This morning I felt like I should read from the Book of Ezra. I have been thinking and praying about changed hearts and realized that the following verses were quite applicable - Ezra 1:5-8,11 NIV:
[5] "Then the family heads of Judah and Benjamin, and the priests and Levites---everyone whose heart God had moved---prepared to go up and build the house of the Lord in Jerusalem. [6] All their neighbors assisted them with articles of silver and gold, with goods and livestock, and with valuable gifts, in addition to all the freewill offerings."
[7] "Moreover, King Cyrus brought out the articles belonging to the temple of the Lord, which Nebuchadnezzar had carried away from Jerusalem and had placed in the temple of his god. [8] Cyrus king of Persia had them brought by Mithredath the treasurer, who counted them out to Sheshbazzar the prince of Judah."
[11] "In all, there were 5,400 articles of gold and of silver. Sheshbazzar brought all these along with the exiles when they came up from Babylon to Jerusalem."
What I am reflecting on this morning is how God can affect hearts, and in verse five above it says that God moved hearts. The original Hebrew would be more accurately translated "everyone whose spirits were stirred up by God", but moved hearts effectively communicates the essential truth. When hearts are inclined towards God, He can guide us into His will through our hearts, through heightened emotion, through enflamed passions. God is not only a God of words, but also understands our emotions and can "speak" to us through them.
I like to think of this as His heart stirring causing our hearts to be stirred. The picture I have in my mind is the plucking of a single guitar string causing the other strings to vibrate slightly as they are impacted by the sound waves produced by the plucking of the first string. These other vibrations are called resonance and they are directly related to the original sound. Resonance is defined as "the reinforcement or prolongation of sound by reflection from a surface or by the synchronous vibration of a neighboring object." (Google Dictionary).
God's stated desire (Jer. 29) was to restore the Jewish people to Jerusalem and help them rebuild the temple. In these passages in Ezra, He caused a stirring in the hearts of the people as well as the King to support this effort. Specifically he caused them (the people) to give of their time and physical efforts, but also caused, through the stirring of their hearts, their neighbors and the King to give financial support. King Cyrus even went so far as to restore the very things from the Temple that had been carried away by the previous King.
My encouragement today is that God is capable of raising up and supporting things that are on His heart. He guides us and directs us through our hearts, causing us to be stirred up by things we hear about. His desire is that we sometimes get involved personally, and other times give financially, for both are legitimate responses to our hearts being impacted by His heart, and our spirits resonating with His as He is at work in and around our lives. We should notice that their hearts were stirred and they gave freely, not through shaming or emotional coercion.
My desire is that my spirit within me and my heart would be impacted by the works of the Lord, that I would resonate with the same affections that are in His heart! Lord help me to be sensitive to Your stirrings!
Amen!
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