Separation

“Then they came to Zerubbabel, and to the chief of the fathers, and said unto them, Let us build with you: for we seek your God, as ye do; and we do sacrifice unto him since the days of Esar-haddon king of Assur, which brought us up hither. But Zerubbabel, and Jeshua, and the rest of the chief of the fathers of Israel, said unto them, Ye have nothing to do with us to build a house unto our God; but we ourselves together will build unto the LORD God of Israel, as king Cyrus the king of Persia hath commanded us.” - Ezra 4v2-3

There has been a lot of abuse about the concept of Biblical separation in the last few years. When this happens it can be tempting to “throw out the baby with the bath water” and forsake the Bible’s teaching on separation.

We must remember that separation is still an important Bible concept. Here in Ezra the people had come back to Jerusalem to build the Temple. The Samaritans, who had a corrupted concept of Jewish worship, opposed the return of Israel. They came and “offered to help” build the Temple. This would have given them a foothold in the re-established culture. Fortunately the leaders had the wisdom to refuse their help. “You have nothing to do with us, we ourselves will build…”

No matter how tempting the offer we must always do God’s work His way, using His methods, and in His time. We must never condescend to using the enemy to do God’s work.