Restored to Joy
Notes
Transcript
Introduction
Introduction
Good morning!
Please keep your Bibles open to Nehemiah, chapter 8. It is a great joy to be able to gather together and to open the Word. Last week, we spoke about Ezra teaching the Law to the Jews, and how they received it with Joy because they understood it. Ezra and the Levites took the time to explain it and teach it so the people could understand what it said and what it meant. We had a great discussion last week in our Sunday School hour about different approaches to teaching the Word of God from the pulpit, and to summarize, I think the best way to word it is that pulpit ministry must connect the people of God to the Word of God. Whatever label we may want to put on it, whether it be expository preaching or whatever - the goal and mission of the pulpit must be to get the Word of God to the People of God in a way that they can understand and apply to their lives.
Our goal as a community is not to become a patch of biblical scholars able to argue or somehow change the minds of the world, but rather to know, understand and react to the Lord in the way that He desires us to as the Lord of the Universe and the head of the church. Our goal is to know and understand the Word, to receive it and obey it, to allow that application and obedience of the Word to provoke us on to good works as the Lord directs and to let the results of it all culminate in celebration and joy at the Work of God’s hands in our lives.
In Nehemiah, we’ve seen God rise up a leader to come and restore the wall around the city. We saw Nehemiah begin to shift his priority to restoring the social community by focusing on housing and other civil matters, and last week we saw him and Ezra partner together to bring the Word back to the people. They taught in such a way that the emphasis in Scripture was that the people understood and received with joy the message being taught to them. They didn’t preach a lofty and scholarly sermon for the academics in the crowd, but the preached and taught so that the people would comprehend and understand what the Word of God said. God used them to restore the Word to God’s people and restore God’s people to the Word.
Today, we see the continuation of this and how it results in a tremendous act of obedience. This obedience culminates in a celebration that brings the community great joy in the Lord. As we go through our time today, I’d like to ask you to keep one question on your mind: “Am I person who experiences the joy of the Lord in my life?”
If you were to take one primary thought away from today, let it be this:
Where the Word is faithfully preached, clearly understood, and obediently embraced, God restores true joy to His people.
For those of you who like to take notes, here is a brief overview of our outline today:
Commencing with Conviction (8:9-11)
Comprehending with Joy (8:12)
Celebrating with Community (8:13-18)
Let’s begin.
Commencing with Conviction (8:9-11)
Commencing with Conviction (8:9-11)
Read with me in…
9 Nehemiah the governor, Ezra the priest and scribe, and the Levites who were instructing the people said to all of them, “This day is holy to the Lord your God. Do not mourn or weep.” For all the people were weeping as they heard the words of the law.
10 Then he said to them, “Go and eat what is rich, drink what is sweet, and send portions to those who have nothing prepared, since today is holy to our Lord. Do not grieve, because the joy of the Lord is your strength.”
11 And the Levites quieted all the people, saying, “Be still, since today is holy. Don’t grieve.”
When someone shepherds a flock of people spiritually, there needs to be a balance of emphases. On one hand, they need to be tender, approachable and the down-to-earth kind of man that inspires within the flock a deeper relational connection than mere acquaintances or even casual friends - a pastor should inspire within his people a desire to have relationship with him because they know he cares for them and for their souls.
On the other hand, a shepherd needs to be ready to be firm and fiercely committed to the teachings of Scripture and the conviction that God’s Word is the ultimate authority for life and godliness - a pastor’s love for his people must not allow him to tolerate sinfulness because of how dire the consequences of sin are to that individual person and the community as a whole.
In this portion of our passage, we see a bit more of the tender shepherd in Nehemiah than we have seen before. When he was sent to build the wall, Nehemiah was driven by a singular focus and vision - build the wall. Now, he - together with Ezra and the Levites - are working on restoring the community and leading them back from the state of exile that remained in their hearts. Notice how he says, “Do not mourn or weep…”? These people are being confronted with the Law of God, many for the very first time - and they are realizing how far off the mark they had been living - how far off their people must have gone to anger God to the point of sending them into exile - and they are being confronted with the weight and reality of sin against the Lord.
But that day was a holy day to God, and even in the midst of their realization of sin, Nehemiah and Ezra tell them not to weep and mourn - why?
Because God was at work in that community - and the foundation of that work was in the Word of God - and that should be reason for celebration! Even in the midst of all the conviction of sin and the heavy, broken hearts that can bring - God was at work in them and that should be cause for great joy! The goal was for the community as a whole to operate in the conviction that they were being restored as God’s holy, chosen people.
He says in verse 10:
10 Then he said to them, “Go and eat what is rich, drink what is sweet, and send portions to those who have nothing prepared, since today is holy to our Lord. Do not grieve, because the joy of the Lord is your strength.”
Instead of focusing on the grief, celebrate together what the Lord is doing in your midst! Go have a potluck and live in this reality - together - that the JOY of the Lord is your strength!
I love that reminder - that the Joy of the Lord is our strength. For the sake of being real with you, JOY is not an emotion but rather a state of being. It is not something we feel because everything is going well; it is something we experience as a direct result of the confidence we have in the source of our JOY. However, we have the ability to turn it on and off. There are times we allow ourselves to get so overwhelmed with things that we begin to subconsciously reject having joy. I don’t often post things to social media because I am of the firm belief that social media should be primarily for sharing pictures and stories of what is making your life full but is most often used to tear people down. But this week, I took a moment to give an update on where I was at emotionally with everything I have going on in my life, and I was met with great support.
What I said is that the threat of a possibly near and impending death had seemingly robbed me of my JOY, but that God was showing me - through his goodness and grace - that what I was struggling with was more a matter of perspective than reality. My lack of JOY in life wasn’t because of my situation and circumstance, but rather a result of my choice to allow those circumstances to speak louder in my life that the Words of my Father who says, “I’ll never leave or abandon you…”
I’m reminded of the word of the author, J.I. Packer who said…
Joy is not an accident of temperament or an unpredictable providence; joy is a matter of choice.
J. I. Packer
This has always been a hard concept for me because I thought JOY was a result of the emotional surplus in my life from being in relationship with Jesus, when that is not true. JOY, as the Bible calls it, is not the emotional elation the world speaks of when circumstances are going well, but rather - JOY is a divine gift from God to His people - an ongoing aspect and reality of God’s grace in the day-to-day experience of His people. It is centered in our individual encounter with Christ as our Lord and savior, and that is something that our circumstances can’t take away. We can allow things to overshadow that JOY and essentially blind ourselves to the reality of Christ in our hearts (which would be a great absence of JOY, for sure!), but we see a pathway here laid out in this passage - that the path to true JOY requires a confrontation with the reality of our sin.
We cannot experience the JOY of the Lord and remain apathetic to sin in our lives. In Nehemiah, the people are now being confronted with what sin is - a God’s Word says it is. The big thing that we have to remember here, however, is that what they were being met with was the actual LAW and their covenantal responsibility to follow that law. Their obligation was laid out and they were being brought back - by God - to covenant relationship with Him; so they had to know, understand and submit to the LAW.
Christian brothers and sisters - Praise the Lord - I have good news for you! We do not live under the same law they did. They had a list of rules and regulations, but we have the indwelling of the Holy Spirit as a guide for us - we live under a new covenant in Christ’s blood - as we celebrate every time we take communion together. However, we cannot take this reality as a reason to dismiss the law at all.
Paul argues from the Christian perspective that the law is still spiritual and a good guide for living - it just doesn’t do what Isreal deluded themselves into thinking it did - the law cannot justify anyone for their sin.
19 Now we know that whatever the law says, it speaks to those who are subject to the law, so that every mouth may be shut and the whole world may become subject to God’s judgment.
20 For no one will be justified in his sight by the works of the law, because the knowledge of sin comes through the law.
All the law did for humanity was to show us that God’s holy and righteous standard is not possible for us to attain to on our own. Paul reminds us that
10 as it is written: There is no one righteous, not even one.
So according to the Law that the Jews were being exposed to, they were seeing their guilt heavily, causing them to weep and mourn - and rightly! Why do I say “rightly”? Because God does not tolerate sin! He is gracious and merciful, but ongoing and unrepentant sin in a believer’s life is not something the Lord tolerates in His people. He’s so serious about this that in the New Testament, if a brother or sister in a church continually refuse to repent of their sin, they are to be put out of the fellowship in order to keep the rest of the community pure from their sin and influence. It’s something we don’t really like to think about today because it is offensive to our higher, 21st century inclusive ways of thinking. People think that it would be hateful to do such a think, but it is really keeping in line with the fact that God hates sin and calls His people not to tolerate it within themselves.
What do we do with sins as Christians?
9 If we confess our sins, he is faithful and righteous to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.
We are to confess our sins to Him, and watch Him purify us from them and cleanse us from unrighteousness.
This is in keeping with what Paul says in
4 For Christ is the end of the law for righteousness to everyone who believes,
5 since Moses writes about the righteousness that is from the law: The one who does these things will live by them.
6 But the righteousness that comes from faith speaks like this: Do not say in your heart, “Who will go up to heaven?” that is, to bring Christ down
7 or, “Who will go down into the abyss?” that is, to bring Christ up from the dead.
8 On the contrary, what does it say? The message is near you, in your mouth and in your heart. This is the message of faith that we proclaim:
9 If you confess with your mouth, “Jesus is Lord,” and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved.
The Israelites are grappling with the reality of their situation from God’s perspective, and Nehemiah, Ezra and the Levites are ministering Joy and peace to them.
Where the Word is faithfully preached, clearly understood, and obediently embraced, God restores true joy to His people.
Comprehending with Joy (8:12)
Comprehending with Joy (8:12)
Read with me again in verse…
12 Then all the people began to eat and drink, send portions, and have a great celebration, because they had understood the words that were explained to them.
Here, we see the community trust their leaders and press into their covenant with God. Although it looks different than how Christians today would understand our relationship with God, they are still seeing how their renewed relationship with Him is cause for great celebration and JOY. God is at work in their lives and in their community and they are receiving the Word as it was explained clearly to them.
It would be easy to cherry-pick this verse and say, “We have reason to celebrate when we can finally understand one of pastor’s sermons!” But that’s not what it’s saying here. What Nehemiah is pointing out is that as people began to trust their leaders and put their weeping and mourning aside, they could see the reality of their hope and Joy in God and it brought about great celebration in their midst. They were no longer exiled vagabonds in desolate ruins, but God was at work restoring the infrastructure of the city and the infrastructure of the community as well. They were beginning to appreciate their place and position with God and this brought about great Joy!
One important fact for us today is that we have a whole lot more time and revelation from God than what they had in Nehemiah’s time. Since Nehemiah, many of the prophets wrote their scriptures, and we also have the life of Jesus and the preserved record of the New Testament to draw on. When we understand the Word of God - today as Christians - we are not only met with a conviction of sin, but we are given clear comprehension of God’s mercy through Jesus Christ! In Nehemiah’s day, they were going back to the Levitical sacrificial system, but today, we rely on the blood of Christ which was once and for all - never needing to be done again.
I’ve pointed out a lot of differences between Christians and the Israelites so far, because it is important to know that there are times when things in the Old Testament are more descriptive - saying what happened - than prescriptive - telling us what to do or how to respond. A very clear example of this is that I will be very disappointed if I find out someone is going home and sacrificing their sheep out of a desire to faithfully apply the message from today - I am not advocating we go back to the Law at all! So that part of this story does not have the same meaning for us today, because God has given us more information through the New Testament and the life of Jesus Christ.
But notice - even with what they knew from the Torah and other writings they had, they trusted their leaders, understood the law as they attentively sat under their teaching and it brought about great celebration in their community - they comprehended the Word with JOY! It’s not unlike the words of the prophet Jeremiah…
16 Your words were found, and I ate them. Your words became a delight to me and the joy of my heart, for I bear your name, Lord God of Armies.
I always want to avoid the risk of downplaying the depth and importance of Scripture, but I do think it’s important - when the opportunity arises - to acknowledge that a verse says something pretty simple and is pretty self explanatory. They understood the word, rejoiced and it lead to a celebration - an outpouring of joy from understanding the word.
Where the Word is faithfully preached, clearly understood, and obediently embraced, God restores true joy to His people.
Celebrating in Community (8:13-18)
Celebrating in Community (8:13-18)
13 On the second day, the family heads of all the people, along with the priests and Levites, assembled before the scribe Ezra to study the words of the law.
14 They found written in the law how the Lord had commanded through Moses that the Israelites should dwell in shelters during the festival of the seventh month.
15 So they proclaimed and spread this news throughout their towns and in Jerusalem, saying, “Go out to the hill country and bring back branches of olive, wild olive, myrtle, palm, and other leafy trees to make shelters, just as it is written.”
16 The people went out, brought back branches, and made shelters for themselves on each of their rooftops and courtyards, the court of the house of God, the square by the Water Gate, and the square by the Ephraim Gate.
17 The whole community that had returned from exile made shelters and lived in them. The Israelites had not celebrated like this from the days of Joshua son of Nun until that day. And there was tremendous joy.
18 Ezra read out of the book of the law of God every day, from the first day to the last. The Israelites celebrated the festival for seven days, and on the eighth day there was a solemn assembly, according to the ordinance.
Notice an important note that the author includes here - they had not celebrated like this since the days of Joshua, son of Nun. Who was Joshua? The one who succeeded Moses, whom God gave these instructions to in the first place. So all throughout the period of the Judges, through the unified and separated Kingdoms, through the exile - all that time, Israel had not celebrated the festival as they were told after Joshua died. They failed to be obedient to the Lord from the get-go, and they realized that and were excited to observe the celebration the Lord had commanded!
It would be fitting to take God’s own words to Joshua -
8 This book of instruction must not depart from your mouth; you are to meditate on it day and night so that you may carefully observe everything written in it. For then you will prosper and succeed in whatever you do.
9 Haven’t I commanded you: be strong and courageous? Do not be afraid or discouraged, for the Lord your God is with you wherever you go.”
There is a principle that is important to understand - true repentance within individual people, couples, families and communities is displayed in their collective changed hearts and changed actions. If a community is truly repentant, their attitudes will reflect a corporate shift in attitude toward God’s guided standard, and their actions as a community will reflect that as well. Part of celebrating what the Lord does within the community of faith means applying His word and working out corporate repentance together - just like the Lord told Joshua.
Here in Nehemiah, the people are coming back with a firm conviction to do what the Lord had commanded and to get themselves back on track with their responsibilities as covenantal partners with God. They discovered the long-forgotten Feast of Booths, and instead of arguing about it not being important or being too much work - they dive in as a community to be faithful to celebrate it according to what the Lord had commanded Moses and Joshua.
This is a corporate act of obedience that shows the outpouring of the community’s joy in what the Lord had done and what He was actively doing in their midst. The Feast of Booths was a seven day mini-recreation of their time wandering in the desert as nomads where staying in temporary shelters symbolized God’s provision, protection and presence with them throughout that defining moment in their history. In a way, it is a festival or party that says our circumstances don’t matter because God is with us, and He is all we need.
Isn’t that a great thought? Wouldn’t we do well to have some kind of celebration like that, even if only in our hearts? How would we live differently if we were able to separate the severity of our circumstances with the reality that God is good in all things and nothing else really matters? Imagine not only what the personal implications would be in each person’s life who held firmly to this, but take it out to the wider community at large - what if everyone was focused more on the reality of who God is and the implications of His presence with them, than on the circumstances that try to block their view of Him. Imagine what the community of God could accomplish together!
Last week, I issued a challenge to the church at large, that the church doesn’t belong to any of us individually, but to Christ alone. Specifically, that we need to take great care in how we portray ourselves within the community, both to each other as brothers and sisters in the Lord and as parts of the civic community in Sprague. The greatest possible witness that we could have - whether personally or communally - is the presence of God being central and active within the body. If God is here and we are listening and responding to Him the way He desires we do, that will have a lasting impact that cannot even be put into words. For the Jews of this day, going back to the Feast of Booths was right, because it was the at the appropriate time of the year for that celebration, and it was specifically speaking to another circumstance that they were living through themselves - they, better than most other generations of Israelites, knew the plight of wandering and living in temporary shelters.
For Christians today, what would such celebration look like? We are obviously not commanded to keep the festivals or the holy days of the Jewish people - that is part of the ceremonial law that was fulfilled in Christ. What are the things we do as Christians?
I would posit to you that there are two things that Jesus has asked the church to do on an ongoing basis that encompasses these kinds of celebrations:
Believer’s Baptism
Communion
By Believer’s Baptism, I am speaking of the full-immersion dunking of a person that symbolizes the death, burial and resurrection of our Lord Jesus as an act of obedience and declaration of allegiance to Christ. When a new believer is baptised, it doesn’t save them, it doesn’t make them any more or less holy - it is an outward symbol of an inward reality. There are some churches and traditions that link this full-immersion dunking in the water with repentance, closer to how the Jews of Jesus’ day would look at it - that it was a sign of sorrow over the sin they had committed and a sign of desire to change. However, the Christian church, throughout its early history, had never adopted baptism to be a repeated ordinance - it is done once as a sign to the church.
I am reminded of the scene from one of my favorite movies, “Oh Brother, Where Art Thou” where the escaped adventurers run into group going to be baptised as part of a regular washing away of sins. Two of the three of them get baptised and have pretty hilarious conversations about their new life now that God has forgiven them of their wrong-doings. As funny as this is, theologically it is not how the Christian Church has historically viewed baptism.
If you are a believer and you have not been baptised - you have no need to fear of some kind of retribution from God for being disobedient - you’re not at risk of not getting into heaven or anything like that, because it is just a symbol and not able to save you or take away your salvation. However, there is a reason it was given and our goal - much like how we see in the lives of the Jews in Nehemiah’s day - is to celebrate the Lord with obedience and joy. If you would like to be baptised, I would love to have that conversation with you! Please just let me know!
The other way that the Lord has given the Christian church to celebrate His presence and provision among us is through the act of Communion. Here is one that gets a little trickier because there are traditions where the act of Communion is seen as much more than jsut a symbolic gesture, but as a supernatural experience. The Roman Catholic Church, for example, believes in what is called Transubstantiation - which means that they believe that the bread and wine taken in communion literally become the body and blood of Christ during the ceremony, meaning that people are literally taking part in consuming Christ’s body. The theological implication of this is that it is a necessary and required part of the Christian’s experience - that without it, he or she will not have done everything they were supposed to in order to enter the Kingdom of Heaven. Does that sound like anything specific that the Apostles warned us about? Like the idea of salvation being by faith and not works?
Baptism wont save you - neither will communion. Salvation is by grace, through faith! It is not earned by works, so that no mere man can boast about it, except in the fact that Christ has saved a wretched man like myself out of His own good love for me.
Communion is a symbolic act where we take bread and wine (juice in our case) and remember the Lord’s death until He comes back. Through it, we contemplate our lives - are we in active sin or rebellion against the Lord? Are we in good standing with our brothers and sisters in Christ? Is there anyone who might have something against me that needs to be dealt with? It is an opportunity for us to seek the Lord for practical insight into our spiritual condition before Him. During that time, we are to be sensitive to the leading of the Holy Spirit and take seriously any of the directions we perceive of areas where we need to address - am I in sin? Have a sinned against my brother or sister? Is there a way I can be more honoring to the Lord in “this” or “that” situation?
Those two things are what the Christian Church has historically viewed to be the two ongoing commandments of Christ that we are to partake in. They both require contemplation and spiritual commitment, but they are both designed as what? Celebrations of what the Lord has done! Baptism recognizes the death and burial of Christ, but celebrates in the resurrection that He gives us through the fact that He, himself conquered death first so that we could join with Him in that resurrection!
In Communion, we celebrate and recognize the Lord’s death until what? Until He comes again! It is a celebration that there is still a promise awaiting us and we celebrate the Lord’s goodness as we wait for Him!
In Nehemiah and Ezra’s time, the people had the Word of God restored to them - and through their repentance of their sin and commitment to honor the Lord, they celebrated the Feast of Booths together, bringing about a great sense of Joy in the community. We have spoken a lot about what real joy is - it isn’t an emotion, but a gift of the Lord through the Holy Spirit that transcends our circumstances. Perhaps we begin to see a link here between obedience and joy? Could it be possible that a community without obedience is also a community without joy? I wouldn’t go as far as to say that as a rule, but I would say that joy does come as a result of obedience. For them, celebrating the Feast of Booths was an act of obedience that brought about great joy because they knew they had been restored to a placed of being God’s people. Finally, the awkwardness of the exile had been addressed and they knew that, YES - they still belong to the Lord and are HIS PEOPLE.
This brought about great reason to celebrate and have joy as a community! It came about by having been taught the Word of God, by understanding it and having the good sense to apply it well!
Where the Word is faithfully preached, clearly understood, and obediently embraced, God restores true joy to His people.
Conclusion
Conclusion
Do we believe that God will restore Joy to His people? We know that a lack of joy in life is a wearisome existence.
22 A joyful heart is good medicine, but a broken spirit dries up the bones.
I believe there are times when every person confuses the presence of God with the presence of joy. It is easy to think, “I’m feeling so down because of this or that - where is God?” The difficult part is that we cognitively know that God is always here! There are times we may not feel the presence of the Lord in our lives because of our emotions or jsut the perceived heaviness we are living in, but we would be good to ask, is that a lack of God’s presence or a lack of joy that we are experiencing?
We know that Jesus’ desire is for us to have full lives and that joy be a part of who we are.
10 A thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy. I have come so that they may have life and have it in abundance.
The example we see from the Jews of Nehemiah’s day - a principle that is reiterated in the New Testament as well, that great joy comes from obedience to the Lord. It might not always make our circumstances easier, though! My idea of a good time isn’t staying in a temporary shelter for a week! But it wasn’t the circumstance at question - it was their obedience; and we see that their obedience and excitement to follow the Word of the Lord brought their community a celebration of great joy.
Today, our primary act of obedience to the Lord is faith in Christ - we start with the gospel that acknowledges or sinfulness, our inability to justify ourselves and our complete and total dependence on Christ. Once we accept that and place our faith in Him for that salvation He promises, we are on a path towards obedience in Him. There is a journey of obedience and discipleship - and that’s part of what being in a community is all about - walking that journey together and growing more and more into the people who Christ wants us to be.
The worst thing we can do is to follow the example of the Pharisees who believed that their obedience alone justified them in the eyes of God. Our deeds - even in done in obedience - are filthy rags before the Lord and not able to justify us, because we are sinful people. The only one able to justify us was a spotless and blameless lamb who died on our behalf so that we could be with Him and glorify him forever!
Understanding the Word of God brought about a great desire to be obedient to the Lord, and in this community, it resulted in celebrations of great joy. Within our community, my hope and prayer is that our time in the Word provokes the hearts, minds and spirits of everyone here so that we can ask ourselves the hard questions - Am I being faithful to Christ in my attitudes and behaviors or am I being sinful against the Lord somehow? The goal isn’t for shame, but for openness, honesty, growth, sanctification, celebration and joy in the Lord!
Let’s pray.
