I am using the daily Bible reading schedule from “The Bible.net” for my daily Bible reading.

Today, I am reading and commenting on Nehemiah 7-8.

    Once the wall around Jerusalem was complete Nehemiah called the people together to celebrate its completion and to rededicate themselves to God. I believe that, at least to some degree, this was modeled on the re-dedications under King Josiah and King Joash. As part of this process, Ezra the scribe (the one for whom the Book of Ezra was named) read the Book of the Law to the people. Nehemiah, Ezra, and the other leaders set things up so that everyone in the large crowd could hear and understand what was going on. There were multiple people spread out in front of the people reading the law and explaining its meaning to the people. The people reacted to the Law in much the same way that King Joash had done. They recognized how far they had fallen short of keeping God’s commands and wept in grief. Nehemiah, Ezra, and the others explaining the Law remonstrated with them to not mourn. This day was intended to be a day of celebrating the completion of the wall, of God restoring Jerusalem to His People. Further, the leaders exhorted the people to celebrate the fact that they had heard and understood God’s Law. The people followed their leaders’ advice.

    However, the people were not satisfied with hearing the Law and celebrating, then going back about their business. They selected leaders to meet with Ezra the scribe to determine how they could order their lives so as to live according to God’s Law. The following day, the selected leaders met with Ezra and began to study the Law in detail. They quickly discovered that the Festival of Shelters was due to be celebrated shortly. So they arranged for a proclamation to go out for the people to do so. The key here is that it was not Ezra, or one of the other long term students of the Law who made this discovery. It was made by those who had not previously studied the Law. We need to remember that it was those new to the study of God’s Law who made this discovery. We need to be receptive to the insights brought to the study of God’s Word by those new to it.

I am using the daily Bible reading schedule from “The Bible.net” for my daily Bible reading.

Today, I am reading and commenting on Nehemiah 4-6.

    When Nehemiah actually got the project started to rebuild the walls of Jerusalem, Sanballat and Tobiah began to actively campaign against him. Initially, they spread rumors that they were going to launch an attack against the Jews. It is not clear to me that they actually planned to attack the Jews, they may have merely hoped to frighten the Jews into stopping work. However, based on the way people have behaved throughout history, it is likely that if the Jews had ignored the threats and continued building they would have attacked. Nehemiah was bright enough to take precautions against attack. At the same time as these rumors about an attack were spreading some of those working began to complain that they needed additional help with the rebuilding. I suspect that the writer intends for us to conclude that these complaints were planted by agents of Sanballat and Tobiah.

    I was going to continue to write about how Sanballat, Tobiah, and Geshem sought to disrupt Nehemiah’s efforts, but I realized that the important part of this was the leadership which Nehemiah demonstrated. First, he worked alongside of those he was leading, expending his own resources in the effort. Those resources were not just his wealth and property, the way I read this Nehemiah actually went and labored beside those working on the wall. He kept his focus on the project and did not let himself get distracted playing politics. When those attempting to derail the project asked for a private meeting with him, Nehemiah rejected it in no uncertain terms. We do not know if the plan was to assassinate Nehemiah, as the passage suggests, or merely to use the meetings to compromise him. In either case, Nehemiah knew that nothing beneficial to his project could come from such a meeting. Then when they threatened to spread false rumors about him and even use them to cause a divide between Nehemiah and the King if Persia, he called their bluff. As far as good leadership goes, Nehemiah had covered this one by arranging in advance how long he would be in Jerusalem.
    Finally, we have Nehemiah’s leadership when the poor complained about the hardships they were suffering. Nehemiah did not just demand that others change their behavior. He recognized that his own behavior had contributed to the problem, that he had profited off of the suffering of others. In the past I had always read the place in this passage where Nehemiah recounts how he did not take advantage of many of the perks available to him as governor as being somewhat boastful. However, as I read it today I realized he was saying, “I worked really hard to avoid being corrupted by position of power and I still missed where I was abusing my power.” Nehemiah did not get defensive when the poor complained. Instead he looked at their complaint and changed his behavior.