Nehemiah:
Fought the Good Fight
from sermon series
“Standing on the Shoulders of Giants”
by
Pastor Dave Strem
Used by
permission
Knowingly
violating God’s best plan for a situation always brings
bad consequences. And the closer someone is to God
the more negative and far-reaching the consequences.
The life and rule of Solomon is a good example of this
principle. Early in his kingship over Israel he
has an encounter with God that changed his life.
“That night the Lord appeared to Solomon in a dream, and
God said, ‘What do you want? Ask, and I will give
it to you!’ Solomon replied, ‘You were wonderfully
kind to my father, David, because he was honest and true
and faithful to you. And you have continued this
great kindness to him today by giving him a son to
succeed him. O Lord my God, now you have made me
king instead of my father, David, but I am like a child
who doesn’t know his way around. And here I am
among your own chosen people, a nation so great they are
too numerous to count! Give me an understanding
mind so that I can govern your people well and know the
difference between right and wrong. For who by
himself is able to govern this great nation of yours?’
The Lord was pleased with Solomon’s reply and was glad
that he asked for wisdom. So God replied, ‘Because
you have asked for wisdom in governing my people and
have not asked for a long life or riches for yourself or
the death of your enemies---I will give you what you
asked for’” (1 Kings 3:5-12)! God promised to give
Solomon all the wisdom he needed to govern. A
thorough reading of 1 Kings 3-1 Kings 10 will show that
God kept His promise to bless Solomon. He blessed
Solomon with wisdom, honor, and riches.
One of the projects Solomon undertook was to build a
central place of worship—a temple. Until this time
there were many local sites for offering sacrifices and
burnt incense. David wanted to build a temple, it was
his idea, but was unable because the many wars he was
involved in took-up too much of his time and attention.
Blessed by peace Solomon built the temple according to
God’s specifications.
After the temple and all the temple contents were
finished and Solomon offered prayers and sacrifices of
dedication, God appeared to Solomon a second time. “I
have heard your prayer and your request. I have set
apart this temple you have built so that my name will be
honored there forever. I will always watch over it and
care for it. As for you, if you will follow me with
integrity and godliness, as David your father did,
always obeying my commands and keeping my laws and
regulations, then I will establish the throne of your
dynasty over Israel forever. For I made this promise to
your father, David; ‘You will never fail to have a
successor on the throne of Israel.’ But if you or your
descendants abandon me and disobey my commands and laws,
and if you go and worship other gods, then I will uproot
the people of Israel from this land I have given them.
I will reject this Temple that I have set apart to honor
my name. I will make Israel an object of mockery and
ridicule among the nations. And though this temple is
impressive now, it will become an appalling sight for
all who pass by. They will scoff and ask, ‘Why did the
Lord do such terrible things to his land and to his
Temple?’ And the answer will be, ‘Because his people
forgot the Lord their God, who brought their ancestors
out of Egypt, and they worshipped other gods instead.
That is why the Lord has brought all these disasters
upon them’” (1 Kings 9:3-9). Unfortunately, despite
God’s explicit warnings and commands against marrying
foreign, idolatrous wives Solomon married hundreds of
them. And as God predicted, these women lead him and
Israel away from the exclusive worship of God the
Creator and Redeemer.
As
a consequence of one powerful man’s disobedience and
idolatry, the kingdom of Israel was split in two.
Immediately after Solomon’s death the kingdom he worked
so hard to build began to crumble. The corrupting
process proceeded faster in the Northern section of the
divided kingdom than it did in the Southern section.
The Northern section, now called Israel, fulfilling
God’s warning given to Solomon in 1 Kings 9, was sent
into exile by the Assyrians in 722 B. C. The Southern
section, now called Judah, was sent into exile by the
Babylonians in 586 B. C.
These exiles were times of discipline for a rebellious
people. They were not evidence that God had given-up on
Israel. God always remembers His promises to Abraham
and David. Temporary disobedience does not thwart God’s
overall plans to fulfill His promises. History teaches
us that these exiles accomplished an important
objective—Israel never again returned to the idolatry
that provoked the exiles.
The exiles were temporary. Starting in 538 B. C., God
began returning people back to Jerusalem and the
surrounding areas. There were actually three periods of
return. The first was under Zerubbabel in 538 B. C.
The second was under Ezra in 458 B. C. The third was
under Nehemiah in 445 B. C. The remainder of this paper
will focus on Nehemiah, the leader of the third return
from exile.
Under Zerubbabel and Ezra, the Temple was rebuilt and
the Law of Moses was again spoken to the people. But
the city and its walls were still in ruin. Jerusalem
was not yet a safe place to live. It was still a place
of ridicule. The people who had already returned were
struggling to survive. Listen to the words of Nehemiah:
“Hanani, one of my brothers, came to visit me with some
other men who had just arrived from Judah. I asked them
about the Jews who had survived the captivity and about
how things were going in Jerusalem. They said to me,
‘Things are not going well for those who returned to the
province of Judah. They are in great trouble and
disgrace. The wall of Jerusalem has been torn down, and
the gates have been burned’” (Nehemiah 1:2-3). Upon
hearing this news, Nehemiah began to weep and mourn.
Nehemiah was born a Jew in a foreign land. He had no
memories of the way Jerusalem used to be before the
exiles. His reaction to the bad news was not a
sentimental one. His prayer to God shows us that his
heart was with God. John 4:23-24 tells us that God has
always sought people who worship Him in spirit and
truth. Jesus said, “But the time is coming and is
already here when true worshippers will worship the
Father in spirit and in truth. The Father is looking
for anyone who will worship him that way. For God is
Spirit, so those who worship him must worship him in
spirit and truth.” Many Israelites got lost in the Law,
or worshipped false images of God, misrepresenting Who
He is. While in exile, apart from the Temple and altar,
many Israelites learned to worship God in spirit and
truth. They developed a spiritual connection to the
Lord. The prayer of Nehemiah shows this spiritual
connection. “O Lord, God of heaven, the great and
awesome God who keeps his covenant of unfailing love
with those who love him and obey his commands, listen to
my prayer! Look down and see me praying night and day
for your people Israel. I confess that we have sinned
against you. Yes, even my own family and I have
sinned!…. Please remember what you told your servant
Moses: ‘If you sin, I will scatter you among the
nations. But if you return to me and obey my commands,
even if you are exiled to the ends of the earth, I will
bring you back to the place I have chosen for my name to
be honored…. Please grant me success now as I go ask the
king for a great favor. Put it into his heart to be
kind to me’” (1:5-10).
Nehemiah was the cupbearer to the king of Persia,
Artaxerxes’. As a cupbearer he had great responsibility
and access to the king. A cupbearer not only made sure
that the king’s wine was safe to drink, but was also a
trusted advisor and confidant. A cupbearer had to have
great organizational skills in order to manage the
selection and protection of the wine; to make sure it
was not poisoned by enemies of the king. For three
months Nehemiah prayed about speaking to the king.
Finally, in God’s providence, Artaxerxes’ noticed
Nehemiah’s sadness and sought the reason. Upon hearing
Nehemiah’s wish to go to Jerusalem, he granted
Nehemiah’s request to return to rebuild the city and its
walls. Nehemiah left the privileged job of cupbearer,
and all the luxuries that go with that position, and
journeyed to Jerusalem, which was characterized by want
and strife.
While it is not necessary to look at all the specific
details regarding the rebuilding of the city and walls,
we are going to look at the opposition Nehemiah faced.
Read 2:19-20, 4:3-14, 5:1-11, and 6:1-7. These passages
speak of all the opposition Nehemiah and the rebuilders
had from those with a vested interest in the project
failing. Greed, anger, ridicule, discouragement, and
deceitful conspiracy fueled the opposition. But how did
Nehemiah react to all this negativity and sin? His was
not a response of compromise and reconciliation. He
actually prayed against the ridiculers and
conspirators. To pray that God’s judgment will fall
against His enemies is called an imprecatory prayer. It
is to take sides with God against God’s enemies.
Nehemiah twice prays against these people: 1) “Then I
prayed, ‘hear us, O our God, for we are being mocked.
May their scoffing fall back on their own heads, and may
they themselves become captives in a foreign land! Do
not ignore their guilt. Do not blot out their sins, for
they have provoked you to anger here in the presence of
the builders’” (4:4-5). 2) “Remember, O my God, all the
evil things that Tobiah and Sanballat have done. And
remember Noadiah the prophet and all the prophets like
her who have tried to intimidate me” (6:14). Not only
did God not forget these people, but He put the accounts
of their opposition in His Word for all to read about
and condemn. The reality of their opposition is no
longer confined to a small plot of ground called
Jerusalem, but wherever the Bible is read their evil
deeds will be known, and their names cursed. This
should strike fear in our hearts. If we should dare to
oppose God’s work and ways, will all hear of our
opposition at the future judgment? Will our names be
listed along Tobiah’s, Sanballat’s and Noadiah’s?
There seems to be several purposes for the writing of
Nehemiah (Malik, 1996), and its companion book, Ezra
(both are records of the return from captivity). 1) To
provide a record of the reconstruction of the Israelite
theocracy upon the physical and spiritual foundations of
the past and to give a continuity between the preexilic
and postexilic times. The promises given to Abraham and
David were still in force. God is not done with Israel,
but He still has plans for it, within His overall plan
to redeem the world from sin and death. 2) To
demonstrate God’s faithfulness in restoring His people
to the blessings found in His promises to Abraham and
David. 3) To proclaim the legitimacy of the restored
religious, political, and social life of God’s
nationally-chosen people. God called them back to the
land. They are not illegitimate occupiers of the land.
They belong there. 4) To foreshadow the complete
fulfillment of the promises made to Abraham and David.
Despite what the critics said in Nehemiah’s day, and
despite what critics say today, God is not finished with
Israel yet. He allowed them to return and receive His
blessing when they confessed the unholy sins of
disobedience to the Law of Moses and idolatry. He will
bless them in the future when they confess the sin of
rejecting their Messiah, the Lord Jesus Christ, the Son
of the living God. Until then they will remain in
spiritual exile.
Nehemiah is an example of a man who fought for what he
knew was God’s will. It was obvious that the city and
walls needed to be rebuilt for the protection of the
people. Only those who had selfish hidden agendas could
oppose it. We need to learn from Nehemiah. Hardship
and opposition does not necessarily mean that we are out
of God’s will. It may actually occur because we are
directly in the middle of His will, involved in His
project. It is interesting, sometimes our projects
proceed along smoothly because God is blessing us, but
at other times all hell seems to break loose against
what we are doing. Yet, like Nehemiah, we are doing
exactly what God wants us to do. Nehemiah triumphed for
two reasons. First, he knew that what he was doing was
God’s will for his life. He was strengthened by his
convictions to complete what God called him to do.
Second, he was surrounded by good people who also were
faithful to complete the task assigned to them. When we
face opposition we should examine ourselves to see
whether we are receiving flak because of our own bad
actions, whether there has been a misunderstanding, or
are our enemies actually striking at God by striking at
us. If the former two can be eliminated, and the later
confirmed, then we must stand strong in God’s strength
and refuse to backaway from our holy task!
Nehemiah did not quit. The postexilic history of Israel
might have been different had he not triumphed. But
Nehemiah is an example of someone who followed God’s
best plan for his life. And God’s people benefited from
his faithfulness. Solomon, despite his great wisdom, is
an example of someone who knew God’s best plan for his
life but failed to do it. Solomon’s unfaithfulness
brought great suffering to his people. The lives of
Solomon and Nehemiah should stand as examples to us.
Solomon is often looked upon as a great man and is
remembered for his great wisdom. But his end was not
good. Nehemiah is not as well known, but when one reads
his story carefully one sees another David-type
character. Solomon inherited peace, but eventually
squandered it on immoral living. Nehemiah ‘inherited’
conflict, but eventually turned it into peace.
Nehemiah, along with Paul, fought the good fight and
finished the race (2 Timothy 4:7). David would have
been proud of him!
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