The Recipe for Revival

Today marks our 6th and final message out of Nehemiah. For the last five weeks we have studied Nehemiah’s journey as he led the Jews in rebuilding he security walls around Jerusalem. Our purpose in doing this six week study has been to learn what a God-given vision is, how He will provide the resources, strength and wisdom we’ll need to fulfill His vision for Monaghan Baptist Church, and how to best handle opposition when we encounter it along the way.

We left off in Nehemiah chapter six last week as Nehemiah embodied a God given courage as he boldly stood up in the face of his enemies as they tried to kill him, ruin his character and reputation.

Verse 15 of Nehemiah 6 tells us that despite all of the enemies attempts, “the wall was finished on the twenty-fifth day of the month of (El-Uel), in fifty-two days.” So the work of rebuilding the wall was completed in an astoundingly fast time frame. Their ability to do so, was because they had “the help of…God” (Vs.17).

While God’s purpose of completing the physical work of rebuilding the wall was completed, His work on the spiritual nature of the Jews was just beginning.

After spending most of chapter seven listing all the of residents who had returned to Jerusalem from exile, He moves on to chapter eight where he describes the beginnings of a spiritual revival among the Jews.

Nehemiah opens chapter 8 by describing that on the first day of the seventh month, all of Jerusalem’s residents came together in the city’s square and Ezra began reading the Law of Moses, which God had given to Moses during the Exodus. In verse 3, Nehemiah says that Ezra read from God’s Word from “early morning until midday, in the presence of the men and the women and those who could understand. And the ears of all the people were attentive to the Book of the Law” (Vs 3.). In verses 5-6, Nehemiah says that “Ezra opened the book in the sight of all the people, for he was above all the people, and as he opened it all the people stood. 6 And Ezra blessed the Lord, the great God, and all the people answered, “Amen, Amen,” lifting up their hands. And they bowed their heads and worshiped the Lord with their faces to the ground.”

At this point, we learn in the latter portion of chapter 8 that while reading the Book of the Law, the Jews felt the need to not only hear God’s Word, but to put it into action. So, for the first time in many years, the Jews celebrated the “Feast of Booths.” The “Feast of Booths” also known as the “Feast of Tabernacles” was one of the the three great pilgrimage-festivals of the Jewish calendar. Considered the greatest of the Jewish agricultural year, the Festival of Booths was celebrated the 15th—22nd days in the seventh month of the Jewish calendar--on our calendar this would include the months of September-October. According to Jewish history, the seven day celebration was a time of feasting and celebrating the completion of the harvest, and most importantly, God’s provisions. The Jews were required to construct temporary shelters, where they would eat and sleep during the seven day festival. This was to remind them of Yahweh’s protection during the wilderness wanderings.

Nehemiah says in the last part of verse 17-19 that, “And there was very great rejoicing. And day by day, from the first to the last day, [Ezra] read from the Book of the Law of God. They kept the feast seven days, and on the eighth day there was a solemn assembly, according to the rule.”

Essentially, God used the rebuilding of the wall to cause the Jews to realize that without Him, it would have never happened. They’ve gone from being under God’s wrath and having the wall around their city destroyed by the Babylonians to having God give them the necessary resources and protection to rebuild the Temple and the wall, which ignites a return to the Lord. The Jews were in the midst of a revival.

Church, we are situated in a community, state, nation, and world that desperately needs reviving. We desperately need an out pouring of the Holy Spirit’s power in the minds and hearts of people of all cultures. That reality is why we’ve spent these last several weeks talking about God’s purpose and God’s vision for Monaghan Baptist Church. My prayer and I hope your prayer is that this building will one day be full of people who are coming to know the Lord Jesus Christ because they’ve been witnessed to by someone in this church who recognizes all that Jesus did for them on the cross at Calvary and the fact that without His sacrifice, life is meaningless.

Rebuilding the wall around Jerusalem was not the end of God’s work. It was the way for God to show the Israelites that He had not forgotten them and He had not broken the covenants that He’d made with their ancestors. The wall was the tool God used to grab their attention and show them He was still their God. And as we are about to see, He used the moment to bring about a revival of the covenant relationship between Him and the Jewish people.

Folks, over the next several months to a year, we are going to be making some necessary updates to our facility. But the goal of updating the building isn’t so we can brag about new aspects of our campus. It is to prepare us to accomplish the vision God has set before us. Everything we believe God is calling us to do, whether it’s renovating our building or starting new ministries, the end goal is to pray that God will use it to bring about a revival such a revival in our community that it spreads to the ends of the earth.

This morning, we are going to see in Nehemiah 9:1-3, the recipe for revival. My prayer is that we will imitate the Jews we read about this morning in such a way that God will honor our worship to Him and allow the revival of all revivals to begin here at Monaghan Baptist Church.

I. God’s Word (Vs. 3)

Nehemiah tells us back in chapter 7, that once the wall was finished, the Jews assembled together near the Temple, on the first day of the seventh month, and reading from God’s Word. Their hearing from the Lord’s Word led them to celebrate the Festival of the Booths from the 15th to the 22nd days of the month. Now we read in verse 1 that it’s the twenty-fourth day of the month and the people are still assembling and reading God’s Word.

As God’s Word is being read, it is likely it is the first time many of the Jews heard about God’s covenant with their ancestors and with them for the very first time. It was probably the first time they’d heard about God’s social and moral law. Most likely, it was the first time they’d heard the Ten Commandments and God’s expectation of them to pass down His Laws and statutes from generation to generation. The reason I believe this, is because it wasn’t until they “studied the words of the Law” that they “found it written in the Law that the LORD had commanded by Moses that the people of Israel should dwell in booths during the feast of the seventh month, and that they should proclaim it and publish it in all their towns and in Jerusalem” (Neh. 8:13d-15). God’s command regarding the festival is located in Leviticus 23. From Genesis to Numbers, the people heard, read, studied and followed God’s Word.

God’s Word is a must for revival. And not just hearing or reading God’s Word, but putting into action what it says. Imagine had the Jews heard from God’s Word each day, but never applied it to their lives. My guess is eventually the people would have stopped coming and hearing the Levites read it from day to day because their lack of following it would’ve demonstrated their lack of belief in it.

But that’s not what happened. They heard, read, studied, and followed God’s Word because they realized they had broken their covenant with God, not the other way around.

Take for example, Deuteronomy 7:6-11 where God tells the Israelites “For you are a people holy to the LORD our God. The LORD your God has chosen you to be a people for his treasured possession, out of all the peoples who are on the face of the earth. It was not because you were more in number than any other people that the LORD set his love on you and chose you, for you were the fewest of all peoples, but it because the LORD loves you and is keeping the oath that he swore to your fathers, that the LORD has brought you out with a mighty hand and redeemed you from the house of slavery…Know therefore that the LORD your God is God, the faithful God who keeps covenant and steadfast love with those who love him and keep his commandments, to a thousand generations, and repays to their faces those who hate him, by destroying them…You shall therefore be careful to do the commandment and the statutes and the rules that I command you today” (Deut. 7:6-11).

Imagine being one of the Israelites who had just returned from being exiled from their home and watching as God providentially and supernaturally uses Nehemiah to lead them to rebuild the wall around their city in the face of death threats and other demonic opposition. Then, after witnessing God’s hand orchestrate the rebuilding of the wall, you start gathering with your family and neighbors to listen and study God’s Word and for the first time, maybe in your entire life, you hear promises God made to your ancestors and to you hundreds of years ago. And then realizing that you were just a part of God’s fulfillment of His promise despite the fact you and your ancestors had abandoned Him a long time ago. He kept His word and you did not. I’m certain you would respond the same way the Jews in Nehemiah’s day did. For the first time in ages, they took seriously God’s Word and it sparked a revival among their people because they understood that without the mercy and grace of the Lord, they would have been a hopeless people.

They had forgotten all that God had done for them and how they had chosen sin over Him. When they were reminded of that reality through His Word, they were brought to their knees in grief and mourning.

II. Confession and Repentance (Vs. 1-2, 3b)

As the Israelites hear, read, study, and follow God’s Word, they are led to the conclusion that they were the one who’d abandoned God and chosen sin over Him. Because God’s Word was convicting them of their sins, they realize their need to confess and repent of their own sins and the sins of the ancestors.

Notice in verse one how Nehemiah describes their physical appearance. First he says they are fasting. Fasting in the Old Testament is sometimes associated with a person who is emotionally distraught about something. Think about moments in your own life when you are upset or grieving and you can’t eat. When it comes to confessing sins, fasting was not required. But the fact that the Jews are fasting tells us that they are extremely upset about sinning against God. There are other instances in the Bible when the Jews are fasting because they are emotionally distraught about their sins.

For example, 1 Samuel 7:6 says that the Jews “gathered at Mizpah and drew water and poured it out before the Lord and fasted on that day and said there, ‘We have sinned against the Lord’” (1 Sa. 7:6).

Next, Nehemiah says that they are “wearing sackcloth” which represents their willingness to repent from their sins.

John Barry, contributor to a commentary on the Book of Nehemiah, describes that a sackcloth was “made of goat or camel hair” and “was coarse and uncomfortable to wear. In contexts of mourning, “sackcloth” usually refers to a loincloth. Sackcloth was often worn to demonstrate repentance. Jeremiah called on his generation to repent by commanding the inhabitants of Judah to put on sackcloth in mourning (Jer 6:26); Daniel used sackcloth as part of his repentance for the sins of the nation (Dan 9:3); the king of Nineveh used sackcloth to demonstrate his repentance upon hearing Yahweh’s announcement of imminent judgment (Jonah 3:6); Yahweh announced that Tyre and Sidon would have repented in sackcloth if they had witnessed His miracles (Matt 11:21).”

Third, Nehemiah records that the Jews had “earth on their heads.” This means that the Jews had taken dirt and rubbed it on their heads. Again, all three of these are outward symbols of their shame, confession, and repentance for their sins.

Look at the first part of verse 2. It says, “And the Israelites separated themselves from all foreigners...” (Vs. 2a).

This is important to point out because it demonstrates their adherence to following God’s Law exactly how it was written.

For example in Deuteronomy 7, God says,

“When the LORD your God brings you into the land that you are entering to take possession of it, and clears away many nations before you...you must devote them to complete destruction. You shall make no covenant with them and show no mercy to them. You shall not intermarry with them, giving your daughters to their sons or taking their daughters for your sons, for they would turn away your sons from following me, to serve other gods. Then the anger of the LORD would be kindled against you, and he would destroy you quickly” (Deut. 7:1-4).

The fact that they separated themselves, points us to the fact that they are fully committed to reviving their relationship with the Lord.

And look at what happened when they combined their return to God’s Word with confession and repentance. A revival broke out.

Nehemiah 10:28-29

English Standard Version Chapter 10

The rest of the people, the priests, the Levites, the gatekeepers, the singers, the temple servants, and all who have separated themselves from the peoples of the lands to the Law of God, their wives, their sons, their daughters, all who have knowledge and understanding, 29 join with their brothers, their nobles, and enter into a curse and an oath to walk in God’s Law that was given by Moses the servant of God, and to observe and do all the commandments of the LORD our Lord and his rules and his statutes.

They recommitted themselves to following God’s commandments and to teaching their children to do the same. Revival broke out among the Jews.

So, what does all this mean for us at Monaghan Baptist Church?

First, if we desire to see a revival breakout in our community, then it must begin with us. If you have forgotten the promises of God’s Word, then pick up your Bible and begin reading, studying, and following it just as the Jews did. When you do that, I promise His Word is going to speak to you because it is alive and it is active.

“For the word of God is living and active, sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing to the division of soul and of spirit, of joints and of marrow, and discerning the thoughts and intentions of the heart. And no creature is hidden from his sight, but all are naked and exposed to the eyes of him to whom we must give account” (Heb. 4:12).

God says to Jeremiah, “Is not my word like fire, declares the LORD, and like a hammer that breaks the rock in pieces” (Jeremiah 23:29)?

A return to God’s Word will remind you of His greatness, His mercy, and His love for us, will lead you to recognizing your need for confession and repentance. And whenever true confession and repentance begins, God’s Holy Spirit will bring about a great revival in our church. And the beauty of that fact is that when revival breaks out in our church, it will not be contained here. It will spread like wild fire throughout our community and who know how far it will go from there.

Pastor and Theologian J.I. Packer said, “Revival is the visitation of God which brings to life Christians who have been sleeping and restores a deep sense of God's near presence and holiness. Thence springs a vivid sense of sin and a profound exercise of heart in repentance, praise, and love, with an evangelistic outflow.”

Historians record that between the early 18th century and the late 20th century there were three or four Great Awakenings in America. The first of these awakenings occured between 1720 and 1740. Led by great pastors such as John Wesley, George Whitfield, Johnathan Edwards and others, these awakenings were marked by their teachings on the impossibility of any man to fulfill God’s Law, God’s wrath against anyone who doesn’t accept His unmerited grace, and the new birth a person can have because of Jesus Christ.

With quotes like these:

“believers by nature, are far from God, and children under wrath, even as others, yet it is amazing to think how nigh they are brought to him again by the blood of Jesus Christ.” —George Whitfield

“I want to know one thing, the way to heaven; how to land safe on that happy shore. God Himself has condescended to teach the way; for this end He came from heaven. He hath written it down in a book. Give me that book! At any price give me the Book of God!” ― John Wesley

“The first and the great work of a Christian is about his heart.  Do not be content with seeming to do good in “outward acts” while your heart is bad, and you are a stranger to the greater internal heart duties.  See that your chief study be about your heart– that there God’s image may be planted; that there His interests be advanced; that there the world and flesh are subdued; that there the love of every sin is cast out; that there the love of holiness grows.” -Jonathan Edwards

These Pastors and others like them highlighted that all people are born sinners, sin without salvation will send a person to hell, all people can be saved if they confess their sins to God, seek forgiveness and accept God’s grace, all people can have a direct and emotional connection with God, and religion shouldn’t be formal and institutionalized, but rather casual and personal.

As a result, of the revival that God used these men to start, thousands of people came to Christ for the first time.

I truly believe the ingredients are here for a revival to happen here in this church. God is doing His part, are we going to do ours?