshullam, leaders; also for Joiarib and Elnathan, men of understanding. 17 And I gave them a command for Iddo the chief man at the place Casiphia, and I told them what they should say to Iddo and his brethren the Nethinim at the place Casiphia—that they should bring us servants for the house of our God. 18 Then, by the good hand of our God upon us, they brought us a man of understanding, of the sons of Mahli the son of Levi, the son of Israel, namely Sherebiah, with his sons and brothers, eighteen men; 19 and Hashabiah, and with him Jeshaiah of the sons of Merari, his brothers and their sons, twenty men; 20 also of the Nethinim, whom David and the leaders had appointed for the service of the Levites, two hundred and twenty Nethinim. All of them were designated by name.
Fasting and Prayer for Protection
21 Then I proclaimed a fast there at the river of Ahava, that we might humble ourselves before our God, to seek from Him the right way for us and our little ones and all our possessions. 22 For I was ashamed to request of the king an escort of soldiers and horsemen to help us against the enemy on the road, because we had spoken to the king, saying, “The hand of our God is upon all those for good who seek Him, but His power and His wrath are against all those who forsake Him.” 23 So we fasted and entreated our God for this, and He answered our prayer.
Ezra continues the account of those who returned from the bondage of seventy years of Babylonian exile by first naming the families who went with him into exile and now returned with him. Each one mattered, so God had the account name them all by genealogy and their numbers. He accounted for their stops along the way on the long journey home to Jerusalem and the surrounding cities. One stop at the river of Ahava identified the lack of Levites to serve in the temple and Ezra had some servants brought them and designated their duties as king David had identified. He assigned them by name since each was important and needed to show who they were descended from in the Levitical order. There they fasted and prayed in humility before God to ask for guidance, the right way for them all to go with their children and possessions due to the amount of robbers known to be along that well-traveled route. They had to;d the king of Babylon that they needed no armed escort for protection because they trusted in the LORD to keep them safe. He did. The witness to the king was that God’s hand was for those who were His and were seeking Him, but that His hand of powerful wrath was against all who rejected Him and His word of the Law. They exercised their spoken faith for protection by fasting for spiritual focus on Hi promises and praying to entreat His Grace to keep them safe along the way. This is our focus in prayer as well, to seek to please Him for the grace we have in His Son for deliverance from the bondage of sin and to guide our steps in the way of our sanctification in this life until we reach the Celestial City brought down (Revelation 21:10-11) from heaven to earth to live before His face (Revelation 22:4-5) forever in absolute safety and unending worship. We will have arrived then at the city which Abraham also awaited by faith, whose builder and maker (Hebrews 11:10) is God Himself! We have peace with God and peace in trials and tribulations as He builds His house (Ephesians 2:21-22, Hebrews 3:4-5, 6, 1 Peter 2:4-5, ) of worship with we who are His to worship forever in His presence. This is our answered prayer as we face fears along life’s perilous (2 Timothy 3:1) and narrow way that we walk by faith that trusts the Lord will keep us to the end.
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