Sermon Tone Analysis

Determined Faithfulness

Intro

He saw Gentile people who lived in Jerusalem transgressing the Sabbath, so he confronted the nobles.

Nehemiah explained that their fathers in the past did such things and wrath came on Israel.

In response to these transgressions, Nehemiah had the gates shut during the Sabbath, to keep the Sabbath holy.

Because of these actions, he asked God to remember and spare him according to God's steadfast love.

Nehemiah also saw Jews who intermarried, so he confronted and attacked them.

He also had them take an oath again not to intermarry.

He cites Solomon's downfall because of intermarriage and attacks their willingness in this evil and treacherous act.

One of the sons of the High Priest was engaging in these evil and treacherous acts as well, so Nehemiah chases him away too.

Because of these actions, he asked God to remember Jehoiada and Eliashib for desecrating the holy priesthood.

By these actions, Nehemiah cleansed the people from everything foreign to holiness and set up the necessary things to promote further holiness.

Nehemiah closes by asking God to remember him for good.

Intro

Overview of Nehemiah

We have spent the last 16 weeks looking at the life of Nehemiah.

I want to share with you some of the key aspects of Nehemiah that we have seen during this series.

(First six aspects of Nehemiah from “Nehemiah” by Edwin Yamauchi in The Expositor’s Bible Commentary Revised Edition #4 ed. by Tremper Longman III and David E. Garland, 2010, page 568.)

Nehemiah was a man of Responsibility, as shown by his position as the royal cupbearer.

He was a man of vision, he planned accordingly then acted.

He was a man of prayer, he prayed spontaneously and even in the presences of the king (2:4-5).

He was a man of action and cooperation, realizing what needed to be done, explaining it to others and enlisted their aid.

He was a man of compassion, moved by the mistreatment of the poor, he renounced his rights as governor (5:18) and denounced others who acted in greed (5:8).

He was a man who triumphed over opposition, whether they ridiculed him (4:3), attempted to slander him (6:4-7) and even spread misleading messages—fake news—about him (6:10-14).

Nehemiah triumphed over difficulties.

The key to all of these aspects was Nehemiah’s faithfulness.

Nehemiah was faithful first to God, second in the mission God had given him and lastly in his convictions.

Faithfulness is the what we are going to look at today.

READ:

How can we lives faithful lives that honor God and lead others to Christ?

PRAY

Today we will look at Nehemiah’s actions in the last several verses of his book.

Turn to Nehemiah 13 verse 15.

Points

Nehemiah has not been in Jerusalem for a while possibly even years.

He has been back in his home serving king Artaxerxes as we saw last week in .

Determined Faithfulness

Right before his departure we see that all the people made a covenant with the Lord in

(ESV)

The Obligations of the Covenant

28 “The rest of the people, the priests, the Levites, the gatekeepers, the singers, the temple servants, and all who have separated themselves from the peoples of the lands to the Law of God, their wives, their sons, their daughters, all who have knowledge and understanding, 29 join with their brothers, their nobles, and enter into a curse and an oath to walk in God’s Law that was given by Moses the servant of God, and to observe and do all the commandments of the Lord our Lord and his rules and his statutes.

30 We will not give our daughters to the peoples of the land or take their daughters for our sons.

31 And if the peoples of the land bring in goods or any grain on the Sabbath day to sell, we will not buy from them on the Sabbath or on a holy day.

And we will forego the crops of the seventh year and the exaction of every debt.

We saw in the first part of chapter 13, that the people had already gone back on caring for the Lord’s house.

(ESV)

We saw in the first part of chapter 13, that the people had already gone back on caring for the Lord’s house. .

10 I also found out that the portions of the Levites had not been given to them, so that the Levites and the singers, who did the work, had fled each to his field.

The section we are going to look at today, shows that they had forsaken all the things they had previously promised to do.

READ:

This event likely took place September-October during the Grape Harvest, Grain would have been harvested a few months earlier and the figs would be late figs or autumn figs.

General Law of Sabbath Rest is in

“Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy.

Six days you shall labor, and do all your work, but the seventh day is a Sabbath to the Lord your God.

On it you shall not do any work, you, or your son, or your daughter, your male servant, or your female servant, or your livestock, or the sojourner who is within your gates.

For in six days the Lord made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that is in them, and rested on the seventh day.

Therefore the Lord blessed the Sabbath day and made it holy.

Harvesting Prohibited

“Six days you shall work, but on the seventh day you shall rest.

In plowing time and in harvest you shall rest.

Demand for Rest of Beast

“Six days you shall do your work, but on the seventh day you shall rest; that your ox and your donkey may have rest, and the son of your servant woman, and the alien, may be refreshed.

There are two distinct groups mentioned in verse 15 and 16.

In 15 Nehemiah is likely speaking of the Jews living in Judah.

In verse 16, we see Tyrians, which are people from Tyre who are living in Jerusalem.

The Tyrians were not Jewish, they were Gentiles.

Forsaken the Sabbath was not a new thing in Israel.

records the people impatiently waiting for the Sabbath to end so they could get back to making money.

4  Hear this, you who trample on the needy

and bring the poor of the land to an end,

5  saying, “When will the new moon be over,

that we may sell grain?

And the Sabbath,

that we may offer wheat for sale,

that we may make the ephah small and the shekel great

and deal deceitfully with false balances,

6  that we may buy the poor for silver

and the needy for a pair of sandals

and sell the chaff of the wheat?”

(ESV)

4 Hear this, you who trample on the needy

and bring the poor of the land to an end,

5 saying, “When will the new moon be over,

that we may sell grain?

And the Sabbath,

that we may offer wheat for sale,

that we may make the ephah small and the shekel great

and deal deceitfully with false balances,

6 that we may buy the poor for silver

and the needy for a pair of sandals

and sell the chaff of the wheat?”

This event likely took place September-October during the Grape Harvest, Grain would have been harvested a few months earlier and the figs would be late or autumn figs.

In , we see that one of the reasons the Israelites were taken into captivity was because they didn’t keep the Sabbath holy.

(ESV)

(ESV)

General law of Sabbath rest is in , harvesting prohibited , and demand of rest for beast in

20and say: ‘Hear the word of the Lord, you kings of Judah, and all Judah, and all the inhabitants of Jerusalem, who enter by these gates.

Keep the Sabbath Holy

21Thus says the Lord: Take care for the sake of your lives, and do not bear a burden on the Sabbath day or bring it in by the gates of Jerusalem.

22And do not carry a burden out of your houses on the Sabbath or do any work, but keep the Sabbath day holy, as I commanded your fathers.