Let us start building. (Neh 2:17-20)
17 Then I said to them, “You see the trouble we are in,
how Jerusalem lies in ruins with its gates burned. Come, let us rebuild the
wall of Jerusalem, so that we may no longer suffer disgrace.” 18 I
told them that the hand of my God had been gracious upon me, and also the words
that the king had spoken to me. Then they said, “Let us start building!” So
they committed themselves to the common good. 19 But when
Sanballat the Horonite and Tobiah the Ammonite official, and Geshem the Arab
heard of it, they mocked and ridiculed us, saying, “What is this that you are
doing? Are you rebelling against the king?” 20 Then I replied
to them, “The God of heaven is the one who will give us success, and we his servants
are going to start building; but you have no share or claim or historic right
in Jerusalem.” (NRSV)
When I knew that these verses
were given to me, it reminded me of our childhood when we used to sing a song
composed by my father basing on these verses, the song was like this, We need a
person in this Mizoram, who would be like Nehemiah, who was appointed by God to
rebuild the broken walls and gates of Jerusalem.
Yes, we need a
person like Nehemiah to rebuild thing or structure in our society, in our church,
even in our individual life. I am not going to do a deep study about the text.
The main concern of the sermon is about the contextual application. We can
connect with our theme New Heaven and New Earth. He had passion for rebuilding
Jerusalem. He prayed to God and his prayer was seconded with
his serious endeavours, he even look sad when he serve a cup to king
Artaxerxes. After asking permission from king Artaxerxes, he
went to Jerusalem with the letters of the king and some armies who accompanied
him. Within three days he had surveyed the wall of Jerusalem at nights. Then he
came to the people of Israel and encouraged them to company him in rebuilding
the gates and wall of Jerusalem. They committed themselves to on common hope and
good. Even though different objections they encountered, they could accomplish
what they want to do.
In
the success of rebuilding Jerusalem, Nehemiah’s great leadership contributed a
lot. Not only his leadership, his complete trust and his confidence in God were
great challenge for other people of Israel. That was why they could build
strong commitment towards their goal. Today, in our individual life, in our
church, in our society, in our Earth community, we are often challenged by
brokenness. Broken in what? It can be spiritual, it can be physical, it can be
between human relationships, it can be between human and other creations, it
can be between us and God. If not every day, at least one or more time, we all
face a challenge of brokenness that we need to rebuild. In order to come up
with rebuilding, we can learn some lesson from these verses.
1. Faith and confidence in God’s promise: If we look his true
faith, we can include him among the ‘champions of faith’ in the Bible. He had
faith to wait, faith to ask, and faith to challenge others. After knowing about
Jerusalem, he waited for four months to really go there to do the work under God’s
direction. We can be too rushing to solve our problem with our own strength.
But we need to wait for God’s providence and instructions with prayerful heart.
He prayed to God with confident that God’s promise to Moses could be fulfilled as
we see in chapter 1:9, “but if you return
to me and obey my commands, then even if your exiled people are at the farthest
horizon, I will gather them from there and bring them to the place I have
chosen as a dwelling for my Name.” He urged God with His promise,
and hope that will be revealed. When they faced problems from other people,
when they mocked and ridiculed them, he replied them
confidently, “the God of
heaven is the one who will give us success”. What a great confidence in
God! Yes, this is what we need in our struggle against difficulties. This
confidence in God is what we need in our rebuilding of the brokenness.
2. Good leadership: We can see how
great leader was Nehemiah. Firstly, he prayed to God, secondly, he followed
what he prayed by going to Jerusalem. Thirdly, he enquired about the walls of
Jerusalem and planned where and how they should do the work. Fourthly, he
encouraged his people to have common good. Fifthly, he stood firm in his
position in the midst of different circumstances. He planned everything wisely.
He even used the words ‘we’ or ‘us’ instead of ‘you’. That means from the
beginning he identified with the people. Can we really lead the people into a
common good if we always say “I and you”. We need to think this.
Being a
Christian leader, how many of us do not pray fervently before we fight a great
challenge? How many of us will stop pushing towards our goal if problems come?
In order to rebuild the brokenness, we need good leader, in Christian circle,
Christian leader. And we can also be good leaders who would do the same as
Nehemiah to heal and to rebuild what is necessary.
3. Committing together in the common good: Another important force
that led them successful in rebuilding Jerusalem was their commitment in a
common goal and good. Nehemiah could not do
the work by himself. He needed the people to work with him. His personal burden
for Jerusalem and his confidence in the Lord convinced the Jews that the time
to come together, and they could say, “Let us start building”. Leaders can't do
the job by themselves. and workers or followers can't accomplish much without
leadership. That is why committing together in the common good is important.
Unless we come together with common commitment and common good, we may have
less chances of success in our struggle against injustice, problem,
difficulties, hardship, and broken relationship.
Lastly, with these
three qualities Nehemiah and his people could complete rebuilding the walls and
gates of Jerusalem. Likewise, having these qualities, we can be successful in
our life in the midst of different circumstances that try to break us, ruin us,
burn us, to let us down to nothing. Let us start building… Amen.
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