Ezra 9: 5-9
At the time of the evening sacrifice, I, Ezra, rose in my wretchedness,
and with cloak and mantle torn I fell on my knees,
stretching out my hands to the LORD, my God.
I said: "My God, I am too ashamed and confounded to raise my face to you,
O my God, for our wicked deeds are heaped up above our heads
and our guilt reaches up to heaven.
From the time of our fathers even to this day
great has been our guilt,
and for our wicked deeds we have been delivered up,
we and our kings and our priests,
to the will of the kings of foreign lands,
to the sword, to captivity, to pillage, and to disgrace,
as is the case today.
"And now, but a short time ago, mercy came to us from the LORD, our God,
who left us a remnant and gave us a stake in his holy place;
thus our God has brightened our eyes
and given us relief in our servitude.
For slaves we are, but in our servitude our God has not abandoned us;
rather, he has turned the good will
of the kings of Persia toward us.
Thus he has given us new life
to raise again the house of our God and restore its ruins,
and has granted us a fence in Judah and Jerusalem."
Dawg's thought:
Today's prayer intention is for those who suffer from Alzheimers disease.
servitude: A state of subjection to an owner or master.
Ezra uses the word servitude twice in today's reading: one to reference to God comforting us and the other in God's faithfulness. These two great truths are overshadowed in our world today by the pursuit of individuality. We try to seek our identity in the things we do, the people we know and countless other things that may be fruits of who God made us, but is by no means who we are. In a way, we lose our true sense of individuality because we have taken away our focus in servitude to Our Lord for the sake of "finding ourselves."
We must return to this sense of servitude, accepting all things and circumstances from Our Lord as a blessing because of His faithfulness. If we fail to trust in God's faithfulness to us, we lose so much more than our individuality; we lose the freedom that God calls us of us to. God forgives all of our transgressions in His mercy so that we can live in freedom to serve God. In serving God, we are truly free.
May you desire obedience over independence when serving the Lord, loving His ways alone. Take care and God Bless.
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