Speaker 1: 0:05

Welcome to Westtown. My name is Dwight. I am one of the pastors here. If we have not had an opportunity to meet, please introduce yourself. I would love to get a chance to get to know you this morning.

Speaker 1: 0:16

As a congregation, we are beginning a new sermon series this morning through the book of Nehemiah, and you might be wondering well, what does an Old Testament book written so many years ago have anything to do with people today? What value could it possibly offer to us as people who live in 2023? Well, if you're wondering what life is about and what your purpose is as a person, if you're looking to have questions answered about who God is and your vision for life enlarged, then Nehemiah is for you. If you are wondering about how you might be able to have your love for God rekindled, how you might enter into a personal relationship with Him, then the book of Nehemiah is for you. If you're wondering about relationships within your home and within the body of Christ, how they can be strengthened and flourished, well, let's get in the book of Nehemiah, because it's for us. And if you're wondering what possible relevance the church can have in our culture and our world today, why we are here and what our interactions are to be like with the world, then the book of Nehemiah is for all of us.

Speaker 1: 1:33

This morning Nehemiah had a very interesting calling by God. He was called by God to rebuild the walls around the city of Jerusalem. We'll get into that in a little bit. But he wasn't content to stop with just a basic construction project. No, nehemiah wanted to rebuild the hearts and the lives of the people before their God. And so much of what the book of Nehemiah deals with we now call today the topic of revival. And that is when the Spirit of God pours out upon the church in an extraordinary way to reanimate much of the church. It's not special meetings, it's not just strictly evangelism, but the revival is a work that the Spirit of God does within the people of God, and that's what we see happening in the book of Nehemiah. Now it's been many, many years since we have seen in our land any kind of widespread movement of the Spirit of God among the churches. They are episodic, they don't occur all of the time, but they can greatly instruct us about what a relationship with God is like and they can give us an incentive for seeing what life can really be, the potential of the Christian life can be.

Speaker 1: 2:58

One man by the name of David Mainz, writing on the topic of revival, said that he was a product of the church all of his life but he never knew what the church was capable of or what he could aspire to in his own spiritual walk, because he had never read about the best of times. That happens in a season of revival. Now, certainly we could say look, fellow, read the book of Acts. I mean, there are things that you scripture certainly reveals. But the truth is, since we seem to be so far removed from those experiences, we're not really sure what they're like or what they're about or what their value can be for us. But in a time of revival, the Lord is made known to his people in a rather extraordinary way. For instance, in 1745, there was a man who was attending a worship service. This guy's name was Howell Harris. He was listening to a man named Daniel Rowland in Wales preach and he said that it was. The sense of the presence of God in the congregation was extraordinary, as this man began to open up the scriptures and people were encountering the living God and individuals began to be convicted of their sin and confessing their sin and others were experiencing joy and relief of knowing that their sins were forgiven and he said it was an extraordinary awareness that God was among his people.

Speaker 1: 4:34

In 1858, john Gerudo, in Charleston, north Carolina he was. You know, we Presbyterians tend to be known to be buttoned down and laced up pretty good. He was ministering in Charleston, north Carolina, and he describes an experience where he was preaching at an evening service and it was as though he felt an electric bolt coursed through his body and it took him for a minute and thought wow, I wonder if this is the spirit of God. So he said to the folks the spirit of God has come, come back tomorrow night for preaching. And he pronounced the benediction and he left Nobody in the church moved and he thought, wow, I wonder if the spirit of God is moving and working among them. So he returned to the pulpit, preached for a couple more hours on expounding the truths of the gospel of Jesus Christ, went to pronounce another benediction and the people were shaking their heads like we're not leaving buddy. So he kept preaching and preaching until midnight. He was preaching because the people were so hungry for the word of God. One of the people that were visiting at that time said. Those services continued day and night for eight weeks, so great was the sense of an awareness of God among the people, so hungry were they for righteousness that they knew that the spirit of God was working among them.

Speaker 1: 6:08

In the Isle of Lewis in Scotland in 1949, duncan Campbell was talking about a young man who was leading the congregation in prayer and he had his devotions earlier that day from Revelation chapter four, sort of like what we were singing in a little bit earlier and holy, holy, holy and I'm with Winston, it gets me every time. And he was beginning his prayer and he says, referring to Revelation chapter four, he said Lord, we see you on the throne, we see you in your power. Will you let it loose? And Duncan Campbell says the spirit of God came and we were a people saturated with God. And so when we see these seasons in scripture and in history, where the spirit of God is mightily and powerfully present among us, we can be motivated to pursue Christ more fully and we're instructed from scripture and those examples as to how we might be able to do so.

Speaker 1: 7:12

If you are following along in Westtown's Bible reading program, we're in Nehemiah Right now. That was not planned by me, but if you aren't, I encourage you to download the scripture plan from our website or the Bible reading app and you can follow along. So if you've read Nehemiah this week, you're well prepared. As we read from Nehemiah, chapter one, verse one here now the word of the Lord, the words of Nehemiah, the son of Hacalliah.

Speaker 1: 7:45

Now, it happened in the month of Kislev in the 20th year, as I was in Sousa, the citadel, that Hananiah, one of my brothers, came with certain men from Judah and I asked them concerning the Jews who had escaped, who had survived the exile, and concerning Jerusalem, and they said to me the remnant there in the province who have survived the exile, is in great trouble and shame. The wall of Jerusalem is broken down and its gates are destroyed by fire. As soon as I heard these words, I sat down and wept and mourned for days and I continued fasting and praying before the God of heaven and I said oh Lord, god of heaven, the great and awesome God, who keeps covenant and steadfast love with those who love him and keep his commandments, let your ear be attentive and your eyes open to hear the prayer of your servant that I now pray before you day and night for the people of Israel, your servants, confessing the sins of the people of Israel, which have sinned against you. Even I, in my father's house, have sinned. We have acted corruptly against you and have not kept the commandments, the statutes and the rules that you commanded your servant Moses. Remember the word that you commanded your servant Moses saying if you are unfaithful, I will scatter you among the peoples, but if you return to me and keep my covenant and do them, though your outcasts are in the uttermost parts of heaven. From there, I will gather them and bring them to the place that I have chosen to make my name dwell there. They are your servants and your people, whom you have redeemed by your great power and by your strong hand. Oh Lord, let your ear be attentive to the prayer of your servant and to the prayer of your servants who delight to fear your name and give success to your servant today and grant him mercy in the sight of this man. Now, I was the cupbearer to the king. The grass withers and the flower fades away, but the word of the Lord shall endure forever. Let's pray together, lord.

Speaker 1: 10:02

We come today as people who need to hear a word from you, whatever, wherever we are, whatever our situations may be. So often, lord, we listen to our own wisdom, the wisdom of our friends, the wisdom of this world. But, lord, we need to hear from you. Would you enlighten our minds by your spirit to the truth of your word? Will your spirit impress its truth upon our minds and our hearts? Would you so convince us in our wills, lord, that we would desire to follow after you and love you more fully? Would you bring about, heavenly Father, within us a renewal of our relationship with you that you might be honored and blessed? We pray in Jesus name, amen.

Speaker 1: 10:50

So, as we begin in the book of Nehemiah, what we are seeing in this first chapter is the evidences, if you will, of what God does in a person or among people when he is getting ready to act. And the first thing that we see is that when God is about to act, he makes us aware of our great need of him. Now it's important to have a little bit of background to what's happening here in the book of Nehemiah. You might remember many, many years before this, that the Lord had called Abraham to himself and promised this old man and his wife that they were going to become parents, and they were going to become a great nation, and from his grandson, jacob, who had 12 descendants, the Lord established tribes of Israel that ultimately formed into the nation of Israel. And again, over many, many years, the people of God were prone to wander from him, and he sent people to continually call them back to him in repentance and faith, and steadfastly they refused.

Speaker 1: 12:02

And so what ended up happening was that, in the time of Solomon's son, rehoboam, the kingdoms were divided. There was no longer one nation of Israel. Ten tribes went to the north, and they that was known as the nation of Israel and the tribes of Benjamin and Judah remained in the south, known as the kingdom of Judah, and over the years they continued their waywardness. In fact, in the northern kingdom there were 20 kings of Israel. Not one of them was a good king, and so, ultimately, the Lord sent the Assyrians to come and to conquer the northern tribes in the kingdom of Israel, and many of them were carried off into captivity. Many were from other lands, were resettled into the northern kingdom, and the people of God married people of other faiths, embraced their practices and they became what is known as the Samaritans. In the New Testament, you might remember when Jesus goes to the woman at the Samaritan woman at the well, and the disciples are shocked that Jesus is traveling through Samaria and talking to Samaritan woman. It's because of this long-standing feeling among the southern tribes that those northern tribes were not legitimate followers of God. Now, the southern kingdom. They also had 20 kings. Only eight of them were good kings, and so their judgment was delayed by a little over 100 years and the Lord sent the Babylonians to come and to conquer the people of Israel or, excuse me, the people of Judah. So you have, at this time, daniel and his friends being carried off to Babylon. Ultimately, the city of Jerusalem falls and the people are subjected to the Babylonians.

Speaker 1: 13:47

Now, 150 years before a man named Cyrus came to be the king of Persia, isaiah prophesied by name that a man named Cyrus would be the deliverer of the Israelites, and so the Persians defeated the Babylonians, and it was under the Persian rule that the Israelites began to be permitted to return back to Jerusalem in small numbers. So you have the recording of the first return and Ezra, chapters 1 through 6, and then not a whole lot really happened. I mean, it was under Cyrus that that return was permitted. They began to renovate the temple, but they didn't get very far because the enemies were oppressing them. And so, 80 years later the events in Ezra, chapter 7 through 10 another wave of exiles returned from captivity to resettle in Jerusalem. But again they're having trouble. And it's at this time of trouble that Nehemiah receives the report that Jerusalem lies in ruin. The wall that by this point the temple had been reconstructed, but the walls around the city still lied and ruined. And that was what prompted what we will see in the rest of the book the third return of exiles from captivity to Jerusalem. That will take place under Nehemiah.

Speaker 1: 15:15

But the people were helpless. They were ruled over by a foreign power. Whenever they tried to resettle in their land, the enemies of their nation would rise up against them and oppose the work time and again. And the people were discouraged, their work was delayed and they felt as though the Lord was not present with them. And so when Nehemiah hears this report, we read how, in verse four, that he sits down and he weeps and he mourns and he fasts and he prays so greatly. Is he aware of the need, of his own personal need and of the need of Israel, that he turns to the Lord and prayer.

Speaker 1: 16:04

Now, there are things that go on in our individual lives. There are things that go on in individual congregations and the church at large that oftentimes we're wondering why are these things happening? You know worldwide pandemic. Don't know why that happened, don't know necessarily why it affected the church the way it did. There are times of pastoral transitions. There are even things like bridges that need to be replaced and we wonder why, why would the Lord bring this to us? Right, we seem like nice people, but why would it be that we need to have all of this focus on replacing a failing bridge? Now, if being nice were the criteria for not having any trouble, jesus would have had no trouble, right? So it doesn't matter whether or not we're necessarily good people. God has his purposes and whatever the purpose is in the failing bridge you know, we can try to come up with all kinds of scenarios. I don't know what they are, but this I do know that in any situation that we face in life, that is a challenge, that is a difficulty. God is showing us how much we need Him, and even things like construction projects are opportunities for us to grow and our dependence upon God. Which leads us to our next point, that when God is about to act, he causes us to depend fully on Him. And this is what happens in Nehemiah's response.

Speaker 1: 17:50

Through the rest of the chapter, what Nehemiah senses is that, while his need and while the nation of Israel's need is great, their God is greater. And he, even though he feels powerless and unable to change his circumstances or the circumstances of his country, he knows whom he can go to to seek change and deliverance from those difficulties and those circumstances. And so, that's and grasping who God is, nehemiah goes to prayer, and we see, in verses four and six, for instance, how he refers to God in prayer. He refers to the difficulty that the people of Israel are facing. But look, in verse four, he refers to God as the God of heaven. You know, as we'll see, it's Art Exerxes who's ruling as the king of Persia, a very powerful man, he's probably the last great ruler of Persia. At this point, he rules one kingdom Now, it was a vast and expansive kingdom, but God rules the heavens.

Speaker 1: 19:15

And so, while Nehemiah felt that he had a terrible situation that he and his people were facing, god rules overall. And that's why, in verse five, oh Lord, god of heaven, again he refers to him as the great in the awesome God, points to him as the faithful God who keeps his covenant promises and a God who abounds in love. And it's on that basis that we read, in verse six, for instance, that he cries out to the Lord and says let your ear be attentive and your eyes open to hear the prayer of your servant. Knowing that God is good, knowing that God is faithful to his promises, knowing that God hears his people when they cry out to him, nehemiah is emboldened to pray, knowing that his God is great and upon him he can depend. And so what does God do in response to this prayer? Well, in chapter two, verse one, the opening verse of the second chapter we didn't read it yet this morning, but he refers to another month, the month of Nissen, which is four months later than the month of Kislev that he mentions in chapter one, verse one. So, after he cries out to the Lord like this, what does God make him do? God makes him wait.

Speaker 1: 20:39

Now, I am a terrible waiter, not like in a restaurant, but like a person who does not wait. Well, and maybe you aren't either. I mean, a lot of my waiting is characterized by trying to figure out how to solve the problem, and I expend a lot of mental energy thinking of options and trying to pick which one's gonna be the best, and then trying to move and work my will so that it can be accomplished. Or maybe you're a kind of person that gets nervous and worries and becomes anxious, or the list can be multiplied on and on. That's not godly waiting. The kind of waiting that Nehemiah is exercising is one that seeks after God, even as you're waiting for his time to move and to act into the liver. His confidence was in the Lord, because his God is so great, and not in himself. And so that leads us to the last aspect of what God does when he is about to act. And when he is about to act, god recalibrates our lives to his glory and others good.

Speaker 1: 21:51

We used to have this car that had one of those compasses in it, and if you traveled from one area of the country to another, like particularly if it was a long distance or you were in a different time zone you had to recalibrate the car so that the compass would be accurate, which affected your GPS, and so what you had to do was like they would tell you to go to a parking lot and drive counterclockwise in a circle and then there would be a message on the dashboard that would instruct you to drive clockwise in a circle until it was done calibrating. And I used to think people must think I'm loaded, driving around in circles in the parking lot trying to get my compass calibrated so I can drive around. But it was necessary so that the car knew where north was, so that it would have its bearings. And when God is about to move and to work in a group of people or an individual heart, he is helping them to get their bearings straight in life and to recalibrate their priorities.

Speaker 1: 23:02

You know, one of the things that amazes me as I read Nehemiah, chapter one is I wonder, why does Nehemiah even care? More than likely he was not born in Jerusalem, and if he was, he probably doesn't remember it. More than likely he doesn't know any of the people in Jerusalem. It's a huge distance from where he is and Suze far, far away. Why would he end up making this extraordinary journey for a people who really didn't seem too content to change their circumstances? It had been nearly 100 years from the time that the first exiles returned to Jerusalem until Nehemiah's time and very little of their circumstances had changed. If they weren't willing to do anything about it, why should Nehemiah be willing to do anything about it?

Speaker 1: 24:01

We read at the end of chapter one how Nehemiah was the cup bearer to the king. He was the official wine taster, and I guess this is the first Somalia, I don't know, but so we might think that that was a pretty low position of service, but actually, within the palace, nehemiah held a place of prominence and prestige. Why then would he care? Why would he be concerned about what's happening in Jerusalem? It's because God had been recalibrating his heart, and there are two things that come into view primarily that is causing Nehemiah to be so concerned, and one is that he is concerned for God's glory. In other words, he wants God to be present among his people. He wants God's people to realize that the Lord is among them. He is seeking the Lord to deliver them so that God's name might be honored and praised throughout the world, and so that's why Nehemiah is.

Speaker 1: 25:10

You might remember, if you were here when we were looking at the solutions to when we need restored in our walk with the Lord from Psalm chapter 80 last week, that one of the things that we mentioned is that when we pray, seeking restoration, that we sort of present our arguments to God. We reason with him, not that our logic is gonna persuade God, but we relay to him our need and our condition, we remind him of the promises that he has made in his word towards us and we ask him to move and to act accordingly. And that is precisely what Nehemiah is doing here in chapter one, in verse 80, he says remember the word that you commanded to your servant Moses, that indeed, that if the people disobeyed you, that they would be taken captive by foreign oppressors. But also remember that if they turn, that you said that you would gather them from around the world. And so Nehemiah is appealing to God, for the glory of God, that he would move and work among the people.

Speaker 1: 26:17

But in addition to that, nehemiah's life had been recalibrated, not only out of a sense of the glory of God, but due to the out of his conviction, his desire to see the people of God experience the goodness of God. He was interested in the welfare of the people, certainly their physical wellbeing and safety and so many other aspects, but predominantly out of his great concern that they would be revived in their walk and their relationship with the Lord. And the other thing, that the perspective that is being recalibrated for us here, as we see in Nehemiah, chapter one, is that the Lord brings about deliverance through one. We may think about armies, and armies are important, they have their place. We may think about vast groups of people and mobilizing vast groups of people, and so on and so forth. They have their place.

Speaker 1: 27:23

But one man. God is going to use one man to bring about the deliverance of the entire nation and restore them and their relationship with God and their place within the world. Not like it was under David or under Solomon, but certainly these people were going to be restored and that was going to be through the efforts in the ministry of one man. We see that time and again in the Old Testament, don't we? Moses, for instance, king David, for instance, time and again? And they were all human, they all failed, and all of them are pointing to the one who God promised that he would bring, that would be the deliverer of his people, who, in perfect life, in himself, in perfect ministry to God, would be the one through whom we would all be delivered, and that is Jesus Christ. Nehemiah's name means. The Lord, or Yahweh, is my comfort and he is pointing in his role as one who would bring about the deliverance of his people to Jesus Christ, who is our true comfort and our true deliverer, and that is why we can have great hope.

Speaker 1: 28:33

If we're feeling like the church is suffering, if a local fellowship of believers is suffering, if we are feeling as though we are apart from the Lord in our walk with him, let's pray. Let's pray that God would help us to see our desperate need of him. Let's pray that we would together begin to see how absolutely dependent we are on God for all things, even as we live in a community that thinks that we can solve all of our problems and experience a joy of a certain level of prosperity that we really don't think we have needs. We all need the Lord, we all desperately need to depend on him, and let us pray that God would help us to reorient our lives to his glory and to the good of others. Will you join me in prayer?