Teach Us How To Pray: Prayer and Word for 10-23-24

Hello Everyone. Mercy Unto You, and Peace, and Love, Be Multiplied. Saint of GOD, tonight my prayer is that you read the Word of  2 Edras. Awesome Word from the Apocrypha Books. My Prayer is that you all gain more divine wisdom, knowledge, and understanding by reading the inspired WORD of GOD. In the MIGHTY AND MATCHLESS NAME OF YESHUA, I pray Amen.

2 Edras (NRSV)

Ezra’s Prophetic Call

The word of the Lord came to me, saying, “Go, declare to my people their evil deeds, and to their children the iniquities that they have committed against me, so that they may tell their children’s children that the sins of their parents have increased in them, for they have forgotten me and have offered sacrifices to strange gods. Was it not I who brought them out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of bondage? But they have angered me and despised my counsels. Now you, pull out the hair of your head and hurl all evils upon them, for they have not obeyed my law—they are a rebellious people. How long shall I endure them, on whom I have bestowed such great benefits? For their sake I have overthrown many kings; I struck down Pharaoh with his servants and all his army. I destroyed all nations before them, and scattered in the east the peoples of two provinces, Tyre and Sidon; I killed all their enemies.

God’s Mercies to Israel

(Ex 14:1–15:25)

“But speak to them and say, Thus says the Lord: Surely it was I who brought you through the sea, and made safe highways for you where there was no road; I gave you Moses as leader and Aaron as priest; I provided light for you from a pillar of fire, and did great wonders among you. Yet you have forgotten me, says the Lord.

“Thus says the Lord Almighty: The quails were a sign to you; I gave you camps for your protection, and in them you complained. You have not exulted in my name at the destruction of your enemies, but to this day you still complain. Where are the benefits that I bestowed on you? When you were hungry and thirsty in the wilderness, did you not cry out to me, saying, ‘Why have you led us into this wilderness to kill us? It would have been better for us to serve the Egyptians than to die in this wilderness.’ I pitied your groanings and gave you manna for food; you ate the bread of angels. When you were thirsty, did I not split the rock so that waters flowed in abundance? Because of the heat I clothed you with the leaves of trees. I divided fertile lands among you; I drove out the Canaanites, the Perizzites, and the Philistines before you. What more can I do for you? says the Lord. Thus says the Lord Almighty: When you were in the wilderness, at the bitter stream, thirsty and blaspheming my name, I did not send fire on you for your blasphemies, but threw a tree into the water and made the stream sweet.

Israel’s Disobedience and Rejection

(Cp Mt 23:29–39; Rom 10:14–20)

“What shall I do to you, O Jacob? You, Judah, would not obey me. I will turn to other nations and will give them my name, so that they may keep my statutes. Because you have forsaken me, I also will forsake you. When you beg mercy of me, I will show you no mercy. When you call to me, I will not listen to you; for you have defiled your hands with blood, and your feet are swift to commit murder. It is not as though you had forsaken me; you have forsaken yourselves, says the Lord.

“Thus says the Lord Almighty: Have I not entreated you as a father entreats his sons or a mother her daughters or a nurse her children, so that you should be my people and I should be your God, and that you should be my children and I should be your father? I gathered you as a hen gathers her chicks under her wings. But now, what shall I do to you? I will cast you out from my presence. When you offer oblations to me, I will turn my face from you; for I have rejected your festal days, and new moons, and circumcisions of the flesh. I sent you my servants the prophets, but you have taken and killed them and torn their bodies in pieces; I will require their blood of you, says the Lord.

“Thus says the Lord Almighty: Your house is desolate; I will drive you out as the wind drives straw; and your sons will have no children, because with you they have neglected my commandment and have done what is evil in my sight. I will give your houses to a people that will come, who without having heard me will believe. Those to whom I have shown no signs will do what I have commanded. They have seen no prophets, yet will recall their former state. I call to witness the gratitude of the people that is to come, whose children rejoice with gladness; though they do not see me with bodily eyes, yet with the spirit they will believe the things I have said.

“And now, father, look with pride and see the people coming from the east; to them I will give as leaders Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, and Hosea and Amos and Micah and Joel and Obadiah and Jonah and Nahum and Habakkuk, Zephaniah, Haggai, Zechariah and Malachi, who is also called the messenger of the Lord.

God’s Judgment on Israel

2 “Thus says the Lord: I brought this people out of bondage, and I gave them commandments through my servants the prophets; but they would not listen to them, and made my counsels void. The mother who bore them says to them, ‘Go, my children, because I am a widow and forsaken. I brought you up with gladness; but with mourning and sorrow I have lost you, because you have sinned before the Lord God and have done what is evil in my sight. But now what can I do for you? For I am a widow and forsaken. Go, my children, and ask for mercy from the Lord.’ Now I call upon you, father, as a witness in addition to the mother of the children, because they would not keep my covenant, so that you may bring confusion on them and bring their mother to ruin, so that they may have no offspring. Let them be scattered among the nations; let their names be blotted out from the earth, because they have despised my covenant.

“Woe to you, Assyria, who conceal the unrighteous within you! O wicked nation, remember what I did to Sodom and Gomorrah, whose land lies in lumps of pitch and heaps of ashes. That is what I will do to those who have not listened to me, says the Lord Almighty.”

Thus says the Lord to Ezra: “Tell my people that I will give them the kingdom of Jerusalem, which I was going to give to Israel. Moreover, I will take back to myself their glory, and will give to these others the everlasting habitations, which I had prepared for Israel. The tree of life shall give them fragrant perfume, and they shall neither toil nor become weary. Go and you will receive; pray that your days may be few, that they may be shortened. The kingdom is already prepared for you; be on the watch! Call, O call heaven and earth to witness: I set aside evil and created good; for I am the Living One, says the Lord.

Exhortation to Good Works

“Mother, embrace your children; bring them up with gladness, as does a dove; strengthen their feet, because I have chosen you, says the Lord. And I will raise up the dead from their places, and bring them out from their tombs, because I recognize my name in them. Do not fear, mother of children, for I have chosen you, says the Lord. I will send you help, my servants Isaiah and Jeremiah. According to their counsel I have consecrated and prepared for you twelve trees loaded with various fruits, and the same number of springs flowing with milk and honey, and seven mighty mountains on which roses and lilies grow; by these I will fill your children with joy.

“Guard the rights of the widow, secure justice for the ward, give to the needy, defend the orphan, clothe the naked, care for the injured and the weak, do not ridicule the lame, protect the maimed, and let the blind have a vision of my splendor. Protect the old and the young within your walls; When you find any who are dead, commit them to the grave and mark it, and I will give you the first place in my resurrection. Pause and be quiet, my people, because your rest will come.

“Good nurse, nourish your children; strengthen their feet. Not one of the servants whom I have given you will perish, for I will require them from among your number. Do not be anxious, for when the day of tribulation and anguish comes, others shall weep and be sorrowful, but you shall rejoice and have abundance. The nations shall envy you, but they shall not be able to do anything against you, says the Lord. My power will protect you, so that your children may not see hell.

“Rejoice, O mother, with your children, because I will deliver you, says the Lord. Remember your children that sleep, because I will bring them out of the hiding places of the earth, and will show mercy to them; for I am merciful, says the Lord Almighty. Embrace your children until I come, and proclaim mercy to them; because my springs run over, and my grace will not fail.”

Ezra on Mount Horeb

I, Ezra, received a command from the Lord on Mount Horeb to go to Israel. When I came to them they rejected me and refused the Lord’s commandment. Therefore I say to you, O nations that hear and understand, “Wait for your shepherd; he will give you everlasting rest, because he who will come at the end of the age is close at hand. Be ready for the rewards of the kingdom, because perpetual light will shine on you forevermore. Flee from the shadow of this age, receive the joy of your glory; I publicly call on my savior to witness. Receive what the Lord has entrusted to you and be joyful, giving thanks to him who has called you to the celestial kingdoms. Rise, stand erect and see the number of those who have been sealed at the feast of the Lord. Those who have departed from the shadow of this age have received glorious garments from the Lord. Take again your full number, O Zion, and close the list of your people who are clothed in white, who have fulfilled the law of the Lord. The number of your children, whom you desired, is now complete; implore the Lord’s authority that your people, who have been called from the beginning, may be made holy.”

Ezra Sees the Son of God

(Cp Rev 7:9–17)

I, Ezra, saw on Mount Zion a great multitude that I could not number, and they all were praising the Lord with songs. In their midst was a young man of great stature, taller than any of the others, and on the head of each of them he placed a crown, but he was more exalted than they. And I was held spellbound. Then I asked an angel, “Who are these, my lord?” He answered and said to me, “These are they who have put off mortal clothing and have put on the immortal, and have confessed the name of God. Now they are being crowned, and receive palms.” Then I said to the angel, “Who is that young man who is placing crowns on them and putting palms in their hands?” He answered and said to me, “He is the Son of God, whom they confessed in the world.” So I began to praise those who had stood valiantly for the name of the Lord. Then the angel said to me, “Go, tell my people how great and how many are the wonders of the Lord God that you have seen.”

Ezra’s Prayer of Complaint

3 In the thirtieth year after the destruction of the city, I was in Babylon—I, Salathiel, who am also called Ezra. I was troubled as I lay on my bed, and my thoughts welled up in my heart, because I saw the desolation of Zion and the wealth of those who lived in Babylon. My spirit was greatly agitated, and I began to speak anxious words to the Most High, and said, “O sovereign Lord, did you not speak at the beginning when you planted the earth—and that without help—and commanded the dust and it gave you Adam, a lifeless body? Yet he was the creation of your hands, and you breathed into him the breath of life, and he was made alive in your presence. And you led him into the garden that your right hand had planted before the earth appeared. And you laid upon him one commandment of yours; but he transgressed it, and immediately you appointed death for him and for his descendants. From him there sprang nations and tribes, peoples and clans without number. And every nation walked after its own will; they did ungodly things in your sight and rejected your commands, and you did not hinder them. But again, in its time you brought the flood upon the inhabitants of the world and destroyed them. And the same fate befell all of them: just as death came upon Adam, so the flood upon them. But you left one of them, Noah with his household, and all the righteous who have descended from him.

“When those who lived on earth began to multiply, they produced children and peoples and many nations, and again they began to be more ungodly than were their ancestors. And when they were committing iniquity in your sight, you chose for yourself one of them, whose name was Abraham; you loved him, and to him alone you revealed the end of the times, secretly by night. You made an everlasting covenant with him, and promised him that you would never forsake his descendants; and you gave him Isaac, and to Isaac you gave Jacob and Esau. You set apart Jacob for yourself, but Esau you rejected; and Jacob became a great multitude. And when you led his descendants out of Egypt, you brought them to Mount Sinai. You bent down the heavens and shook the earth, and moved the world, and caused the depths to tremble, and troubled the times. Your glory passed through the four gates of fire and earthquake and wind and ice, to give the law to the descendants of Jacob, and your commandment to the posterity of Israel.

“Yet you did not take away their evil heart from them, so that your law might produce fruit in them. For the first Adam, burdened with an evil heart, transgressed and was overcome, as were also all who were descended from him. Thus the disease became permanent; the law was in the hearts of the people along with the evil root; but what was good departed, and the evil remained. So the times passed and the years were completed, and you raised up for yourself a servant, named David. You commanded him to build a city for your name, and there to offer you oblations from what is yours. This was done for many years; but the inhabitants of the city transgressed, in everything doing just as Adam and all his descendants had done, for they also had the evil heart. So you handed over your city to your enemies.

Babylon Compared with Zion

“Then I said in my heart, Are the deeds of those who inhabit Babylon any better? Is that why it has gained dominion over Zion? For when I came here I saw ungodly deeds without number, and my soul has seen many sinners during these thirty years. And my heart failed me, because I have seen how you endure those who sin, and have spared those who act wickedly, and have destroyed your people, and protected your enemies, and have not shown to anyone how your way may be comprehended. Are the deeds of Babylon better than those of Zion? Or has another nation known you besides Israel? Or what tribes have so believed the covenants as these tribes of Jacob? Yet their reward has not appeared and their labor has borne no fruit. For I have traveled widely among the nations and have seen that they abound in wealth, though they are unmindful of your commandments. Now therefore weigh in a balance our iniquities and those of the inhabitants of the world; and it will be found which way the turn of the scale will incline. When have the inhabitants of the earth not sinned in your sight? Or what nation has kept your commandments so well? You may indeed find individuals who have kept your commandments, but nations you will not find.”

Limitations of the Human Mind

4 Then the angel that had been sent to me, whose name was Uriel, answered and said to me, “Your understanding has utterly failed regarding this world, and do you think you can comprehend the way of the Most High?” Then I said, “Yes, my lord.” And he replied to me, “I have been sent to show you three ways, and to put before you three problems. If you can solve one of them for me, then I will show you the way you desire to see, and will teach you why the heart is evil.”

I said, “Speak, my lord.”

And he said to me, “Go, weigh for me the weight of fire, or measure for me a blast of wind, or call back for me the day that is past.”

I answered and said, “Who of those that have been born can do that, that you should ask me about such things?”

And he said to me, “If I had asked you, ‘How many dwellings are in the heart of the sea, or how many streams are at the source of the deep, or how many streams are above the firmament, or which are the exits of Hades, or which are the entrances of paradise?’ perhaps you would have said to me, ‘I never went down into the deep, nor as yet into Hades, neither did I ever ascend into heaven.’ But now I have asked you only about fire and wind and the day—things that you have experienced and from which you cannot be separated, and you have given me no answer about them.” He said to me, “You cannot understand the things with which you have grown up; how then can your mind comprehend the way of the Most High? And how can one who is already worn out by the corrupt world understand incorruption?” When I heard this, I fell on my face and said to him, “It would have been better for us not to be here than to come here and live in ungodliness, and to suffer and not understand why.”

Parable of the Forest and the Sea

He answered me and said, “I went into a forest of trees of the plain, and they made a plan and said, ‘Come, let us go and make war against the sea, so that it may recede before us and so that we may make for ourselves more forests.’ In like manner the waves of the sea also made a plan and said, ‘Come, let us go up and subdue the forest of the plain so that there also we may gain more territory for ourselves.’ But the plan of the forest was in vain, for the fire came and consumed it; likewise also the plan of the waves of the sea was in vain, for the sand stood firm and blocked it. If now you were a judge between them, which would you undertake to justify, and which to condemn?”

I answered and said, “Each made a foolish plan, for the land has been assigned to the forest, and the locale of the sea a place to carry its waves.”

He answered me and said, “You have judged rightly, but why have you not judged so in your own case? For as the land has been assigned to the forest and the sea to its waves, so also those who inhabit the earth can understand only what is on the earth, and he who is above the heavens can understand what is above the height of the heavens.”

The New Age Will Make All Things Clear

Then I answered and said, “I implore you, my lord, why have I been endowed with the power of understanding? For I did not wish to inquire about the ways above, but about those things that we daily experience: why Israel has been given over to the Gentiles in disgrace; why the people whom you loved has been given over to godless tribes, and the law of our ancestors has been brought to destruction and the written covenants no longer exist. We pass from the world like locusts, and our life is like a mist, and we are not worthy to obtain mercy. But what will he do for his

name that is invoked over us? It is about these things that I have asked.”

He answered me and said, “If you are alive, you will see, and if you live long, you will often marvel, because the age is hurrying swiftly to its end. It will not be able to bring the things that have been promised to the righteous in their appointed times, because this age is full of sadness and infirmities. For the evil about which you ask me has been sown, but the harvest of it has not yet come. If therefore that which has been sown is not reaped, and if the place where the evil has been sown does not pass away, the field where the good has been sown will not come. For a grain of evil seed was sown in Adam’s heart from the beginning, and how much ungodliness it has produced until now—and will produce until the time of threshing comes! Consider now for yourself how much fruit of ungodliness a grain of evil seed has produced. When heads of grain without number are sown, how great a threshing floor they will fill!”

When Will the New Age Come?

(Cp Rev 6:11)

Then I answered and said, “How long? When will these things be? Why are our years few and evil?” He answered me and said, “Do not be in a greater hurry than the Most High. You, indeed, are in a hurry for yourself, but the Highest is in a hurry on behalf of many. Did not the souls of the righteous in their chambers ask about these matters, saying, ‘How long are we to remain here? And when will the harvest of our reward come?’ And the archangel Jeremiel answered and said, ‘When the number of those like yourselves is completed; for he has weighed the age in the balance, and measured the times by measure, and numbered the times by number; and he will not move or arouse them until that measure is fulfilled.’ ”

Then I answered and said, “But, O sovereign Lord, all of us also are full of ungodliness. It is perhaps on account of us that the time of threshing is delayed for the righteous—on account of the sins of those who inhabit the earth.”

He answered me and said, “Go and ask a pregnant woman whether, when her nine months have been completed, her womb can keep the fetus within her any longer.”

And I said, “No, lord, it cannot.”

He said to me, “In Hades the chambers of the souls are like the womb. For just as a woman who is in labor makes haste to escape the pangs of birth, so also do these places hasten to give back those things that were committed to them from the beginning. Then the things that you desire to see will be disclosed to you.”

How Much Time Remains?

(Cp Mt 24:9–31; Mk 13:9–27; Lk 21:20–28)

I answered and said, “If I have found favor in your sight, and if it is possible, and if I am worthy, show me this also: whether more time is to come than has passed, or whether for us the greater part has gone by. For I know what has gone by, but I do not know what is to come.”

And he said to me, “Stand at my right side, and I will show you the interpretation of a parable.”

So I stood and looked, and lo, a flaming furnace passed by before me, and when the flame had gone by I looked, and lo, the smoke remained. And after this a cloud full of water passed before me and poured down a heavy and violent rain, and when the violent rainstorm had passed, drops still remained in the cloud.

He said to me, “Consider it for yourself; for just as the rain is more than the drops, and the fire is greater than the smoke, so the quantity that passed was far greater; but drops and smoke remained.”

Then I prayed and said, “Do you think that I shall live until those days? Or who will be alive in those days?”

He answered me and said, “Concerning the signs about which you ask me, I can tell you in part; but I was not sent to tell you concerning your life, for I do not know.

Signs of the End

(Cp Mt 24:3–8; Mk 13:1–8; Lk 21:7–19)

5 “Now concerning the signs: lo, the days are coming when those who inhabit the earth shall be seized with great terror, and the way of truth shall be hidden, and the land shall be barren of faith. Unrighteousness shall be increased beyond what you yourself see, and beyond what you heard of formerly. And the land that you now see ruling shall be a trackless waste, and people shall see it desolate. But if the Most High grants that you live, you shall see it thrown into confusion after the third period;

and the sun shall suddenly begin to shine at night,

and the moon during the day.

Blood shall drip from wood,

and the stone shall utter its voice;

the peoples shall be troubled,

and the stars shall fall.

And one shall reign whom those who inhabit the earth do not expect, and the birds shall fly away together; and the Dead Sea shall cast up fish; and one whom the many do not know shall make his voice heard by night, and all shall hear his voice. There shall be chaos also in many places, fire shall often break out, the wild animals shall roam beyond their haunts, and menstruous women shall bring forth monsters. Salt waters shall be found in the sweet, and all friends shall conquer one another; then shall reason hide itself, and wisdom shall withdraw into its chamber, and it shall be sought by many but shall not be found, and unrighteousness and unrestraint shall increase on earth. One country shall ask its neighbor, ‘Has righteousness, or anyone who does right, passed through you?’ And it will answer, ‘No.’ At that time people shall hope but not obtain; they shall labor, but their ways shall not prosper. These are the signs that I am permitted to tell you, and if you pray again, and weep as you do now, and fast for seven days, you shall hear yet greater things than these.”

Conclusion of the Vision

Then I woke up, and my body shuddered violently, and my soul was so troubled that it fainted. But the angel who had come and talked with me held me and strengthened me and set me on my feet.

Now on the second night Phaltiel, a chief of the people, came to me and said, “Where have you been? And why is your face sad? Or do you not know that Israel has been entrusted to you in the land of their exile? Rise therefore and eat some bread, and do not forsake us, like a shepherd who leaves the flock in the power of savage wolves.”

Then I said to him, “Go away from me and do not come near me for seven days; then you may come to me.”

He heard what I said and left me. So I fasted seven days, mourning and weeping, as the angel Uriel had commanded me.

The Holy Bible: New Revised Standard Version. 1989. Nashville: Thomas Nelson Publishers.