Introduction
The Bible itself often identifies the spiritual significance of its major characters and it is also instructive who makes these identifications. Abraham is called “the father of all them that believe” by Paul, the great proponent of justification by faith alone (Rom. 4:11). David is spoken of as “the man after [God’s] own heart” by no less than Jehovah Himself, who moulded and knew David’s heart (I Sam. 13:14; Acts 13:22). John the Baptist is the one who would “make ready a people prepared for the Lord,” as stated by the angel Gabriel, who was preparing Zacharias and Elizabeth for the birth of their son (Luke 1:17
Nehemiah is a man who sought the welfare of Israel, the Old Testament church. This is what God’s enemies thought regarding him. This is a good testimony to have from the ungodly and their fears regarding Nehemiah were accurate! “When Sanballat the Horonite, and Tobiah the servant, the Ammonite, heard of it, it grieved them exceedingly that there was come a man to seek the welfare of the children of Israel” (Neh. 2:10).
Here are three well-known roles or works of Nehemiah. First, he was the cupbearer of Artaxerxes, the Medo-Persian Emperor. Second, he became the governor of Judah. Third, in this office, he was the moving force in the rebuilding of Jerusalem’s perimeter wall. In all these roles, whether as cupbearer, governor or wall builder, he was a man who sought the welfare of Israel. The church needs more men and women like him!
Two members of Nehemiah’s family are named. His father was called Hachaliah (1:1; 10:1) and he had a brother named Hanani (1:2; 7:2), as well as at least one other brother (1:2). If Nehemiah had sisters, they are not mentioned in this book.
Here are two good reasons to think that Hachaliah and his wife had a godly home. First, they had Nehemiah for a son. Second, they had Hanani for a son, whom faithful Nehemiah appointed one of the leaders in Jerusalem, the holy city (7:2).
Our covenant God especially uses homes like that of Mr. and Mrs. Hachaliah to produce men and women who seek the welfare of Israel, the elect, redeemed and gathered church of our Lord Jesus Christ. These are the sort of homes we need in our congregations!
Nehemiah’s Specific Enquiry
What does Nehemiah ask at the very start of his book? He makes a double-barrelled enquiry about the people back in Judah and its capital city, Jerusalem (1:2).
The people about whom Nehemiah asks are those who had returned to Judah out of the Babylonian captivity in two main groups. First, there was the group under Zerubbabel the governor. They numbered about 50,000, including Jeshua the high priest, and they rebuilt the temple (Ezra 1-6). These people arrived in Judah over 80 years before the events of Nehemiah 1. Second, there was a smaller group under Ezra the scribe. Ezra 7-10 deals with the arrival of this great priest and focuses on his leadership in promoting spiritual edification (rather than physical construction). Ezra and his group arrived just 13 years before Nehemiah 1.
How are these two groups doing? Are they amalgamating and uniting in the Lord’s service? Why did Nehemiah enquire about them? Because he cared about their welfare!
Why did he ask about the place, Jerusalem? Because he knew that there was rebuilding work that needed to be done. He hoped to hear that the city wall was progressing. After all, Ezra’s party was there to inject new energy into the people of God in Judah.
To whom did Nehemiah make these enquiries? Nehemiah asked Hanani because his godly brother knew the issues and understood the importance of the people’s spiritual morale. Nehemiah asked the “men of Judah” who were with Hanani because they had recently been there and so they had first-hand knowledge.
Do you see the significance of this? In general, you need to ask the right people to get accurate and helpful answers. This is perhaps especially true as regards the church. Ask people at the heart of the church, spiritually attuned people.
When did Nehemiah ask Hanani and these men of Judah these questions? When, after journeying from Jerusalem, they had arrived in Shushan the palace, also known as Susa the citadel, one of the places where the Medo-Persian emperor resided and where Nehemiah worked. In other words, these people had up-to-date information on the situation on the ground or, at least, information as current as possible in those days.
Let us follow the text in Nehemiah 1:1-2, which summarises our exposition so far. “The words of Nehemiah the son of Hachaliah” (v. 1)—here is the book’s heading. Next, the scene is set: “And it came to pass in the month Chisleu, in the twentieth year, as I was in Shushan the palace” (v. 1). Then comes the arrival of the party from the west: “Hanani, one of my brethren, came, he and certain men of Judah” (v. 2), followed by Nehemiah’s enquiry about the people and the place, “I asked them [1] concerning the Jews that had escaped, which were left of the captivity, and [2] concerning Jerusalem” (v. 2).
What was their reply? “And they said unto me, [1] The remnant that are left of the captivity there in the province are in great affliction and reproach: [2] the wall of Jerusalem also is broken down, and the gates thereof are burned with fire” (v. 3).
Nehemiah’s Deep Mourning
How did Nehemiah respond? Not merely with pleasantries: “And how was the weather during your long journey?” Was he a little bit saddened or fairly upset? No! He was deeply troubled and you know why, reader! Because Nehemiah was a man who loved God’s church, her distress was his distress. Doubtless Nehemiah had sung Psalm 137 in the captivity many times and he had meant it! “If I forget thee, O Jerusalem, let my right hand forget her cunning. If I do not remember thee, let my tongue cleave to the roof of my mouth; if I prefer not Jerusalem above my chief joy” (vv. 5-6)!
Though deeply troubled, Nehemiah did not keel over, as some do when they hear terrible tidings. He did not need anyone to put a chair behind him lest he collapse but that godly man did realise that he needed to sit, so at once he lowered himself to the ground or into a chair, for he was heartbroken: “it came to pass, when I heard these words, that I sat down and wept” (Neh. 1:4).
Nehemiah’s reaction is all the more remarkable given that he was a grown man, not a child. He was not an emotional wreck or a fifth-century BC snowflake, in modern language. Nehemiah was a responsible person, even the emperor’s cupbearer.
Even though he was personally affluent and working in Shushan the palace (the citadel of Susa) some 1,000 miles from Jerusalem, her distress was his distress. Nehemiah’s tears were genuine, for God had put into his heart a love for the church and so he suffered with Israel’s suffering.
Nehemiah was not only deeply grieved immediately after hearing the sad report concerning Jerusalem. Afterwards, he continued to do three things: he “mourned … and fasted, and prayed before the God of heaven” (v. 4). You could say that he prayed with lamentations and fasting.
For how long? Scripture says on “certain days” (v. 4). During how long a period? For the four months from Chisleu (v. 1), the ninth month of the year, to Nisan (2:1), the first month of the year. At what times? Nehemiah tells us: “day and night” (1:6).
Nehemiah has been seeking the Lord for the welfare of His church deliberately, and with resolution and perseverance, for about 120 days. These are the actions of a man who sought the welfare of Israel for a long time even before he exhorted the Jews to rebuild Jerusalem’s defensive walls (2:17) or oversaw this massive construction project. The genuine and deep distress that he manifests for the people of God over 2,400 years ago puts us to shame and stirs us up to pray for the body of Christ in our day!
Nehemiah’s Covenant Prayer
Nehemiah 1:5-11 contains a summary of his covenantal praying for four months in Mesopotamia. It begins with the covenant address: “I beseech thee, O LORD God of heaven, the great and terrible God, that keepeth covenant and mercy for them that love him and observe his commandments” (v. 5). Here, as elsewhere, the Lord’s “covenant and mercy” refer not to two separate things but to His one covenant mercy in Christ.
If we approach Jehovah as the God of the covenant in the Lord Jesus, we have access to Him and confidence that He will answer our prayers for His people: “Let thine ear now be attentive, and thine eyes open, that thou mayest hear the prayer of thy servant, which I pray before thee now, day and night, for the children of Israel thy servants” (v. 6).
Next Nehemiah laments Israel’s covenant breaking. I “confess the sins of the children of Israel, which we have sinned against thee: both I and my father’s house have sinned. We have dealt very corruptly against thee, and have not kept the commandments, nor the statutes, nor the judgments, which thou commandedst thy servant Moses” (vv. 6-7). Notice that Nehemiah includes in this confession of sin both himself and his family and that he makes no excuses: “We have dealt very corruptly against thee” (7). This is the way that we too must confess our sins to God: with shame and without cover up.
Nehemiah acknowledges God’s covenant judgment upon Israel’s covenant breaking. This is the explanation for the Jews’ fall to, and exile by, the Babylonians, as God had warned repeatedly in the Pentateuch (e.g., Lev. 26:33; Deut. 4:27): “the word that thou commandedst thy servant Moses, saying, If ye transgress, I will scatter you abroad among the nations” (Neh. 1:8).
Then Nehemiah recalls God’s covenant promises (e.g., Lev. 26:40-45; Deut. 4:29-31; 30:1-5): “But if ye turn unto me, and keep my commandments, and do them; though there were of you cast out unto the uttermost part of the heaven, yet will I gather them from thence, and will bring them unto the place that I have chosen to set my name there [i.e., Jerusalem with its temple]” (Neh. 1:9).
Nehemiah reminds Jehovah of Israel’s identity and His deliverance of her from Egypt: “Now these are thy servants and thy people, whom thou hast redeemed by thy great power, and by thy strong hand” (v. 10). Specifically, Nehemiah requests the answer to the prayers of two parties, not only himself but all of God’s covenant people: “O LORD, I beseech thee, let now thine ear be attentive to the prayer of thy servant, and to the prayer of thy servants, who desire to fear thy name” (v. 11). Even more particularly, he asks, “prosper, I pray thee, thy servant this day, and grant him mercy in the sight of this man [i.e., Artaxerxes, the Medo-Persian Emperor]” (v. 11).
Beloved, we live some 2 ½ millennia after this profound prayer in Nehemiah 1. Our hope is in our Lord Jesus Christ, whom Nehemiah’s contemporary, Malachi, called “the messenger of the covenant” (3:1). He bore our covenant judgment on the cross of Calvary because of our covenant breaking of the law of God. In Him, we have all the covenant promises: the forgiveness of sins and the righteousness of God, a new heart and a new life, and the new heavens and the new earth! Let us seek the welfare of Christ’s church—often troubled by false doctrine, worldly members, divisions and persecution—by seeking God’s face in covenant prayer for her!
Written By: Rev. Angus Stewart
Salt Shakers 