When God Moves us, We can Submit to Him

When God moves our hearts, we can submit to him (Ezra 4&5 and Haggai 1).

I have been writing about the relationship between God’s commands and our obedience. Obedience pleases God; however, when our disobedience continues, sins harden our hearts to move us to do what God wants from us and trick us to think that obedience is not an important part of our relationship with God. The issue is that submission to God is hard whether we just became Christians or have been walking with Jesus for many years. It could take years to walk away from a sinful pattern of life. When we think that we reached the point of sanctification, we could fall back dramatically. Then, how can we submit to God’s words and please him? The Book of Ezra and Book of Haggai teach us that when God moves our hearts, we can submit to him.

The Book of Haggai fits in the context of Ezra 4 and 5 where the enemies of the people of the covenant sought to prevent them from rebuilding the temple of God and had the Persian king to halt the project. As a result, they were discouraged from the unfortunate circumstance and forsook their mission. They used to think that reconstructing the temple was God’s will but were not sure any longer. More than that the prophet Haggai writes that even though God inflicted suffering upon them, so that they may consider their ways and repent from their sins to start the project again, they were blinded to see God’s plans for his people (Hag. 1:6). In this setting, the Book of Haggai explains how the Jewish people were finally able to obey God’s command and start reconstructing the broken temple.

Now, the prophet Haggai explains that this amazing transformation from their disobedience to obedience occurred, because God moved the hearts of his people: “So the Lord stirred up the spirit of Zerubbabel son of Shealtiel, governor of Judah, and the spirit of Joshua son of Jozadak, the high priest, and the spirit of the whole remnant of the people” (Hag. 1:14). Interestingly, Ezra likewise uses the same verb, stir, to explain how the LORD moved the heart of the King Cyrus to execute his mission: “Now in the first year of Cyrus king of Persia, in order to fulfill the word of the Lord by the mouth of Jeremiah, the Lord stirred up the spirit of Cyrus king of Persia” (Ezra 1:1). In both cases, Ezra and Haggai use the same verb, עוּר, which has the meanings of to rouse and to awake. The LORD of the hosts “roused” the dull spirit of the Persian king to make the decree to rebuild the temple and “awoke” the sleeping spirits of his people to see God’s bright calling.

Simultaneously, God uses his words to move the stubborn hearts of his people. They forsook the words and promises of God and struggled with spiritual crisis, for they no longer felt that obedience was an important part of their relationship with God. Thus, they lost the purpose of their lives and the hope in the God of Israel. In this context, Ezra records that Haggai and Zechariah prophesized to the Jews in Judah and Jerusalem and supported them, and afterward, the people “set to work to rebuild the house of God in Jerusalem” (Ezra 5:2). Again, when the message of the LORD was proclaimed through the prophet Haggai, he records that “Zerubbabel son of Shealtiel, Joshua son of Jozadak, the high priest, and the whole remnant of the people obeyed the voice of the Lord their God and the message of the prophet Haggai, because the Lord their God had sent him” (Hag. 1:12). God still speaks to us personally through the words of God and moves our hearts, so that we may please him through our obedience.

The Book of Ezra and Book of Haggai teach us that when God moves our hearts, we can submit to him. When we, sinners, confess our sins, believe that Jesus died for our sins, and accept him as the Lord of all aspects of our lives, we are saved and become the children of God. Still, we fail to obey his commands, because we live in sinful nature and are weak morally and spiritually ontologically. I mean if we had the power to obey God’s commands, we would not need the Son to be crucified on the cross and die for our sins. Therefore, if we want to truly submit to his authority, we need to ask him to move our arrogant hearts. Obedience is hard, and I wish that God would make me to obey his words without any struggle and difficulty. But, as we all know, that is not the way God sanctifies us into his holy image. If we desire to glorify God through our obedience and ask him for his strength, he would be pleased to help us to obey his holy words.