Summit Baptist Church - Net Wetters

End of an Era

2011-07-15T06:48:00.006-04:00

This website is closed to future posting.

Thank you to everyone who made this class possible.

The final count is:
361,358 Words
798 Pages
132 Lessons

Continue to follow Canyon's teaching at

http://www.reformacworth.com

May 1st - The Attributes of God

2011-05-01T07:03:00.005-04:00

Prayer Requests

Summit Sanctification

Whoever’s Preaching

Marietta Square Preaching

Tornado Results, Esp. in White

Pollock Car Accident

Grant and Greyson Football Starting

Cassandra's Broken Arm

Text – Nehemiah 9

This morning we're going to look at an absolutely amazing chapter in the Bible. In chapter 9 of Nehemiah we're coming out of chapter 8. What major events have just taken place in chapter 8? What major project has just been completed? They completed the walls and set the doors. What has made the people more attentive to the law of God? The reading of the Law. Which book was this? Deuteronomy. What was the response to the reading of the Law? Mourning. They weren't supposed to mourn because this was during a festival, the Feast of Tabernacles, why weren't they supposed to mourn? Because this festival pointed towards their salvation; how does it point towards Jesus? Because he came as God in the flesh to dwell with and in us forever.

As we come into chapter 9, the feast of Tabernacles is over and the people are in full mourning over their sin. In this chapter they go over a general history of Israel, and we'll see that the character of God is beautifully displayed in this list. So let's get started. We're going to move pretty quickly through this, hopefully, so we won't stop to look at the minor details, because we want to see this chapter as a whole and not just a collection of verses.

Nehemiah 9:1-5 Now on the twenty-fourth day of this month the people of Israel were assembled with fasting and in sackcloth, and with earth on their heads. And the Israelites separated themselves from all foreigners and stood and confessed their sins and the iniquities of their fathers. And they stood up in their place and read from the Book of the Law of the LORD their God for a quarter of the day; for another quarter of it they made confession and worshiped the LORD their God. On the stairs of the Levites stood Jeshua, Bani, Kadmiel, Shebaniah, Bunni, Sherebiah, Bani, and Chenani; and they cried with a loud voice to the LORD their God. Then the Levites, Jeshua, Kadmiel, Bani, Hashabneiah, Sherebiah, Hodiah, Shebaniah, and Pethahiah, said, "Stand up and bless the LORD your God from everlasting to everlasting. Blessed be your glorious name, which is exalted above all blessing and praise.

We see a continued effort of repentance and knowing God's Law. Why is it so important to know the Bible? Because here-in God has revealed himself to us. There is a massive movement today with people saying that God is too mysterious for man to know, that our finite minds can never understand an infinite God, but that utterly misses the fact that he has chosen to reveal himself through a book which he has perfectly preserved for millennia. The first thing we see is that God is worthy to be praised, that is the hermeneutic of this passage, or the way in which they are reading the Bible. This makes the point that everything God does is right, that his plans and purposes are perfect. The second important point is the beginning of verse 6.

Nehemiah 9:6 You are the LORD, you alone.

This is an identification that God is One, he is God and there is no other. It is an affirmation of what is called the "Shema", which is found in Deuteronomy 6. We're not going to read many other verses today, but let's be sure to read that one.

Deuteronomy 6:4-6 Hear, O Israel: The LORD our God, the LORD is one. You shall love the LORD your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your might. And these words that I command you today shall be on your heart.

Next we'll see that God is Creator and creative:

Nehemiah 9:6 You have made heaven, the heaven of heavens, with all their host, the earth and all that is on it, the seas and all that is in them; and you preserve all of them; and the host of heaven worships you.

This is a reminder how powerful God is, that he created everything there is with the power of his Word. Not just that he created something massive, and the universe is bigger than we can even measure, but also that the minute details are incredible. The universe is intricately interesting from the biggest galaxy to the tiniest cell; and it may go much bigger and smaller than we can see. The level of diversity is also incredible, no two stars are exactly alike, no two people are exactly alike, and no two snowflakes are exactly alike. God shows both his power and creativity in creation. I really like that it mentions the "seas and all that is in them" because this has really blossomed for us in the past half century or so as we are able to record and see what is in the seas. Some of the creatures I've seen look made up, but are real, living, amazing creations of God. See the website, I've included a link: http://www.godofwondersvideo.org/chapter12.htm

We'll come back to this verse in a bit to support another point, but let's move to God's sovereignty over man in election:

Nehemiah 9:7-8 You are the LORD, the God who chose Abram and brought him out of Ur of the Chaldeans and gave him the name Abraham. You found his heart faithful before you, and made with him the covenant to give to his offspring the land of the Canaanite, the Hittite, the Amorite, the Perizzite, the Jebusite, and the Girgashite. And you have kept your promise, for you are righteous.

God chose to take a man and his barren wife to make a people who would be in the spotlight of his grace for the next 1700 years, through whom the blessing of Christ would come to all people groups. God promised them the land of Israel, even when it was populated by many other wicked people, it seemed impossible, but because God is righteous, he kept his promise, and the people at this exact moment in Nehemiah 9 were living that promise fulfilled.

Here we see that God interacts with mankind, he is not a "deistic deity" which means he created the universe and then left it alone. This is seen prominently in verse 9, where God is involved and is a God of miracles:

Nehemiah 9:9-10 And you saw the affliction of our fathers in Egypt and heard their cry at the Red Sea, and performed signs and wonders against Pharaoh and all his servants and all the people of his land, for you knew that they acted arrogantly against our fathers. And you made a name for yourself, as it is to this day.

Next we'll see that God is selective, and also able to avenge his people.

Nehemiah 9:11 And you divided the sea before them, so that they went through the midst of the sea on dry land, and you cast their pursuers into the depths, as a stone into mighty waters.

After the Israelites fled through the Red Sea, it opened up for God to do many other things. He led them:

Nehemiah 9:12 By a pillar of cloud you led them in the day, and by a pillar of fire in the night to light for them the way in which they should go.

God gave them light in the darkness, and led them where they should go. Besides a physical leading, God is able to communicate himself and his laws morally:

Nehemiah 9:13 You came down on Mount Sinai and spoke with them from heaven and gave them right rules and true laws, good statutes and commandments,

This law is not burdensome, it points to the coming Messiah, it shows us why God is God and we are not. It opens up the opportunity for God to be both our Creator and our Saviour. Most directly, it gives us a definitive moral law to discern right from wrong.

Contained in that Law is the Sabbath, which is directly concerned with mankind resting for the glory of God, especially now where we rest in Jesus Christ, and it shows that God is attentive to the welfare of his people.

Nehemiah 9:14 and you made known to them your holy Sabbath and commanded them commandments and statutes and a law by Moses your servant.

Let's read another verse:

Mark 2:27-28 And he said to them, "The Sabbath was made for man, not man for the Sabbath. So the Son of Man is lord even of the Sabbath."

Next we see that God is sustainer:

Nehemiah 9:15 You gave them bread from heaven for their hunger and brought water for them out of the rock for their thirst, and you told them to go in to possess the land that you had sworn to give them.

If you jump back to verse 6 you see that God is preserving all of his creation, in the New Testament it says Christ holds it together by the power of his Word. I wasn't going to, but we have to read that one!

Hebrews 1:3 He is the radiance of the glory of God and the exact imprint of his nature, and he upholds the universe by the word of his power.

We pray, "Give us this day our daily bread," and God always does, he could easily cut this planet off from sustenance just by causing it to stop raining, or for the crops to stop growing, and the Bible promises before it is all over, a famine so great will strike the world that a loaf of bread will cost over a $100. But through history until now, God has been sustaining his people.

But his people were not grateful, yet God is patient.

Nehemiah 9:16-17 But they and our fathers acted presumptuously and stiffened their neck and did not obey your commandments. They refused to obey and were not mindful of the wonders that you performed among them, but they stiffened their neck and appointed a leader to return to their slavery in Egypt. But you are a God ready to forgive, gracious and merciful, slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love, and did not forsake them.

We've got several other attributes in there, don't we, merciful, gracious, forgiving, and full of love. It was almost as though the Israelites in the Sinai desert were trying to prove that God is rich in mercy:

Nehemiah 9:18-19 Even when they had made for themselves a golden calf and said, 'This is your God who brought you up out of Egypt,' and had committed great blasphemies, you in your great mercies did not forsake them in the wilderness. The pillar of cloud to lead them in the way did not depart from them by day, nor the pillar of fire by night to light for them the way by which they should go.

Here and in the next verse we see that God's grace is not contingent on men doing anything, in fact, if it was, then it wouldn't be grace. God continued to give them good things, even though they utterly rebelled. This went on for 40 years. Another attribute we'll see in this passage is that God also gave his Spirit to instruct.

Nehemiah 9:20-21 You gave your good Spirit to instruct them and did not withhold your manna from their mouth and gave them water for their thirst. Forty years you sustained them in the wilderness, and they lacked nothing. Their clothes did not wear out and their feet did not swell.

After these 40 years, God proved himself to be faithful to his promises by giving them the land he had promised. Not only did he give them the land and multiply them, but it was already prepared for them to move right in. God plans things in advance, he has foreknowledge and the power to make it happen. He sees the end and the beginning, and he is working all things for good to those who love him and are called according to his purpose.

Nehemiah 9:22-25 And you gave them kingdoms and peoples and allotted to them every corner. So they took possession of the land of Sihon king of Heshbon and the land of Og king of Bashan. You multiplied their children as the stars of heaven, and you brought them into the land that you had told their fathers to enter and possess. So the descendants went in and possessed the land, and you subdued before them the inhabitants of the land, the Canaanites, and gave them into their hand, with their kings and the peoples of the land, that they might do with them as they would. And they captured fortified cities and a rich land, and took possession of houses full of all good things, cisterns already hewn, vineyards, olive orchards and fruit trees in abundance. So they ate and were filled and became fat and delighted themselves in your great goodness.

Right at the end of this passage we have another attribute of God, that he is good, which means perfect and complete, there is no darkness in him, he is the standard and highest measure of good. This is intensified by how mankind constantly reacts to him, even his own people. God does not abandon his people, but he also does not let them continue towards their destruction. Let's read another New Testament verse,

Revelation 3:19 Those whom I love, I reprove and discipline, so be zealous and repent.

God is a correcting God.

Nehemiah 9:26-27 Nevertheless, they were disobedient and rebelled against you and cast your law behind their back and killed your prophets, who had warned them in order to turn them back to you, and they committed great blasphemies. Therefore you gave them into the hand of their enemies, who made them suffer.

God's punishment is correctional not punitive towards his people. He is also saviour.

Nehemiah 9:27-31 And in the time of their suffering they cried out to you and you heard them from heaven, and according to your great mercies you gave them saviors who saved them from the hand of their enemies. But after they had rest they did evil again before you, and you abandoned them to the hand of their enemies, so that they had dominion over them. Yet when they turned and cried to you, you heard from heaven, and many times you delivered them according to your mercies. And you warned them in order to turn them back to your law. Yet they acted presumptuously and did not obey your commandments, but sinned against your rules, which if a person does them, he shall live by them, and they turned a stubborn shoulder and stiffened their neck and would not obey. Many years you bore with them and warned them by your Spirit through your prophets. Yet they would not give ear. Therefore you gave them into the hand of the peoples of the lands. Nevertheless, in your great mercies you did not make an end of them or forsake them, for you are a gracious and merciful God.

At this point it gets a little tedious, God is good and his people rebel, over and over and over again. This is a great look at the fact that we cannot obey God on our own, but that we need an intercessor, we need someone to bear our sins for us, and someone to guide us. God has provided both for us in Jesus Christ and in the Holy Spirit. The Old Covenant was good, but God was making a definitive statement that it was not perfect and that the New is so much better than the Old. We are thereby warned by God to not fall back from his Son, and we also see that God sends prophets who proclaim his message.

All of this points us at the fact that when sin increases, grace abounds all the more. Therefore the Apostle Paul asks, "Should we then sin all the more so that grace abounds further?" No, this leads back to our very first point, that God is worthy to be praised. His faithfulness leads us to something else, let's read Romans 2:4:

Romans 2:4 Or do you presume on the riches of his kindness and forbearance and patience, not knowing that God’s kindness is meant to lead you to repentance?

This is precisely where the Israelites in Nehemiah 9 go, let's read about their awesome repentance:

Nehemiah 9:32-38 Now, therefore, our God, the great, the mighty, and the awesome God, who keeps covenant and steadfast love, let not all the hardship seem little to you that has come upon us, upon our kings, our princes, our priests, our prophets, our fathers, and all your people, since the time of the kings of Assyria until this day. Yet you have been righteous in all that has come upon us, for you have dealt faithfully and we have acted wickedly. Our kings, our princes, our priests, and our fathers have not kept your law or paid attention to your commandments and your warnings that you gave them. Even in their own kingdom, and amid your great goodness that you gave them, and in the large and rich land that you set before them, they did not serve you or turn from their wicked works. Behold, we are slaves this day; in the land that you gave to our fathers to enjoy its fruit and its good gifts, behold, we are slaves.And its rich yield goes to the kings whom you have set over us because of our sins. They rule over our bodies and over our livestock as they please, and we are in great distress. "Because of all this we make a firm covenant in writing; on the sealed document are the names of our princes, our Levites, and our priests.

We'll look at this covenant next week, but the main point is that the attributes of God led these people to strive for holiness, not to sin all the more so that God's patience and kindness and admonishing would be magnified. We long to be perfect as our Father in Heaven is perfect, to be so perfectly sanctified that we neither want to sin, and do not sin. This is, of course, impossible apart from the perfect work of God in us which he has accomplished through his Son who is the embodiment of all of God's attributes, an instructor to the foolish, a light in the darkness, the only God, gracious, merciful, patient, and the Saviour of all who believe. We know that when he appears, we will be like him, for we have such a great and lasting promise of God's faithfulness. He has been faithful with others, we trust he will be faithful with us, he has been faithful in the past, so we can trust that he will be faithful forever. Let's close with Philippians 1:6.

Philippians 1:6 I am sure of this, that he who began a good work in you will bring it to completion at the day of Jesus Christ.

April 17th - Biblical Open Air Preaching

2011-04-17T07:41:00.003-04:00

Prayer Requests
Youth Pastor Candidate

Dave Sloan Preaching

Summit Sanctification

Big Shanty Festival Outreach

Easter Outreaches

Ian Health

Tyler Allergies

David's continued sanctification

Jennifer's dad's safe travels

James - Camping Scouts

Text – Nehemiah 8

Nehemiah 8 is the main reason I started going through Nehemiah. This is one of my favorite chapters in the Bible. A lot of times when I’m open-air preaching I get pseudo (name only) Christians saying, “Open-air preaching isn’t biblical!” Can you give me some examples of open-air preaching in the Bible? Noah, Jonah, Ezra, Paul, Peter, Stephen, and one more major example, Jesus. Open-air preaching is profoundly biblical, it is one of the major ways that Christianity has spread, great preachers of the past included Patrick, Boniface, John Knox, George Whitefield, and Charles Spurgeon, to name only a few of many.

Sometimes open-air preaching is done evangelically, to take the gospel out to people who normally wouldn’t listen, other times, like with George Whitefield and John Flavel, it was because they had no church to preach in. Whitefield was disliked by the Anglican Church, and Flavel was a Puritan, outlawed by the Anglican Church from mentioning his Christian beliefs. We’ll see today that often an open-air meeting is to accommodate massive numbers of people.

This passage has also been used heavily to drive the liturgy of the church. What is liturgy? The way we do church. It’s the way we sing, read the Bible, pray, and the actions we take during these things. There are lots of different liturgies between different denominations, I think it would be very foolish for us to try to say one way is the only right way, the important thing is that our motives are pure in how we do church. We’ll see some great things in Nehemiah today, but there are lots of other ways described throughout the Bible. One of my favorite examples is when Hannah prays silently but her mouth is moving, and it’s so weird to the priest that he accuses her of being drunk. Was she wrong? No. Can you pray silently or outloud? Yes, whichever seems most appropriate for the situation.

Let’s do some review real quick, what major even has just been completed in Nehemiah? They have just finished the wall and set the gates. The city of Jerusalem is now well on its way to restoration, but the spiritual side of Jerusalem is still pretty wrecked. How many days did it take to rebuild the wall? 52, was that quick? Yes, everyone who saw it had to agree that it was accomplished because God was with them, even in the face of severe persecution. So, let’s now take a look at the restoration of the spiritual state of Judah.

Nehemiah 8:1 And all the people gathered as one man into the square before the Water Gate. And they told Ezra the scribe to bring the Book of the Law of Moses that the Lord had commanded Israel.

Ezra wrote down the history of Jerusalem from the end of the Babylonian Exile to right before Nehemiah came to town. They call on him to read the Law, or more specifically the word here is Torah. What is the Torah/Law? It is the first 5 books of the Bible, the 5 books of Moses. What are they? Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, Deuteronomy. There was a law, which the Jews had forsaken for at least 160 years, to read the Torah to all of the people every seven years. Some people believe that this was all five books, but most really good scholars believe this was just the book of Deuteronomy, which is really a great summation of the whole Torah, plus there is a verse that makes it sounds like just Deuteronomy:

Deuteronomy 31:10-13 And Moses commanded them, “At the end of every seven years, at the set time in the year of release, at the Feast of Booths, when all Israel comes to appear before the Lord your God at the place that he will choose, you shall read this law before all Israel in their hearing. Assemble the people, men, women, and little ones, and the sojourner within your towns, that they may hear and learn to fear the Lord your God, and be careful to do all the words of this law, and that their children, who have not known it, may hear and learn to fear the Lord your God, as long as you live in the land that you are going over the Jordan to possess.”

Ezra was called to read it, he was a scribe, it was his job to make copies of the Old Testament, this would make him especially well familiar with the Bible. Here is something you can consider doing that I have been doing for a while. I make a copy of one chapter of the Bible every week, it really slows me down and makes me think. It’s not the only way to make sure you pause to think on your Bible, but it is a great way.

Nehemiah 8:2 So Ezra the priest brought the Law before the assembly, both men and women and all who could understand what they heard, on the first day of the seventh month.

Here is an important point throughout church history until about the 1950's onward, that youth ministry was unheard of. If you were old enough to understand, you stood in the congregation and learned with the adults.

Nehemiah 8:3-4 And he read from it facing the square before the Water Gate from early morning until midday, in the presence of the men and the women and those who could understand. And the ears of all the people were attentive to the Book of the Law. And Ezra the scribe stood on a wooden platform that they had made for the purpose. And beside him stood Mattithiah, Shema, Anaiah, Uriah, Hilkiah, and Maaseiah on his right hand, and Pedaiah, Mishael, Malchijah, Hashum, Hashbaddanah, Zechariah, and Meshullam on his left hand.

This is five or six hours of reading, and we see that they were attentive, they paid attention to the reading. This wasn't all reading, as we'll see in a bit, there was explanation of what the text meant and even translation for those who didn't have a strong grasp of Hebrew, as many in attendance grew up speaking Chaldi, or the language of the Babylonians.

Nehemiah 8:5 And Ezra opened the book in the sight of all the people, for he was above all the people, and as he opened it all the people stood.

Speaking of liturgy, do you even wonder why the pastor stands on a stage? In recent years I think that many churches have utterly lost this concept and have turned the pulpit into nothing more than a stage for entertainment and self agrandizement. The reason for an elevated pulpit is for the main purpose that people can see and hear the one speaking. A secondary purpose is that it shows authority, and hopefully gives reverence to the message.

I find in open-air preaching that if I am standing even a few inches above my audience, that my voice carries farther, and people will stop and listen. I have preached from street level on occasion and have had much less visible evidence that people were listening than if I stand on a box or a wall.

Everyone could see Ezra opening the book, the Hebrew word here is cepher, it really ought not be translated "book", what Ezra opened here was a scroll.

When he opened it, all of the people stood in reverence. It was tradition to stand during the reading of scripture for much of the Dark Ages; during the Reformation, many traditions like this were outright done away with. There were a lot of other weird things people were doing that you can't find in the Bible, like reading the Bible in Latin to people who didn't speak Latin, or clothing to set the priests apart from the laity (called sacerdotalism), and all sorts of strange rules about things like communion, baptism, "crossing" yourself when you came before a crucifix, or bowing a certain number of times during the service. The Reformation did away with many of these things as Popish superstition.

Not all of it was unbiblical though, such as we see here the standing in reverence when the Law of God is opened. Here is where it can be wrong though, if the standing is just tradition or is mandated. It is better that you stay seated and give reverence to the hearing of the Word, than stand because everyone else does and ignore what is being said; not ignoring in hearing, but ignoring in believing and acting on.

Nehemiah 8:6 And Ezra blessed the LORD, the great God, and all the people answered, "Amen, Amen," lifting up their hands. And they bowed their heads and worshiped the LORD with their faces to the ground.

Here is one place we get the idea of praying before the scripture is read. Praying is always good, but again, if you just do it to do it, you're doing it wrong. We don't have it recorded in the Bible, but Jewish tradition has recorded what Ezra's prayer could have been. In order to break with tradition of only praying at the beginning and end of a lesson, lets pray Ezra's prayer now,

Blessed art thou, O Lord our God, King of the world, who hath chosen us out of all people, and hath given us his law; blessed art thou, O Lord, who hast given us the law; and all the people answer, Amen.

The Amen at the end literally means "Truth", and it is an affirmation of what has just been prayed. Yesterday at the Big Shanty Festival a very flamboyant person came up and asked to pray with us, it was awkward to say the least, at the end of his prayer, which was charismaniac goofiness, I was very reserved to give an "amen."

One thing which we don't often do is what they did, lifting their hands towards Heaven. I think one of the reasons we shy away from this is because it has been hijacked by the emotionalistic bents of christendom that want to "feel" something in worship, and their handraising is often almost cultish and very mystic (feelings based). But we have to remember that we don't reject biblical truth just because someone is doing it wrongly. Check out what Paul says,

1 Timothy 2:8 I desire then that in every place the men should pray, lifting holy hands without anger or quarreling;

This is the method of Psalm 134, calling us to reach towards Heaven, moreso spiritually than physically, but also physically, when we are in need. We'll read a verse in the sermon on the mount in just a moment that will show us why, but before we do, can someone please read Psalm 134...the whole thing, if you're able:

Psalm 134:1-3 Come, bless the LORD, all you servants of the LORD, who stand by night in the house of the LORD! Lift up your hands to the holy place and bless the LORD! May the LORD bless you from Zion, he who made heaven and earth!

So then, they read the Law, what do we do if someone doesn't understand what it means, or even what it says? That's verse 7-8,

Nehemiah 8:7-8 Also Jeshua, Bani, Sherebiah, Jamin, Akkub, Shabbethai, Hodiah, Maaseiah, Kelita, Azariah, Jozabad, Hanan, Pelaiah, the Levites, helped the people to understand the Law, while the people remained in their places. They read from the book, from the Law of God, clearly, and they gave the sense, so that the people understood the reading.

They explain what it means, I love that it says they "read clearly", and I'd encourage you to know what a passage says before you stand to read it. I hate it when a preacher stands up to preach and it sounds like he's reading the passage for the first time as he begins his sermon. If you're going to read the Bible to other people, I beg of you, practice being a good reader. Several commentaries also say that the Hebrew words used here give an indication that the Law was also translated into other languages so that people whose first language was not Hebrew would get a perfect grasp of what was being said.

The Law is good, it is wonderful, it is a textual representation of who God is: holy, perfect, undefiled; but the Law is directly against us, when we sin it stands as a witness against us. When the people heard how perfect God is in the Law, it caused them to mourn, as we'll see in the next passage,

Nehemiah 8:9-12 And Nehemiah, who was the governor, and Ezra the priest and scribe, and the Levites who taught the people said to all the people, "This day is holy to the LORD your God; do not mourn or weep." For all the people wept as they heard the words of the Law. Then he said to them, "Go your way. Eat the fat and drink sweet wine and send portions to anyone who has nothing ready, for this day is holy to our Lord. And do not be grieved, for the joy of the LORD is your strength." So the Levites calmed all the people, saying, "Be quiet, for this day is holy; do not be grieved." And all the people went their way to eat and drink and to send portions and to make great rejoicing, because they had understood the words that were declared to them.

They are weeping over their sin, and it would have been rightly so, if it had not been during a festival (we'll see it in a minute), and all of the festivals pointed to the faithfulness of God towards a repentant people, which these people were.

Numbers 10:10 On the day of your gladness also, and at your appointed feasts and at the beginnings of your months, you shall blow the trumpets over your burnt offerings and over the sacrifices of your peace offerings. They shall be a reminder of you before your God: I am the LORD your God.

So Nehemiah sends them off not to mourn, but to feast. These sacrifices pointed forward to Jesus Christ, the perfect sacrifice,

Hebrews 7:27 He has no need, like those high priests, to offer sacrifices daily, first for his own sins and then for those of the people, since he did this once for all when he offered up himself.

This is why Nehemiah and the priests could tell the people not to mourn, but to celebrate, even though they saw that they were great sinners. This is why Jesus could make an extremely audacious claim in the Sermon on the Mount,

Matthew 5:4 Blessed are those who mourn, for they shall be comforted.

The Hebrew people in Nehemiah 8 had no idea (or very little idea) how that was going to take place, but they trusted that God was faithful, and because they trusted in God, they did their best to keep his laws. Which is our next section.

Nehemiah 8:13 On the second day the heads of fathers’ houses of all the people, with the priests and the Levites, came together to Ezra the scribe in order to study the words of the Law.

Pause here really quick, in Nehemiah 8 we see both corporate worship and private study. A church is much blessed when it has godly leaders who study and believe and act on their Bibles.

In it they discovered a law that they were forsaking, and called people to honor it:

Nehemiah 8:14-18 And they found it written in the Law that the LORD had commanded by Moses that the people of Israel should dwell in booths during the feast of the seventh month, and that they should proclaim it and publish it in all their towns and in Jerusalem, "Go out to the hills and bring branches of olive, wild olive, myrtle, palm, and other leafy trees to make booths, as it is written." So the people went out and brought them and made booths for themselves, each on his roof, and in their courts and in the courts of the house of God, and in the square at the Water Gate and in the square at the Gate of Ephraim. And all the assembly of those who had returned from the captivity made booths and lived in the booths, for from the days of Jeshua the son of Nun to that day the people of Israel had not done so. And there was very great rejoicing. And day by day, from the first day to the last day, he read from the Book of the Law of God. They kept the feast seven days, and on the eighth day there was a solemn assembly, according to the rule.

Let me sum this up for your real quick since we are quickly running out of time. The Feast of Tabernacles, or Feast of Booths, was a one week celebration where the people would live in "tents" made of palm fronds and other leafy branches. It commemorated a time in the desert with Moses when God dwelt in the midst of the people, not in a temple, but in a tent, and they could see his glory, for he was with them. It was meant to be a reminder of God's faithfulness in calling his people out of slavery into the promised land. Unfortunately the Jews had done a very bad job of commemorating this event, after all, it took a long time and a lot of effort, and was quite uncomfortable. It would be like me saying, next week don't go sleep in your own beds, we're going to camp in the parking lot. It was celebrated on and off since Joshua, but here it tells us that it was celebrated with more joy and more correctly than it had been since his time.

Jerusalem must have looked pretty weird during this time, with homemade tents all over, on roofs, in front yards, in two of the major open places, on every street. But the people were celebrating that God was faithful, that he would once against dwell with them, that they would once against see his glory.

I wish we had time to read John 7 and really look at it, but I want to point out really quickly that Jesus went to the Feast of Tabernacles and revealed himself as the purpose of the feast, but look at the last verses of that passage (which is actually the last verse of chapter 7 and first verse of chapter 8),

John 7:53-8:1 They went each to his own house, but Jesus went to the Mount of Olives.

So here-in is our conclusion, that Jesus Christ is the reason that the people were not to mourn over their sin, that the Law pointed towards him, the Feast of Tabernacles pointed towards his faithfulness, that he would dwell with his people and make them right with God. In John 7 they missed him altogether, beloved, I pray that you will not miss this Godman who dwelt among us.

John 1:14 And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, and we have seen his glory, glory as of the only Son from the Father, full of grace and truth.

So beloved, testify to him, show the glory of God through the man who died on a cross but yet lives, who is the one who can say to those who mourn, you shall be comforted. Do so in public, or in private, study his word, tell people about him. Give full reverence to his Word, but moreso to him, do nothing from vain tradition, but out of respect to the Righteous and Resurrected One. Lift your hands and your soul towards him in recognition of your great need for his salvation and his blessings, and in that, I pray that he may bless you, he who made heaven and earth.

April 10th - Our Personal God

2011-04-10T07:21:00.008-04:00

Prayer Requests

Summit Sanctification

Whoever’s Preaching

Jerusalem Project Results

Braves Outreach Results

Swift Cantrel Witnessing

Todd Love Homecoming

Barton's Grandmother's Health

Jennifer's Aunt's Health

Jennifer Swim Team and Play, Dad's Job

Praise-Greyson's Dad's Job

Text – Nehemiah 7

Today we come to the only chapter in Nehemiah that made me almost not teach Nehemiah. This could be the most boring lesson ever taught if I just went name by name and tried to tell you something about each of these guys, but I think there is actually much to be learned here. This is going to be more of a topical lesson today than an expositional lesson.

Let’s talk about topical versus expositional real quick. Expositional preaching is where you “expose” the meaning of a text, to let the text speak on the topic or topics it is going to speak on. This is the preferred preaching method and the reason I go verse by verse through various books of the Bible, because then I don’t choose what you should learn, God has already written it out. A topical lesson on the other hand, is where we look at topics in the Bible instead of a single passage. It’s like if we wanted to look at God’s love or wrath, or one of Dave Snyder’s better jokes was his upcoming book, “Birds of the Bible.” Topical sermons can be very edifying, but their danger is that the preacher may be cheating you out of topics that you might never look at in topical sermons, like last week we looked at an imprecatory prayer, something no topical preacher would ever choose, or what has gotten me into more trouble than any other topic, how to confront false teachers.

There is a new phrase that has been coined called, “Topositional”, a topical lesson based on chapter by chapter preaching of the Bible. This lesson will be a topositional sermon, we’ll be looking at three topics pulled from Nehemiah 7. The first will be that God cares for us individually; the second will be how people before Jesus were saved; and third will be an apologetic look at God’s order and the historicity of the Bible, and maybe even talk about some numerology. These three won't necessarily go in order.

I had a terrible time deciding if we should read the whole chapter, let’s start by reading the part I know we should read,

Nehemiah 7:1-4 Now when the wall had been built and I had set up the doors, and the gatekeepers, the singers, and the Levites had been appointed, I gave my brother Hanani and Hananiah the governor of the castle charge over Jerusalem, for he was a more faithful and God-fearing man than many. And I said to them, “Let not the gates ofJerusalem be opened until the sun is hot. And while they are still standing guard, let them shut and bar the doors. Appoint guards from among the inhabitants of Jerusalem, some at their guard posts and some in front of their own homes.” The city was wide and large, but the people within it were few, and no houses had been rebuilt.

Remember that in the last chapter the walls were finished, but the doors were not installed yet. Here in the beginning of chapter 7 the doors are put in place, and we see a ceremony to open and shut them for the first time. During this time, Nehemiah officially turns the city over to two godly men, his brother, whose petition had started the rebuilding process, and a man we know very little about named Hananiah (an especially popular name in the Old Testament) who though Nehemiah chose for being an exceptionally godly man. Our first application is that we ought to strive to have someone be able to say the same about us!

So they wait until the sun is up and it is hot out, partly so they can see any enemies approaching, and also so any enemies would be dissuaded to fight due to the heat. It was an ingenious way to avoid a fight. It reminds me of one of my favorite verses,

Hebrews 12:14 Strive for peace with everyone, and for the holiness without which no one will see the Lord.

Nehemiah looks around the city, which was quite large, a little more than six miles around, and sees that for the most part it is very sparsely populated. So that brings us to the rest of chapter 7, I decided we should read it, except we’re going to skip the numbers.

Nehemiah 7:5 Then my God put it into my heart to assemble the nobles and the officials and the people to be enrolled by genealogy. And I found the book of the genealogy of those who came up at the first, and I found written in it:

Wait, stop there for a moment. Look who put it into Nehemiah’s heart, not just God, but “my God”, we’re going to see in this chapter that God cares for his church as well as the individuals in his church.

The list we’re going to see was compiled by Ezra, you can find almost the exact list in Ezra 2, but they are not exactly the same, sometimes the numbers are quite a bit different. You can find this is various other lists of names in the Bible, usually there is a logical answer as to why they are different, like look at verse 10, it says in Nehemiah’s list there are 652, but in Ezra’s list there were 775, and verse 11, Nehemiah’s list says 2818, but in Ezra’s list there are 2812. The logical answer is that in one case more said they would leave Babylon than made it to Jerusalem, some may have died, others may have changed their mind and stayed back. The cooler example is when there are more in Nehemiah’s list, because that means they originally didn’t return to Jerusalem, but later did decide to return. We don’t have time to look at the parable, but Jesus makes it abundantly clear that it is better to be obedient after saying you’ll be disobedient than to be disobedient after you say you will obey. (cf. Matthew 21:28-31)

Another option, which seems right in a few places, though I’m not sure, but is likely not true for this example, is what is called “copyist errors”, where someone was supposed to write 3000 but only wrote 300. Whether these are errors or not, and I believe they are not errors but have good explanations for appearing to be errors, it actually shows us something amazing about the Bible, that for more than two-thousand years the Bible has not been edited. Sometimes people claim that the Bible has been changed year after year and it’s no longer a reliable copy of the original. But if the Bible were being edited, the first thing people would have done is tried to take out the supposed errors, but we see that they haven’t, and the Old Testament we read today is the same Old Testament that Jesus read, is the same Old Testament that Nehemiah and others wrote down.

Confusing enough? In the early 1900’s, the oldest copy of the Old Testament we had was from about AD1100, more than a millennia after the New Testament was written. Some people doubted the age of the Old Testament, and this hurt the prophecies of the Old Testament, because people thought, of course the prophecies are perfect if the Old Testament was written after the New Testament. Well, this drove an effort to do what is called “Biblical Archaeology”, or to find some of the sites the Old Testament describes, like the old city of Jericho, which they found in ruins just like Joshua describes it. In 1946 they found what has since been called the “Qumran” or “Dead Sea Scrolls”, which were copies of the Old Testament dating from ~150BC. These copies were identical to the copies that were much later, showing that no editing had been done, even on supposed “errors”.

So, there are logical reasons why the numbers don’t match up, but also let this strengthen your faith in the transmission of the Bible that the Old Testament we are reading today is exactly the same Old Testament that Jesus read 2000 years ago.

So then, let’s read Nehemiah 7, sans numbers,

Nehemiah 7:6-73

These are a lot of names, and beloved, I can tell you less than a sentence about most of them. But check out:

Luke 12:6-7 Are not five sparrows sold for two pennies? And not one of them is forgotten before God. Why, even the hairs of your head are all numbered. Fear not; you are of more value than many sparrows.

It doesn’t matter if you are super famous or totally unknown, God knows you, even infinitely tiny details about you, and he cares for you. None of these people who are utterly forgotten to us are forgotten to him. This list would have made way more sense to us if we were living in Jerusalem in 445BC, but now even the places are foreign to us, for example, he says, “The other Nebo”, we don’t know where either Nebo is, but the original audience did. It’s likely, if the world lasts another thousand years, that nobody will have a clue that there was a Summit Baptist Church or a Canyon Shearer or (insert your name), but God will, and you know who else will? Anybody who you preached Christ to, whether they are in Heaven because they repented, or whether they are in Hell because they held to their sin.

So what do you think happened to these Jews here who were trusting in the faithfulness of God (we’ll see in chapter 8 and 9 that they were), did they die and go to Hell because they didn’t believe that Jesus died on a cross and rose again? How could they possibly believe in something that had yet to happen? Throughout the Old Testament there are references to people going to be with God, having their sins forgiven, and having an eternal happiness. How can that be?

Romans 4:3 For what does the Scripture say? "Abraham believed God, and it was counted to him as righteousness."

These Jews were saved by believing that someday, in some way, God would rescue them and put their sins away.

Ephesians 4:7-8 But grace was given to each one of us according to the measure of Christ’s gift. Therefore it says, "When he ascended on high he led a host of captives, and he gave gifts to men."

These Old Testament saints were not allowed into Heaven, but neither were they forsaken, and when Christ defeated death, ascended to Heaven, and opened the gates, they were allowed into glory. They were saved not because they believed in the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus Christ, but because they trusted that God would save them. The gospel is that God saves those who trust in him, Jesus Christ is the way he made that effectual. I often tell atheists, "I don't believe in God, I know there is a God, I believe he will save me from death when I step out of this world." Then I explain to them how I know that he is able to do that, having forgiven my sins, nailing them to a cross, and by raising Christ from the dead.

Does that make sense on how God saved people before Jesus? Think about this point as well, that many people in the Old Testament are currently in Hell. In 1 Peter 3 it says that Jesus preached through Noah to people who are now in Hell.

Alright, so we've seen that God cares for us individually as well as corporately, we've seen how Old Testament saints were saved by their faith in God, just as we're saved by our faith in God, accomplished through the redeeming work of Jesus Christ, proven by an empty cross and an empty grave. Now we're going to look briefly at the order of God and a quick look into numerology, or a study of biblical numbers.

1 Corinthians 14:33,40 For God is not a God of confusion but of peace...all things should be done decently and in order.

There are a surprising number of people today, even within Christianity, who think that there is power in certain numbers and evil in others. For example, what is an unlucky number? 13, right? No! There are no unlucky numbers, there are no lucky numbers! Numbers are neutral.

There are preachers today who say that 40 is a special number, that if you do 40 days of something, you'll be blessed. Another preacher says that Satan hates the number 7 and by speaking in 7's you can hide your intentions from the Devil. Others play with the years, saying that 2011 is the beginning of a new decade and that you need to give them even more money so the rest of your decade will be blessed. None of these is true, the universe is put together very mathematically, but that doesn't tell us that God can be manipulated through numbers, it says that God is very orderly and the operating principles of the universe show that he is faithful. Every time science does an experiment they affirm God's faithfulness, expecting the outcome to be measureable and repeatable.

A quote that I like is "Science is thinking God's after him." Remember, it's not science versus God or the Bible, it is God and science versus sin. I'd love to camp out on this idea, but we're running out of time and that was sort of a rabbit trail.

There is a present day antichrist leading people away via radio named Harold Camping, he is basically a present day Joseph Smith (who started the Mormon cult) and the major way he is leading people astray is by messing with some numbers in the Bible and determining that the end of the world is for sure going to happen on May 21st, 2011. We have a little more than a month left, if he's right. Do you think he's right? We talked about this a bit when we looked at the 2012 end-time date. No, they are obviously not right,

Matthew 24:36 But concerning that day and hour no one knows, not even the angels of heaven, nor the Son, but the Father only.

So, here is our final application, we sort of got off track, but I wanted you to know the things we got off track on, which is the beauty of a topical lesson. God is a God of order, he knows both the number of people in his church, as well as each individual personally. We see this list that Nehemiah has as a precursor to a much more important list in the New Testament. Nehemiah's roll is just the membership of Jerusalem, and none of our names were on it, what we are much more concerned about is the membership roll of Heaven,

Revelation 21:26-27 They will bring into it the glory and the honor of the nations. But nothing unclean will ever enter it, nor anyone who does what is detestable or false, but only those who are written in the Lamb’s book of life.

So, cast your cares on Christ, know that he cares for you. Know that your Bible is trustworthy, know that there will be a great number of saints in Heaven from both before Christ and after Christ, and be hastening his return by preaching the gospel calling people to flee to the Lamb who was slain, who is alive forevermore. Know that no-one knows the day or the hour of his return, so don't fixate on any given date, just know that this present evil age will not last forever. In everything, know that God is not a God of confusion, but of peace, so let everything you do be done decently and in order.

April 3rd - Redeem the Time

2011-04-03T06:00:00.002-04:00

Prayer Requests

Pastor Aaron preaching and resignation

Swift Cantrel witnessing

Students traveling for Spring Break

Easter Baptism Outreach (in the works)

Balfours camping

David - Job and School

Mason - Job

Gavin - Teaching

Jerusalem Project

Text – Nehemiah 6, Ephesians 5:15-16

This week I was going to step out of Nehemiah 6 briefly since many of our students are heading out of town for the week, but as I examined it, it seemed that our class would be intact, at least those who are following us through Nehemiah, so I decided to stay with Nehemiah, and the lesson I was going to teach is actually going to fit in pretty well.

So last week we saw some instructions for a perfect church. How should we treat our brothers and sisters within the church when they are in need? We should, out of our own abundance, fulfill their lack. Should we charge them exorbitant interest? No, we shouldn’t charge interest at all within the church. Nehemiah was a great example in this, but who is our greatest example? Jesus Christ.

Now we’re in chapter 6, here the wall is just about done, actually the wall portion is done, but all of the gates are not yet installed, and the enemies of Jerusalem are getting pretty desperate and sneaky to stop the completion. We’re going to see what they sought to do and how it relates to our life. So let’s go through it as a narrative:

Nehemiah 6:1-2 Now when Sanballat and Tobiah and Geshem the Arab and the rest of our enemies heard that I had built the wall and that there was no breach left in it (although up to that time I had not set up the doors in the gates), Sanballat and Geshem sent to me, saying, “Come and let us meet together at Hakkephirim in the plain of Ono.” But they intended to do me harm.

The plain of Ono is about 25 miles away from Jerusalem, it would take at least a few days for Nehemiah to go and get back. Nehemiah clearly sees that they want him to go so far so they can murder or detain him in Samaria. There is nothing wrong with avoiding someone who intends to do you harm, nor is it wrong to stand against evil, the event and your conscience must drive your response. Let me give you an example from Acts where the response was fleeing.

Acts 14:5-7 When an attempt was made by both Gentiles and Jews, with their rulers, to mistreat them and to stone them, they learned of it and fled to Lystra and Derbe, cities of Lycaonia, and to the surrounding country, and there they continued to preach the gospel.

Alternately what was Esther's response in the face of danger for God's sake? (I think we're going to look at Esther next) If I perish, I perish.

But saving his own life was not Nehemiah’s reason for not going, for he trusted in God and would have no problem walking into danger, but what he was interested in was good stewardship of his time,

Nehemiah 6:3 And I sent messengers to them, saying, “I am doing a great work and I cannot come down. Why should the work stop while I leave it and come down to you?”

Nehemiah knew that his example was driving the work of the wall, he was instrumental in the building of the wall. If he left, he had reason to believe the building effort would fall apart. It would be very easy for me to say to you that this applies to all leaders, but that would be wrong, else we would expect our church to fall apart today as Pastor Aaron leaves, or when I leave sometime next year, but that’s not the case. Any guesses as to why Nehemiah was instrumental in the building of the city of God and we aren’t? Nehemiah was a type for Christ, and Christ is absolutely instrumental in the building of his church; who is in charge of building the church?

Matthew 16:18 And I tell you, you are Peter, and on this rock I will build my church, and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it.

Considering Nehemiah to be a type for Christ, I need to follow a rabbit trail real quick so you see almost the exact thing happening, when Christ was doing a great work and scoffers opposed him:

Matthew 27:42 He saved others; he cannot save himself. He is the King of Israel; let him come down now from the cross, and we will believe in him.

On the cross Christ was doing an infinitely better work than Nehemiah was doing in Jerusalem. Nehemiah was only saving men’s lives, Christ was saving men’s souls, he was doing a far greater work than Nehemiah, yet both their detractors wanted him to come down from the work they were doing.

As we near Easter, I don’t think we can emphasize enough that Christ was tempted more in his life than any of us have even been tempted, coming to unbelievable levels on the cross, where he had legions of angels at a moments notice to rescue him from death, taunting, beating, and reviling, as he absorbed the full cup of his Father’s wrath for our sake. Yet he pushed through and those who hope in him are saved. Let this next verse be our favorite in the Bible, our battle cry, knowing that Christ accomplished his work first, giving us an example to follow in our lives,

Psalm 69:6 Let not those who hope in you be put to shame through me,
O Lord God of hosts; let not those who seek you be brought to dishonor through me, O God of Israel.

The call to Nehemiah was not a one-time taunt, but was repeatedly,

Nehemiah 6:4-5 And they sent to me four times in this way, and I answered them in the same manner. In the same way Sanballat for the fifth time sent his servant to me with an open letter in his hand.

They are about to resort to blackmail, seeing that they cannot lure Nehemiah away. Let’s look at this letter:

Nehemiah 6:6-7 In it was written, “It is reported among the nations, and Geshem also says it, that you and the Jews intend to rebel; that is why you are building the wall. And according to these reports you wish to become their king. And you have also set up prophets to proclaim concerning you in Jerusalem, ‘There is a king in Judah.’ And now the king will hear of these reports. So now come and let us take counsel together.”

The claim is once again to a higher authority, to tell King Artaxerxes that the Jews are about to rebel. These are serious claims if they were true, but they’re not. We see Jesus in this as well, that though the main reason they crucified him was because he claimed to be God, the Romans saw him as a rebel trying to be king over the world. Jesus answered,

John 18:36 “My kingdom is not of this world. If my kingdom were of this world, my servants would have been fighting, that I might not be delivered over to the Jews. But my kingdom is not from the world.”

Once again we see that if we trust in God, then the truth is our best option, and Nehemiah knows that as he holds to the truth, God will bless their efforts.

Nehemiah 6:8-9 Then I sent to him, saying, “No such things as you say have been done, for you are inventing them out of your own mind.” For they all wanted to frighten us, thinking, “Their hands will drop from the work, and it will not be done.” But now, O God, strengthen my hands.

As always we have both difficulties outside, and difficulties inside. There have never been a lack of false prophets in the church, one of the major ones to watch out for today is Rob Bell, who is everything but a Christian, but whom is exceptionally popular with young people today. Nehemiah goes to talk to a prophet/priest who for some reason, perhaps out of fear or appearance of fear, is hiding in his house. Here is what happened,

Nehemiah 6:10 Now when I went into the house of Shemaiah the son of Delaiah, son of Mehetabel, who was confined to his home, he said, “Let us meet together in the house of God, within the temple. Let us close the doors of the temple, for they are coming to kill you. They are coming to kill you by night.”

This prophet tells Nehemiah to go hide in the temple, clearly the last place anyone would look for Nehemiah, because it was illegal for him to enter the temple.

Numbers 18:7 And you and your sons with you shall guard your priesthood for all that concerns the altar and that is within the veil; and you shall serve. I give your priesthood as a gift, and any outsider who comes near shall be put to death.”

So we see that we have a false prophet in the midst of the people, he’s just tried to kill Nehemiah. Let’s see how Nehemiah reacts,

Nehemiah 6:11-12 But I said, “Should such a man as I run away? And what man such as I could go into the temple and live? I will not go in.” And I understood and saw that God had not sent him, but he had pronounced the prophecy against me because Tobiah and Sanballat had hired him. For this purpose he was hired, that I should be afraid and act in this way and sin, and so they could give me a bad name in order to taunt me.

You must constantly be on the lookout for these false prophets, and they are more rampant today than ever before. Jesus tells us how to look for them,

Matthew 7:15-16 Beware of false prophets, who come to you in sheep's clothing but inwardly are ravenous wolves. You will recognize them by their fruits. Are grapes gathered from thornbushes, or figs from thistles?

A few things we see, they look like Christians, but they don’t act or believe like Christians. I find that they are often consumed with money, gifts, strange doctrines, or sexual deviancy, though these are not the only signs. Shemaiah here obviously cared more for money than God.

Remember that every time you speak for God, you make yourself a prophet, so make sure you are speaking from his Word and with reverence towards Christ, seeking to please him rather than people or yourself. It doesn’t tell us what Nehemiah did to Shemaiah, but it does tell us that he prayed to God against them, another imprecatory prayer,

Nehemiah 6:14 Remember Tobiah and Sanballat, O my God, according to these things that they did, and also the prophetess Noadiah and the rest of the prophets who wanted to make me afraid.

Apparently Nehemiah knew of some other prophets and prophetesses operating against him, and asked God to do violence to them. Remember from Romans 12 that we leave all vengeance up to God. In all of this, Nehemiah did not cease to oversee the building of the wall.

Nehemiah 6:15-16 So the wall was finished on the twenty-fifth day of the month Elul, in fifty-two days. And when all our enemies heard of it, all the nations around us were afraid and fell greatly in their own esteem, for they perceived that this work had been accomplished with the help of our God.

This was record time; it shows what good leadership and the help of God can do. We know that it was record time because the people around Jerusalem saw it and knew that it was accomplished by supernatural means.

We can see the supernatural work in the building of the church when we have people from every nation and tongue come together in perfect harmony, something that can’t and won’t happen under any other world-view, because they don’t have God on their side. The devil can counterfeit a lot of amazing signs and wonders, but he cannot produce a true peace like the gospel of peace and Prince of Peace do. In the final days the Antichrist will produce a worldwide peace, but it will be short-lived, less than four years.

In the last three verses we see a new little conspiracy forming in Jerusalem, something that we’ll talk about a lot more in chapter 13, but check out how sinners are intertwined with some of the people in Jerusalem,

Nehemiah 6:17-19 Moreover, in those days the nobles of Judah sent many letters to Tobiah, and Tobiah's letters came to them. For many in Judah were bound by oath to him, because he was the son-in-law of Shecaniah the son of Arah: and his son Jehohanan had taken the daughter of Meshullam the son of Berechiah as his wife. Also they spoke of his good deeds in my presence and reported my words to him. And Tobiah sent letters to make me afraid.

All of this says that Tobiah is intermarried into the Jewish people, though he himself is not a Jew. This gives him political prowess and shows that the people of Jerusalem are not willing to divorce from the world. This is a bad thing, because it points to a sinful state, moreso spiritual than physical. I feel I would do you a disservice if I didn’t point out that the Bible is certainly not against interracial marriages, for the main reason that there is only one race, the human race. But the Bible is totally against interspiritual marriages, for what fellowship does light have with darkness?

James 4:4 You adulterous people! Do you not know that friendship with the world is enmity with God? Therefore whoever wishes to be a friend of the world makes himself an enemy of God.

Ok, so some application now. Nehemiah did some amazing things in a very small amount of time. Before that the walls of Jerusalem had been in ruins for 141 years, 90 of those years with people dwelling in it, and they had no interest to rebuild the city. But Nehemiah, in just a few weeks was able to do amazing things.

Ephesians 5:15-16 Look carefully then how you walk, not as unwise but as wise, making the best use of the time, because the days are evil.

There are a lot of ways you can waste your time. In the United States we have a pandemic of “busyness”, where people run full speed all the time, never stopping to think, and accomplish nothing. Beloved, be testing where you spend your time, make sure it is edifying to yourself and the church, when you feel like you’re really busy, look at what you’re busy doing.

I think one of the reasons that we make so much effort to stay busy is so we don’t have to stop and think we’re not really accomplishing anything. It is good to step back every once in a while and determine whether what you’re doing is worthwhile. Nehemiah very easily could have headed off to the meeting at Ono and said, “I have to do this and it will take a week,” but he saw that his time was best spent somewhere else.

So beloved, be redeeming your time, the days are evil, now that the work for the church of Christ is infinitely more valuable than work for things that will not last. However, in everything you do, know that you are a representative of the Living God, and so live with this in mind. Let's close with,

Colossians 3:23-24 Whatever you do, work heartily, as for the Lord and not for men, knowing that from the Lord you will receive the inheritance as your reward. You are serving the Lord Christ.

March 27th - Instructions for a Perfect Church

2011-03-27T06:03:00.006-04:00

Prayer Requests

Pastor Aaron Healing / Resignation

Christians in Ethiopia

Jennifer - Brother's Wedding

Ryan French - Broken Arm

James Band Festival

Text - Nehemiah 5

Last week we talked about the building of the wall in a hostile situation. Nehemiah commissioned several tactics to make sure everyone was ready, what were some of them? Everyone built the wall while holding a weapon, others stood back and held extra weapons in case of attack, a trumpeter would sound the call at the place of attack and everyone would rally to him, and workers were working directly on the wall closest to their homes and families.

What sort of material were they using? New or old? A little of both, one of the great lessons is that the wall was built out of the old wall, just as Christ's church is built out of redeemed people. Something sort of related that I think is cool is a quote by Patrick of Ireland, in Ireland there were and are stone walls everywhere, definitely different than the defensive wall in Jerusalem, but stone walls none-the-less. Patrick looked at one of these walls and saw a spiritual parallel in his life, he said,

"Before I was humiliated I was like a stone that lies in deep mud, and he who is mighty came and in his compassion raised me up and exalted me very high and placed me on the top of the wall."

It's a good picture of us, totally useless and then redeemed and made useful. So, moving on in Nehemiah, in chapter 4 the great danger is external enemies who want to kill and/or oppress the people of God, a lesser danger is those in Jerusalem who start to doubt that the wall can be rebuilt, and are grumbling. Now we're going to see that this internal problem goes deeper than just grumbling.

Nehemiah 5:1-5 Now there arose a great outcry of the people and of their wives against their Jewish brothers. For there were those who said, "With our sons and our daughters, we are many. So let us get grain, that we may eat and keep alive." There were also those who said, "We are mortgaging our fields, our vineyards, and our houses to get grain because of the famine." And there were those who said, "We have borrowed money for the king’s tax on our fields and our vineyards. Now our flesh is as the flesh of our brothers, our children are as their children. Yet we are forcing our sons and our daughters to be slaves, and some of our daughters have already been enslaved, but it is not in our power to help it, for other men have our fields and our vineyards."

Due to the enemies outside of Jerusalem, and past problems, the people in Jerusalem are running out of their personal food stores and are needing to buy it from the storehouses in Jerusalem. In order to be able to afford this food, they are making deals with those that own the grain, by mortgaging their property. A mortgage is putting up a piece of property for money, as collateral on a loan, it comes from two words in Olde English, Mort and Gaige, which mean, Death and Pledge, so a Mortgage is a death hold on you by the one you've mortgaged something to. Not a great thing to be in.

The "what" they are doing is bad, but what is worse is the "who" is doing it. The nobles in Jerusalem are the ones who are exacting these charges, as we'll see in a moment, the people are upset because though they're all Jews, it is the poor Jews who are facing the severest consequences. We often look at kings like Artaxerxes who do somewhat nice things for one or two of the Jews as good kings, but Artaxerxes was overall a pretty wicked king, and he had some pretty hefty taxes out over the lands he controlled. The Jews were having to mortgage their land to be able to pay these taxes as well, and if they can't pay the king's taxes, the payment then reverted to sons and daughters, and Persia would take them off to be slaves in some far off land.

This is extremely sad and when Nehemiah hears it he responds well.

Nehemiah 5:6-7 I was very angry when I heard their outcry and these words. I took counsel with myself,

Let's pause here, Nehemiah is ANGRY at the sins against his brothers and sisters. Is being angry a sin? It can be, but everything can be a sin, very few things are always sins.

Ephesians 4:26-27 Be angry and do not sin; do not let the sun go down on your anger, and give no opportunity to the devil.

Nehemiah is angry, but he doesn't sin, but he is also very careful to check why he is angry, it says, "I took counsel with myself." I believe he paused for a moment to consider why he was angry and to think about some scripture, and especially how to best approach the problem. He could have just freaked out and said, "That's it, I'm leaving you and going back to my cushy job in Susa, deal with your own fool problems!" But he remembers some Bible verses and he decides that if these people really want to honor God, then by sharing the law with them, they will repent.

Nehemiah 5:7-8 and I brought charges against the nobles and the officials. I said to them, "You are exacting interest, each from his brother." And I held a great assembly against them and said to them, "We, as far as we are able, have bought back our Jewish brothers who have been sold to the nations, but you even sell your brothers that they may be sold to us!"

Nehemiah calls Jerusalem together to stand in court against those who are breaking the law and causing so much pain in Jerusalem. He immediately goes to the Law of Moses,

Exodus 22:25 If you lend money to any of my people with you who is poor, you shall not be like a moneylender to him, and you shall not exact interest from him.

It doesn't get any clearer than that, yet the nobles in Jerusalem are exacting interest, which means they loan money expecting more money in return. It's a good way to make money, but it's also a good way to tear a community apart, and God absolutely forbids it within the people of Israel and in the church.

Nehemiah points to the opposite end of the spectrum, that many Jews were sold into slavery, or sold themselves into slavery, during the exile, and many of the people, including Nehemiah, had been making every effort to buy their freedom and bring them home. This is one reason Nehemiah is so angry as well, because what the nobles are doing is in effect making people slaves in Jerusalem, people who had just been freed from the Babylonians.

Proverbs 22:7 The rich rules over the poor, and the borrower is the slave of the lender.

Americans are not my brothers and sisters, but I am still furious when I see commercials like the "J.G. Wentworth" ones where the lawyers are offering to buy annuities. They don't say so, but I'm sure they're offering less than 75% of the value, it is a great way to prey on the poor. The "Title-Pawn" and "Payday Loan" places are the same, exacting huge amounts of interest on the poor so that they are poorer at the end of the week than if they had just had no money. As you grow up, whichever industry you get into, please please please don't let it be one where you exploit the poor and drive them farther into debt. God absolutely hates it, many passages attest to this fact, this one in Nehemiah is especially clear.

Avoid getting into massive debt as well, because this makes you a slave, it shackles you to possessions and makes money more important in your life than it should be.

1 Corinthians 7:23 You were bought with a price; do not become slaves of men.

There is good news though, Nehemiah's rebuke of these sinning nobles has an effect,

Nehemiah 5:8 They were silent and could not find a word to say.

This is exactly what is supposed to happen when we preach the law to lawbreakers, showing that they have sinned against Heaven.

Romans 3:19 Now we know that whatever the law says it speaks to those who are under the law, so that every mouth may be stopped, and the whole world may be held accountable to God.

Now that they know they are sinning, Nehemiah drives for the correction,

Nehemiah 5:9-12 So I said, "The thing that you are doing is not good. Ought you not to walk in the fear of our God to prevent the taunts of the nations our enemies? Moreover, I and my brothers and my servants are lending them money and grain. Let us abandon this exacting of interest. Return to them this very day their fields, their vineyards, their olive orchards, and their houses, and the percentage of money, grain, wine, and oil that you have been exacting from them." Then they said, "We will restore these and require nothing from them. We will do as you say."

Nehemiah calls for a complete correction, a complete adherence to the law, not some compromise or a slow change, but he says, "This very day!" Hey says, stop charging them interest, he says, give their land back, and give their past interest back. Interest back then would have been just as today, a percentage of the loan added to the loan, except back then it wasn't just on money. If I loaned you a hundred pounds of grain, I'd expect a hundred-ten pounds back, if I were to charge you interest.

These nobles can't argue with the law of God, so they promise to repent, Nehemiah then wants to make sure they hold to it,

Nehemiah 5:12-13 And I called the priests and made them swear to do as they had promised. I also shook out the fold of my garment and said, "So may God shake out every man from his house and from his labor who does not keep this promise. So may he be shaken out and emptied." And all the assembly said "Amen" and praised the LORD. And the people did as they had promised.

The priests administered an oath and Nehemiah gave the example, saying basically, if you don't do what you've promised, may God do bad things to you. This is reminiscent of the Law of Moses promising curses for law breakers. Let's pause here just momentarily, because we've all broken the law of God, and not just a little, but quite spectacularly. This law that the Jews are under here is a good law, and it is meant to cause them to live long and happy lives together, but it is so perfect that often times we fall from keeping it,

Romans 7:10 The very commandment that promised life proved to be death to me.

So let's see how we are redeemed from under the curse of breaking the law:

Galatians 3:13 Christ redeemed us from the curse of the law by becoming a curse for us—for it is written, "Cursed is everyone who is hanged on a tree".

So that leads to probably our most important application, that we are NOT saved by the law, we are saved by Jesus Christ. But then, should we abandon the law all together?

Romans 3:31 Do we then overthrow the law by this faith? By no means! On the contrary, we uphold the law.

This law leads for happy congregations, even if it can't save our souls. All of the people in attendance are happy with this new law and say, "Amen", which means "Truth" and is affirming that the law of God is good, then they praised the Lord for giving such a good law.

Nehemiah now is going to step out of the chronology of the book real quick to preach at us. I love this little addendum because it shows that Nehemiah really understood his role as proto-savior of Israel, or the one who was delivering the Jews from both external and internal dangers. Christ fulfilled this so much more perfectly, but Nehemiah does it about as well as a man can.

Nehemiah 5:14-15 Moreover, from the time that I was appointed to be their governor in the land of Judah, from the twentieth year to the thirty-second year of Artaxerxes the king, twelve years, neither I nor my brothers ate the food allowance of the governor. The former governors who were before me laid heavy burdens on the people and took from them for their daily ration forty shekels of silver. Even their servants lorded it over the people. But I did not do so, because of the fear of God.

Nehemiah looks back over twelve years of service, well after the events of the Book of Nehemiah are over, and is able to affirm his words with his actions. We're not 100% sure when Nehemiah was made governor of Judah, my guess is right after the walls were finished, but the exact details are not given. But for twelve years he was the governor of Judea and he had certain rights as governor. One of those rights was to live like the king of Judah, but he didn't, and one of the reasons was because the past governors, from right after Zerubbabel died to when Nehemiah showed up, required the full food allowance, asking for all manner of food and wine daily, which greatly taxed the people. Nehemiah knows that one of the reasons a leader should fear God and follow his commandments is because those under him will follow his example, just as the evil governor's servants were mean to people as well.

We've read this verse a lot of times, but it is such a wonderful verse, lets read who we should imitate so we can point people at our lives and likewise tell them to imitate who we're imitating:

1 Corinthians 11:1 Be imitators of me, as I am of Christ.

During all of this time, Nehemiah IS getting paid, by Artaxerxes, and Artaxerxes is able to pay him because Artaxerxes is taxing the people. If Nehemiah had taxed them, they would have been doubly taxed. Our government is a terrible example, but just so you know, the fewer taxes the better, even if that one is big, because then it's easier to know where your money is going and to keep track of it. Let's see what Nehemiah did with his pay,

Nehemiah 5:16-18 I also persevered in the work on this wall, and we acquired no land, and all my servants were gathered there for the work. Moreover, there were at my table 150 men, Jews and officials, besides those who came to us from the nations that were around us. Now what was prepared at my expense for each day was one ox and six choice sheep and birds, and every ten days all kinds of wine in abundance. Yet for all this I did not demand the food allowance of the governor, because the service was too heavy on this people.

Nehemiah had a lot of people to feed, but he did it out of his own paycheck, even though he could have made the taxpayers foot the bill. One of my favorite verses in the whole Bible is in Psalm 50, it tells us that God likewise is not demanding from us money or possessions, but something so much more valuable,

Psalm 50:12-15 If I were hungry, I would not tell you, for the world and its fullness are mine. Do I eat the flesh of bulls or drink the blood of goats? Offer to God a sacrifice of thanksgiving, and perform your vows to the Most High, and call upon me in the day of trouble; I will deliver you, and you shall glorify me."

So if you are put in a position like Nehemiah, where you make a ridiculous amount of money, don't think it's because God loves you more, for we saw on Friday night that God loves all of his saints equally as he loves his beloved Son Jesus, but that you ought to be using whatever money you have to invest in his kingdom and alleviate the suffering of the poor and to glorify his name. Know that if God has given you an abundance, it is so you may give out of that abundance.

2 Corinthians 8:14-15 Your abundance at the present time should supply their need, so that their abundance may supply your need, that there may be fairness. As it is written, "Whoever gathered much had nothing left over, and whoever gathered little had no lack."

Nehemiah is a great writer, if he had just left it at that, we may be able to say all sorts of strange things about his motives, but he tells us exactly why he does what he does:

Nehemiah 5:15,19 ...because of the fear of God... Remember for my good, O my God, all that I have done for this people.

Let me give you the New Testament Parallel real quick as we're running out of time, Luke 19:

Luke 19:1-2 He entered Jericho and was passing through. And there was a man named Zacchaeus. He was a chief tax collector and was rich.

Tax collectors were the chief of sinners in most peoples' eyes, they were sell-outs to Rome and also greedy, as we see that Zacchaeus is rich, it confirms the stereotype, which is almost always true.

Luke 19:3 And he was seeking to see who Jesus was, but on account of the crowd he could not, because he was small of stature.

Not only does this refer to Zacchaeus' literal height, and also to how most people saw his character.

Luke 19:4-7 So he ran on ahead and climbed up into a sycamore tree to see him, for he was about to pass that way. And when Jesus came to the place, he looked up and said to him, "Zacchaeus, hurry and come down, for I must stay at your house today." So he hurried and came down and received him joyfully. And when they saw it, they all grumbled, "He has gone in to be the guest of a man who is a sinner."

It looks as though Jesus is mingling with the worst sinner in Jericho, which he definitely did on occasion, but here is not what he is doing,

Luke 19:8-10 And Zacchaeus stood and said to the Lord, "Behold, Lord, the half of my goods I give to the poor. And if I have defrauded anyone of anything, I restore it fourfold." And Jesus said to him, "Today salvation has come to this house, since he also is a son of Abraham. For the Son of Man came to seek and to save the lost."

Zacchaeus was wealthy, but he was also using that wealth for great good, and very careful not to defraud anyone, but if by some chance he did, he made sure to pay it back twice what the law required. Jesus goes on to tell a parable about how some people are rich and others are poor, and that richness or poorness are not indications of sin or blessing, but are entrusted to people by God to use for good.

So to our application, you may be like Nehemiah and Zacchaeus, hugely wealthy, and that's great, but know that much is required of you. Or you may be poor, and in that case you must know that much is required of you. Jesus is our great example, I think we've read this verse recently, but it is such a great verse that I'd read it everyday if I could,

2 Corinthians 8:9 For you know the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, that though he was rich, yet for your sake he became poor, so that you by his poverty might become rich.

Your second application is that Jerusalem was being rebuilt, it was going to be beautiful, but who cares how beautiful the city is if the people are all slaves and miserable inside. We must seek to build the church, but we must hold to the laws and joy of Jesus Christ so that we are not defrauding or mistreating our brothers and sisters. Who cares how massive the church is if we're no better off inside than outside? If the Son sets us free, we shall be free indeed.

We could go on to read passages like 1 Corinthians 3, 5, and 6 where sin inside of the church at Corinth is tearing it apart, cliques are formed, sexual abuse is tolerated, and Christians are suing and defrauding one another. It is a miserable church and one we must strive not to be. As Christ has forgiven you, let us also forgive one another, as Christ has set us free, let us not enslave one another, but let us love one another as Christ has loved us.

If we do so, we will have the perfect church.

March 20th - Ministry in a Hostile World

2011-03-20T07:34:00.003-04:00

Prayer Requests
Pastor Aaron Preaching / Resignation / Future
Summit Members in Foreign Lands
Christian Missionary in Sendai
Jennifer - Burn, Witnessing, Brother's Wedding
James - Band Festival
Mason - Lacrosse Game
Ben - Great Grandmother Health

Text - Nehemiah 4

Last week we talked about Nehemiah 3 and the beginning of the rebuilding of the wall when everything was going pretty smoothly. What are some things we can learn from chapter 3? It doesn't matter where you are in society, you have a roll to be playing in doing the work of God. If you want to see a manifestation of the Holy Spirit, what is the best way to do so? Strive to build up the church (1 Cor 14:12).

1 Corinthians 1:26-27 For consider your calling, brothers: not many of you were wise according to worldly standards, not many were powerful, not many were of noble birth. But God chose what is foolish in the world to shame the wise.

Last week in Nehemiah was the rebuilding of the wall during a time of peace, but this week we add a new element and one that will greatly edify us, it is doing ministry in a hostile world. If you desire to live a godly life in Christ, will you be persecuted? 2 Timothy 3:12 promises it.

So in Nehemiah 3 they are rebuilding the wall, and they are cruising to set a new record in wall building, but in chapter 4 we see the persecution begin.

Nehemiah 4:1 Now when Sanballat heard that we were building the wall, he was angry and greatly enraged, and he jeered at the Jews.

Sanballat is a high up official, probably a governor of a neighboring town to Jerusalem, likely in Moab across the Jordan River. He has never been happy to see someone helping Jerusalem, for at least two reasons, one, because with Jerusalem in shambles, Judah is free for the plundering, and two, because Sanballat is an idolater and hates the Living God.

His name is likely Egyptian, and it means "God of Sin, alive." This is a telling name, because it is obviously directly against the God of Righteousness. I don't want to press too far to try to say this is an incarnation of Satan, though he definitely is a type for Satan (which means Adversary), just as when Moses and Joshua were on the home stretch in coming into the promised land and a similar man named Balak (Destroyer) stood against them. The reason I don't want to press too far and say that Sanballat represents Satan is because he may also just represent sin, and how much sin hates it when you seek to build a wall to defend from worldly influences. One of my friends on facebook pointed out that in the war that rages continually in our soul between our sin nature and new nature, that our sin nature HATES reading the Bible and so we must push to overcome and read the Bible anyways.

Romans 7:21-24 So I find it to be a law that when I want to do right, evil lies close at hand. For I delight in the law of God, in my inner being, but I see in my members another law waging war against the law of my mind and making me captive to the law of sin that dwells in my members. Wretched man that I am! Who will deliver me from this body of death? Thanks be to God through Jesus Christ our Lord! So then, I myself serve the law of God with my mind, but with my flesh I serve the law of sin.

Sanballant moves around a lot during the book of Nehemiah, sometimes he's in Jerusalem, sometimes he's in Samaria, which is North of Jerusalem. Where-ever he lives and whatever his job title is, he is well familiar with Jerusalem, and prefers that it is in shambles.

Nehemiah 4:2 And he said in the presence of his brothers and of the army of Samaria, "What are these feeble Jews doing? Will they restore it for themselves? Will they sacrifice? Will they finish up in a day? Will they revive the stones out of the heaps of rubbish, and burned ones at that?"

We see in this passage that Sanballat has found or called together an army, and in a bit we'll see that it's not the only one. We see in this passage one of the main reasons he's mad, he asks, "Will they sacrifice?" His audience here is telling too, because the Samaritans at this point had built a temple on Mt. Gerazim to say that that was the correct place to worship God. Sanballat was from Bethhoron, or the "House of the god, Horon", Horon being a mytical god of the underworld, so both the Samaritans and Sanballat were against worship of the true God.

A neat part about the rebuilding of the walls is not just that the Jews are doing it so fast, it is the material they are using. They have some brand new material, but the wall is being largely built out of redeemed material that was greatly damaged in the destruction of Jerusalem in 587BC. Stone doesn't burn, but when it fell it would have been greatly damaged and then when the wood and other combustibles burned, it would have left these stones charred and looking unusable. But God is able to use the least of materials to build great things, just as he uses broken people to build a great church.

1 Peter 2:4-5 As you come to him, a living stone rejected by men but in the sight of God chosen and precious, you yourselves like living stones are being built up as a spiritual house, to be a holy priesthood, to offer spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God through Jesus Christ.

Because of the nature of the wall, though it is thick and well built, because of the craftsmen building it, it receives derision:

Nehemiah 4:3 Tobiah the Ammonite was beside him, and he said, "Yes, what they are building—if a fox goes up on it he will break down their stone wall!"

Tobiah, who we'll see in a few weeks is an exceedingly wicked dude, looks at the wall and says its so flimsy that it will never stand long. Nehemiah at this point does the best thing he could do, instead of going out and thumping these unbelievers on the head, he prays to God to intervene. Before we read that though, I want you to see that in chapter 2, Sanballat and Tobiah were in Jerusalem, but now they are not, the first step towards separating from these sinners was to put them outside of the city of God.

1 Corinthians 5:11-13 But now I am writing to you not to associate with anyone who bears the name of brother if he is guilty of sexual immorality or greed, or is an idolater, reviler, drunkard, or swindler—not even to eat with such a one. For what have I to do with judging outsiders? Is it not those inside the church whom you are to judge? God judges those outside. "Purge the evil person from among you."

Nehemiah has an absolutely amazing prayer against these sinners,

Nehemiah 4:4-5 Hear, O our God, for we are despised. Turn back their taunt on their own heads and give them up to be plundered in a land where they are captives. Do not cover their guilt, and let not their sin be blotted out from your sight, for they have provoked you to anger in the presence of the builders.

This is called an "imprecatory" prayer, or a prayer asking God to do violence against someone. They are not at all rare in the Bible, in fact 90 out of 150 Psalms contain imprecatory language. Look at what Nehemiah asks for, both physical action, that they would be taken captive, and spiritual action, that God would hold their sins against them. Jesus prays a very similar prayer on the cross in Psalm 69:22-28, for time's sake let's just read verse 27:

Psalm 69:27 Add to them punishment upon punishment; may they have no acquittal from you.

So that leads us to the question of whether we should pray prayers like that today. I would say yes, with a minor caveat, because unlike Jesus, and God's prophets of the Old Testament, we don't know who will repent of their sins, so I always temper my imprecatory prayers with, "God, please crush or convert them, but don't let them keep working such evil."

We remember that in action we always love our enemies and we leave all action up to God, for vengeance belongs to him.

Nehemiah 4:6-8 So we built the wall. And all the wall was joined together to half its height, for the people had a mind to work. But when Sanballat and Tobiah and the Arabs and the Ammonites and the Ashdodites heard that the repairing of the walls of Jerusalem was going forward and that the breaches were beginning to be closed, they were very angry. And they all plotted together to come and fight against Jerusalem and to cause confusion in it.

Just when things were going well, persecution arises and now we've got even more enemies standing against Jerusalem than we had just a few days ago. Their goal isn't to wipe out the Jews, because they like having them as slaves and targets of plunder, but to make sure they can't defend themselves. They want to cause confusion, to keep the people from focusing on the task at hand. Here is our first major lesson,

Ephesians 6:16 In all circumstances take up the shield of faith, with which you can extinguish all the flaming darts of the evil one...

We know that if God is for us, no-one can possible stand against us in any sort of capacity. So by trusting in God, this trust becomes a shield to protect us from confusion and it keeps our minds set on the task at hand, which is building the kingdom. That's exactly what Nehemiah does:

Nehemiah 4:9 And we prayed to our God and set a guard as a protection against them day and night.

We see both a trust in God, and an action. But the efforts of the enemy are having a small effect, Nehemiah needs to strengthen his people,

Nehemiah 4:10-11 In Judah it was said, "The strength of those who bear the burdens is failing. There is too much rubble. By ourselves we will not be able to rebuild the wall." And our enemies said, "They will not know or see till we come among them and kill them and stop the work." At that time the Jews who lived near them came from all directions and said to us ten times, "You must return to us."

Some of the greatest damage done to the wall building effort comes from within the camp, doubters who think the work is impossible, others who are afraid of what men can do, and then verse 12 is somewhat hard to translate, but it seems to say that Jews not involved in the wall-building effort are saying, "Stop doing what you're doing, let's just live the way we've always lived, it's better than dying." These doubters are causing a lot of damage and strife to the efforts, so Nehemiah comes up with an ingenious plan, where-as during peace we had people working all over the city, now Nehemiah is going to strategically place them for ministry in a hostile environment.

Nehemiah 4:13-14 So in the lowest parts of the space behind the wall, in open places, I stationed the people by their clans, with their swords, their spears, and their bows. And I looked and arose and said to the nobles and to the officials and to the rest of the people, "Do not be afraid of them. Remember the Lord, who is great and awesome, and fight for your brothers, your sons, your daughters, your wives, and your homes."

Nehemiah places the men in front of their houses and families, so they aren't just defending Jerusalem, but they are defending their whole world. It gives them a personal stake in standing firm. I love the whole church of Christ, but beloved, I love this church more than I love churches in far off lands, I love you more than I love Christians I don't know and/or am only faintly familiar with. This should be us as well, loving the whole church, but loving our own body of believers to the extent that we would rather die than see danger befall them, physically, and more importantly spiritually.

Because of this concerted effort, the plan of the enemy fails, and work can resume.

Nehemiah 4:15-17 When our enemies heard that it was known to us and that God had frustrated their plan, we all returned to the wall, each to his work. From that day on, half of my servants worked on construction, and half held the spears, shields, bows, and coats of mail. And the leaders stood behind the whole house of Judah, who were building on the wall. Those who carried burdens were loaded in such a way that each labored on the work with one hand and held his weapon with the other.

The Jews can no longer work like there is no threat, they are prepared for war, but they are still doing the work on the wall. It is important to remember that a good defense is often the best offense. A solid wall will keep Jerusalem safe from invaders. One of my favorite quotes, and one that is failing all over the world, is that we seek "Peace through Superior Firepower." When you are weak and easily conquered, everyone will come against you, but if you're bigger and stronger and your God is so much more powerful, then you're safe without having to fire a shot. We'll see that the Jews never do have to fight, because they are prepared.

We likewise must put on the full armor of God, having the Sword of the Spirit, which is the Word, ready as an offensive weapon, clothed in righteousness and truth, secured in salvation, and defended by the God of Peace. We must be ready and willing to war, not physically, but spiritually, and not against flesh and blood, but against spiritual forces.

Ephesians 6:12 For we do not wrestle against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the cosmic powers over this present darkness, against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly places.

Our goal is to build the church and see captives of the enemy come to Christ to receive forgiveness and reconciliation. It has been said that evangelism is, "One beggar showing another beggar where to find bread." It is so much more violent and dangerous than that, it is two armies standing against each other, an army of light and an army of darkness, the army of light made up of traitors to the darkness, and evangelism is those traitors boldly coming into the camp of darkness to proclaim that the King of Light is prepared to make peace if the soldiers of darkness will surrender completely. It is dangerous beyond dangerous, and the enemy soldiers are more than willing to kill the ambassadors of Christ. It is estimated that 100,000 Christians are martyred every year, and many more are mistreated. Let us be ready then to rush to the battle, where-ever it rages,

Nehemiah 4:18-20 And each of the builders had his sword strapped at his side while he built. The man who sounded the trumpet was beside me. And I said to the nobles and to the officials and to the rest of the people, "The work is great and widely spread, and we are separated on the wall, far from one another. In the place where you hear the sound of the trumpet, rally to us there. Our God will fight for us."

Boniface, missionary to Germany in the 700's, said it better than I can, "I yearn to go forth where the dangers are, not because I particularly enjoy those dangers, but because I know it is there that the battle rages for the souls of men and nations. God set me before the front lines. Let me not end my days in comfort and complacency!"

Let us rally to the spiritual battle for souls, not being complacent or pretending no war is raging, but always ready to build the church and defend the truth. The men under Nehemiah were always ready, let us likewise always be ready,

Nehemiah 4:21-23 So neither I nor my brothers nor my servants nor the men of the guard who followed me, none of us took off our clothes; each kept his weapon at his right hand.

This is another difficult Hebrew verse to translate, it likely says that the only time they were not in full battle gear was to wash, though the minutiate of this verse is not particularly important, because we see that they were always prepared. Let us likewise always be prepared, fully clothed in the righteousness of Christ, washed in his blood, having the Sword of the Spirit always at our right hand. We'll see that this wall was then completed, 52 days total, and that each person in Jerusalem had a share in building it, and each received the blessing of completing it.

It is hugely important that you take a portion of the church to build, pick a part that you care about deeply, either youth, or evangelism, or senior citizens, or whichever, find something you care about, and go forward with full strength. When the Pilgrims settled among the Massachusetts people, the first two years they had communal fields to plant and harvest, and they had a huge issue getting people to work hard and the harvests were sparse. On the third year they assigned each family a portion of the fields with the understanding that what grew belonged to that family. The effort put forth then was considerably better and the crops were bumper.

So beloved, find a portion of the church to work on, know that there is a reward in Heaven, know that you are working for your King, and know that your labor is not in vain.

March 13th - Building the Church

2011-03-13T07:41:00.005-04:00

Prayer Requests
Pastor Aaron Preaching / Resignation
St. Patrick's Day Witnessing
Swift Cantrel Witnessing
Summit Members in Foreign Lands
Japan Evangelism and Safety
Cassandra Feeling Better
Etowah High School, loss of student
Jennifer finishing Magnet applications
Ben's Great Grandmother Rest
David Master's College Scholarship
Students Teaching Friday

Text - Nehemiah 3, 1 Corinthians 12

We embark today on an absolutely amazing chapter of the Bible, but one which I could also make the most boring lesson in the Bible. It could be called a "baby-name chapter" because it contains some absolutely great names for babies when in a decade you' re looking, I especially like Hashbneiah (thoughts of God), Harumaph (Snub-nosed), and Shelemiah (thankful to God). We're not going to spend a whole lot of time in Nehemiah 3, because I want to look at the New Testament Parallel in 1 Corinthians 12.

Let's do some context in Nehemiah 2 Nehemiah leaves a very cushy position and travels to Jerusalem to seek the wellbeing of his people. How does this parallel Jesus Christ? Jesus stepped out of Heaven to be born into abject poverty to seek the welfare of his people.

2 Corinthians 8:9 You know the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, that though he was rich, yet for your sake he became poor, so that you by his poverty might become rich.

Something that I've read to you before, but is definitely worth reading again, is John Flavel's presumption on how the conversation between Jesus and his Father may have gone as Jesus left Heaven to rescue his people.

Father: My son, here is a company of poor miserable souls, that have utterly undone themselves, and now lie open to my justice! Justice demands satisfaction for them, or will satisfy itself in the eternal ruin of them: What shall be done for these souls?

Son: O my Father, such is my love to, and pity for them, that rather than they shall perish eternally, I will be responsible for them as their Surety; bring in all thy bills, that I may see what they owe thee; Lord, bring them all in, that there may be no after-reckonings with them; at my hand shalt thou require it. I will rather choose to suffer thy wrath than they should suffer it: upon me, my Father, upon me be all their debt.

Father: But, my Son, if thou undertake for them, thou must reckon to pay the last mite, expect no abatements; if I spare them, I will not spare thee.

Son: Content, Father, let it be so; charge it all upon me, I am able to discharge it: and though it prove a kind of undoing to me, though it impoverish all my riches, empty all my treasures, yet I am content to undertake it.

Nehemiah 2 is also a great look at Nehemiah leaving the world to endeavor something huge for God and his people. How does Jerusalem look at this point? It's in ruins, the walls are torn down, it is open for attack on every side, it is a sad place to live.

Here we see another parallel to Jesus, that he immediately started building his church after he was raised. We see this to a much smaller extent in Nehemiah as he starts to rebuild Jerusalem. There is much to learn in this passage and I struggled with how much we should read, I've decided we should read the whole chapter for the sake of knowing that the Bible it totally the Word of God and we shouldn't skip anything.

This passage shows us that the book of Nehemiah is a historical book, it's not just an allegory or a neat fictional account, but that it actually happened. Some people here are mentioned nowhere else, but in their faithfulness to God they are recorded for our edification and we should always remember that God takes notice even if others don't.

Nehemiah 3

The actual geography of Jerusalem is of a little value, I actually heard a whole sermon on the different gates trying to find a superspiritual hidden message in them, but the greater value is that we look at how everyone worked together. Though for geographies sake, the way this chapter is written works its way around the city from the Sheep Gate to the Sheep Gate, if you see in verse 1 it starts here, and in verse 32 it ends here. There is no greater importance for who is named in order, other than who is named first, the others are just in order of where they were on the wall.

The first people we see working are the priests led by the high priest, Eliashib. There is a community of people found in Georgia called the Mennonites, they used to be closely related to the Amish. They do a lot of weird things, but one of the weirdest is that they believe only their pastors should share their faith. The biblical model is that everyone should be doing the work of God, but that this should be led by the religious leaders. Where a pastor puts his emphasis is where the church will put their emphasis. You can see that with me that my emphasis is on evangelism and Bible memorization and growing students into capable disciples. You can see it in David Platt's church where one of his big thrusts is giving money for world missions and sending world missions, and his church is doing a mighty work in that.

So the priests are setting the example and everyone else falls in line, check out how Paul would say this,

1 Corinthians 11:1 Be imitators of me, as I am of Christ.

Another important thing we see in this passage is who is working. Look at verse 1, it's the high priest and lesser priests, verse 8, it is skilled laborers the goldsmiths and perfumers, throughout the passage there are noname people who seem to have no skill, just working, verse 12 a mayor/governor of Jerusalem and his daughters, so now we've got girls involved, verse 13, people from outside of Jerusalem join in, and in verse 30 we see a "sixth son" which is a son with little to gain in inheritance, but he's working for God, not worldly gain. The important thing to see about this passage of scripture is how many people are working and how diverse they are.

Not everyone is working though, look at verse 5, the nobles of the Tekoites would not help, they wouldn't stoop, to lowly levels, to serve God. There are many people I run into in Christendom today who will do things for all sorts of reasons, but won't dare to open their mouth to talk about Jesus Christ. They think they're serving God, but many of them unfortunately are not. Sometimes the most menial tasks can be the most important, while the most grandiose accomplish the least. Like yesterday Kyle was faithful to preach the gospel in Atlanta, maybe two-hundred people heard him, but I guarantee you he did more good yesterday than Joel Osteen will do today even though 2 million people will hear Joel Osteen. Stoop, beloved, to serve your Adoni, your Lord.

Two more things I want to show you before we move to 1 Corinthians 12. Look at verse 4, we've got this priest Meremoth working on the wall near the Fish Gate, which just for trivia is the gate that fish from Tyre would be brought through and where the fish markets were, but we see Meremoth working, and he must have finished his job. Instead of going and sitting down, he goes to verse 21 and finds another job to do, he repaired another section on the door of Eliashib's house.

That brings me to the next point. Eliashib wasn't working on his own house, which would have shared a wall with the wall of Jerusalem, he's working on another project somewhere else. But look at verse 23, here we've got people working on their own houses. I just want to show you that it's great to reach out, it's also great to be helped as well. They all knew that they were building the wall together and that it would get done, they trusted the efforts of their brothers and sisters. We should be doing likewise in the church, not saying, "Ok, everybody come work on my project." We're building the church together, and together it will get done by the work of the Holy Spirit.

So that brings us into the New Testament. There are all sorts of churches this morning that will be throwing wiz-bang services with crazy loud music, light shows, amazing computer animations, motorcycles jumping over the pastor, weird gimmicks, animals on stage, preachers dressed up, speaking in tongues and dancing like crazy and really trying to feel the Holy Spirit. Steve Lawson preached on Friday at John MacArthur's church and he made an excellent point that these are the "bland leading the bland", these churches, though alive in appearance, have no clue as to the power of the life giving Word of God, and are dead in their sin and trespass. We don't do that to try to feel the Holy Spirit, let's read

1 Corinthians 14:12 Since you are eager for manifestations of the Spirit, strive to excel in building up the church.

The way the Holy Spirit works is not by giving you a warm-fuzzy feeling inside, but by growing you in holiness, giving you boldness, enlightening the word, making your efforts fruitful, giving you love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, gentleness, faithfulness, and self-control. If you want these things more and more, then strive to build up the church.

And how do you do that? Can you only do it if you're a pastor or elder or teacher? By no means, let's go back to chapter 12.

1 Corinthians 12:4-11 Now there are varieties of gifts, but the same Spirit; 5and there are varieties of service, but the same Lord; and there are varieties of activities, but it is the same God who empowers them all in everyone. To each is given the manifestation of the Spirit for the common good. For to one is given through the Spirit the utterance of wisdom, and to another the utterance of knowledge according to the same Spirit, to another faith by the same Spirit, to another gifts of healing by the one Spirit, to another the working of miracles, to another prophecy, to another the ability to distinguish between spirits, to another various kinds of tongues, to another the interpretation of tongues. All these are empowered by one and the same Spirit, who apportions to each one individually as he wills.

The simplest summation of this passage is that you're not all goldsmiths, you're not all religious leaders, you're not all nobles, you're not all governors, but that you all have a place to work in God's building of the church.

Let's take a closer look at these, this is not a comprehensive list by any means, I think there are at least a few other gifts not here mentioned, like I believe I have a gift of boldness, of not caring what people think of me because I care more about what Jesus Christ thinks of me.

Utterance of Wisdom - This probably makes more sense to us if we see it as "ability to speak well with instructing words." This is the ability to teach application so that the hearers can more easily apply it.

Utterance of Knowledge - This is the ability to teach deep truths so that many understand.

Faith - The ability to persevere in the face of great adversity. Some are easily blown about in a sea of doubt, but others have a steadfast anchor, which can be used to moor others to the truth.

Healing - Either the ability to understand medicine better than most, or more probably to pray for sickness and have better than average results. It is not God's will that you are healthy and wealthy, because he uses the opposite for his glory, but there are definitely no lack of stories of people being healed through prayer. It is said that Charles Spurgeon had this gift and that 3 out of 4 people he prayed for got better. He always sought to point people at eternal healing rather than temporal healing though.

Miracles - This is the working of power, doing things much bigger than seems possible.

Prophecy - This is the public proclamation of the Word of God. In the Old Testament prophets spoke new revelation, in the New Testament we speak revelation that has been given to us in the Bible.

Discernment - The ability to tell what is God glorifying and what is not. Here is a good point to pause and let you know that all of these should be sought and strived for, that they are gifts by the Spirit, but we can definitely grow them.

Hebrews 5:14 Solid food is for the mature, for those who have their powers of discernment trained by constant practice to distinguish good from evil.

Tongues - The ability to speak other languages, to learn them easily. Anyone can learn a language, but some people have a supernatural gift to easily learn another language.

Interpretation - The ability to translate the one language into different languages. William Carey, a famous Baptist missionary to India, translated the New Testament into 27 languages, he had this gift.

Other gifts mentioned in the Bible are serving, exhortation, giving, mercy, and leadership.

1 Corinthians 12:14-31 For the body does not consist of one member but of many. If the foot should say, "Because I am not a hand, I do not belong to the body," that would not make it any less a part of the body. And if the ear should say, "Because I am not an eye, I do not belong to the body," that would not make it any less a part of the body. If the whole body were an eye, where would be the sense of hearing? If the whole body were an ear, where would be the sense of smell? But as it is, God arranged the members in the body, each one of them, as he chose. If all were a single member, where would the body be? As it is, there are many parts, yet one body. The eye cannot say to the hand, "I have no need of you," nor again the head to the feet, "I have no need of you." On the contrary, the parts of the body that seem to be weaker are indispensable, and on those parts of the body that we think less honorable we bestow the greater honor, and our unpresentable parts are treated with greater modesty, which our more presentable parts do not require. But God has so composed the body, giving greater honor to the part that lacked it, that there may be no division in the body, but that the members may have the same care for one another. If one member suffers, all suffer together; if one member is honored, all rejoice together. Now you are the body of Christ and individually members of it. And God has appointed in the church first apostles, second prophets, third teachers, then miracles, then gifts of healing, helping, administrating, and various kinds of tongues. Are all apostles? Are all prophets? Are all teachers? Do all work miracles? Do all possess gifts of healing? Do all speak with tongues? Do all interpret? But earnestly desire the higher gifts.

And all of this is led by the head, who is Christ. Where the head goes, there goes the church, we follow him, he's leading us and working in us. Here is our major application, that as you grow into leaders it is absolutely imperative that you preach the true Jesus, because if you preach a squishy or lop-sided Jesus, your disciples will follow that error. You must strive to be good teachers, rightly representing the head of the church, so that the whole body will be healthy.

James 3:1 Not many of you should become teachers, my brothers, for you know that we who teach will be judged with greater strictness.

And finally, we build this church, knowing that our labor is not in vain:

1 Corinthians 15:58 Therefore, my beloved brothers, be steadfast, immovable, always abounding in the work of the Lord, knowing that in the Lord your labor is not in vain.

March 6th - Separation From the World

2011-03-06T03:40:00.005-05:00

Prayer Requests
Whoever's Preaching
Swift Cantrel Witnessing
Eve and David - Salvation
Friend from work - Salvation
Ian's health
Tyler Mc's collarbone
KSU students going to Jordan
War in Tripoli/Believers safety
Praise - James' great band camp

Text - Nehemiah 2

Let's do some review, we're in Nehemiah 2 today, so first question, who is Nehemiah? Nehemiah is a Jewish man living in Persia in the year 445BC. He is probably up in age, very wise and in the most trusted position under the king of Persia. In chapter 1 his brother Hanani comes to visit him in Susa, and Nehemiah asks how things are in Jerusalem, how are they? Not good at all, the walls are torn down, and they are greatly oppressed. How did Jerusalem get that way? Over a hundred years prior it was destroyed by the Babylonians. How long have Jews been living in Jerusalem like that? Almost a hundred years. Why is Jerusalem such an important place, why did Daniel pray towards Jerusalem? It was the official dwelling place of God on earth. Why don't we pray towards Jerusalem today? Because God dwells in Heaven, his Spirit dwells in each of us, we seek a city to come, here we have no lasting city. But in Nehemiah's time it was imperative that they return to Jerusalem to be in the presence of God, but right now it is in rough shape.

So Nehemiah does what when he learns this? He mourns and prays and fasts. Do you remember how long he prays? Four months; a long time. At the end of four months, after he's counted the cost, he decides that he would rather please God than men. Here is our first application nice and early, let's read Paul's similar conclusion:

Galatians 1:10 For am I now seeking the approval of man, or of God? Or am I trying to please man? If I were still trying to please man, I would not be a servant of Christ.

So Nehemiah sets his heart towards home and prays to God to get him out of his current job as the Cupbearer to the king, which is generally not a position a person can get out of. Nehemiah has a very basic plan, he'll pray and then go before the king. I don't think Nehemiah had the faintest idea what he would ask, because his request was impossible, he couldn't get himself out of his current state through any effort of his own, so he goes trusting God.

Nehemiah 2:1-2 In the month of Nisan, in the twentieth year of King Artaxerxes, when wine was before him, I took up the wine and gave it to the king. Now I had not been sad in his presence. And the king said to me, "Why is your face sad, seeing you are not sick? This is nothing but sadness of the heart." Then I was very much afraid.

Many different kings in history have made it a law that you're not allowed to be sad when you're around them, everyone should always appear happy and like everything is super-wonderful all the time. Apparently Artaxerxes had the same law, because Nehemiah here feels like he's made a fatal mistake. Here is another application, that the kings of Persia called themselves, "King of kings", and they wanted it to appear that to be in their presence was pure joy. Our God, on the other hand, who genuinely is the King of kings, welcomes our weaknesses and sorrows, he tells us to come with boldness into his presence even if we're sad, he tells us to cast our cares on him, for he cares for us. He is such a better King than anything this world has ever produced.

Hebrews 4:16 Let us then with confidence draw near to the throne of grace, that we may receive mercy and find grace to help in time of need.

It was a great sign of disrespect to stand in front of Artaxerxes with a sad face on, but Nehemiah relies on God to give him the words to speak and carry him through this perilous situation.

Nehemiah 2:3 I said to the king, "Let the king live forever! Why should not my face be sad, when the city, the place of my fathers’ graves, lies in ruins, and its gates have been destroyed by fire?"

Nehemiah does the best thing you can ever do if you're trusting in God, he tells the truth. There are times in this world that if you're against God, it might be beneficial to tell a lie to keep yourself out of trouble, but we're not against God, we rely on the God of Truth, and so we should always be truthful both to rightly represent his both his truthfulness and our reliance on his Sovereignty.

Nehemiah tells Artaxerxes that his sadness is caused because Jerusalem is in shambles. This isn't just a statement, apparently, because the king hears it as a question.

Nehemiah 2:4-5 Then the king said to me, "What are you requesting?" So I prayed to the God of heaven. And I said to the king, "If it pleases the king, and if your servant has found favor in your sight, that you send me to Judah, to the city of my fathers’ graves, that I may rebuild it."

I love the verse where Nehemiah prays to God, it doesn't say he prayed it out loud, and by the context it clearly couldn't have been a long prayer. The shortest prayer I ever prayed was, "Help!" on the freeway when a car almost hit us in the shuttle. The important thing here is a complete reliance on God's sovereignty.

Nehemiah asks to be sent by the king to Judah, to rebuild Jerusalem. This is an exceptionally bold prayer, but if God were not with Nehemiah, he would already be in huge trouble for standing before the king in sadness.

Here's another application, God calls us to do bold things by his strength and in his power. None of these things are ever easy, if they were easy we would miss the power of God in them. It is amazing when a doctor helps a sick person get better, and while God is definitely in that, it is so much more amazing when God raises a person from the dead, something no man has ever or will ever do. The more difficult it is for us, the more it shows his power.

God is more than capable of doing it the easy way, but sometimes (most of the time) he does it the hard way so we grow in grace and we see his hand more clearly.

Proverbs 21:1 The king’s heart is a stream of water in the hand of the LORD; he turns it wherever he will.

God could have put it in Artaxerxes' heart to send a messenger to Nehemiah saying, "Pack your bags, I'm sending you to be governor of Jerusalem." But there is very little miracle in that, we want a big miracle, and here it comes.

Nehemiah 2:6 And the king said to me (the queen sitting beside him), "How long will you be gone, and when will you return?" So it pleased the king to send me when I had given him a time.

The impossible just happened, the king let his most trusted adviser go, the time is uncertain, probably a few years at least, we'll see Nehemiah return in a few chapters. The reason Nehemiah doesn't give the time is because he wants you to focus on the miracle of his salvation from a foreign kindgom instead of the logistics of it. I don't have the faintest idea why it says the queen was sitting beside Artaxerxes, there is probably a big theological reason, but we'll have to wait to Heaven to find out why.

Once we see that God is definitely working, it gets a little easier to be bolder. When I open air preach I remember that I have to say the first word, then the Holy Spirit will take over. The first word is almost impossible to get out, but afterwards preaching is easy. We see Nehemiah felt the same thing, his next request is pretty bold.

Nehemiah 2:7-8 And I said to the king, "If it pleases the king, let letters be given me to the governors of the province Beyond the River, that they may let me pass through until I come to Judah, and a letter to Asaph, the keeper of the king’s forest, that he may give me timber to make beams for the gates of the fortress of the temple, and for the wall of the city, and for the house that I shall occupy." And the king granted me what I asked, for the good hand of my God was upon me.

Now Nehemiah has the permission of the king, the blessings of the king, and even papers that are worth a ton of money. And we see in the end of verse 8 that Artaxerxes didn't do it out of the goodness of his own heart, but because God had directed his heart to do so.

So Nehemiah sets off, leaving the life he has always known, leaving safety and great riches and prestige, stepping out on faith to accomplish something that is definitely going to be very hard. Here's another application, go out and attempt something hard for God, he has used everyone from teenagers to old people, know that in the Lord your labor is not in vain, ask him to glorify himself through you.

Nehemiah 2:9 Then I came to the governors of the province Beyond the River and gave them the king’s letters. Now the king had sent with me officers of the army and horsemen.

Let's pause here so I can make a correction. Last week I told you that the province called Beyond the River was beyond the Jordan River, but it's actually beyond the Euphrates River, it's a lot more than just Judah, it's modern day Syria and Jordan and much of Iraq. This was a long and dangerous hike, and we see that the king cares so much for Nehemiah that he wants to make sure it's safe for him, he doesn't want to lose him to bandits. A great evangelist to Germany, named Boniface in the 700's, was murdered late in his life because bandits thought his caravan was carrying money, when it was actually carrying books and Bibles. Here is your next application, you have an appointment with death, you will not be late, and you are invincible until that day, so don't fear men.

2 Thessalonians 3:3 The Lord is faithful. He will establish you and guard you against the evil one.

Psalm 91:11 For he will command his angels concerning you to guard you in all your ways.

This next verse is pretty wild, because Nehemiah didn't announce his intentions, but the word has gotten out somehow.

Nehemiah 2:10 But when Sanballat the Horonite and Tobiah the Ammonite servant heard this, it displeased them greatly that someone had come to seek the welfare of the people of Israel.

These are likely rival governors, or at least men of prominence. Sanballat is from Moab, to the Northeast of Judah, and Tobiah, who was once a slave but has ascended to a higher position, is from Ammon, South of Moab. They are upset that someone is here to help the Jews. In my own witnessing I haven't run into this too often, but it is wild when someone knows who you are and why you're there without you telling them. I believe it is satanic for sure.

Here's your next application, if you are being obedient to God, the prince of the power of the air is going to oppose you. We'll see in future weeks how good they are at opposing God's purposes...here's a spoiler though, they're not good at it.

2 Timothy 3:12-13 Indeed, all who desire to live a godly life in Christ Jesus will be persecuted, while evil people and impostors will go on from bad to worse, deceiving and being deceived.

The most christlike man who ever lived was crucified, if we're living christlike lives we should expect persecution. There are some amazing parallels between Nehemiah and Jesus Christ, we'll look at them in a bit, some are blatant, some people have tried to force, we'll see a forced one in the next verse:

Nehemiah 2:11-12 So I went to Jerusalem and was there three days. Then I arose in the night, I and a few men with me. And I told no one what my God had put into my heart to do for Jerusalem. There was no animal with me but the one on which I rode.

Jesus was in the grave for three days, and Nehemiah was in Jerusalem for three days...I'll tell you that I don't think this is any more than a coincidence, there is absolutely no theological significance that I can find for Nehemiah; Christ lay dead for three days so we were sure he was dead. But look, we do have some parallels, Nehemiah has come to seek the welfare of Jerusalem and yet he doesn't immediately announce himself, he prepares beforehand, just as Jesus did. Jesus was doing more though, he had to fulfill all righteousness so that in his exchange for us all of our sins would be on him and all of his righteousness would be on us. He exchanged his truth for our lies, our adultery for his faithfulness, he was even baptized so he could cover the sin of those who fail to be baptized.

Nehemiah rested because it was a long journey from Susa, and he was likely old and worn out. He rode on a beast of burden I believe for two reasons, first because he was worn out, and two because he was fulfilling Zechariah's prophecy that the anointed one of God would arrive humbly riding on a donkey. Jesus would be the greater fulfillment later.

It seems that Jerusalem didn't know why Nehemiah was there, and there isn't any fan-fare to be spoken of, I believe this points towards to when the Messiah would be born four hundred years later and be mostly ignored by the very people he came to save.

So Nehemiah goes out to survey the damage. Jerusalem is a disaster at this point, piles of rocks everywhere, massive holes in the wall, no gates, it is a sad sad place to live.

Nehemiah 2:13-16 I went out by night by the Valley Gate to the Dragon Spring and to the Dung Gate, and I inspected the walls of Jerusalem that were broken down and its gates that had been destroyed by fire. Then I went on to the Fountain Gate and to the King’s Pool, but there was no room for the animal that was under me to pass. Then I went up in the night by the valley and inspected the wall, and I turned back and entered by the Valley Gate, and so returned. And the officials did not know where I had gone or what I was doing, and I had not yet told the Jews, the priests, the nobles, the officials, and the rest who were to do the work.

He went around most of the city, some places he couldn't go due to rubble, but he got a good look at the damage. One thing cool in here, look at verse 13, he went to the dragon spring. There is some history to say that it is so named because a dragon/dinosaur lived there during the time of Lamentations when very few people lived in Jerusalem. Unfortunately we'll have to wait until Heaven to know for sure why it is so called the Dinosaur Spring, but this is just one more of many places the Bible mentions dinosaurs known by men. The best is in Job 40 and I encourage you to read it later when you get a chance.

So Nehemiah sees that there is much to be done. He has prayed, he as counted the cost, now it's time to get moving.

Nehemiah 2:17-18 Then I said to them, "You see the trouble we are in, how Jerusalem lies in ruins with its gates burned. Come, let us build the wall of Jerusalem, that we may no longer suffer derision." And I told them of the hand of my God that had been upon me for good, and also of the words that the king had spoken to me. And they said, "Let us rise up and build." So they strengthened their hands for the good work.

These men were more than capable of rebuilding Jerusalem, of calling on the name of the Lord for help, for stepping up to action, but they had fallen into stagnancy and just accepted that they were constantly in danger from the world. Sometimes what a major project needs is just someone to stand up and say, "Let's do something!" It helped a lot that God had so worked in Nehemiah's life already and his testimony was used to motivate people. So the wall was rebuilt and everyone lived happily ever after, the end. No, not really.

Nehemiah 2:19 But when Sanballat the Horonite and Tobiah the Ammonite servant and Geshem the Arab heard of it, they jeered at us and despised us and said, "What is this thing that you are doing? Are you rebelling against the king?"

Three people step up to try to stop the rebuilding of Jerusalem. Sanballat, Tobiah, and someone we haven't seen before, Geshem, from Arabia south of Judah. Israel, indefensible at this point, had been theirs basically, they could do whatever they wanted to Israel because they couldn't defend themselves. Now they're concerned because Israel might be able to stand up for herself. But they can't say, "We want to keep stealing your stuff, so no rebuilding the wall." They need a different excuse.

Their excuse is to claim that the work is against Artaxerxes, that the Jews are seeking to throw off his authority, but we know that Nehemiah had the full blessing of Artaxerxes. Besides the blessing of Artaxerxes, the blessing of God Almighty is so much better.

Nehemiah 2:20 Then I replied to them, "The God of heaven will make us prosper, and we his servants will arise and build, but you have no portion or right or claim in Jerusalem."

One of the main reasons that they are rebuilding the wall is to set themselves apart once more as a holy people, to keep sinners out. In the church today it is really popular to try to build bridges to the world, to find relevancy so that they will listen to us, but the Bible says we ought to be building walls, that lest they be our brethren through regeneration, then an easy intermingling between us shouldn't be possible.

James 4:4 You adulterous people! Do you not know that friendship with the world is enmity with God?! Therefore whoever wishes to be a friend of the world makes himself an enemy of God.

We can build walls by rejecting sin, by using our language for good, by avoiding physical sins, by esteeming life as worth defending, by not giving the world even an appearance of sin in ourselves, redeeming the time and rejecting ungodly living.

John 17:14-19 I have given them your word, and the world has hated them because they are not of the world, just as I am not of the world. I do not ask that you take them out of the world, but that you keep them from the evil one. They are not of the world, just as I am not of the world. Sanctify them in the truth; your word is truth. As you sent me into the world, so I have sent them into the world. And for their sake I consecrate myself, that they also may be sanctified in truth.

Let's look at Jesus, he was the highest official in Heaven, he looked and saw his people perishing, he was commissioned by his Father to step out of Heaven, he came to us, seeking the welfare of his saints, his people took very little notice of his arrival, and on his last week he rode in humble on a donkey. Jesus did what Nehemiah couldn't, he atoned for our sins on the cross, then he defeated death. He has commissioned the building of his church, and he has called many helpers to himself to work in that. So let us arise and build, let us share out faith, not loving the world, but calling many out of the darkness into Christ's glorious light.

February 27th - Count the Cost

2011-02-27T06:59:00.004-05:00

Prayer Requests
Pastor Aaron Preaching
Swift Cantrel Preaching
Indian Christians murdered
David - College
Kyle - Mt. Paran
Greyson - Mom health, Uncle health, Job interviews
Tyler - Job interviews
Kari - Friend in hospital, Dance teacher's husband cancer
Tyler McIntosh's collar bone
Jennifer - Magnet Decisions

Text - Nehemiah 1

We're starting this morning the book of Nehemiah. There are many different types of writing in the Bible, the Epistles are letters which are to instruct and edify. Zechariah, which we just finished, is prophetic, it is teaching through dreams and visions and word-pictures. Other types are the poetry of Psalms, the wisdom of Proverbs, and the Narrative of the Gospels and Acts of the Holy Spirit. Each of these requires a slightly different teaching style, and Nehemiah, which is a Historical Narrative, will be best taught not line-by-line, but so that you see the major theme of each major event. If you get lost or confused it is imperative that you ask questions, because something that may seem totally obvious to me might be lost on you, since I've spent so much time already in this book.

Nehemiah comes as a package deal with Ezra, so much so that sometimes this book is called Ezra-Nehemiah. They are split up mainly because of scroll length when they weren't written in books, but on scrolls. The reason we are not going to Ezra right after Zechariah is because Ezra is an extremely fast paced, numbers-based, book which is really useful for giving us the timeframe of Zechariah, Haggai, Nehemiah, and Esther, but with not a lot of didactic material of its own. It would literally take us years to get through Ezra because every chapter would have us going to another minor prophet.

The reason we chose to do Nehemiah after Zechariah is because in Zechariah the major rebuilding effort was the Temple, now the major rebuilding effort in Nehemiah will be the wall of Jerusalem. Both of these books happen after the Babylonian exile, Zechariah in 522-518BC, and Nehemiah quite a bit later in 445BC. Remember that Jerusalem was burned in 586BC, so the fact that Jerusalem lay in rubble for so long is a very important point as we get a little farther into Nehemiah.

After the Jews were allowed to go home after the Babylonian exile, starting about 535BC, there were two major returns. The first was when Zechariah and Zerubbabel and Joshua led many back. The second was led by Ezra, quite a bit later. During this time there were trickling of Jews back in, but even as we see in the book of Acts in the AD40's that many Jews had not come back but had lived in foreign lands for hundreds of years.

It is very important to remember that God dwelt in a temple in Jerusalem during this time, so to have no interest to be near to Jerusalem was to have no interest to be near to God. In our days though, we remember that Jesus Christ, God the Son, created for himself a temple of flesh and dwelt in it; that if anyone is born again then the Holy Spirit dwells in them and they are a temple of God.

1 Corinthians 6:19-20 Or do you not know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit within you, whom you have from God? You are not your own, for you were bought with a price. So glorify God in your body.

It is massively important that we recognize that a Jew living willingly outside of Jerusalem in the 5th century BC was rejecting God. To the contrary, Daniel was forced to live outside of Jerusalem and he reacted this way,

Daniel 6:10 When Daniel knew that the document had been signed, he went to his house where he had windows in his upper chamber open toward Jerusalem. He got down on his knees three times a day and prayed and gave thanks before his God, as he had done previously.

Daniel knew where God dwelt, and prayed towards him, not at all happy that he was a prisoner in a foreign land. Remember this point, because it will be very important for our application at the end.

So that brings us to Nehemiah. Nehemiah is a man born outside of Israel in Persia (Modern Day Iran), he is probably about 60 years old, and many think he was probably a very smart and handsome man, because of his job he had as the Cupbearer of the king of Persia. A Cupbearer isn't just a waiter, it is a much more trusted position. It can be so high as to be the second in command of a nation. The Cupbearer is responsible for making sure the king is not poisoned, so it is a very trusted position. There have been no lack of Cupbearers in history who have betrayed their kings to death in order to try to steal the throne.

The Cupbearer is privy to all manner of military and kingdom secrets, and his advice is readily sought and desired by the king. So the first thing we learn about Nehemiah is that he has done very well for himself in the world, he is probably the richest and most powerful Jew in the world at this time, more so than even the governor of Jerusalem.

At this time, the land of Israel/Judah aren't even called by their names, but are called the "Province Beyond the River." Which river do you think it's beyond? The Jordan. It is a dark, dark day for Jerusalem, but Nehemiah seems to be oblivious, so let's start into Nehemiah,

Nehemiah 1:1-3 The words of Nehemiah the son of Hacaliah. Now it happened in the month of Chislev, in the twentieth year, as I was in Susa the capital, that Hanani, one of my brothers, came with certain men from Judah. And I asked them concerning the Jews who escaped, who had survived the exile, and concerning Jerusalem. And they said to me, "The remnant there in the province who had survived the exile is in great trouble and shame. The wall of Jerusalem is broken down, and its gates are destroyed by fire."

The twentieth year is the twentieth year of Artaxerxes, so that definitively dates this book to 445BC. The month of Chislev is November, this will be more important in a bit, but not right now. There was constant traffic from Jerusalem to Susa, a capital city of Persia, some of whom would be Jews. Nehemiah talked with his brother named Hanani, who was either just coincidentally in Susa where Nehemiah was, or more likely perhaps Hanani sought Nehemiah out to try to improve the condition of Jerusalem. Nehemiah asks, basically, "How is the rebuilding of Jerusalem coming?" I don't think he gets the answer he was expecting at all, he is told they are shamed, in great persecution from surrounding peoples, and that their walls are still in shambles and the gates are wide open to any oppressor. The Holy Spirit greatly convicts Nehemiah and Nehemiah instantly goes into mourning.

Nehemiah 1:4-5 As soon as I heard these words I sat down and wept and mourned for days, and I continued fasting and praying before the God of heaven. And I said, "O LORD God of heaven, the great and awesome God who keeps covenant and steadfast love with those who love him and keep his commandments..."

Nehemiah goes into great mourning, both for the condition of Jerusalem, but I think more so for his own sin of being so affluent in a sinful place.

His prayer is fantastic, he starts here by quoting Daniel's prayer in Daniel 9. He shows himself to be well versed in the Hebrew scriptures, he quotes Daniel, Moses, and Ezra, and I love his beginning to this prayer, to the Lord God of Heaven. This prayer is asking both for forgiveness of the people Israel, and also for Nehemiah, and I think his opening shows that he has not mixed any of the Persian gods into his worship, but sees that God is the only God and Saviour. His prayer continues,

Nehemiah 1:6-7 Let your ear be attentive and your eyes open, to hear the prayer of your servant that I now pray before you day and night for the people of Israel your servants, confessing the sins of the people of Israel, which we have sinned against you. Even I and my father’s house have sinned. We have acted very corruptly against you and have not kept the commandments, the statutes, and the rules that you commanded your servant Moses.

Nehemiah confesses great sin before God, starting with the nation, then to his own house, then even himself. He is totally broken over this sin, as evidenced by his fasting and weeping for days, not just minutes. He continues now by appealing to God's faithfulness and that he responds to repentance,

Nehemiah 1:8-9 Remember the word that you commanded your servant Moses, saying, 'If you are unfaithful, I will scatter you among the peoples, but if you return to me and keep my commandments and do them, though your outcasts are in the uttermost parts of heaven, from there I will gather them and bring them to the place that I have chosen, to make my name dwell there.'

Nehemiah confesses that Israel's sins led to the exile and the condition of Jerusalem now, but he continues the verse from Deuteronomy, that if they repent then they will be returned to a place where God dwelt. Nehemiah is hoping for this repentance to lead to God turning his eyes and ears back in favor towards Jerusalem.

At this point we see that it was very clearly the sins of Israel that led to their great pain and destruction. Sometimes when bad things happen, it is the result of sin, especially in the context of a whole nation. But it is not always the result of sin. Like if you stub your toe you shouldn't go to try to figure out, "Which sin was it that God is punishing me for in the stubbing of my toe?" As children of grace, we do not expect every sin to receive a retribution, since they have been paid for on Calvary's cross. But we also have to see in the falling of nations and bad things that happen to cities can be seen to be punishment from God,

Amos 3:6 Does disaster come to a city, unless the LORD has done it?

Does that mean that cities that have disaster in them are worse and cities that are safe was better? No, Jesus answered that question by saying, "Unless you repent, you shall likewise perish." (Luke 13:1-5) Disaster is a punishment for sinners, and also a warning. This is a complex issue and I encourage to read Psalm 73 when you get a chance, which tackles it a lot deeper. Not everything bad that happens is a result of sin, but some things are. Like the condition of Jerusalem right now in Nehemiah's day is definitely a result of sin. Nehemiah is praying that God will forgive them and build them back up,

Nehemiah 1:10-11 They are your servants and your people, whom you have redeemed by your great power and by your strong hand. O Lord, let your ear be attentive to the prayer of your servant, and to the prayer of your servants who delight to fear your name, and give success to your servant today, and grant him mercy in the sight of this man."

This is recognized as one of the greatest intercessions in the Bible, asking God to listen and save and rescue his people. We'll see much more next week on how Nehemiah brings it to fruition, but we need to remember that the beginning of all success starts with prayer. When I'm witnessing I like to remember that we have to talk to God about people before we talk to people about God.

John 9:31 We know that God does not listen to sinners, but if anyone is a worshiper of God and does his will, God listens to him.

We see in this case that Nehemiah is a worshipper of God, but he needs to do his will. It is impossible to be a follower of God and not be changed. Nehemiah at this point is a great sinner, he lives in absolute wealth and extravagance while his people perish. We'll see next week that he does God's will, he is changed, he does act on his worship of God.

This is very similar to one of my favorite conversations Jesus had in Luke 18,

Luke 18:18-30 And a ruler asked him, "Good Teacher, what must I do to inherit eternal life?" And Jesus said to him, "Why do you call me good? No one is good except God alone. You know the commandments: 'Do not commit adultery, Do not murder, Do not steal, Do not bear false witness, Honor your father and mother.'" And he said, "All these I have kept from my youth." When Jesus heard this, he said to him, "One thing you still lack. Sell all that you have and distribute to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven; and come, follow me." But when he heard these things, he became very sad, for he was extremely rich. Jesus, seeing that he had become sad, said, "How difficult it is for those who have wealth to enter the kingdom of God! For it is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich person to enter the kingdom of God." Those who heard it said, "Then who can be saved?" But he said, "What is impossible with men is possible with God." And Peter said, "See, we have left our homes and followed you." And he said to them, "Truly, I say to you, there is no one who has left house or wife or brothers or parents or children, for the sake of the kingdom of God, who will not receive many times more in this time, and in the age to come eternal life."

There is a young man very like Nehemiah who has the world by the toes, he has every good thing, wealth, food, respect, power, and yet he is confronted with the fact that these things have become his idol. You can't go to Heaven by selling everything you own and giving it to the poor, what you must do is love God more than anything else, and we see that this young man wouldn't repent, and walked away sad, walking away from the greatest treasure in the universe. Jesus said that it was easier to get a two-ton dromedary through a 1 millimeter hole than to get a sinner into Heaven.

Jesus' followers recognized that they wouldn't make it either, so they said, "That sounds impossible." This is similar to Nehemiah's condition, in that he is the Cupbearer of the king, he cannot leave. He has all sorts of classified information, he knows where armies are, how big they are, how major campaigns are being waged, the tactics of the Persians, building projects and weaknesses of cities and provinces...if he asks to leave, it is very unlikely that the king will let him go. We'll see next week that what is impossible with men, is possible with God. After four months of praying, Nehemiah is allowed to return to Judah, leaving all manner of wealth behind him.

And this is not a call to leave all money and comfort, but it is a call to love God more than money and comfort. In the New Testament we see Christians with families and houses and wives and parents and children and even some with great wealth (Lydia), but these must not be your idols, or they will keep you out of the kingdom. Whatever you lose in this world will be repaid many times over in Heaven, Jesus calls us thusly,

Matthew 6:19-21 Do not lay up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moth and rust destroy and where thieves break in and steal, but lay up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor rust destroys and where thieves do not break in and steal. For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.

None of us should enter lightly into following Christ. He does not say, "Try it for a little while and if you don't like it, then go on your way." He does not say as many have dubbed "Pascal's Wager" that "It is better to believe in God and be right than not to believe in God and be wrong." or "If I'm right, then I'm fine, but if you're right, I'm fine."

No, Jesus calls for a much deeper and more committed discipleship. It is a discipleship that says if your own brother hates you for being a Christian, that you continue to be a Christian. It is a discipleship that says if you lose your life you will rejoice, if you lose your house you will continue to follow, if none go with you, you will walk alone with Christ.

Luke 14:25-33 Now great crowds accompanied him, and he turned and said to them, "If anyone comes to me and does not hate his own father and mother and wife and children and brothers and sisters, yes, and even his own life, he cannot be my disciple. Whoever does not bear his own cross and come after me cannot be my disciple. For which of you, desiring to build a tower, does not first sit down and count the cost, whether he has enough to complete it? Otherwise, when he has laid a foundation and is not able to finish, all who see it begin to mock him, saying, 'This man began to build and was not able to finish.' Or what king, going out to encounter another king in war, will not sit down first and deliberate whether he is able with ten thousand to meet him who comes against him with twenty thousand? And if not, while the other is yet a great way off, he sends a delegation and asks for terms of peace. So therefore, any one of you who does not renounce all that he has cannot be my disciple.

So your application today is to not love the world or the things in the world, but to recognize that there is salvation and hope and everlasting happiness in only One. He requires much, but he also promises much, do not enter into his discipleship lightly, endeavor to be the best disciple he has ever had, or don't claim to be a disciple at all. Nehemiah prayed for 4 months before he decided to leave his worldly paradise to do the work of God, please be likewise praying and counting the cost, knowing that whatever you lose in Christ will be repaid to you many times over in Heaven.

Also, pray for your nation, for your church family, for your biological family, and for yourself, that you would be strengthened to withstand the temptations of the world, that you would be accurate representations of Christ in the world, and that through your life and ministry many would be saved. When we pray we don't pray towards Jerusalem, but towards Heaven, knowing that through Christ we are heard and that our prayers have great power because of him who has effected them.

Finally, as we'll look at next week, that Nehemiah is a type for Christ, he shows us some things about Christ which wouldn't take place for almost 500 years. Jesus Christ, God our Comforter, (Nehemiah means God comforts), stepped out of the kingdom of Heaven to be poor, to exchange our spiritual poverty for his spiritual affluence, he came to save his people, and he has secured salvation for those who once were exposed to the world without hope. Set your affections on this Christ, know that he always lives to make intercession for his saints, know that he has paid for all of your sins, both confessed and unconfessed, that he took our sins on himself and confessed them for us, so if we follow him, repenting towards him, and placing our full faith in him, then we are totally forgiven and will be welcomed into the kingdom of Heaven.

February 20th - The Watchman

2011-02-20T08:04:00.000-05:00

Prayer Requests

Pastor Aaron Preaching John 14

Princess Weekend

Men's Dinner

Athens Preaching

Swift Cantrel Preaching

Students Traveling:

-Hannah DC

-Westbrooks Caribbean

Kari Birthday

This morning we will look at a topical lesson at our purposes in evangelism. Please turn to Ezekiel 33, actually start in Jeremiah 23. Next week we will start Nehemiah 1, which is the rebuilding of Jerusalem after the Babylonian Exile. What major structure was rebuilt in Zechariah and Haggai? The Temple, this was also rebuilt after the Babylonian exile and the destruction of Jerusalem.

I realized as I was looking at Nehemiah 1 that I didn't do a very good job of explaining to you why Jerusalem was destroyed and Israel sold into captivity by God. This exile happened from 605~535BC. The sin of Israel was great, it started partly in her prophets, who preached "Peace!" when in fact there was no peace, neither peace with Babylon, nor peace with God. Prophets who were godly who warned beforehand were Isaiah and Micah, prophets who were godly who preached during the exile were Jeremiah, Daniel, and Ezekiel. Prophets who were godly after the exile were Zechariah, Haggai, Ezra, Nehemiah, and Esther. Let's let a prophet tell us why God is so furious with false preachers then and now and why he sent Israel into captivity then, and the church today.

Jeremiah 23:9-32 Concerning the prophets: My heart is broken within me; all my bones shake; I am like a drunken man, like a man overcome by wine, because of the LORD and because of his holy words. For the land is full of adulterers; because of the curse the land mourns, and the pastures of the wilderness are dried up. Their course is evil, and their might is not right. "Both prophet and priest are ungodly; even in my house I have found their evil, declares the LORD. ¹² Therefore their way shall be to them like slippery paths in the darkness, into which they shall be driven and fall, for I will bring disaster upon them in the year of their punishment, declares the LORD. In the prophets of Samaria I saw an unsavory thing: they prophesied by Baal and led my people Israel astray. But in the prophets of Jerusalem I have seen a horrible thing: they commit adultery and walk in lies; they strengthen the hands of evildoers, so that no one turns from his evil; all of them have become like Sodom to me, and its inhabitants like Gomorrah." Therefore thus says the LORD of hosts concerning the prophets: "Behold, I will feed them with bitter food and give them poisoned water to drink, for from the prophets of Jerusalem ungodliness has gone out into all the land." Thus says the LORD of hosts: "Do not listen to the words of the prophets who prophesy to you, filling you with vain hopes. They speak visions of their own minds, not from the mouth of the LORD. They say continually to those who despise the word of the LORD, 'It shall be well with you'; and to everyone who stubbornly follows his own heart, they say, 'No disaster shall come upon you.'" For who among them has stood in the council of the LORD to see and to hear his word, or who has paid attention to his word and listened? Behold, the storm of the LORD! Wrath has gone forth, a whirling tempest; it will burst upon the head of the wicked. The anger of the LORD will not turn back until he has executed and accomplished the intents of his heart. In the latter days you will understand it clearly. "I did not send the prophets, yet they ran; I did not speak to them, yet they prophesied. But if they had stood in my council, then they would have proclaimed my words to my people, and they would have turned them from their evil way, and from the evil of their deeds. "Am I a God at hand, declares the LORD, and not a God far away? Can a man hide himself in secret places so that I cannot see him? declares the LORD. Do I not fill heaven and earth? declares the LORD. I have heard what the prophets have said who prophesy lies in my name, saying, 'I have dreamed, I have dreamed!' How long shall there be lies in the heart of the prophets who prophesy lies, and who prophesy the deceit of their own heart, who think to make my people forget my name by their dreams that they tell one another, even as their fathers forgot my name for Baal? Let the prophet who has a dream tell the dream, but let him who has my word speak my word faithfully. What has straw in common with wheat? declares the LORD. Is not my word like fire, declares the LORD, and like a hammer that breaks the rock in pieces? Therefore, behold, I am against the prophets, declares the LORD, who steal my words from one another. Behold, I am against the prophets, declares the LORD, who use their tongues and declare, 'declares the LORD.' Behold, I am against those who prophesy lying dreams, declares the LORD, and who tell them and lead my people astray by their lies and their recklessness, when I did not send them or charge them. So they do not profit this people at all, declares the LORD.

This passage perfectly sums up why Israel was taken into captivity, because they rejected God, substituted an idol, chased after their sin, and then found preachers who would tell them that God had no wrath and was not angry and did not require them to repent. These false prophets became a burden both to God and to the people, and so God sent them both from his presence in Jerusalem into far away lands, and also from his spiritual presence into everlasting pain. Besides lying prophets, Israel had a problem with prophets who wouldn't tell people about sin or the consequences of sin,

Isaiah 56:10 His watchmen are blind; they are all without knowledge; they are all dumb dogs; they cannot bark, dreaming, lying down, loving to slumber.

A lying or lazy prophet will reek havoc on a people spiritually, and we see this today in a myriad of preachers who say, "It will go well with you," or "No disaster shall come upon you," or "Live your best life now," or "I'm ok and you're ok," or any such thing pretending that God is not angry. Let me start out by saying because of our sin, you and I are in grave danger from the God of Heaven.

Hebrews 10:31 It is a terrifying thing to fall into the hands of the living God.

There is but one hope, it is listed throughout the Bible, but my favorite is in

Romans 8:1 There is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus.

We are in Christ, not because we do good works, but by faith, but if we are in Christ, then we will do good works. If you have not been changed, not born-again, not seeking to the will of your Father who is in Heaven, then beloved, the chances that you still stand in condemnation are great. This message is a painful one, and one which is not popular today just as it was not popular then, check out Jeremiah's response when he preached this message, people HATED him for it, and though he preached for at least 50 years, he never so much as reaped one convert, because the people were so sinful:

Jeremiah 20:8-10 For whenever I speak, I cry out, I shout, "Violence and destruction!" For the word of the LORD has become for me a reproach and derision all day long. If I say, "I will not mention him, or speak any more in his name," there is in my heart as it were a burning fire shut up in my bones, and I am weary with holding it in, and I cannot. For I hear many whispering. Terror is on every side! "Denounce him! Let us denounce him!" say all my close friends, watching for my fall. "Perhaps he will be deceived; then we can overcome him and take our revenge on him."

So now, let's go to our application. Every person who speaks for God is a prophet, if we speak of the true and living God, then we are true prophets, if we say we speak for God but we preach a different god, then we are false prophets. We do not receive new revelation, for in these latter days God speaks through his Word, but this revelation is more than sufficient and it is the Word of Faith which we are to proclaim. Let's read two verses to support this:

Hebrews 1:1-2 Long ago, at many times and in many ways, God spoke to our fathers by the prophets, but in these last days he has spoken to us by his Son, whom he appointed the heir of all things, through whom also he created the world.

Romans 10:8 "The word is near you, in your mouth and in your heart" (that is, the word of faith that we proclaim)...

Beloved, here is where it gets personal; you may say, I don't want the office of a prophet, I don't want the derision of Jeremiah, I don't want to be persecuted, so I will not speak for God and therefore will not have this responsibility. But just by your affiliation with a Christian church, you have a reputation as a Christian, and if you do not speak then you fall into the camp of the lazy and hungry dumb dog of Isaiah, and you tell the world that the message of Christ is not worth proclaiming.

I don't say this simply to scare you, but to impress upon you the huge responsibility and privilege you have in being called out of the darkness into the light of Christ, that we cannot waste this life nor this Word we have been given, not just to avoid punishment, but there is a threat of punishment,

Luke 12:47-48 And that servant who knew his master’s will but did not get ready or act according to his will, will receive a severe beating. But the one who did not know, and did what deserved a beating, will receive a light beating. Everyone to whom much was given, of him much will be required, and from him to whom they entrusted much, they will demand the more.

Not just to avoid punishment, but for the great reward of both the glory of Christ, and to be welcomed home as a faithful witness,

Matthew 25:21 His master said to him, 'Well done, good and faithful servant. You have been faithful over a little; I will set you over much. Enter into the joy of your master.'

It has taken us a while to get to Ezekiel 33, but here we are. Ezekiel was a great sinner, sent away from the presence of God in the Babylonian exile, but who was called to be a prophet in Ezekiel 2. He was instantly changed and declared the Word of God to many and converted some and angered others. In chapter 3 he is given a command which he heeds, which is again reiterated in chapter 33. This is reiterated for a purpose, to assure us that the office of prophet is not a one-time command, but extends over our entire lifetime. So let's read

Ezekiel 33:1-9 The word of the LORD came to me: "Son of man, speak to your people and say to them, If I bring the sword upon a land, and the people of the land take a man from among them, and make him their watchman, and if he sees the sword coming upon the land and blows the trumpet and warns the people, then if anyone who hears the sound of the trumpet does not take warning, and the sword comes and takes him away, his blood shall be upon his own head. He heard the sound of the trumpet and did not take warning; his blood shall be upon himself. But if he had taken warning, he would have saved his life. But if the watchman sees the sword coming and does not blow the trumpet, so that the people are not warned, and the sword comes and takes any one of them, that person is taken away in his iniquity, but his blood I will require at the watchman’s hand. "So you, son of man, I have made a watchman for the house of Israel. Whenever you hear a word from my mouth, you shall give them warning from me. If I say to the wicked, O wicked one, you shall surely die, and you do not speak to warn the wicked to turn from his way, that wicked person shall die in his iniquity, but his blood I will require at your hand. But if you warn the wicked to turn from his way, and he does not turn from his way, that person shall die in his iniquity, but you will have delivered your soul.

The picture here is of a watchman set in a high tower to watch for danger. His job is simple, it is not to defend the people against an army, it is simply to see an army coming and sound a trumpet saying, "There is danger coming, brace yourself!" This is his one and only job.

He can fail in this job one of two ways. First by seeing the advancing army and not caring. Or two by falling asleep and missing the advancing aggressor, or by seeing the aggressor and being too lazy to do anything to warn the people.

Either way, this failed prophet/watchman will answer for his sin to God.

How can we see this in our life? Is a real army going to march upon Swift Cantrel? Very unlikely. But is there a great danger from God towards sinners? Yes, check out

Nahum 1:8-9 But with an overflowing flood he will make a complete end of the adversaries, and will pursue his enemies into darkness. What do you plot against the LORD? He will make a complete end; trouble will not rise up a second time.

Let's read some places where the Apostle Paul quoted or alluded to this passage:

Acts 18:6 And when they opposed and reviled him, he shook out his garments and said to them, "Your blood be on your own heads! I am innocent. From now on I will go to the Gentiles."

Acts 20:26-27 Therefore I testify to you this day that I am innocent of the blood of all of you, for I did not shrink from declaring to you the whole counsel of God.

This is our charge, to never shrink of declaring the whole counsel of God, to proclaim Christ and him crucified, the offense of the cross, telling people that they must repent or perish, they must be born again to inherit the kingdom of God. Now, if we are genuinely a Christian, but we fail to do our duty as the watchman, will we lose our salvation? Let's let 1 Corinthians 3 answer that:

1 Corinthians 3:11-15 For no one can lay a foundation other than that which is laid, which is Jesus Christ. Now if anyone builds on the foundation with gold, silver, precious stones, wood, hay, straw—each one’s work will become manifest, for the Day will disclose it, because it will be revealed by fire, and the fire will test what sort of work each one has done. If the work that anyone has built on the foundation survives, he will receive a reward. If anyone’s work is burned up, he will suffer loss, though he himself will be saved, but only as through fire.

We're not saved by our efforts, but the efforts of Christ, so we cannot lose our salvation, but we can be disobedient and enter Heaven with nothing to show for our lives at all. Lecrae says, "I would hate to never lead someone to Christ before I face the Lord."

So what do we say? Ezekiel continues,

Ezekiel 33:10-20 "And you, son of man, say to the house of Israel, Thus have you said: 'Surely our transgressions and our sins are upon us, and we rot away because of them. How then can we live?' Say to them, As I live, declares the Lord GOD, I have no pleasure in the death of the wicked, but that the wicked turn from his way and live; turn back, turn back from your evil ways, for why will you die, O house of Israel? "And you, son of man, say to your people, The righteousness of the righteous shall not deliver him when he transgresses, and as for the wickedness of the wicked, he shall not fall by it when he turns from his wickedness, and the righteous shall not be able to live by his righteousness when he sins. Though I say to the righteous that he shall surely live, yet if he trusts in his righteousness and does injustice, none of his righteous deeds shall be remembered, but in his injustice that he has done he shall die. Again, though I say to the wicked, 'You shall surely die,' yet if he turns from his sin and does what is just and right, if the wicked restores the pledge, gives back what he has taken by robbery, and walks in the statutes of life, not doing injustice, he shall surely live; he shall not die. None of the sins that he has committed shall be remembered against him. He has done what is just and right; he shall surely live "Yet your people say, 'The way of the Lord is not just,' when it is their own way that is not just. When the righteous turns from his righteousness and does injustice, he shall die for it. And when the wicked turns from his wickedness and does what is just and right, he shall live by this.

There is salvation in none other than Jesus Christ, who is the just and the justifier, the righteous one who died for the unrighteous. If we do not repent towards him, putting on his righteousness, then we will fall in the final judgment. But wearing his righteousness, him paying for our sin and rising again, we have a strong and perfect plea, we will live.

So let us go out and proclaim this message of reconciliation, let us not be dumb dogs, let us not be lying prophets. We have the words of eternal life, let us declare them with boldness, both so that we are not bad stewards and watchmen, but so that many will turn and live, and Christ will get the glory for being a perfect Saviour, and we will be welcomed into Heaven on the phrase, "Well done, good and faithful servant, enter into the joy of your Master."

February 13th - Superbowl Debrief

2011-02-13T08:30:00.002-05:00

Prayer Requests
David Preaching
Pastor Aaron Preaching
Superbowl Outreach Results
Kari's friend Kyle - Death of mother, heart attack of father
Hannah - Washington Trip
Jennifer - Magnet Admittance
Greyson - Job Interviews

Text - Zechariah 14:16-21

Today we are going to finish up Zechariah with a definite application of world-evangelization.

Since Tyler and myself and 108 of our closest friends went to the Superbowl we have lots of sermon illustrations for this lesson, so the second part of this lesson will be a Superbowl debrief.

The very end of Zechariah is an amazing prophecy for world-evangelization. God has always had a chosen people, starting first with the descendents of Seth, then to Abraham, then to the people Israel descended from Jacob. This selectivity shows that God is Sovereign in the world and has a plan and a purpose for everything that happens, that he is orchestrating history, and is under no requirement to save anyone at all, but in his grace has a small remnant of saints amongst rebels.

If you asked a Jew in Zechariah's time, or even today, you'll most likely hear that God's chosen people is the nation Israel, and God is not particularly interested in people outside of Israel. But chapter 14 is going to show us otherwise, the God will be saving from every nation and tongue.

It's always good to check the New Testament to make sure it agrees with our interpretation of the Old Testament, and here we definitely see that it does:

Revelation 5:9-10 And they sang a new song, saying, "Worthy are you to take the scroll and to open its seals, for you were slain, and by your blood you ransomed people for God from every tribe and language and people and nation, and you have made them a kingdom and priests to our God, and they shall reign on the earth."

So, what was the major event that happened in the beginning of chapter 14 of Zechariah? Major battles and Christ's total victory. The language used at the end of this passage is great, because it really paints a great picture of Heaven and of Christ.

Zechariah 14:16-21 Then everyone who survives of all the nations that have come against Jerusalem shall go up year after year to worship the King, the LORD of hosts, and to keep the Feast of Booths. And if any of the families of the earth do not go up to Jerusalem to worship the King, the LORD of hosts, there will be no rain on them. And if the family of Egypt does not go up and present themselves, then on them there shall be no rain; there shall be the plague with which the LORD afflicts the nations that do not go up to keep the Feast of Booths. This shall be the punishment to Egypt and the punishment to all the nations that do not go up to keep the Feast of Booths. And on that day there shall be inscribed on the bells of the horses, "Holy to the LORD." And the pots in the house of the LORD shall be as the bowls before the altar. And every pot in Jerusalem and Judah shall be holy to the LORD of hosts, so that all who sacrifice may come and take of them and boil the meat of the sacrifice in them. And there shall no longer be a trader in the house of the LORD of hosts on that day.

All survivors will recognize that God is the King of the earth, and they celebrate a very specific feast, it is called the Feast of Booths, or probably a better title is Feast of Tabernacles. This feast commemorates a time when God lived with the Israelites in the desert when Moses had led them out of captivity from Egypt. This was a very important feast because it reminded the Jews that God was with them and dwelt with them and cared for them and would be their Saviour. Basically what this feast was was the Jews would built little tents in their front yards or on their flat roofs or in the center of town, and live in them for a week, both to remind themselves of God's provisions, and to remember that ultimately they must dwell with him if they would live. So that brings us to the greatest verse in all of scripture, if you only memorize one verse in your entire life, you need to memorize this verse, it is the summation of the whole Old Testament, John 1:14. Let's start at verse 1 for context:

John 1:1,14 In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, and we have seen his glory, glory as of the only Son from the Father, full of grace and truth.

Jesus Christ, God himself, tabernacled among us, he built a tent out of flesh and came and lived in it. So this feast of Tabernacles that we will celebrate for eternity is not us living in tents in our back yards, no, it is so much more grand, it is us recognizing that Jesus Christ is God with us, he is the Word Incarnate, the gracious God, the True God, the full weight of glory of the Father, and that we have put on his righteousness and his Spirit dwells in us and makes us holy. Anyone who rejects this Christ as the true Tabernacle will be rejected,

vv.17-19 And if any of the families of the earth do not go up to Jerusalem to worship the King, the LORD of hosts, there will be no rain on them. And if the family of Egypt does not go up and present themselves, then on them there shall be no rain; there shall be the plague with which the LORD afflicts the nations that do not go up to keep the Feast of Booths. This shall be the punishment to Egypt and the punishment to all the nations that do not go up to keep the Feast of Booths.

The language here is very prophetic, it's something the Jews would have understood without knowing exactly how Christ would save them, so it relates it in language they would understand giving allegiance to a sovereign conquering king. What is missing from this passage is any idea that the decision is reversible; if a nation changes its mind there is no chance of blessing after they have rejected the Conquering King.

Look at the language of the curses, there will be no rain, we can very clearly see Hell described in this passage, look at one description of Hell in Luke 16:

Luke 16:24 And he called out, 'Father Abraham, have mercy on me, and send Lazarus to dip the end of his finger in water and cool my tongue, for I am in anguish in this flame.'

And there is a final nail in the coffin for anyone who thinks they will find blessing somewhere else, like Egypt doesn't really need rain because they have the Nile River, so God adds pain to the lack of moisture. The other curse is a plague for punishment, it doesn't take much to see this described in the endless torment and wailing of Hell. We could say these are the people who say, "I don't need Christ, I'm good enough," or "Mohammed will save me," or "Mary will save me," or, "my suffering in purgatory will save me," or even, "My ceasing to exist will end my torment." No, there is no other Saviour than Christ, and God knows how to keep them in eternal punishment, as it says in 2 Peter 2.

So all who recognize Christ as God in the flesh, and who honor him as such, will be saved and receive blessing after blessing after blessing, but those who will not recognize him will face an endless punishment because their sin against a Sovereign and Infinite King will require an infinite retribution.

vv.20-21 And on that day there shall be inscribed on the bells of the horses, "Holy to the LORD." And the pots in the house of the LORD shall be as the bowls before the altar. And every pot in Jerusalem and Judah shall be holy to the LORD of hosts, so that all who sacrifice may come and take of them and boil the meat of the sacrifice in them. And there shall no longer be a trader in the house of the LORD of hosts on that day.

These verses describe Heaven, where everything is totally holy. The smallest ornaments will be holy, there will be no need for Priests, which is where, "Holy to the Lord" used to be found, because there will be no need for atonement for sins, both because the atonement has been perfectly completed by Christ, AND because there will be no sin to atone for. Everything down to your coffee cups will be holy, as if they had been cleansed in the temple. And we will forever offer a sacrifice of praise to God for our salvation, partaking in the blessings forever and ever.

And the book of Zechariah concludes with a great little phrase, that there will never again be a sinner/trader/Canaanite in Heaven ever again.

So, let's transition to real world application; evangelism and world-missions. Right now there are hundreds, if not thousands, of nations that have no believers in Christ from them. When we think nations, we think big massive governmental systems, but a nation can actually be much smaller. In early American evangelism it was an exciting time because many thought it was the last frontier to bring the gospel to, and they catalogued Indian nations and found there were thousands of them. Growing up I always remember that he Hopi and Navajo Indians were very careful to call themselves nations.

The main reason that Christ is not returning today is that many of his saints have not yet believed, and many of these are in currently-lost nations. So it is vital for us to be hastening his return by sharing his gospel. We live in such an amazing age today that we are able to witness to Christ in ways previously unknown of, like the internet, or skype, or online games. Another way is our airport in Atlanta has multitudes of foreigners travel through it daily. And yet another way is to visit major sporting events which draw massive crowds.

Last weekend Tyler and myself and six others from Atlanta drove to Dallas for the Superbowl. We went because there were probably half-a-million visitors in Dallas/Fort Worth for this event.

We were in Dealey Square, where Kennedy was shot, and an Egyptian demonstration sprouted up behind us. My guess is that there were 150 protestors there, mostly Muslims. This fall of Mubarak is a horrible thing for the world, and will cause great damage to the world, the fact that our president supports the Muslim Brotherhood in this tragedy is horrendous.

The demonstration happened under a guise of democracy and social justice, but truly it is a means for Islamic domination of the nation. At the rally I read Revelation 3:14-21 on how God is against democracy and calls for people to recognize him as King. The Muslims were using a public address system, which I clearly had to preach over. I really surprised the man speaking when I was so loud, and the Muslims moved very close to me to try to intimidate us. As soon as I knew I had their attention I preached the gospel and called them to repentance. Later my friend Rich preached for over an hour with our public address system.

At the rally my friends were talking to various people, one of them talked to an Egyptian woman named Messina who believed that Jesus was just a prophet. My friend asked, "Can prophets lie?" She said no. He asked, "Well then was Jesus lying when he claimed to be God?" The woman said, "I've always wondered about that." They were able to answer many of her questions.

Another group of my friends talked to a man from Jordan who had gotten saved a few months ago. He had no idea where to go for discipleship, and was getting some really bad information from various places. My friends were able to show him a little about how to read the Bible, and they got his contact information to hopefully help find him a church near where he lives.

Another man from Jordan was given a Muslim specific gospel tract and read the entire thing, which was not short. Probably every Muslim there got that tract, given out by a new evangelist who really stepped out of his comfort zone to call people out of the darkness into the light, to be a part of the chosen nation of Christ.

I was getting flustered and my friend Bobby asked me if I wanted to go somewhere else to talk to some people, I assented and went with my friend Katherine to share the gospel. It so happened that the first people we talked to were from France; four 17-18 year olds. They had no idea who Jesus is or what he has done, and it was a real treat to get to witness to them. They tried to say that they didn't need to worry about their sin because they didn't believe in Jesus; I corrected them to say that it doesn't matter what they believe, judgment is coming and they must flee from the wrath to come. At the beginning of the conversation I used the example that they could get hit by a bus and stand before God today. At the end of the conversation one of them was so anxious to get away that he almost ran into traffic. I told him, "Don't you get hit by a bus until you've had time to think about this!"

Afterwards Tyler and I approached a group of five local kids hanging out next to a parking lot. As we approached it became readily apparent by odor that they were smoking Marijuana. Two of them ran off as soon as I started talking, I thought it was to get away from the light, but I think what they did was run off and stash their drugs, because they came back after not too long and got to hear the gospel.

That night as we were waiting to eat in a crowded restaurant lobby my friends Peter and Alex had the idea to do what is called "eavesdrop evangelism" where they share the gospel over their cell-phone with the hopes that people around them will listen in on the conversation.

I open-air preached at the train station and got to talk to two totally lost girls who claimed to be Southern Baptists. It was a running theme through the week to talk to people who thought they were Christians but had no idea of the basics. We gave them tracts and a book on what the gospel is.

Late that night we ended up preaching in front of an Usher concert, there was a line of about 250 people and we got to tract and preach to the whole crowd. Sometimes when you're preaching you need to gather a crowd, other times the crowd is provided for you. A drunk guy came up to tell us we were evangelizing wrong, and over the course of a long conversation it became apparent that he didn't believe the Bible, that God is Trinity, or that drunkenness and fornication is a sin, and we left him knowing that we did not consider him a brother and that he needed to repent.

At the Superbowl we gave out about a hundred thousand tracts, and preached all over the stadium. It was a great day and many many people from all over the world heard the gospel. I was preaching in front of the Rangers Stadium, doing what is called stoplight preaching, which means you need to deliver the message very quickly, between a minute to three minutes. My friend Eddie had my open-air stand, so I was at street level, while it's always good to have some elevation over your audience so your voice will carry farther. Once when I was preaching a guy said, "You're too loud." I responded, "Sir, you're too close."

My open-air sermon when something like this: Hello sports fans, we're with Sports Fan Outreach International out of Atlanta, Georgia. We're here partly because we like football, we were here last year because we like baseball, but the main reason we're here is because we want to see you in Heaven some day. Every major religion says that in order to go to Heaven you must be a good person. I know from the Bible that almost everyone of us will proclaim our own goodness, but we have a problem, Jesus said, "There is none good but God." So let's test ourselves to find out if we're right, or if the Bible is right. Here is the good person test: Have you ever told a lie? What do you call someone who lies? A liar, right? Have you ever stolen anything, regardless of value? Here is the good news for your Packer fans, it doesn't make you a Stealer, but here is the bad news, it does make you a thief. Have you ever taken God's name in vain? When we do that we set our mouths against Heaven, we declare war on the God who made us. And the one that got me, you've heard it said of old, thou shalt not commit adultery, but Jesus said that if you look with lust you've committed adultery already in your heart. Those are four of the Ten Commandments, there are six more and they don't get any easier, if you've broken them then you are not a good person, but a lying, thieving, blasphemous, adulterer at heart, and you have to stand before God on judgment day. But God, in his great mercy and by the great love by which he loved us, sent his Son Jesus Christ, God manifest in the flesh, to live a perfect life and die willingly for our sins on the cross. We broke the law, he paid our fine. Three days later he defeated death, proving he was who he said he was, so now if we repent of our sins and place our full trust in him to save us, we will be saved, for he who knew no sin became sin for us so that we may become the righteousness of God in him. I implore you, in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ, be reconciled to God! Thank you for listening to me, enjoy the game!

That night we wanted to go eat and watch the game on TV, but we ended up at a Chili's where they didn't have TV's except in the bar. It was alright though because we had great fellowship. We asked our waitress if there was anything we could pray for her about, and she said no. As we were ready to leave she asked us which church we went to, and we explained that we were from out of town. We had two girls with us, Eve and Katherine, both amazing young women with great theology and boldness, and Katherine took over this conversation, encouraging the girl to read her Bible. At the end Katherine asked to pray for her and when Katherine was done the girl was crying and really touched by the compassion of our group.

A couple days before Eve had read the entire book of Second Corinthians in the open-air in Fort Worth.

It was really a great trip and hopefully people from many nations and tongues will be added to the kingdom of Christ. I pray that it encourages you to share your faith and go out and preach Christ to your friends and neighbors. Our next major evangelism outreach will be the Big Shanty Festival in April, so be praying about going with us.