One Holy Passion
Nehemiah 5
March 25, 2001
¡§An Inside Job¡¨
The challenges for Nehemiah seemed to fly fast and furious. After hearing the report of the reproach that Jerusalem had become and in prayer determining that God had laid it on his heart to do something about it, Nehemiah faced an immediate obstacle: he had to convince the king to allow him to act! And as we saw, this king, Artaxerxes, was one who, as recently as a few years earlier, had forbidden the rebuilding of Jerusalem¡¦s wall, using force to stop the project. After God miraculously changes the king¡¦s mind, Nehemiah faces the challenge of garnering support from the beleaguered citizens of Jerusalem who would have to do the actual rebuilding. He negotiates that obstacle quite well and immediately finds himself face-to-face with opposition from a couple of turkeys named Sanballat and Tobiah, later joined by Geshem and others. These guys attempted, in a variety of ways, to stop the rebuilding project. But Nehemiah deals with them in an effective manner.
Now we come to chapter 5 and the pressure on Nehemiah¡¦s leadership doesn¡¦t let up at all. In fact, in some ways, the situation in chapter 5 poses the biggest threat yet. Sometimes that which threatens us most is internal problems rather than external pressure! Nehemiah had to undertake an inside job. And that is exactly what we find in Nehemiah 5. Let¡¦s read it together!
(READ SCRIPTURE AND PRAY).
Working with other people¡Xeven those closest to you¡Xcan sometimes be a challenge. On some projects, my wife and I work very well together; at other times, not so well at all! We come at things from different angles, with different ways of wanting to approach jobs. For instance, when we paint, we have an agreement: she does the meticulous trim work, while I do the wall painting. See, my philosophy of painting is quite simple: whomever gets the most paint on the wall, wins! And so we mesh pretty well, now that we have this understanding. Other times, though, we don¡¦t mesh that well¡Xand the project suffers for it. Sometimes, partners and teammates start fighting, even, in the middle of a project, and when that happens, they become ineffective.
Such is the threat now in Jerusalem. Let¡¦s set the stage:
The situation:
„h Famine
Crops have not produced as they should, and so the people have been low on food for some time.
„h Inflation due to greedy merchants
Taking ruthless advantage of the situation, the ¡§haves¡¨ raise prices so that the ¡§have-nots¡¨ have to pay more to get food.
„h Time off work to rebuild walls
Nehemiah comes to town to organize a work crew to get the walls rebuilt, and the people rally to the project, but this costs them productive time from work, further exacerbating the situation.
„h Heavy taxation
Add to this the fact that Persian monarchs were known for imposing heavy burdens upon the people, often for the personal enrichment of the king or for the building of lavish palaces and the enrichment of the state.
This is what these folks have been dealing with, and so midway though the building project, we can imagine what happened. Jacob, who is bone-weary from hard work, whose muscles are sore and who is in an irritable mood because of exhaustion, looks down the wall and sees one of these greedy merchants working on the wall. He looks the other direction and sees another rich guy who has taken advantage of his family. And here is old Jacob, dirt poor but willing to work hard, sweating and straining to build the walls. He remembers the things that these guys have done, and how the rich have taken advantage of their position to make things miserable on their fellow Jews. And the flames of resentment begin to smolder. Old Jacob shares his gripes with his co-worker Jeshua, who immediately reports the frustration he feels with the situation too. Pretty soon the discontentment spreads like wildfire; eventually the women join in. And before you know it, class warfare is breaking out in Jerusalem, threatening the team effort. Notice what happens:
1. Nehemiah hears the problem - :1-5
It is altogether likely that Nehemiah had no knowledge that this problem existed. He was certainly intent on the problem at hand; the walls were broken down and the name of God was being held in reproach. Broken-down walls can be seen; this problem was not nearly so tangible, but it was every bit as real.
A. Land-less people were short of food
In verse 2, we see that people were hungry!
B. Landowners were compelled to mortgage their property
Some had already sold their property just to be able to eat; in verse 3 we see that others were about to have to resort to this radical tactic.
C. Some were forced to borrow at exorbitant rates because of excessive taxation
Just to pay taxes, some had to borrow money from their brethren, but we understand that the rate of interest was high, and this ran counter to the Law, which stated that Jews were not to take advantage of their brothers by charging interest to the poor. We see this in verse 4.
D. Some were forced to sell their children into slavery
Horror of horrors, verse 5 tells us that some had had to sell their own children into slavery to their fellow Jews just so they and those children could eat; this too ran counter to Jewish Law which clearly said that Jews were not to hold fellow Jews as slaves under these conditions.
The object of hostility was the rich people who had not acted like brothers to the poor, but had instead seen them as a means to get rich. They had lent the money at exorbitant rates; they had confiscated the lands; they had cheerfully accepted girls from poor families as slaves and were now ready to take the boys as well. The root cause of this problem was selfishness; of course, the root cause of internal conflict and discord is always selfishness! We can disagree; in fact, if there are two people who always see eye-to-eye on everything, one of those people is useless! But disagreement can be helpful if the people who disagree are selfless, but terribly harmful if they are selfish.
The bottom line is that the poor people began to see the rebuilding of the walls, on top of everything else, was ruining them. The work would have to be abandoned if they were to have much hope of survival, and even if the work were not abandoned, they themselves would have to come off the job. At a time when the people should have been rallying as teammates, they were acting as enemies. Nehemiah faced a crisis, once he became aware of the problem.
2. Nehemiah fixes the problem - :6-13
Nehemiah emerges as a more and more impressive leader the further we get into this book!
A. Nehemiah faced the problem by marshalling his resources - :6-7a
Many times we react to a problem on one or two levels, but do not engage the problem fully. Nehemiah did, and it made a tremendous difference!
1. Emotional ¡V ¡§very angry¡¨
Remember, anger is not always sinful, though it often is. Paul tells us to ¡§be angry, and sin not¡¨; Jesus was angry with a righteous indignation. Now, we had better be careful; most of us are quick to justify ourselves as it is, and sometimes we imagine our anger to be righteous when it is anything but! But there is a time to be angry! Nehemiah¡¦s anger showed that he took the situation seriously! Problem with some of us is that we engage the problem on an emotional level¡Xbut leave it there! We get all worked up about things but then do nothing about them further, leaving us fuming and frustrated with nothing resolved.
Nehemiah knew that the project was in severe jeopardy if division and discord roamed free in the ranks. He was right! About the worst thing you can do around here is to cause dissension, to be a source of discord within the body. Jesus prayed for unity among His followers; the Bible says that God hates discord among the brethren, and frankly, it is one thing that cannot be and will not be tolerated at FCC. That is not, of course, to say that there is no room for constructive criticism; that is a valuable tool that will be received well if given in the right spirit! But spreading of gossip and dissension is an absolute no-no here, because of what it does to God and because of what it does to a church. Nehemiah got angry when he considered the problem.
2. Intellectual ¡V ¡§I consulted with myself¡¨
Nehemiah went further: he ¡§consulted with himself¡¨! Funny wording, there, but I think it is simply suggesting that he took time to think about the situation. He didn¡¦t go off angry and half-cocked. He thought about his response. How often do we get angry but fail to think before we speak! Sticks and stones may break bones, but words can hurt even more, and when we don¡¦t take the counsel of the Word of God to heart, which tells us to combine a slowness to speak with a slowness to anger, then we sometimes say things which hurt others and which we later regret. Nehemiah took the time to think before he responded.
3. Volitional ¡V ¡§contended¡¨
His emotion, intellect, and will are all engaged. Having been stirred to anger and having thought through his response, he took action, taking the problem directly to the source.
Confrontation is difficult; though there are some people who seem to relish it, most people shirk it, some like the plague! I don¡¦t like to confront people, because I want everyone to like me. But confrontation is often necessary. A few thoughts on the subject:
ƒá Confrontation can be for everyone¡¦s good. Sometimes morale in the entire office can deteriorate because of the attitude of one jerk! An effective manager will not sacrifice the welfare of the group out of fear of confronting.
ć Failure to confront a problem usually makes it worse, and that much harder to confront down the road!
ƒá The longer I wait, the harder it is to confront! Families suffer sometimes because parents are afraid to confront their children. I like it when Brent calls me his ¡§buddy¡¨, but he only does so in the secure knowledge that I am first of all his father. If I can be ¡§father¡¨ and ¡§buddy¡¨, I will, but I will be father ahead of being ¡§buddy¡¨. Too many parents forget that they are primarily parents and not primarily friends to their kids. I will confront my kids when they do wrong, and we need to have the courage to confront problems. Nehemiah did!
B. Nehemiah brought the issue out in the open - :7b-13
Covering up does no good. Here¡¦s a rule of thumb: deal with things publicly to the degree that they are publicly known or to the degree that they are public in nature. There may be times when this rule of thumb isn¡¦t appropriate, but it generally is. This was a public sin, and Nehemiah brought it out into the light of day. This is one of the reasons that, acc. to verse 8, the nobles ¡§had nothing to say!¡¨
The thing was that these rich folks were acting more like pawnbrokers than they were like brothers! They lent with the best of cover and the worst of motives, to get rich to the impoverishment of others. They cared little for their fellow Israelites. They were oblivious to mercy, more concerned with what was legal than with what was right, more concerned with getting money than with extending grace. And this had to stop!
C. Nehemiah appealed to the nobles on several levels - :9
Nehemiah is strong, Nehemiah is forceful, but Nehemiah appeals to the nobles rather than threatening them with some legal action.
1. The morality of their actions
He introduces the word ¡§should¡¨ into the equation. The highest motive for doing right is because it is right, and pleasing to God, the eternal Judge.
2. The Glory of God
Here is what it is all about¡Xthe glory of God. He tells them that they are defacing the glory of God by what they are doing. When we fail to treat our brothers and sisters with love, we insult God!
3. The witness toward outsiders
And furthermore, they are being a poor witness to the Gentiles. Many of the Gentiles understood that the Jews were not to act as they were, and it was another source of reproach regarding their witness to other nations.
D. Nehemiah applied the same standard to himself - :10
This is an important point: Nehemiah refuses to preach without practicing! He had been lending to his fellow Jews, although it is apparent on different terms. I believe that while what he was doing wasn¡¦t wrong, now that he saw the depth of poverty that some of the people were in, he realized that the situation called for gifts, not loans. What impresses me here about this man is his teachable spirit. He now saw a better way, and love demanded that he choose that better way! Satan likely saw himself as having Nehemiah in a trap: how could he speak out against something that was in the ballpark of what he himself had been doing? But when Nehemiah determined that the buck stopped with him, that he needed to take personal inventory and set the example, his credibility to deal with the problem was enhanced! John White said, ¡§What marks godly leaders is the willingness to¡Kapply the same criteria to themselves as to others.¡¨
E. Nehemiah called for reparations - :11
He doesn¡¦t just hurl accusations; he proposes action. Real repentance involves, as much as possible, a setting right of things made wrong. Where restitution is possible, it must be made for repentance to be complete. If your misdeeds have caused harm to someone, don¡¦t imagine that you can just confess it to God when you have it in your power to make restitution to the one you have hurt. And this is what he called on the rich folks to do!
F. Nehemiah sealed the deal with an oath - :12-13
By now, we can imagine that the poor folks are cheering Nehemiah on! And so, convicted by God, the words of Nehemiah, and the hundreds of poor people whose presence there was testimony against them, the nobles came clean, willing to make amends to those who had been hurt by their callous greed. And Nehemiah made them seal their words by taking an oath. Nehemiah finalizes things by making like the prophets of old, using visual imagery to pronounce a curse upon any who would dare go back on their promises.
Once again, led by the Spirit of God, Nehemiah has averted a crisis which threatens the rebuilding efforts. And remember, his task there is about more than building walls. In chapter 5, we don¡¦t hear anything about construction of walls, but we learn a lot about how Nehemiah is God¡¦s instrument of building people!
3. Nehemiah sets an example - :14-19
The final few verses, written in summary by Nehemiah years later, point us to the two things that motivated him to be the example that he was.
A. Nehemiah is motivated by a reverence for God
He did what he did, acc. to verse 15, because of his fear of God. His reverence for God kept him from lording it over the people, seizing even that which was rightfully his; his reverence for God made the verdict of heaven that which mattered most to him. This again was the one holy passion for this man, the glory of God. It is what made him the man he was; it is what ought to motivate us in our service to God!
B. Nehemiah is motivated by a compassion for others
Nehemiah bent over backwards not to be a burden to those whom he governed. He reminds us of Paul in I Corinthians 9, who said that he failed to take advantage of some of the prerogatives of leadership so as not to be a burden to those to whom he was trying to minister.
And when we consider these two things, we are reminded of Jesus¡¦ words, when they asked Him what was most important: ¡§Love the Lord your God with all your heart, all your soul, and all your mind, and love your neighbor as you love yourself."
Folks, we are in a building program. Soon, God willing, it will entail physically building a new physical plant to house the ministry of FCC. Currently, it involves building people in their relationship with God. Warren Wiersbe said that ¡§It is important to note that the building of the wall did not create these problems; it revealed them. Often when a church enters into a building program, all sorts of problems start to surface that people didn¡¦t even know were there. A building program is a demanding thing that tests our faith, our patience, and our priorities; and while it brings out the best in some people, it can often bring out the worst in others.¡¨
All the more reason that we need to be knit together as one in the body of Christ at FCC. In years to come, we will face our share of problems, difficulties, and circumstances from the outside. The last thing we need is people on the inside contending with one another, selfishly demanding their own way regardless of the consequences. What then is our job description for the years ahead? In part, it is found in Ephesians 4:3, which says, ¡§Make every effort to keep the unity of the Spirit through the bond of peace.¡¨ Every effort. Do all you can. Make it high priority. Keep the unity that God has brought to us. He wants to do an inside job in each of us¡Xbut make no mistake: Satan wants desperately to get on the inside as well. If this is a work that truly is the work of God; if indeed this is the book God is writing here, then Satan would like nothing better than to get on the inside, get in between us, and mess things up. By God¡¦s grace, may he fail miserably, and may God grant each of us a humble spirit and unselfish hearts that we may join together, arise and build, to the glory of God!
