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The return of the Jews to Jerusalem from Babylon, described in the books of Ezra and Nehemiah, can be confusing. It’s not a simple trip of “purchase your plane tickets, pack your bags, and back to Jerusalem we go.” It was three groups of Jews traveling back over a period of 1oo years.
Admittedly, it’s confusing as we have three leaders leading the return. Zerubbabel leads a group back to rebuild the temple. . .
Now in the second year after their coming to the house of God at Jerusalem, in the second month, Zerubbabel the son of Shealtiel and Jeshua the son of Jozadak … all who had come to Jerusalem from the captivity. They appointed the Levites, from twenty years old and upward, to supervise the work of the house of the Lord (Ezra 3:8, ESV).
Then, about 60 years later, Ezra leads another group back to Jerusalem to teach the people the law. . .
Ezra came to Jerusalem in the fifth month, which was in the seventh year of the king. For on the first day of the first month he began to go up from Babylonia, and on the first day of the fifth month he came to Jerusalem, for the good hand of his God was on him. For Ezra had set his heart to study the Law of the Lord, and to do it and to teach his statutes and rules in Israel (Ezra 7:8-10).
Finally, 12 years after Ezra returns, Nehemiah returns to Jerusalem to rebuild the temple.
Then I said to them (leaders in Jerusalem), “You see the trouble we are in, how Jerusalem lies in ruins with its gates burned. Come, let us build the wall of Jerusalem, that we may no longer suffer derision” (Nehemiah 2:17, ESV).
Let’s do some brain mapping to see the entire process. . .
I’ve thought about this timeline for years.
Why didn’t God just bring the Israelites back at once?
God works through processes. The Assyrians and Babylonians had decimated the land of Israel, and bringing a mass of people back at one time would create chaotic shortages in housing, food, and governmental infrastructure.
In this three-fold return, can we learn more of God’s ways?
Yes. The temple was rebuilt (“born again” or “justification”), the Law was restored (“growing holiness” or “sanctification”), and the walls were rebuilt (“healing of relationships between God, others, and self”). Rebuilding Jerusalem imitates the same processes God uses in restoring us completely to his Kingdom.
Is there a prophetic lesson for us to learn from the rebuilding of Jerusalem?
The rebuilding of Jerusalem took about 100 years in the Old Testament. In 1948, Jews from around the world began returning to Jerusalem. One hundred years later is 2048.
Can the one-hundred-year return of Jews to Jerusalem in Ezra and Nehemiah indicate a divine stopwatch in God’s end times for a rebuilt New Jerusalem in which all nations worship God?
And I saw the holy city, new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, prepared as a bride adorned for her husband … The nations will walk by its light, and the kings of the earth will bring their glory to it (Revelation 21:2 and 24).
Amen and amen!