We're studying the book of Nehemiah. Now Nehemiah is one of the three postexilic reformers.
These three reformers are coming into Jerusalem to rebuild. There's an order that they have here,
which I thought was very interesting as I looked at the order of the exilic reformers and I
compare our discipleship in our own lives. So let me just share with you what I realized this
week.
First, we have Zerubbabel. He comes in and he's the one who is rebuilding the temple,
establishing the spiritual center first. Then comes Ezra who's a teacher. That's what he is. He's a
teacher. He comes in and he's interested in the growth and the revival of the people, trying to
strengthen them. And then Nehemiah, the guy we're studying now, he comes in and does the
building of the walls. So I'm thinking that sounds a lot like the flow of discipleship.
Did you know there's a flow to the discipleship that we experience? Yes, there is. In fact, I kind
of laid it out in a similar fashion. The first thing you do when you become a disciple is you make
a decision to accept Jesus Christ as your Lord and Savior. When you make that decision, it's a
decision that changes your life. If you have not made that decision yet, I invite you to make that
decision today and invite Jesus Christ to come into your life. And then you get baptized. Usually
those things come very closely together. But in our culture, sometimes people got saved later and
they didn't get baptized, or maybe they were baptized as a baby. That's not really the baptism
talked about in the Bible. That's really a dedication that your parents had (and thank God for that
in your life). But there's a believer baptism that's described here. That's that first establishing
Christ as the spiritual center of your life. Then once you do that, you look around. Where's a
church that I can be a member of? The church I was formerly a part of, our membership was very
kind of informal. We believed in membership, but we just said if you feel like you're a member
then you are one. At GraceWay there’s a specific plan for becoming a member and it's a strategic
plan. So you want to look at that.
I'm going to talk about membership in two weeks here at GraceWay Bible Church. In fact, if you
look in your bulletin, you'll see my name is in there because I'm applying for membership here at
this church. You'll learn more about that in two weeks. And this is a place where you grow. So
maybe you've been a part of a Grace Group. Or the summer electives for the summer are going
to be a really interesting, different kind. You have a flyer in your bulletin about that. And then
Grace Groups will start up again. It's where we're growing. But then we want to serve.
Nehemiah is all about the service part. So I want you to see the sermons that we're talking about
now have more to do with this last part – getting involved in service and outreach in the life of
our church. So that's where we are. That's where we're talking about. There are a lot of ministries
here at GraceWay. In fact, just like in the building of the walls, we're going to look at forty-seven
names today. And there’s probably forty-seven ministries at GraceWay, something like that. I
know you can't read this. And that's not important. I just want you to see that there's a big list of
them. You're going to learn more about those next Sunday during our Ministry Fair between the
services. So plan to stay a little bit longer next Sunday so you can go down to the Family Life
Center and see all of the tables for all the ministries. Maybe the Lord will do something in your
heart and you'd like to be a part of one of those. So we welcome you to do that.
Today as we look at Nehemiah 3 we're going to see a lot of names. I hope that as you listen to all
those names you think about the individuality of those people. As I was reading all of this and
I'm thinking about GraceWay and the work that we're doing here to build a lighthouse in this
church, I'm thinking, wow, there's a lot of ministries that we're a part of. We all have a part of the
wall, so to speak, like Nehemiah’s crew are building the wall. And so I thought about this New
Testament Bible verse that I want to read as our stand-up verse today. So if you would stand with
me, I want to read this passage from Ephesians 4:11-16.
[PRAYER] God, we ask for your blessing on your word as we look at it today. Speak to us.
Teach us what you have in our hearts for today. We ask that you’d bless us. In Jesus’ name,
amen.
Ephesians 4:11-16. We stand in honor of God's word. It says this: And he gave the apostles, the
prophets, the evangelists, the shepherds and teachers, to equip the saints for the work of
ministry. Why do the saints need to be equipped for ministry? Because it’s their job to build up
the body of Christ, until we all attain to the unity of the faith and of the knowledge of the Son of
God, to mature manhood, to the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ, so that we may
no longer be children, tossed to and fro by the waves and carried about by every wind of
doctrine, by human cunning, by craftiness in deceitful schemes. Rather, speaking the truth in
love, we are to grow up in every (and I’ve underlined some of those every, whole, and each
words here) way into him who is the head, into Christ, from whom the whole body, joined and
held together by every joint with which it is equipped, when each part is working properly,
makes the body grow so that it builds itself up in love. That word builds there that's used in
Ephesians 4 is the Greek word that complements the Hebrew word in the Old Testament, repair,
that use thirty-nine times in the passage I'm about to read to you. It's the same idea there.
You may be seated.
Now as I read through this section, I'm going to pause at different points and draw attention to
some things. I'm learning more about how GraceWay works. There's a lot of things I don't know
about GraceWay and I'm learning as we go. For example, maybe you know this, but there's an
information table out there. And that's at the church office on Sunday morning. So if you want to
communicate anything to the church office, you can stop by the information table there and you
can talk to Jeff LiMato, who happens to be there today. but others may be sitting behind there.
You can sign up for things, you can learn about things, you can be a part of things. So you can
take advantage of that if you'd like. And I'm learning about how GraceWay work. So I'm going
to talk about some of those things as I go through. Some of these things you already know, but
I'm just learning them. And we'll just talk about in general how we serve the Lord as a result of
our work together.
Let me read to you Nehemiah 3. Then Eliashib the high priest rose up with his brothers the
priests, and they built the Sheep Gate. Now one of the things we're going to see is that
sometimes we build things that are close to our heart. I would imagine that being a part of the
Sheep Gate over there was important to the priests because the priests used sheep in their
ministry to the people. So they wanted to have that responsibility and build the Sheep Gate. Now
I would suggest that sometimes in our lives we get involved in ministry opportunities that are
close to our hearts, like Eliashib and his crew, the high priest with his brothers.
It says – They consecrated it and set its doors. Now remember, they're taking bricks and they're
stacking up these bricks. “Hand me another brick, Mr. Priest,” and they're putting together this
brick wall and they're hanging the doors and so on. But it says they consecrated them. I would
suggest that any work you do in the life of the church is consecrated. Consecrated means it's
holy, set apart for the Lord. If you're working in the nursery, it's consecrated. If you’re bringing
food for refreshments for the Family Life Center worship time, that's consecrated to the Lord. If
you're a greeter, then that's consecrated. Everything you do in the life of the church is
consecrated to the Lord and that's what they did. They consecrated it and set its doors.
They consecrated it as far as the Tower of the Hundred, as far as the Tower of Hananel. And
next to him the men of Jericho built. Whoa, whoa. Let's just pause there a minute because the
men of Jericho are twenty-five miles away. It's interesting that these guys from twenty-five miles
away come and say, “How can I help?” Because sometimes you serve in an area that might not
be on your heart. Sometimes you come and say, “How can I help? I’ll serve anywhere. What do I
need to do?” How can I help build the walls (or in our case the lighthouse that God wants here in
this community)?
The men of Jericho built. And next to them Zaccur the son of Imri built. The sons of Hassenaah
built the Fish Gate. They laid its beams and set its doors, its bolts, and its bars. And next to them
Meremoth (remember his name; he’s going to come up again) the son of Uriah, son of Hakkoz
repaired. And next to them Meshullam the son of Berechiah, son of Meshezabel repaired. And
next to them Zadok the son of Baana repaired. And next to them the Tekoites repaired, but their
nobles would not stoop to serve their Lord.
You wonder why not? Were they busy doing something? But the word stoop seems to indicate
that they thought it was beneath them. “Oh I'm retired. I'm not going to do that.” Or “I'm too
busy to do this.” There seems to be some indication here that that's negative, a negative
connotation. I was thinking, wow, I suppose there are a lot of excuses that people have for not
serving the Lord.
As I pondered that this week I thought of Moses. Do you remember when God wanted to give
Moses that great opportunity to lead his people out of Egypt? Moses had five excuses. In fact, I
put them up here for you just so you could see them. These are the five top excuses that we can
find, at least in Moses’ experience. Here's what he said. “I'm not adequate for the job.” Do you
ever feel that way? Oh I'm not qualified to do that work or this work. No, no, no, no, no. It's not
about us. Is it? It's about God working through us. Or “I don't know enough,” Moses says to
God. Or “people won't take me seriously.” I think we got to be careful with that one. Because
sometimes we think it's about us when it really isn't about us. It's just about us imparting God's
grace. We're just grace dispensers and passing that grace on. If you're greeting or if you're
opening doors for people then you're just a grace dispenser. “I'm not good with words,” Moses
said. And he said, “I'm not willing.” I suppose that's an excuse that is common. But there's these
excuses. I wonder what it was that these Tekoites’ nobles said to themselves that said, “I'm not
going to serve in this case.”
Joiada the son of Paseah and Meshullam the son of Besodeiah repaired the Gate of Yeshanah.
They laid its beams and set its doors, its bolts, and its bars. There are thirteen gates mentioned in
this passage, if you’re counting. In verse 7 it says – And next to them repaired Melatiah the
Gibeonite and Jadon the Meronothite, the men of Gibeon and of Mizpah, the seat of the governor
of the province Beyond the River. Next to them Uzziel the son of Harhaiah, goldsmiths, repaired.
Next to him Hananiah, one of the perfumers, repaired, and they restored Jerusalem as far as the
Broad Wall.
I'm thinking, wow, that's interesting. Their normal job was goldsmithing. Their normal job was
perfumers. And yet they were willing to do something different, like hang doors and hand me
another brick, or mix the mortar, or whatever they needed to do to build the walls.
Now I prepare my sermon early in the week. So I've got it going in my mind. I'm thinking about
what I'm doing because I'm looking for ways that God might speak to me in regards to that. I go
to the gym. I'm a member of the Robert Wood Johnson Hamilton Fitness Center. If you’re there
you might see me. Just remind me who you are if you do. When I was there this week on
Monday, there was a man there who was selling and buying jewelry, gold, or checking your
rings and that kind of thing. So I'm thinking goldsmith? The man works with gold. I'm going to
ask him some questions.
So I said to him, “Hi, my name is Scott. I'm a pastor down the road here. I still don't know the
address, but it’s down there, down the road. Now in my passage in the Bible for my sermon this
Sunday, it talks about a goldsmith. I have no idea what a goldsmith does. Are you a goldsmith?”
His answer to me, “Well, I worked on the bench for fourteen years. But I'm not on the bench
now.” Which tells me there's a bench. I have no idea what a goldsmith does. But he says, “Think
about it this way. Do you remember when Moses went up on the mountain?” He's telling me
this! “Moses goes up on the mountain and Aaron had all of those people take all their jewelry,
and they brought it together, and they melted it all down to be a golden calf. They had a mold for
it. And then when it came out of the mold, they probably scraped it off like they do to make it
clean, and then they shine it all up and it's a golden calf.” I'm thinking wow, this guy must be a
Christian. Now he tells me he saw The Ten Commandments movie.
I said, “Well, that's great. Some people see the movie, some people read the book. I like to read
the book.” But then here he is telling me about the goldsmiths.
I just thought, wow, what an interesting thing in the passage that these goldsmiths had a job to
do, yet they were willing to do other things. Isn't that true about the body of Christ? You might
be grading or teaching Sunday school or working in the nursery or working in the youth and you
don't even know what that person that you're serving with does? You know there's doctors and
nurses and electricians and people who work at Walmart and stay-at-home moms, all kinds of
people working together. Because the work we do outside of the church isn't as important as the
work we do inside of the church and our relationships together. The goldsmiths, the perfumers
repaired.
Verse 9 – Next to them Rephaiah the son of Hur, ruler of half the district of Jerusalem, repaired.
Next to them Jedaiah the son of Harumaph repaired opposite his house. And next to him Hattush
the son of Hashabneiah repaired. Malchijah the son of Harim and Hasshub the son of Pahathmoab repaired another section and the Tower of the Ovens. Next to him Shallum the son of Hallohesh, ruler of half the district of Jerusalem, repaired, he and his daughters.
I go, whoa. Isn't that interesting? I love family ministry. Whenever I see kids serving together,
it’s just a really special thing. And so today when I went down into the Family Life Center, I saw
the people getting ready. I don't know their last name, but it's Jacob and it's Jenny, and then their
two kids were…I forget. Oh, yeah. Okay, so you got them. Alright. So they're all serving
together. I said, “This is family ministry taking place right here. You guys are serving the Lord.
This is great.” If you have children, I'd encourage you to invite them to serve with you. If you're
opening doors on a Sunday morning, someone can help you open the doors. Your children can be
there. If they like to hand out bulletins, they can be there handing out bulletins and support the
usher ministry. Or they're helping them down in the kitchen getting all our food ready so we can
go down there and enjoy some time together. It's just a beautiful thing when families work
together. And it's so powerful in a child's life to help them experience the faith. Not just learn
about it. Not just learn the Bible stories. But experience the faith and serving God is a key
element of that.
Verse 13 – Hanun and the inhabitants of Zanoah repaired the Valley Gate. They rebuilt it and
set its doors, its bolts, and its bars, and repaired a thousand cubits of the wall, as far as the
Dung Gate. I’m going a thousand cubits? You know that’s 1500 feet. I’m thinking who were
those guys again? Oh that was Hanun and the inhabitants of Zanoah. Well, that's a long way that
they were. They said, “Okay. Let's put this together.” And so they stepped in to do their part of
the work.
Malchijah the son of Rechab, ruler of the district of Beth-haccherem, repaired the Dung Gate.
He rebuilt it and set its doors, its bolts, and its bars. And Shallum the son of Col-hozeh, ruler of
the district of Mizpah, repaired the Fountain Gate. He rebuilt it and covered it and set its doors,
its bolts, and its bars. And he built the wall of the Pool of Shelah of the king's garden, as far as
the stairs that go down from the city of David.
After him Nehemiah the son of Azbuk, ruler of half the district of Beth-zur, repaired to a point
opposite the tombs of David, as far as the artificial pool, and as far as the house of the mighty
men.
The word next is mentioned fifteen times that I count in chapter 3, which describes this ability
for them to work next to each other because they all had a job to do. As I'm learning things about
GraceWay, last week I went into the Family Life Center during our break, and I asked Mary
Hart, who was in charge of making the coffee on that last Sunday, “Mary, who brings the food
for us to eat here?” Because there were like ten loaves of cinnamon bread. She said “I brought
the cinnamon bread. But if someone else brought food then we would allow them to bring it.”
That's how we operate here. Did you know that? If you go down and there's no food there, it’s
because you didn't bring it. That's basically the idea. We only eat what you bring. Now maybe
you would like to provide some cinnamon bread or maybe you'd like some more health food.
And so you'd provide some yogurt and some granola and some fruit. Wouldn’t that be great to
have down there. Maybe you're not into health food and you want to bring some doughnuts.
That's fine. Whatever you want to bring, we'll eat. The idea is that that we're serving together and
we're seeing what needs to be done here. What can happen? Now if you decide to bring
something next week, don't just bring it. You want Faye to know. Faye’s in charge of that whole
ministry. And so you want to stop by (where?) the information table and say, “Next week I'm
going to bring some doughnuts” or whatever you're going to bring in. Or on Friday you can
contact the office. But we're working next to each other as we're trying to accomplish the work
that God has for us.
Verse 17 – After him the Levites repaired: Rehum the son of Bani. Next to him Hashabiah, ruler
of half the district of Keilah, repaired for his district. After him their brothers repaired: Bavvai
the son of Henadad, ruler of half the district of Keilah. Next to him Ezer the son of Jeshua, ruler
of Mizpah, repaired another section opposite the ascent to the armory at the buttress.
Now a buttress was support that sticks out a bit. That's why they call it a buttress. It sticks out a
bit. And so you'd be able to say, “Hey, you take it from the buttress there to the gate over there.”
That's the descriptive word which we're going to see several times mentioned now starting in
verse 20.
After him Baruch the son of Zabbai repaired another section from the buttress to the door of the
house of Eliashib the high priest. After him Meremoth (now remember, we’ve already heard his
name) the son of Uriah, son of Hakkoz repaired another section from the door of the house of
Eliashib to the end of the house of Eliashib.
Now the key word is another. You see that? Son of Kakkoz repaired another section. What that
means is he finished his one section and he says, “How else can I help?” I like his initiative.
Where can I participate? Or what can I do?
After him the priests, the men of the surrounding area, repaired. After them Benjamin and
Hasshub repaired opposite their house. Sometimes it's just right near their house because that's
where their heart is that they're serving.
You know as you think about GraceWay and the lighthouse that God is building in this place,
maybe there's something that's close to your heart that you'd like to build. Although we have a lot
of ministries at GraceWay, we don't have a GriefShare ministry, we don't have a divorce care
program, we don't have a single-parent ministry. There are several ministries. Addiction
ministry. I don't know where your heart is, but maybe there's something close to your heart that
you're saying, “You know, I'd like to maybe start something,” or I'd like to build the wall near
my house. And that's what is happening here.
It says – After them Azariah the son of Maaseiah, son of Ananiah repaired beside his own house.
After him Binnui the son of Henadad repaired another section, from the house of Azariah to the
buttress and to the corner. Palal the son of Uzai repaired opposite the buttress and the tower
projecting from the upper house of the king at the court of the guard. After him Pedaiah the son
of Parosh and the temple servants living on Ophel repaired to a point opposite the Water Gate
on the east and the projecting tower. After him the Tekoites… You remember the Tekoites. They
were the ones whose nobles didn’t want to stoop to do the work. They repaired another section.
Here’s a second group of people that said, “Hey, how can I help? We’ve already done our part.
We’ll do some more.” When you go down to the Ministry Fair next week, you will see that
there's a table here of one ministry and table here of another ministry and the same person is
trying to go back and forth between the tables. Those are the Tekoite persons who say, “Okay,
I'll do more.”
Verse 28 – Above the Horse Gate the priests repaired, each one opposite his own house. After
them Zadok the son of Immer repaired opposite his own house. After him Shemaiah the son of
Shecaniah, the keeper of the East Gate, repaired. After him Hananiah the son of Shelemiah and
Hanun the sixth son of Zalaph repaired another section. After him Meshullam the son of
Berechiah repaired opposite his chamber. His chamber? That's the first time I see chamber.
Everybody else had a house (near his house). This guy has a chamber. Maybe it's like a mancave
or something. I don't know what it is, but somewhere near him, he has a chamber near that part
of the wall.
After him Malchijah, one of the goldsmiths, repaired as far as the house of the temple servants
and of the merchants, opposite the Muster Gate, and to the upper chamber of the corner. And
between the upper chamber of the corner and the Sheep Gate the goldsmiths and the merchants
repaired.
Wow, that's a list. Forty-seven people. The word repaired is used thirty-nine times, whereas next
is used fifteen times. Thirteen gates all mentioned (as I count them) in the passage. But you
know, when I think about all of those words, maybe you got distracted by some of those names.
But I want you to remember a few things.
One, God is concerned about every individual. Their names are there. He's concerned about
every one of us and it looks like he keeps track of the things that we do.
Secondly, they took initiative. And that initiative was strategic for getting the work done. Hey,
I'll take this job. I'll take that job.
The other thing we see is the word next. And the word next is strategic because we do this work
together. As God is drawing us together in various ways you will meet new people as you serve
the Lord. But there's something about serving with someone else that says, “Wow, I really
appreciate this that God is doing some work through us.” And we really develop close
relationships throughout.
Now maybe you're here today and you're saying, “You know, I’ve got things going on in my life,
I can't really serve.” And that's fine. This is a place for you to grow, to be encouraged. Maybe
we're going to serve you in order to help you in this period of time in your life. So I'm not trying
to lay a guilt trip on you here. I just know that there are people here waiting to be asked. So I'm
asking you. Let's serve the Lord. How can we do what God would have us to do?
Which brings me back to the initial passage that we mentioned. This is the second page of that.
And let me just tell you, again, it's picking up in verse 15. It says – to grow up in every way into
him who is the head, into Christ, from whom the whole body, joined and held together by every
joint with which it is equipped, when each part is working properly, makes the body grow so that
it builds itself up in love.
God has a very special place for you at GraceWay. Many of you are serving in a number of
different ways and thank you for your service. I trust that God will use this to speak to you and
just encourage you in your work with the Lord. We are part of something very big and very
important. It's God's work and God allows us to be part of that in a way that's significant and
strategic.
Let's pray together.
[PRAYER] Father, we come before you at this moment and we ask for your Holy Spirit to
convict us, teach us, encourage us, comfort us, satisfy us. Father we're honored to be part of your
team. You call that team the church. We know that it's not just about work, getting things done.
It's about your growth that you're doing in our hearts. So we submit ourselves to you, our hearts
to you and ask you to continue to do that deeper work in our lives. Thank you for the privilege of
serving you. We ask this in Jesus’ name, amen
