A Lesson in Leadership

I’m just going to read this quote to you, and you can go find it for yourself. It’s from Dale Ralph Davis’s commentary on 1 Kings. As I move around, I find there’s tremendous confusion amongst the people of God in relationship to the place of the law of God—that we’re clear that the law is not a basis for justification. It’s over as far as justification is concerned, it’s over as far as the Mosaic legislation is concerned, it’s not the dynamic of sanctification either, but it is, if you like, the tramlines or the railway tracks on which the expressions of our devotion to God and love for God find themselves fulfilled. So this is Dale Ralph Davis:

I know [that] some Christians have allergic reactions when [they are] told they are subject to [God]’s moral law in Exodus 20. This, they fear, is legalism and an effort at salvation by works. But that fear misunderstands the function of the ten commandments. The law … comes in the context of grace …. Yahweh lays down [the] pattern in … Exodus: he delivers his people …, then he demands …; he works his redemption before he sets down his requirements. He first sets Israel free and then tells them how that freedom is to be enjoyed and maintained. Glad obedience to [God]’s moral law is simply our “logical” act of worship.[1]

Romans 12: “Present yourselves to God,”[2] and so on.

Now, I mention that because we won’t have time for Q and A at the end of this, I’m relieved to know—and you probably are too. But it probably—there’s a possibility that it may trigger thoughts along those lines, and so I mention that just in case you would find it helpful.

I want to read 13, but I want to read before that just a few verses from chapter 10. And from Nehemiah 10:

“The rest of the people”—verse 28. “The rest of the people, the priests, the Levites, the gatekeepers, the singers, the temple servants, and all who have separated themselves from the peoples of the [land] to the Law of God, their wives, their sons, their daughters, all who have knowledge and understanding, join with their brothers, their nobles, and enter into a curse and an oath 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 [God] and his rules and his statutes. We will not give our daughters to the peoples of the land or take their daughters for our sons. 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 on the Sabbath or on a holy day.”

I’ll leave you with the balance of that, and then we turn to chapter 13:

“On that day they read from the Book of Moses in the hearing of the people. And … it was found written that no Ammonite or Moabite should ever enter the assembly of God, for they did not meet the people of Israel with bread and water, but hired Balaam against them to curse them.” You remember how they’re going to make their way through. They said, “Hey, would it be okay if we got a sandwich and something to drink?” They said, “No, not a chance.”[3] And they “hired Balaam against them to curse them—yet our God turned the curse into a blessing. As soon as the people heard the law, they separated from Israel all those of foreign descent.

“Now before this, Eliashib the priest, who was appointed over the chambers of the house of our God, and who was related to Tobiah, 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. While this was taking place, I”—that is, Nehemiah—“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. 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 … 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. So I confronted the officials and [I] said, ‘Why is the house of God forsaken?’ And I gathered them together and set them in their stations. Then all Judah brought the tithe of the grain, [the] wine, and [the] oil into the storehouses. And I appointed as treasurers over the storehouses Shelemiah the priest, Zadok the scribe, … Pedaiah of the Levites, and as their assistant Hanan the son of Zaccur, son of Mattaniah, for they were considered reliable, and their duty was to distribute to their brothers. Remember me, O my God, concerning this, and do not wipe out my good deeds that I have done for the house of my God and for his service.

“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, … all kinds of loads, which they brought into Jerusalem on the Sabbath day. And I warned them on the day when they sold food. 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! Then I confronted the nobles of Judah and said to them, ‘What is this evil thing that you[’re] 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.’

“As soon as it began to grow dark at the gates of Jerusalem before the Sabbath, I commanded that the doors should be shut and gave orders that they should not be opened until after the Sabbath. And I stationed some of my servants at the gates, that no load might be brought in on the Sabbath day. Then the merchants and sellers of all kinds of wares lodged outside Jerusalem once or twice. But I warned them and said to them, ‘Why do you lodge outside the wall? If you do so again, I will lay hands on you.’ From that time on they did not come on the Sabbath. Then I commanded the Levites that they should purify themselves and come and guard the gates, to keep the Sabbath day holy.” And this is… He prays again here, you’ll notice: “Remember this also in my favor, O my God, and spare me according to the greatness of your steadfast love.

“In those days also I saw the Jews who had married women of Ashdod, Ammon, and Moab. And half of their children spoke the language of Ashdod, and they could not speak the language of Judah, but only the language of each people. And I confronted them and cursed them and beat some of them and pulled out their hair. And I made them take an oath in the name of God, saying, ‘You shall not give your daughters to their sons, or take their daughters for your sons or for yourselves.’” And then he says, “And I gave them a little lesson from history”: “‘Did[n’t] Solomon king of Israel sin on account of such women? Among the many nations there was no king like him, and he was beloved by his God, and God made him king over all Israel. Nevertheless, foreign women made even him to sin. Shall we then listen to you and do all this great evil and act treacherously against our God by marrying foreign women?’

“And one of the sons of Jehoiada, the son of Eliashib the high priest, was the son-in-law of Sanballat the Horonite. Therefore I chased him from me.” Then he prays again: “Remember them, O my God, because they[’ve] desecrated the priesthood and the covenant of the priesthood and the Levites.

“Thus I cleansed them from everything foreign, and I established the duties of the priests and Levites, each in his work; and I provided for the wood offering at appointed times, and for the firstfruits.” And then, finally, a prayer once again: “Remember me, O my God, for good.”

Father, we get tired by this point in the day, all of us. And so we pray that you will grant to me clarity, brevity, and the abiding sense of your hand upon each of our lives for good. Open our eyes, that we may behold wonderful things in your Word.[4] For Jesus’ sake we ask it. Amen.

Well, what we discover is in some senses very disappointing and in some senses no surprise at all: that Nehemiah returns to Jerusalem, after the visit that he’s made back to Susa, to discover that promises that had been made are now promises that have been broken. And it is clear from the thirteenth chapter that he did not respond to this in the way that some of us might be at least tempted to in contemporary circumstances—i.e., he did not respond by assuming, “Well, I was gone. Things change. I have looked at things in a certain way. Truth is elastic. We can see that it is changing, these people are innovating. There’s opportunities for the future.” No, he didn’t do any of that at all—not for a moment!

No, for him, if you like, a dark curtain has actually fallen over the proceedings. As this period of time ends and as the prospect of the intertestamental period is before us, this curtain has fallen down, waiting for the promised light of life who will come to shine into that darkness,[5] into a prevailing darkness. The four hundred years of the intertestamental period is a period of darkness. It’s a period of silence. Where is the word from God? Where is the light to shine? Where is the Shekinah glory? And, of course, the answer to it is found as we turn in to our New Testament.

What we’re going to discover as we read on in the Bible is that only one who is the temple himself can actually right the wrongs that are represented not only here but actually everywhere. Remember, he says to the Jews, “You destroy this temple, and in three days I’ll raise it again.” And they said, “This is insanity.”[6] But they didn’t understand he was referring to himself.

So, throughout the chapter—and I hope you picked this up as I read it—you will notice that Nehemiah intersperses all that he does in a prayerful manner. He’s not engaged in a big, long prayer time, but in the same way that earlier, where we didn’t study—you know, where he says, “And I prayed to God, and then I said to the king,”[7] you know—so he’s constantly, if you like, in tune with God.

And so we see that his prayers are interspersed, and he pleads them on the basis—verse 22: “Remember this also in my favor, O my God, and spare me according to the greatness of your steadfast love.” That’s what he pleads: the greatness of God’s covenant love—a covenant love which, we know—when we read our Bibles backwards, as we proceed forward from here—a covenant love which finds its fulfillment, finds its culmination in the death and resurrection of the Lord Jesus, so that all who were living before Christ were saved on the basis of Christ’s sacrifice, and all who will live post-Christ are saved on that which preceded us.

And so the historical framework of this is that you will remember, perhaps, that when he asked the king if he could go, the king said, “When will you come back?”[8] That’s always a good sign. You know, if you say… I had a friend one time. He was a minister in Detroit, and he asked his elders one evening in a meeting—he said, “You know, do you think I could have a sabbatical sometime?” And they said, “Well, you know, yeah, there’s no time like the present. Why don’t you step out, and we’ll discuss it?” And so he went out in the hallway. He was out for ages. And when he came back in, they said, “We’ve decided: You can have a sabbatical for the rest of your life!” And they canned him, right there! So they weren’t interested in whether he was ever going to come back. They didn’t want him to come back.

“Can I go and deal with this problem?” he says to the king. King says, “Yeah, I’ll help you with that. But when are you coming back?” And now he’s back.

There’s a couple of things here that we just mention in passing. Here’s one: Good beginnings are no guarantee of happy endings. It’s a straightforward thing. It looks like something you would see on a shaving mirror, if there are such things.

The biblical narrative is clear on this. The narrative of Scripture provides for us frustrated ambitions, disappointing failure, neglected opportunities, broken vows, and broken relationships. Abraham was deceitful. Jacob was a cheat. Moses lost his temper. David commits adultery. Peter tells lies. This is the history. This is the biblical narrative. When you look at the lineage of Jesus, you understand why it is that Sinclair in one of his little Christmas books makes the point that Jesus came to die for the kinds of people that were in his family tree, because it was such a motley group of people.[9]

And so what we discover here is, to quote Jim Packer, that “our spiritual life is … a fragile convalescence, easily disrupted.”[10] “Our spiritual life is … a fragile convalescence, easily disrupted.” And I say to each of us who think we stand: Take heed lest we fall.[11] Poor leadership and disobedience to God’s Word is a recipe for disaster.

And that is the disaster that has unfolded in the absence of Nehemiah. He has been gone. His hand is no longer on the tiller. If you like, the tiller is the Word of God—obedience to the Word of God. And in his absence, a number of things have become apparent. I’ll just mention them. I’m not going to go on for a while, for various reasons.

Unhelpful Associations

But notice, number one, the presence of what we’ll refer to as unhelpful associations. Unhelpful associations. We read this, essentially, in verses 4–9. What had happened was that there was a sort of casualness, a laxity, that had seemingly just crept into the people of God—that the things that they had begun to take for granted or the things that they had either become bored with or whatever it was, the appeal from various quarters, their laxity had replaced their commitment.

And as I read this, I think each of us—especially if we haven’t read this in a while—might be tempted to say, “Well, we thought Nehemiah was a really nice fellow and fairly congenial and so on, and very prayerful and so on. What the world is going on with the guy here? This seems to be over the top. Isn’t it over the top?”

What’s his concern here? His concern is for the spiritual well-being of the people under his care. I mean, when you think about—the oncologist is zealous in dealing with cancer, hates it, wants to eradicate it. No father is happy to tolerate the awareness that one of his children is doing drugs. He wants to invade that immediately, wants to eradicate it completely. And when sin is revealed as sin, then a holy God could have no truck with it. And those who then seek to live holy lives ought to be in the same department.

Eliashib, of course, as we saw in the text, gave room to Tobiah. Is that a big deal? Yes, it actually is a big deal! He created space for him. It wasn’t like he said—came in here, and he said, “Well, you know, we don’t want to disrupt any of the things that are for the normal worship and things, but there’s a closet over there. It’s not very big, but you can keep your stuff in there.” No, he doesn’t do that. No, he says, “Oh, we’ll make a space for you!” And that’s exactly what he did. And the reason that he did was because he was hand-in-glove with Tobiah.

When sin is revealed as sin, then a holy God could have no truck with it. And those who seek to live holy lives ought to be in the same department.

This actually relates to a couple of the questions before about what you’re going to do with friendships. Who are the friendships going to be? Can you put yourself in a situation where a friendship may be corrupted by something? Figure it out.

Eliashib, who was a strategic person, lacked discernment. At least you’ve got to say that—especially because by the time we get to the twenty-eighth verse, his grandson is now married to the daughter of Sanballat. And throughout the project, you will remember, Nehemiah was really clear that Sanballat, Tobiah, and those characters, they were not going to have any part in anything that was going on. “You,” he said to them, “have no place in Jerusalem,”[12] let alone having a suite of rooms in the temple itself.

Unhelpful associations. This is not a personality clash. This is not because Nehemiah is ticked that Tobiah has been an irritant for him. Because he says quite clearly in verse 7, this is an “evil” thing. An evil thing.

Just the whole idea of evil—it’s peculiar, isn’t it? People just think, “There’s nothing really evil. I mean, our children are beautiful little creatures.” I mean, put them alone in a nursery, they’ll terrorize the place. Put them in a restaurant, they’ll wreck the place, given the chance. Why is that? Well, ’cause they’re bad. “No, no.” Yeah, they’re all potential juvenile delinquents, every one of them. Why? Because they’re born in sin and “shapen in iniquity.”[13] You see, our view of the world is crucial to the entire proclamation of the good news we give.

So, if we said to Nehemiah, “How did you feel when you came back and found that was the case?” he tells us in verse 8: “I was greatly displeased.”[14] Okay, good. Because, remember, the people from Moab and the Ammonites had access only into the Israeli world, into the realm of Israel, by the same route that Ruth took: “Entreat me not to leave thee nor to return from following after thee, for where you go I will go; where you die I will die. Your people will be my people, and your God will be my God.”[15] That is how she ends up in the position she’s in. But he knows that apart from that reality, if you like, of conversion, there is no place for Tobiah in that context.

“How did you feel?”

“Displeased.”

“What did you do?”

“Well, I threw all his stuff out.”

It’s a kind of a new spin on the idea of room service, you know. They come, and they go, “Room service! Room service!” And so he comes and says, “I’m going to do a little room service for you here, guys. Anybody who wants to help, it’s going out of the window.” And out of the window it goes.

And when you read the text, he removed, he cleansed, and he restored. Removed, cleansed, restored. He wasn’t simply having a bad afternoon. He was dealing with evil. It was the problem. It was the very clear problem of their unhelpful associations.

Unfulfilled Commitments

In 10–14, he’s dealing with what we might refer to as unfulfilled commitments. And I’m not going reread the text; it’s there in front of you. But he recounts the fact that the Levites and the singers were no longer functioning as they had been set apart to do in the temple precincts. And when he traced this back to the source, he realized that it was because the people had become increasingly materialistic, and as a result of that, they were not making the provisions necessary for the Levites and the singers to function in the way that God intended. And the reason that I read chapter 10 was because they had already said they would do that. They were going to observe these things. They were going to make sure that these things happened. And now they’ve decided that they’re not going to.

And so what we find is that Nehemiah acts in a very dramatic way. We could actually say that what he’s doing here is along the lines of what Paul charges Timothy to do “in the presence of God and of Christ Jesus, who[’s] to judge the living and the dead, and by his appearing and his kingdom”: to “preach the word; … ready in season … out of season; reprove, rebuke, … exhort.”[16]

Now, the Word of God will do these things. I don’t think that what we need to necessarily do is stand up and say, “Now, we’re going to have a reproving sermon this morning,” or “I’m looking forward to a bunch of rebukes this morning.” No, let the club head do the work. Just swing. Let the Word of God do the work of God by the Spirit of God. But that means that when it rebukes, we acknowledge the rebuke; that when it reproves, we make it clear that this is reproving. Because it runs counter to the way in which people think.

And the extent to which this is actually the case in our culture, I think, is far more endemic than we realize. He says—he quotes history here. You know, he says, “Well, think about Solomon later on.”

I’m reading this little book. It’s not one of the books through there, but it is from The Banner of Truth. It’s a little biographical piece on a guy called Alexander Stewart, who lived in the eighteenth century. And he was converted after he had gone into pastoral ministry. And it is the record of the impact of a believing pastor on this fellow, Alexander, as an unbelieving pastor, and how he came to understand the work of grace and so on. It then goes on to explain how he then took very seriously his role as a pastor. And I was reading this last week. And on page 144, I put a little asterisk, and I put, “c.f. Nehemiah chapter 13.” And if you don’t mind, I’m just going read this to you.

So, he’s ministering in the eighteenth century. He recognizes that the spiritual well-being of his people are his highest priority. Right is right. Wrong is wrong. Good is good. Bad is bad. Relationships are seldom neutral. There are people in whose company it’s easy to be good. There are people in whose company it’s easy to be bad. It’s not often that you’re in neutral company. It’s either moving you one direction or the other—at least that’s what I found as a teenager. Okay?

So now, in a very different era, he has discovered something that has unfolded in his parish while he was preaching somewhere else. And he says, “Another occurrence”—’cause there were some before, but I won’t give them to you—“another occurrence, last week, called for my interference,” or “my involvement.” Here it goes:

Some of the young volunteers had planned a ball, and engaged some of the lightest girls in the neighbourhood to attend. I learned that they were contriving among themselves to spend the day abroad, and to attend the ball without their parents’ knowledge. I have thought it my duty uniformly to discourage those foolish revels which increase youthful levity, and apply artificial heat to ripen the fruits of folly.

Now, there—I mean, you talk about the use of the English language! What he means is: If they clown around like this, get half drunk, doing their thing, there’s going to be a lot of unwanted pregnancies. That’s basically—that’s what he’s saying. We don’t want to encourage this kind of stuff. And so,

I repaired first to the woman of the public house (her husband died the other winter) [and this was] where the ball was to be kept. She assured me it was not agreeable to her, nor done with her consent. I then took my elder Mr W—— with me, and [we] called on every young woman in the village. [And] a few words of introduction [after], I asked each, in presence of her father and mother, if she intended to go to the ball; taking at the same time my pen and ink, and writing the person’s name and [the] answer I received. Every one answered me without hesitation, that she was not to go. I then made her give me her promise in the presence of her parents and [of] the elder, that she would not go. This they all readily did, and I wrote it down. This was on the morning of the day appointed for the dance. The lads were [all] abroad at drill. I called on two or three of them in the afternoon, and remonstrated with them. The result was, that there was no ball. It would have been extremely rash to set about any measure of this kind, without asking special direction from God.[17]

You see how this… Four times he says, “God, remember me. God, help me.” He’s not lost his temper. He’s got a view of the holiness of God that is such that he can’t countenance what is taking place. That’s the difference.

This is what he says—and here’s the reason I wrote this down. Quote from Alexander Stewart: “People learn soon to disregard admonitions from the pulpit, if they are not followed up in some way that shews the monitor to be in earnest, and concerned in the counsel he gives.”[18]

Now, if you have read—which I’m sure you have—The Reformed Pastor by Richard Baxter, then, like me, you have said to yourself, “I don’t think I have ever engaged in pastoral ministry properly or effectively at all.” People come willy-nilly into the Communion services from who knows where, believing who knows what, adapting themselves to the event without any framework given—maybe a little fencing of the Table, but it doesn’t mean anything at all, ’cause they don’t understand what you’re doing. The sense of laxity, brethren, that is representative in the framework of “conservative evangelical churches” is alarming at a level that we have never actually countenanced, at least in my lifetime. And so, when we see somebody acting like this—or even Alexander Stewart—you say, “Ah, yeah he is the eighteenth century. This is the twenty-first century.” Yeah! Yeah, it’s the twenty-first century. Did God’s Word change? No, it never changed.

“How do you feel?”

“Greatly displeased.”

“What did you do?”

“I chucked it out.”

“What about the unfulfilled commitments?”

“Well, I brought them all together. I got them all back in, and I set them in their place. I restored it.” Because he recognized that what was taking place was a genuine impediment to spiritual progress.

Unkept Promises

Then he says, “We were dealing not only with unfulfilled commitments”—and whatever the first one was that I wrote down (I don’t know what I said it was)—unhelpful associations, unfulfilled commitments, unkept promises. Unkept promises.

It’s there in 15–22: “In those days I saw in Judah people treading winepresses on the Sabbath.” They said, “Well, what’s the big deal?” Well, they had just made a covenant. I mean, this is chapter 10. “I went on my sabbatical, and I came back, and they flipped the whole thing.”

Sabbath observation set the Jews apart. It distinguished them from the surrounding culture. It was one of the most significant features of Judaism. The fact is that Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego—those guys—when they got swallowed up and taken into an alien environment, they were prepared to allow a number of things to go. They said, “Okay, you can educate us. Okay, you can change our names. But you’re not changing the stuff that relates to our Sabbath observance and the dietary restrictions that are part and parcel of who we are. This is not simply a predilection. This identifies us.”[19] And these people understood that, and they were committed to that.

But where are they now? The Sabbath observance had set them apart. Now they’ve set it aside—the increase of secularization, the increase of commercialization, and so on. They knew that the Sabbath was their particular way of acknowledging that God is the Creator, that God is the Provider, that God is the Sustainer. And it was there that their spiritual commitment was distinguishable. The spiritual dimension of their lives, they said, was more significant than the material, social, physical elements.

Now, I’m not going to stop on this, and I’m glad you’re all leaving, but—for a number of reasons—but my favorite movie, without question, is Chariots of Fire, 1981. Right. Okay. There you’ve got that amazing encounter between the royal prince and Eric Liddell. The guy who’s speaking on behalf of the royalty says, “Come now, Mr. Liddell. Would you despise the King?” Remember what he says? He says, “I would not despise the King, but I serve a King who sets kings up and sets them down. And I will not do this.” And he didn’t do it. And God honored the fact that he didn’t do it: new world record—new record, Olympic record—in a race for which he’d never prepared, only tangentially.

Remember, his sister says to him when he’s at the university and he shows up late for the Bible study, “You know, Eric, you’re spending too much time on athletics and too much time on all that stuff. You know, God made you for himself.” And he says, “Aye, Jenny. I know he made me for himself, for China. But he also made me fast. And when I run, I feel his pleasure.”[20]

Let me tell you: Whatever your view is on the Sabbath and whatever you want to do with it, there is no question in my mind that American Christianity for a significant period of time has determined that there are only nine commandments that remain valid in the Ten Commandments. This is partly due to New Testament scholarship that has said, “You know, well, this is the final rest. This is the Hebrews rest of God.”[21] I don’t need to go into it all. I’m just making the observation.

American Christianity for a significant period of time has determined that there are only nine commandments that remain valid in the Ten Commandments.

And let me tell you what has happened: The people are not coming to your church, because they think it’s more important that little Johnny goes to the swim meet, or that little Johnny is at the baseball, or whatever it might be. In other words, what they’re saying is that the physical well-being and advance of their children is more significant than their own spiritual well-being. In fact, they are prepared to take themselves out of the gathered worship of the church, which they have said they’re committed to do, in order to see this happen. And the only place in the whole of America that anybody’s got any notion of it is Chick-fil-A! Chick-fil-A! Hobby Lobby! There you go, both the same thing: “These people are crazy!” They’re making a fortune! They’re doing more business in six days than anybody is doing in seven days. Don’t you think there’s a correlation? I’ll leave it all with you. That’s fine.

If you want help on this, read John Murray, in the four volumes of John Murray, on the abiding significance of the Sabbath. The abiding significance of the Sabbath.

Unholy Marriages

Unkept promises. (Oh, stop it, Alistair.) And finally, unholy marriages. And again, you see, he just keeps praying: “Remember this … in my favor, … God, … spare me according to the greatness of your steadfast love.” And then he goes—and here we go—“In those days … I saw the Jews who had married women of Ashdod.” The purity of the temple worship, the distinctiveness of the Sabbath, and then the tolerating of this.

The issue is clearly—despite the way stuff like this was handled, before Rosa Parks was on the bus—the issue here has always been theological and spiritual. It has never been racial. Never been racial. The fact that people got that wrong is to their shame forever. What he’s saying here is that God’s commitment to his people is sacrosanct, and therefore, it is flat-out wrong for these individuals to marry into these families. And he points out—he says, “Think about it: Half of the kids don’t even know their Hebrew. Half of them speak a foreign language.” It’s not like it’s a marginal thing. It’s gone!

And so into action he goes—the action man. He said, “I confronted them and cursed them.” Again, I don’t think we should—I don’t imagine him getting all inflamed. No. No, I don’t think so. “I said, ‘Guys, come here. I’m just going to beat you. Do you realize I care about you so much?’”

Hey, just tangentially: How are the young couples in your church in relationship to the issues of corporal punishment of their own children? How much has a secular world upturned the framework that God has given? I tell my kids, “You make God a liar if you refuse to deal with your children.” Read the book of Proverbs, and try and bring up your teenage son. I mean, it’s so straightforward. But we’ve moved so far from it. And it partly comes back to those issues of the law that I mentioned at the beginning and the stuff—you go into average congregation, and there’s incipient antinomianism that runs through Reformed circles, particularly with young guys, who all of a sudden discovered grace, and now they think grace equals license. They don’t understand. They’re just not good theologians, these boys. And we’ve got to watch out for them. That’s part of my role as an old guy now.

So, he beats them, pulls out their hair. “And I made them take an oath in the name of God.” He went in the house, and he says, “I want you to promise in front of your mom and dad, and I want you to sign your name here.”

“Oh, come on! You can’t… You’re not going to be doing that, are you? At homecoming?” You want to get bombed out of your church? Try that program! I guarantee you. It won’t be the kids that will be your opponents, ’cause some of them are longing for somebody to actually do that. Some of them are longing for the parameters that grant to them the kind of framework for stability and purity and hope. And they’re not at all helped. Not at all helped.

My one granddaughter is just almost sixteen. She’ll be sixteen in a couple of weeks. She told me that she was invited to a party at somebody’s house in a secular context, not in the church context. But she was there. She’s a fifteen-year-old girl. And the parents were in the house. She decided she wanted to go home, ’cause she didn’t like the flavor of it. Afterwards, one of her friends from school told her, “When you left, one of the girls produced a bottle of vodka and started pouring shots for all the people that were in the place”—with the mom and dad up the stairs. Hmm!

Unholy marriages. I know that my friend John Piper takes a very strong view on this—stronger than I have taken in relationship to remarriage. But I understand why he does, and I respect the fact that he does. Because what he’s actually trying to say is: Marriage matters. God’s way is perfect, and everything else other than that is not simply a deviation; it’s a violation. And so we’ve got a responsibility there.

Well, I think I should stop. Nehemiah gives us a lesson in leadership that is principled. It’s actually practical in a way that maybe is more than we expect. It’s certainly prayerful.

And this is what it did for me. I found myself saying this: “Lord, am I guilty of unhelpful associations? Lord, am I guilty of unfulfilled commitments? Lord, am I guilty of unkept promises? Lord, am I guilty of looking at a woman and committing adultery with her in my heart?”[22] The ruthlessness is staggering to us because we are living in such lax times. And this is partly the answer to the fellow who had a question and hated the answer so bad that he left the building entirely, as I can see. But this is the ruthlessness of John, and with this I will finish: “And this is love,” says John—2 John—

that we walk according to his commandments; this is the commandment, just as you … heard from the beginning, so that you should walk in it. For many deceivers have gone out into the world, those who do not confess the coming of Jesus Christ in the flesh. Such a one is the deceiver and the antichrist. Watch yourselves, so that you may not lose what we have worked for, but may win a full reward. Everyone who goes on ahead and does[n’t] abide in the teaching of Christ, does not have God. Whoever abides in the teaching has both the Father and the Son. If anyone comes to you and does[n’t] bring this teaching, do not receive him into your house or give him any greeting, for whoever greets him takes part in his [evil] works.[23]

So let God be God and every man a liar.[24]

What a privilege to be shepherds of God’s people! What a challenge!

Be strong in the strength that is ours in Christ Jesus.[25]

Father, thank you for the day. Thank you for the privilege of being in each other’s company. Thank you for your Word, which shines as a light on our path[26] and is food for our souls and establishes our coming and going.[27] We do pray that you will help us to process these things—that the forcefulness with which I may have said things is only significant insofar as it reinforces your Word. Lord, we, on our best day, are unprofitable servants,[28] and we acknowledge this freely—that we don’t stand in judgment on Abraham’s deceitful approach when he had such a beautiful wife and was trying to figure out what to do. We recognize how deceitful our own hearts are.

And so we thank you that we can pray as Nehemiah prayed: Remember us, O Lord, according to your steadfast love, which has been provided for us fully, finally, savingly in the death and resurrection of your dearly beloved Son, in whose name we pray. Amen. Amen.

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[1] Dale Ralph Davis, 1 Kings: The Wisdom and the Folly (Fearn, UK: Christian Focus, 2002), 83n5.

[2] Romans 12:1 (paraphrased).

[3] See Numbers 22:1–6.

[4] See Psalm 119:18.

[5] See John 1:5; 8:12.

[6] John 2:19–20 (paraphrased).

[7] Nehemiah 2:4–5 (paraphrased).

[8] Nehemiah 2:6 (paraphrased).

[9] Sinclair B. Ferguson, The Dawn of Redeeming Grace (The Good Book Company, 2021), 26.

[10] J. I. Packer,Rediscovering Holiness(Ann Arbor: Servant, 1992), 41.

[11] See 1 Corinthians 10:12.

[12] Nehemiah 2:20 (paraphrased).

[13] Psalm 51:5 (KJV).

[14] Nehemiah 13:8 (NIV).

[15] Ruth 1:16 (paraphrased).

[16] 2 Timothy 4:1–2.

[17] Memoirs of the Late Rev. Alexander Stewart, D. D.: One of the Ministers of Canongate, Edinburgh (Edinburgh: William Oliphant, 1822), 169–170.

[18] Stewart, 170.

[19] See Daniel 1.

[20] Chariots of Fire, directed by Hugh Hudson, written by Colin Welland (1981). Paraphrased.

[21] See Hebrews 4:1–11.

[22] See Matthew 5:28.

[23] 2 John 6–11 (ESV).

[24] See Romans 3:4.

[25] See Ephesians 6:10.

[26] See Psalm 119:105.

[27] See Psalm 121:8.

[28] See Luke 17:10.