Third Sunday after Epiphany

Richard Davenport January 23, 2022 - 3rd Sunday after Epiphany Nehemiah 8:1-3, 5-6, 8-10 I've mentioned before that I didn't do so well when I first went off to college. When I found that higher level calculus and I weren't really on speaking terms I was pretty well doomed. After spending 2 years there without much to show for it, I came home. I didn't really have any sort of plan at this point. I didn't have a strong sense of what I wanted to do with myself when I went off to college to begin with, so that was all made worse when even that didn't pan out. There was an elder at my church that I got along with really well. He was a geeky sort of guy like I was and he owned his own little IT and computer programming company. He and his partner, along with 3-4 other guys all worked out of a small office working on contracts and such for various companies. The work they did would pull in quite a bit of money, but they were hampered because they had to manage some of the more mundane tasks around the office, keeping computers up to date and fixing problems there and so on. So the elder offered me a job managing the office so he could focus more of his attention on the stuff that earned money. He knew I was reasonably good with computers, since I would set up my own networks and build my own computers, so it looked like a pretty good fit. After some of the newness wore off, I slowly came to realize this wasn't a job for me. My tinkering with computers was definitely more of a hobby than a career. Computers that had problems weren't a puzzle to be solved. They were an irritation and an annoyance. There were some projects I didn't mind doing, but by and large I wasn't very motivated to do the job. I knew I wasn't motivated. I knew I wasn't really doing a good job at it. I felt bad that I wasn't working to the extent I should be, especially since he didn't have to hire me at all. But that didn't seem to be a big enough motivator to work harder. Eventually there was a downturn in the market and he had to lay me off. I didn't blame him. Some time later, after I had sorted myself out, I contacted him and apologized for being a bit of a slacker. He told me he knew I was kind of adrift and didn't know what to do with myself and that hiring me had been his way of helping me get back on track. That still took me a while, but looking back on my time there, I did learn something pretty important. An IT career just isn't really the place for me. I'm sure God's hand was there to guide me and I'm certainly glad he got me to where I needed to be, but still, it's a part of my life that I regret not living up to the responsibilities I had at the time and not be a good steward of what had been given to me. We all have regrets. We regret not pursuing our dreams. We regret letting life grind us down. We regret not taking opportunities that were presented to us. We find ourselves always looking back and wondering "What if?" But those regrets aren't quite the same thing because they don't mean we did anything wrong. They are those wishes and hopes that might never get fulfilled. They aren't a reflection on all of those times we failed to serve our neighbor. They don't recall all of the times we put ourselves first. They aren't all of the times we lied, we manipulated, we selfishly avoided our responsibilities, or where we callously sat back and watched someone get hurt when we could have helped. We think back to the hurt we caused, intentionally or not, and we have regrets. We could have done better. We should have done better. The Israelites in the days of Nehemiah are in a tough place. The exile has ended and King Cyrus has sent them back home to rebuild. They look at the ruins of their cities, and Jerusalem in particular, and they see again what they have lost. The city walls have been torn down. The temple is leveled. Everything that made this city great, whether you count by spiritual or worldly standards, has been lost. The people set about rebuilding, which doesn't go as smoothly as it probably should have. Nehemiah comes to town to prod people to overcome their apathy and get the job done. Some work still needs to be done, but at the moment Nehemiah teams up with Ezra the priest to do something very important. The laws of God had been long since forgotten. No one remembered what it meant to be God's people. This didn't happen during the exile, because they had forgotten long before God sent Babylon to carry them off. They needed to start over and hear the law and God's promises all over again. So Ezra the priest reads the book of the Law to the people. They hear everything God had said. They heard again what He did for them in the past and how they were to live as his people. They saw how far short they had fallen from living up to that law and they were devastated. They cried out as the realization hit them that they deserved everything God had inflicted on them and much, much more, and they regretted all of it. The crying and wailing is justified and understandable. Looking at what they had lost, it's hard not to see yourself doing the same. Their people were a shadow of what they once were. The independence they had under the first kings of Israel, the strength and prosperity they had then as well, all gone. Now they were a province of the Persian empire and subjects of King Cyrus. He helped them and looked favorably on them, but he was still a pagan, at least as far as we know. Technically that wasn't new to the Israelites, since most of the kings since Solomon were pagans of one form or another, but still, at least they were Israelites. That's why it becomes odd that Nehemiah would tell people to go home and not mourn. He tells them to go and celebrate. It all feels backward. Weren't they supposed to mourn their sins? Weren't they supposed to express their sorrow at what they had done? This doesn't fit at all. No it doesn't fit. Nehemiah doesn't say it does. When Ezra and Nehemiah are reading the book to the people and explaining it to them, they aren't reading to people whom God sent off into exile. They aren't reading to pagans who rejected God and sought their own way. They are reading to the people who have been blessed by God. They are reading to those who returned from exile and are once again living in the land he promised to give them. They are reading to people who have been restored and are once again in God's presence. In short, they are reading to people whose sins have been forgiven. Now, it's true they probably didn't realize the extent to which they had been rebelling against God. They didn't see all of the things they were supposed to do and weren't. They didn't know how far they had fallen from who and what they were supposed to be. But none of that matters now. Now they have a clean slate. Now they are starting over. These people were seeing God's grace at work. The prophecy God gave through Jeremiah, one that would be fulfilled by Christ and his church, was already coming to pass now, "Behold, the days are coming, declares the LORD, when I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel and the house of Judah, 32 not like the covenant that I made with their fathers on the day when I took them by the hand to bring them out of the land of Egypt, my covenant that they broke, though I was their husband, declares the LORD. 33 For this is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel after those days, declares the LORD: I will put my law within them, and I will write it on their hearts. And I will be their God, and they shall be my people. 34 And no longer shall each one teach his neighbor and each his brother, saying, 'Know the LORD,' for they shall all know me, from the least of them to the greatest, declares the LORD. For I will forgive their iniquity, and I will remember their sin no more." God had forgiven them for their past misdeeds and was willing to start over. To continue to cry over your sins then becomes a belief and a statement that you have not been forgiven, that maybe you've done things that can never be forgiven. But that wasn't the case, and still isn't the case in our day. God forgives the sins of all who come to him, no matter who they are, no matter what they've done. Jesus dies for the sins of the world, all of them, for all time. Nehemiah tells them to go home and celebrate because the people need to learn what it means to live this new life as the forgiven and redeemed people of God. "Don't keep wailing over sins God isn't counting against you! Go! Be thankful and celebrate the goodness of God!" The same is true for us. We remember all of those regrets and they plague us from time to time as we think about what rotten people we have been. But that is all in the past now and Christ has washed us clean and continues to do so. We have been baptized into Christ and have put on his righteousness, so all of those sinful stains are covered by his perfect life. God doesn't see them anymore, and neither should we. Instead we look forward, look ahead to what else God has in store for us and we continuously return to him to learn how to better live as his people. The early church talked about this as an essential part of repentance. When we are confront by the Law and see our sins, we ask for forgiveness and God gives it freely. But, the additional part is just as necessary. We look at what we have done and we resolve, with God's help and guidance, not to keep doing that sin. We desire to be better, to be the people he has called us to be. The Israelites have come back to the land. They have been forgiven. Now God gives them the Law again so they know what they have been called to be and can strive to meet those expectations. They will fail, repeatedly. But that forgiveness is always there for them and the desire to do better. That still holds true for us as we repent, we receive forgiveness, we look to our baptism and give thanks for what Christ has given us, and we ask for the strength and wisdom to stand firm under temptation and the assaults of the devil, so that we may avoid that sin in the future, and learn to live a little more like the people we were created to be.