THE GREATEST LOVE STORY EVER TOLD
(WHAT CAN YOU LEARN FROM THE PAST?)
Nehemiah 9:1-37
Key Verse: 9:17b
“But you are a forgiving God, gracious and compassionate, slow to anger and abounding in love.”
God created man to live for a great project (Ge 1:28). Because Nehemiah had a great project (6:3), he built the wall in 52 days (6:15). Then he shifted gears from building to consolidation: He appointed leaders, registered the people, raised money (chap 7) and studied the Bible (chap 8). Some people start off well, but then they plateau or drop off after some success. It’s because they don’t change, they keep doing the same thing, and they don’t learn new skills. But Nehemiah continued to innovate and to make progress. He knew that leadership was important and he fully delegated and entrusted responsibility to leaders (7:1,2; 2 Ti 2:2). He especially knew the utmost importance of Bible study (8:1). Now (chapter 9) let’s find out the outcome of their Bible study.
Nehemiah 9 is a detailed history lesson. It’s the history of the people of Israel. But it could just as well be the history of any other nation of people. Though it’s the history of an entire nation of people, it could also the history of each individual person. What’s the gist of this history lesson? It’s actually quite humbling. It’s that we human beings continually mess up again and again, but God continues to love us again and again. So this history lesson is an unbelievable love story between God and you. Oscar Wilde (Irish Poet, Novelist, Dramatist and Critic, 1854-1900) said, “Who being loved is poor?” The main point of the whole Bible is “God loves you.” Nehemiah’s history lesson in chapter 9 is such a love story between God and you. In fact, it’s the greatest love story ever told.
1st, love leads to confession of sins (1-4). In Nehemiah 8, the people studied the Bible for 7 days (8:18), as Ezra, a dedicated and devoted Bible scholar (Ez 7:6,10), read the Bible to them from daybreak till noon (8:3). What is the result of their intensive weeklong Bible study? Briefly, they did 3 things. (i) they were fasting, wearing sackcloth and having dust on their heads (1). It meant that they humbly acknowledged who they were before God who loved them, in spite of all their wickedness and sins. (ii) they separated themselves from all foreigners (2a). This wasn’t discrimination, but it was their desire to devote themselves to God by separating themselves from the influences of the world that distract them from God. (iii) they confessed their sins. Look at verse 2b. “They stood in their places and confessed their sins and the wickedness of their fathers.” Why did they confess their sins? It’s because through sincere Bible study they realized how much God loves them, even while they lived without God. This teaches us that it’s the love of God that compels man to confess his sins. But these days confession of sins is rare, because there’s no concept of sin in society. For example, people may feel bad if they lie and cheat. But without a concept of sin, their bad feeling from their bad behavior doesn’t lead to change, since after feeling bad, they continue to lie and cheat. Therefore, a genuine confession of sins must lead to repentance, which means, “You must change.” One who lies and cheats should change and no longer lie and cheat. But no man can repent and change by his own will power or effort. He must know the love of God (Jn 3:16). He must also cry out to God for help (4).
2nd, the God who loves us (5-15). In verse 5, the Levites said, “Stand up and praise the Lord your God, who is from everlasting to everlasting.” We praise God because God loves us in spite of all our sins. Who is this God who loves us? Read verse 6. “You alone are the Lord. You made the heavens, even the highest heavens, and all their starry host, the earth and all that is on it, the seas and all that is in them. You give life to everything, and the multitudes of heaven worship you.” * The God who loves us is our Creator who gave us our precious lives. That God is our Creator teaches us why God loves us. Just as parents dearly love their children even when they misbehave, God our Creator loves us as his dear children, even after we dishonor him by the way we live. Verses 7-15 teach us a few more things about the God who loves us.
The God who loves us choose us to bless us, just as God choose Abraham to bless him (7; Ge 12:2). The day Angie chose Tim was such a memorable, happy and unforgettable day. Imagine if we know deeply the meaning of the Creator of the Universe choosing us!
The God who loves us keeps his promise (8). Verse 8b says, “You have kept your promise…” Millions make a promise on the altar to be faithful to the one they love till death do they part. But that promise once made in love is often forgotten. This broken promise wounds, hurts and damages them and especially their children. I was shocked to hear that the greatest fear of junior high kids today is that daddy will suddenly leave mommy without warning. How traumatic it is for a young child to grow up in fear that daddy will abandon mommy. Such tragedies happen among men because men do not keep their promises. But our God is the God who keeps his promises because he loves us.
The God who loves us delivers us from bondage (9-12). Jean Jacques Rousseau said, “Man is born free but everywhere he is in chains.” The Israelites were slaves in Egypt. They groaned and moaned because of their slavery. Similarly one who suffers from sin is like a slave to their sin. A young man suffered because he can’t get rid of the pornographic images in his mind. A young woman suffered because she couldn’t stop herself from being infatuated with every other cute boy. Who can deliver us from bondage? Only God can. God delivered the Israelites by dividing the Red Sea, allowing them to pass and then drowning their Egyptian pursuers. Similarly, our God delivers us from sin because he loves us and knows how much we suffer because of our sins.
The God who loves us teaches us how to live (13,14). Man thinks that he knows how to live. But he makes bad choices and bad decisions at critical moments. He needs guidance and clear instructions about life. Read verses 13,14. “You came down on Mount Sinai; you spoke to them from heaven. You gave them regulations and laws that are just and right, and decrees and commands that are good. You made known to them your holy Sabbath and gave them commands, decrees and laws through your servant Moses.” Because God loves us, God gave us clear instructions in the Bible on how we can live a happy and fulfilling life.
The God who loves us is the God who provides for us (15). Read verse 15. “In their hunger you gave them bread from heaven and in their thirst you brought them water from the rock; you told them to go in and take possession of the land you had sworn with uplifted hand to give them.” Our God is the God of provision. God gave his people bread from heaven when they were hungry and water from the rock when they were thirsty in the desert. God also gave them the Promised Land, though their enemies occupied it. God, who loves us, blesses us with what we need, and wants to give us good things, even the best things (Jas 1:17).
3rd, the greatest love story (16-37). Now let’s think about who we are that God should love us. Look at verses 16 and 17a. “But they, our forefathers, became arrogant and stiff-necked, and did not obey your commands. They refused to listen and failed to remember the miracles you performed among them. They became stiff-necked and in their rebellion appointed a leader in order to return to their slavery.” The sad, recurring story of mankind is our repeated rejection of God’s love for us. We reject God’s love by disobeying God’s commands. We are like this because of our selfishness: we selfishly long to satisfy our own desires for love, sex, money, fame, etc., not realizing that man’s greatest joy and fulfillment comes from accepting the love of God. Let me tell you a story of rejecting the love of another: Hosea was an O.T. prophet. God instructed him to marry a prostitute as an illustration of God’s unchanging love for his adulterous people. Though Hosea loved his wife, she ran off and chased after and slept with other men and even became pregnant with another man’s child. Still God told Hosea to love her as his dear wife and take her back, even as she continued to sleep with other men. In this real life example, God wanted to show us how much he loves us, even when we spit in his face and reject his love again and again. 22 verses from verses 16-37 show us how much God loves his people, and yet his people continued to despise God’s love for them, just like Hosea’s prostitute wife despised Hosea’s love for her.
How did God’s people Israel despise God’s love for them? Instead of loving God, they loved idols and they credited their idols for their happiness and salvation (18). Despite God’s continued love for them by guiding them, sustaining them, blessing them with good things and with many children and giving them virtually everything they wanted, yet they ignored God’s word (19-26). They phrase “they committed awful blasphemies” is repeated twice (18, 26). What are “awful blasphemies”? Blasphemy is disrespect and irreverence. Blasphemy is to do the very thing that would humiliate God. For instance, there is nothing more humiliating to a husband or a wife, than if their spouse loved some other man or woman. There was a man missionary who would go crazy and ballistic toward his missionary wife, whenever he saw her just speaking with another man. Though she loved her husband and was faithful to him, yet he couldn’t handle it if she sometimes just happened to look in the direction of another man. Imagine how God would feel when God loves us so much, yet we reject his love by loving something vile, instead of God. In this way, the people whom God loved “committed awful blasphemies.”
To help his people come to their senses, God handed them over to their enemies, who oppressed them (27a). God didn’t do this out of spite or disgust. Rather, God simply allowed them to make their own choices and do whatever they wanted. When they did, soon they were in great distress. Then they cried out to God (27b). If God were a man, he might say, “Serves you right!” But God is not a man. Out of his love and compassion for them, God gave them deliverers who rescued them from the hand of their enemies (27c). Thus, his people should be indebted to God forever. Were they? Look at verse 28a. “But as soon as they were at rest, they again did what was evil in your sight.” The moment they felt better because of God’s kindness, they immediately reverted to their evil ways of committing awful blasphemies. So God had no choice but to leave them alone again, and again they were in agony. Then they shamelessly cried out to God again. God should have already learned his lesson and ignored their cry for help. But look at verse 28b. “And when they cried out to you again, you heard from heaven, and in your compassion you delivered them time after time.” How amazing is our God that he would deliver us “time after time”! God knows full well that he is taking a big foolish risk, since all we human beings have done with God’s goodness is to turn our backs on him they moment we feel better.
Look at verses 29-31. Verse 29 says. “You warned them to return to your law, but they became arrogant and disobeyed your commands. … Stubbornly they turned their backs on you, became stiff-necked and refused to listen.” Why would God even bother with such people? Yet verse 30 says, “For many years you were patient with them. By your Spirit you admonished them through your prophets. Yet they paid no attention…” Verse 31 says, “But in your great mercy you did not put an end to them or abandon them, for you are a gracious and merciful God.” Just how gracious and merciful is God? God has a great weakness for those who mess up again and again. So, I can come back to God, even though I mess up again and again. I love God because God is so gracious and merciful toward me! But I, for whatever reason, have great difficulty being gracious toward others. Once a young man with whom I had studied the Bible for a long time, said to me, “I want another Bible teacher, anyone but you!” I should be gracious and merciful toward him, as God has always been toward me. But in my heart I was uncontrollably wishing for many horrible things to happen to him. Thank God that God is not like me! Thank God that our God is always “gracious and merciful.”
When the people realized how gracious and merciful and loving God is toward them, they came to a great realization. Read verse 33. “In all that has happened to us, you have been just; you have acted faithfully while we did wrong.” They said, “we did wrong.” The starting point of all knowledge and wisdom is to know who we truly are. Both Socrates and Descartes said, “Know thyself.” Do men know themselves? Generally, man thinks, “I’m not that bad.” Surprisingly, even criminals and crooks think, “I’m not that bad.” Likely, God’s people Israel didn’t think they were that bad, since there are obviously some blatantly bad people, such as Osama. But even Osama thinks that he’s not bad, and that he is even good and is doing good for the world. Not only Osama, but there are also millions of people who support what Osama did and is continuing to do. But God’s people said, “In all that has happened to us, you have been just; you have acted faithfully while we did wrong.” “We did wrong” is their confession of sins and their repentance. When they truly knew themselves, they realized how great is the love of God for them. They knew they were wrong when they ignored God while enjoying God’s abundant goodness (34,35). They knew they were wrong when they blamed God and others, and they began to acknowledge that all the hardships and distress they faced as slaves was because their own fault (36,37).
Verse 17b, our key verse, says, “But you are a forgiving God, gracious and compassionate, slow to anger and abounding in love.” This verse is a perfect description of our Lord Jesus Christ, because Jesus is forgiving, gracious, compassionate, slow to anger and abounding in love. Jesus showed us how much he loves us when he died in agony on the cross for our sins. When Jesus died, he said out of his abounding love, “Father, forgive them, for they do not know what they are doing” (Lk 23:34). God’s love is like this not for good people, but for those who break his laws often without even a 2nd thought again and again. For example, the 9th commandment says, “You shall not give false testimony against your neighbor” (Ex 20:16). This means that we shouldn’t lie and gossip about others. But we have countless lewd and vulgar talk shows and truckloads of raunchy magazines that gossip about others based on indecent photos and unsubstantiated stories. This is “entertainment.” But God is not entertained. The 2 common commandments that are often broken are the 6th and 7th commandments: “You shall not murder. You shall not commit adultery” (Ex 20:13,14). We live amidst rampant violence and murder. Almost as many babies are aborted in 1 day in the U.S. (3,700) [1.3 million/year; ~ 49 million since Roe vs. Wade in 1973], every single day, than all the American soldiers that have been killed in Iraq in 5 years since the war began on 3/19/03 (4,080). We also live in a nation where husbands and wives desire another man’s spouse. How can we survive as a nation, when our God is righteous and holy? Honestly, we’re as good as dead. The only reason we’re still alive is because our God is “a forgiving God, gracious and compassionate, slow to anger and abounding in love.” Let’s think about the phrase “abounding in love.” Millions of girls through out the world loved the movie Titanic. They made it the No. 1 movie of all time. It’s because Jack, played by Leonardo di Caprio, loved Rose at the cost of his life, as he died as a frozen ice cube in the cold ocean because of his love for Rose, who survived on a raft, while the song “My heart will go on” by Celine Dion plays on. This is such a great romantic love story. But God’s love for you through Jesus Christ is even greater than this.