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As we stand, let’s pray:

Lord Jesus, we fall way short of what we’ve just sung – of worshipping you with every breath; and loving you consistently, but that’s what we want. And through your Word and your Spirit now, we pray you would strengthen that desire in us. In Jesus’ name, Amen

Please have a seat, and to kick off would you turn to the person next to you, or someone near you, and quickly answer this question to one another: What comes into your mind when you hear the word holy? What thoughts or pictures does the word holy conjure up? Over to you…

OK, let me call us back together. I wonder what you said? Maybe the word holy makes you think of the atmosphere in an old church building. Maybe it makes you think of the Holy Spirit. Maybe it makes you think of nuns or monks. Maybe it makes you think of God’s holiness. Well in the Bible, the word holy means ‘set apart from other people or things’. So when it says God is holy it means he’s set apart from us, different from us, in every way because he’s morally perfect and we’re not. And he’s the ruler of everything and we’re not, and so on. And then when it says that we (if we’re God’s people) are holy, it means we’re set apart from other people to live for God and so point those other people to him. And that vision of being God’s holy people is the note Nehemiah ends on, as we wrap up this series in his book. So, let me remind you of the story. It began with Nehemiah away from his Jewish homeland in Persia, and that’s because God had allowed his people to be invaded and exiled as a judgement on their failure to be holy. But, God never meant that to be end of story because his plan was that his people would return to their land, and rebuild their capital Jersusalem, with his temple at the centre. And Nehemiah was crucial to that plan because in God’s sovereignty, Nehemiah had become personal private secretary to the king of the Persian Empire, which now included his Jewish homeland. And the king gave Nehemiah permission to return home, lead the rebuilding. But as we’ve seen, God’s plan was not just the rebuilding, but the recommitment of his people. Which is what we saw last time, two weeks back. So would you open the Bibles to page 406, and we’ll remind ourselves where we got to. Page 406, and look at the top at Nehemiah 9.38:

Because of all this we make a firm covenant [in other words, commitment or re-commitment to God]

And skipping to Nehemiah 10.29, half way through the verse, that was a commitment:

…to walk in God's Law that was given by Moses the servant of God, and to observe and do all the commandments of the Lord our Lord and his rules and his statutes.

And they re-committed themselves in three areas where they’d especially failed. So look on to Nehemiah 10.30:

We will not give our daughters to the peoples of the land or take their daughters for our sons.

In other words, as we saw last week, we will only seek marriages that encourage us to put the Lord first. Then Nehemiah 10.31:

And if the peoples of the land bring in goods or any grain on the Sabbath day to sell, we will not buy from them…

In other words, as we saw last week, we will live one day in seven differently to show we belong to the Lord first. And skipping to chapter 10, and the very end of Nehemiah 10.38:

We will not neglect the house of our God.

In other words, as we saw last week, we will value the temple enough to put its support first, because in Old Testament time, the temple was the key to relating to God, and to neglect the temple was basically to neglect God. So Nehemiah 10 rasies your hopes for the future holiness of God’s people. And you see that in Nehemiah 11.1:

Now the leaders of the people lived in Jerusalem. And the rest of the people cast lots to bring one out of ten to live in Jerusalem the [what?... the] holy city [in other words a city full of holy people – that’s the vision]

So, I’ve got three lessons about holiness from the last three chapters of Nehemiah. And if you’re wondering why we’re doing three in one go, it’s because in the Old Testament, especially in Old Testament narrative, you often have to read a few chapters, rather than a few verses, to get the main point it’s making. So lesson 1:

1. Being holy flows from the joy of what God has done for us

Now just run your eyes from Nehemiah 11.1, over Nehemiah 11, into Nehemiah 12, and over the page all the way down to Nehemiah 12.26 and what you see there is the list of people who moved back into Jerusalem – who raise your hopes for the future holiness of God’s people. And we’re then shown that being holy flows from the joy of what God has done for us. Look down to Nehemiah 12.27 which was our first reading earler:

And at the dedication of the wall of Jerusalem they sought the Levites in all their places, to bring them to Jerusalem to celebrate the dedication with gladness, with thanksgivings and with singing, with cymbals, harps, and lyres.

I know someone called John, who’s not a Christian, who was invited with some others to a meal at the home of this couple Andrew and Sarah. And as they sat down to eat, wrongly assuming he was a Christian, they said ‘Would you like to give thanks for us?’ And John said he didn’t have a clue what they were on about; he knew Christians were weird, but not this weird. But he called people to order and said ‘Well, on behalf of us all, I’d like to thank Andrew and Sarah for inviting us and cooking this lovely meal, and I suggest we show our appreciation by tucking in.’ How was he to know they were asking him to thank God for the food, as opposed to the people involved? And the whole point of this section of Nehemiah is that the people involved didn’t pat themselves on the back for the rebuilding of the wall. They thanked God for the rebuilding of the wall because it had ultimately been his work from start to finish; from stirring up Nehemiah’s heart about it in the first place, to moving the king to give Nehemiah permission to return and rebuild, to creating the miraculous unity among the people to get the job done, to protecting them from the threats of Sanballat and Tobiah and all the other enemies you’re supposed to hiss and boo at whenever you meet them in this book. And being holy flows from that. Look on to Nehemiah 12.30:

And the priests and the Levites purified themselves, and they purified the people and the gates and the wall.

And that was a symbolic purifying, sprinkling water everywhere, but it symbolised their commitment to be holy. It said ‘We want this city to be clean from what displeases God and full of what pleases him.’ And after these thanksgiving choirs have circled the whole city and met at the temple, skip to Nehemiah 12.43 and you see the same thing:

And they offered great sacrifices that day and rejoiced, [so there’s the commitment again – offering sacrifices symbolising offering themselves to live for the Lord. And what does that flow from?] for God had made them rejoice with great joy; the women and children also rejoiced. And the joy of Jerusalem was heard far away.

Because being holy flows from the joy of what God has done for us. And since it’s Ashes time, England v Australia, C.T. Studd is the obvious example of that because C.T. or Charlie Studd went through Eton and Cambridge in the late 1800s, he became an England cricketer as an undergraduate, he played in the first ever Ashes test, and he was a rising star and household name, but then he shocked the country by turning his back on all that and going instead to be a missionary in China. Because, like God’s people in Nehemiah 12, he’d rediscovered the joy of what God had done for him. A few years earlier he’d been like God’s people in Nehemiah 1, and he wrote this about himself:

It was one long, unhappy, backsliding state. My religion was minimal and formal. Instead of telling others of Christ’s love, I was selfish and kept it to myself. And the result was that my love for Christ grew cold, and love for the world came in.

But then he wrote this, after he’d rediscovered the gospel:

I’d known about Jesus dying for me, but never really understood that if he died for me, then I didn’t belong to myself. Redemption means, ‘buying back’, so that if I belonged to him, either I had to be a thief and keep what wasn’t mine, or else I had to give over everything to God. And when I came to see that Jesus had died for me, it didn’t seem hard to give up all for him.[Quotations from A Cambridge Seven, John Pollock]

Joy in God, and the holiness it leads to, flows from discovering and rediscovering what God has done for us. In their case, in Nehemiah 12, it was the joy of their rescue from exile back into a fresh start with God. In our case, it’s the joy of rescue from judgement through the cross – and not just back into one fresh start with God, when we first trusted in Jesus, but into a lifelong fresh start where all our ongoing failure is covered by ongoing forgiveness. So maybe you’re just looking into all this, and right now living for God (holiness) looks pretty unattractive, and it will only become attractive as you see what C.T. Studd saw: that Jesus died for you, to see you forgiven. Or maybe you are a Christian but just weary of trying to be holy – even unconvinced about trying to be holy. In which case, when did you last spend some good time reflecting on the truth that Jesus died for you, to see you forgiven? And in which case, please keep meeting with God’s people like this, because as in Nehemiah 12, we all need to be lifted by corporately remembering and giving thanks for what God has done for us. And the times we least want to come to church are the times we most need to. So that’s lesson no.1: Being holy flows from the joy of what God has done for us. Here’s lesson no.2:

2. Being holy is compromised by our ongoing sinfulness

So you could say Nehemiah 12 is the climax of the book. In which case, Nehemiah 13 is the anti-climax where we move from high hopes for the holiness of God’s people to disappointed hopes. So just look down to Nehemiah 13.6-7:

While this was taking place [don’t worry for now what’ this’ is. While this was taking place…], I [this is Nehemiah speaking] was not in Jerusalem, for in the thirty-second year of Artaxerxes king of Babylon [ie, the Persian emperor] I went to the king [presumably because the king recalled him]. And [then] after some time [which may have been about 15 years] I asked leave of the king and came to Jerusalem.

So you get the picture; Nehemiah left Jerusalem for quite a long time, and then came back, and what he discovered was holiness compromised. In fact, Nehemiah discovered that in the three areas where they’d especially recommitted themselves: seeking godly marriages, keeping the Sabbath, and valuing the temple there was yet more failure. So, begin with their commitment to value the temple. Look down to Nehemiah 13.4-5:

Now before this, Eliashib the priest, who was appointed over the chambers of the house of our God [ie, the temple], and who was related to Tobiah [who you should be inwardly boo-ing and hissing at; so Eliashib has allowed his family to inter-marry with the enemy… and it goes on he…], prepared for Tobiah a large chamber where they had previously put the grain offering, the frankincense, the vessels, and the tithes of grain, wine, and oil, which were given by commandment to the Levites, singers, and gatekeepers, and the contributions for the priests.

So Eliashib has cleared out an important room right next to the temple for this enemy of the Jewish people to use as his office because he’s compromised by his family’s commitments. It’s like us giving the British Humanist Society Eslington House rent free and all bills paid. Read on, Nehemiah 13.6-11 again:

While this was taking place, I was not in Jerusalem, for in the thirty-second year of Artaxerxes king of Babylon I went to the king. And after some time I asked leave of the king and came to Jerusalem, and I then discovered the evil that Eliashib had done for Tobiah, preparing for him a chamber in the courts of the house of God. And I was very angry, and I threw all the household furniture of Tobiah out of the chamber. [Does that remind you of someone else cleansing the temple 400 years later?] Then I gave orders, and they cleansed the chambers, and I brought back there the vessels of the house of God, with the grain offering and the frankincense. I also found out that the portions of the Levites had not been given to them, so that the Levites and the singers, who did the work, had fled each to his field. [In other words, they weren’t giving to support the temple ministry so the temple ministers had gone back to their day jobs. Which illustrates the old saying: ‘You not only get the ministry you pray for; you get the ministry you pay for.’] So I confronted the officials and said, “Why is the house of God forsaken?”

So in Nehemiah 10.38, they said:

We will not neglect the house of our God.

And in Nehemiah 13.11, Nehemiah has to say:

Why is the house of God forsaken?

The same goes for their commitment to keep the Sabbath. In Nehemiah 10.31, they said:

…if the peoples of the land bring in goods or any grain on the Sabbath day to sell, we will not buy from them…

But look on to Nehemiah 13.15 – that second reading we had earlier:

In those days I saw in Judah people treading wine presses on the Sabbath, and bringing in heaps of grain and loading them on donkeys, and also wine, grapes, figs, and all kinds of loads, which they brought into Jerusalem on the Sabbath day.

So it’s not the peoples of the land (the non-Jewish people like Tobiah) who are compromising the Sabbath, it’s God’s people themselves. So Nehemiah 13.17-18 Nehemiah writes:

Then I confronted the nobles of Judah and said to them, “What is this evil thing that you are doing, profaning the Sabbath day? Did not your fathers act in this way, and did not our God bring all this disaster on us and on this city? Now you are bringing more wrath on Israel by profaning the Sabbath.”

And the same goes for their commitment to seek godly marriages with fellow-Israelites (Nehemiah 13.23):

In those days also I saw the Jews who had married women of Ashdod, Ammon, and Moab.

And Nehemiah confronts them in no uncertain terms. And, skipping to Nehemiah 13.27, he says:

Shall we then listen to you and do all this great evil and act treacherously against our God by marrying foreign women?

It’s depressing isn’t it? High hopes and then disappointed hopes, as being holy is compromised by ongoing sinfulness. And that wasn’t just an Old Testament experience, was it? It’s a constant and depressing side of New Testament experience as well, because turning to Jesus doesn’t do away with our ongoing sinfulness. It dethrones our sinfulness so it’s not in the driving seat any more, but it doesn’t do away with it. It’s still a passenger, whispering directions in our ear, and we’re still taken in by it and led by it. No wonder Paul, writing about his ongoing sinfulness, said (Romans 7.24):

Wretched man that I am! Who will deliver me from this body of death?

In other words, who will finally get me out of this predicament of wanting to be holy and failing to be holy? And the answer is: Jesus, when he resurrects you into the new creation where you’ll finally be sinless. But that’s not yet. And the now is that being holy is compromised by our ongoing sinfulness. So we resist it, but we can’t root it out. So here’s the final lesson about holiness:

3. Being holy only happens through God’s work in us

So in Nehemiah 8, we saw Ezra re-introducing people to God’s Old Testament law – the complete package of his will that they were to live under back then. Then in Nehemiah 9-10, we saw them confessing their failure to live under God’s law, and then recommitting themselves to do so. And in Nehemiah 13 we see failure all over again. And the story of the book of Nehemiah is really the story of the whole Old Testament in miniature.
Which is that: law is not enough. Law can’t change us. It can tell us what God wants, but it can’t make us want what God wants. And it’s as if Nehemiah’s role here is teaching us that we need something more than law, because while God has Nehemiah there with them, Nehemiah’s heart for God and zeal leads them in being holy. But take Nehemiah away to Persia for 15 years, and what happens? Holiness compromised by ongoing sinfulness. And so God brings Nehemiah back again, and once again his heart for God and zeal, and his discipline and correction of them, bring back some semblance of holiness. And yet…And yet it seems so external doesn’t it? So imposed. I mean, for example, when you have to lock and guard the gates of Jerusalem to stop the people who want to trade seven days a week. It’s hardly touching the heart, is it? What’s needed is for all God’s people to have a heart for God – a heart like the one which God, by his Spirit, had clearly given Nehemiah. And the promise of that is what the Old Testament ends on. So that through Ezekiel, who lived during the exile but before Nehemiah, God made this promise (Ezekiel 36.26-27):

And I will give you a new heart, and a new spirit I will put within you. And I will remove the heart of stone from your flesh and give you a heart of flesh. And I will put my Spirit within you, and cause you to walk in my statutes and be careful to obey my rules.

And having died and risen for us, that’s the work the Lord Jesus is able to do in us, and if he’s done that in you then you’ll want to be holy, thanks to the ongoing work of his Spirit in your heart. But your holiness will be compromised by your ongoing sinfulness, until one day he resurrects you into the new creation where you’ll finally be sinless. And that’s why our next morning series is going to be Revelation 21-22 – that vision of the fully and finally finished holy city.