In the sermon 'The Grieving Prayer of a Godly Man,' Jason Dohm focuses on Nehemiah's prayer in chapter 1, verses 4-11, highlighting its significance as a model for God-centered, intercessory prayer. Nehemiah responds to news of Jerusalem's distress with intense prayer and fasting, demonstrating his deep connection to God's people despite being geographically distant. The sermon emphasizes Nehemiah's exemplary pattern of prayer, which includes acknowledging God's greatness, confessing sin, and calling on God's promises. Nehemiah's prayer is marked by humility, perseverance, and a lack of self-centeredness as he intercedes for the people of Israel. The sermon encourages believers to use Nehemiah's prayer as a guide in their own prayer life, urging them to be persistent and heartfelt in their prayers, and to align their desires with God's will. Dohm also challenges listeners to troubleshoot the absence of tears in their prayers, suggesting a lack of time with God or unconfessed sin might be the cause. The sermon concludes by urging the congregation to make prayer a central focus in the new year.

Nehemiah chapter 1 sermon text is verses 4 through 11 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 God of heaven and I said I pray Lord God of heaven oh great and awesome God you who keep your covenant and mercy with those who love you and observe your commandments Please let your ear be attentive and your eyes open that you may hear the prayer of your servant which I pray before you now, day and night, for the children of Israel your servants and confess the sins of the children of Israel which have sinned against you. Both my father's house and I have sinned. We have acted very corruptly against you and have not kept the commandments, the statutes, nor the ordinances which you commanded your servant Moses. Remember, I pray, the word that you commanded your servant Moses saying if you are unfaithful I will scatter you among the nations but if you return to me and keep my commandments and do them Though some of you were cast out to the farthest parts of the heavens Yet I will gather them from there and bring them to the place which I have chosen as a dwelling for my name Now These are your servants and your people, whom you have redeemed by your great power and your strong hand.

O Lord, I pray, please let your ear be attentive to the prayer of your servant and to the prayer of your servants who desire to fear your name. And let your servant prosper this day I pray and grant him mercy in the sight of this man for I was the King's cup bearer. The title of the message this morning is the grieving prayer of a godly man. And that's what we have before us. Nehemiah, we left him off in verse 4 last week.

And he had sat down and wept before the Lord and he's praying and fasting. And the text says this goes on for many days. Last week we had the introduction to this man and the book that he's written much first person narrative in. So he's at least responsible for writing long portions of the book. And last week we learned that he's actually in the city of Shushan, which is one of the three most prominent cities in the Persian Empire.

He's the cup bearer of the king. It's the twentieth year of King Artaxerxes. King Artaxerxes has been king a long time and is going to be king a lot more. He has actually a 42 year reign. As Nehemiah is in Shushan, Hanani and others from Judah come, and they've come from Judah.

And so Nehemiah is able to inquire about how things are going with the Lord's people and how things are going in the Lord's city. Jerusalem. Han and I and his brethren from Judah reply that the people there in Jerusalem are in great distress and reproach. They are hard pressed. They are really in a shameful condition.

They are feeling the shame of how exposed they are. The walls are broken down and the gates are burned. They are totally exposed to the enemy around them. They are feeling the shame of that. Having heard this, the text says of Nehemiah, by Nehemiah, I sat down and wept and mourned for many days.

I was fasting and praying. Not I fasted and prayed, period move on. I was fasting and praying. He's in a perpetual state of prayer and fasting. This week in verses 5-11 we get the actual contents of his prayer.

That's why I've titled the message, The Grieving Prayer of a Godly Man, because we know he's weeping. So this is a prayer offered in tears. You have to keep that in mind as you're reading the words of 5 through 11. It's a prayer offered in tears. It's an exemplary prayer, meaning it's a great prayer.

It's a prayer that we should learn to pray like. And it's a pattern for prayer that God has given to His people. That's why we have this text, as a pattern, to help us to learn how to pray in a way that will please God. So as we go to the text, let's go to the Lord in prayer. Lord, I pray that you would use Nehemiah chapter 1 to help us to learn to pray in a way that would honor you, that our prayers would be a sweet smelling aroma to you.

And that they would glorify you and that our prayers would be so consistent with the desires of your own heart. God, don't let our prayers be consistent with the desires of our heart. Let our prayers resonate with you. Let them be like your own desires. Let them express your desires.

Be according to your will and be for your glory. God I pray as we learn to pray after a pattern that you've given to us in your word that you would help us to grow in the discipline of prayer. That it would become such a pattern, such a part of our rhythm of life, that we would be more like these godly men who you set before us. Thank you for the text and I pray that your spirit now would come and help me to preach, help everyone else to hear, hear from you in Jesus' name. Amen.

So this prayer is so much like what Ezra prayed in Ezra chapter 9 that rather than do kind of a phrase by phrase exposition of what a long text would take a long time to do that, and it's sort of already been done in some ways in Ezra chapter 9 because the prayers are so similar, I've gone through to look at this as a pattern, as a way that God would use in our lives to help us to pray in a more God-honoring way, in a more God-centered way. I've just plucked things out of here to say, okay, this is part of a pattern. Here's an element of this pattern that God is giving us. Here's another element. Here's another element.

Here's another element. And I've taken ten things from this prayer that I think would help us as we would use Nehemiah's prayer as a pattern for our own prayers. So it's really going to be a list of ten things. My encouragement isn't memorize the ten things. My encouragement is know that this is a pattern that can help us in our prayers.

The things I've lifted out are so obvious you won't need your notes. You'll be able to go back to Ezra chapter 1 and lift them out again in the future. You don't need to make an acrostic that helps you memorize the ten points. They're there and they're obvious. And so now let's embark on the list.

So if you've got a handout, it's a fill in the blank Sunday. I know some of you love lists and some of you love filling the blanks. So it's your Sunday if that's you. Number one, point number one, Nehemiah praise. I'm starting with the painfully obvious.

Nehemiah praise. He hears this report, a heart breaking report. People are in great distress and reproach. They're feeling ashamed of how exposed they are. And this breaks Nehemiah's heart.

What does he do when he receives a heart breaking report? He prays. It's a passionate prayer. It's a prayer offered in tears. It's a prayer born out of grief.

And you can tell this man is not a stranger to prayer. He has been much with the Lord. And so these things that grieve the heart of God grieve him, really grieve him to the point where he would sit down and weep for many days. And that would thrust him into fasting and praying. Nehemiah is in Shushan.

He's 1200 miles away from Jerusalem. So he Hardly knows anyone there by name, is my guess. It's a world away. But it's not a world away in his heart. It's just a world away in miles.

He's very connected with these brothers and sisters in the Lord, even though he's so far away from them geographically. So when he gets this report that the walls are broken and the gates are burned, he can't do anything but sit and weep. This is not the last time anyone will weep over Jerusalem. In Luke chapter 19 verses 41 through 44, Jesus is coming into Jerusalem for the last time. It's going to be a spectacular week of ministry.

And He'll be dead in a week. As He comes into Jerusalem for the last time, He weeps over the city. Because the people there did not know the time of their visitation. That's what the text says. That's why he's weeping.

They didn't realize that the Redeemer was coming into their city. He was coming into His holy temple. And so Nehemiah here is modeling for us in Nehemiah chapter 1 the heart of Jesus Christ. 450 years later or something like that, Jesus is going to come into Jerusalem. As he's looking out over the city, as he comes into it, he's weeping over the city.

And Nehemiah is weeping over the city of Jerusalem and the state of it. In Nehemiah chapter 1. Here's my question for us. It really is for us. I'm not pointing a finger at you.

I'm pointing a finger at me and saying it might apply more broadly. Why are our prayers always tearless? How come? I'm not saying it would be normal if we cried all the time when we prayed. I'm just saying if we never find ourselves crying when we pray, can we really lay claim to having the heart of Jesus?

And the answer to that is no. We cannot lay claim to having the heart of Jesus if our prayers are always tearless. Nehemiah is a man who has been much with God. You can tell that by his prayers. This is not the prayer of an amateur.

These are the prayers of the man who has been with God much, and so he shares the heart of God, he has the heart of God, he has the mind of Christ. A mind that weeps over the city of Jerusalem. Of course this is spiritually applied. The city of Jerusalem is the Lord's people. It's the symbol of where God has chosen for His name to dwell.

It dwells in His people. The knee-jerk reaction of Ezra, the knee-jerk reaction of Nehemiah is deep intercessory prayer, bridging the gap between God and a sinful people who bear His name. Is that our knee-jerk reaction? We saw that in Ezra, right? That's the immediate reaction of Ezra in Ezra chapter 9 as he gets the report of The mixing of the holy seed with the unholy.

Ezra does exactly the same thing. He sits down, he weeps and he prays. It's the knee-jerk reaction of Nehemiah. Deep, intercessory prayer. What's our knee-jerk reaction?

When we get news that the Lord's people are not well, that they're in deep distress and reproach. So that's number one. Nehemiah prays. This is his knee-jerk reaction. You tap him on the knee with a hammer, this is what happens.

He prays. He seeks God. Number two, Nehemiah begins by acknowledging God as He is. So if you're taking notes on the handout, acknowledging God is. Nehemiah begins.

This is how his prayer begins. He acknowledges by acknowledging God as He is. Look at verse 5. It's the very beginning of the prayer. And I said, I pray, Lord God of heaven, O great and awesome God, you who keep your covenant and mercy with those who love you and observe your commandments.

Nehemiah knows who God is and he begins his prayer by acknowledging it, by acknowledging what God is like. He begins, Lord God of Heaven, capital L, capital O, capital R, capital D, Jehovah, Yahweh, the most holy name of God. God has many names in the Bible. This is the most holy one. That's why it's in all caps.

Rather than transliterating it Jehovah or Yahweh, we have Lord in all caps. That's Lord of Lords. I am that I am, the self-existent God of everything. This reminds me so much of Matthew chapter 6 verse 9, Jesus teaching his disciples to pray. In Matthew chapter 6 verse 9, Jesus tells his disciples, in this manner Therefore pray, Our Father in Heaven.

These are almost exactly the same words as Nehemiah in the beginning of his prayer. Our Father in heaven, hallowed be your name. Hallowed means to honor as holy. The name of God, His name is just the representation of all that He is. That His name, the representation of all that He is, would be honored as holy.

It would be lifted up and exalted and known as incomparable. That's the holiness of God. It means he's not like anything else. He's not a superman. He's totally other.

So Nehemiah begins his prayer by hallowing the name of God, by highly exalting the one whom he is addressing. Turning your Bibles to Exodus 34 verses 5 through 9. In Exodus 34, the Ten Commandments have been given, Moses comes down the mountain, he sees the people dancing before a golden calf, and he throws those tablets down and breaks them. And now he has to go back up on the mountain, and He has to be given tablets. He brings the tablets and this time he has to etch the Ten Commandments in the tablets.

And this is what's happening in Exodus chapter 34. So that's the background of Exodus chapter 34 verses 5 through 9 in which God announces himself. He comes to meet with Moses at the top of the mountain and he announces himself and then Moses responds. Exodus chapter 34 verses 5 through 9. Now the Lord descended, the Lord, capital L, capital O, capital R, capital D, Jehovah Yahweh.

The Lord descended in the cloud and stood with him there and proclaimed the name of the Lord. This is God announcing himself, proclaiming his own name. And the Lord passed before him and proclaimed, the Lord, the Lord God, Merciful and gracious, long-suffering and abounding in goodness and truth, keeping mercy for thousands, forgiving iniquity and transgression and sin, by no means clearing the guilty, visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children and the children's children to the third and fourth generation. So Moses made haste and bowed his head down to the earth and worshiped. Then he said, If now I have found grace in your sight, O Lord, let my Lord, I pray, go among us even though we are a stiff-necked people and pardon our iniquity and our sin and take us as your inheritance.

Nehemiah is so much like Moses as God comes and meets with him and announces himself as a God of mercy, A God who forgives transgressions but doesn't clear the guilty. And Moses just falls down on his face and says, Lord, go with us even though we're a sinful people. Nehemiah sounds like this man. Nehemiah sounds like he's been reading Exodus. And when your address of God, your acknowledgement of God, sounds like how God announces himself, you're on the right track.

This is what's happening in Nehemiah 1. Nehemiah is acknowledging God as He is. How do we know that? Because it sounds just like how God announces Himself when He comes down to Moses. Nehemiah says, Lord God of heaven, you who rule from heaven, you are a covenant-keeping God, O God who always keeps all of His promises, O God of mercy, you who have not treated us as our sins deserve.

You keep your promises and you extend your mercy to those who love you and who observe your commandments. God's promise keeping and God's mercy are pointed towards a certain group of people, towards those who love Him and observe His commandments. Now, how are we to understand that? I think there are two ways you could understand it. I mean this group that God's promise keeping and His mercy are pointed at.

So here's the first way you can understand it. These two things, loving God and observing His commandment are separate things. They're separate conditions that must exist. And if they exist, then God will keep His promises and He'll point His mercy at you. If you love God but you don't observe His commandments, you're out.

You've not met the two preconditions. Or if you observe His commandments but you don't really love Him in your heart, then you're out. He's not keeping those promises towards you. His mercy is not pointed at you. You could understand it that way.

There's a second way which I think is the right way to understand that, which is to say that one describes the other. That loving God and observing His Commandments are not separate things that serve as preconditions that have to be met so that God will keep His promises and point His mercy at you, but that observing His commandments describes one who loves him. Those who love him, parentheses, keep his commandments. That's who loves God. The ones who are keeping his commandments.

Consider as I read John 14, 23 and 25. In John chapter 14 verses 23 through 25 we read this, Jesus answered and said to him, if anyone loves me he will keep my word. My Father will love him and we will come to him and make our home with him. He who does not love me does not keep my words. And the word which you hear is not mine but the fathers who sent me." Jesus just says so plainly that if you love him, you keep his commandments.

There aren't people who love God but just can't bring themselves to observe His commandments. They don't exist. It's not a real category. It's an imagined category. The flip is also true.

There are not people who observe the commandments of the Lord but just can't bring themselves to love Him. Real obedience to God always comes out of a love for God. You might be able to do things externally, so somebody else would be able to look from the outside and say, looks like he's observing the Lord's commandment. But if your heart's not in it, God has a different view of the same set of circumstances. He says, that's not obedience.

So to love God is to observe His commandments. To observe His commandments is to love God. Obedience always flows from a heart that loves God. If you love God, it is because He loved you first. The great demonstration of His love is what?

The cross. Jesus on the cross is the great demonstration of His love. It paves the way for you to love Him in return. If you love God, it's a sign that He loved you first. He demonstrated it in Christ.

He brought you into Christ. And then, that always, always, always, always, always bears fruit. You are the object of God's love, so you find yourself loving Him back. That is always going to bear fruit. In other words, His love is the source of your love and it transforms you.

That's how this should be understood. The love of God is the source of your love. If you find yourself loving God, that's why. He loved you first. And that always transforms you.

There's no other option. Everything else is just a mirage. It can be faked. But that's not a real category if it's faked. So number two was Nehemiah begins by acknowledging God as he is.

This is how we should begin our prayers, by acknowledging God as he is. And a good place to start is how he announces himself. How he introduces himself. Number three, Nehemiah frees himself from presumption. So if you're taking, if you're filling in blanks, freeze presumption.

Nehemiah frees himself from presumption. We really need to do this when we pray. Look at the first part of verse 6. We're back in Nehemiah chapter 1, first part of verse 6. Nehemiah prays, Please let your ear be attentive and your eyes open, that you may hear the prayer of your servant which I pray before you now." Wow, could the modern Christian world use a big heaping dose of this.

Please, we'll start there. Please, you're not approaching God like he owes you something, are you? In your prayers? God owes you something. You've earned something from God.

I think the magic word is the most appropriate way to begin our prayers. Please, oh God, oh God who owes me nothing, who if he was hungry wouldn't even tell me because I have nothing to give him, nothing to add him. That's Psalm 50. God says if I were hungry I would not tell you. God needs nothing from us and owes us nothing.

Please let your ear be attentive and your eyes open. God, I may not have a right to be heard or seen by you, but I desire to be heard by you and seen by you. Nehemiah is a supplicant. That's a nice way to say a humble beggar. He comes to God as a humble beggar.

Yes, it is true that in Christ we have free access. We are actually told to come with boldness. I'm not trying to teach the opposite of that. There is a sense in which we come before God as humble beggars. Even though we're welcome to come, and we can come boldly, we are coming to a God who doesn't owe us.

Nehemiah comes as one who serves at the pleasure of a king. And I'm not talking about King Artxerxes. He prays like a man who understands that he serves at the pleasure of a king. Not an earthly king, the King of Kings. Today there's a blasphemous theology that says we can command God.

That's not only silly, that's not only stupid, that's blasphemous. We don't command God, He commands us. And our prayers should reflect it. The language of our prayers should be like you would talk to an earthly authority, only how much more so. So that was number three.

Nehemiah frees himself from presumption. When we pray, we should free ourselves from presumption, from presuming that God has no choice but to hear our prayers, that we can command Him in our prayers, that we're anything but serving at the pleasure of a king of kings. Number four, Nehemiah perseveres in prayer. That's the blank, perseveres. Nehemiah perseveres in prayer.

Look at 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 God of heaven. It is many days. It's not one and done.

This prayer is prayed again and again over the period of many days, I'm sure in many different forms, with many words that we don't have here. This is the start of a many day prayer. Verse 6, day and night. God, I pray to you day and night. Just confirming what we saw in verse 4.

Then if we go to chapter 2, the second half of verse 4, Nehemiah has come into the presence of the king, the king notices that he's downcast, he says, why are you downcast? He tells him, he says, what's your request? And then we see this in the second half of verse 4, chapter 2. So I prayed to the God of heaven. So even as he's making the request, he keeps on praying.

He's secretly praying to God as he's making his request to the kings. Just praying and praying and praying and praying. He's persevering in prayer. Turn to Luke chapter 18. Luke chapter 18.

Luke chapter 18 verses 1 through 8. Then Jesus spoke a parable to them that men always ought to pray and not lose heart, saying, There was in a certain city a judge who did not fear God nor regard man. Now there was a widow in that city and she came to him saying, Get justice for me from my adversary. And he would not for a while, but afterward he said within himself, Though I do not fear God nor regard man, yet because this widow troubles me I will avenge her. Lest by her continual coming, she weary me." Then the Lord said, Hear what the unjust judge said, And shall God not avenge his own elect, who cry out day and night to him, though he bears long with them.

I tell you that he will avenge them speedily. Nevertheless, when the Son of Man comes, will he really find faith on the earth? It's almost like Nehemiah was there in Luke 18, listening to Jesus. He's learned it from someone. Men always ought to always pray and not lose heart.

He keeps praying. He doesn't lose heart. He knows God will hear the prayers of His people, so He keeps praying. At the very end of this, we see this. Jesus asks, when the Son of Man, will he really find faith on the earth?

He says keep praying, keep praying, keep praying. If the unjust judge will answer persistent prayers, How much will God, who is tender towards his people, who loves his elect, how much will God, how much more will God answer the prayers of his people? So he exhorts people to pray that way. But He says, when I return will I find faith on earth? In other words, it is a demonstration of faith.

It's a demonstration of trust in God to persevere in prayer. Not to be one and done for the things that you're asking the Lord for. That demonstrates faith. God wants us to be faithful in our prayers. Full of faith in our prayers.

Demonstrating through our persistence that we believe that he answers the prayers of his people. That was number four, Nehemiah perseveres in prayer. Number five, Nehemiah's prayer is not self-centered. Blank fillers, self-centered. Nehemiah's prayer is not self-centered.

Second half of verse 6, we're back in Nehemiah now, second half of verse 6, I pray before you now day and night for the children of Israel your servants. That's the object of his prayers. That's what he's targeting the Lord's people, for the children of Israel your servant. Verse 11, we're going to see that he prays for success and favor, but even that is for the Lord's people. He needs success.

Nehemiah needs success. Nehemiah needs favor, but the end of that is not so he can enjoy success in favor. It's for him to be a blessing to the Lord's people. So even the prayers for himself here in this prayer are not ultimately for himself. They are not self-centered prayers, even though he is praying for himself.

We should pray for ourselves. Do I even need to say that? Of course we should pray for ourselves. We are so needy. God is so able.

If we're this needy and God's that able, how could we not pray for ourselves? So of course we should pray for ourselves. Of course that's appropriate. But our prayers must not be self-centered. That's not the same thing.

At the heart of our prayers must be the glory of God and the welfare of His people. And you're one of His people, so you can pray for you. The welfare of his people so that God's name would be great. That's at the heart of our prayers. This is at the heart of Nehemiah's prayer.

This is not a prosperity prayer even though we're going to see the word prosper in verse 11. It's not a prosperity prayer in that sense. He wants to prosper so that God's name would be great, so that the reproach would be lifted from the Lord's people in Jerusalem And God would be exalted. That's number five. Nehemiah's prayer is not self-centered.

Number six. Nehemiah confesses sin before he makes his requests. Nehemiah confesses sin before he makes his requests. Look at the very end of verse 6 and verse 7. And confess the sins of the children of Israel which we have sinned against you, both my father's house and I have sinned.

We have acted very corruptly against you and have not kept the commandments, the statutes, nor the ordinances which you commanded your servant, Moses. The order matters. The order of this prayer matters. It's significant that he acknowledges and confesses his sins, the sins of his family, the sins of his people before he starts asking of God. Our biggest need is always the forgiveness of sin.

So really he is asking of God. In the confession of his sin and asking for mercy, he's begun the requests. Our biggest need is always the forgiveness of sin. This is like the Lord's prayer, like the Lord teaching his disciples. In Matthew chapter 6 verse 12 we see it very simply, forgive us our debts.

Jesus taught us to pray the way that we see Nehemiah praying here, forgive us our debts. God we are sinners. Our greatest need is that you would pass over our transgressions. That the blood of your son would be painted over our doorpost so that the angel of death would pass over us. He started with acknowledging God as he is.

God, you are a great and awesome God. Awesome means terrible, fearful. You're a great and a fearful God, a great and terrible God. So he sees this grand vision of God, this expansive, heart captivating vision of God and then he acknowledges him, he acknowledges himself as he is. So, God you're like this, God I see I'm like that.

You see what's happening here? God you're great. You're holy. Your name should be hallowed, honored as holy. And I'm nothing like that.

I'm a sinful man from a sinful family among a sinful people. Paul Washer says this in his book, The Gospel's Power and Message. I was reading that yesterday and came across this quote and I said, oh this is right for the sermon. We rob men of a greater vision of God because we will not give them a lower vision of themselves." Did you get that? These things are related.

How you see yourself and how you see God are totally interrelated, inseparably interrelated. We rob men of a greater vision of God because we will not give them a lower vision of themselves. In that, we think too much of man and we think too little of God. So we need to expand our vision of God and rightly have a vision of man, have a right understanding of man. This is not false humility.

This is seeing ourselves as we really are. I'm not lobbying for a woe is me false humility. I'm saying we we don't need that. Like We have every basis for all this true humility in the world because of what we're really like, especially in comparison to God. We need to understand the gap between a holy God and ourselves and what we think and say and do.

It's good for our view of God and it's good for our view of ourselves and it should find its way into our prayers. Like Ezra in Ezra chapter 9, like Daniel in Daniel chapter 9, Nehemiah keeps himself as part of the sin equation. In other words, it's not those knuckle-headed sinners over there. It's us knuckle-headed sinners right here. It's Right in the middle of the equation because he's seeing things rightly.

He's sinned. His father's house is sinned. His people have sinned. He says, like Ezra and like Daniel, we, we. Not them and me, we have sinned.

That's number six. Nehemiah confesses sin before he makes his request. Here's number seven. The heart of Nehemiah's request is, summed up in this word, remember. That's at the heart of Nehemiah's request.

Look at the first part of verse 8. Remember, I pray, the word that you commanded your servant Moses. God, remember your word. God, remember your promises. Not that God could ever forget, but He's calling on God to see these circumstances and to take this opportunity to make these circumstances a glorious fulfillment of His promises.

God, remember your word to your people. Remember your promises to your people. Take these circumstances and use these circumstances, God, to glorify your name by using them as just a glorious fulfillment of promises that you've made. Now, I could take you to Leviticus chapter 26 and show you almost these exact words that follow this. About God promising to scatter them to the nations if they won't obey and promising to gather them back when they repent.

We can go to Leviticus chapter 26 and see almost identical words. Or I could take you to Deuteronomy chapter 4 to find almost the identical words. This is a man in Nehemiah who is very familiar with Moses' books. The Pentateuch, Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, Deuteronomy. He knows them.

You can tell that because he's using all the same words. He's getting it right to the nth degree. I'll ask you to turn to Deuteronomy chapter 28. I just want you to see Nehemiah using Moses' words. He acknowledges in his prayer these are the things that God has given through Moses.

Deuteronomy chapter 28. Deuteronomy chapter 28 at the end verses 63 through 65. Follow along. Deuteronomy chapter 28, beginning in verses 63. And it shall be That just as the Lord rejoiced over you to do good to you and multiply you, so the Lord will rejoice over you to destroy you and bring you to nothing.

And you shall be plucked off from the land which you go to possess. Then the Lord will scatter you among the peoples from one end of the earth to the other, and there you shall serve other gods which neither you nor your fathers have known, wood and stone. And among those nations you shall find no rest, nor shall the sole of your foot have a resting place. But the Lord will give you a trembling heart, failing eyes, and anguish of soul. Now turn to chapter 30.

Just flip over a page. Deuteronomy chapter 30. I'll be reading verses 1 through 6. Now it shall come to pass when all these things come upon you, the blessing and the curse which I have set before you. And you call them to mind among all the nations where the Lord your God drives you and you return to the Lord your God and obey his voice According to all that I command you today, you and your children, with all your heart, with all your soul, that the Lord your God will bring you back from captivity and have compassion on you and gather you again from all the nations where the Lord your God has scattered you.

If any of you are driven out to the farthest parts under heaven, from there the Lord your God will gather you, and from there he will bring you. Then the Lord your God will bring you into the land which your fathers possessed and you shall possess it. He will prosper you and multiply you more than your fathers and the Lord your God will circumcise your heart and the heart of your descendants to love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul that you may live." Nehemiah is practically quoting Deuteronomy 28 and 30. He's calling on God to remember what He said in Leviticus chapter 26 and Deuteronomy chapter 4 and Deuteronomy chapter 28 and Deuteronomy chapter 30. Oh God, remember your word, remember your promises to your people that if they'll repent and turn towards you, that you'll gather them again and that you'll prosper them.

If God is really that great, if He's really the God of heaven, the great and awesome God, and He is, And if we're really that sinful, if we're sinners from sinful families among sinful people, and we are, our only hope is His promises. That's it. We're reduced to this in Nehemiah's prayer. God is great, we are sinful, we only have one hope, that's in His promises. That's that He would be merciful.

Not because He owes us anything, but because He is a compassionate God. So you throw yourself on those promises because there's nothing else to throw yourself on. We should take note of the content of what he's saying. He's saying in his prayers what Paul says in Galatians chapter 6, God will not be mocked. God is not mocked.

Do not be deceived, brethren. God is not mocked. Whatever a man sows, that he will reap. The people of God have sowed and they did reap. Nehemiah is a man who was born in Persia.

Imagine this man praying this. A man born in Persia. A man whose life is a fulfillment of God's promise to judge sin, unrepented sin. But, That's not the end. The curses aren't at the end.

The blessings are also promised for those who will turn their hearts. Their stubborn, sinful hearts, if you will turn and forsake your wickedness and throw yourself upon the mercy of God, you will find him merciful and he'll bring you back and he will prosper you. He'll give you spiritual prosperity even though it's exactly the opposite of what you deserved if you'll just turn. Listen to Joel 2 verse 25. Joel 2 verse 25, the first part of Joel is just about being scattered for sin.

It's a promise that God is going to scatter them for their sins. But then God says this in Joel 2.25, So I will restore to you the years that the swarming locust has eaten, the crawling locust, the consuming locust, the chewing locust, my great army which I sent among you. You shall eat in plenty and be satisfied. And praise the name of the Lord your God who has dealt wondrously with you. My people shall never be put to shame." This is the truth.

This is the beauty of the Gospel that though you're a sinner from a sinful family among a sinful people, that God is able to restore the years that have been eaten up by the locust that He sent to judge sin. So maybe He sent judgment into your life for your stubbornness or your sin. Not all trial and tribulation is that, but some of it is. Maybe he sent it upon you. He sent an army of locusts to eat up your stuff.

The story doesn't end there. He can give back the years that the locust devoured. We should believe in him to do it. Number eight. That was number seven.

The heart of Nehemiah's request is remember number eight. The words of God are on Nehemiah's lips. I've sort of been making this point all along. The words of God are on Nehemiah's lips. He's praying Exodus chapter 34 and how God announces Himself.

He's using the same words. He's praying Deuteronomy chapter 28 and 30, the promises of God both to discipline those who are in sin and won't repent and to restore those whose hearts are turned back to God. If praying the will of God is the name of the game, and it is, that's our prayer should honor ourselves, our prayer should honor man, our prayer should honor God. That's the name of the game. If praying things consistent with the heart of God is the name of the game, and it is, we should be praying things that line up with the heart of God, then we should pray scripture.

Have you noticed that quarter by quarter, so a three month period of time, we have a recitation passage? Sometimes we do better with actually memorizing it and sometimes we do worse, if you like the domes. But in any event, there's 13 Sundays where we recite it. So we're becoming very familiar with the words. And then we move on, there's another three months and another passage.

That as we're piling up passages that at the very least we've read aloud together 13 times, that the phrases are creeping into our prayers. This is good. We should want an acceleration of that trend. We should want more of the phrases of scripture in our prayers. They're more in line with God's heart than our own phrases.

They are. They're more honoring to God than our own thoughts. They're more in accord with His will than the things we think up on our own. Of course, we have to know it to pray it. Nehemiah knew it.

He knew the word of God and it rolled off his lips in his prayers. So that's number eight. The words of God are on Nehemiah's lips. Number nine, Nehemiah is among those who delight in the fear of God. Look at verses 10 through the first part of 11.

Nehemiah chapter 1 verses 10. Now these are your servants and your people whom you have redeemed by your great power and by your strong hand. O Lord, I pray, please let your ear be attentive to the prayer of your servant and to the prayer of your servants who desire to fear your name. Nehemiah is among those who Delight to fear God. The New King James renders it desire.

Desire to fear the Lord. The NASB and the ESV, the New American Standard and the English Standard, render it delight instead of desire. Delight to fear the Lord. Here's a literal expansion on that word from the Hebrew. It is desiring, delighting in, Having pleasure in.

That's an expanded view of what that Hebrew word means. So desire is a good translation. But as long as you understand it in the context of the broader view, delighting in, having pleasure in, it's that kind of desire. It's not the I hope I can somehow make myself fear your name kind of desire. While I'm really hoping that I can muster up enough to fear your name.

It's not that kind of desire. It's the delight kind of desire. Like you desire cake. That kind of desire. Take pleasure in.

These are people who delight to fear the Lord. They don't just fear the name of the Lord, they love it. They love to fear his name. They take pleasure in fearing the name of the Lord as you would fear a good father. Their prayers are offered in that spirit God We take pleasure in revering your name and hallowing your name In honoring the holiness of your name And we're offering our prayers because of that Number nine neomaias among those who delight to fear God that's the kind of desire number ten Neomaias praise for success and favor Look at the second half of verse 11.

Let your servant prosper this day, I pray, and grant him mercy in the sight of this man. So the new King James says, let your servant prosper. The new American standard though, the NASB, renders it, make your servant successful. Very close, but just a little different flavor. Or the English standard, the ESV says, give success to your servant.

This is not a self-centered, make me rich prayer. None of the rest of the prayer has been like this. There's no reason to understand this, and that way we'd be so out of step with everything else. Let me prosper does not mean make me rich. It means give me success for your great name so that your people would be blessed and helped.

He says, grant him mercy in the sight of this man. The hymn here is Nehemiah. Grant me mercy in the sight of this man. So to Nehemiah, the Lord is the Lord God of Heaven, the great and awesome God who keeps His promises and directs His mercy towards His people. And the King of the Empire is this man.

See how striking that is. God is great and awesome. God is the promise-keeping God who is merciful towards His people. The most powerful man on earth is this man. Nehemiah knows that whether or not he has favor in the eyes of the king is completely up to God.

This king's heart is in the hand of the Lord and he directs it wherever he will, like a river. This is why we pray, because God can do anything at any time at his own pleasure. That's why we pray to him. That's why we don't pray to anyone else, because God can do anything. He's the great and awesome God who rules from heaven.

So next week I'm going to deal with the significance of being a cup bearer. So I'm parking that, I'm just taking this last sentence of verse 11 and we'll push it into chapter 2. It's very significant. There's a lot to talk about and I don't have time. I knew I wouldn't have time, so it goes into chapter 2.

Applications, Three of them. Application number one, this is a model prayer. Use it. This is an exemplary prayer. This is how we should pray.

Use this prayer. It's the grieving prayer of a godly man. It's so heartfelt. It's got all these good elements in it. You should know to go to Daniel 9.

Note this down in your notes. Daniel 9, Ezra 9, Nehemiah 1, Nehemiah 9, Matthew 6, the Lord's Prayer. These are exemplary patterns for prayer. Sometimes you should flop open your Bible to Daniel 9 and just pray through it. Use it as your pattern for prayer.

Sometimes flop open your Bible to Ezra 9, sometimes to Nehemiah 1, sometimes to Nehemiah 9, sometimes to Matthew 6, and just use it as your pattern. It will keep you from forgetting things that you should be praying for. It will free you from presumption. These are gifts. Daniel 9, Ezra 9, Nehemiah 1 and 9, Matthew 6 are gifts to teach us to pray in a way that's more consistent with the heart of God.

Use them. Open up your Bible. Look and see how these godly men are praying. And use it to help you in your prayers. Number two.

So that was number one. This is a model prayer. Use it. Number two. Troubleshoot your tearlessness.

You dry-eyed people. That spells trouble. Troubleshoot that. Our prayers are overwhelmingly dry-eyed. I cannot tell you the last time I wept in prayer.

I don't know when it was. I have. I know what he's doing here. I have experienced that, but it's been a long time. Why is that?

What does that say about me? How cold my heart is. What does that say about us? Troubleshoot that. Whatever you find, do something about it.

Take action. It's probably just our neglect of prayer. When we're much with God, we'll take on the heart of God. We'll be more tender-hearted about the things that He's tender-hearted about. It's that we haven't been much with God.

I think that's a good place to start in your troubleshooting. There are also maybe sins that make your heart cold. There may be things in your life that are making your love of entertainment. Maybe making your heart cold. These things are very searching.

These things are very convicting to me. I'm not alone. I know I'm not alone in this room. I know there are many dry-eyed prayers here beside me. We should troubleshoot this.

When we find things that are probably at the root of it. We should take action. That's number two. Troubleshoot your tearlessness. Finally, a new year is upon us.

Make it a year of prayer. You're going to make a long list of things you want to do for next year. A lot of them are going to fall by the wayside if you're anything like me. You won't accomplish everything you want to for next year, probably. Don't fail in this one.

Make sure this is on your list. Don't fail at this one. We need to be more of a praying people. We're pretty busy, we want to be more fruitful. Okay, not just busy, but fruitful.

Prayer. Prayer will make us fruitful. For the Lord, for His glory. God make us a praying people. I thank you for this exemplary prayer, a prayer that we can set before our eyes when we pray to help us and I pray that we would many times open to Nehemiah chapter 1 and be helped by our brother.

God make us a tender hearted people who sometimes offer our prayer in tears. Jesus name, Amen. In Jesus' name, Amen.