Shortly after I returned from India, in the fall of 1979, I heard that Francis Schaeffer was speaking at a conference in Philadelphia. When I and some others expressed an interest in the conference, the father of one of Annie’s friends bought tickets for all of us. I had never met this man until then. He just knew that there were some ex-OM’ers who wanted to go hear Francis Schaeffer. He owned several meat markets in Lancaster County, and he had the financial means to pay our way; the thing that became clear, as I talked with him during the conference, was that he took great delight in being able to do this. There was no sense of superiority. We were very grateful to him, but he didn’t seem to think it was a big deal. It was as if God had called all of us to that conference and had simply entrusted him with the money; he saw himself as a steward, entrusted with a certain amount of money to use under God’s lordship.
Ten years later, Annie and I were looking to move out of Philadelphia. I was in graduate school at Temple University, and Michael and Daniel were both toddlers at the time. But life in the city just wasn’t working well for us as a family. When he learned of our desire to move, this same man told us to go ahead and sell our row house and come live with him and his wife as long as necessary until we could get settled somewhere else (all of their own children were grown by this time). So we left the city, stored all our furniture in their barn, and lived in their home for 6 months. When we first got there, I approached him about paying rent and helping with buying food. After all, we were adding four people to the house, which would increase the food bill considerably. But he told me they didn’t want us to pay rent. When I pressed the issue, he said: “We have enough money; we don’t need any more.” And again, he and his wife approached it with the same attitude I had seen 10 years earlier. God had entrusted them with their money, and they wanted to use it faithfully under His lordship. Not only this, but as members of the body of Christ, part of their stewardship involved using their money for the good of the body, not just for themselves. Rather than giving away something that belonged to them, my impression has been that these people see themselves as having been entrusted with some of the money that will be needed by others in the body. It’s not theirs. It belongs to God, and their responsibility is to prayerfully discern how God wants it to be used.
Nehemiah would approve of this outlook. We see him, throughout this chapter, acting in similar ways and calling others in the nation to do the same. Nehemiah is clearly a wealthy man, but he’s intent on using his wealth for the good of God’s people, not for his own personal enrichment. The thing we can see in this chapter is this: God calls His people to care for one another in concrete ways. That means not taking advantage of one another, but it means more than that. The command, “love one another as I have loved you,” coming from the One who impoverished Himself to enrich us, is meant to transform every area of our lives.
Notice, first of all, that Nehemiah rebukes the officials and nobles for profiting from the suffering of their brethren. The people come to him with a series of complaints, listed in verses 1-5. The work of building the wall has taken people away from their means of livelihood, and for some of them the problem is becoming serious. The first group, in verse 2, are people who don’t have land. Their situation is desperate; they need food for themselves and their families if they’re to stay alive. The second group, in verse 3, has had to mortgage their land to get food during the crisis. And the third group, in verse 4, has had to borrow money to pay taxes. All of them are at the point where their children are being subjected to debt-slavery. They’re having to give their children as slaves to their creditors, to pay off the debt. And the people they’re borrowing from, the people who are subjecting them to debt-slavery, are fellow-Israelites. The wealthy people in the nation are supplying them with food, but they’re making a profit. They’re making sure they get everything they can out of the deal.
When Nehemiah hears what is going on, he says, “I was very angry.” We see here something of his wisdom as a leader, because he doesn’t immediately speak out in his anger. He says, “I pondered [these things] in my mind.” He stops and thinks about the best course of action, and then, having pondered the situation, he “accused the nobles and officials.” There’s some debate among commentators, and there are also differences in translations, over whether Nehemiah is rebuking them for charging interest on loans. Under Old Testament law, it was permissible to charge interest to foreigners, but not to fellow-Israelites. We don’t have time to discuss this in any detail, and anyway, it’s really not the main issue here. Nehemiah doesn’t confront them primarily on the basis of law. Some of them may have been guilty of violating the law; maybe some others were staying within the strict parameters of legal observance, so they felt OK about what they were doing. Whether they were within the law or not, they were gaining a profit from the suffering of their brethren.
Nehemiah charges them with violating their obligations to the family of God’s community. “You are exacting usury from your own countrymen” (v. 7b). “Now you are selling your own brothers” (v. 8b). They’re using this crisis as an opportunity to enrich themselves. They’re benefitting from the suffering of their brethren. They may be breaking the law also, but Nehemiah doesn’t want them to just do the minimum that the law requires. He wants them to look at one another differently, to see one another as brethren engaged in a common task, with an obligation to carry one another’s burdens. He says that their conduct reveals a spiritual problem: “Shouldn’t you walk in the fear of our God...?” They’re not walking in the fear of God, they’re not taking seriously all that God has done for them, and, as a result, they’re providing unbelievers with an opportunity to speak evil of the religion of Israel. By using this situation as an opportunity to enrich themselves, they’re violating their family in the faith, they’re defecting from the God who’s called them by His name, and they are causing His name to be blasphemed by His enemies. They’re violating their family obligations, they’re being unfaithful in their stewardship of God’s resources, and they’re giving a bad witness to the unbelieving world.
Notice, next, that Nehemiah calls them to do just the opposite of what they’re doing. Rather than profiting from their brethren’s suffering, he calls them to take a loss financially for the sake of the community of God’s people: “Give back to them immediately their fields, vineyards, olive groves and houses, and also the usury you are charging them – the hundredth part of the money, grain, new wine and oil.” It was legal to hold a borrower’s possessions as collateral on a loan. That’s what the “fields, vineyards, olive groves and houses” are. The nobles and officials have seized all these things, to make sure they get their money back in the future. And some of them are charging interest, contrary to the law. Nehemiah tells them to give it all back. It’s better for them to take a loss, rather than take advantage of any of God’s people. In this situation, they should be giving, rather than receiving. God calls them to take a loss, to give up these things. Some of them are acting within the strict limits of the law, but what they are doing is displeasing to God.
Again, we see Nehemiah’s wisdom as a leader. He confronts these offenders without alienating them. If he had approached this as a purely legal question, it may have led to endless debate. But because he approaches it as a family problem, they have no defense: “They kept quiet, because they could find nothing to say” (v. 8b). In the end, they agree to follow his instructions: “We will give it back.... And we will not demand anything more from them. We will do as you say.” To make sure they understand the seriousness of their commitment, Nehemiah calls for the priests, and has the nobles and officials take an oath in their presence. Then he prophetically utters a curse on any who don’t follow through. Nehemiah isn’t just blowing off steam in his anger. He’s seeking to lead God’s people through a time of crisis. He listens to the problem, pauses to carefully consider the right course of action, then he boldly confronts the people with a concrete course of action. The end result is described at the end of verse 13: “At this the whole assembly said, ‘Amen,’ and praised the Lord. And the people did as they had promised.”
The third thing to notice is this: Nehemiah himself models the things he’s calling the people to do. That’s the point of verses 14-19. In the earlier part of the chapter, he’s describing a crisis that happened during the building of the walls of Jerusalem. In this final paragraph of the chapter, he’s reflecting on his conduct for 12 years as governor. He says that previous governors laid heavy burdens on the people to enrich themselves. But he refused to follow their example: “neither I nor my brothers ate the food allotted to the governor.” He was entitled to it, as governor, but he declined. Neither he nor his men acquired any land through his position (v. 16). Nehemiah was there to serve, not to be served. He came to Jerusalem to give something, not to get something for himself.
The even more startling thing is that he fed, at his own expense, “a hundred and fifty Jews and officials... as well as those who came to us from the surrounding nations.” He describes what this meant each day: “Each day one ox, six choice sheep and some poultry were prepared for me, and every ten days an abundant supply of wine of all kinds. In spite of all this, I never demanded the food allotted to the governor.” He bore it all at his own expense. Nehemiah was a wealthy man, but he didn’t see it as his own wealth, to do whatever he wanted with. It had been entrusted to his care, for the benefit of God’s people.
He tells us explicitly why he conducted himself in this way. In verse 15, after telling how the previous governors placed a heavy burden on the people, he says “But out of reverence for God I did not act like that.” He was more concerned about faithfulness to God than he was about personal gain (and the previous governors were just the opposite). He was willing to take a financial loss in order to be faithful to God’s call. And then, in verse 18, he says “I never demanded the food allotted to the governor, because the demands were heavy on these people.” He genuinely cared about the people, which motivated him to use his wealth compassionately. So, Nehemiah modeled the things he was calling the people to do, 1) out of reverence for God, and 2) out of love for God’s people. He was motivated by the 2 greatest commandments. When Jesus was asked what is the greatest commandment, He answered: “‘You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind.’ This is the greatest and first commandment. And a second is like it: ‘You shall love your neighbor as yourself.’ On these two commandments hang all the law and the prophets” (Matthew 22:37-40). Nehemiah’s conduct was motivated by these two commands.
God calls His people to care for one another in concrete ways. Our financial decisions, as God’s people, cannot be primarily about how to get more. The most important thing is not getting the most for ourselves or for our families. The most important thing is living under God’s sovereign lordship, being faithful stewards of the resources He’s entrusted to our care. He may have entrusted something to our care which He intends for someone else. And this applies, not only to our money, but also to our time and the use of all our gifts. All we do, in every area of our lives, needs to be done with these two things in mind: 1) reverence for God, and 2) compassion for His people. “‘You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind.’ This is the greatest and first commandment. And a second is like it: ‘You shall love your neighbor as yourself.’ On these two commandments hang all the law and the prophets.”
The One to whom we’ll one day give account is the same One who possess all power in heaven and on earth, and about whom it is said: “For you know the generous act of our Lord Jesus Christ, that though he was rich, yet for your sakes he became poor, so that by his poverty you might become rich” (2 Corinthians 8:9). He took a great loss for the sake of our gain. Are we following Him in the way of the cross, or are we so unlike Him that we can’t bear the thought of enduring loss for His sake? The nobles and officials of Nehemiah’s time went wrong because they were too occupied with their own concerns and were not attentive to the needs of God’s people. Let’s be attentive, not only to the possibility of financial gain, but to the possibility that God may want us to use our resources in ways that we’ve never considered. Let’s put all we have and all we are at His disposal. We may have things that He intends for someone else, and yet, for the moment, has entrusted to us. Our job is to do all we can to make sure these things end up where God wants them. “We know love by this, that he laid down his life for us – and we ought to lay down our lives for one another. How does God’s love abide in anyone who has the world’s goods and sees a brother or sister in need and yet refuses help? Little children, let us love, not in word or speech, but in truth and action” (1 John 3:16-18). He laid down His life for us, and He calls us to lay down our lives for one another in His name. Doing that will often be painful and costly, as it was for Him. But knowing what He’s done for us, how can we, who’ve received so much freely from His hand, do otherwise?
Wednesday, October 23, 2013
Friday, October 18, 2013
Persevering Despite Opposition, Nehemiah 4:1-23
A friend of mine was once passing out Christian literature on a street corner in Amsterdam, when a man approached him and began threatening him with a knife. The man walked up, pulled out his knife, and said, “I’m going to cut you up. It’s nothing against you, personally. It’s because you’re a Christian. I hate Christians. I hate the way you live.” He wasn’t talking about nominal Christians, people who are Christian only in name, who claim to belong to Jesus Christ but make no attempt to live for Him. He was talking about followers of Jesus Christ, people who take seriously their commitment to live under His lordship. People like that filled him with anger and hatred; he wanted to kill them.
Why does true Christianity arouse such hatred? What is it about the gospel of Jesus Christ that causes someone to say, “I hate Christians. I hate the way you live”? Jesus said, in John 15: “If you belonged to the world, the world would love you as its own. Because you do not belong to the world, but I have chosen you out of the world – therefore the world hates you.” Because of our relationship with Him, our relationship to the world has changed forever. We no longer belong to this world as we once did, and because of this the world hates us, just as it hates Him. When I was studying in the religion department at Temple University I noticed this: people in the department were very open-minded, for the most part. One woman was into new age spiritualities and she talked freely, with much enthusiasm, about her practices. We had Islamic fundamentalists, Buddhist monks, Hindus, and secularists with an interest in the phenomenon of religion. There was a real spirit of openness toward all these things. The only position that these people found really intolerable was believing Christianity. Why is that? Because Christians, in a way that is not true of any of these other religions, do not belong to this world.
In the Roman Empire, Christians were seen as a group of people who didn’t belong. They somehow weren’t connected with the rest of society. One scholar explains it this way: “The Christian movement was revolutionary not because it had the men and resources to mount a war against the laws of the Roman Empire, but because it created a social group that promoted its own laws and its own patterns of behavior. The life and teachings of Jesus led to the formation of a new community of people called ‘the church.’ Christianity had begun to look like a separate people or nation” (Robert L. Wilken, The Christians as the Romans Saw Them, p. 119). This is just saying, in a different way, what Jesus said to His disciples: “If you belonged to the world, the world would love you as its own. Because you do not belong to the world, but I have chosen you out of the world – therefore the world hates you.”
This is what Nehemiah and the builders are experiencing at this point: the hatred of a world that doesn’t know God. This is all happening before the coming of Jesus Christ, so they aren’t called Christians, but the problem is the same one. A world that’s in rebellion against God’s lordship, that’s alienated from Him and going its own way, hates God’s people. Nehemiah and the people of Jerusalem are working at God’s direction; they have a clear sense of call from Him to do this work. They’ve been experiencing His blessing and His confirmation that they’re headed in the right direction.
Notice, first of all, that the people are encountering serious difficulties at this point. The opposition is beginning to intensify. We’ve encountered these enemies before, but now they’re becoming more serious. In the early part of the chapter, they’re using ridicule to try to demoralize the builders: “What are these miserable Jews doing? Do they think they can get everything back to normal overnight? Make building stones out of make-believe?.... That’s right! What do they think they’re building? Why, if a fox climbed that wall, it would fall to pieces under his weight” (The Message). They’re ridiculing, making fun of the builders, but their ridicule is not very convincing. If the builders really have no hope of success, what is Sanballat so angry about? “When Sanballat heard that we were rebuilding the wall he exploded in anger, vilifying the Jews” (The Message). If he really thought they had no chance of success, he wouldn’t be so angry. He’s angry because he’s threatened. He ridicules the builders, because deep down he’s afraid they’re going to succeed.
When the builders ignore their ridicule, Sanballat and his friends take things a step further. They begin plotting a surprise attack: “When Sanballat, Tobiah, the Arabs, the Ammonites, and the Ashdodites heard that the repairs of the walls of Jerusalem were going so well – that the breaks in the wall were being fixed – they were absolutely furious. They put their heads together and decided to fight against Jerusalem and create as much trouble as they could” (The Message). The opposition is becoming more determined, and the list of enemies has become larger. At this point, Jerusalem is literally surrounded by enemies on all sides, and these enemies are willing to resort to violence.
Sanballat and his friends are on dangerous ground here. Nehemiah has the backing of the king, so they’re taking the risk of offending him by their opposition to Jerusalem. But the king is a long way off and is busy with other things. And their hatred of the Jews is such that they’re willing to take the risk.
So the builders in Jerusalem are surrounded on all sides by people who hate them and are preparing for a violent attack. At the same time, the work is becoming more difficult. There’s too much rubble; when Nehemiah had done his initial inspection of the walls, he’d seen this problem. The destruction of the wall had left great piles of rock and mortar, making it impossible to move around in some areas. So now the builders are becoming demoralized by the sheer magnitude of the task. Verse 10, in the original, is in the form of a jingle. Here’s how it reads in The Message:
But notice Nehemiah’s response to all this. He manages to keep his perspective. He responds, first of all, with prayer: “Oh, listen to us, dear God. We’re so despised: Boomerang their ridicule on their heads; have their enemies cart them off as war trophies to a land of no return; don’t forgive their iniquity, don’t wipe away their sin – they’ve insulted the builders!” (The Message). Remember what we’ve seen in the past: Nehemiah is a man of action. His first impulse would be to jump in and fix things, but he doesn’t follow through on that impulse. He turns first to God. He remembers what is going on; this is God’s work; he’s been acting under God’s direction. So he begins by turning to God with the problem and handing it over to Him. Those who are opposing the work are God’s enemies; that’s why they hate the Jews so intensely. There’s a spiritual battle going on. There’s more at stake here than building a wall. So that’s where Nehemiah begins; he turns to God for help.
But he doesn’t stop there. Our temptation is to polarize on one side or the other. We pray, then we think that if we’re really trusting God, prayer is enough. We think that if we begin to act, we’re showing a lack of faith. We think that trusting God means leaving it all with Him and not doing anything ourselves. I’ve known people who didn’t believe in using medicine or taking care of their physical health; they thought it was enough to just pray about these things and leave it all with God. And then, on the other side, we’re tempted to take the whole burden upon ourselves, to begin scheming and manipulating to get what we want. Nehemiah prays, but he doesn’t only pray. Notice what he does in this context. When he learns of the plot to attack them by surprise, Nehemiah says “But we prayed to our God and posted a guard day and night to meet this threat” (v. 9). They prayed and, at the same time, they posted a guard. There’s no contradiction between these things. Throughout the rest of the chapter, Nehemiah describes some of the things they’re doing to meet the threat. They pray, looking to God for help, and then they act wisely in response to the situation that’s facing them. Nehemiah keeps his focus on God. Unless God defends them, everything is going to fall apart. And, at the same time, God calls them to use all the resources He’s given them.
Nehemiah needs to keep his sense of perspective, and he manages to do that. But he’s not the only one tempted by discouragement. He’s been called to lead these people who are becoming demoralized, discouraged with the magnitude of the job and fearful of attack from their enemies. So he reminds them: “Don’t be afraid of them. Put your minds on the Master, great and awesome, and then fight for your brothers, your sons, your daughters, your wives, and your homes” (The Message). And then, a little later in the chapter: “When you hear the trumpet call, join us there; our God will fight for us.” They’re not on their own. They need to act responsibly, using the gifts and resources God has given them, but the outcome is not dependent on them. “Our God will fight for us.” He reminds them of the truth, which enables them to keep going, despite the difficulty.
The outcome of all this is that the work goes forward. As they pray and work and keep watch, God protects them and prospers the work. Their enemies see that they’ve lost the element of surprise, so they call off the attack. And the work continues to progress, because “the people [work] with all their heart.” The people are working with all their heart, and God is prospering the work. The problems aren’t going away; their enemies continue to give them trouble, and the work is still difficult and exhausting. But God enables them to keep going, and He enables them to make surprising progress.
John, in his first letter, says, “We know that we are children of God, and that the whole world is under the control of the evil one” (1 John 5:19). This world is under the control of the evil one. That’s why there’s such hatred of true Christianity. Sanballat and his friends hated Nehemiah because Nehemiah belonged to God. Their opposition to God, their refusal to submit to His lordship, overflowed in hatred toward Nehemiah and the rest of the people of Jerusalem.
When we encounter that kind of hatred, it’s easy to become threatened. It’s easy to become defensive and fearful. My friend in Amsterdam was able, with God’s help, to respond calmly to the man who was threatening him and eventually the man left without doing any harm. But it doesn’t always turn out that way. What we need to know, in a situation like that, is that the work is not ours. We’re called to be faithful, but the survival of the Church is not dependent on us. Our calling, when things are difficult and when people are opposing us, is to look to God for help and to use whatever means He has given us to improve the situation. And then, having done that, we leave it in God’s hands. It’s not dependent on us. It’s His work. We care about the outcome, but the outcome is not our responsibility. The burden of it is not ours to bear. And since God has promised to care for His Church, He will also care for us personally, as part of His Church.
Polycarp was a disciple of John, the apostle. He became bishop of Smyrna, and when he was in his 80's he was arrested by the Roman authorities. The magistrate commanded him to swear an oath by Caesar and to revile Christ, and Polycarp replied: “For eighty-six years I have been his servant, and he has done me no wrong. How can I blaspheme my King who saved me?” When the magistrate continued to threaten him with physical punishment, Polycarp responded, “You threaten with a fire that burns only briefly and after just a little while is extinguished, for you are ignorant of the fire of the coming judgment and eternal punishment, which is reserved for the ungodly. But why do you delay? Come, do what you wish.” So they prepared him to be burned, and just before they lit the fire, Polycarp lifted up his voice in prayer: “O Lord God Almighty, Father of your beloved and blessed Son Jesus Christ... I bless you because you have considered me worthy of this day and hour, that I might receive a place among the number of your martyrs in the cup of your Christ, to the resurrection to eternal life, both of soul and of body, in the incorruptibility of the Holy Spirit.... For this reason, indeed for all things, I praise you, I bless you, I glorify you, through the eternal and heavenly High Priest, Jesus Christ, your beloved Son, through whom to you with him and the Holy Spirit be glory both now and for the ages to come. Amen” (“The Martyrdom of Polycarp,” in The Apostolic Fathers, ed. Michael W. Holmes).
Polycarp was able to respond calmly before the power of Rome, because: 1) he knew whatever they might do to him personally, the Romans could not destroy the Church; 2) whatever the outcome might be in this specific situation, he knew that God would faithfully stand with him. He had an intense awareness that the power of the world is no match for the power of God, and that there is a day of judgment coming in the future, when all things will be made right. Nehemiah was able to maintain his sense of perspective because he knew that, however powerful and threatening they might seem at the moment, the powers of this world are no match for God, and He will be faithful to His people till the end. And for us, whatever might be happening outwardly at any moment in time, we have these words of Jesus: “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me.... And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age” (Matthew 28:18, 20).
Why does true Christianity arouse such hatred? What is it about the gospel of Jesus Christ that causes someone to say, “I hate Christians. I hate the way you live”? Jesus said, in John 15: “If you belonged to the world, the world would love you as its own. Because you do not belong to the world, but I have chosen you out of the world – therefore the world hates you.” Because of our relationship with Him, our relationship to the world has changed forever. We no longer belong to this world as we once did, and because of this the world hates us, just as it hates Him. When I was studying in the religion department at Temple University I noticed this: people in the department were very open-minded, for the most part. One woman was into new age spiritualities and she talked freely, with much enthusiasm, about her practices. We had Islamic fundamentalists, Buddhist monks, Hindus, and secularists with an interest in the phenomenon of religion. There was a real spirit of openness toward all these things. The only position that these people found really intolerable was believing Christianity. Why is that? Because Christians, in a way that is not true of any of these other religions, do not belong to this world.
In the Roman Empire, Christians were seen as a group of people who didn’t belong. They somehow weren’t connected with the rest of society. One scholar explains it this way: “The Christian movement was revolutionary not because it had the men and resources to mount a war against the laws of the Roman Empire, but because it created a social group that promoted its own laws and its own patterns of behavior. The life and teachings of Jesus led to the formation of a new community of people called ‘the church.’ Christianity had begun to look like a separate people or nation” (Robert L. Wilken, The Christians as the Romans Saw Them, p. 119). This is just saying, in a different way, what Jesus said to His disciples: “If you belonged to the world, the world would love you as its own. Because you do not belong to the world, but I have chosen you out of the world – therefore the world hates you.”
This is what Nehemiah and the builders are experiencing at this point: the hatred of a world that doesn’t know God. This is all happening before the coming of Jesus Christ, so they aren’t called Christians, but the problem is the same one. A world that’s in rebellion against God’s lordship, that’s alienated from Him and going its own way, hates God’s people. Nehemiah and the people of Jerusalem are working at God’s direction; they have a clear sense of call from Him to do this work. They’ve been experiencing His blessing and His confirmation that they’re headed in the right direction.
Notice, first of all, that the people are encountering serious difficulties at this point. The opposition is beginning to intensify. We’ve encountered these enemies before, but now they’re becoming more serious. In the early part of the chapter, they’re using ridicule to try to demoralize the builders: “What are these miserable Jews doing? Do they think they can get everything back to normal overnight? Make building stones out of make-believe?.... That’s right! What do they think they’re building? Why, if a fox climbed that wall, it would fall to pieces under his weight” (The Message). They’re ridiculing, making fun of the builders, but their ridicule is not very convincing. If the builders really have no hope of success, what is Sanballat so angry about? “When Sanballat heard that we were rebuilding the wall he exploded in anger, vilifying the Jews” (The Message). If he really thought they had no chance of success, he wouldn’t be so angry. He’s angry because he’s threatened. He ridicules the builders, because deep down he’s afraid they’re going to succeed.
When the builders ignore their ridicule, Sanballat and his friends take things a step further. They begin plotting a surprise attack: “When Sanballat, Tobiah, the Arabs, the Ammonites, and the Ashdodites heard that the repairs of the walls of Jerusalem were going so well – that the breaks in the wall were being fixed – they were absolutely furious. They put their heads together and decided to fight against Jerusalem and create as much trouble as they could” (The Message). The opposition is becoming more determined, and the list of enemies has become larger. At this point, Jerusalem is literally surrounded by enemies on all sides, and these enemies are willing to resort to violence.
Sanballat and his friends are on dangerous ground here. Nehemiah has the backing of the king, so they’re taking the risk of offending him by their opposition to Jerusalem. But the king is a long way off and is busy with other things. And their hatred of the Jews is such that they’re willing to take the risk.
So the builders in Jerusalem are surrounded on all sides by people who hate them and are preparing for a violent attack. At the same time, the work is becoming more difficult. There’s too much rubble; when Nehemiah had done his initial inspection of the walls, he’d seen this problem. The destruction of the wall had left great piles of rock and mortar, making it impossible to move around in some areas. So now the builders are becoming demoralized by the sheer magnitude of the task. Verse 10, in the original, is in the form of a jingle. Here’s how it reads in The Message:
The builders are pooped,The work is too difficult. They’re beginning to wear out, so they’ve composed this saying to express their discouragement. They’re demoralized by the difficulty of the job, and now the people who’ve been ridiculing them are preparing to attack. Things are looking pretty bleak.
the rubbish piles up;
We’re in over our heads,
we can’t build this wall.
But notice Nehemiah’s response to all this. He manages to keep his perspective. He responds, first of all, with prayer: “Oh, listen to us, dear God. We’re so despised: Boomerang their ridicule on their heads; have their enemies cart them off as war trophies to a land of no return; don’t forgive their iniquity, don’t wipe away their sin – they’ve insulted the builders!” (The Message). Remember what we’ve seen in the past: Nehemiah is a man of action. His first impulse would be to jump in and fix things, but he doesn’t follow through on that impulse. He turns first to God. He remembers what is going on; this is God’s work; he’s been acting under God’s direction. So he begins by turning to God with the problem and handing it over to Him. Those who are opposing the work are God’s enemies; that’s why they hate the Jews so intensely. There’s a spiritual battle going on. There’s more at stake here than building a wall. So that’s where Nehemiah begins; he turns to God for help.
But he doesn’t stop there. Our temptation is to polarize on one side or the other. We pray, then we think that if we’re really trusting God, prayer is enough. We think that if we begin to act, we’re showing a lack of faith. We think that trusting God means leaving it all with Him and not doing anything ourselves. I’ve known people who didn’t believe in using medicine or taking care of their physical health; they thought it was enough to just pray about these things and leave it all with God. And then, on the other side, we’re tempted to take the whole burden upon ourselves, to begin scheming and manipulating to get what we want. Nehemiah prays, but he doesn’t only pray. Notice what he does in this context. When he learns of the plot to attack them by surprise, Nehemiah says “But we prayed to our God and posted a guard day and night to meet this threat” (v. 9). They prayed and, at the same time, they posted a guard. There’s no contradiction between these things. Throughout the rest of the chapter, Nehemiah describes some of the things they’re doing to meet the threat. They pray, looking to God for help, and then they act wisely in response to the situation that’s facing them. Nehemiah keeps his focus on God. Unless God defends them, everything is going to fall apart. And, at the same time, God calls them to use all the resources He’s given them.
Nehemiah needs to keep his sense of perspective, and he manages to do that. But he’s not the only one tempted by discouragement. He’s been called to lead these people who are becoming demoralized, discouraged with the magnitude of the job and fearful of attack from their enemies. So he reminds them: “Don’t be afraid of them. Put your minds on the Master, great and awesome, and then fight for your brothers, your sons, your daughters, your wives, and your homes” (The Message). And then, a little later in the chapter: “When you hear the trumpet call, join us there; our God will fight for us.” They’re not on their own. They need to act responsibly, using the gifts and resources God has given them, but the outcome is not dependent on them. “Our God will fight for us.” He reminds them of the truth, which enables them to keep going, despite the difficulty.
The outcome of all this is that the work goes forward. As they pray and work and keep watch, God protects them and prospers the work. Their enemies see that they’ve lost the element of surprise, so they call off the attack. And the work continues to progress, because “the people [work] with all their heart.” The people are working with all their heart, and God is prospering the work. The problems aren’t going away; their enemies continue to give them trouble, and the work is still difficult and exhausting. But God enables them to keep going, and He enables them to make surprising progress.
John, in his first letter, says, “We know that we are children of God, and that the whole world is under the control of the evil one” (1 John 5:19). This world is under the control of the evil one. That’s why there’s such hatred of true Christianity. Sanballat and his friends hated Nehemiah because Nehemiah belonged to God. Their opposition to God, their refusal to submit to His lordship, overflowed in hatred toward Nehemiah and the rest of the people of Jerusalem.
When we encounter that kind of hatred, it’s easy to become threatened. It’s easy to become defensive and fearful. My friend in Amsterdam was able, with God’s help, to respond calmly to the man who was threatening him and eventually the man left without doing any harm. But it doesn’t always turn out that way. What we need to know, in a situation like that, is that the work is not ours. We’re called to be faithful, but the survival of the Church is not dependent on us. Our calling, when things are difficult and when people are opposing us, is to look to God for help and to use whatever means He has given us to improve the situation. And then, having done that, we leave it in God’s hands. It’s not dependent on us. It’s His work. We care about the outcome, but the outcome is not our responsibility. The burden of it is not ours to bear. And since God has promised to care for His Church, He will also care for us personally, as part of His Church.
Polycarp was a disciple of John, the apostle. He became bishop of Smyrna, and when he was in his 80's he was arrested by the Roman authorities. The magistrate commanded him to swear an oath by Caesar and to revile Christ, and Polycarp replied: “For eighty-six years I have been his servant, and he has done me no wrong. How can I blaspheme my King who saved me?” When the magistrate continued to threaten him with physical punishment, Polycarp responded, “You threaten with a fire that burns only briefly and after just a little while is extinguished, for you are ignorant of the fire of the coming judgment and eternal punishment, which is reserved for the ungodly. But why do you delay? Come, do what you wish.” So they prepared him to be burned, and just before they lit the fire, Polycarp lifted up his voice in prayer: “O Lord God Almighty, Father of your beloved and blessed Son Jesus Christ... I bless you because you have considered me worthy of this day and hour, that I might receive a place among the number of your martyrs in the cup of your Christ, to the resurrection to eternal life, both of soul and of body, in the incorruptibility of the Holy Spirit.... For this reason, indeed for all things, I praise you, I bless you, I glorify you, through the eternal and heavenly High Priest, Jesus Christ, your beloved Son, through whom to you with him and the Holy Spirit be glory both now and for the ages to come. Amen” (“The Martyrdom of Polycarp,” in The Apostolic Fathers, ed. Michael W. Holmes).
Polycarp was able to respond calmly before the power of Rome, because: 1) he knew whatever they might do to him personally, the Romans could not destroy the Church; 2) whatever the outcome might be in this specific situation, he knew that God would faithfully stand with him. He had an intense awareness that the power of the world is no match for the power of God, and that there is a day of judgment coming in the future, when all things will be made right. Nehemiah was able to maintain his sense of perspective because he knew that, however powerful and threatening they might seem at the moment, the powers of this world are no match for God, and He will be faithful to His people till the end. And for us, whatever might be happening outwardly at any moment in time, we have these words of Jesus: “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me.... And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age” (Matthew 28:18, 20).
Wednesday, October 9, 2013
Uniting Together in the Work, Nehemiah 3:1-32
Over the past several studies, we’ve seen Nehemiah being led by God in forming a vision for the rebuilding of the wall in Jerusalem. Nehemiah had been a cupbearer to the King, a very prestigious and powerful position; he had a comfortable, prosperous life. But he had received news about the condition of Jerusalem and had been overwhelmed with sadness at what he had heard, so he’d begun praying about it, crying out to God on behalf of his people. And, as Nehemiah had continued in fasting and prayer, God had begun to lead him to become involved himself. After several months, he had spoken to the king and had received permission to travel to Jerusalem; he’d also been supplied with the material things he’d need to carry out the job.
It’s a great thing to have a concrete vision like this. There’s been opposition along the way, but, at the same time, all the pieces have been falling together. And yet, Nehemiah has taken a considerable risk. These people don’t know him, and they’ve already been beaten down by past experiences. What if they just aren’t interested in building the wall? What if they refuse to cooperate? Obedience to God doesn’t guarantee a successful outcome. Jeremiah had a genuine commission from God to preach a message of repentance to the people of Israel, and he did that faithfully for many years; but, on the whole, no one listened. Even though Nehemiah has been called by God and has experienced His blessing up to this point, it’s still possible that the people will reject his vision. It’s possible that they’ll rebel against God and refuse to engage in the work. And, if the people refuse to follow him, he’ll be in great danger. In that society at that time in history, the likelihood is not that Nehemiah will return to the capital in shame; the likelihood is that he’ll be killed. So Nehemiah has taken a considerable risk in stepping out like this.
But we saw in our last study that the people responded positively to his call: “Then they said, ‘Let us start building!’ So they committed themselves to the common good” (2:18). In chapter three we see the outworking of this. We see the people uniting together in the work. Up till this point, the story has been mainly between Nehemiah and God; now all the people in Jerusalem are involved. That the people are willing to unite with him in this way implies at least two things about them.
First, it implies that they’ve been humbled. Notice all the different kinds of people who are listed in this chapter, all uniting together in the work: priests, citizens of various regions in the area, goldsmiths, perfumers, rulers. The people are willing to work together, despite their different places and functions in society. The priests and rulers aren’t too proud to work beside the common people in this task.
There’s one exception to this, in verse 5: “next to him the Tekoites (except for their nobles, who wouldn’t work with their master and refused to get their hands dirty with such work)” (The Message). They thought it was beneath them. After I graduated from Messiah College, I worked at the college for a year as a custodian, and several years later as a construction worker. It was interesting to observe those professors who didn’t know me as a former student. Most treated me respectfully, like a human being doing a job, but there were a few who acted like I was beneath them. They didn’t see any need to treat janitors and construction workers with respect and dignity. That’s what the nobles of the Tekoites were like. They didn’t want to unite with these common people in doing the work. It was beneath them.
But they’re an exception. On the whole, the people of Jerusalem have been humbled by their situation. One thing that happens when we suffer is that we realize our own frailty. Difficulties and sorrow tend to destroy our illusions about ourselves. We begin to see ourselves more truly as we are. The people have gone through some hard times, and it’s humbled them. They’ve seen something of the truth about themselves; they’ve seen that they are not too good to engage in the hard work of rebuilding the wall.
The second thing about these people is that they’re willing to lay aside their own plans to do what God has called them to do. They’ve been humbled, and in their humility they’ve submitted to God’s lordship over their lives. It’s not that they have nothing else to do. These are people with trades, people who are seeking to make a living. Given the condition of the city, we can be sure that it hasn’t been easy for them. They don’t have a large bank account to sustain them while they’re working on the wall. They have other things to do, important things. But their primary call is to be God’s people, so they lay aside their plans and submit to His will.
One of the great dangers, in a situation like this, is to rationalize. We think, “of course, there’s a great need, but God doesn’t expect me to go out on a limb like that. It’s a great idea Nehemiah has, but I have other responsibilities. I have to make a living. I’ll pray for the Lord to raise up someone else.” When God calls us to lay aside our plans and step out in obedience to Him, the situation is usually not ideal. There are always many good reasons why we shouldn’t do what He’s calling us to do. But the people have been humbled before God. They’re more aware of their own spiritual poverty than they’ve been in the past. They realize their neediness, and this makes them willing to submit to His will and to trust Him with the outcome.
Part of what it means to be God’s people is that our lives are no longer our own. When He calls us into His kingdom, He claims our lives for His own and calls us to surrender to Him in every area. This was true for the people in Israel. God had redeemed them from slavery in Egypt and had called them to be His own people. Their lives were not their own to simply do whatever they wanted to do. Every area of their lives was to be transformed by their relationship with Him. And this is even more true for us today, as Christians.
Some of the Christians in Corinth were misusing their bodies in sexual sin, and they were justifying themselves by saying, “All things are lawful for me.” So Paul responds: “do you not know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit within you, which you have from God, and that you are not your own? For you were bought with a price; therefore glorify God in your body” (1 Corinthians 6:19-20). You are not your own. This applies, not only to the specific sin Paul is addressing here, but to every area of our lives. We are not our own; we’ve been bought with a price and are called to glorify God in our bodies. Our primary calling in life is to be God’s people, living in obedience to His lordship.
This is the difference between the people in Nehemiah’s time and the people living under Jeremiah’s ministry. These people who are working together with Nehemiah still experience failure and outbreaks of rebellion; we’ll read about these things as we continue our study. They’re not perfect. But they’ve been humbled before God. They’ve seen the truth about themselves; they realize their spiritual poverty. The people listening to Jeremiah persistently refused to face the truth, and because they refused to face the truth, they were unable to see their need of repentance. They refused to be humbled.
And, at the same time, they refused to lay aside their own plans to submit to God’s will. That’s why there were so many false prophets in the nation at that time. The false prophets were telling the people what they wanted to hear. They were telling the people: “go ahead, do what you want; God is with you and everything is going to be fine.” They were telling the people: “you can have it both ways; you can grasp after the best for yourself and still be on good terms with God.” That’s what the people wanted. It made them feel good. But the results were disastrous. It destroyed them and led them into the period of captivity in Babylon (from which they’re just beginning to recover under the leadership of Nehemiah and Ezra). The people who are working with Nehemiah aren’t perfect, but they’ve humbled themselves before God and they’ve submitted to His lordship. And because of this, they’re able, and willing, to unite together in this work to which He’s called them.
In the Church, we celebrate two things that emphasize these realities in our lives. First, we receive Christ in the Eucharist, remembering that the Son of God, the Second Person of the Trinity, became a man and died in our place to pay the penalty for our sins. Celebrating communion reminds us of our spiritual poverty, that we always come to God with empty hands, depending on His grace and mercy. And, as we take the bread and the cup, we receive Him in ways that go beyond our understanding.
And before we receive the Eucharist, we enter the Church in baptism. In baptism, we enter into fellowship with Christ in His death and resurrection. In baptism, we’re saying “good-bye” to our old lives in the world. We’re pledging ourselves to God and His kingdom. Here’s a good description of the meaning of baptism: “When we enter into the waters of baptism, we enter into a divine connection with the suffering of Jesus and with his resurrection. We are brought into a pattern of life that is an actual identification with Jesus. Baptism is therefore not only an identification with Christ but a calling to live the baptized life. The calling which baptism symbolizes gives concrete form to our spirituality” (Robert Webber, Ancient-Future Faith, p. 110). Saving faith is not only something that happens within us; it takes concrete form in the things we do. Baptism is a tangible identification with Christ in His death and resurrection and a tangible break from our old way of life in this world.
As you take part in these things, enter into them with an awareness of what you’re doing. Come and take communion, not because you’re worthy, or because it’s just the thing to do, but because you’re in need of Him and He offers Himself to you in this sacrament. Come to Him in faith, with a humble sense of your spiritual poverty. And when you participate in a baptismal service, renew the vows you’ve made to the Lord in your own baptism. “Baptism is... not only an identification with Christ but a calling to live the baptized life,” a life in which we recognize that our lives are not our own, that we are bought with a price. And if you haven’t yet submitted to baptism, ask God whether He might be calling you to take this step in the near future. It’s as we humble ourselves before God and lay all our hopes and dreams at His feet that we are able to unite together as a body of His people, doing the work He’s called us to do.
It’s a great thing to have a concrete vision like this. There’s been opposition along the way, but, at the same time, all the pieces have been falling together. And yet, Nehemiah has taken a considerable risk. These people don’t know him, and they’ve already been beaten down by past experiences. What if they just aren’t interested in building the wall? What if they refuse to cooperate? Obedience to God doesn’t guarantee a successful outcome. Jeremiah had a genuine commission from God to preach a message of repentance to the people of Israel, and he did that faithfully for many years; but, on the whole, no one listened. Even though Nehemiah has been called by God and has experienced His blessing up to this point, it’s still possible that the people will reject his vision. It’s possible that they’ll rebel against God and refuse to engage in the work. And, if the people refuse to follow him, he’ll be in great danger. In that society at that time in history, the likelihood is not that Nehemiah will return to the capital in shame; the likelihood is that he’ll be killed. So Nehemiah has taken a considerable risk in stepping out like this.
But we saw in our last study that the people responded positively to his call: “Then they said, ‘Let us start building!’ So they committed themselves to the common good” (2:18). In chapter three we see the outworking of this. We see the people uniting together in the work. Up till this point, the story has been mainly between Nehemiah and God; now all the people in Jerusalem are involved. That the people are willing to unite with him in this way implies at least two things about them.
First, it implies that they’ve been humbled. Notice all the different kinds of people who are listed in this chapter, all uniting together in the work: priests, citizens of various regions in the area, goldsmiths, perfumers, rulers. The people are willing to work together, despite their different places and functions in society. The priests and rulers aren’t too proud to work beside the common people in this task.
There’s one exception to this, in verse 5: “next to him the Tekoites (except for their nobles, who wouldn’t work with their master and refused to get their hands dirty with such work)” (The Message). They thought it was beneath them. After I graduated from Messiah College, I worked at the college for a year as a custodian, and several years later as a construction worker. It was interesting to observe those professors who didn’t know me as a former student. Most treated me respectfully, like a human being doing a job, but there were a few who acted like I was beneath them. They didn’t see any need to treat janitors and construction workers with respect and dignity. That’s what the nobles of the Tekoites were like. They didn’t want to unite with these common people in doing the work. It was beneath them.
But they’re an exception. On the whole, the people of Jerusalem have been humbled by their situation. One thing that happens when we suffer is that we realize our own frailty. Difficulties and sorrow tend to destroy our illusions about ourselves. We begin to see ourselves more truly as we are. The people have gone through some hard times, and it’s humbled them. They’ve seen something of the truth about themselves; they’ve seen that they are not too good to engage in the hard work of rebuilding the wall.
The second thing about these people is that they’re willing to lay aside their own plans to do what God has called them to do. They’ve been humbled, and in their humility they’ve submitted to God’s lordship over their lives. It’s not that they have nothing else to do. These are people with trades, people who are seeking to make a living. Given the condition of the city, we can be sure that it hasn’t been easy for them. They don’t have a large bank account to sustain them while they’re working on the wall. They have other things to do, important things. But their primary call is to be God’s people, so they lay aside their plans and submit to His will.
One of the great dangers, in a situation like this, is to rationalize. We think, “of course, there’s a great need, but God doesn’t expect me to go out on a limb like that. It’s a great idea Nehemiah has, but I have other responsibilities. I have to make a living. I’ll pray for the Lord to raise up someone else.” When God calls us to lay aside our plans and step out in obedience to Him, the situation is usually not ideal. There are always many good reasons why we shouldn’t do what He’s calling us to do. But the people have been humbled before God. They’re more aware of their own spiritual poverty than they’ve been in the past. They realize their neediness, and this makes them willing to submit to His will and to trust Him with the outcome.
Part of what it means to be God’s people is that our lives are no longer our own. When He calls us into His kingdom, He claims our lives for His own and calls us to surrender to Him in every area. This was true for the people in Israel. God had redeemed them from slavery in Egypt and had called them to be His own people. Their lives were not their own to simply do whatever they wanted to do. Every area of their lives was to be transformed by their relationship with Him. And this is even more true for us today, as Christians.
Some of the Christians in Corinth were misusing their bodies in sexual sin, and they were justifying themselves by saying, “All things are lawful for me.” So Paul responds: “do you not know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit within you, which you have from God, and that you are not your own? For you were bought with a price; therefore glorify God in your body” (1 Corinthians 6:19-20). You are not your own. This applies, not only to the specific sin Paul is addressing here, but to every area of our lives. We are not our own; we’ve been bought with a price and are called to glorify God in our bodies. Our primary calling in life is to be God’s people, living in obedience to His lordship.
This is the difference between the people in Nehemiah’s time and the people living under Jeremiah’s ministry. These people who are working together with Nehemiah still experience failure and outbreaks of rebellion; we’ll read about these things as we continue our study. They’re not perfect. But they’ve been humbled before God. They’ve seen the truth about themselves; they realize their spiritual poverty. The people listening to Jeremiah persistently refused to face the truth, and because they refused to face the truth, they were unable to see their need of repentance. They refused to be humbled.
And, at the same time, they refused to lay aside their own plans to submit to God’s will. That’s why there were so many false prophets in the nation at that time. The false prophets were telling the people what they wanted to hear. They were telling the people: “go ahead, do what you want; God is with you and everything is going to be fine.” They were telling the people: “you can have it both ways; you can grasp after the best for yourself and still be on good terms with God.” That’s what the people wanted. It made them feel good. But the results were disastrous. It destroyed them and led them into the period of captivity in Babylon (from which they’re just beginning to recover under the leadership of Nehemiah and Ezra). The people who are working with Nehemiah aren’t perfect, but they’ve humbled themselves before God and they’ve submitted to His lordship. And because of this, they’re able, and willing, to unite together in this work to which He’s called them.
In the Church, we celebrate two things that emphasize these realities in our lives. First, we receive Christ in the Eucharist, remembering that the Son of God, the Second Person of the Trinity, became a man and died in our place to pay the penalty for our sins. Celebrating communion reminds us of our spiritual poverty, that we always come to God with empty hands, depending on His grace and mercy. And, as we take the bread and the cup, we receive Him in ways that go beyond our understanding.
And before we receive the Eucharist, we enter the Church in baptism. In baptism, we enter into fellowship with Christ in His death and resurrection. In baptism, we’re saying “good-bye” to our old lives in the world. We’re pledging ourselves to God and His kingdom. Here’s a good description of the meaning of baptism: “When we enter into the waters of baptism, we enter into a divine connection with the suffering of Jesus and with his resurrection. We are brought into a pattern of life that is an actual identification with Jesus. Baptism is therefore not only an identification with Christ but a calling to live the baptized life. The calling which baptism symbolizes gives concrete form to our spirituality” (Robert Webber, Ancient-Future Faith, p. 110). Saving faith is not only something that happens within us; it takes concrete form in the things we do. Baptism is a tangible identification with Christ in His death and resurrection and a tangible break from our old way of life in this world.
As you take part in these things, enter into them with an awareness of what you’re doing. Come and take communion, not because you’re worthy, or because it’s just the thing to do, but because you’re in need of Him and He offers Himself to you in this sacrament. Come to Him in faith, with a humble sense of your spiritual poverty. And when you participate in a baptismal service, renew the vows you’ve made to the Lord in your own baptism. “Baptism is... not only an identification with Christ but a calling to live the baptized life,” a life in which we recognize that our lives are not our own, that we are bought with a price. And if you haven’t yet submitted to baptism, ask God whether He might be calling you to take this step in the near future. It’s as we humble ourselves before God and lay all our hopes and dreams at His feet that we are able to unite together as a body of His people, doing the work He’s called us to do.
Wednesday, October 2, 2013
An Example of Godly Wisdom, Nehemiah 2:11-20
Several years ago I joined the National Wood Carvers’ Association. Membership is very inexpensive, and they put out a magazine called “Chip Chats” that is full of carving ideas and suggestions. One of the first articles I read was by a carver named Fred Cogelow, who is well-known for his very expressive, detailed carvings. He described, in the article, the process of getting ready to do a carving of Peter’s denial of Christ. Before he picked up any carving tools, he constructed a clay model of the carving. It struck me, as I was reading the article, that this great carver, who is able to imagine things at a level of detail that is simply beyond me, needs to have a model to look at when he is carving. He isn’t able to just pull the ideas out of his head. Looking at a model helps him make a much better carving than he’d be able to do otherwise.
It’s the same with our Christian lives. We need models, people who embody for us what genuine godliness looks like. That’s one of the reasons for a day like All Saints Day, which is celebrated on November 1. It’s a day for remembering those who’ve gone before us and are now with the Lord, those who are part of that great cloud of witnesses that the author of Hebrews mentions. Thomas Howard complains about Evangelicals’ hesitancy in giving honor to the saints: “At the Feast of All Saints, the Church remembers and gives thanks for all the faithful who have gone before us.... Thus, as the letter to the Hebrews reminds us, we are surrounded with a great and awesome cloud of witnesses, men and women of whom the world was not worthy. Why, why will we most gladly set days aside to honor the fathers of our nation – Washington, Lincoln, Jefferson – but draw back in dismay from giving honor to the Fathers of our Faith? Believing what they taught is fine, but let us press on to the fullness of faith and give honor to whom honor is due” (Evangelical is Not Enough, pp. 147-48). It’s right that we should honor those who’ve been faithful to the end in following the Lord, who are now in His presence. And one of the ways we honor them is by studying their lives and using them as models. They embody for us something of what it means to follow Jesus Christ in this fallen world.
Nehemiah is part of that great cloud of witnesses; he’s one of our models of godliness. We need to give attention to his life, because he breaks many of our stereotypes. He doesn’t fit the mold of a quiet, contemplative person. As we’ve seen in our earlier studies, Nehemiah was a man of action, a great leader. He wasn’t a priest or a prophet; he spent most of his time in secular employment, first as cupbearer to the King, then as the leader of the rebuilding of the wall of Jerusalem, and then, finally, as the governor. In reading through this book we don’t get the impression that Nehemiah was easy to live with; but over and over again we see his concern to be faithful to what God called him to do.
We saw, in our earlier studies, that Nehemiah was a man of action, but that he put a priority on prayer. He resisted the temptation to rush ahead and start fixing the problem right away. Before he did anything else about the problems in Jerusalem, Nehemiah spent several months waiting on God, calling out to Him in prayer. And now, with all that behind him, he arrives in Jerusalem with a clear vision for rebuilding the walls. The thing that comes across clearly in our present passage is Nehemiah’s wisdom once he arrives in Jerusalem.
First, he’s wise in choosing the right time to speak. Nehemiah is a newcomer to Jerusalem. The people there have been living in hardship and disgrace. All their previous attempts to rebuild the city have been forcibly stopped. They’re discouraged and have lost hope. How likely is it that they will listen to this man, Nehemiah, who’s been sitting comfortably in the king’s palace and who hasn’t experienced what it’s really like to live in Jerusalem? In 1978, I spent six months in Nepal, and one of the chronic problems I kept hearing about in the church there was the problem of disunity. The church was plagued by factions and power struggles. A friend of mine was at a social gathering one evening, where he met a young man who’d just arrived within the past week or so. The man was in his early 20's, and when Al asked him what he was doing in Nepal, he announced, “I’ve come to unite the church of Nepal.” My friend thought the idea was ridiculous. Of course, it would be a wonderful thing to see the church united, but this man really didn’t know much about the church in Nepal; it’s possible that he had a genuine vision from God to work toward unity in the church, but he was speaking too soon; he hadn’t taken the time to acquaint himself with the local situation. By speaking so soon and making such a grandiose announcement of his plans, he undermined his ability to carry out his plans. No one took him seriously.
Nehemiah avoids that temptation. He has, after all, a genuine vision from God, and he has the backing of the king, but before he talks about any of that he takes the time to acquaint himself with the local situation. For the first three days he’s in Jerusalem, no one even knows why he’s there. Then he goes out secretly at night to inspect the walls. He wants to get a clear picture of what he’s asking the people to do.
It’s important to know that there is no conflict between a God-given vision and the hard, sometimes boring, work of study and investigation. A vision for God’s work, a sense of calling, may come to us in a supernatural way. More often, an idea will slowly form over time as we wait on God and seek direction from Him, but sometimes He’ll give us a clear sense of vision more-or-less instantly. Martyn Lloyd-Jones, who was pastor of Westminster Chapel in London for 30 years, told once of receiving a sermon series in this way. He had a practice of putting together sermon skeletons from his daily reading of Scripture. Whenever a passage was speaking to him, he would stay with it and pray over it, and then he’d put together a rough outline of a sermon, which he then put into a file. One morning, he said, God came to him in an extraordinary way and called him to preach a series on Spiritual Depression using some of these outlines in his files. He saw the whole series in an instant, and he just needed to go to his file and pull out the skeletons that God had called him to use. But then, when it came time to preach the series, he still had to do the hard work of sermon preparation. He had to study the passages and pray for direction; he still had to trust God and look to Him for help as he developed these skeletons into finished sermons. A vision may come to us supernaturally, but then God calls us to use all our gifts and resources in carrying out this vision. There is no conflict between a God-given vision and the hard, sometimes boring, work of study and investigation. Nehemiah takes the time to acquaint himself first-hand with the problem before he speaks publicly about the vision God has given him.
The second point is that Nehemiah is wise in the way he presents his vision to the people. When the time comes to speak, he resists the temptation to overemphasize the negative. He identifies the problem – “you see the trouble we are in” – but he’s not obsessed with the problem. His purpose in talking about it is to point to a solution: “Come, let us rebuild the wall of Jerusalem.” Why is this important? In order to confront the situation, Nehemiah has had to take a long, hard look at the sorry condition of the nation. He’s been dwelling on it for months. His calling, at this point in his life, is tied to the problem. If the problem goes away, what will he do with his life? There’s a subtle temptation that comes to people in this situation. They begin forming their own identity in relation to the problem they’re concerned about, and over time they become, in some sense, dependent on the problem. It’s the only thing they have to talk about. Their whole life revolves around this antagonistic relationship.
Several years ago I stopped listening to one radio preacher because he seemed obsessed with fighting the culture wars. Every time I heard him he was talking about some aspect of this problem; he seemed to be reveling in it. He seemed to be getting some pleasure out of pointing to all the things that are wrong in our culture. He was right in most of what he was saying, but his spirit seemed to be wrong. His whole ministry was increasingly formed in this sense of opposition to the direction of our general culture. I began to wonder whether he ever talked about anything else, and I just got tired of hearing him.
I think he’d probably defend himself by pointing to the Old Testament prophets. And it’s true that the balance is much more heavily on the negative side in the prophets. The prophets were speaking to people who persistently refused to acknowledge the problem. The nation was in a state of advanced spiritual decline and was headed toward disaster; and though the prophets addressed the problem again and again, the people refused to listen. So the balance is much heavier on the negative side. But even in the most negative prophecies, their reason for pointing to the problem is to issue a call to repentance and an invitation to grace and mercy. They’re not reveling in the negative; the longing of their hearts is to see the nation turn to God. Their identity is not tied to the continued spiritual decline of the nation. They’re confronting the negative, but they’re not secretly enjoying it.
Nehemiah confronts the problem: “Face it: we’re in a bad way here. Jerusalem is a wreck; its gates are burned up” (The Message). And he identifies himself with the problem. Even though he’s a newcomer to Jerusalem, it’s his problem. He’s one of them. One of the things that has often wearied me in the folk music movement is the tendency to point to other peoples’ problems: “when will they ever learn?” Nehemiah could easily have said, “you people really dropped the ball and now you’re paying a heavy price for it; it’s time to get with it.” But he doesn’t do that. He doesn’t just point out their problems and failures. He unites with them: “we’re in a bad way here.” “We need to do something about it.” And then he goes on to tell them about all the things God has done already: “‘Come – let’s build the wall of Jerusalem and not live with this disgrace any longer.’ I told them how God was supporting me and how the king was backing me up” (The Message). He points to the problem, but he identifies himself as part of the nation and tells them what God has already done. God has already begun acting on their behalf, so “Come – let’s build the wall of Jerusalem.”
The third thing is that Nehemiah is wise in the way he responds to criticism. Even when the opposition begins, Nehemiah remembers that God is the One who is in charge of the whole operation. He doesn’t become discouraged. Things have been going very well. He’s received support from the king, and now the people have responded enthusiastically to his challenge: “They said, ‘We’re with you. Let’s get started.’ They rolled up their sleeves, ready for the good work” (The Message). When things start falling in place like this, it’s easy to become discouraged by setbacks. Since God has called us and has begun prospering the work, it’s tempting to expect that everything will run smoothly.
Something like this happened to the prophet Elijah. He stood firm against the whole nation assembled at Mt. Carmel. He stood alone as a prophet of God against 450 prophets of Baal and issued a challenge: they would both prepare a sacrifice, place it on the altar, and whoever was answered by fire was a prophet of the true God. The prophets of Baal had prepared their sacrifice first and had called out to Baal all day with no response. In early evening, Elijah had prepared his sacrifice, and when he prayed, God had answered dramatically with fire. The whole nation had seen a graphic demonstration of God’s power and they had cried out, “the Lord – he is God! The Lord – he is God!” (1 Kings 18:39). Then, when Elijah got home, he received a message from Queen Jezebel: “The gods will get you for this and I’ll get even with you! By this time tomorrow you’ll be as dead as any one of those prophets” (1 Kings 19:2, The Message). It caught Elijah by surprise. Everything had been going so well; everything had been falling into place. It caught him off guard, and he fled into the wilderness.
It’s easy to become discouraged when we’re following God’s leading and experience setbacks. It’s especially discouraging to find that everything is falling into place, then experience opposition and hatred from others. That’s what is happening to Nehemiah, but he doesn’t become discouraged. He remembers that God is the One who is in charge of the whole thing: “I shot back, ‘The God-of-Heaven will make sure we succeed. We’re his servants and we’re going to work, rebuilding” (The Message).
The things Sanballat and Tobiah and Geshem are saying don’t sound that threatening at first glance. “‘What are you doing?’ they asked. ‘Are you rebelling against the king?’” In reality, though, it’s a very serious charge. In Ezra 4, King Artaxerxes (the same king who had given Nehemiah permission to rebuild the wall) had ordered the work on the temple stopped. The officials who opposed the Israelites had written to him, reminding him that Israel had once been a powerful nation and that the people there had a history of rebellion. King Artaxerxes wrote back to these officials: “a search was made [in the royal archives], and it was found that this city has a long history of revolt against kings and has been a place of rebellion and sedition” (Ezra 4:19). Sanballat and his friends are renewing this charge, the same charge that had earlier led the king to order the work forcibly stopped.
It’s a serious threat, but Nehemiah doesn’t become discouraged. It’s not his work, ultimately. God is the One who is in charge of the whole thing. So Nehemiah ignores the charge of rebellion and answers wisely: “The God of heaven will give us success. We his servants will start rebuilding, but as for you, you have no share in Jerusalem or any claim or historic right to it.”
We need models like Nehemiah. Every day, in our society, we’re bombarded by more information than we can possibly make use of. The sheer magnitude of it dulls our sensibilities and cripples our ability to think clearly. T.S. Eliot, writing before the Internet, said this in one of his poems:
It’s the same with our Christian lives. We need models, people who embody for us what genuine godliness looks like. That’s one of the reasons for a day like All Saints Day, which is celebrated on November 1. It’s a day for remembering those who’ve gone before us and are now with the Lord, those who are part of that great cloud of witnesses that the author of Hebrews mentions. Thomas Howard complains about Evangelicals’ hesitancy in giving honor to the saints: “At the Feast of All Saints, the Church remembers and gives thanks for all the faithful who have gone before us.... Thus, as the letter to the Hebrews reminds us, we are surrounded with a great and awesome cloud of witnesses, men and women of whom the world was not worthy. Why, why will we most gladly set days aside to honor the fathers of our nation – Washington, Lincoln, Jefferson – but draw back in dismay from giving honor to the Fathers of our Faith? Believing what they taught is fine, but let us press on to the fullness of faith and give honor to whom honor is due” (Evangelical is Not Enough, pp. 147-48). It’s right that we should honor those who’ve been faithful to the end in following the Lord, who are now in His presence. And one of the ways we honor them is by studying their lives and using them as models. They embody for us something of what it means to follow Jesus Christ in this fallen world.
Nehemiah is part of that great cloud of witnesses; he’s one of our models of godliness. We need to give attention to his life, because he breaks many of our stereotypes. He doesn’t fit the mold of a quiet, contemplative person. As we’ve seen in our earlier studies, Nehemiah was a man of action, a great leader. He wasn’t a priest or a prophet; he spent most of his time in secular employment, first as cupbearer to the King, then as the leader of the rebuilding of the wall of Jerusalem, and then, finally, as the governor. In reading through this book we don’t get the impression that Nehemiah was easy to live with; but over and over again we see his concern to be faithful to what God called him to do.
We saw, in our earlier studies, that Nehemiah was a man of action, but that he put a priority on prayer. He resisted the temptation to rush ahead and start fixing the problem right away. Before he did anything else about the problems in Jerusalem, Nehemiah spent several months waiting on God, calling out to Him in prayer. And now, with all that behind him, he arrives in Jerusalem with a clear vision for rebuilding the walls. The thing that comes across clearly in our present passage is Nehemiah’s wisdom once he arrives in Jerusalem.
First, he’s wise in choosing the right time to speak. Nehemiah is a newcomer to Jerusalem. The people there have been living in hardship and disgrace. All their previous attempts to rebuild the city have been forcibly stopped. They’re discouraged and have lost hope. How likely is it that they will listen to this man, Nehemiah, who’s been sitting comfortably in the king’s palace and who hasn’t experienced what it’s really like to live in Jerusalem? In 1978, I spent six months in Nepal, and one of the chronic problems I kept hearing about in the church there was the problem of disunity. The church was plagued by factions and power struggles. A friend of mine was at a social gathering one evening, where he met a young man who’d just arrived within the past week or so. The man was in his early 20's, and when Al asked him what he was doing in Nepal, he announced, “I’ve come to unite the church of Nepal.” My friend thought the idea was ridiculous. Of course, it would be a wonderful thing to see the church united, but this man really didn’t know much about the church in Nepal; it’s possible that he had a genuine vision from God to work toward unity in the church, but he was speaking too soon; he hadn’t taken the time to acquaint himself with the local situation. By speaking so soon and making such a grandiose announcement of his plans, he undermined his ability to carry out his plans. No one took him seriously.
Nehemiah avoids that temptation. He has, after all, a genuine vision from God, and he has the backing of the king, but before he talks about any of that he takes the time to acquaint himself with the local situation. For the first three days he’s in Jerusalem, no one even knows why he’s there. Then he goes out secretly at night to inspect the walls. He wants to get a clear picture of what he’s asking the people to do.
It’s important to know that there is no conflict between a God-given vision and the hard, sometimes boring, work of study and investigation. A vision for God’s work, a sense of calling, may come to us in a supernatural way. More often, an idea will slowly form over time as we wait on God and seek direction from Him, but sometimes He’ll give us a clear sense of vision more-or-less instantly. Martyn Lloyd-Jones, who was pastor of Westminster Chapel in London for 30 years, told once of receiving a sermon series in this way. He had a practice of putting together sermon skeletons from his daily reading of Scripture. Whenever a passage was speaking to him, he would stay with it and pray over it, and then he’d put together a rough outline of a sermon, which he then put into a file. One morning, he said, God came to him in an extraordinary way and called him to preach a series on Spiritual Depression using some of these outlines in his files. He saw the whole series in an instant, and he just needed to go to his file and pull out the skeletons that God had called him to use. But then, when it came time to preach the series, he still had to do the hard work of sermon preparation. He had to study the passages and pray for direction; he still had to trust God and look to Him for help as he developed these skeletons into finished sermons. A vision may come to us supernaturally, but then God calls us to use all our gifts and resources in carrying out this vision. There is no conflict between a God-given vision and the hard, sometimes boring, work of study and investigation. Nehemiah takes the time to acquaint himself first-hand with the problem before he speaks publicly about the vision God has given him.
The second point is that Nehemiah is wise in the way he presents his vision to the people. When the time comes to speak, he resists the temptation to overemphasize the negative. He identifies the problem – “you see the trouble we are in” – but he’s not obsessed with the problem. His purpose in talking about it is to point to a solution: “Come, let us rebuild the wall of Jerusalem.” Why is this important? In order to confront the situation, Nehemiah has had to take a long, hard look at the sorry condition of the nation. He’s been dwelling on it for months. His calling, at this point in his life, is tied to the problem. If the problem goes away, what will he do with his life? There’s a subtle temptation that comes to people in this situation. They begin forming their own identity in relation to the problem they’re concerned about, and over time they become, in some sense, dependent on the problem. It’s the only thing they have to talk about. Their whole life revolves around this antagonistic relationship.
Several years ago I stopped listening to one radio preacher because he seemed obsessed with fighting the culture wars. Every time I heard him he was talking about some aspect of this problem; he seemed to be reveling in it. He seemed to be getting some pleasure out of pointing to all the things that are wrong in our culture. He was right in most of what he was saying, but his spirit seemed to be wrong. His whole ministry was increasingly formed in this sense of opposition to the direction of our general culture. I began to wonder whether he ever talked about anything else, and I just got tired of hearing him.
I think he’d probably defend himself by pointing to the Old Testament prophets. And it’s true that the balance is much more heavily on the negative side in the prophets. The prophets were speaking to people who persistently refused to acknowledge the problem. The nation was in a state of advanced spiritual decline and was headed toward disaster; and though the prophets addressed the problem again and again, the people refused to listen. So the balance is much heavier on the negative side. But even in the most negative prophecies, their reason for pointing to the problem is to issue a call to repentance and an invitation to grace and mercy. They’re not reveling in the negative; the longing of their hearts is to see the nation turn to God. Their identity is not tied to the continued spiritual decline of the nation. They’re confronting the negative, but they’re not secretly enjoying it.
Nehemiah confronts the problem: “Face it: we’re in a bad way here. Jerusalem is a wreck; its gates are burned up” (The Message). And he identifies himself with the problem. Even though he’s a newcomer to Jerusalem, it’s his problem. He’s one of them. One of the things that has often wearied me in the folk music movement is the tendency to point to other peoples’ problems: “when will they ever learn?” Nehemiah could easily have said, “you people really dropped the ball and now you’re paying a heavy price for it; it’s time to get with it.” But he doesn’t do that. He doesn’t just point out their problems and failures. He unites with them: “we’re in a bad way here.” “We need to do something about it.” And then he goes on to tell them about all the things God has done already: “‘Come – let’s build the wall of Jerusalem and not live with this disgrace any longer.’ I told them how God was supporting me and how the king was backing me up” (The Message). He points to the problem, but he identifies himself as part of the nation and tells them what God has already done. God has already begun acting on their behalf, so “Come – let’s build the wall of Jerusalem.”
The third thing is that Nehemiah is wise in the way he responds to criticism. Even when the opposition begins, Nehemiah remembers that God is the One who is in charge of the whole operation. He doesn’t become discouraged. Things have been going very well. He’s received support from the king, and now the people have responded enthusiastically to his challenge: “They said, ‘We’re with you. Let’s get started.’ They rolled up their sleeves, ready for the good work” (The Message). When things start falling in place like this, it’s easy to become discouraged by setbacks. Since God has called us and has begun prospering the work, it’s tempting to expect that everything will run smoothly.
Something like this happened to the prophet Elijah. He stood firm against the whole nation assembled at Mt. Carmel. He stood alone as a prophet of God against 450 prophets of Baal and issued a challenge: they would both prepare a sacrifice, place it on the altar, and whoever was answered by fire was a prophet of the true God. The prophets of Baal had prepared their sacrifice first and had called out to Baal all day with no response. In early evening, Elijah had prepared his sacrifice, and when he prayed, God had answered dramatically with fire. The whole nation had seen a graphic demonstration of God’s power and they had cried out, “the Lord – he is God! The Lord – he is God!” (1 Kings 18:39). Then, when Elijah got home, he received a message from Queen Jezebel: “The gods will get you for this and I’ll get even with you! By this time tomorrow you’ll be as dead as any one of those prophets” (1 Kings 19:2, The Message). It caught Elijah by surprise. Everything had been going so well; everything had been falling into place. It caught him off guard, and he fled into the wilderness.
It’s easy to become discouraged when we’re following God’s leading and experience setbacks. It’s especially discouraging to find that everything is falling into place, then experience opposition and hatred from others. That’s what is happening to Nehemiah, but he doesn’t become discouraged. He remembers that God is the One who is in charge of the whole thing: “I shot back, ‘The God-of-Heaven will make sure we succeed. We’re his servants and we’re going to work, rebuilding” (The Message).
The things Sanballat and Tobiah and Geshem are saying don’t sound that threatening at first glance. “‘What are you doing?’ they asked. ‘Are you rebelling against the king?’” In reality, though, it’s a very serious charge. In Ezra 4, King Artaxerxes (the same king who had given Nehemiah permission to rebuild the wall) had ordered the work on the temple stopped. The officials who opposed the Israelites had written to him, reminding him that Israel had once been a powerful nation and that the people there had a history of rebellion. King Artaxerxes wrote back to these officials: “a search was made [in the royal archives], and it was found that this city has a long history of revolt against kings and has been a place of rebellion and sedition” (Ezra 4:19). Sanballat and his friends are renewing this charge, the same charge that had earlier led the king to order the work forcibly stopped.
It’s a serious threat, but Nehemiah doesn’t become discouraged. It’s not his work, ultimately. God is the One who is in charge of the whole thing. So Nehemiah ignores the charge of rebellion and answers wisely: “The God of heaven will give us success. We his servants will start rebuilding, but as for you, you have no share in Jerusalem or any claim or historic right to it.”
We need models like Nehemiah. Every day, in our society, we’re bombarded by more information than we can possibly make use of. The sheer magnitude of it dulls our sensibilities and cripples our ability to think clearly. T.S. Eliot, writing before the Internet, said this in one of his poems:
The endless cycle of idea and action,With all our advances in knowledge and information, we’ve lost sight of the wisdom of how to live in God’s world. How do we learn to live wisely, like Nehemiah? In much the same way that he did: by immersing ourselves in the corporate worship of God’s people, where we together offer worship to God and cultivate habits of godliness; by soaking our minds in God’s Word, which is full of pictures of godly living in a fallen world (some of them are listed in Hebrews 11); and, most of all, by cultivating the presence of Jesus Christ, “in whom are hidden all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge” (Colossians 2:3); we learn to live wisely in God’s world by cultivating His presence and seeking to order every area of our lives in obedience to Him. May He increasingly enable us to be people who do this.
Endless invention, endless experiment,
Brings knowledge of motion, but not of stillness;
Knowledge of speech, but not of silence;
Knowledge of words, and ignorance of the Word.
All our knowledge brings us nearer to our ignorance,
All our ignorance brings us nearer to our death,
But nearness to death no nearer to God.
Where is the Life we have lost in living?
Where is the wisdom we have lost in knowledge?
Where is the knowledge we have lost in information?
The cycles of Heaven in twenty centuries
Brings us farther from God and nearer to the Dust.
(“Choruses from ‘The Rock,” in T.S. Eliot: The Complete Poems and Plays, p. 96).
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