Ezra Chapter 3
It is remarkable that the people who returned gathered on the first day of the seventh month and built the altar for burnt sacrifices, even before the foundation of the Temple was laid. This is the time of the last 3 Feasts: Tumpets (on the first day), then the Atonement (on the 10th), and the Booths or Tabernacles (on the 15th of the seventh month).
So they could immediately begin to offer all the burnt offerings that the Law proscribed for every day, as well as, I assume, these Feasts.
Then when the foundation was laid, there was a concert.
Chapter 4
Here comes the opposition to the Jews' building. The residents of the area (the Samaritans) wanted to help with the building of the Temple, but the leadership recognized the danger of allowing their help, as their religion wasn't pure, but a mixture with Paganism. So they incited Artaxerxes (Xerxes) to stop the work.
It was stopped for 15 years.
Chapter 5
This chapter introduces Haggai and Zechariah, God's prophets, who encouraged the people to resume building God's Temple. This prompts the local big-wigs to question them, and complain to King Darius.
Chapter 6
So Darius makes a search and finds Cyrus' decree, and he tells these big-wigs to lay off and leave them alone. And to even help them! All the costs of this building, along with the sacrifices to be done there, were to be paid by them, out of their taxes due to the Crown.
So God had the enemies to "bow down" financially to the Lord God, as ordered by King Darius, a ruler who didn't even know the Lord, but is being used by Him to further His Plan of the Ages among the Nations.
Our God is still sovereign over all the governments of this World.
So I know that I can trust Him to have us all in His hand. He is still sovereign, His Plan has never changed, and all the heads of the Nations will not be able to deter Him from His purposes for us.
He instead uses all their decisions that they "freely" make to carry us all forward in His Plan toward that final culmination when Christ returns.
Even so, come, Lord Jesus!
