The sermon, titled 'Summarizing Ezra and Nehemiah,' delves into the actions of Nehemiah as documented in chapter 13 of his book and connects these actions to broader biblical teachings. The speaker emphasizes that Nehemiah's actions, which may appear rash, are deeply rooted in Old Testament and New Testament scripture, particularly highlighting the role of civil magistrates as outlined in Romans 13. Nehemiah's actions, including the cleansing of pagan practices, assigning duties to priests and Levites, and the keeping of the Sabbath, are presented as efforts to realign the people with God's commandments. The speaker draws parallels between Nehemiah’s reforms and similar efforts in Ezra, emphasizing the central role of worship and the importance of adhering to the covenant. Six key themes emerge from the books: God raises up kings and leaders, worship is central, the sovereignty of God, the transformative power of God’s word, the progressive nature of sanctification, and the notion of Christians building a life post-captivity. The sermon concludes by highlighting God's unwavering support for His people, encouraging believers to take the necessary next steps in their spiritual journey.

We read Nehemiah 13, 30 and 31 and then Isaiah 44, 24 through 28. Nehemiah 13, verse 30 and 31. Thus I cleanse them of everything pagan. I also assign duties to the priests and the Levites, each to his service, and to bringing the wood offering and the first fruits at appointed times. Remember me, O my God, for good.

Isaiah 44 verses 24 through 28. Thus says the Lord, your Redeemer, in he who formed you from the womb, I am the Lord who makes all things, who stretches out the heavens all alone, who spreads abroad the earth by myself, who frustrates the signs of the babblers and drives diviners mad, who turns wise men backward and makes their knowledge foolishness, who confirms the word of his servant and performs the counsel of his messengers, who says to Jerusalem, you shall be inhabited. To the cities of Judah, you shall be built. And I will raise up her waste places who says to the deep be dry and I will dry up your rivers who says of Cyrus he is my shepherd And he shall perform all my pleasure, saying to Jerusalem, You shall be built. And to the temple your foundation shall be laid." Please be seated.

This morning we are summarizing Ezra and Nehemiah. That shouldn't take long. Last week we were dealing with intermarriages again, unfortunately. And If you're just reading it over quickly for the first time, you'd say, wow, that guy's out of control. Nehemiah is sort of acting out of control, but it's not that at all, really, in any way.

If you're not reading it carefully, and if you are not reading it thoughtfully, considering what other passages in the Old Testament have to say about what civil magistrates should be doing, you would think that Nehemiah is just in a rage. He woke up on the wrong side of the bed and he's acting in a really ungodly fashion. But that's really not what's happening. Each thing that we see Nehemiah doing in last week's text is something that is firmly grounded in Old Testament scripture. And New Testament scripture too.

In Romans 13, Paul says that the civil magistrate is to be a terror to evildoers. That's what we see Nehemiah doing in last week's passage. He is being a terror to evildoers in very biblical ways. And so he takes these actions, but as he is exhorting the people to come away from these marriages with pagans and not to do that anymore, he ties it to King Solomon. And the argument is this, if Solomon didn't escape with as much as God loved him, he was beloved of God, That's exactly what the text says.

So he has all these marks of the favor of God on his life. He has strength and wealth and wisdom all given to him by God. If Solomon couldn't escape the consequences of marrying a pagan. Who are we to think that we are not vulnerable to the same falls? And so we ended in 1 Corinthians chapter 10 verse 12 where the apostle Paul says, let him who thinks he stands take heed lest he fall.

If Solomon is vulnerable, you and I so much more so. This week we are going to finish the last two verses of Nehemiah And then we are going to summarize Ezra and Nehemiah. And I'm actually going to do a sort of a running summary of all 23 chapters. You don't think it can be done in a timely fashion, but it's going to be done in a timely fashion. And then I'm going to give you six themes that we just see recurring and so beautifully developed in these two books of the Bible.

As we go to the text, let's go to the text in prayer. Our God, I thank you for our weeks in Ezra, in Nehemiah, something like a year and three months or so, that you have had us here learning at the feet of giants, of men that you raised up and brought to such striking maturity through your hand working in their lives. Now we have the opportunity to see them, to see how the godly operate in many different pressure packed environments. What a help this has been to us. We thank you, God for your word.

What a gift, what a treasure that you've given to your people. Help us to treasure it like we never have before. Ask this in Jesus' name. Amen. Okay, well let's re-read verses 30 and 31.

We're in Nehemiah chapter 13, the last chapter. We're in the last two verses of that chapter. Nehemiah writes, Thus I cleanse them of everything pagan. I also assigned duties to the priests and the Levites, each to his service, and to bringing the wood offering and the firstfruits at appointed times. Remember me, oh my God, for good.

Here we are finishing the book of Nehemiah. We have two verses and I want to point out three things that are very prominent in these two verses. Here's number one. I cleanse them of everything pagan. That's what Nehemiah says.

These are right in his closing remarks. I cleanse them of everything pagan. And I think what Nehemiah is doing here is summarizing the actions of chapter 13. Chapter 13 has been full of action. And I think this is a summary statement.

It's the cleansing by Nehemiah, the rightful lawful civil magistrate, the one that God has set an authority over them, using that authority to cleanse them from pagan practices. Verses 1-3 of this chapter we see that he discontinued the practice of Ammonites and Moabites coming into the assembly of God. In other words, coming into the temple to participate in temple worship. That's what verses 1 through 3 were. Obviously, Moabites and Ammonites had been coming in and participating in temple worship in direct contradiction to Deuteronomy chapter 23.

You can go back and look at that chapter and find that is expressly prohibited. Moabites and Ammonites are the historic enemies of the people of God and they are not to come into the temple through ten generations. So if you got grafted in today, it would be ten generations before your offspring would be able to participate in temple worship. In verses four through nine of this chapter, Nehemiah throws Tobiah the Ammonite out. Tobiah is an Ammonite, he has no business being given a store room, having a store room of the temple put at his disposal.

So Nehemiah comes back from serving the king to Jerusalem. He finds that this has happened and he takes immediate action. That was pagan. When the Moabites and the Ammonites were allowed to participate in temple worship, that was pagan. And Nehemiah cleansed them of that.

When Tobiah had been given a store room in the courts of the Lord, that was pagan. Nehemiah cleanses them of that. In verses 15-22, Nehemiah restores the keeping the Sabbath holy. The fourth commandment, remember the Sabbath day to keep it holy. Or observe the Sabbath day to keep it holy, depending on whether you're Looking at Exodus 20, the first giving of the law, or Deuteronomy 5, the second giving of the law.

Nehemiah came back to Jerusalem. He found that the Sabbath day was being trampled on. The producers were producing, the sellers were selling, men from Tyre, pagans, were coming, bringing fish and other goods and selling them on the Sabbath. That was pagan. Nehemiah cleanses them of it.

Verses 23-29, our text last week that brings us right up to the text we are talking about. Inner marriages with who? With pagans. That was pagan. Nehemiah cleansed them from it.

So it's a summary statement when we see in these last two verses. I cleanse them from everything pagan. Indeed, indeed he did. Whatever pagan he found, whatever pagan practices he found, he charged them. He made war on them.

And he cleansed the people of that. Number two. We see Nehemiah assigning duties to the priests and the Levites. Specific duties to the priests and the Levites. This is in accordance with what King David did.

The first time we see groups of Levites being given specific tasks is in 1 Chronicles 24. King David did. Now the priests and the Levites as groups already had a bunch of things that God's Law said that they should be doing. But to put this into a regimented schedule where this family does this, And this family does this, and this family does this. In their turn, that happens in 1 Chronicles 24.

And there's a casting of lots. And you're in this family, so you do this task at this time. And then your time's up. You can go do other things and another family the lot has fallen to them to follow right on your heels And to continue with that task David did that in first Chronicles 24 for the priests and then he cast lots again for the Levites that's where we see it instituted and that's what Nehemiah is doing here And that is happening at the time of Christ. Listen to Luke chapter 1.

This is about Zacharias, John the Baptist's father. Luke chapter 1 verse 5, there was in the days of Herod, the king of Judea, a certain priest named Zacharias of the division of Abijah. So there is the priest's name Zacharias And his family is of the division or the family of Abijah. Then we read this a couple of verses later in Luke chapter 1 verses 8 and 9. So it was, while he was serving as priest before God, In the order of his division, according to the custom of the priesthood, his lot fell to burn incense when he went into the temple of the Lord.

And of course then an angel appears to him and tells him he's going to have a child. And the child is to be named John. That's John the Baptist. So David institutes it in 1 Chronicles 24. Nehemiah brings it back into practice here at the end of Nehemiah chapter 13, And it's still happening at the time of Christ in Luke chapter 1 with Zacharias, the father of John the Baptist.

Under this heading, Nehemiah also mentions the bringing of the wood offering and the first fruits at their appointed time. So I want to connect this back to chapter 10. Flip back to chapter 10. We keep flipping back to chapter 10 because in chapter 13 we keep seeing violations of what they covenanted that they wouldn't do back in chapter 10. So chapter 10 is the covenant that the people entered into maybe 15 years earlier.

Look at chapter 10 verses 34 and 35. We cast lots among the priests, the Levites, and the people for bringing the wood offering into the house of our God according to our Father's houses at the appointed times year by year to burn on the altar of the Lord our God as it is written in the law. And we made ordinances to bring the first fruits of our ground and the first fruits of all the fruits of all trees, year by year, to the house of the Lord." So the implication in chapter 13 is that he's reordering things so the wood offering begins to be brought at appointed times again and so the first fruits begin to be brought at appointed times again. That means that something they specifically said, we'll do this in their covenant in chapter 10 again, like keeping the Sabbath, like not intermarrying, like providing for the Levites, all things that we've seen in chapter 13. This is another place where they explicitly said in the covenant in chapter 10, we'll do this, and by chapter 13, maybe 15 years later, It needs to be reordered again.

So number one was I cleanse them of everything pagan. Number two was the assigning of duties to the priests and the Levites. Number three, finally we see him saying again for the umpteenth time, remember me, oh my God, for good. There are two things I'd like to say about this. The first is this, God does remember.

Nehemiah's right to call out to God in prayer, that he would remember both his deeds that were done for the honor of God, for the glory of God, by the grace of God, and also for him to remember the deeds of his enemies that have been done to harm the cause of God's kingdom. He's done both multiple times. There are two verses, or two texts, an Old Testament text and a New Testament text that give us the grounding for God remembering. Here's one, Ecclesiastes chapter 12, verses 13 and 14. Ecclesiastes is a wisdom book written by Solomon.

Chapter 12 is the last chapter, and this is the end of this last chapter. So this is really the conclusion of a wisdom book written by the wise King Solomon. Ecclesiastes 12 verses 13 and 14 says this, Let us hear the conclusion of the whole matter. Fear God and keep His commandments. For this is man's all.

For God will bring every work into judgment, including every secret thing, whether good or evil. We're all going to stand before a righteous judge one day. That's not New Testament teaching or Old Testament teaching. That's Bible teaching from cover to cover. Every work will be brought into judgment, including every secret thing, whether good or evil.

This is exactly what the Apostle Paul teaches in 2 Corinthians 5 verse 10. In 2 Corinthians 5 Verse 10, Paul writes, For we must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ, that each one may receive the things done in the body according to what he has done, whether good or bad. It's like he's quoting Ecclesiastes chapter 12, isn't it? The Old Testament and the New Testament teach the same thing. We will all stand before our righteous judge one day.

All the things done in the body will be known before God. There will be an answering. Now does this teach works based salvation? Not in any way. This has nothing to do with whether you are saved or not saved.

Salvation is by faith alone, is by grace alone, through faith alone. But then for those who are saved, there are rewards to the extent that we live to the glory of God. So whether you'll be saved or damned has nothing to do with your works. It has to do with whether you've repented and believed the Gospel. Whether you've seized upon the work and the provision of the blood of Jesus Christ by believing.

Turning away from trusting yourself to turning and trusting Christ. Then what? For those who have believed to have been cleansed by the blood of Jesus Christ who stand before Him in the innocence that Christ has earned, you will be rewarded to the extent that you live to His glory on this earth. Many parables in the New Testament speak to this. One who had one talent, or the one who had two talents and gains two more through the investment of his life, what are the words of God then?

Well done, good and faithful servant. You've been faithful with a few things. You'll be put in charge of many things. Enter into the joy of your Master. The same with five, the same with ten.

So that was the first thing. God does remember. Nehemiah is calling on the remembrance of God and He will remember. It's what the New Testament teaches and the Old Testament. The second thing is for us to consider that Nehemiah opens and closes the book of Nehemiah in the same way he's praying.

This is a prayer. These are the last words of the book of Nehemiah. And he's calling on God. And when we go back to the first of Nehemiah, Chapter 1 verse 4, he gets this report, and what is his immediate response as soon as he gets the report about the condition of Jerusalem? Chapter 1 verse 4, so it was, when I heard these words that I sat down and wept and mourned for many days.

I was fasting and praying before the Lord God of heaven." Nehemiah opens with Nehemiah praying, crying out to God, and it ends with Nehemiah praying and crying out to God. This is a man of prayer. How many times do we see him pray in between? I should have counted this week, but I didn't count. It was many times.

He was a man of prayer. He was a man who sought God through prayer. He's exemplary for us. He's always praying. Now I want to do something unusual.

I want you to turn your Bibles to Ezra chapter 1. Ezra chapter 1. And I'm going to attempt a running summary of all 23 chapters, and it's going to be at the highest level. We'll have to assess whether this was beneficial or not afterwards. I can only envision it in my mind.

Everybody I've told the idea to looked at me like I was crazy. But we're going to take a stroll down memory lane and look at a little less than the last year and a half of our history and just touch on some of the points chapter by chapter that were so precious to us as we were studying these things for the first time. Ezra chapter 1 begins where Isaiah 44 and 45 ended. Now we just had that read as the sermon text. And it was our recitation and memory text for 13 weeks.

And it was written 150 years before Ezra chapter 1. But it calls out the name of the king who wouldn't be born for generations into the future. It calls Cyrus by name. This is just a spectacularly wonderful specific prophecy that you look and if you believe that Scripture is really the Word of God, it just fortifies you in that belief. It makes your jaw drop open.

To see that 150 years before this king was even born, God called him by name and said, He'll be my shepherd. He'll be the one who will send them back to Jerusalem. Foundations of the temple will be laid again. The temple will be restored. Jerusalem will be repopulated and this is exactly what we have been studying.

This is the fulfillment of Isaiah 44 and 45. So Ezra 1 begins where Isaiah 44 and 45 ended. We see God raises up this king, Cyrus. He gives him the Persian Empire, which includes Babylon once he conquers it. And chapter 1 starts with the decree allowing this first wave of captives that have gone into captivity 70 years before under Nebuchadnezzar, you're free to go back.

Whoever of all the Jews, if you want to go back, you can go back. And then beginning in verse 5, we see that everyone was to either go or help. Do you remember that? I mean this is very relevant to us. This is a message to us.

It's the same in the New Testament. Either you go to advance the kingdom, or you help those who are going. That's exactly what we saw. And at the end of chapter one we see that the king loads them down with riches and he doesn't send them back out of captivity empty handed, but he sends them with all the treasures of the temple to take them back. The articles of the temple had gone into captivity too and they are free to go back with this first wave.

Chapter 2, we see those who returned. And it begins with the list in verse 2. The first two names on the list are Zerubbabel and Jeshua. And they are the ones we see them leading. As long as the first wave is on the scene, the first wave of captives going back from Babylon, it's always Zerubbabel and Jeshua at the head.

Zerubbabel is the authority, the leader, and Jeshua is the high priest. They are grandsons too. Remember that? Zerubbabel is the grandson of the last king before they were taken into captivity. And Jeshua is the grandson of the last high priest before they were taken into captivity.

Their grandfathers led in disobedience and unrighteousness, but Zerubbabel and Joshua lead in obedience and righteousness. And it goes to show us that those old family patterns, those baggage that we carried in from generations past, it can be broken. God can break those things in our life and make us obedient and faithful like He did with Zerubbabel and Jeshua. Then we start having family names. There's a lot of family names and then in verse 21 it switches over from family names to localities in Judah that will be repopulated starting with Bethlehem.

We know that name. And then in verse 36 it's priests. And then in verse 40 it's Levites. And then in 41 it's singers. And then in 42 it's gatekeepers.

And then in 43 it's nethineim or temple servants. They served the Levites. And then in 55 it's the sons of Solomon's servants, other servants. And then starting in 59 there's a listing of people who couldn't prove that they were genealogically Israelites. And some of them were priests.

And because they can't prove that they're genealogically priests, they're not allowed to serve. You have to be able to prove that your family tree goes back to Aaron, or you can't serve as a priest in the temple. And then we had this summary in verse 64 that says that the first wave was right at 50, 000 people going back. So there's a lot of captives that are returning. It's not beginning to be enough to really fully repopulate Jerusalem and Judah, but it's a lot of people, 50, 000 people, and a lot of donkeys too.

And the chapter ends with many giving to the effort. In chapter 3 we see that they've arrived. So The first wave of captives has come home, even though it was probably their grandparents who really knew those homes. And what do they do as soon as they get home? They gather at Jerusalem and they rebuild the altar so that they can start worshipping God.

Now, this is amazing. It's only 50, 000 who have come back. They're way outnumbered by the surrounding kingdoms. And it's hostile territory. That's what we see through the rest of Ezra and Nehemiah, how hostile the territory is.

And yet, they don't prioritize the rebuilding of their homes, or getting crops in the field, or raising defenses against their enemies. They prioritize getting that altar in place so they can begin to worship God. And they put that in place and they begin to celebrate the feasts. Towards the end of the chapter, they lay the foundations of the temple. And when the foundation has been laid, there is this public worship where they say, God is good, His mercy endures forever toward Israel.

This is a responsive singing in verse 11 we see. This great public rejoicing that just the foundations of the temple had been laid. And then we have this scene at the very end of the chapter where a few of the old men who had seen the first temple before King Nebuchadnezzar came and leveled it to the ground, they are seeing that the foundation has been laid and they are weeping. My guess is this is mixed emotions. They are missing the beauty of Solomon's temple, the first temple which they saw undoubtedly in their boyhoods.

And there is a bitterness to that, but there is a sweetness to know that it is being rebuilt again. There is such a tumult over the weeping and the shouting and the rejoicing all mixed together that people can hear it a long way off. Then chapter 4 was such an interesting chapter. Chapter 4 pans out. So we've been looking under the microscope at days and weeks and months.

Very specific things. So we go from the microscope to the telescope in chapter four. And it shows us a century of time. It shows us a hundred years and I kept using a phrase during chapter 4, sustained spiritual opposition. A century of opposition is what we see.

It begins under King Cyrus, the first king, and it continues under Ahasuerus, who we only see in chapter 4 verse 6. And it continues through King Darius, and it continues through Artaxerxes. We see all those kings. And those are the kings of the full time span of Ezra and Nehemiah. And you just keep seeing, opposition during the time of this king, opposition during the time of this king, opposition during the time of this king for a hundred years.

The author wants us to know that there was no let up that the work of God was being opposed during the whole time span of Ezra and Nehemiah. Then in chapter 5, because of that opposition that began during the time of Cyrus, they laid the temple foundation and then it just sits for something like 16 years. There's no more progress. They laid the foundation, they rejoiced, there's opposition, and there's no more progress. But in chapter 5, 16 years later, God raises up two prophets.

You can go read them if you'd like. Haggai and Zechariah. And He raises them up to rebuke the people for not continuing in the work, but to encourage them to start again and they do. And again, Zerubbabel and Joshua are right out front. They hear the voice of God through the prophets and they rally the people and they begin to make real progress in getting the temple done and then the people from the region around again say, wait a minute, who said you could do this?

But they've been so emboldened by the word of God through the prophets that they say, we're not stopping, you write to the king and see what he says. And we're going to continue our work. So they write to the king, and actually the letter that they write to the king in chapter 5 is a much more honest letter. They are saying, we don't know if they have the right to do this king, you have to let us know, but it's not the letter of opposition that we saw was written to Artaxerxes in chapter 4. And so they write to King Darius, the empire, Cyrus is dead now and Darius is the king.

They write to Darius this letter which is answered by Darius in chapter 6. So now we are in chapter 6. And King Darius has done as they suggested. He has gone back and he has looked in the historical accounts and he found the decree of Cyrus that said you can go back, you rebuild this temple. So Darius says to the surrounding peoples, you help them.

Not only do you allow them, you give them resources. So he gives them, reauthorizes the building of the temple, and he actually authorizes the surrounding peoples to give them resources to do it. And he says if you don't do it, I'll pull a timber out of your house and hang you on it. So the next thing we find is that they're diligently helping them. Not a surprise.

At the end of chapter 6 we see that the temple is completed. The work really prospers from this point on and they complete the temple really in record time and they dedicate it, that's verse 16, they dedicate the house of God consecrate it to the glory of God, and then at the end of the chapter they are celebrating the Passover. Not just those who have come back from captivity, but also those who have separated themselves from the filth of the nations in order to seek the Lord God of Israel. In chapter 7, it doesn't read this way, but in chapter 7 it's many years later. Many years later.

It's decades later. It's really 85 years after Ezra chapter 1, as Ezra chapter 7 starts. And we're introduced to our author Ezra, who could forget chapter 7 verse 10, for Ezra had prepared his heart to seek the law of the Lord and to do it and to teach statutes and ordinances in Israel. Ezra the scribe had made himself ready for this moment. He had sought the law of the Lord and he learned it and he did it and he taught it and Artaxerxes, this king authorizes Ezra to go back and He sends him with wealth and he gives him letters to give to the surrounding rulers so that he will have authorization from the king of the empire.

In chapter 8, we see the beginning of the chapter, we see the heads of the families that came back in the second wave. So the first wave was Zerubbabel and Jeshua, about 50, 000 people. The second wave is profiled in chapter 8. They come back with Ezra and we see almost 1500 men named. And if you just do a little math to say a bunch of those men who came back are married, and of those who are married, probably they have an average of this many kids.

You end up with some assumptions thinking probably 7-8, 000 people came back in the second wave. They gather, they're ready to go back out of captivity to Jerusalem. No Levites. There's no Levites. And the great reason for the second wave coming back is reform of worship.

You cannot go back without Levites. And so, He stops everything there and he sends for Levites and Levites come and join them. And then in verse 21 we have one of my favorite verses of both books. Ezra chapter 8 verse 21, There I, Ezra, proclaimed a fast there at the river of Ahava, that we might humble ourselves before our God to seek from Him the right way for us and our little ones and all our possessions." Before they get started on this journey, like a four month, 1500 mile journey, They stop at the river and they fast and they pray and they seek God's favor. We see in the middle of chapter 8 that they are given gifts by the king and his advisors, and they are loaded up with, I think it was $165 million in today's currency if you try to make the conversion.

Lots and lots of money. They are sent back with their pockets loaded down. And they arrive safely in Jerusalem and they check in all the riches with the personnel who are already serving in the temple. Chapter 9 was a sad chapter. Having arrived in Jerusalem, Ezra gets a report.

It's not a good report. It's a report about intermarriages. Where have we seen this before? And so, he plucks out some of his hair, and He plucks out some of his beard because he is so ashamed that the Lord's people have engaged in something that is so harmful and that God has spoken so clearly about. And he prays this great prayer of repentance.

There are two great prayers of repentance in Ezra and Nehemiah. Ezra chapter 9 and Nehemiah chapter 9. It's easy to remember. And there's another great prayer of repentance and it's Daniel chapter 9. So if you want to remember the great prayers of repentance in the Bible, chapter 9 of Ezra, Nehemiah, and Daniel.

So he prays this great prayer of repentance and that's how the chapter ends. Chapter 10, the people gather to him and They say, you're right. This is a great sin. We never should have entered into it. In chapter 10 verse 4 they say, arise Ezra for this matter is your responsibility.

We're with you. Be of good courage and do it. So he gathers the people and they deal so decisively with these mixed marriages and they put a process in place where Ezra and the head of each family, So Ezra and tribal heads are going to form a council. And if you're accused of engaging in a marriage with a pagan, you're going to come on an appointed day and it's going to be judged. You're going to come with your city leaders who know about your life and who can testify.

And then there's going to be an inquiry. And if you're found that you really are in a pagan marriage, that you have married someone from a foreign land who hasn't forsaken the filth of the nations in order to seek God, then you're going to have to put away that spouse. And that's how the chapter ends with the putting away of the pagans wives. And there are many names named and they're priests because that was the height of the apostasy or the height of the falling away was priests engaging in that. So ends Ezra.

Now to Nehemiah. Take a deep breath. I'll give you Nehemiah. Nehemiah Chapter 1. This is 13 years later.

Ezra was in the seventh year of Artaxerxes, the king. Nehemiah begins in the twentieth year of King Artaxerxes. So 13 years have passed since Ezra. Nehemiah is the king's cup bearer. He's the cup bearer of our exerxes and he gets a report from Jerusalem.

His brother and some other men from Judea come and Nehemiah asks about Jerusalem and they say the people there are in distress. The walls are broken down and the gates are burned. And Nehemiah is grieved and he weeps and he prays that God would use him in his position with the king and give him favor. Then in chapter 2, he is serving the king. And the king notices that he is downcast.

You are not supposed to be downcast. When we studied this, I remember going back and looking at other places where people got in big trouble for being downcast in the presence of the king. So this is a real risk that the king notices you to be downcast. But the king apparently has an affection for Nehemiah, his cup bearer. And so he asks him about it and he says, how can I be anything other than downcast when my people are in distress?

Will you let me go back to where the tombs of my fathers are and rebuild? The king says, how long are you going to be gone? And they set a time for when he will come back. So the king authorizes him to go back and rebuild the wall and he gives him letters. About the halfway point of chapter 2 were introduced to the villains of the book of Nehemiah.

Sambalat, Tobiah, and Gesham the Arab. They are beside themselves that anyone would come back to try to help these people. And they commit themselves very firmly to opposing this work. Nehemiah, as soon as he gets back to Jerusalem, at night under cover of darkness, without a lot of people, he goes and surveys the walls so that he knows what he is dealing with. And then at the end of the chapter he gathers the prominent members of the people of God and he says, here's what I've observed, here's what we need to do, let's do it.

And they say, yes, we will follow you, we'll do it. And the chapter ends with Sambalat and Tobiah and Gashub just laughing that the people would try to rebuild. In chapter 3, the whole chapter is about the rebuilding of the wall. And we get, it's sort of hard to read, because there are 42 sections of wall and there are 40 work crews and they are named off, section by section. You have to read through all 42 sections of the wall that are going to get repaired and rebuilt.

And the names of those who are leading each work crew. There are 40 work crews. Many times in this chapter it says that you rebuilt the section of wall by your house. How much sense does that make? That is the wisdom of God at work.

How hard are you going to work on the section of wall next to your house? You're going to work really hard. The craftsmanship is going to be good. You are going to have that right because the safety of you and your family depends upon it. In chapter 4, the enemies get serious about being enemies in chapter 4.

The chapter opens with them just mocking and saying, if a fox goes up on this wall, the work that they're doing, Just the weight of a light-footed fox will knock down the work that they have done. But by the middle of the chapter, it's clear that this is no laughing matter because the gaps in the wall are being closed in record time. And so, We read in verse 8, and all of them conspired together to come and attack Jerusalem and create confusion. A little later, verse 11, the adversaries say, they will neither note or see anything till we come into their midst and kill them and cause the work to cease. They go from mockery at the beginning of the chapter to a serious military conspiracy by the middle of the chapter.

What does Nehemiah do? He's a great leader. He mobilizes the people. He's got them standing guard. His own servants are standing guard.

He never takes off his weapon. He sleeps in his clothes with his weapon on his side. And he's got the people working with one hand and a sword in the other hand. And here's what he says in verse 20. This is one of the key verses in both books.

Nehemiah chapter 4 verse 20. Wherever you hear the sound of the trumpet, Rally to us there. Our God will fight for us. Nehemiah believed, not in really their own power, they're outnumbered. He believed that God would fight for them.

That They should take the measures that they could take. They should work with one hand and have a sword in the other, but ultimately he was trusting in God, knowing that God would fight for them. In chapter 5, There's internal strife. The rich have been oppressing the poor. It's a time of famine.

And people are actually having to sell the labor of their children for tax money. And so the rich are exploiting. The rich have the resources. They have the money to lend. And so they're charging it.

They're lending it at usury. And so Nehemiah says stop it. And he makes them swear that they'll stop it. And they do. They do swear that they'll stop it.

And the chapter ends with a testimony of Nehemiah's own practices. So far from exploiting the poor, he's providing for himself. So the chapter makes clear that the governor has a right to provisions, but he forgoes the right and he provides for himself and he provides for 150 people who are at his table and those who come from the nations. He doesn't take any, he doesn't levy any taxation to provide for himself or the 150 people who are in Jerusalem helping him lead. Chapter 6, the wall is finished but the enemies aren't finished.

They're still enemies and they try to lure him out. They say come meet with us on the plain of Ono. This is right at the edge of Judah, right next to what would have in former times been Philistine territory. Bad idea. Nehemiah knows it's a bad idea and he says, no thanks, no thanks, no thanks, no thanks.

Four times they invite him, four times He says no. And then they say, well you should come talk to us about that. The report is out that you are trying to make yourself king. And he is wise. He is as innocent as a dove, but he is as wise as a serpent.

And he says, No such thing as you say is happening. That having failed, they try to hire people inside Jerusalem. So it turns from an external conspiracy against Nehemiah to an internal conspiracy against Nehemiah. But he sees through that too. So that one fails also.

Then we have this verse in chapter 6 verse 15, so the wall was finished on the 25th day of Elul in 52 days. Two miles of wall got repaired and rebuilt in 52 days. Chapter 7, we see him appointing leadership, two leaders over Jerusalem and putting a sustainable security plan in place. Which is, he knows exactly who is guarding what. He puts them in place and in verse 3 he says, Do not let the gates of Jerusalem be opened until the sun is hot.

It would have been customary during that time to open the gates of the city right at sunrise, but he knows that Jerusalem is still in a time of vulnerability, so he says, wait till noon. Wait till the sun is hot and then open the gates when you are less vulnerable. Finally, the rest of chapter 7 is a repeat of Ezra chapter 2. It recounts who came back in the first wave almost a hundred years earlier with Ezra. And I think that's because he has in mind to repopulate Jerusalem.

So he wants to begin that by knowing who came back to Jerusalem with the first wave. And Chapter 8 might be my favorite chapter of all of Ezra and Nehemiah because the people say to Ezra, the scribe, bring the book of the law of Moses. Read it to us. So there's Ezra on a platform and from early morning from sun up till noon, he's reading the book. The people have longed to hear the book of the law and he's reading the book of the law and the Levites are giving a sense of what it means, they read the book, they realize it's almost time for the Feast of Tabernacles.

And so the second part of chapter 8 is the celebration of the Feast of Tabernacles. And all during that feast, every day they keep bringing out the book and having public readings as part of the day, as part of the Feast of Tabernacles, more reading of the law of God. In chapter 9, it's just a few days later, and they stuck around. They didn't leave. They had gathered, They had sent Ezra to bring the book.

He read half the day. They realized it was almost time for the Feast of Tabernacles. They come for this eight day celebration. But at the end of eight days, as many things must have piled up on their to-do list under that eight days. They didn't leave at the end of that.

What did they do? They put on sackcloth and they fasted. Why was that? Well, because back in chapter eight, when Ezra read from daybreak till noon, they're hearing the law of God, they're seeing the righteous standard of God held up, and they're comparing it to their lives, and they're seeing how they have not measured up, and what do they do? They weep.

And they actually have to be restrained from weeping because it should be a time of joy and celebration. So the Levites say, not now! Go feast! This is a feasting time. So now, after the feast of tabernacles, after the feasting, they stay and they put on sackcloth and they confess and we have this beautiful prayer, a coordinated public prayer through almost all of chapter 9 where they recount the history of Israel and all the sins of their fathers and they acknowledge that they have followed right along in The sins of their fathers and then we see this in verse 33 However, you God are just and all that has befallen us for you have dealt faithfully, but we have done wickedly." They summarize the history of Israel, 1500 years of history or something like that.

They say, God, here's the summary of the history. You've been faithful and we've dealt wickedly, and you're just in everything that has befallen us. The chapter ends with them just asking for mercy anyway because they know that God is a God of mercy. In chapter 10, right on the heels of this public prayer of confession, the people enter into a covenant. And there are many names that are given to us of those who sealed it.

They put their name to the covenant, but They were just representing the rest. Everyone entered into the covenant and some of their representatives actually sealed. They marked the covenant. And the covenant started very broad. It was that They would walk in God's law.

That was chapter 10 verse 29. We'll walk in God's law. But then they begin to name very specific things that have been traps for the people of God. Areas of persistent sin like Sabbath breaking, like intermarriage, like intermarriage, like not providing for the Levites and the priests, like neglecting The temple worship, the corporate worship of God. The people enter into a covenant in 10.

Then in 11, 11 is a chapter about the repopulation of Jerusalem. Jerusalem is this great city but almost no one's living in it. And so what do they do? They designate one out of ten, there's a casting of lots, and a tenth of the population of Judah relocates into Jerusalem. One tenth into Jerusalem, nine tenths remain as the population of Judah.

And there's also mention in verse 2, chapter 11 verse 2, that there are those who willingly offer. They volunteer to go live in Jerusalem and they're blessed by the people. Verse 4, people from the children of Judah. Verse 7, sons of Benjamin, another tribe. Verse 10, of the priests.

Verse 15, of the Levites. Verse 19, of the gatekeepers. These are a listing of the people who already lived in Jerusalem. So they were already there. And I think they are included to honor them because they were in Jerusalem when it was dangerous to be in Jerusalem.

When a tenth of the population relocates to Jerusalem, Jerusalem is going to become strong. These are the names of the people who lived there when Jerusalem wasn't strong, when the enemies always wanted to come in and disrupt and keep them weak. So there's a memorial to these here. And then the chapter ends with the other population centers in Judah. It names them where the rest of the people were living in Judah.

Chapter 12 seems boring because it's names, it's more genealogy. Here's the importance of the genealogy. It's the family trees of priests and Levites. And God has been so clear that in the right worship of Him, He wants the priests doing this and the Levites doing this. Only the priests doing these things.

Only the Levites doing these things. So being able to substantiate that you're really a priest, you can trace your family line back to Aaron is important. And being a Levite, Really being able to trace your family line back to Levi and that tribe is very important. The end of this chapter is not boring at all. It's the dedication of the wall.

They call out two large thanksgiving choirs in verse 13. And one choir goes up on the wall and goes clockwise, and one choir goes up on the wall and goes counterclockwise. They're going opposite ways around the wall, and then they meet at the temple and they go down into the temple to celebrate and sacrifice and dedicate the wall. Chapter 13, I hardly need to say a word about chapter 13 because we've been there for a month. But it says in verse 6 that Nehemiah had had to leave Jerusalem, go back 1500 miles to serve the king.

He's probably away for multiple years. We don't know for sure, but it would take him about a year to get there and back. You don't undertake that length of a trip to go back for a few days and then start on the return journey. When he comes back to Jerusalem, he finds many things a wreck, and he sets them right. They had not been honoring the Sabbath, he sets that right.

They had been letting the wrong people into the temple, he sets that right. They hadn't been providing for the Levites. They're back in the field farming because they have to provide for themselves. People hadn't given them their provision. He sets that right.

They've been engaging in intermarriage. He sets that right. That's where Nehemiah ends. Okay, what should we make of this? Six major themes.

Six major themes. I'm guessing I've forgotten some really important ones. Six is all we have time for anyway. Number one, God raises up kings. That's who does it.

Why is Barack Obama our President? Because God raised him up. There were two verses as we've gone from king to king. Almost every time we change kings, I quote two texts. The first was Daniel chapter 2 verse 21.

God changes the times and the seasons. He removes kings and raises up kings. That's what Daniel says in Daniel chapter 2, 21. The other verse I quoted again and again was Proverbs chapter 21 verse 1. The king's heart is in the hand of the Lord.

Like rivers of water, He turns it wherever He wishes. There were four kings that we studied during the span of Ezra and Nehemiah. Cyrus was the first king. 539 to 530 BC. About ten year reign.

The first wave came back out of captivity because Cyrus said they could. So that was the first king, Cyrus. 539 to 530 BC. The second king was Darius. His reign was 522 to 548 BC.

Now there's a gap of about eight years there. If you're writing down those, you'll see there were two kings, historically, Cambyses and Smyrdis. They're not mentioned in Ezra or Nehemiah because we don't need to know about them. King Darius reigned from 522 to 540, excuse me, 586 BC, about 37 years, a monster reign. There's some historical indication that he's the son-in-law of Cyrus.

Many historians think that he was Cyrus' son-in-law. The temple is completed under his reign. His son, the son of Darius, is a Hasuerus. We only saw him in one verse, Ezra 4 verse 6. But he's very important because he's also known as Xerxes, Ahasuerus or Xerxes, and the book of Esther, and all that happened during the book of Esther, that's a Hasuerus.

So he matters a lot. His son is Artaxerxes. Did I give you the reigns for Hasuerus? The reign? 486 to 464 BC 23 years 486 to 464 Then his son was artxerxes Artaxerxes was the king all during Ezra, the person, not the book.

Ezra The scribe was under King Artaxerxes and so was Nehemiah. So a lot of what we studied was during the time of Artaxerxes. His reign was 464 to 423 BC. Forty-two year reign. Ezra comes onto the scene in the seventh year of his reign.

Nehemiah comes onto the scene in the twentieth year of his reign. Here's what we get out of this. God raises up kings. We only need to fear God. Don't ever fear kings.

God raises them up. God puts them down. God directs their hearts like a water course. Their hearts are in His hand. He directs them wherever He wants to direct them.

We should fear God. He's the one controlling the king. Number two, God raises up sons and daughters to bless and lead His people. That's the second great theme. God raises up sons and daughters to bless and lead His people.

We didn't really study any of the great women of God in Ezra and Nehemiah, but I'm giving a tip of the hat to the daughters of God because Esther is during this time span. It's right in the middle of this time span. God raised her up to bless His people for sure. Think of the names. Zerubbabel, the son of a king, a bad king.

He was a faithful, obedient to God son. Grandson. Think of Jeshua, same thing. He had a wicked grandfather. Those patterns were broken in that family line and he became an obedient, faithful Son of God.

Haggai and Zechariah, prophets that God raised up to bless His people. Ezra, God raised Ezra up to bless and lead his people. Nehemiah, God raised up Nehemiah to bless and lead his people. Listen to Acts chapter 3 verse 22. This is Peter's preaching.

Acts chapter 3 verse 22. Peter's preaching to Jews on Solomon's portico at the temple. He says this, For Moses truly said to the fathers, the Lord your God will raise up for you a prophet like me from your brethren. Him you shall hear of all things whatever he says to you." In Peter's preaching in Acts chapter 3 verse 22 he's quoting Deuteronomy 18 15 where Moses prophesies that God will raise up a prophet like himself. Who is he talking about?

Peter says he is talking about Jesus. God has always raised up people to bless and to lead his people. But Jesus is the ultimate one who is raised up to bless and lead his people. All the rest are just placeholders. So we should marvel at the compelling personalities in Ezra and Nehemiah.

They are compelling. They are worthy of being marveled at, but just know that God did that. And that Jesus Christ, they're just holding the place for who? For Jesus. Because the great need of people is to be saved from their sin.

That's the blessing and the leading we need, is that we would be cleansed from our sins. Good leadership is only of any value if you're not an enemy of God. There's only one thing that makes you not an enemy of God. It's the cleansing blood of Jesus Christ. So marvel at the placeholders, but no, they are just keeping those seats warm for Jesus who will come and do the real work for His people, the saving work.

Number three follows right on the heels of this. God is the main character of Ezra and Nehemiah. God Himself is the main character of Ezra and Nehemiah. It's not the compelling personalities, though they are compelling. Don't go away and write the book, The Leadership Secrets of Nehemiah.

He'd be a best seller. He was a fantastic leader. There's a lot to learn from Nehemiah. You just have to see beyond Nehemiah and know that it's God who raised him up to bless and lead his people. It's God.

How many times did we see the eye of God was upon us, so we did this. Or the good hand of our God was upon us. Or God frustrated our enemies. Or our God will fight for us. Ezra and Nehemiah knew who the real main character of these books was.

It was God Himself. The compelling characters in these two books were rightly seeing life through these lenses, the lenses of the sovereignty of God. What about you? God brings hardship in your life, or when God brings blessing into your life, do you recognize that it's Him? It's the good hand of your God upon you.

Even if you're not wild about the circumstances, He's wiser than you. He knows best how to make a disciple, how to make you grow, how to wean you from the world. We saw this over and over and over again in Ezra and Nehemiah. These are not circumstances that these people would have charted out. But God charted it out for His people and He is wiser.

He knows how to make disciples. Number four, worship is central. If you don't come away with anything else from Ezra and Nehemiah, come away with this. Worship is central. The first wave returns.

Be a great time to attend to your housing. Or getting crops into the field. Or figuring out how you're going to defend yourself. So what did they do? They built the altar.

They started to worship. Because they believed that all that stuff would fall into place if they worshiped God as He had prescribed. How true it is. The second wave comes back. What is the second wave about?

It's about worship reform. That's why Ezra is at the head of it. He's a scribe. He's an expert in the law. He's one who prepared himself to seek the law of the Lord and to do it and to teach it.

That's why he's at the head of this wave of returning captives. For reform of worship. The third wave comes back. Their main task is to build the wall, but as soon as that wall is built, what are they doing? Reforming worship.

So we should come away from Ezra and Nehemiah and ask ourselves, what place does worship occupy in my life? What place? Does worship get the leftovers in your life? Oh boy, that's not worship. Actually, it is worship.

It's worshiping you. When worship gets the leftovers, It is worship, but it's not worship of God. It's worship of you. God should get the best. The first and the best.

That's the principle of the first fruits. God gets the first and the best, not the leftovers. That's what we should learn from Ezra and Nehemiah that worship should have the central place, the place of honor in our lives. Number five. The Word of God changes the people of God.

How could I leave these two books without saying that? The Word of God changes the people of God. They keep colliding with the Word of God. Usually the public reading of the Word of God. We saw that so much towards the end of Nehemiah.

People keep being pressed upon by the Word of God. The righteous standard of God is held up and explained and people say, I'm nothing like that. I need to change. And those who are really of God, who are really sons and daughters of God, when they collide with the Word of God, they change. How do you know if you're really in Christ?

Well, can you look back and see some trajectory of change? You must. This is what it means to be really a son or a daughter. When you collide, eventually the Word of God gets the best of it. And you admit that He's right, and you've been wrong all this time.

And there's a desire to be different, to be conformed into the precious image of Jesus. I'm coming away from Ezra and Nehemiah wanting the Word of God to have a place of greater honor in my life. I hope that's true of you too. Number six. Finally.

Christians are all building a life after escaping the captivity of Babylon. I'll say it again because that's a long one. Number six, Christians are all building a life after escaping the captivity of Babylon. To me, this has been maybe the most useful thing in the book. To see these people who were dragged into captivity, and then they are released, and they can go back to Jerusalem and build a life that honors God.

Brothers and sisters, that's all we're doing. If you're in Christ, You are in captivity. You are in bondage to sin. And the blood of Jesus Christ releases you. But that's not the end of the story.

That's the beginning of a long 1500 mile journey back to Jerusalem. And even when you get there, the altar is not in place, the walls are broken down, there's no temple. You've got to start building. Praise the Lord for justification, but the story doesn't end for Christians at justification. It's just the starting line.

Here are the lessons that I think we learned from Ezra and Nehemiah. Number one, it's hard fought. If you're expecting growth to be anything other than hard fought, we haven't been studying Ezra and Nehemiah very well. Growth is hard fought. Number two, we need God.

God is the main character in our stories too. We are in desperate need. If He doesn't do it, it's not going to get done. So We need to throw ourselves on our faces before God and plead with Him like these compelling personalities in Ezra and Nehemiah were doing all the time. The third thing I learned is that it doesn't happen all at once.

The king doesn't say, okay fine you can leave from captivity and then you're at the end state somehow magically. No! There's a century covered in Ezra and Nehemiah, 117 years. And they're still not done. I mean that story is not done at the end of Nehemiah.

Do you think all is taken care of permanently? At the end of Nehemiah? No. Sanctification is progressive. Justification happens in a moment of time.

You repent and believe the Gospel and you are saved forever. Sanctification is only getting started then. This side of heaven, it will never be done. On the day of your death, you'll wish you had made it further than you make it. That's how it works.

The more progress you make, the more feeble you feel. One day, we'll be free from all sin. And then we really will have arrived. In the meantime, we haven't arrived. So here's the question.

Are you taking the needful next step or pining away for the end step? The end state. That's the question for you and me. Are you taking the needful next step? Ok, there's no temple and we just got back and a lot of things need to be done, but we should build the altar.

And it will be an altar out under the stars. Because we can't do both at the same time. But the needful next step is we build the altar and get going on doing something. I can't do everything, but I should do something. Are you taking the needful next step or pining away for the end state, looking at someone who's decades ahead of you in sanctification and just wishing you were there?

No, God doesn't want us to spend our lives like that. God wants us to take the needful next step and get moving. Here's the conclusion. Very simple, very short. Rejoice in God.

God is a God who fights for His people. That's what we see from Ezra chapter 1 verse 1 through Nehemiah chapter 13 verse 31. The whole span is God fighting for His people. How many times in this hundred year span would you have given up on that people and said, this is hopeless. God doesn't do that.

He never leaves us or forsakes us. He fights for his people. They keep falling back into the same old sins. He keeps raising up men to help them and bless them and lead them. Praise God.

Rejoice in God. Father, thank you for the time that you've given us in Ezra and Nehemiah. It has been rich months. We look forward to what's in the future in 1st and 2nd Thessalonians. Every time we leave a book of the Bible, it's like leaving an old friend.

It's hard to leave, but thank you God for giving us the richness, the texture, the depth, the breadth of your Word. Help us to continue to be, to collide with it and change. We pray in Jesus' name, Amen.