Nehemiah and Rebuilding

Hook

Think about your room in your house. If you could change one thing about your room, what would it be, and why?

What about your whole house? If you could change one thing about your house, what would it be and why?

What about school? What’s something you’d change about school?

What about your life? What’s one thing you’d change about your life?

Encourage students to be serious with their answer and to write it down on their piece of paper. Try and get them to think about a thing or situation they really struggle with. Getting better at a video game or winning the lottery aren’t the type answers we’re going for. Let them know that they won’t have to show it to anyone.

One more as we stay in this serious mind set.

What would you say is the next step that you need to take in your relationship with God?

Don’t just write down what you think it should be but really think about it.

Transition

Nehemiah, a story that happens during a time in history when Israel was no longer an independent nation, let alone a powerful one. Let’s make sure we are all on the same page.

· Israel became a dived nation, resulting in two kingdoms, Israel and Judah.

· Israel was eventually defeated by Assyria and the Babylonians defeated Judah. Most of the wealthy and influential people were captured and taken into exile.

· Several decades later, after the Persians defeated the Babylonian Empire, the exiles from Judah were allowed to return to Jerusalem. Some decided to stay.

Book

I want to start by taking some time and making a list of the Promise that God made to Abraham.

God’s Promises to Abraham:

We talked last week about how it did not look like God was going to keep His promises. That when Israel looked around at their circumstances it look like God had given up. There was lots of doubt among the people of God. The nation was divided , the people scattered among lands that were not their own, and if we were to stop right here we would say yep no way God is going to come through on this is there.

Imagine a job where having a bad attitude doesn’t just get you reprimanded—it gets you executed.

Fifth century BC: Many of the Jews are still in exile in Persia. The Jerusalem wall has been destroyed, which means the Jews who have returned to Jerusalem are unprotected. They are being persecuted and murdered. They desperately need help from the Persian monarchy. They need an insider.

Nehemiah opens his account of the events by saying, “Now I was cupbearer to the king” (Neh 1:11 NRSV). This simple description reveals that God was already working to change the fate of the Hebrew exiles.

What is a cupbearer?

The New Bible Dictionary (NBD) entry on this term traces the history of cupbearers. In Egypt, cupbearers were often called “pure of hands” and, in one instance, “the one who tastes the wine.” Cupbearers protected the life of the Pharaoh. Their job was to detect poison. A cupbearer was a glorified guinea pig for any beverage served to the king. For this reason, cupbearers were often among the king’s most trusted servants.

Name for me another famous cupbearer that we have talked about?

Harper’s Bible Dictionary (HBD) points out that the Nehemiah story had a literary forerunner: the story of Joseph. The cupbearer to Pharaoh played a critical, providential role in Joseph’s rise. Here we find a biblical theme: God rescues his people by placing an insider in the court of foreign kings.

We saw this theme last week when we talked about Daniel.

Daniel rose to a position of power under the kings that he served, and God used him.

Our story today is about a guy who saw the situation that Israel was in was a major issue . He remembered God’s promises and trusted them, but knew he wasn’t called to sit back and wait for something to happen.

Background on Nehemiah

The events of the narrative take place in two significant cities: Susa and Jerusalem.

Susa was part of the Nation of Persia

It actually was the winter capital for the king of Persia

The message of the book of Nehemiah is that God’s work is never easy and never complete

Nehemiah’s life becomes extremely complicated when his heart is moved by the trouble and shame of Jerusalem. Though it means leaving his trusted and esteemed position as the king’s cupbearer, Nehemiah does what God has placed in his heart (Neh 2:12; 7:5). He moves across the Persian Empire—from the king’s palace in Susa to the ruins of Jerusalem—and becomes the governor of Judah, a construction foreman

Nehemiah 1:1–11 ESV

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 citadel, 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.” 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, 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. 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.’ 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.” Now I was cupbearer to the king.

Nehemiah is living in Susa the Capital of Persia, and he gets some visitors from the old country that bring with them some news that upsets Nehemiah.

What was the news that Nehemiah got?

OK but why should Nehemiah care, after all he does not even live in Israel, let alone Jerusalem?

Why does Nehemiah make such a big deal about what he just heard?

1st, he recognizes that it was the Jews sin that had brought destruction to Jerusalem.

Nehemiah mourned the fact that the nation had turned their back on God.

2nd, he knew that a strong wall was a city’s first defense against enemies.

With a broken down wall and gates that had been destroyed by fire it would have been hard to keep animals for just walking in and out of the city, let alone keeping and enemy out. So the people were not safe.

Patriotism is the most prominent principle in Nehemiah’s conduct. Deeper considerations emerge later, especially after he has come under the influence of an enthusiastic religious teacher in the person of Ezra. But at first it is the city of his fathers that moves his heart. He is particularly distressed at its desolate condition, because the burial-place of his ancestors is there. The great anxiety of the Jews about the bodies of their dead, and their horror of the exposure of a corpse, made them look with peculiar concern on the tombs of their people. In sharing the sentiments that spring out of the habits of his people in this respect, Nehemiah gives a specific turn to his patriotism. He longs to guard and honour the last resting-place of his people; he would hear of any outrage on the city where their sepulchres are with the greatest distress. Thus filial piety mingles with patriotism, and the patriotism itself is localised, like that of the Greeks, and directed to the interests of a single city. Nehemiah here represents a different attitude from that of Mordecai. It is not the Jew that he thinks of in the first instance, but Jerusalem; and Jerusalem is dear to him primarily, not because of his kinsmen who are living there, but because it is the city of his fathers’ sepulchres, the city of the great past.

Walter F. Adeney, “The Books of Ezra, Nehemiah and Esther,” in The Expositor’s Bible: Samuel to Job, ed. W. Robertson Nicoll, vol. 2, Expositor’s Bible (Hartford, CT: S.S. Scranton Co., 1903), 631.

For Nehemiah to get this news it would have been like what your parents felt on September 11th 2001. This news really stirred up Nehemiah’s patriotic feelings.

We can tell that Nehemiah knows the scriptures and the promises that God has made to the nation. this is why he becomes so emotional about the news that he receives. He knows that God is commited to his steadfast love for the people of Israel and he calls out to God, appeals to God to keep His commitment and promise that He made all the way back in the book of Genesis.

Nehemiah 2:1–10 ESV

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. 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?” 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.” 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. 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. 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. 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.

We know from the last chapter that Nehemiah was hopeful God would use him in some way to help Jerusalem. Do you think Nehemiah had a plan?

Whether this was part of Nehemiah’s plan or not, things worked out pretty well for him. Even though he was very close to the king as the cupbearer, he wasn’t generally allowed to freely talk about his own desires or wishes. So, the fact that Artaxerxes starts the conversation to allow Nehemiah to talk about what was going on in Jerusalem is a small miracle in itself.

Look back at verse 8. What is Nehemiah’s attitude toward the fact that the king was allowing him to rebuild Jerusalem’s walls?

He was grateful to God and gave him credit.

In verse 10 Nehemiah foreshadows some opposition that he eventually encounters in building the wall. Why do you think Sanballat and Tobiah weren’t happy that someone had come to repair the walls of Jerusalem?

Answers will vary, but these men had used the weakness of Jerusalem for their own political and financial advantage.

Nehemiah 2:11–18 ESV

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. 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. 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.

Nehemiah doesn’t tell the people in Jerusalem at first why he’s there. Why do you think he waited?

Answers will vary; likely he knew he would have some opposition to his plan. He also probably wanted to see how much work would be needed before he presented his plan to the city leaders.

The people had probably wanted to rebuild the wall before Nehemiah arrived. After all, they were far less safe without a secure wall. Why had they not rebuilt it already?

Answer: The biggest reason would have been a lack of resources, but there also could have been a lack of confidence that they would be able to even pull it off.

How do you think they felt when Nehemiah shared his plan and the fact that he had the resources and political power to make it happen?

Answers will vary; they likely felt hopeful for the first time in a long time.

Now we are going to jump ahead in the story…We are going to pick it back up and see that Nehemiah has led the people in rebuilding the wall, but it was not the easiest thing to do. Nehemiah and to deal with some problems and had to deal with those who were opposed to the wall being rebuilt.

Nehemiah 12:27–43 ESV

And at the dedication of the wall of Jerusalem they sought the Levites in all their places, to bring them to Jerusalem to celebrate the dedication with gladness, with thanksgivings and with singing, with cymbals, harps, and lyres. And the sons of the singers gathered together from the district surrounding Jerusalem and from the villages of the Netophathites; also from Beth-gilgal and from the region of Geba and Azmaveth, for the singers had built for themselves villages around Jerusalem. And the priests and the Levites purified themselves, and they purified the people and the gates and the wall. Then I brought the leaders of Judah up onto the wall and appointed two great choirs that gave thanks. One went to the south on the wall to the Dung Gate. And after them went Hoshaiah and half of the leaders of Judah, and Azariah, Ezra, Meshullam, Judah, Benjamin, Shemaiah, and Jeremiah, and certain of the priests’ sons with trumpets: Zechariah the son of Jonathan, son of Shemaiah, son of Mattaniah, son of Micaiah, son of Zaccur, son of Asaph; and his relatives, Shemaiah, Azarel, Milalai, Gilalai, Maai, Nethanel, Judah, and Hanani, with the musical instruments of David the man of God. And Ezra the scribe went before them. At the Fountain Gate they went up straight before them by the stairs of the city of David, at the ascent of the wall, above the house of David, to the Water Gate on the east. The other choir of those who gave thanks went to the north, and I followed them with half of the people, on the wall, above the Tower of the Ovens, to the Broad Wall, and above the Gate of Ephraim, and by the Gate of Yeshanah, and by the Fish Gate and the Tower of Hananel and the Tower of the Hundred, to the Sheep Gate; and they came to a halt at the Gate of the Guard. So both choirs of those who gave thanks stood in the house of God, and I and half of the officials with me; and the priests Eliakim, Maaseiah, Miniamin, Micaiah, Elioenai, Zechariah, and Hananiah, with trumpets; and Maaseiah, Shemaiah, Eleazar, Uzzi, Jehohanan, Malchijah, Elam, and Ezer. And the singers sang with Jezrahiah as their leader. And they offered great sacrifices that day and rejoiced, for God had made them rejoice with great joy; the women and children also rejoiced. And the joy of Jerusalem was heard far away.

What is the main theme that you notice in this celebration?

Answer: Thankfulness and joy. Have students think about all that the people in Jerusalem had been through. None of them were alive when Israel was still an independent nation, but their parents and grandparents had passed down stories to them about God’s promises to give His people a land and uphold David’s kingdom, which was in Jerusalem.

What do you think it was like to hear stories but live in a time when Israel was no longer its own nation, and Jerusalem was anything but a royal city?

Answer: They may have lost hope, and they probably wondered whether God had forgotten His promises and His people.

With that in mind, what do you think this rebuilt wall meant to the people of Jerusalem?

Answer: From their celebration, we can tell the people had a renewed hope in God and the covenant He made with Israel. They had a renewed understanding of God’s promises and what He had called them to do.

Transition

Look

In the book of Revelation the apostle John was give a brief look into what heaven and eternity would look like. One of the big themes of the book is that Jesus is the rightful King of Heaven, and He confirmed his Kingship through His sacrifice.

Revelation 21:1–8 ESV

Then I saw a new heaven and a new earth, for the first heaven and the first earth had passed away, and the sea was no more. And I saw the holy city, new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, prepared as a bride adorned for her husband. And I heard a loud voice from the throne saying, “Behold, the dwelling place of God is with man. He will dwell with them, and they will be his people, and God himself will be with them as their God. He will wipe away every tear from their eyes, and death shall be no more, neither shall there be mourning, nor crying, nor pain anymore, for the former things have passed away.” And he who was seated on the throne said, “Behold, I am making all things new.” Also he said, “Write this down, for these words are trustworthy and true.” And he said to me, “It is done! I am the Alpha and the Omega, the beginning and the end. To the thirsty I will give from the spring of the water of life without payment. The one who conquers will have this heritage, and I will be his God and he will be my son. But as for the cowardly, the faithless, the detestable, as for murderers, the sexually immoral, sorcerers, idolaters, and all liars, their portion will be in the lake that burns with fire and sulfur, which is the second death.”

So, what did John see in these verses? What is he describing?

Answer: He’s describing heaven. But heaven isn’t going to be just floating around on clouds like some people think. What John is describing here is a very real, physical reality. He’s talking about what it’s going to be like when we dwell with God forever. This is a land promise!

What are some characteristics of heaven that John mentions?

Answer: There will be no death, no tears, no mourning, and no pain. All things will be made new and God will dwell among His people. If you’re able, take time to write down the students’ answers on a dry erase board.

What is the connection between this passage and God’s promises to Abraham?

Answer: God promised His people that they would dwell in a land where He was their God and they were His people. While there were immediate fulfillments of that along the way, this is the ultimate fulfillment of that promise.

This is going to sound like a totally random question. No, I haven’t lost my mind. Hang with me. What is the point of an appetizer at a restaurant? If you’re really hungry, is the appetizer usually going to fill you up?

Answer: The point is to get you ready for the real meal. The appetizer whets the appetite. If it were all you ate, you wouldn’t be fulfilled.

How did the story of Nehemiah help point forward to the reality of Revelation? How was it a bit of an appetizer for what we read in Revelation 21:1-8?

Answer: The experience of brokenness and the consequences of sin make us long for something more. The reality that things aren’t ok makes us long for the One who can make them ok. The rebuilding of the wall demonstrated God’s faithfulness to His people and His promises. It gave a taste of what the ultimate fulfillment of His promises would be like. It didn’t totally fulfill God’s promises and it didn’t totally satisfy His people, but it gave them a taste of what that complete fulfillment would be like.

Transition

Think about the question we talked about at the beginning, and about your answer. Now think of the description of heaven we just came up with. yes there are thing about this life that we wish we could change. there is a lots of things that we see as unfair, or broken.

But in heaven all of that brokenness, all of our insecurities , all of our pain, our struggles, and sin will be no more. and everything will be made right.

Took

Closing