Does Anybody Really Care?

SERMON OUTLINE:

• Setting the Scene #1: A brief background.

• Setting the Scene #2: What the book is about?

• (1). He cared enough to ask (vs1-3)

• (2). He cared enough to weep (vs 4)

• (3). He cared enough to pray (vs 5–10)

• (4). He cared enough to volunteer (vs 11)

SERMON BODY:

Ill:

• People cry about a lot of things.

• They cry at weddings.

• Parents cry when their children leave home.

• Sometimes they cry at the birth of their children and grandchildren.

• They cry at sad movies.

• I have even seen grown men crying at a football match!

• Today we are going to look at a man who cried about a broken wall.

• That is right, a wall,

• Can you imagine crying over cement and brickwork!

• Now I often Quote: John Marsden (‘The Other Side of Dawn’)

• “Never cry over anything that can't cry over you”

• But Nehemiah would not have heeded that advice,

• He was the man who cried about a broken wall.

Question: Why did he cry?

Answer: is obvious because he cared.

• You will see that again and again as you read through this book,

• He cared about is past, the traditions of his people that were being lost.

• His heritage was important to him.

• He cared about his people’s future.

• And more important than all of that he cared about the glory of his God.

Setting the Scene #1: and give you a very brief background.

• In the Hebrew Scriptures, the Old Testament,

• The Books of Ezra and Nehemiah were originally one book,

• That got divided into two books.

• Both Jewish and Christian traditions recognize Ezra as the author.

• And the books Ezra & Nehemiah continues where the book of 2 Chronicles ends

• (2 Chronicles chapter 36 verses 22-23; Ezra chapter 1 verses 1-2).

Ill:

• We are all familiar with the ‘Black Lives Matter’ movement.

• We have been reminded through that movement,

• That in the past our own country was involved in the slave trade.

• Sadly, the trade slave is not finished, it continues today,

• e.g. Modern forms of slavery can include debt bondage,

• Where a person is forced to work for free to pay off a debt,

• e.g. Child slavery, forced marriage, domestic servitude and forced labour,

• Where victims are made to work through violence and intimidation.

• e.g. Trafficking of people,

• Mainly women, who are forced to work in the sex trade.

• TRANSITION: if you go back 2,400 years in time to the year 586 BC.

• The Babylonians, under King Nebuchadnezzar, destroyed the city of Jerusalem,

• And took most of the inhabitants into slavery, into Exile.

• We read in 2 Kings chapter 24 verse 14, that King Nebuchadnezzar,

“…carried away all Jerusalem, all the officials, all the warriors, ten thousand captives, all the artisans and the smiths; no one remained, except the poorest people of the land”.

Ill:

• CAPTIVES: At the end of the sixth century B.C.E.,

• The kingdom of Judah was demolished by the Babylonian empire.

• Jerusalem and the Temple were destroyed,

• And thousands of people were taken against their wills,

• And forced to live in captivity in another country.

• FREEDOM: Next time you are visiting London and have some spare time,

• Go along to the British Museum and look for The Nabonidus Cylinder of Sippar.

• You can read how Cyrus the Persian king defeated the Babylonians

• And how after the 70 years of enslavement,

• Cyrus gave permission for some of the Jewish people to return to their homeland.

• Not all the Jews returned home,

• But those who went back returned in three stages,

• Stage 1 was led by Zerubbabel.

• (Ezra chapter 1)

• The first return was around 538 B.C. under the leadership of a man named Zerubbabel.

• About 40,000 individuals returned home (Ezra chapter 2 verse 64).

• It was during this period that the people of Israel built the second Temple.

• Stage 2 was led by Ezra.

• (Ezra chapter 7 verses 1–10 and chapter 8 verses 1–14)

• About eighty years later, a second group, under the priestly leadership of Ezra,

• 1,500 men, which would approximate 5,000 to 6,000 totals, counting women and children.

• Returned to the land. Spiritual and religious reformation occurred at that time.

• And Nehemiah will lead stage 3,

• And as we enter the story of Nehemiah, this has not yet taken place.

The Jewish people who had gone back in the first two groups:

• Had rebuilt the temple.

• But, as we will learn, the walls of Jerusalem were down,