Were We Born Too Late?

But isn't it wonderful to be here? I mean, when we're here doing this is happening, I can't think of any place else that I'd want to be or another time. But have you ever wondered? Because, you know, we're looking ahead. We're planning for summer camps. Other things we'll be doing. Planning for where we're going for the feast. So even when we're in the most wonderful time and place, we're looking at other times and places. And sometimes we look back.

Have you ever had a thought of an era when you would have liked to lived and been there? See what it was like. Maybe in the medieval periods of knights and shining horses and engaging in joust to win the hand of fair maidens. Or pioneers coming across the frontier and clearing the land. And I couldn't help but notice the paintings in here. I'm actually a history teacher at heart. And the late 18th century is my field.

George Washington is one of my personal heroes. I can't wait to meet him in person. You know, and I'm tempted to start giving you lectures on that instead of the sermon. But, you know, it's wonderful to think of some of those things. Maybe some biblical incidents that you'd love to see. Imagine standing there at the Red Sea when suddenly Moses holds out his staff and it parts. Or, you know, the plagues on Egypt. Jesus Christ's ministry. So many things we wish we could see and experience. Part of what makes me think this way, the things we've missed, is I had an incident when I was, I'm not sure, my late teens or early 20s.

I had a good friend who told me, Frank, we were born too late. What do you mean born too late? Or he said, you know, if we'd have been born at the time of the great economic upswing after World War II, he said, with our brains and our work ethic, we'd be captains of industry. We'd build great companies. We'd be rich. Oh, man, you know. Of course, as it was, we were coming out of the 1970s with the recession and the energy crises and the loss of morale from the Vietnam War.

You know, sometimes you wonder, would we have been better off at another time? And can you imagine any Bible characters thinking that way? Anyone who we read about in scriptures who might think that they'd missed out? And as I said, that story from my youth combined with having taught the book of Ezra to make me think of that man, especially when he was a young man.

And I want to talk about the example of Ezra to consider if we might, especially if our young people, might sometimes think we were born too late. You know, look at the things we missed out on. Now, to move into that, let's consider, you know, what all happened before Ezra came on the scene.

You might know Ezra's, well, he's not at the end of the Old Testament, but I always think of him as near the end in a biblical chronology. But imagine what's happened in biblical... I do that in class all the time. Say it in English. In biblical history, you know, God created the heavens and the earth.

He made the Garden of Eden, put Adam and Eve there. You know, sometime later, about 16, 1700 years Noah's flood. What a thing that would be to witness. And then Noah and his family going out to repopulate and rebuild the earth. Some hundreds of years after that, God called one man, a Brahm, sent him into a land he didn't know. And I'd love to have seen his journeys with Isaac and then Jacob.

Of course, the children of Israel went down to Egypt following Joseph's lead during the famine, grew into a nation, waiting for Moses. God spoke to Moses, sent him in, and he leads them out like great power. You know, God's great power.

You know, it talks about they went out with a high hand, which we celebrate when we keep the night to be much observed every year. Okay, they settled the Promised Land, eras where there are the various judges. I would love to have seen Gideon's army of 300 Ralph de Midianites. I'd love to see Samson rip a lion. Well, I don't know if I'd want to see that, but you know, that we have that time.

And then the era of David. Wouldn't you have loved to have seen David face down Goliath? And then we established the monarchy. But you know, a young man like Ezra reading the Holy Scriptures might be saying, yeah, that's in the past. I miss that. What's going to happen for me? As he'd keep reading, he might read about Solomon establishing the temple. We might want to remember that Ezra was a priest, descended from Aaron. I'd be excited about the building the temple and this Shekinah glory coming in and filling that house.

Of course, it wasn't also good after that, Rehoboam and Jeroboam divided the kingdom. And there are good times and bad times, but eventually the northern kingdom that kept the name Israel, they were overrun by the Assyrians, taken away into captivity, lost. And wasn't all that many years later, well, long by our lifespans, that the Babylonians did the same to Judah. You know, they were punished. They went into exile. Maybe they were someone like Ezra would be glad to miss that. But maybe not what happened afterwards, because God had prophesied he would bring them back.

First scripture I want to read is near the end of 2 Chronicles. 2 Chronicles chapter 36 and verse 22. So, 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, so that he made a proclamation throughout all his kingdom, and he put it in writing. Thus says Cyrus, king of Persia, all the kingdoms of the earth, the Lord God of heaven has given me, and he has commanded me to build him a house at Jerusalem, which is in Judah.

Who is among you of all his people? May the Lord his God be with him and let him go up. That's kind of stirring, exciting. That's something you wouldn't want to miss. And that leads us to the time of Ezra. Actually, for me, it's just across the page. I see almost the exact same wording that starts the book of Ezra. Of course, refugees were able to return. They returned to a Jerusalem that probably still had lots of ruins and desolation, and they set to work. You know, Ezra, we know him because, well, because he's got a book in the Bible named for him.

You know, there is not a book of Frank anywhere in the Bible. If there were, I'd probably pay close attention to it.

But the whole first half of the book is filled with genealogies and inventories, and there's letters to the government and letters coming back. And, of course, there were people that did not want the Jews to build a temple. You know, wanted to stop them, and they did for a while. The people became discouraged. They left off that work. And God took a hand. He sent a couple of prophets, prophets by the name of Haggai and Zechariah. I'm going to read from the book of Haggai, chapter 1, starting in verse 3. Haggai is really short, so it's one of those you turn past, and you turn past, and you keep going back and forth right near the end of the Old Testament. Haggai chapter 1, in verse 3, this is when the Jews in Jerusalem, you know, they'd started the temple, but government officials had tried to stop them. They were discouraged, so they left off. And it says, Then the word of the Eternal came by Haggai the prophet, saying, Is it time for you yourselves to dwell in your panelled houses and this temple to lie in ruins? Now therefore, says the Lord of Hosts, consider your ways. And he talks about how they've sown a lot, but they don't bring in much. They drink, but they don't have enough, put on clothes, they're not warm enough. And so in verse 7, again, consider your ways. Go up to the mountains and bring wood, and build the temple, that I may take pleasure in it and be glorified, says the Lord. And they did. Although what they were able to build, you know, as they looked in the past, they said, huh, they might have wondered, wouldn't it have been great to live in Solomon's time? We've heard about that temple. It was larger, it had so much more gold and silver. If you read in Haggai chapter 2, we'll begin in verse 3.

The message through the prophets came to the people, saying, Who is left among you who saw this temple in its former glory? How do you see it now? There would be some old men. Matter of fact, there are some versions back in Ezra say the ones who remembered the original temple when they saw what they had now at the foundation wept. Some people were probably crying tears of joy, but some were just dejected and disappointed. Wow, it's not what it once was. Well, God is pointing that out. How do you see it in comparison? Is it in your eyes as nothing? Yet now, be strong Zerubbabel, says the Lord. Be strong Joshua, son of Jehazadak, the high priest. Be strong all you people of the land, says the eternal, and work. For I'm with you. Work for I'm with you. Let's drop down to verse 8, because if they were disappointed that they didn't have enough gold and silver, God is going to let them know that doesn't matter to him, because he already has it all. He says the silver is mine. The gold is mine, says the Lord of Hosts. The glory of this latter temple shall be greater than the former, says the Lord of Hosts. It might not look as glorious, but the glory is going to be greater. And in this place, I'll give peace, says the Lord of Hosts. Wow. That's something. That's looking ahead, not to the past, and wondering if you were born too late, if you missed it. But as I consider the young man Ezra, and I want to call him a young man and remember him there. I'm sure he lived to be an old man, but don't those of us who are old men want to remember when we were younger, right? All of what we've covered so far was still before the time of Ezra. The book has his name on it, but oh, let's turn back to Ezra. I should have told you to keep your finger there. It's named Ezra, but the man Ezra doesn't show up in his own book until chapter seven. So all of this had happened, and Ezra knew about it the same way we do. Reading about it, hearing stories about it. He might have wondered, was I too late? The big things have been done. And you might wonder, okay, don't go, why are you talking about this now? The reason I talk about it is I've seen young people in the church, and I've been a young person in God's church wondering, was I born too late? I've heard stories most of my life about great things that were done. I've heard of Herbert W. Armstrong driving hundreds of miles to give two services on a Sabbath, and then the next morning do a live radio program, and then drive for hours and give another live radio program that afternoon, then drive hours back and do a Bible study that night. And the work grew and developed. Went on radio station after radio station, TV.

He established college campuses. There are times I've thought, oh, I'd love to have lived then, but it was before my time. And I could say, I was born too late, you know, and other things happen. And many of you have the memory of us, you know, sending out eight million magazines a month. When I say us, I'm stirring myself into people who I had nothing to do with it. You know, I was living down there in Ohio being a kid. But you hear about, you know, the receivership and people taking bold, heroic stands to preserve and protect the church. Later on, the church is put back on track. Many of us remember what happened in the 1980s and then eventually in the 90s. We went through a very difficult time, you know, absolute heresy.

But we survived. You know, next week at the General Conference of Elders meeting, we're going to celebrate the 30th year since the anniversary or the founding of the United Church of God. It's amazing. 30 years. I was alive when it happened. I know I look so young you would never think I'd been around. Sorry, I joke. At my home, I've got a picture of me and my wife and our son when he was an infant. And my wife and I do not have a white hair anywhere on our heads. And I say, see what happens? You have kids and they make you grow old. Because it's not the years passing or anything. But what I'm getting at is it was heroic to stand up for the truth and strive to hold to it and then try to figure out how to start something new when the church you'd been a part of left you. But I wasn't a part of that. I mean, I got to be part of that church. I could say, like Ezra, I was born too late. I'm really glad it happened. I'm sure, you know, well, I wonder. A lot of times at summer camp, some of us old guys, we talk about those eras. And the young people look at us, you know, and, oh yeah, you weren't around back then. And so I wonder if they say, yeah, we missed the trauma, we missed the difficulty, the heartache, but we also missed the excitement and the fun, the challenge of rebuilding and making something where it wasn't. You know, I hope none of you who are young, though, will settle and say, no, I don't want you to think I was born too late. Because then you might say, well, there's nothing to do, but let's wait for Christ to return.

Because I'm going to say you were not born too late. No one in this room was born too late. God has perfect timing. He puts us where He wants us, when He wants us. It's never too late. And I want to look at Ezra as an example who might be looking at all those things I described and say, I missed that. What's left for me to do? If you turn with me to Ezra, chapter 7, let's look at some of what he did do. Now, we're introduced to him, as I said, in chapter 7, verse 1. I was a little bit inspired also by how this chapter begins. Now, after these things, a lot of things, after those things, in the reign of Artaxerxes, king of Persia, Ezra, the son of Saria, the son of Azariah, the son of a bunch of people here. But it gives this genealogy showing that he was, at the end of verse 5, the son of Aaron the chief priest. Okay, so he had the genealogy. He had the credentials. Verse 6, this Ezra came up from Babylon, and he was a skilled scribe in the law of Moses, which the Lord God had given. Okay, a skilled scribe. I kind of miss the old King James because it called him a ready scribe, and we don't use that term anywhere else, but being a ready scribe or a skilled scribe, it didn't only mean that he could read and write, because I'm pretty sure most of us in this room fit that qualification, which we should. But he was well trained. He could create legal documents. You know, he was more like what we would call an attorney today. Because he was in the priesthood, he probably also participated in creating new copies of the Scripture. Not new, well, actually he did help create new Scripture by God's inspiration. We believe he wrote the books of Ezra and Nehemiah, and many believe he also wrote what we call first and second chronicles. So yeah, he was that type of scribe. Jewish tradition says he was a scribe scribe, which I don't know if that means anything, but if we call someone a man's man, we know what that means. Think of that in academic circles. A scribe scribe. Okay, so he's got the background, but like I said, all that stuff had happened. He's coming along long after the temple was rebuilt. It was rebuilt, so what is he gonna do? Well, one thing he's gonna do is he's gonna be ready. Let's drop down to, well, we read verse 6. Yeah, I want to go to verse 10.

Ezra, Ezra the priest the scribe, he's called, had prepared his heart to seek the law of the Lord, and to do it, and to teach statutes and ordinances in Israel. That one's verse mentions three important, powerful things. He prepared his heart. He was devoted. His mind and energy were devoted to the law of the Lord his God, and to seek it. I take that to mean he studied it. He spent time with it. I get the feeling he learned it inside, now backwards and forwards. He sought the law of the Lord. He didn't wait for it to come to him. He was devoted to it, and then, I'll look again in verse 10, to seek the law of the Lord and to do it.

Okay, head knowledge is great, but it's got to be put into practice, and we all know that. We've been called by God out of this world to know his law, to know his ways, but to live his ways, to know his way and walk in it. And Ezra sets an example. He prepared his heart to do God's law. He lived it. He was an example. And then also to teach it, to teach ordinances and statutes. And they say in education theory, you know, there's different levels of learning.

You can learn something to pass a test. You can learn something to internalize it. When you learn something for the purposes of teaching, it makes it a part of you in a way that nothing else really does. And I can say that from experience. You know, I've been teaching for a few years, but, you know, when I was called on to teach at Ambassador Bible College, you know, I'd gone to Ambassador College.

I'd learned on a certain level, but preparing to teach, that's something. And we are all called to be teachers in God's kingdom to come. So, you know, that's one hint about the idea that we're not born too late. And I hope we're preparing to seek the law of the Lord to do it and preparing to teach it. You know, we might not all be up here right now, but teaching God's way is our destiny, I believe.

I think that's a lot of what we'll be doing during the millennium. But Ezra, he was prepared. Huh, sorry, I had something in my notes that I couldn't read. Well, I was just thinking, of course, we're looking to the kingdom, but is it only the kingdom? You know, and I think, you know, Mr. Dean and I aren't always going to be around to stand behind this lectern or the one in the home office.

And we've got some ABC graduates here. And matter of fact, that's one of the things I'm thrilled. I love to come and we get people who have come to ABC. I hope we've got some that are going to come to ABC. We've got some young ones here. Hopefully best advertisement we could give our current students. But the next generation comes. I know that because I was one of those young people that maybe someday might go to Ambassador College. Reminds me if I could tell on myself, because I remember I finished school and I'm not sure my reputation for the adults in the Columbus-Ohio congregation, but, you know, every now and then when you talk to someone you know has finished high school, you say, well, what are you going to be doing?

After I'd gotten accepted to Ambassador, I said, well, I'm going to Ambassador College. And some people stop and go, really? You? So if you thought, you know, you think that would never be for you, a lot of people thought it would never be for me. But, okay, Ezra prepared. As I said, he prepared his heart to seek the law of the Lord, to do it, and to teach it.

What did Ezra actually do? Well, I'm not going to read great detail, but right after chapter seven and chapter eight describe him making the journey to come to Jerusalem so he could put his teaching into practice. In chapter nine, it describes him working to restore the purity of the nation.

He's there, and he's told that a lot of the people have been intermarrying with the nations around them. You know, they've taken, well, actually, let me see if I can find the scripture. I wasn't going to read it, but there's a certain phrase that... my pages are sticking together. Yeah, in chapter nine, verse two, they've taken some of their daughters as wives for themselves and their sons so that the Holy Seed is mixed. Still not seeing the phrase I was looking for. It says, pagan wives. And I said, boy, that sounds really bad. Well, I will say, you know, if you've been in the church long enough, you remember there was a time we pointed to this and talked about interracial marriage, but we've realized that really it's talking about interreligious marriage.

You know, many of the people that were considered pagans were of the same ethnicity as the Israelites, like the Moabites and the Ammonites, but they were marrying outside of the church because church and state were one then. Ezra was used by God to lead a reform in that, to bring people back to saying, we don't want to be unequally yoked. We shouldn't be. And that's not the point of my sermon here, but the point is he was ready to lead when they needed help to see what to do.

I want to turn to another great thing he did we can find in the book of Nehemiah. Nehemiah chapter 8.

It's worth remembering, or if you didn't already know, I'll remind you that Ezra and Nehemiah were thought to have originally been one book that Ezra put together, and that's why he's in both. Let's start reading in Ezra chapter 8 verse 1.

Now all the people gathered together as one man in the open square that was in front of the Watergate, and they told Ezra the scribe to bring the book of the law of Moses, which the Lord had commanded. So Ezra the priest brought the law before the assembly of men and women, all who could hear with understanding on the first day of the seventh month.

That's significant. The first day of the seventh month is what we call the Feast of Trumpets. I almost said tabernacles, getting ahead of myself. He read from it in the open square that was in front of the Watergate from morning until midday before the men and women and those who could understand in the ears of all the people were attentive to the book of the law. So he's teaching. People didn't have this on their laps back then.

Copies of the scripture were rare, and even more rare was a download onto their phones because the wi-fi service was terrible back then. So they had to have Ezra stand up and read. Let's jump ahead to verse 8 where it says, so they read distinctly from the book in the law of God and they gave the sense and helped them to understand the reading. And that makes me wonder if some of what they were doing was like a well-crafted sermon. You know, maybe not quite like this one, but where they read God's law and they give explanation and understanding.

In verse 9, in Nehemiah, who was the governor and Ezra the priest, the scribe, and the Levites, who taught the people, said to all the people, this day is holy to the Lord your God. It's a holy day. As they're reading, they probably came to Leviticus chapter 23, perhaps, but don't mourn nor weep. The people wept when they heard the words of the law. Then he said, go your way.

Eat the fat. Drink the sweet. And archaic language, that means eat the good stuff. Send portions to those for whom nothing is prepared, for this day is holy to our Lord. Don't sorrow, for the joy of the Lord is your strength. Let's be happy to know God's truth. We can do it. So the Levites quieted the people. Be still.

The day is holy. Don't be grieved. Don't be sad. Don't be disappointed. That's a message for all of us. We know God's truth. Now, prophecy could be scary, but we know the ultimate prophecy leads to Christ's return and what I call the happy ending. You know, I never watch movies that don't have happy endings, if I can help it.

And God's book has a very happy ending, so they were explaining that. And verse 12 tells us, all the people went their way to eat and to drink and to send portions and rejoice greatly because they understood the words that were declared to them. I'm sure if Ezra were here, he'd say, well, that wasn't me. You know, that was God's word. And that's absolutely true. But I'll bet at that moment, Ezra wasn't thinking, oh, I wasn't here for Solomon's temple.

Oh, I wasn't here when they rebuilt this one. What he was thinking is, God's got work for me to do right here and right now. And he was filled with joy at getting to do the mission that God gave him. He wasn't born too late. He was doing what needed to be done right then.

And I like to say, you're not born too late. God has something for us to do. And we might not all know what that is or when and where, but there's plenty to do. I'll mention one other thing that Ezra is famous for, but it's not recorded in Scripture because tradition and legend says that Ezra helped canonize the Old Testament, that God used him to gather the scrolls and determine which books would be in the Bible and which books would not.

How important is that? You know, it's because of Ezra that Obadiah is... well, no, it's not because of Ezra, it's because of God. But Ezra was the tool that was at hand when God was making sure we had Scripture. You know, if it hadn't been for all of these things, you know, if it hadn't been for what we read about in Ezra and Nehemiah, there would not have been a temple for Jesus Christ to come to. And we understand when God promised the glory of that temple would be greater than the first, a large part of that was because God in the flesh came into that temple.

And the people had God's Word. You know, the scribes and Pharisees of Jesus' time were a little off in their understanding, but they had it, and they were studying it. And of course, it was available for when Christ explained the spirit of the law. And Ezra had a hand in that, I believe. They had... every synagogue would have their copies of the scrolls that people could read and learn from God's Word.

That was amazing. That was powerful. That devotion to God's Word led to something that was actually in the inter-testamental period, the time of what we call the Maccabees. You know, God led them to throw off external rule. You know, we had the Greek empires. Was it the legs and thighs, the belly and thighs of bronze before the legs of iron? You know, they established the Hasmonean. They threw out the Seleusids with Antiochus Epiphanes, who we all know as Darth Vader if you've listened to the right class at the right time.

But Ezra's work was important for them to be able to do that. And I want to read in Daniel chapter 11 verse 32 a prophecy ahead of time, we believe, of this happening. And Daniel was before Hosea, not after. Because, of course, you know Daniel 11 is this very long prophecy that starts in that era and goes all the way up to the end time and takes a jump. And I wonder if some of it might be dual prophecy, especially in verse 32. Where it says, those who do wickedly against the covenant heal corrupt with flattery. But the people who know their God shall be strong and carry out great exploits. I'm glad they left that in the New King James because I love the word exploits.

As a young man, I thought, I want to be strong and do great exploits. I'm not sure what exploits are, but I want to do them. Now I've got a better idea. That happened. How exciting! You know, those people that lived in the period of the Maccabees were not born too late. When we reach a crisis near the end of this era, will God's people, those who know their God, will they be strong and do great exploits?

You know, I don't know if some of us, Mr. Dean and I, are we going to still be around? We're not strong anymore anyways. Well, we're stronger than we look, right? But those of you who are younger, you've got a lot of strength and a lot of time for exploits. But to be ready for that might be required to do some of what Ezra did. Prepare your heart to seek the law of the Eternal, to do it, and to be prepared to teach it to others. As I said, my story might be a little instructive, because like I said, people looked at me as like Ambassador College. Really? You know, and I was somebody nobody noticed when I was there, and I'm not saying this to pump myself up, because anything any of us do that's worthwhile is God's doing in us, because I loved Ambassador. I didn't want to leave, but you know what happens? You finally come to graduation, they make you leave, which I hate to tell you guys, some of you, it's like, you know, by the end of May, we're gonna make you leave. Well, except for Tim. Tim gets to stay. Sorry, you know, Tim joined two different classes, and he's served as our pianist for many years. I would never want Tim to leave. I know, sadly, it might happen, but I'm getting off track here. Although, I was gonna say what happens every year is people ask me, how's the class? But every year, we fall in love with our class, and then they leave us, and we're very sad, but another class comes in, and we're gonna fall in love with them, too. But, oh yeah, I was telling my story. You know, I was one of those, I went to Ambassador and had to leave, and you know, when I finally decided what I wanted to do when I grew up, I realized I had several more years of college, because I went to be trained to be a teacher. I wanted to study history, and at that time, I thought, man, it'd be great if I could go back to Ambassador College and teach history classes. Maybe they'd let me be a club director or something, and the college closed down. I'm never gonna teach at Ambassador College. I was born too late, but, you know, some heroic men founded the United Church of God, and then later started Ambassador Bible College to carry on that tradition. Of course, I wasn't part of that either, you know. I don't know if I was born too late for that, but when the time came, you know, Mr. Antion started using me as a substitute, because I lived nearby, and he was on the Council of Elders, and I enjoy sharing this story, because I think it's kind of funny and ironic, because I'd done that several times, and one day I was in my car, you know, driving somewhere and, you know, serving the ministry, and Mr. Antion calls, you know, Frank, this is Gary Antion. Oh, yes, you know, and so I figure he's going to give me a date when I need to come and substitute, and instead what he tells me, at the end of the school year, I'm retiring, and you're taking my place. Yes, sir. I wasn't born too late. I needed to do more preparation to seek the law of the Lord, and to do it, and to teach it, but it was really something, and that's where, you know, for all of us, we have, I think, great things ahead. Exploits to be done. God's work goes on, and you weren't born too late for it. You know, God's timing is perfect.

You know, I don't know for sure what's ahead. I know Christ hasn't returned yet. I know we have to be about our Father's business. We have to be preaching the gospel powerfully. We have to be living an example. We want to be an example so that people say, what's the reason for the hope that lies within you? And then we're ready to give an answer. We want to train our children. You know, that's one thing. It's been in my mind for many years, because, like I said, when I was thinking I was born too late for a lot of things, I did get to serve at summer camp, and I was counselor to a lot of fantastic teenagers whom I thought, they're going to go on and they're going to do exploits. And now some of them are counselors to younger people, and so on and so forth. But we weren't born too late. Some of the best things for God's work, I believe, are ahead. And I hope we're all excited about it. I hope we're all ready for it. Let each of us determine that we will know the Lord, determine that we will do God's way. Let's be prepared as we're able to teach, so that when the time comes we will know the Lord our God, and we will be strong, and if God wants, we'll do exploits.