Ten Minute Bible Talks Devotional Bible Study - Building an Eternal City | The Writings | Nehemiah 2:11-3:32

Episode Date: September 10, 2024

Are you living for God's kingdom or your own? Do you trust God in the face of opposition? Are you willing to serve? In today's episode, Tanya shares how Nehemiah 2:11-3:32 encourages us to take part in God's eternal kingdom by protecting, trusting, and serving. Read the Bible with us in 2024! This year, we’re tackling a group of Old Testament books traditionally known as “The Writings”— Psalms, Chronicles, Proverbs, Daniel, Ruth and more! Download your reading plan now. Your support makes TMBT possible. Ten Minute Bible Talks is a crowd-funded project. Join the TMBTeam to reach more people with the Bible. Give now. Like this content? Make sure to leave us a rating and share it so that others can find it, too. Use #asktmbt to connect with us, ask questions, and suggest topics. We'd love to hear from you! To learn more, visit our website and follow us on Instagram, Facebook, and Twitter @TenMinuteBibleTalks. Don't forget to subscribe to the TMBT Newsletter here. Passages: Nehemiah 2:11-3:32

Welcome to 10-minute Bible Talks, where we connect the Bible to your life in the time it takes to get to work. I'm Tanya Wilmeth. I wake up in the morning and check my image in the mirror. Check my status on social media. Check the balance in my bank account. Check the way my clothes fit on my body. Check my checklist for the day.

Check my house for things that need to be done. Check my mood for things that are worrying me. Check my running list of people who have wronged me. And I forget to check my heart for unforgiven sin. I forget to check my desires and reorder my first love. I forget to check my plans and place them in God's hands. I forget to check with God because I'm so busy checking in with myself. I can get so distracted with the low-hanging fruit of busyness

and building my own little kingdom that I forget to be part of God's. Whose kingdom are you building? Yesterday, Keith introduced us to Nehemiah. He was a Jew living far away from Jerusalem. His people had been living away from the city for several generations, but his heart was still geared toward home. While Nehemiah was working as a royal official for the King of Persia, he heard from his brother that the city of Jerusalem was still in ruins. The Jewish people had been allowed to return home for several years, but the city was still a shameful and troubled place. The walls were rubble, the gates destroyed by fire had not been rebuilt, and the people were not operating

and worshipping as a collective people of God. This broke Nehemiah's heart. The needle wasn't moving forward, as we might say today. Nehemiah was an important and probably busy man in the Persian empire, where his family had lived in exile for many years. He was the cut bear to the king, which made him a trusted advisor and confidant to perhaps the most influential person in the ancient world. But Nehemiah knew the city of Jerusalem was at the center of God's big story, his saving purposes for the world. So after three or four months of prayer and a bold request to the king, Nehemiah got permission to go to Jerusalem for 12 years as a governor to rebuild the city. On one hand, this was just what it appeared, a physical rebuilding of a city that was lying in

ruins. On another hand, Nehemiah's heart was drawn toward the people and their place in God's promise, and this was a spiritual rebuilding of God's people who had been living in exile and then trouble and shame for many years. The second and third chapters of Nehemiah chronicle the way Nehemiah assessed the damage and began the rebuilding process. For us, these scriptures also reveal what it looks like to be in the work of building up God's kingdom. Living for a kingdom, greater than your own, is marked by three things in these chapters. Number one, a fascinating combination of fierce confidence and utter humility. Number two, opposition.

And number three, willingness to serve. When I look at these three things, I understand the feeling of opposition. I relate to a desire to serve, though, I'm sometimes more willing than others. I understand confidence and humility to be opposite instead of working together. And rarely do I ever display all of these at one time. But Nehemiah's heart was drawn to love and value what God loves. The first chapter of this book showed and described his prayer life. I'm sure it must have been that dedicated prayer to be part of what God was doing

that prepared him to rebuild Jerusalem. First, let's look at Nehemiah's fierce confidence and utter humility. How do these qualities fit together in a godly person? When Nehemiah arrived in Jerusalem, he went out at night to inspect the city gates from the outside. Some commentaries think he was looking at the city from the vantage point Jerusalem's enemies would have seen. What needed to be shored up to keep the city and the people safe? Nehemiah describes his nighttime inspection. He says,

Then I arose in the night, I and a few men with me, and I told no one what my God had put into my heart to do for Jerusalem. I went out by night by the valley gate to the dragon spring and to the dung gate, and I inspected the walls of Jerusalem that were broken down, and its gates that had been destroyed by fire. Nehemiah had the confidence that came from a prayerful relationship with God and was affirmed by keen Ardxer's outward support to send and equip him for the task.

When we are in a vertical relationship with God, through prayer, reading our Bibles, being in worship and community with other believers, our hearts are drawn toward God in a way that we want the same things he wants. Rather than stating our plans and trying to sanctify or bless them with sayings like God told me or God showed me, we can have confidence that our relationship with him will draw our hearts to love what he loves and desire what he desires. Sometimes we receive outward confirmation, but we shouldn't try to sanctify things ourselves. We should walk forward confidently in our relationship and humbly in our humanity.

We are given the gift of knowing God and being in relationship with Him, but we must also remember that we are not God. Nehemiah keeps what God has given him to himself until he's able to scout out the physical evidence and give the people an accurate report to get them on board for the rebuilding process. After his nighttime inspection, he gathered the nobles and officials and workers and said, Come, let us build the wall of Jerusalem that we may no longer suffer derision, and then he told them about how the hand of his God had been on him for good,

and also about the words the king had spoken to him to bless him and send him to do the work. He had spirit-filled insight and practical earthly support to get the people motivated for the work ahead. But not surprisingly, opposition came quickly, and the naysayers tried to distract him from the work by making him afraid and by destroying his confidence. God's people always meet opposition from the world around. And Sanbalat, the governor of Samaria to the north, and Tobaya, an official from Ammon to the east, came and accused Nehemiah of building up a kingdom for himself, on the king's clock and the king's dime. These guys didn't like what Nehemiah was doing in Jerusalem, because it made them and their own territories feel insecure.

Sounds familiar, doesn't it? Nehemiah answered their jeers with, The God of heaven will make us prosper, and we his servants will arise and build, but you have no portion or right or claim in Jerusalem. Ouch, that sounds a bit harsh, doesn't it? But Nehemiah is trusting God to do what He has promised and be true to His Word. The opposition doesn't change God's promises. Finally, we see the officials and priests and workers come together for fierce service

to rebuild the city walls and repair the gates in Chapter 3. There are many people listed in chapter three that work together to rebuild the sheep gate, where the people are able to bring in their sacrifice, and the fish gate, where the fishermen can bring their catch and supply the people with food. The city walls are also being rebuilt, but what stands out in these descriptions is one verse that says, The Tekkaites repaired, but their nobles would not stoop to serve the Lord. Service often involves doing things we think we don't have time for, or things we think other people could do or should do.

This chapter in Nehemiah helps us see that a willingness to serve is evidence that God has included us in his plans to build up His kingdom and his people and make our hearts willing. Do you see evidence of that in your own life? As we watch the work for the city unfold, restoring the gates and rebuilding the walls over the next few chapters and the next few episodes, we can be thinking of God's promise for an eternal city

that all of God's people will call home. Revelation 21 describes this city. John writes, And I saw the holy city, a new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, prepared as a bride adorned for her husband, and I heard a loud voice from the throne saying, Behold, the dwelling place of God is with me.

He will dwell with man, and they will be his people, and God himself will be with them as their God. He will wipe away every day, every tear from their eyes and death shall be no more. Neither shall I be mourning nor crying nor pain anymore for the former things have passed away. We long for this city. When our kids and the kids and our communities are hurting and isolated, when our parents are slipping away physically and mentally, when our marriages are broken, when our friends are anxious and troubled, when our lives are riddled

with sin and discontent and worry we long for this eternal city. This city is also what Nehemiah longed for most, the eternal city where the sun will be no more because God's presence and his glory will give it light, and its lamp will be the Lamb, Jesus Christ. We can long for this city and leave it at that, or we can long for this city and pray like Nehemiah did and do something. what burdens for your community has God given you? What opportunities to serve in your church are on your mind, in your inbox? Will you face the opposition that wants to keep you too distracted and too busy and too prideful and too insecure and too aloof and ask God for confidence and humility to be part of His kingdom each day?