Ezra 4:14

Now because we have maintenance from the king’s palace.

Good cause for great zeal

I. We acknowledge a very gracious fact.

1. We have been maintained from the King’s palace--

(1) In things temporal.

(2) In things spiritual.

2. Our maintenance from the King’s palace has cost His Majesty dear. He spared not His own Son.

3. We have had a bountiful supply.

4. We have had an unfailing portion.

5. The supply has ennobled us.

6. How cheering it is to have such a soul-satisfying portion in God.

II. Here is a duty recognised. By every sense of propriety we are bound not to see God dishonoured--

1. By ourselves.

2. By those who dwell under our roof.

3. By those with whom we have influence; particularly those who desire to unite with us in Church fellowship. We must not receive into our membership persons of unhallowed life--those who know not the truth as it is in Jesus.

4. By the mutilation and misrepresentation of His Word.

5. By a neglect of His ordinances.

6. By a general decline of His Church.

7. By so many rejecting His gospel. We cannot prevent their doing so, but we can weep for them, pray for them, etc.

III. A course of action pursued. “Certified the king.” It is a holy exercise of the saints to report to the Lord the sins and the sorrows they observe among the people and to plead for their removal. (C. H. Spurgeon.)