They celebrated the Feast of Matzot with joy for seven days, because Adonai had given them joy and had changed the heart of the king of Assyria toward them so as to strengthen their hands in the work on the House of God, the God of Israel.
I got up during the night along with a few men. But I did not tell anyone what my God had put in my heart to do for Jerusalem. There were no animals with me except the animal I was riding.
as well as a letter to Asaph, the keeper of the king’s forest so he will give me lumber to make beams for the gates of the fortress adjacent to the Temple, for the wall of the city and for the residence I will occupy.” The king granted me the requests because the good hand of my God was upon me.
So my God put into my heart to assemble the nobles, the officials and the people to be registered by genealogy. I found the scroll of the genealogical record of those who formerly returned. I found the following written there:
The glory of Lebanon will come to you —cypress, elm and pine together— to beautify the place of My Sanctuary. I will give to the place of My feet glory.
I rejoiced in the Lord greatly, that now at last you have revived your concern for me (though you were concerned before but lacked opportunity to show it).
“This is the covenant that I will cut with them: ‘After those days,’ says Adonai, ‘I will put My Torah upon their hearts, and upon their minds I will write it,’” then He says,
For this is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel after those days, says Adonai. I will put My Torah into their mind, and upon their hearts I will write it. And I will be their God, and they shall be My people.
For God has put it into their hearts to do His will, and to be of one mind, and to give their royal power to the beast until the words of God are fulfilled.