Nehemiah 8
Amen. Please turn in your copy
of God’s word to Nehemiah. Chapter eight is our passage
for this evening. It has 18 verses. When we ended
last week with chapter seven, we really finished the first
half of the book, maybe not numerically, but at least thematically. The
wall was finished and there was a desire of the people of God
to repopulate the city, to get the city filled again with the
right people to do the right tasks so that the city of God
would be up and running again. We make a shift tonight in our
study of God’s word. We see Ezra come back into the
picture. We’ve not seen him really since
the book of Nehemiah. It’s been quite a bit, quite
a while, maybe 13 years. at least chronologically since
we’ve seen him, but he is back and he’s back to do his job of
ministering the word of God. So let’s give our attention to
Nehemiah chapter eight, verses one through 18. Hear God’s word
with me. And all the people gathered as
one man into the square before the water gate. And they told
Ezra the scribe to bring the book of the law of Moses that
the Lord had commanded Israel. So Ezra the priest brought the
law before the assembly, both men and women and all who could
understand what they had heard on the first day of the seventh
month. And he read from it facing the square before the water gate
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. And Ezra,
the scribe, stood on a wooden platform that they had made for
the purpose. And beside him stood Mattithiah,
Shema, Ananiah, Uriah, Hilkiah, and Masariah. And on his right
hand, and Paddaiah, Mishael, Malkijah, Hashem, Hashbadanah,
Zechariah, and Mesholam on his left hand. And Ezra opened the
book in the sight of all the people, for he was above the
people, and as he opened it, all the people stood. 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. Also, Jeshua,
Bani, Sherebiah, Jamin, Aqab, Shabbati, Hodiah, Messiah, Kelita,
Azariah, Jehozabad, Hanan, Peliah. The Levites helped the people
to understand the law while the people remained in their places.
They read from the book, from the law of God clearly and gave
the sense so that the people understood the reading. And Nehemiah,
who was the governor, And Ezra the priest and scribe and the
Levites who taught the people said to all the people, this
day is holy to the Lord your God. Do not mourn or weep. For all the people wept as they
heard the words of the law. Then he said to them, go your
way, eat the fat and drink sweet wine and send portions to anyone
who has nothing ready for this day is holy to our Lord. And
do not be grieved for the joy of the Lord is your strength.
So the Levites calmed all the people saying, be quiet for this
day is holy, do not be grieved. And the people went their way
to eat and drink and to send portions and to send portions
and make great rejoicing because they understood the words that
were declared to them. On the second day, the heads
of the father’s houses of all the people with the priest and
the Levites, they came together to Ezra the scribe in order to
study the words of the law. And 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, go out to the hills and bring branches
of olive, wild olive, myrtle, palm, and other leafy trees to
make booths. as it is written, so the people
went out and brought them and made booths for themselves, each
on his roof and in their courts, and in the courts of the house
of God, and in the square at the water gate, and in the square
at the gate of Ephraim. And all the assembly of those
who had returned from the captivity made booths and lived in the
booths. For from the days of Jeshua,
the son of Nun to that day, the people of Israel had not done
so. And there was great rejoicing, and day by day, from the first
day to the last day, he 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.” Amen, the word
of the living God for us. When you come to a story like
this in the Bible, it’s good to think of where it fits in
the book. For example, we just mentioned
a moment ago that Ezra chapter 8 is a new beginning in the life
of the returnees. Chapter 7 finished with the finished
wall, the completion of the wall and the repopulation of the city.
Now chapter 8 to the end of the book is going to show us what
living by the Word of God looks like. That’s, in a sense, the
immediate context of the book of Ezra and Nehemiah. But think
in the big picture, in the history of God’s people, what are some
of the things in Ezra chapter 8 that we sort of pick up in
our mind that go back to other places in the scripture. Well,
there’s a really important place. Those of you who come on Wednesday
nights know we’re studying the law of God and the book of Exodus. And so in chapter 20, we’re looking
at the 10 commandments, what it is, what is required and what
is forbidden, and then what special blessing or curse is attached
to the keeping or the failing to keep of the laws. Well, when
we got to our studies some weeks back, we spent a few moments
in chapter 19. And in chapter 19, just before
the law was given, we read that Israel had left Egypt and after
the third full moon, so a couple months in, they came to Sinai
and they camped at the foot of the mountain of Mount Sinai. It was the mountain of the Lord,
the mountain of Yahweh, and Moses went up on the mountain to meet
with God. God said to remind the Israelites of everything
that he had done for them. I rescued you from Egypt. You saw what I did to the Egyptians.
I bore you up on Eagle’s wings. I gave you bread from heaven. I gave you quail to eat. You
got water from the rock. The bitter water was made sweet. And so now tell the people of
Israel that they are to listen to my voice. And they are to
obey the words and keep covenant. And so God sets before Israel. He sets before Moses. He sets
before the elders of Israel, the law of God, the covenant
of God. And they say, we will do it. And God says, okay, get
the people ready to come to the mountain and hear the law, receive
the law. So he tells them the mountain
will be covered in thick smoke. There will be a thick cloud around
it. They will hear the sound of a trumpet. and they will believe
my word. They will, uh, receive my word,
but he says, consecrate them, tell them in three days time,
get, get ready, get a bath, consecrate yourself, set apart yourself,
uh, abstain from certain things. And, and Moses, you come up on
Mount Sinai, the people though, they’re to, to, to honor, honor
the boundaries, the limits. They’re not to come near the
mountain or touch the mountain. And if they do, they will die. Well,
when you hear the blast of the trumpet, be ready, God will speak.
Well, the blast of the trumpet came and the people in the camp
trembled. They trembled at the presence
of God Almighty. And when he gave them the word,
it says the mountain itself also trembled. And so there’s this
picture we get of God speaking to Israel in the thick cloud. There’s the thick cloud and the
smoke that hovered around the mountain. God spoke in thunder. The people shook, the mountain
shook. Moses went up, Aaron went up
and God gave the commandments. And then we come into verse one
of chapter 20. The Lord spoke these words to
Israel. I am the Lord, your God. And
then we get the 10 commandments. Well, all that history, to set
up the setting for chapter eight of the book of Nehemiah. It’s
the Feast of Trumpets. And they would think back, if
they knew their history, if they knew the stories that have been
told them from generation to generation, they would think
back that when the sound of a trumpet is heard, it is the voice of
God. It is the word of God coming to his people. And it’s not insignificant
that our passage begins by telling us it’s the first day of the
seventh month. It’s the time of the feast of
the trumpets. It’s the launch of the new year
and the people would live in booths. They would celebrate
the day of atonement, observe the day of atonement. All of
this harkens back to Mount Sinai. When the trumpet of God’s word
sounded and they received it, the voice of a trumpet, God’s
word is often counted as, came to the people and they heard
and received the word of the living God. And I want us to
think through what many would refer to as another Sinai in
the life of the people. This is another opportunity for
the people of God as they’re establishing themselves in the
promised land to receive and hear the word of God. I want
us to think about three things tonight. God’s word. Think about
word. Think about joy and think about
reform. Word, joy and reform. Let’s think about the word. We
talk from time to time about this idea of revival. Our nation’s
going to hell in a handbasket, we say. Our country’s going to
pot. Just look at the young people.
Look at the schools. Look at culture. Look at what’s
on the top 10 radio songs. Look at what’s on television.
Look at Well, Washington, look at the swamp, you know, all these
things. We need a revival. And we think of that word revival,
the prefix re- means again, the vive, vivification, life, give
life again. And we think through historically
how God has done that. He’s done it through the preaching
of his word. And so anytime we think through what does our nation
need? Well, it needs revival. How does
our nation get revival? Should we rally the youth? You know, should we maybe dumb
down church and get people in the door, that sort of thing?
No, we preach the word. That’s God’s means of grace,
isn’t it? To comfort and build up as saints,
but it’s also to convince and convert sinners. And so what
this world needs is what was needed at the time of the returnees
from exile. They needed an Ezra. Our world
needs Ezra’s, the prophet and the priest and the scribe. We
need preachers. We need preaching, but we also
need hearers who by God’s grace and by the power of the Holy
Spirit, respond to God’s word. We’ll see as we look at the word
here in a moment, we’ll see what happens when the word is read
and the people respond in God’s grace. And there’s a real sense
where throughout the history of God’s people, you see God’s
word come, you see people respond. and you see change made and in
a sense throughout history, we should just rinse and repeat,
rinse and repeat, rinse and repeat. Don’t invent anything new. Don’t
try gimmicks. Don’t try fads. Just keep preaching
the word and let the Holy Spirit do his work while people aren’t
coming to church. Well, perhaps we should go out
and evangelize. We should go out and do missions
work. We should go out. You know, America is not the
country it used to be where people went to church because it was
respectable. In a sense, a preacher had fish jumping in the boat.
He was shooting fish in a barrel, as it were, because people, for
the most part, because it was a respectable thing to do, went
to church. Now it’s out of fashion to go to church. And so we’re
gonna have to go out and about to the highways and the byways
preaching the word of God. But God gave to the people of
the returned exiles day, the gift of Ezra. Remember way back
in Nehemiah, this would have been back in the winter, back
in March, back when it was cold again. He gave them Ezra. He gave them the gift of a prophet,
a scribe, a priest. to give him the gift of the law.
And the law or the Pentateuch, the five books of Moses, we suspect
this means, was preserved through the destruction by Babylon of
Jerusalem. God’s word was preserved through
exile and it was brought back into Jerusalem and Judea and
into the city of God and into the rebuilt temple. You know,
when we read our Westminster Confession of Faith, chapter
one on the Holy Scriptures, It talks about how God preserves
his word over time and makes it available to his people. You
know, they had these scrolls, these books of the law, and only
certain people, usually the priest and the scribes, the Levites
or so had copies of them. Now we’re, you know, we all come
with them on our Bibles, on our phones. We got stacks of them
in the house, one for a baptism, one for a membership, one for
a retirement, one for school graduation. We have God’s word
in plenty. yet they had to come and hear
it read. Well, it’s New Year’s Day in
the life of the people. It’s time to begin a new start. It’s time to turn over a new
leaf. And their apparent New Year’s goal that year was
not to go to Sears and buy an exercise bike. It wasn’t to go
to Academy and get a treadmill. It wasn’t to join Weight Watchers
and it wasn’t to you know, get a, get a tablet and better organize
the life. It was to build a platform. And
it was to have Ezra the scribe read and explain the law of God. They had not heard it in some
time. And so the elders gathered, the people gathered, it was of
their own initiative. Ezra did not call this assembly.
Ezra was just asked to do it. And he said, okay, I’m, I’m,
I’m there. You know, you never ask a preacher
to preach and think he won’t. Right? You ask a preacher to
say the blessing, he’s going to preach. You ask a preacher,
you know, to say a few words, he’s going to say more than a
few words. Well, this was the initiative
of the people. And you contrast this with just a couple of years
ago, churches were so quick to close with COVID and some stayed
closed for two years. And where were the people to
say to their leaders, how dare you cut us off? from the reading
and preaching of the word. How dare you cut us off from
the sacraments? How dare you cut us off from
the life giving blessings of the church of Jesus Christ? Well, this was a solemn assembly
of God’s covenant community. It says young and old and in
between were there and they gathered and they were attentive. I want
to read through these verses and I want you to listen. to
the initiative of the people, the posture of the people, and
the response of the people. Picking up at verse three, it
says, of Ezra, he read from the book of the law, facing the square
before the water gate, from early morning until midday, that’s
about five hours. And he read it in the presence
of men and the women and those who could understand, and the
ears of all the people were attentive to the book of the law. I know
how y’all can be, I can be, We get New Year’s Bible reading
plan. We’ll read through the Bible and we get hung up in Leviticus,
but that’s what they were reading. We get hung up in the tedium
and boy, they stood there and listened. Well, Ezra the scribe,
verse four says, stood on a wooden platform that they had made for
the purpose, and beside him stood, and it has that list of those
six or seven, and then he’s got some on his right hand. It says
in verse five, Ezra opened the book in the sight of all the
people, for he was above all the people as he opened it. The
people stood, no seats, no pews. 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. And then you pick up verse eight.
They read from the book of the law clearly, gave the sense so
the people could understand the reading. Isn’t it interesting
to note the people took initiative to call this assembly. They made
provisions for Ezra the priest, Ezra the scribe to read the book
of the law. They were attentive with their ears we’re going to
see they were attentive also with their hearts, but their
posture, their body language in this solemn assembly is significant. And then they responded to the
word of God. They didn’t just walk away and
say, well, the preacher was over today. I guess we’re going to
be late to, um, Quincy’s or wherever it was. They went over there.
Um, no, they, They sat through or stood through the reading
of the word, the preaching of the word, the explanation of
the word. Now notice on the other side, Ezra’s actions. He read the word. But before
he read the word, he prayed for the word. It says, Ezra blessed
the Lord, the great God, and all the people answered, amen,
amen. Maybe something akin to what
we do before we read the word. We pray that God would help and
bless us as we hear the word read and the word preached. They,
Ezra and the others helped the people understand. They read
the word clearly. They gave a sense of the word
of the living God. Now think through what we do
in church. I think it was on Wednesday night
when we were thinking through the second commandment that we’re
to worship God in the way he prescribes in his word. And so
we were talking about elements of worship and circumstances
of worship. The elements of worship would
be the things the Bible says we must do. Read the word, sing
the word, pray the word, preach the word. We see the word in
the baptism. We taste the word in the Lord’s
supper, but word and sacrament. is what’s important in the life
of the church. Now we’ve got so many add-ons
and extras that the word of God has become eclipsed in the church
in our day. And so there’s a famine of the
hearing of God’s word and it’s no wonder culture is the way
it is and it’s no wonder there’s no revival. But to be positive
and to be a little more happy and upbeat, we think through
why we do what we do in church. Well, Nehemiah chapter eight
gives us. some thought to why we read the
word publicly, why we explain the word, why we preach the word,
why there’s a platform, why there’s a place for people to, well,
y’all get to sit, but there’s a place for the hearers and there’s
a place for the ministers of the word. I think of my task
as a minister. I’m a minister of word and sacrament.
I’m not a CEO. I’m not a CFO. I’m not a business
manager, though there is a business side of the church and we’ve
got to do a few things, but my job is to minister the word,
to minister the sacraments. And if I busy myself doing other
things, I don’t do word and sacrament, or I do them very poorly. And
we wonder why the American church is suffering so much as expected
of pastors these days, except being ministers of word and sacrament. And so I think we see when we
look at law and we look at the first eight or so verses, we
see why it’s important for us to have solemn assemblies with
the word read, preached, explained, and understood. But we thought
about what Ezra did. We thought about what the people
did under the reading of the law, the reading of the word,
but we never got to the response. And the response is the next
word we wanna think of, it’s joy. Now you’re probably a little
confused here because when the word was read and when it was
explained and the Holy Spirit seemed to be convicting these
people, they wept. So why bring up the word joy? Well, remember the word of God
does not return void. It does accomplish the errand
on which God sends it. It comforts and builds up saints. in their most holy faith, but
sometimes it judges us and that judgment leads to godly sorrow. Now, sometimes when the word
judges, it leads to anger. I’ve been preaching before and
seen people get hotter and hotter and hotter and hotter and more
mad and more angry that they storm out of the sanctuary. at
the end of the service. They won’t look at you, they
won’t speak to you, and they let you know of their anger.
A good friend of mine reminded me that anger is not at you,
it’s at the Lord. But when God’s word judges us,
and Hebrews 4.12 says this, God’s word is living and active, it’s
sharper than a two-edged sword, it cuts to the joints and the
marrows, it shines down in us, it shows us who we are, what
we are. You know, we go to the doctor and we get one of those
scopes, They go up, they go down, they see through. The doctor
either likes what he sees or doesn’t like what he sees, but
it can see all our dirty laundry. Well, it can’t see our sins,
but the x-ray of God, the x-ray of the word, the PET scan of
God’s holy law, it does show these things and it leads us
to sorrow. Now, why were these people sorrowful? Well, they
were probably sorrowful because they realized for generations,
they had failed to listen to the word. heed the word and do
the word. It’s after all, while they were
in exile, it’s after all, while they had to come back with hammers
and nails and screwdrivers and drills and putty and all the
rest and fix up the city because Babylon at the command of God
had torn the place down and laid it bare. And it was such a reproach. It needed to be rebuilt by God’s
people. And so as the word of God was read, they began to realize
the culmination of our lives has been sin. which led them
to sorrow, which led them to tears. But they also, and this
is why we should really use the word joy here and not sorrow,
tears are but for a moment, because God lifts up our heads. And he
brings Israel back after 70 years of Sabbaths. Jeremiah 29 verses
10 through 14, I think, speaks. of God saying, I know the plans
I have for you declares the Lord, plans to prosper you, not to
harm you. He says, I’m going to bring you back. You’re going
to be there. I don’t know how many of you
caught it this morning, but you get extra points if you did.
When we were reading Jeremiah 31, I think it was in the new
covenant. It mentioned this. You’re going
to go back. You’re going to rebuild the city.
And it talked about the gates and the walls and certain names
that we’ve read in this passage. That’s why we want to speak here
of joy, not sorrow. Yes, there’s tears, but God lifts
up our heads. And so it’s a holy day. It’s
a feast day. In verses 10 through 12, tell
us what the leaders are thinking. Go your way, eat the fat. Drink the sweet wine, send portions
to anyone who has nothing ready for this day is holy to the Lord.
Do not be grieved for the joy of the Lord is your strength.
Yes, the word of God should cut you up. Yes, the word of God
should judge you. Yes, the spirit of God should
do surgery on you, but then our heads should be lifted up. We
should say, I’m going to recover. This is not a mortal wound. This
is God chastening me and disciplining me, but lifting up my head This
is a feast. I can’t help here, but think
when it says the joy of the Lord is your strength, it literally
means he’s your strong fortress. They’ve just finished the wall.
They’ve just placed the doors and the gates. And I don’t know
if Psalm 46 has been written yet. I know Martin Luther’s a
mighty fortress has not yet been written. That would be a thousand
years later. But don’t you think they understand
as they’re in the city, hearing the word, reading the word, the
gates are up, the city is full and up and running again. And they think God is our help.
He is our refuge, our strength. He is our ever present help in
time of trouble that helps us lift up our weary hands and strengthen
our weak knees and no longer mourn, but have great joy. Yes,
there’s revival here. There’s life again. There’s renewal. There’s hope. But first there had been the
word with godly grief and sorrow and repentance, but he says,
have joy. And he goes on to say at the
end of 11, be still or be quiet for this day is holy. Do not
be grieved. The people went their way to
eat and drink. You know, the word needs to do
its hard work, but we need to leave with benediction. The word
needs to do its hard work, but we need assurance of pardon. The word needs to do its hard
work, but we need bread and cup because God needs to assure us
that, yes, there’s sorrow, but there’s also joy. Well, the last
word we want to think of, and it’s a brief one, is the word
reform. You notice in verse 13 on the second day, they had all
gone back and eaten the fat or the choice of the land. They
had to drink the sweet wine. But the men, the leaders, they
come back the next day to meet with Ezra for a little Bible
study. And as they’re reading the law
of God during this feast, as they’re reading the law of God
on the second day. They’re not glued to the NFL
men. They’re not glued to fantasy
football. They take initiative. They come to the preacher. They
come and take initiative and they read the law and realize
we’ve not kept the feast of booths. We’ve not made and dwelled in
tabernacles these seven days. These tabernacles reminded them
of their exodus from Egypt when they lived in tents. when God
fed them bread from heaven, when God gave them quail to eat and
water from the rock and their sandals did not wear out and
moths did not eat their clothing. And they realized our people
have failed to keep this feast. They’ve failed to observe God’s
goodness and kindness. And so there was reform. And
it’s a good reminder for us. We speak of the word of God and
it, It revives, but the word of God can also reform. Imagine
if we were reading our Bibles as a church and we realized we’ve
not served the Lord’s supper for 50 years. That would be rather
strange, wouldn’t it? But we’d come bumping along in
our reading the word to first Corinthians chapter 11, and we’d
come bumping along in our Bibles to the gospel account where Jesus
takes Passover and transforms it into the Lord’s supper. And
we’d say, what’s this? This sounds like it’s something we should
do. There’s reason Jesus gave it, so we should look at it.
That’s what this would be like. And I want to encourage you to
never lose your wonder at reading the Bible and seeing what you’ve
been missing. And the Bible can always fix
where we’ve fallen. It can always repair what we’ve
ruined. It can always rebuild what’s been broken. We think
of 2 Timothy 3, 16 and 17. All scripture is breathed out
by God and is useful for teaching and for rebuking and for correcting
and for training the man of God and righteousness. And it’s so
that we can be fully furnished to live a life that’s pleasing
to God. And we can’t have revival and reform unless we’re people
of the book, like Ezra, like this covenant community. and
like faithful people through the generations. And by God’s
grace, may it be so for each of us and our church. Pray with
me. Lord, we thank you for the opportunity
to be in your house with your people and to be under your word.
And we pray that what we’ve fought about Our attitude, our posture,
our attentiveness to the reading and the preaching of the word
would go with us. We pray that every time we gather with your
people, we’d be comforted and built up in our most holy faith.
We pray that sinners would be convinced and converted of their
need of Christ. And we pray that in the week
ahead, we would reach for our Bibles and perhaps not our phones
or the remote control. but we’d reach for the word which
is able to save us. Hear us and help us. We make
our prayer in Jesus name, amen.