Sermon Tone Analysis

Although the book of Nehemiah is ostensibly historical, it is also eminently practical.

Nehemiah has assessed problems, planned responses, faced opposition and handled discouragement.

At each point, he has demonstrated absolute faithfulness to the Word of God.

Chapter 5 introduces another practical lesson: financial responsibility.

Financial concerns seem to dominate the newspaper these days.

The housing market is in a huge slump, major banks have failed, and even automotive lenders and credit card companies are far more hesitant to make loans than they were just a few months ago.

Further, the financial picture of many individuals is not that much better.

How many people across the United States have bought homes that they cannot afford, or loaded up a bunch of credit cards with debt they can never repay?

There is no distinction anymore between good debt and bad debt.

Good debt secures tangible necessities (houses and cars) or makes an investment (education and business).

Nor is there an understanding that debt turns the borrower into a slave.

Proverbs 22:7 says, /The rich ruleth over the poor, and the borrower is servant to the lender/.

The people of Nehemiah’s day had financial problems, too.

Their problems were different than those we face today, but the underlying issue is the same.

Both fail to recognize that Jesus Christ is Lord of our finances just as much as he is Lord over everything else.

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Famine Complaints

Our text begins with the poorer Jews expressing their cries and complaints against their richer brethren.

But what had the richer Jews done to them?

It all goes back to one thing — a famine that probably started before the Nehemiah began rebuilding the wall of Jerusalem but became especially severe during the reconstruction.

The work on the wall was done during the summer, which meant that those who helped were not able to care for their crops.

This seems to be the most likely explanation for the immediate shortage of food.

Some commentators try to connect the famine to some extremely heavy rainfalls that are mentioned in Ezra and Haggai, but those stormy seasons were probably too early to be a problem here.

Note that our text says nothing about bad weather, locusts or anything else that might account for the crop failure.

If the famine was at least partly the result of rebuilding the wall, then that only aggravates the complaint of the poorer Jews.

It’s bad enough that people take advantage of one another at any time, but what made the rich Jews think they could abuse their poor brothers when they were doing the Lord’s work?

These men had volunteered to help rebuild the wall knowing that their crops might suffer as a result.

Now, think about what’s going on here.

We really need to put the famine in perspective to get the whole picture.

The Jews had spent the last few weeks working on the wall.

They told Nehemiah in the previous chapter that they were exhausted — partly because the work itself was extremely demanding and partly because of the added stress of Sanballat threatening to destroy them.

But they continued to work because the rebuilding of the wall meant that God was looking favorably upon his people once again.

It is no exaggeration to say that it painted a picture of a bright future and looked forward to the coming of the Messiah himself.

So, it gave the people hope — more hope than they had had in decades!

But the famine and the way that the rich used it to oppress the poor was like a slap in the face.

Having no food and being taken advantage of made them question whether there was any real value to their work.

Was God leading them through this toward something new and better?

Or was he only playing a cruel trick on them to make them a laughingstock among the nations?

Just what was his purpose?

Sometimes when we face trials we must be like Job.

When there’s nothing we can do, we have to wait and see what God has for us.

Other times we can do something.

Here the Jews took their complaints to Nehemiah.

Although there wasn’t much he could do about the famine, as governor he could deal with the problems that the famine had caused.

Being a faithful governor, he heard the cries of his people.

The Jews’ first complaint was that there was no food.

Verse 2 says, /For there were that said, We, our sons, and our daughters, are many: therefore we take up corn for them, that we may eat, and live/.

These people needed food for their families, but no one listened to their pleas for help.

But note what they were really saying.

To begin with, they blamed the shortage of food on the overpopulation of Jerusalem and surrounding communities.

They said, /We … are many/.

They didn’t have enough food, they reasoned, because there were too many mouths to feed.

This concern was ridiculous.

God commanded Adam and Eve in the very beginning to fill the earth with their children, and he told Abraham that his descendents would be as numerous as the sand on the seashore.

The fact that Jerusalem was populated was a manifestation of God’s blessing, not his curse.

Yet, how true it is that we often turn blessing into cursing in our minds!

Isn’t this what we do when we think that two worship services each week is too much?

God blesses us with the opportunity to gather together twice to feast upon his Word and fellowship with his people, but the only thing we can think of is what attending a second services means we can’t do.

We can’t watch a ball game, go skiing or visit Aunt Mary.

A more justified concern was that the rich Jews had plenty of food, but they were refusing to make it available at a reasonable cost to those who had sacrificed so much for the rebuilding of the wall, which they all benefited from.

The poor brothers had given up their own crops to make sure that the wall was rebuilt.

Their richer brothers should have appreciated their sacrifice.

The second complaint of the Jews was that some of them had to mortgage their property in order to buy food.

This means that one of two things was happening, or perhaps both.

Either the property values were extremely deflated or the cost of food had skyrocketed.

This scenario is not impossible.

After World War I, the German economy was in such a sorry state that it literally took a wheelbarrow load of cash just to buy one loaf of bread.

But, again, the complaint of the Jews goes a little deeper.

In an agricultural society, mortgaging one’s property not only put his property at risk but also threatened his ability to provide for his family, since his livelihood was tied to his use of the land.

If he were to lose his land, there would be little chance that he could ever repay his debts.

Even if the famine were to improve, the fact that he lost his property would mean that he could not help himself.

The third complaint is that the king’s taxes still had to be paid.

Some of the Jews had to borrow money to satisfy their tax burden, but this only compounded their problem because it made it even less likely that they would be able to buy food or reclaim their property.

A few of them, knowing that they could not repay their loans otherwise, even sold their children into slavery (v. 5) with no hope of ever being able to buy them back.

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Nehemiah’s Response

With morale at its lowest perhaps since Nebuchadnezzar first razed Jerusalem a century and half earlier and sin abounding all around him, Nehemiah had to do something.

When David saw the wickedness that existed in his kingdom, he wept.

Psalm 119:136 says, /Rivers of waters run down mine eyes, because they keep not thy law/.

Ezra likewise mourned the intermarriage of God’s people with unbelievers.

Upon hearing that this had become a problem, he tore his clothes, plucked the hair out of his head and beard, and sat down in bewilderment (Ezra 9:3).

But Jesus, seeing the profiteering of those who sold sacrificial animals in the temple courtyard, made a whip of small cords and drove the money-changers out of the temple, while overturning their tables (John 2:15).

Our reaction to sin may vary in different circumstances depending on a number of factors, but the fact that God hates sin should always be clear in our actions.

Nehemiah’s response was more like Jesus’ than David’s or Ezra’s.

He responded with righteous indignation.

Anger is wrong when it’s irrational or driven by hatred or revenge, but anger that shows a zeal for the law of God is good and holy.

Jesus demonstrated this when he drove out the money-changers.

Remember also how Phinehas, Aaron’s grandson, executed God’s wrath against the Moabite prostitutes and was consequently blessed with an everlasting priesthood, i.e., a priesthood that typified the priesthood of Christ (Num.

25:6–13)?

We find the same kind of holy anger in Nehemiah.

The fact that the richer Jews were taking advantage of the Lord’s harsh providence to increase their own wealth at the expense of their poorer brethren not only showed a lack of compassion, but was a severe injustice.

Sadly, the people who were the most guilty (the nobles and rulers) were the least compassionate of all.

Nehemiah could not allow this to go unchallenged.

So, after serious reflection (v.

7 literally says, “my heart advised me”), he rebuked the nobles and rulers.

The specific crime that he charged them with was usury.

Leviticus 25:37 says, /Thou shalt not give him [i.e., the poor] thy money upon usury, nor lend him thy victuals for increase/ (cf.

Exod.

22:25; Lev.

25:35–38 and Deut.

23:19–20).

Thus, the Jews were not allowed to charge interest to other Jews who had fallen upon hard times and were in need of ordinary necessities, nor were they permitted to charge a profit when selling them food.

In fact, the law went even further to protect the poor from such abuse.

It forbad a creditor, for example, from accepting a millstone as collateral on a loan (Deut.