Nehemiah – Chapter 13

So I confronted the officials and said, “Why is the house of God forsaken?” And I gathered them together and set them in their stations. Nehemiah 13:11 – While seeing this backtrack in faithfulness is hard for us to see, imagine the pain it caused Nehemiah. These last few chapters have been filled with Spirit led revival taking place among the people of Israel. New passion for the word of God was found, confession and repentance of sin took place, and true worship was made by all the people. We see in chapter ten the people making a covenant with the Lord to not neglect the house of the Lord anymore. Yet after a little more than ten years away, what does Nehemiah discover? The house of the Lord has been neglected. They returned to all the sinful things they said they wouldn’t do and even more wrongs were discovered than before. Here we see the true assessment of our repentance and revival…how long will it last? Let’s be blunt, words of repentance at the altar and shouts of praise of revival are wonderful, but if there is a return to sin immediately after, we didn’t offering anything pleasing to the Lord. What God is looking for is lasting change in our life. When it comes to lasting change with sin, know that only comes through a dependance on Jesus. When it comes to lasting change with revival, know that only comes through a dependence on the Spirit. Camp highs are great, mountaintop revivals are wonderful, broken hearts are the altar are precious, but what God is also seeking is a life that is faithful beyond the altars and mountaintops. That level of faithfulness comes from a choice to rely on the Lord fully for everything. Daily coming to Him, asking Him for help with your sin and reviving you spiritually. Such prayers are fully in line with His will, so we can have confidence those prayers will be answered. With everything Jesus did for us at the cross, let’s give our every day to faithfulness to Him. I love you, but Jesus loves you more – Mac – Daily DEVO 3410

Then the merchants and sellers of all kinds of wares lodged outside Jerusalem once or twice. But I warned them and said to them, “Why do you lodge outside the wall? If you do so again, I will lay hands on you.” From that time on they did not come on the Sabbath. Nehemiah 13:20-21 – In our chapter Nehemiah returns and sees many things happening that aren’t honoring to God that had started to take place while he was gone. One was trading and selling of goods on the Sabbath. Nehemiah kicked out the merchants and told them to not even camp outside the city wall during the Sabbath so as to not be a temptation to the people. We see here that temptations just don’t stop coming. What we can do is be active in each other’s life in trying to keep things away that would cause another brother or sister to stumble. That takes us learning about each other’s struggles and being willing to watch out for each other. Let’s not tackle our temptations on our own or let our brothers and sisters try to do the same either. I love you, but Jesus loves you more – Mac – Daily DEVO 1295

And I confronted them and cursed them and beat some of them and pulled out their hair. And I made them take an oath in the name of God, saying, “You shall not give your daughters to their sons, or take their daughters for your sons or for yourselves. Nehemiah 13:25 – I selected this verse out of the passage because it shocked me the most when I read it this morning, but throughout this whole chapter Nehemiah is seeing different sins and correcting them. Here he sees people marrying foreign women and having children with them, like God commanded not to do. He proceeds to curse, beat, and pull out their hair to help them see their wrong. Now my gut reaction to this is probably like yours, he went too far here. He didn’t need to take it to this extreme to confront their sinful actions, right? While we don’t get anywhere God blessing such actions, we also don’t see God condemning them either. What we do see in other scriptures is God displeased when His followers do the full opposite of Nehemiah and just let sin remain in their brother’s life without addressing it. Maybe we don’t need to be pulling out each other’s hair, but we also can’t just let a brother or sister in Christ continue walking in sin without at least saying something to them. What I know is God would rather us be bald because we’ve pulled each other’s hair out yet walking faithfully together after Him than having luscious locks yet silent about each other’s sin. My point is we ought to see the dangers of remaining silent when we see sin in a fellow follower’s life. Grace and truth must carry our conversation to our brother about his sin, but we must also be willing to first have a conversation with him about his sin. Silence over sin is more hurtful to your brother than confronting him about it. I love you, but Jesus loves you more – Mac – Daily DEVO 2516