1. Ezra 10:1–4 (ESV)
  2. Application

Self-examination when listening to Scripture

Ezra 10:1–4 (ESV)

1 While Ezra prayed and made confession, weeping and casting himself down before the house of God, a very great assembly of men, women, and children, gathered to him out of Israel, for the people wept bitterly.

The point is, we need also to apprehend that God's Word, and this portion of God's Word, is for me as well. Here is a question: do you approach God's Word with the question, how have I sinned, and/or how have we sinned? When you open the Word of God is that one of the questions that you ask? As David said, Search me O God, and know my heart, try me and know my anxious thoughts, and see if there be any wicked way in me. Do you pray that prayer? Lord, search me! As I read this passage, is there something that you are calling me to repent of? Is there wrong thinking on my part? Is there wrong affections? Is there any idols that I have made that replace you? An idol could be your spouse, your children. It could be [the desire to have things go your way.] That is usually the case, isn't it? Do you examine yourself in the light of the Word of God?1

Michael Voytek