This week we will read Ezra, Nehemiah, and Malachi - the last of God's recorded words to His people until John the Baptist is conceived some four centuries later. As the nation finally rebuilds her homeland after being humbled by exile, a question hangs in the air: Is the promised restoration finally nigh?

We know that the answer is no. But it's a difficult "no" to swallow when we see Ezra and Nehemiah working so hard to inspire revival, desperately pointing their nation back to her God, trying to build something new and lasting from the spiritual rubble that has made up the hearts of Israel's people for so long.