Nehemiah 13:1-22: Helpful Habits for Spiritual Growth

Nehemiah 13:1-22: Helpful Habits for Spiritual Growth

Please turn with me in your Bible to Nehemiah 13. If you’re using one of the Story Bibles we provide, that’s on page 328. We’ve been going through the book of Nehemiah passage by passage, and this morning we find ourselves in Nehemiah 13:1-22. And since this is a rather lengthy passage, I am going to do a little bit of skipping around. Nehemiah 13:1-22:

1 On that day they read from the Book of Moses in the hearing of the people. And in it was found written that no Ammonite or Moabite should ever enter the assembly of God, 2 for they did not meet the people of Israel with bread and water, but hired Balaam against them to curse them—yet our God turned the curse into a blessing. 3 As soon as the people heard the law, they separated from Israel all those of foreign descent. 4 Now before this, Eliashib the priest, who was appointed over the chambers of the house of our God, and who was related to Tobiah, 5 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. 6 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 7 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. 8 And I was very angry, and I threw all the household furniture of Tobiah out of the chamber. 9 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. 10 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. 11 So I confronted the officials and said, “Why is the house of God forsaken?” And I gathered them together and set them in their stations. 12 Then all Judah brought the tithe of the grain, wine, and oil into the storehouses….15 In those days I saw in Judah people treading winepresses 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. And I warned them on the day when they sold food. 16 Tyrians also, who lived in the city, brought in fish and all kinds of goods and sold them on the Sabbath to the people of Judah, in Jerusalem itself! 17 Then I confronted the nobles of Judah and said to them, “What is this evil thing that you are doing, profaning the Sabbath day?”

This past week was a big week in my son Caleb’s life. As you can see, he was very excited about starting kindergarten this past Tuesday. In fact, even the night before, he was so excited that he could barely go to bed—almost like it was Christmas Eve or something. He was ready for his first day of school. And as you can see on shirt he’s wearing, Caleb is part of the Class of 2031. By the way, the idea with that large shirt is to take a picture of him wearing it every year on the first day of school until he graduates high school. Hopefully by then he’ll fit into it a little better. But that shirt is a good reminder that Caleb has a lot of work ahead of him. He’s just at the very beginning of numerous years in school before he’s ready for his career. The work has just begun. 

And that’s similar to the way it is when God saves us. When God saves us and we become a Christian, there’s a sense in which the work has just begun. By that, I’m referring to the work of progressing in holiness and becoming more like Jesus and defeating the sins that plague our lives. Now of course, that “work” isn’t what gets us saved. The Bible teaches very clearly that we’re saved simply by trusting in Jesus. We don’t earn salvation or gain eternal life through our own merit. It’s all through Jesus—his righteousness, his sacrifice on the cross, his provision. We’re saved through him. But having been saved, the Bible does tell us in Philippians 2:12 to “work out” our salvation. In other words, we need to make sure that our salvation becomes visible and manifest in our day-to-day lives. And that requires a good amount of intentionality on our part as we strive, through God’s grace, to become what he wants us to be. So when you put your trust in Jesus and become a Christian, don’t think you’ve arrived. Conversion isn’t the end but merely the beginning of a lifetime of growing and changing. 

And that brings us to our main passage of Nehemiah 13. The main idea of this passage is that sanctification never happens by accident. Sanctification never happens by accident. And that word “sanctification” simply means growing in holiness. When something’s sanctified, it’s set apart to God. So sanctification is the lifelong process of us becoming more and more set apart to God in the way we live. And looking at Nehemiah 13, we can see three habits that sanctification requires from us. Number one, immersion in the Bible. Number two, difficult decisions. And number three, constant vigilance. 

Immersion in the Bible

So first, immersion in the Bible. Look again at verses 1-3: 1 On that day they read from the Book of Moses in the hearing of the people. And in it was found written that no Ammonite or Moabite should ever enter the assembly of God, 2 for they did not meet the people of Israel with bread and water, but hired Balaam against them to curse them—yet our God turned the curse into a blessing. 3 As soon as the people heard the law, they separated from Israel all those of foreign descent. So as the Israelites are reading the Bible together, they discover that they have a problem. Contrary to God’s command, they’ve allowed foreigners to be a part of their assembly and a part of their nation. So they repent and separate themselves from the foreigners in their midst. Now at first, the idea of excluding foreigners might seem a bit racist to you. And in our day and time, it certainly would be. But you have to understand the situation here. First of all, as verse 2 states, previous generations of Ammonites and Moabites had mistreated God’s people, so excluding them was a part of God’s judgment on them. And second, they were excluded because of their idolatrous practices. They were corrupting the Israelites with their idolatry. So excluding them was kind of like removing the cancer from Israel before it could spread. So that’s what Israel did. They separated themselves from the corrupting influence of the foreigners. And notice that the catalyst for all of this was that they were reading the scriptures. Now some scholars will connect this reading of the scriptures to the ceremony recorded in the previous chapter where they’re dedicating the wall, while other scholars believe these things took place several years later. Either way, we see that it was clearly the Bible that sparked the repentance and reformation that’s recorded. And that’s likewise the case for all of the reforms recorded in chapter 13. The rest of the chapter records Nehemiah returning from a lengthy absence and reforming the nation in various ways—cleansing the temple, reinstituting the system of tithing, prohibiting work on the Sabbath. The foundation for all of these reforms was the scriptures. They were the catalyst for the changes we see. 

And that’s how the Bible should function in our lives as well. As we immerse ourselves in the Bible on a regular basis, the Holy Spirit will use the things we read to shape us and form us into who he wants us to be. And that often involves him convicting us of our sin and exposing the areas in our lives where we’re not what God wants us to be. Hopefully that’s happening in your life. That’s actually one of the signs you’ve truly been saved. And the words of the Bible have a unique way of bringing that about. There’s a unique power in the Bible that’s not found in any other book—a power to form us, a power to sanctify us, a power to change us from within. John Calvin said that’s actually one of the ways we know that the Bible comes from God and that it’s not merely a product of the human mind. We know that because of the sanctifying effect it has on us. As Hebrews 4:12 states, 12 For the word of God is living and active, sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing to the division of soul and of spirit, of joints and of marrow, and discerning the thoughts and intentions of the heart. So if you want to see growth and transformation in your life, the best thing you can ever do is pick up the Bible start reading it regularly. 

And you’ll see this pattern start to emerge—a pattern we see quite clearly in Nehemiah 13. You read the Bible, God points out sin in your life, and you repent. Then it happens again. You read the Bible more, God points out more sin in your life, and you repent—over and over again for the rest of your life prior to heaven. Kind of like when I was a child and my dad would have me clean something. Let’s say he asked me to sweep the dining room. I would grab the broom and do what I thought was an acceptable job sweeping the dining room. And I would usually try to do it pretty quickly so I could get back to playing with my toys. But then my dad would come in and point out all the places I had missed. So I would have to get the broom again and sweep some more. And if I still didn’t do a very good job, my dad would point out what I missed again and make me sweep it a third time. By then, of course, he would begin to get kind of annoyed. In fact, one time I was actually making him so frustrated by repeatedly doing a poor job sweeping that he told me I couldn’t use the broom any more. I would just have to finish the job by picking up the rest of the dirt with my fingers. So he had ways of encouraging me to improve the quality of my work. And that’s not a perfect analogy for the way God shows us our sin, but it’s relatively similar. God shows us a sin and we repent and we think we’re good. But then God’s like, “Did you notice that part over there?” Maybe it’s the same sin and the roots of it go deeper than we thought. Or maybe it’s a different sin. Either way, there’s always a lot more sin in our lives than we think at first. And God helps us peel it back layer by layer. I believe he’s actually merciful in doing it that way because perhaps he knows that if he were to show us all of our sin at once, we’d be overwhelmed. That’s why he helps us deal with it progressively. So be encouraged: however sinful you think you are this morning, you’re actually ten times worse. But God graciously uses Scripture to bring those sins to our attention one by one and ever so patiently leads us to repentance. And really, what greater blessedness is there than God liberating us from our sin and bringing us closer to himself?

And if he’s not doing that very much in your life, that’s not good—because there’s no question that you have sin. We all do. So if God’s not regularly showing you the sin in your life and leading you to repentance, that just means your sin is silently metastasizing within you. One seventeenth-century theologian named John Owen once wrote that “sin is always active when it seems to be the most quiet, and its waters are often deep when they are calm.” Did you get that? “Sin is always active when it seems to be the most quiet, and its waters are often deep when they are calm.” Hopefully that’s not you. And the way you can make sure that’s not you is by regularly immersing yourself in the Bible, because that’s what the Holy Spirit uses to sanctify us. 

Difficult Decisions

Then secondly, not only does our sanctification require immersion in the Bible, it also requires that we make difficult decisions. That’s our second point: difficult decisions. Because, honestly, it can often be very difficult to forsake a sin in your life. Back in Nehemiah 13, think about how difficult it must have been for the Israelites to send away the foreigners from their mist. I’m sure some of the foreigners were their friends. And after that, think about how difficult it must have been for Nehemiah to undertake his reforms in the nation. Verses 4-9 record how Nehemiah discovers a guy named Tobiah living in the temple. You may remember from previous chapters that Tobiah was one of the main guys who opposed the rebuilding of the wall. He intimidated the workers, slandered Nehemiah, and manipulated the situation however else he could in an attempt to keep the wall from being built. He was bad news. But now, when Nehemiah returns from his long trip, he discovers that Tobiah has weaseled his way into the temple. So he kicks him out. And I bet that took a lot of backbone for Nehemiah to do. Tobiah seems like the kind of guy who’s very sly and is obviously very well-connected in the city of Jerusalem. But Nehemiah doesn’t care. He knows what he has to do, and he does it. And that’s also the case for his other reforms as well. I imagine it wasn’t easy to re-institute the system of tithing like he does in verses 10-14 or get people to stop working on the Sabbath like he does in verses 15-22. These were not easy things. But Nehemiah knows that the Law God gave through Moses clearly requires these things. So he makes sure that they happen. 

And in the same way, the Bible often requires us to make some difficult decisions in our lives as well. Like I said, it can be really hard to give up some of the sins we’re holding onto. Sometimes it’s hard because we like the sin so much—or at least we think we do. Or maybe we’re afraid of what life will be like without the sin. Someone might wonder, “If I stop shacking up with my boyfriend or girlfriend, how will I pay the bills?” So forsaking sin in our lives is often not easy. But it’s always worth it in the end. Kind of like having surgery. It’s not easy. There’s often a lot of discomfort involved and possibly a lot of therapy afterwards. I know when my son Caleb had his tonsils and adenoids taken out, I felt sorry for him. He couldn’t eat regular food, he couldn’t sleep through the night. It was rough. But we all understand that surgery is ultimately a very good thing. It may hurt us for a little while, but it ultimately helps us. So even if you find repenting of a certain sin to be quite difficult, don’t resist what the Holy Spirit’s leading you to do. Give him your full cooperation and make whatever difficult decision needs to be made. You see, the Holy Spirit is a master surgeon and is only cutting out of your life the things that will prevent you from possessing the greatest joy imaginable—the joy of being close to God. Because you can’t have both. Any time you become aware of a sin in your life, you always have to make a decision: either God or the sin. You can’t have both. 

And if you’re ever having trouble making the right decision, just think about the gospel. Remind yourself of how God loved you even when you were in such a miserable and wretched condition. Remind yourself of how he sent his own Son Jesus to the cross to suffer the penalty your sins deserved. Jesus died for you. He redeemed you at the cost of his own blood. And if you really grasp that gospel message of Jesus dying for you, there’s only one thing you’ll want to do, and that’s live for him. 2 Corinthians 5:15 states, “And he died for all, that those who live might no longer live for themselves but for him who for their sake died and was raised.” So if Jesus died for you, will you not live for him? And does it not bring you incomparable joy to live for him? Think about that the next time you have trouble making the decision to forsake sin. Meditate on the gospel until it warms your heart and gives you such a profound gratitude toward God that you can’t imagine ever doing anything or persisting in anything that would grieve God. Let the gospel motivate you to make difficult decisions to forsake sin.

Constant Vigilance 

Then finally, not only does sanctification require immersion in the Bible and difficult decisions, it also requires constant vigilance. That’s point three: constant vigilance. In verses 6-7 of our main text, we’re told that the reason things had gotten out of hand in Israel and all these reforms were necessary was because Nehemiah had been called back to the king. You may remember that Nehemiah was the king’s personal cupbearer, which was an extremely high-ranking position. So the king called Nehemiah back into his service and had him stay there far away from Jerusalem for an unspecified period of time before allowing him to return to Jerusalem. And when Nehemiah returns, things are not looking good in the city. Now you may remember that back in chapter 10, the Israelites under Nehemiah’s leadership had experienced a season of national revival and had passionately committed themselves to start observing God’s Law in very specific ways. The whole chapter was basically them telling God all the ways they were going to obey him. Well, unfortunately, as we see here in chapter 13, their passion proved to be short-lived. In Nehemiah’s absence, the Israelites had reverted right back to doing the very same sins they had repented of in chapter 10. They weren’t separating themselves from foreigners as they had committed to do in verses 28-30 of chapter 10, they weren’t keeping the Sabbath as they had committed to do in verse 31 of chapter 10, and they weren’t contributing tithes and other offerings to God as they had committed to do in verses 32-39 of chapter 10. These are all things Nehemiah has to reform again in chapter 13. 

And that’s very instructive for us because it shows us just how persistent our sinful tendencies can be. We may repent of a certain sin with all sincerity, but that’s often not the end of it. It often starts to creep back in and try to insert itself again into our lives. That’s why we have to remain vigilant. We have to be prepared to put our sin to death as often as it rears its ugly head. It kind of reminds me of a game they have or at least used to have at Chuckie Cheese. Does anyone remember that game where there were bunch of holes and these alligator heads would randomly come up out of the holes and you had to quickly hit them down again either with your hand or some kind of mallet? And you never knew which hole the next alligator head was going to come up out of, so you had to be ready to hit anywhere. Sometimes two or three alligator heads might even come up at the same time, or in rapid succession, and you had to be ready to hit them. You had to be vigilant. And that’s the way it works with sin. You repent of it and put it to death one day, but then what happens? It rears its ugly head again the next day or perhaps the next week. It keeps coming up again and again. So you have to be constantly vigilant and ready to do battle with sin and put it to death day after day after day. As John Owen says in the same book of his I quoted earlier, “Always be killing sin or it will be killing you.” “Always be killing sin or it will be killing you.” It’s a constant battle that demands constant vigilance. You have to always be ready to put sin to death and to use whatever means necessary. 

Because that’s part of being vigilant. Vigilance includes not only being ready to identify sin as sin but also to put it to death through swift and decisive action. Notice how Nehemiah does this with Tobiah in our main passage. Remember, the Israelites had allowed Tobiah, a man who had openly opposed the rebuilding of the wall, to actually live in one of the temple chambers. Out of all the ways the Israelites dropped the ball that are recorded in this chapter, this in my opinion is probably the most shocking. They actually let this guy live in the temple. So instead of this chamber in the temple being used to facilitate the worship of God, it’s housing an enemy of God. No wonder Nehemiah writes this about his response in verses 8-9, 8 And I was very angry, and I threw all the household furniture of Tobiah out of the chamber. 9 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. So Nehemiah’s not messing around with this guy. He throws Tobiah’s furniture out of the temple and basically kicks him to the curb. Let me ask you something: Where has Tobiah moved in in your life? What sins have you been tolerating that you need to make a decision even this very day to put to death through whatever means necessary? Don’t let Tobiah stay in that chamber. Because he would love to stay there. He would love nothing more than to hinder and eventually destroy the worship of God in your life. Don’t give him that opportunity. “Always be killing sin or it will be killing you.” And of course, we do that through the power of the Holy Spirit. Romans 8:13 states that it’s “by the Spirit” that we “put to death the [evil] deeds of the body.” So put to death those evil deeds through the Spirit’s power.