Pray the word with David Platt is a resource from Radical.net.

Ezra chapter 3, verse 12,

but many of the priests and Levites and heads of Father's houses,

old men who had seen the first house,

wept with a loud voice when they saw the foundation of this house being laid,

though many shouted aloud for joy.

What a scene here in Ezra chapter 3 as the temple is being rebuilt in Jerusalem,

when people who had seen the first temple that was destroyed when

when the Babylonians came and took God's people into exile,

and they are weeping because they remember what the temple

this house looked like before, and they remember

how God had moved in such power back in those days,

and they're weeping because they are remembering their sin that

led God's people into exile. So there's weeping here, and at the same time

they're shouting for joy. Many people shouted aloud for joy because

of the restoration God was bringing about that we were

praying according to in Ezra chapter 2,

and in this mixture of emotions, I think we see a picture of

really the Christian life of each of our lives,

like there should be in our lives sadness over sin in our lives, or the effects

of sin in our lives, or the effects of sin in the world around us,

in ways that cause us to weep, in ways that cause us to wish,

...