Nehemiah 1:1-11
Introduction
The name
Nehemiah means “The LORD comforts.”
The books of Ezra and Nehemiah are closely tied together.
Sometimes Nehemiah is known as the second book of Ezra.
The books of Chronicles, Nehemiah, and Ezra cover an overlapping time
frame. The books of Ezra and
Nehemiah cover the time period of 538 to 433 B.C.
The book of Nehemiah is dated from information gathered in Nehemiah 2:1
stating the 20th year of the reign of Artaxerxes who reigned from 465
B.C. to 425 B.C. dating the book of Nehemiah to about 445 B.C.
Artaxerxes 1 was the ruler Longimanus.
He was the son of Xerxes and the grandson of Darius Hystaspis.
He was friendly toward Jerusalem.
Ezra returned to Jerusalem in 458 B.C. and Nehemiah returned in 445 B.C.
and became Governor. Like Joseph
who was raised up from a slave to be Governor of Egypt, Nehemiah was raised from
a Cup Bearer to a Governor. The
basic theme of Nehemiah is not only the rebuilding of the walls of Jerusalem but
shows God’s faithfulness in protecting and providing for his people through
godly, prayerful, and pro-active leadership.
The book shows God’s trustworthiness in restoring his exiled people.
Ne 1:1
The words of Nehemiah the son of Hachaliah. And it came
to pass in the month Chisleu, in the twentieth year, as I was in Shushan the
palace,
Nehemiah was the son of Hachaliah whose name means “who
waits for the LORD.” He is only
mentioned in the book of Nehemiah twice.
The month Chisleu would correspond to the latter part of November and the
early half of December. Shushan was
the winter home of the Persian king and was also a chief city of Persia.
It was located about 740 miles (1191 KM) east of Jerusalem.
Ne 1:2
That Hanani, one of my brethren, came, he and certain
men of Judah; and I asked them concerning the Jews that had escaped, which were
left of the captivity, and concerning Jerusalem.
Hanani whose name means “my grace or mercy” may have
been the actual brother of Nehemiah as we read in Nehemiah 7:2.
Hanani was accompanied by some other brethren who came from Judah.
Nehemiah asks them what the condition was of those who escaped which
carries with it the meaning of “delivered” from the captivity they experienced
for 70 years. They were coming back
slowly and Nehemiah wanted to know their condition and the conditions which
prevailed in Jerusalem at the time.
Ne 1:3
And they said unto me, The remnant that are left of the
captivity there in the province are in great affliction and reproach: the
wall of Jerusalem also is broken down, and the gates thereof are burned
with fire.
While the temple was built under the direction of
Zerubbabel and Haggai which began about 518 B.C nevertheless the rest of the
city was still in need of major repairs.
The people who went back were suffering from bad treatment from the
neighboring nations along with disgrace and shame.
Then Hanani told Nehemiah that the walls were still broken down and the
gates of the city were still in a condition of being burned from the Babylonian
invasion 141 years before in 586 B.C.
Initially the group which returned in 516 B.C. were to rebuild the temple
and their own private houses. This
was the message of Haggai that the people rebuilt their own houses and did not
rebuild the temple of God.
The ways of Zion do mourn, because none
come to the solemn feasts: all her gates are desolate: her priests sigh, her
virgins are afflicted, and she is in bitterness. (Lamentations 1:4)
Ne 1:4
And it came to pass, when I heard these words, that I
sat down and wept, and mourned certain days, and fasted, and prayed
before the God of heaven,
Then when Nehemiah heard the report he was emotionally
devastated. He had to sit down and
his sorrow was so great that he wept.
He was in mourning so badly that he probably mourned in dust and ashes
sitting on the ground just as Job did.
And he took him a potsherd to
scrape himself withal; and he sat down among the ashes. (Job 2:8)
It was not only a few hours that he mourned but his mourning lasted
several days and he fasted during that time and while he fasted he prayed to the
God of Heaven which means Nehemiah knew his scriptures and he was a godly man.
Sometimes this is how God gets the attention of Christians when he wants
them to start a specific ministry for a specific purpose.
Ne 1:5
And said, I beseech thee, O LORD God of heaven, the
great and terrible God, that keepeth covenant and mercy for them that love him
and observe his commandments:
This is the first of the nine recorded prayers in the
book of Nehemiah. He addresses God
as LORD which means the “self-existent one” and that he is the ruler of Heaven.
Then he describes him as the “great and terrible God” which means he is
the great ruler of all Heaven and earth and is one to be feared as the
Babylonian captivity would still be well-entrenched in their minds.
Then he speaks about God as a covenant keeping God in that he made many
promises within those covenants and he grants true mercy to those who love him
and observe his commandments. The
nation of Judah and Israel did not obey the commandments of the LORD although
God gave them many chances to return to him and repent of their evil ways.
Nehemiah makes it a verbal fact that those who do love the LORD and keep
his commandments will be loved of the LORD.
Ne 1:6
Let thine ear now be attentive, and thine eyes open,
that thou mayest hear the prayer of thy servant, which I pray before thee now,
day and night, for the children of Israel thy servants, and confess the sins of
the children of Israel, which we have sinned against thee: both I and my
father's house have sinned.
Nehemiah now prayed that the LORD would be attentive to
his prayers, that is, that God would hearken unto his prayers.
He did not just say a generic prayer one time but he was in constant
prayer both day and night which means he was a serious prayer warrior.
He does not pray for himself being in the court of a pagan king but for
the nation of Israel which he calls God’s servants.
He confesses the sins of the nation of Israel which got them into the
predicament they are now in. Notice
how humble Nehemiah is in that he puts himself among those that have sinned
instead of saying “they have sinned” he includes himself by saying “we have
sinned” against the LORD. He states
that both he and his father’s house was guilty of sinning before the LORD.
Daniel, Isaiah, and Jeremiah all used the same term that “we have sinned”
placing themselves within the group that deserved the judgment of God upon them.
It shows the true humility of these men in that they are not claiming
some type of superiority above those who sinned against the LORD.
Who gave Jacob for a spoil, and Israel to the robbers?
did not the LORD, he against whom we have sinned? for they would not walk
in his ways, neither were they obedient unto his law. (Isaiah 42:24)
We lie down in our shame, and our confusion covereth us:
for we have sinned against the LORD our God, we and our fathers, from our
youth even unto this day, and have not obeyed the voice of the LORD our God.
(Jeremiah 3:25)
We have sinned, and have committed iniquity, and
have done wickedly, and have rebelled, even by departing from thy precepts and
from thy judgments: (Daniel 9:5)
Ne 1:7
We have dealt very corruptly against thee, and have not
kept the commandments, nor the statutes, nor the judgments, which thou
commandedst thy servant Moses.
The word “corruptly” is in the Qal stem and means
exactly what it says. Corruptly is
a synonym for “sinfully or immorally.”
Nehemiah is continuing to identify himself with the nation of Judah as
sinning horribly against the LORD.
They violated the law of God by not keeping the commandments as they went
headfirst into idolatry. They did
not just fall into this sin but they voluntarily left the law of God and took up
idolatry. They did not observe the
commandments, statutes which were the decrees or laws, and the judgments that
were the ordinances which was the law and regulations.
God gave the law to Moses for Israel to obey and they intentionally
turned aside from obeying the law and followed after other gods.
Ne 1:8
Remember, I beseech thee, the word that thou commandedst
thy servant Moses, saying, If ye transgress, I will scatter you abroad
among the nations:
This verse contains the decree that if Israel did not
obey the LORD then he would scatter them abroad to all the pagan nations which
he did with the northern kingdom to Assyria and the southern kingdom to Babylon.
And the LORD shall scatter thee
among all people, from the one end of the earth even unto the other; and there
thou shalt serve other gods, which neither thou nor thy fathers have known,
even wood and stone.
(Deuteronomy 28:64)
Ne 1:9
But if ye turn unto me, and keep my commandments,
and do them; though there were of you cast out unto the uttermost part of the
heaven, yet will I gather them from thence, and will bring them unto the
place that I have chosen to set my name there.
This was the cry of the prophets that Israel and Judah
should return to the Lord and he would pardon them.
Come, and let us return unto the
LORD: for he hath torn, and he will heal us; he hath smitten, and he will bind
us up. (Hosea 6:1) This quote
from Hosea is an example of what the prophets were saying that if Judah and
Israel would have rejected the idolatry and then returned unto the LORD, then he
would have pardoned their sin and returned them to the land which he gave unto
the fathers. At this time God
placed his name in Jerusalem where the temple was situated but once the Messiah
came, he would place his name in the New Jerusalem which would be the body of
believers.
Ne 1:10
Now these are thy servants and thy people, whom
thou hast redeemed by thy great power, and by thy strong hand.
Now Nehemiah states that the people of Judah are the
servants of God plus they are his people whom he has redeemed with his great
power and strong hand. Nehemiah may
have the destruction of Egypt in mind when God freed Israel from bondage.
He also may be alluding to the fact that the Babylonian captivity is over
and the people will once again return to Judah.
Ne 1:11
O Lord, I beseech thee, let now thine ear be attentive
to the prayer of thy servant, and to the prayer of thy servants, who desire to
fear thy name: and prosper, I pray thee, thy servant this day, and grant him
mercy in the sight of this man. For I was the king's cupbearer.