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JULY 21
stirred up a rebellion and led the four thou- 40 So when he had given him permission,
sand assassins out into the wilderness?” Paul stood on the stairs and motioned with his
39 But Paul said, “I am a Jew from Tarsus, in hand to the people. And when there was a
Cilicia, a citizen of no mean city; and I implore great silence, he spoke to them in the Hebrew
you, permit me to speak to the people.” language, saying,

DAY 20: How did God sovereignly restore the Jews to the land?

It was through a proclamation by Cyrus king of Persia.The Lord had prophesied through Isaiah,
who said of Cyrus, “He is My shepherd,…saying to Jerusalem, ‘You shall be built,’ and to the
temple,’Your foundation shall be laid’”(Is. 44:28).The historian Josephus records an account of the
day when Daniel read Isaiah’s prophecy to Cyrus, and in response he was moved to declare the
proclamation of Ezra 1:2–4 (538 B.C.).“That the word of the LORD by the mouth of Jeremiah might be
fulfilled.”Jeremiah had prophesied the return of the exiles after a 70-year captivity in Babylon (Jer.
25:11; 29:10–14; Dan. 9:2). This was no isolated event, but rather an outworking of the covenant
promises made to Abraham in Genesis 12:1–3.
We are told that “the LORD stirred up the spirit of Cyrus.” A strong expression of the fact that
God sovereignly works in the lives of kings to effect His purposes (Prov. 21:1; Dan. 2:21; 4:17). Cyrus
made a proclamation,which was the most common form of spoken,public communication,usually
from the central administration. The king would dispatch a herald, perhaps with a written docu-
ment,into the city.In order to address the people,he would either go to the city gate,where people
often congregated for social discourse, or gather the people together in a square, occasionally by
the blowing of a horn. The herald would then make the proclamation to the people. A document
called the Cyrus Cylinder, recovered in reasonably good condition by archeologists, commissions
people from many lands to return to their cities to rebuild the temples to their gods, apparently as
some sort of general policy of Cyrus.Whether or not this document was an extension of the procla-
mation made to the exiles in this passage must remain a matter of speculation.
It is possible that Daniel played a part in the Jews’ receiving such favorable treatment (Dan.
6:25–28). According to the Jewish historian Josephus, he was Cyrus’s prime minister who shared
Isaiah’s prophecies with Cyrus (Is. 44:28; 46:1–4). The existence of such documents, written over a
century before Cyrus was born, led him to acknowledge that all his power came from the God of
Israel and prompted him to fulfill the prophecy.

of everyone who willingly offered a freewill
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offering to the LORD. From the first day of the
July 21 seventh month they began to offer burnt
offerings to the LORD, although the foundation
of the temple of the LORD had not been laid.
Ezra 3:1–4:24 7 They also gave money to the masons and the
And when the seventh month had come, carpenters, and food, drink, and oil to the peo-
3 and the children of Israel were in the cities, ple of Sidon and Tyre to bring cedar logs from
the people gathered together as one man to Je- Lebanon to the sea, to Joppa, according to the
rusalem. Then Jeshua the son of Jozadak and permission which they had from Cyrus king
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his brethren the priests, and Zerubbabel the of Persia.
son of Shealtiel and his brethren, arose and 8 Now in the second month of the second
built the altar of the God of Israel, to offer burnt year of their coming to the house of God at Je-
offerings on it, as it is written in the Law of Mo- rusalem, Zerubbabel the son of Shealtiel,
ses the man of God. Though fear had come upon Jeshua the son of Jozadak, and the rest of their
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them because of the people of those countries, brethren the priests and the Levites, and all
they set the altar on its bases; and they offered those who had come out of the captivity to Je-
burnt offerings on it to the LORD, both the morn- rusalem, began work and appointed the
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ing and evening burnt offerings. They also kept Levites from twenty years old and above to
the Feast of Tabernacles, as it is written, and of- oversee the work of the house of the LORD.
fered the daily burnt offerings in the number 9 Then Jeshua with his sons and brothers,
required by ordinance for each day. Afterwards Kadmiel with his sons, and the sons of Judah,
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they offered the regular burnt offering, and those arose as one to oversee those working on the
for New Moons and for all the appointed feasts house of God: the sons of Henadad with their
of the LORD that were consecrated, and those sons and their brethren the Levites.

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