Building While The Nations Rage

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Introduction

Describing the cast of characters of The Chronicles of Narnia, C. S. Lewis writes of Reepicheep,

Reepicheep is the Chief Mouse. He is the self-appointed humble servant to Prince Caspian, and perhaps the most valiant knight in all of Narnia. His chivalry is unsurpassed, as also are his courage and skill with the sword.

Reepicheep is chivalrous and courageous because more than anything—more even than his own life—he loves Aslan and Aslan’s prince. Valiantly fighting in Prince Caspian, Reepicheep is almost killed, and would have died were it not for Lucy’s ability to heal with the drops from her diamond bottle. Practically raised from the dead, Reepicheep leaps to his feet and bows before the lion, Aslan, only to realize that he has lost his tail in battle. Reepicheep pleads with Aslan to restore his tail, and as Aslan discusses with Reepicheep whether he thinks too highly of his own honor, represented by his tail, Aslan sees what Reepicheep’s fellow mice have done and asks:

“Why have your followers all drawn their swords, may I ask?” said Aslan.

“May it please your High Majesty,” said the second Mouse, whose name was Peepiceek, “we are all waiting to cut off our own tails if our Chief must go without his. We will not bear 112the shame of wearing an honor which is denied to the High Mouse.”

“Ah!” roared Aslan. “You have conquered me. You have great hearts. Not for the sake of your dignity, Reepicheep, but for the love that is between you and your people ... you shall have your tail again.” (Lewis, Prince Caspian, 220-24)

Reepicheep’s comrades love him because the mouse was more valiant than most men. His great aim in life was to serve the high cause of the lion, Narnia, and the rightful king. Reepicheep was ready to protect those he loved, ready to stand for truth, goodness, and beauty, and ready to love his friends by laying down his life for them.

Need

If we are going to live for something more than our trivial agendas to make our own names great, we must be convinced of the truth, goodness, and beauty of God on display in the gospel of Jesus Christ and advanced in the work of the church. If we are going to sacrifice personal luxuries and advantages in order to live for the gospel and advance it in the church, we must not only see but experience the truth, goodness, and beauty of God on display in the gospel and advanced in the work of the church. If we lay down our lives for the gospel and the church, it will be because we have seen, experienced, and lived for the truth, goodness, and beauty of God on display in the gospel and advanced in the church.

Context

In Nehemiah 1-2 we saw that Nehemiah, at the height of power and influence in Persia, was a student of Scripture who interpreted life in light of the Bible, prayed for God to accomplish the purposes He laid out in the Bible, and took action to do what he could to be used of the Lord in answer to his own prayers. The good hand of God was on Nehemiah, and Nehemiah traveled back to Jerusalem and called the Jews to rise up and rebuild the gates and walls of the city.

In Nehemiah, we see a model of valor, and this valor exemplified by Nehemiah is a forward-looking Christlikeness. Nehemiah was a student of the Scriptures, a prayer warrior, one who loved God and His people, who sought the good of God’s people at great risk to himself, who showed great courage and boldness protecting God’s people and 113trusting God, and who lived for the high cause of God’s kingdom. To all Christians I say, let us follow in Nehemiah’s footsteps on the valiant path of Christlikeness: study the Bible, pray, and lay your life down to protect others.

Builders Of Gates And Wall

Nehemiah 3:1-32

Nehemiah 3 shows the people’s response to Nehemiah’s call to action in 2:17-18. The chapter seems to be organized around the rebuilding of the gates, and the references to those who worked next to those rebuilding gates perhaps account for the people who rebuilt the walls between the gates.

Think of what this construction project entailed: wood, tools, labor—and we read of bolts and bars and beams in verse 3.

The gates named would encircle the city of Jerusalem, beginning north of the temple and moving counter-clockwise around the city, as can be seen from the map entitled “Nehemiah’s Jerusalem” on page 781 in the HCSB Study Bible. This geographical layout seems to provide the organizing principle for Nehemiah 3:

• 3:1-2—Sheep Gate
• 3:3-5—Fish Gate
• 3:6-12—Old Gate
• 3:13—Valley Gate to Dung Gate
• 3:14—Dung Gate
• 3:15-27—Fountain Gate
• 3:28-32—Horse Gate to Inspection Gate to Sheep Gate

The Nations Rage

Nehemiah 4:1-4

Just as Nehemiah 3 showed the people’s response to Nehemiah’s call to action in 2:17-18, Nehemiah 4 exposits the mocking of Sanballat, Tobiah, and Geshem stated in 2:19. In fact, the language of 2:19 is similar to that of Nehemiah 4:1:

114Sanballat and Tobiah were displeased that Nehemiah had come (2:10), and now they are angry that the wall is being rebuilt (4:1). Why would Nehemiah’s arrival and the rebuilding of the wall make them angry? If Nehemiah succeeds, their own agenda will be thwarted. Nehemiah has come “to seek the welfare of the sons of Israel” (Neh 2:10; my trans.). Rebuilding the walls will protect the people and create a safe place in which the law of Yahweh can be enforced, a place where justice and goodness can be upheld. This would thwart Sanballat and Tobiah because they are not interested in justice and goodness. Rather, they seek to exploit the weakness and vulnerability of the Israelites for their own profit. This is un-valiant behavior, which is to say it is un-Christlike.

These two agendas cannot be reconciled to each other. Nehemiah is seeking the good of others, and Sanballat and Tobiah are seeking their own advantage at the expense of others. Nehemiah is seeking to do unto others as he would want them to do unto him, while Sanballat and Tobiah are thinking only of themselves at the expense of others. So when Sanballat and Tobiah see goodness done for the returnees under the leadership of Nehemiah, they are angry and begin to mock.

Are you concerned about others, or are you only concerned about yourself? Do you rejoice in the exploitation of other people, finding a perverse pleasure in benefiting from the misuse and abuse of another person? Or are you someone who loves goodness? Are you someone who recognizes that taking from another person—whether by wresting a toy away from your brother or sister because you’re bigger and stronger than he or she, by benefiting financially from someone else’s ignorance or need, by stealing some sexual pleasure because of moral weakness, or by exalting yourself over others because they are disadvantaged—amounts to pilfering pleasures at the expense of someone else? Do you recognize that you would not want to be treated that way yourself? Do you recognize that while these stolen pleasures may seem sweet in your mouth, they will turn your stomach?

Not only do Sanballat and Tobiah seek their pleasure at the expense of the Jews, being angered by good done to Jews they would exploit, they seek to maintain their advantage over the Jews by bullying them. In verses 2-3 we read of their attempt to make the Jews afraid through verbal intimidation:

This scoffing requires no courage on the part of Sanballat and Tobiah. They have their henchmen around them, they insult the Jews as pathetic, they sarcastically call into question the possibility that the Jews will succeed, and they mock the efforts of the Jews. These guys are nothing but bullies. They are not valiant but childish, not Christlike but selfish, and certainly not to be imitated but learned from. Do not be a Sanballat or a Tobiah.

Sanballat is a Horonite, Tobiah an Ammonite, and this fellow Geshem the Arab has been mentioned (2:19). It is almost as though Nehemiah presents the nations gathered together against Yahweh and His people. Psalm 2:1 speaks of the nations raging, plotting a vain thing, and says that the One who sits enthroned in heaven laughs at them, holding them in derision. Psalm 2:4 uses the same Hebrew term to describe God’s response to His enemies as the one used to describe Sanballat and Tobiah’s jeering at God’s people in Nehemiah 4:1. It is as though Psalm 2:4 presents God responding in kind to His enemies. God’s enemies mock and jeer, and God turns their behavior back on them, mocking and jeering at their futility. The Bible does not back away from stating that God hates the wicked:

The Bible also shows the righteous taking God’s side. The righteous agree with God about the wicked:

Lord, don’t I hate those who hate You, and detest those who rebel against You? (Ps 139:21)

Nehemiah recognizes that there can be no reconciliation between Yahweh’s agenda and the agenda Sanballat and Tobiah pursue. Nehemiah recognizes that Sanballat and Tobiah have set themselves up as those who oppose Yahweh, and Nehemiah takes Yahweh’s side, saying in verses 4-5 (ESV),

Nehemiah is calling on God to conquer His enemies. He calls on God to do justice against their sin. God’s justice against them might lead to their repentance, but Nehemiah leaves that implicit and unstated. What he explicitly states is his desire for God to do justice against them. He wants God to triumph over them.

There is nothing wrong with praying for God to uphold justice against those who oppose His people. Nor is this in conflict with Jesus’ instruction, “Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you” (Matt 5:44). It is not loving to want someone to continue in their evil and avoid God’s justice. It is loving to desire that God would deliver someone from his or her evil by means of the revelation of His justice against them.

Nehemiah’s imprecatory prayer calls for God’s justice against Sanballat and Tobiah’s wicked opposition to the good purposes of God. God’s justice against them may result in their salvation, but if they continue in unrepentant sin, God’s justice will result in their damnation. Nehemiah prays that they would not continue unpunished in their unrepentant sin.

The Peoples Plot In Vain

Nehemiah 4:6-14

Nehemiah responded to the mockers in 2:20, but he does not respond to their mocking in 4:1-3. Rather than speak to them, he speaks to God in verses 4-5, and he continues the work in verse 6 (my trans.):

Rather than reply to Sanballat and Tobiah by speaking to them, Nehemiah speaks to God about them, and the people keep right on working. The ongoing work only makes the enemies angrier, as we see in verse 7:

They are so angry, in fact, that they are not going to sit idly by and allow goodness to proceed unchecked, as we see in verse 8:

Unfortunately, it is not uncommon for people to do physical violence against those who would protect the vulnerable. Nehemiah and the Jews are only seeking to build walls for their own protection. They seek to obey the true and living God of the universe, whose laws are just and fair, and for these acts of goodness the wicked would do violence against them.

Once again, rather than respond to the enemies, Nehemiah and the people of God pray and appoint guards. Look at verse 9:

I would imagine that they prayed along the lines of what we saw in verses 4-5, and that kind of prayer is very common in the Psalms. For example, we find in Psalm 5:10,

Then in Psalm 104:35,

These are not isolated examples of this kind of thing in the Psalms. If you are not submitted to God and Christ, if you are not trusting His goodness and faithfulness, and if you are not actively pursuing God’s kingdom but pursuing your own agenda, then you have set yourself up as God’s enemy. If you are God’s enemy, if you have made yourself your own God and try to rival Him as the Lord of the world, it is righteous for the people of God to pray for God to triumph over you.

I call you to repent of your opposition to God and His purposes. I call you to bend the knee to the King Messiah, Christ the Lord. And I 118call you to believe that what God has planned for you is better than what you could plan for yourself. Believe that what God has done for you in Jesus is better than what you could ever hope to accomplish for yourself. Jesus has paid the penalty for sin by His death and resurrection. Repent of your rebellion and cast yourself on His mercy.

The people of God, meanwhile, face challenges to their faith. There is faithless talk within (v. 10), enemy talk without (v. 11), and faithless talk from round about (v. 12). Nehemiah writes in verse 10,

The people seem too weak, the task seems too big, and the people recognize that they cannot do this by themselves. They are right, but what those who speak this way fail to remember is that they are not doing this by themselves. God has promised to enable the effort, and the good hand of God is upon Nehemiah.

The enemies show their arrogance and folly in verse 11:

These enemies are also making their calculations without factoring God into their equation, and we see this also from the Jews who live around Jerusalem in verse 12 (ESV):

These faithless Jews are trying to make those in Jerusalem rebuilding wall and gate flee the danger of the city.

Nehemiah’s response to this is in verses 13-14 (ESV):

They will not protect themselves by fleeing or fretting, and if they do not act, the plots of the enemies will come to fruition. Nehemiah neither frets nor flees but takes action. He identifies the most vulnerable 119locations in the work, and he strategically locates people near those, grouping defenders with those to whom they are emotionally connected. Not only are they next to those for whom they care deeply, for whom they will fight, but they are armed.

Are there things in your life that you fear? Take action! Are there doubts lurking in your mind about your ability to do what God has called you to do? Take your eyes off your inability and fix them on the One for whom nothing is impossible. As you contemplate the greatness of God, do the next thing. Look at the weak points and reinforce them, and when you reinforce them, do so with the recognition that you need armed defenders. Not only do you need to put weapons in the hands of those guarding the wall, you need to make sure that the ones wielding the weapons are ready to die fighting for this cause because they are standing next to those they love. Use your emotions. Use your brain. Trust God, and guard the wall.

Let me be specific: meditate on the way that God is more powerful than your sinful urges and more powerful than your wicked opponents. As you think on that, take action against the enemies of the gospel by calling on God to do justice against them. As you fill your mind with God’s greatness and fill your mouth with prayer, recognize how the sin that tempts you would crush those you love in its iron jaws, grinding them in its merciless evil. Flee temptation. Fight the good fight. Set your mind on Christ. Be valiant.

Spears And Shovels

Nehemiah 4:15-23

Look at how this works out for Nehemiah: the enemies of God’s people do not have God on their side; they do not have a cause worth more than their own lives, and so they are making calculated risks about what they can get away with. We who have God on our side not only have the support of the Almighty, we serve a cause worth more than our own lives, so we can lay our lives down ferociously standing for truth, celebrating beauty, and acting for goodness. This is what Nehemiah and the returnees are ready to do in verses 13-14, and look at how it plays out in verses 15-17:

God frustrated the plans of the enemies. He did so by allowing the secret conspiracy to be made known to the Jews. Note the divine sovereignty and human responsibility. God is at work for His people, and His people are doing what they can to advance His kingdom. Look, too, at how the people respond there in verse 15—they get right back to work! Not only do they keep working, verses 16-17 detail the way they kept their weapons close by.

Nehemiah is right in the middle of the fight, as we see in verses 18-20:

If there had been a crisis, the trumpet would have sounded, and the people were to rally to the trumpeter. The trumpeter was beside Nehemiah, which means Nehemiah planned to be on the scene of the crisis. He was not backing down. He was not hiding away. He was on the front line, right there on the wall, ready to seal his commitment with his own blood. Look at the sovereignty and responsibility again in verse 20—they were going to rally to fight, believing that God would fight for them.

What did they do next? Verses 21-23 say that they kept right on working:

You want a picture of leadership? You have it here in Nehemiah. Nehemiah is not using people to make his life more luxurious. He is laying his own life down for a cause that is bigger than his reputation. 121He is not motivating the people with the song of his own greatness; he is motivating the people with the greatness of God. He tells them in verse 14 to remember the Lord, who is great and awesome. He tells them that God is at work for them frustrating the plans of the enemy (v. 15), and he asserts in verse 20, “Our God will fight for us!”

In addition to pointing the people beyond himself to the Lord, Nehemiah is leading by example as he shows his own willingness to engage the fight—with the trumpeter next to him (v. 18). He is leading by example as he surveys the situation and makes provision for the people to be defended at weak points (v. 13), for the battle to be joined in case of crisis (v. 20), and for the city to be guarded at night (v. 22). The extremity of his readiness to sacrifice is then stated in verse 23 as he describes the vigilance and readiness that he modeled with his inner circle.

Conclusion

Do you live for a cause greater than yourself? Do you lay your life down for those you love? Do you fix your mind on Christ, the perfect man? Do you lead by example?

What enables people to do this, of course, is the experience of God’s truth, goodness, and beauty, supremely displayed in the gospel. If we know God as He is, we will be enraptured by Him and ready to do whatever He says. Not only that, we will do whatever we must to be in fellowship with God, to be in His presence, to see the Lord Christ face to face.

Reepicheep and Prince Caspian are together again in C. S. Lewis’s The Voyage of the Dawn Treader. They are traveling to the edge of the world, and at one point in the story it looks as though the crew might not be willing to go any further. The strongest desire in Reepicheep’s valiant mouse heart is to get to the end of the world that he might enter Aslan’s country. As the crew seems unwilling to go on, Lucy seeks help from Reepicheep:

“Aren’t you going to say anything, Reep?” whispered Lucy.

“No. Why should your Majesty expect it?” answered Reepicheep in a voice that most people heard. “My own plans are made. While I can, I sail east in the Dawn Treader. When she fails me, I paddle east in my coracle. When she sinks, I shall swim east with my four paws. And when I can swim no longer, if I have not reached Aslan’s country, or shot over the edge of the world in some vast cataract, I shall sink with 122my nose to the sunrise and Peepiceek will be the head of the talking mice in Narnia.” (Voyage, 230-31)

Reflect and Discuss

1. Why do you think Nehemiah answered the scoffers in 2:20 but did not respond to them in chapter 4?
2. In Nehemiah’s day, Sanballat and Tobiah were mocking those rebuilding the wall. Now God’s people are striving to advance His kingdom. What form does mocking from our enemies take today?
3. Nehemiah prayed that God would not allow unrepentant sin to go unpunished. Against whom and against what would we pray if we were to follow Nehemiah’s example today? How might grace come into play in these situations?
4. Nehemiah led the people to set a guard against the enemies day and night (4:9). What should God’s people be on guard against day and night today?
5. In 4:12 other Jews were discouraging those at work on the walls. How do Christians discourage other Christians today? Are there any ways that you yourself might discourage other Christians?
6. Why did Nehemiah redouble his defenses and rebuilding efforts in the face of discouragement (4:13)? What were his other options? Why was taking action his best option?
7. How might you direct the eyes of others to the great and awe-inspiring Lord, as Nehemiah did (4:14)?
8. In 4:16-17 the people work with a weapon in one hand and a tool in the other. If God’s people were to follow this example today, what would be analogous to the weapon, and what would be analogous to the tool?
9. In a military battle, sometimes leaders direct the action from the rear, and sometimes they place themselves at the point of crisis, as Nehemiah did (4:18-20). Which should a leader do in the kinds of spiritual battles a church faces?
10. What are ways that the leader of a church might model sacrificial devotion, as Nehemiah did in 4:20, 23?