Ezra 9:8
And now for a little space grace hath been shewed from the LORD our God, to leave us a remnant to escape, and to give us a nail in his holy place, that our God may lighten our eyes, and give us a little reviving in our bondage. And now for a little space grace hath been shewed from the LORD our God, to leave us a remnant to escape, and to give us a nail in his holy place, that our God may lighten our eyes, and give us a little reviving in our bondage.
Ezra uttered this prayer after the return from captivity when Israel had intermarried with the surrounding heathen peoples, bowed in shame and grief over that unfaithfulness. He prayed it at the time of the evening sacrifice, fallen on his knees with hands spread out to God, confessing iniquity increased over the head and grown up to heaven and entreating pardon. He identified himself with the guilty, confessing his own sins and the sins of his people as if he himself were the offender.
The prayer looked back to the history since the days of their fathers, when they with their kings and priests had for great trespass been delivered to the sword and to captivity and to spoil and to shame. That ruin had come through mingling with heathen nations, which brought apostasy and ended in the Babylonian captivity. For a little space God had then shown grace by leaving a remnant to escape and giving them again a foothold and secure place in their native land in His holy place. His purpose was to lighten their eyes and grant them a little reviving even while they remained in bondage.
That grace meant that though they were bondmen God had not forsaken them but had extended mercy to them before the kings of Persia. He had punished them less than their iniquities deserved. By that mercy they were enabled to set up the house of God and to repair its ruins and desolations, and to enjoy protection in Judah and Jerusalem.
After such deliverance, to forsake His safeguard commands spoken by the prophets and join again with abominable peoples would deserve consuming anger until none were left as a remnant to escape. God is righteous, and a people guilty in trespass cannot stand before Him. The prayer thus models the work of reform as patient toiling and praying and suffering to set people right. In that work the greatest difficulty is not the open hostility of the heathen but the secret opposition of pretended friends who lend their influence to evil and furnish God's enemies with material for warfare upon His people, while with evil passions and rebellious wills they war against the plain requirements of God.