His Mercy Is More: Sin’s Long History and God’s Unfailing Grace
Nehemiah: From Rubble to Restoration • Sermon • Submitted • Presented • 43:00
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He got married knowing exactly what he was getting into.
He was told before the wedding that this woman would not be faithful to him.
She'd take his name,
she’d have his children,
and she'd take other men.
And he married her anyway.
He gave her a home.
He provided for her.
Three children came over the years.
And she did EXACTLY what he'd been told she would do.
And not just once, in a moment of weakness.
Again and again she broke her covenant vows and went after man, after man, after man,
even while living off everything her husband provided.
And yet, instead of writing her off,
The man took her back.
Even after she had left him,
and after she had lost all value to other men and was sold into slavery,
he sought her out,
paid the price to buy her back,
and brought her to his home and loved her has is wife again.
When we hear a story like this,
it makes the hair on our arms stand up!
“How could he do this?”
“How could he take her back?”
“After everything she did!”
“I surely wouldn’t” - we think.
“I wouldn’t give that kind of mercy and grace!”
“At least not that for many times!”
So let me ask you…
What’s your number?
Because we’ve all got one.
There’s a point where our mercy runs out and we say:
“enough is enough.”
"I'm not going to keep letting somebody treat me like that."
Once? Maybe.
Twice? Now we're not so sure.
A third time?
A fourth?
Somewhere in there,
I think most, if not all of us, have a point where we'd say,
“That's it, I'm done!”
And yet, in the book of Hosea, and Nehemiah chapter 9,
We are shown a God who has no number.
Because though our sins they are many, His mercy is more!
And in our passage this morning the Israelite people realize this.
They realize they are the unfaithful wife who has broken covenant time and time again.
But they also realize that God is the ever-forgiving husband who has continued to love and care for them in spite of their continual sin.
And this truth brings them to their knees in repentance before the God of mercy.
And by God’s grace, the same will happen us to us this morning.
To see that His mercy is more, we must:
Remember God’s Grace (vv. 5b–15)
Reckon With Our Rebellion (vv. 16–31)
Recognize Our Ruin (vv. 32–37)
So far in our study through the book of Nehemiah,
we’ve seen how God used Nehemiah to rebuild the walls of Jersualem in just 52 days.
And yet, even though the walls have been rebuilt the heart still needs restoration.
Which is why the book doesn’t end in chapter 7.
And in chapter 8, that’s exactly what we see God doing,
As the people gather by the thousands and ask the priest Ezra to read to them the Words of God’s law.
And they do this for 6 hours!
And as they stand there listening to God’s Word:
They hear it.
They understand it.
And they obey it.
Pretty simple right?
They people celebrate the Feast of Booths and actually lives in booths as the Law commands,
And as they laid there with the stars above them,
they remembered how God had cared for their fathers in the wilderness after He brought them out of slavery in Egypt.
Then in Nehemiah, it’s two days later after the feasts of booths,
and the people come back,
but this time they aren’t celebrating,
they are mourning.
1 Now on the twenty-fourth day of this month the people of Israel were assembled with fasting and in sackcloth, and with earth on their heads.
And just like that they have gone from a feast to a funeral.
That’s how they are dressed.
That’s how they are acting.
Verse 2 says they separated themselves from the foreigners and stood confessing the sins of the and iniquities of their fathers.
They are saying: “Lord, we have broken covenant and acted unfaithfully before you!”
And how did the know that?
Because they had been spending HOURS in God’s written Word.
That’s how they knew!
Verse 3 says:
3 And they stood up in their place and read from the Book of the Law of the Lord their God for a quarter of the day; for another quarter of it they made confession and worshiped the Lord their God.
And for those who are counting.
and you know I am…
That’s another six hours!
And during this time,
no one was checking their watches.
No one was falling asleep…
No one was… ok you get the idea.
NO BODY WAS WONDERING HOW LONG THE PREACHER WOULD PREACH!
AMEN?
AMEN!
The point is, these people had a hunger for God’s Word because they had a hunger for GOD!
And so the people stand here led by the Levites, once again,
for six hours hearing God’s Word and confessing their sins.
That’s what true revival looks like.
And it always begins with the Word of God.
In verse 5, we find one of the longest prayers recorded in the Bible,
and it begins with: “Stand up and bless the LORD your God from everlasting to everlasting!”
And it this prayer, what do we find?
We don’t find request after request after request of the people asking God to heal their bad knees,
to help them find better jobs,
we find a prayer that is CHALK FULL of CONFESSION!
But even before that, we find something else.
We find that it begins, not with sin, but with GOD!
From verses 6-15, God is the subject of every sentence.
He’s the noun attached to every verb!
YOU God made the heavens and the earth!
YOU Chose Abraham and YOU gave us the land!
YOU kept your promises for YOU are righteous!
YOU saved us out of Egypt!
YOU performed signs and wonders!
YOU divided the Red Sea and YOU led your people by a cloud by day and pillar of fire by night.
YOU spoke and gave us the LAW from Mount Sinai.
YOU gave us bread from heaven and water from the rock.
Verse after verse after verse is the people worshiping God for Who He is!
For He is LORD ALONE!
And He is a GOOD and GRACIOUS God.
Church, do you see what Israel is doing here?
They are stopping to reflect on the goodness of God!
They are pausing to remember all the good God had done for them!
Before they reflect upon their long history of sin,
they are reflecting on God’s long history of grace.
Do you understand how important this is?
It’s important for two reasons:
First: if you don’t ever pause to reflect on God’s long history of grace in your life,
You’ll stop remembering how great of a spouse our God has been to us.
And if you do that,
You’ll quickly become ungrateful and doubt the goodness of God.
When problems arise in your life,
You’ll question God’s love for you.
You’ll doubt his goodness and think He’s not the loving spouse He actually is.
And then you’ll chase after other lovers, other gods, and think they will love you and care for you more!
BUT THEY NEVER DO!
They always lead us down the path to slavery,
just as it happened with Hosea’s wife Gomer.
And so if we want to avoid being a GOMER…
that works on two levels doesn’t it…
We MUST REMEMBER THE GOODNESS OF GOD!
If we don’t top to pause and reflect on God’s long history of grace in our life,
not only will become ingrates who chase sin,
but we won’t come back once we’ve gone down the hard road of sin.
We’ll think:
“God won’t forgive me…”
“God won’t take me back…”
And instead of returning home like the prodigal son did,
we’ll settle for the pigs slop of this world when a feast lay before us!
So how about you?
Are you taking time to pause and reflect on God’s long history of grace in your life?
And I don’t mean just giving it a quick thought.
I mean actually taking time to list out all the things you can think of that God has been so incredibly good to you?
Or… have you forgotten His goodness and chased other gods thinking they will be better lovers.
That’s what Israel did.
Even though God was the perfect loving husband…
they forgot this,
which led to them continually rebelling against him time and and time and time again.
To see that His mercy is more, we must:
Remember God’s Grace (vv. 5b–15)
Reckon With Our Rebellion (vv. 16–31)
Recognize Our Ruin (vv. 32–37)
In verse 16, we find two of the saddest words in all of Scripture.
“But they.”
God gave.
But they… acted presumptuously and stiffened their neck and did not obey God’s commandments.
And that word for presumptuously is doing some heavy lifting here.
It’s the same exact word that verse 10 used to describes the Egyptians and how they acted arrogantly against God.
Do you see what they are admitting?
They are saying: “We are no better than the Egyptians that God destroyed in the Red Sea!”
Israel came out of Egypt, and then Israel behaved like Egypt.
That’s what they are acknowledging!
And that term in verse 17, “Stiffened their necks,” is a farm word.
It’s the idea of an ox fighting the hoke of the very hand that feeds it.
They refused to obey.
They stiffened the neck.
They even appointed a leader to oppose Moses and bring them back to slavery in Egypt.
and they made a golden calf and said: “This is your God who brought you up out of Egypt!”
Remember when I asked you what your number was?
Surely this is God’s!
He rescued them.
Fed them.
Cared for them.
and loved them.
And in response these rescued slaves campaign to un-rescue themselves!
But… remarkably… God wasn’t done loving them.
17 … But you are a God ready to forgive, gracious and merciful, slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love, and did not forsake them.
But they.
But you.
That’s the story of Nehemiah 9.
And it’s the long story of Israel.
And like Hosea,
God knew beforehand that the people would do this!
Let me prove it to you.
If we go all the way back to the book of Deuteronomy.
Israel is standing on the edge of the Promised Land,
and Moses is preparing the next generation to go in.
And in Deuteronomy 28,
God lays out the blessings of covenant faithfulness and the consequences of covenant rebellion.
14 … do not turn aside from any of the words that I command you today, to the right hand or to the left, to go after other gods to serve them.
In other words:
Stay faithful.
Don’t turn away.
Don’t go chasing other gods.
And then God warns them exactly what will happen if they do.
Their enemies will defeat them.
Foreign nations will rule over them.
The fruit of their land will go to somebody else.
They will experience the consequences of breaking covenant with God.
But then God says:
1 “And when all these things come upon you, the blessing and the curse, which I have set before you, and you call them to mind among all the nations where the Lord your God has driven you, 2 and return to the Lord your God, you and your children, and obey his voice in all that I command you today, with all your heart and with all your soul, 3 then the Lord your God will restore your fortunes and have mercy on you, and he will gather you again from all the peoples where the Lord your God has scattered you.
Did you catch that?
Not if.
When!
Before they ever entered the land,
God already knew they were going to be unfaithful to Him!
Hey knew they would rebel.
He knew they would chase other gods!
And yet, He still promised to love them and restore them.
Do you remember Hosea's children?
One of them, a little girl, was given a terrible name.
Lo-Ruhamah.
Which means: No Mercy.
But that wasn’t a promise of no mercy ever again.
Because later in that same book God says, "I will have mercy on No Mercy!”
That’s how MERCIFUl our God is!
Hey looks at a people who’s sins are many and says: “NO MERCY!”
And yet… in the next breath our merciful God says:
“I will have mercy upon those who deserve no mercy.”
That’s the love of our God!
In verses 22-25,
The text tells us of all the things the people received from the good hand of their God.
Kingdoms.
Land.
Cities they did not build.
Houses, cisterns, and vineyards they did not plant.
"They ate and were filled and became fat and delighted themselves in Your great goodness."
But in verse 26 it says:
26 “Nevertheless, they were disobedient and rebelled against you and cast your law behind their back and killed your prophets, who had warned them in order to turn them back to you, and they committed great blasphemies.
Are you picking up on the pattern here?
From grumbling in the desert,
to worshiping false gods,
and murdering God’s messengers.
Israel continued to play the harlot!
Is that the number?
Surely this would be God’s breaking point!
Verse 27 sounds like it might be.
God gave them into the hands of their enemies.
They suffered and began to cry out to God asking for mercy.
And what does God?
He takes them back!
He gives gives them mercy!
He gave them judges.
Eborah,
Barak,
Gdieon,
Samson,
and more!
All saviors sent from the God of mercy to a people who deserved NO MERCY!
And then verse 28.
The same story runs again!
The people turn from God.
They end up on bondage.
God showers them with mercy and saves them again!
How many times?
Seriously, at what point does God finally say, enough?
Then verses 29-30.
Same pattern of sin and rebellion yet AGAIN!
And yet, once again.
31 Nevertheless, in your great mercies you did not make an end of them or forsake them, for you are a gracious and merciful God.
Do you see this church?
over and over and over God’s people respond in unfaithfulness,
But in over a thousand years of that pattern God’s number was never hit!
And that’s why you won’t find the word “MERCY” in this entire chapter!
Its not here…
But the word MERCIES is!
Because God’s mercies never run out for His people!
Yes… their were consequences…
and those consequences were at times severe.
But because our God is a God of mercies,
the prophet Jeremiah could over look the destruction of Jerusalem and still proclaim.
22 The steadfast love of the Lord never ceases; his mercies never come to an end; 23 they are new every morning; great is your faithfulness.
When you hear of the mercies of God,
there are two wrong ways to respond to this.
We either make our sin too small or too big.
The way of making sin too small looks like this:
We think our sin must not be that big of a deal.
“Oh, God will forgive me…”
And so we we hide our sin.
We excuse our sin.
We keep stiffening our neck against what God has said.
But look at the history of this attitude in this text.
Did sin come with serious consequences?
Yes it is!
Painful, hard, difficult consequences.
People died.
Kingdoms fell.
Jerusalem burned.
They were dragged into exile.
People died.
Kingdoms fell.
Jerusalem burned.
They were dragged into exile.
God’s mercy never made their sin safe.
It just made sin not the last word!
But some of you have the opposite problem.
You make your sin too big.
And what I mean is, you make your sin, which is a big problem, bigger than the mercies of God!
You keep living in your past.
Running the replay on that sin you wished you never did.
And sometimes,
you might even think God’s has hit His number with you.
But HE hasn’t!
Because God’s love for His people never runs out!
But either way.
If you’ve made your sin too big or too small.
The solution is the same!
It’s to see how great the mercies of God are!
Look.
You know we don't teach here the losing of salvation.
The Scripture doesn't teach that at all.
That's complete nonsense that shrinks the mercies of God and puts a number on it!
But if you’re here this morning in a “BUT THEY” moment in your life.
You need to gaze deeply into the goodness and mercies of God in this chapter and turn from your sin and be restored!
I can’t emphasize the serious importance of that enough!
And so if that’s you,
gaze upon the goodness of your God.
Confess your sins.
And remember that His mercy is more!
But to do that you, you have to recognize the ruin you’ve brought upon yourself.
To see that His mercy is more, we must:
Remember God’s Grace (vv. 5b–15)
Reckon With Our Rebellion (vv. 16–31)
Recognize Our Ruin (vv. 32–37)
In verse 32, we finally come to the only request in the entire prayer.
and it’s a simple request.
It’s a request for mercy.
32 “Now, therefore, our God, the great, the mighty, and the awesome God, who keeps covenant and steadfast love, let not all the hardship seem little to you that has come upon us, upon our kings, our princes, our priests, our prophets, our fathers, and all your people, since the time of the kings of Assyria until this day.
The people are again praising God for who He is.
Great
Mighty
Awesome.
The God who keeps covenant and steadfast love.
And on that basis.
They say “Our God… let not all the hardship seem little to you that has come upon us.”
But even in this request,
They recognize they don’t deserve it.
They recognize they are rightfully named: “No mercy.”
That’s what verse 33 is saying.
“You have been righteous is all that has come upon us!
“you have dealt faithfully and to our unfaithfulness!”
Verse 34: “For our kings, princes, priests and fathers have not kept your law.”
They spurned your goodness - verse 35.
And then.. verse 36
36 Behold, we are slaves this day; in the land that you gave to our fathers to enjoy its fruit and its good gifts, behold, we are slaves. 37 And its rich yield goes to the kings whom you have set over us because of our sins. They rule over our bodies and over our livestock as they please, and we are in great distress.
Did you catch the pronoun shift?
it’s not “they broke your laws.”
But “WE have acted wickedly.”
Different generation, but the same rebellion.
Different idol, but the same unfaithful heart.
There’s no blame shifting here.
Just straight honest confession that their hearts are no different than their fathers’ hearts.
Just acknowledging their sin.
recognizing their deserved judgment in slavery under a new Egypt that was just as unloving as the old Egypt.
And all because their hearts were prone to wander, prone to leave the God they love and Who loved them.
And there the prayer ends with five words:
"we are in great distress."
What a picture of what sin does does to us.
It promises us the world but leaves us in chains.
And a part from the mercies of God,
we don’t even realize we are in chains!
And centuries later,
we find that point proven when the children of Abraham stand before God Himself in the flesh,
and under Roman rule and oppression they confidently say:
"We are offspring of Abraham and have never been enslaved to anyone."
And not only were they in bondage physically and could not see it,
they were in a greater bondage spiritually and could not see it!
That’s why Jesus told them.
34 Jesus answered them, “Truly, truly, I say to you, everyone who practices sin is a slave to sin.
Make no mistake about it:
sin is a cruel taskmaster.
It will promise to love you and care for you,
but it leaves you in bondage!
Which is why we all need a Savior.
After Hosea’s wife was unfaithful to him again and again and again.
God tells Hosea to go again and love her.
and so he does.
He finds her in ruined and in chains.
He pays the price of her redemption at cost to himself.
And takes her home to be his bride.
And as loving and merciful as that was,
it pales in comparison to what our God has done for us.
For years later, Jesus Christ,
the greater Hosea.
Came for a bride with a long record of unfaithfulness.
And like Hosea, His father told Him to go and love her.
And He did and great cost to Himself.
Except when He found us in chains He did not pay mere silver or gold to set us free,
but He paid the cost with His own blood through death on a cross.
And at the cross, God’s mercy did not pretend our rebellion did not matter.
It proved it did!
But is also proved that the love and mercy of God goes father than the golden calf.
father than murdered prophets.
and father than your worst day.
It goes all the way to death, even death on a cross!
And because it does
we too can confidently say:
31 But in your great mercy you did not put an end to [us] or abandon [us], for you are a gracious and merciful God!
So stop making your sin smaller than it is
or bigger than God’s mercy.
Bring the whole record.
Own it.
Confess it.
Do not hide behind what somebody else did first.
Say with Israel:
“You have dealt faithfully and we have acted wickedly.”
And then look to the cross where justice and mercy meet.
18 knowing that you were ransomed from the futile ways inherited from your forefathers, not with perishable things such as silver or gold, 19 but with the precious blood of Christ, like that of a lamb without blemish or spot.
Remember this as we go to the table.
PRAY FOR MEAL!
