If you have difficulty trying to get an understanding of just what took place when the Hebrew exiles returned to Jerusalem, you are in good company. Most scholars believe some portions of the book got misplaced in their chronological order, leaving us to wonder whether Ezra and Nehemiah worked at roughly the same time, whether Nehemiah preceded Ezra or if Ezra preceded Nehemiah.

But, as I indicated last week, we don’t have to solve these problems – and they may never be solved – because these two books, even in their present form, can still speak to us and our time.

We know the 10 tribes of Israel, the Northern Kingdom, were carried into captivity in 722 B.C. by the Assyrians. Despite much speculation, we really don’t know what happened to them. They have disappeared into history.

Although the Southern kingdom of Judah and Jerusalem were unharmed in 722, in 587 B.C. the cream of Judea’s citizenry was carried off by the Babylonians, who had replaced the Assyrians as the power of the Middle East. Jerusalem became the abode of Judean Jews not carried off, as well as of Samaritans and other non-Jews.

A new generation

It was approximately 70 years that Judeans were in captivity. Most, if not all, of those who would “return to Jerusalem” had not lived there previously, but were born and grew up in Babylonian exile. So the dream of returning to Jerusalem and restoring the Temple was kept alive by the exiled parents who passed it on to the generations that followed them.

The prophets, Haggai and Zechariah, also were instrumental in encouraging the exiled Jews to return (Ezra 5:1). And Ezra, a priest from a high priestly family, played a key role in instituting reforms in the religious life of the exiles and encouraging them to return.

So, what does this have to do with us? Few of us have lived in captivity. But, as we get older, we are sometimes captive to our memories and our own views of how things were and ought to be. We have probably known churches that were content to resist any changes to congregational life.

An apocryphal story tells of a pastor newly assigned to a church in a semi-rural area becoming suburban. As he inspected the church, he spied an elderly man and said, “Well, old-timer, I guess you’ve seen a lot of changes in your time.”

The “old-timer” cleared his throat and replied, “Yep, and I’ve been agin’ every one of them, too!”

A renowned scientist once observed most of the changes in science are made possible not because the majority of scientists are persuaded to accept new views, but because scientists who would not accept changes in their thinking eventually die and are replaced by those willing to move on.

That is human nature, but as Christians we are called to rise above the limitations of human nature. In each parish I have served, I have found people who focus on what their church has been, while others have fixed their sights on what that church can become.

Our focus is not a matter of one view prevailing over the other, but an appreciation of both the present and future that can grow out of a congregation’s heritage.

The exiles returning to Jerusalem had a motivating appreciation of what Jerusalem and the Temple had meant to those who had been carried off into exile. But when they arrived in Jerusalem and beheld the tragic ruins of its walls and Temple, on the strength of what they had been told, they were motivated to remain, restore and rebuild.

I have been associated with First United Methodist Church (FUMC) of Dallas, Texas, for 36 years, 13 of which I served on its staff as a minister until I retired in 1994. It is incredible how much this church has changed in that time, while retaining a rich heritage and outstanding record. (Five of its ministers became bishops.).

Most important, for the last 15 years it has reached out to serve the community in ways that would not have been considered likely when I first arrived. Our Crossroads Community Center last year fed 1.1 million meals to 13,525 needy people of Dallas, as well as providing tons of clothing.

This has been possible because it is a congregation and staff that has not been content to sit on their laurels and thus were able to pass on to new generations a sense of purpose that remains secure, even as the ways in which that purpose is worked out are constantly changing.

We recently completed a modest building project at FUMC that gives us an airy new entrance hall, a central area for meeting and greeting, as well as some additional educational space. The project involved tearing down a wall that for many years had shuttered all windows on the west side of the sanctuary.

Yesterday we had an opportunity to see, for the first time in anyone’s remembrance, the sun streaming through the west windows. Looking up through a new roof window we saw the steeple of our church presiding over both the new and old of FUMC.

Christ’s call to us as his followers does not mean that we give up the “old” at the price of the “new,” or vice versa. It is an opportunity to build upon the old in order to do whatever new thing God gives us.

The views and opinions expressed in this column are those of the author and not necessarily those of Farm World. Those with questions or comments for Rev. Althouse may write to him in care of this publication.