Once again we as Believers in Jesus are warned that we should keep ourselves separate from the world.

Ezra 9:1
After these things had been done, the leaders came to me and said, "The people of Israel, including the priests and the Levites, have not kept themselves separate from the neighboring peoples with their detestable practices, like those of the Canaanites, Hittites, Perizzites, Jebusites, Ammonites, Moabites, Egyptians and Amorites.

And once again the leaders have led the way.

Ezra 9:2b
They have taken some of their daughters as wives for themselves and their sons, and have mingled the holy race with the peoples around them. And the leaders and officials have led the way in this unfaithfulness."

Some of Ezra's prayer really resonated with us as we read this passage again.  See if this prayer applies to us as a nation, as a church, and as individual believers in Jesus.  These are portions from Ezra's prayer.

O, my God, I am too ashamed and disgraced to lift up my face to you, because our sins are higher than our heads and our guilt has reached to the heavens...you have punished us less than our sins have deserved...Here we are before you in our guilt, though because of it not one of us can stand in your presence...we have been unfaithful to our God.  But in spite of all this, there is still hope.  Now make confession to the Lord and do His will.  Separate yourselves from the people around you (and our sins).  

Couldn't help but think about 2 Chronicles 7:14.  The first thing He wants us to do is to repent.  That's what this prayer is all about!

Shecaniah offered a very drastic way of correcting (or more like overcorrecting) the situation of intermarriage. His correction was to send away the foreign wives and their children. Most of the men agreed - only a few opposed the plan.

Wouldn’t it have been easier to have just obeyed God in the first place? How often in our lives as Believers have we made things much harder on ourselves because we didn’t listen and obey...the first time???