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

I see a connection between what was going on with the attempts by outsiders to intimidate the Returned Exiles into giving up on rebuilding Jerusalem’s walls and the exploitation of the poorer Returned Exiles by those who were wealthier.  The outsiders were discouraging the work on the wall on purpose, but the wealthy Returned Exiles were doing so because they thought more about their self-interest than the interest of the people as a whole.  At least some of the wealthy had not realized the impact their actions were having on their countrymen.   Even Nehemiah had been doing so, but when he realized the effect his actions were having on those less fortunate than himself he acted to change things and to recompense those whom he had previously exploited.  The willingness of Nehemiah, and others like him, to expend their resources to make the project come to fruition gave heart to those who only had their physical efforts to contribute.

I hope those of you reading this can see the spiritual lesson which I got from this passage and tried to convey in the above words.

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