My dear wife is my best gift. She's a gift from God. It is
a pretty tough country. If she wasn't there, I'm not
sure, in a human sense, I could be. Because she's, well, Gary
once said she's a bit of a, she's a woman to ride the river with,
or that she'd walk beside the wagon. And I said, brother, she'd
be driving the wagon. But she sends her greetings,
and I love, she's become a grandmother in these last two weeks. And
she was planning to come, and then that baby came. And then
it's daddy who had to go back to work. So she's with our daughter
and our youngest daughter looking after little Evie. But she does
send her love and we are thankful for your love and prayers. Let's
open the Word of God together. Let's turn to the book of Nehemiah. Just after Ezra there. Last night
when we, those of us that gathered together, we looked at this book
and I was thinking what What would be a good verse to just
define what's happening here? And I've thought of Hebrews chapter
7 verse 19. For the law made nothing perfect,
but the bringing in of a better hope did. By the witch we draw
nigh to God. For the law made nothing perfect,
but the bringing in of a better hope did. by the witch we draw
nigh to God." What we've got here is Jerusalem that was, which
is in bondage with all her children. It's ruined, its gates are broken
down and burned with fire, its walls are tumbling down, and
it's oppressed and under a yoke. We talked about whether we should
be thinking about the man who came to rebuild the walls and
the doors as a bit like a pastor in a church and the church people
getting behind him. We decided that that wasn't the
way to look at this book. At least I hope we decided, I
did. That would be the wrong way to look at this book. Another
wrong way to look at this book would be to get all nationalistic
and say, well, Fortress America. We've got to build up those walls.
Nehemiah says so. You've got to look to those men
that stand strong. Well, that might be a good thing, but that's
not the best thing. That's not the thing that God's church and
elect people should be about. What we should do is we should
go to the Bible and go to the Lord Jesus and go to His Word
and find out Why these things are those that Jesus said speak
of him. These are they which speak of
me. Search the scriptures he said
for in them you think to find eternal life. These are they
which speak of me. This is our Lord Jesus' word
and every part of this word speaks of him and it is my infirmity
that I can't always see that. And we have to rely on His Holy
Spirit to open our eyes, give us a heart to understand it,
to see Jesus and be like those Greeks. So as we would see Jesus. What I felt was here in the first
two chapters was the servant of the Lord. And we're looking
not at the earthly Jerusalem as we think of the servant of
the Lord, but the heavenly Jerusalem that comes down out of heaven
from God. The city that's made of living
stones. The one that is free and is the mother of us all.
The city that the builder and maker is God, not man. Here we have who are God's people,
His chosen, His called, His beloved. We don't have a continuing city,
no matter how much. I was raised in a city called
Newcastle. I love that city. I spent the first 35 years of
my life there. I'd like to go back there. At the moment, it's
been leveled by a big hurricane. And my parents are there, and
my brothers, my sisters. But that's not the first city
that I feel loyalty to. I feel loyalty to a city that's
going to endure and is eternal. and its builder and maker is
God, and its citizens are among us. God's children, His chosen, His
redeemed, are the citizens of that city. And it doesn't matter
whether they're black, white, Brindle, North, South, Aussie,
Brits, even Brits are going to be there. He said I was a short
time in England. Thirteen years seemed a long
time, I can tell you. They're a bit more restrained
in England than we are in Australia, and you guys down here. But the
servant of the Lord came because he was a man of sorrows, acquainted
with grief, and he was full of sympathy for a ruined people,
as he considered them. And he considered them before
their creation, before the creation of a world. Nehemiah considered
these people, when he hears news of a fallen creation, of a fallen
ruined city. But the Lord Jesus and our Heavenly
Father and the Holy Spirit, our Triune God, had mercy on a people
before they were ever created. And He fought upon them and He
was touched with the feeling of their infirmities. And He
came into this world. But we saw that He was sent by
a sovereign. He was unashamed to call them
brethren. He said, my brethren came. But he was sent by a sovereign.
Now, he prayed to the God of heaven. He interceded. He was a mediator. He was an
intercessor. And the God of heaven sent him.
He used human instruments. It might seem like Artaxerxes
was the sovereign, but he wasn't. He was the king, whose heart
is in the Lord's hands. And the Lord turned it whichever
way he wished. And he gave him grace in his
eyes. And, you know, it wasn't a good
thing to be unhappy in the presence of the King. People have died
for less. But God moved that man's heart
to provide everything that Nehemiah would need, and to send him. Well, our Lord Jesus came with
much more, because His work was a greater work. These works that
are under the Old Covenant, remember we said what it says there in
Galatians, The Jerusalem that now is the earthly Jerusalem
is in bondage. It's Hagar with all her children. But the Jerusalem that is above
is free. So there's bondage here. We can't
just pretend it's not there. That's why these people are being
plundered and ruined again and again. And Nehemiah confesses
their sin in the first chapter. And so he's sent by a sovereign. But he's also contradicted by
sinners. He has resistance of sinners
against himself. And these men, Tobiah, and Geshem,
and Sanballat, They're sinners who contradict Him every step
of the way. And our Lord Jesus, we're told
that we should consider Him who endured such contradictions of
sinners against Himself. That's where we just about ended
up. And we saw that it was for our
encouragement, because we who, you know, we're earthen vessels,
we're clay pots, but those of us who know Jesus, we want to
be full of unsearchable riches, we want treasure in earthen vessels,
we want to try and be a saviour of Christ in every place, we
want to bring that gospel. Well the thing that that will
do, as soon as sinners hear that someone is seeking the welfare
of God's people, they'll rise up. They'll rise up. Till God opens their eyes, till
they're born again of His Spirit. If they are among those chosen
people, they'll come by grace to Him. And there'll be a whole
different story. But they'll resist the One who
comes to seek the welfare of the people. And that was where
we ended. One had come to seek the welfare of the people. But
tonight we want to look at the Saviour of the city. The Saviour
of the city. So he's got to come, first of
all, to the city. He came from a very high and
lofty position. And you can see the parallels.
We can't come to Nehemiah any other way except that points
us and brings us to Lord Jesus. And I pray God will bless us
much, much more even in coming days as we go back to this portion
and not just leave it. The things that are here, they're
eternal and they're unchangeable in the heavens and they're our
hope and our sustenance. And I can tell you when I mean,
this is a big meeting. We generally get together with
four or five people. This is a big meeting. And it's
so good, you know, to be among friends. But so often, we feel
small, and we feel ashamed of what we are, we feel burdened,
because we know that in us, that is in our flesh, dwells no good
thing. Where are we going to look? Look to Him who loved us
and gave Himself for us, the Savior of the city, the city
of God. What's our hope? That one day
we shall see Him as He is and we'll be with Him because we'll
be like Him. It's a hope, a sure foundation,
confidence for the future. There is no other confidence.
So He comes and He enters the ruins. And that's really important. He comes from a high and lofty
and privileged position, Nehemiah. Remember, he didn't send a construction
team, he didn't send mobile mission maintenance. Much as I'd love,
you know, where we live, it'd be great to have a guy, guys
just turn up, you know, but it doesn't happen. I would. Yeah,
you would, brother. It's a long way, but happy to
see you. But, you know, he doesn't say, Artaxerxes, send the construction
team from Shushan. Send them down and fix it all
up. Then we'll listen and hear and see and get the news of what's
been done. He goes himself. Have you thought of the enormity
of the love of God? The enormity that he should enter
into our world as a man? that he should be touched by
the feeling of our infirmities and tested in every way as we
are. Is your life a testing, a temptation? Is it surrounded
by things that are snares and evil and draw at your heart and
present themselves? Well, how is it for the perfect
man among us? I mean, we're shocked by what
we do. We read the newspapers, we see the television. We know
what happens in our streets. We know what happens in our families.
How does it confront Him? And yet He comes. Yet He comes. He comes from a greater height
than Nehemiah came. Nehemiah was a king's cupbearer,
was a prime minister, a vice president, I don't know, secretary
of state, something like that. This is the Son of God, by whom
the worlds were created, for whom the worlds were created. And He comes to a fallen, ruined
people. And we have no defense. The wall's
broken down. Gates are burned with fire. And
we are plundered and ruined. Sinners. And He enters the ruins personally.
And God promised that our Lord Jesus, He promised, God promised
that He would come. Isaiah 40, I did just, you know,
Not everything is a product of study for preachers. I was just
sitting there and I said to Gary, where is that verse? And I, you
know, God gives you things, everything is a gift. But in Isaiah 40,
the prophet says that, Behold, the Lord God shall come with a strong hand, and his arm
will rule for him, and his reward is with him, and his work before
him. He shall feed his flock like
a shepherd. He shall gather the lambs with his arm, and carry
them in his bosom, and shall gently lead those that are with
young. Behold, the Lord God shall come."
So we beheld Nehemiah coming, but we know he points to a greater
one. We look at the city of Jerusalem
ruined, but we see a city that will never be ruined. His builder
and maker is God. And, you know, he comes to a people that he
knows by name. Now, we skipped from chapter
2 to chapter 6, but, you know, between that there's a lot of
people that are named. Sometimes they're named by what
they do, the goldsmiths and the grocers and these different...
Sometimes they're named by who their family is, sometimes they're
named by where they live. But they are real people. They
are the inhabitants of a ruined city. They're not the people
outside the walls. They're a separate, real, numbered, identified people. And that should encourage us. I don't know really how to preach
through all those names and all the things they're doing. But
I know this, that it's a real people, a chosen people. are people that were known by
name. And He knows our names. He knows them that are His. He
came for them. And this is what He says to us
in John 6. Just as Nehemiah knew and rehearses
before us the names of the people whom he cared about, for whom
he came, and whom his work would rescue, so our Lord Jesus tells
us that this is the will the Father's will the one who sent
him in John 6 and Jesus is saying I am the bread of life our Lord
Jesus is the living bread and he confronts those who are around
him with their unbelief you've seen me you don't believe and
then he comforts us and all who have heard his voice verse 37
all that the Father giveth me shall come to me and And him
that cometh to me, I will in no wise cast out. That will keep you. Men will
cast you out. It happens. But that will keep you. Verse 38, For I came down from
heaven, not to do mine own will, but the will of him that sent
me. And this is the Father's will
which has sent me." You see that? Sent. Sent. Sent. Here he is, he's sent. "...that
of all which he has given me, I should lose nothing, but should
raise it up again at the last day. And this is the will of
him that sent me, that everyone which seeth the Son, and believeth
on him, may have everlasting life, and I will raise him up
at the last day." And everyone went, Amen. Then the Jews murmured
at him. Those who cling to lying vanities
forsake their own mercy. And Geshem the Arab, and Sanballat
the Horonite, and Tobijah the Ammonite, they murmured. They
murmured when they heard that someone had come to seek the
welfare. But he came. He entered the ruins and he assessed
it. And he came quietly and without fanfare. And he came in the night
and we see our Lord Jesus came, didn't he? He came in the night. He came quietly. He was born
in a stable. And for 30 years, He veiled His
glory. But what was He doing? You see,
He didn't only enter the ruins personally, but He assessed the
damage. He experienced the damage. He endured the contradictions
of sinners against Himself. He was born of a woman at the
right time. He was born of a woman, He was born under the law to
redeem those who were under the law. And He obeyed the law in
every point. No one ever has before Him, no
one ever will after Him. He established a righteousness
that was perfect. A righteousness that was practiced. He was the only truly, He is
the only truly righteous man on this side of heaven. in that
sense of personal, innate, righteous nature from beginning to end.
In every action, every thought, every provoking situation, every
aggressive situation, every positive and every negative situation,
he assessed the damage. He saw what sin was. He groaned
at times at the spectacle of death and ruin. And Nehemiah saw the damage and
he assessed it. And not just a damaged city,
but damaged people. If you like, it's again the lesser
to the greater. Nehemiah went from Shushan's
glory to a ruined capital. But the Lord Jesus went from
heaven's glory to earth's ruinous total depravity. No prospect of reformation or
rebuilding. only redemption. Redemption of
a people and that's where Jesus' work is much more than Nehemiah's.
That's why Nehemiah's work had to be repeated. This wasn't the
last time that the walls of Jerusalem were broken down. This wasn't
the last time that the Jewish people were plundered and it
wasn't the first time. It had to happen again and again
all through the period of the judges. They weren't rebuilding
the city but the people was ruined in idolatry, and they were separated
and punished for their sin, and God had to raise up judge after
judge. The law made nothing perfect, and just as those offerings had
to be made continually, because they could never accomplish what
they pointed to in Christ, so a work like Nehemiah's will never
be enough. You can't make sinners better
by some work and some program Jesus Christ makes sinners saints
by his work and by the will of God so Nehemiah's work was temporary
by the time our Lord Jesus is preparing to go to the cross
he is saying that Jerusalem is going to fall And by the time
the Apostle Paul has himself lost his life, Jerusalem, not
one stone lays upon another. It's gone. And any idea that
there's some special place over there in Palestine today that
we should look to be rebuilt as a Christian's hope and that
the Church should put its energies into is a false and forlorn hope.
The Jerusalem that now is is in bondage with all her children.
The Jerusalem above is free. That's it. So he assesses what
must be done and it won't be temporary, it'll be permanent.
It'll be a finished work. It'll be a work that no man can
do. He'll redeem those who were under
the law. Nehemiah redeemed no one. In
that, his work is very different from our Lord Jesus. And we redeem
no one, even when we bring the gospel. It's only Jesus who redeems
his people. It's only God who redeems his
people. And he does it. That's the thing. He does it.
And he does the work himself. Now, in that, Nehemiah can point
us to it. Because Nehemiah sets about doing
what's needed. He doesn't just assess the damage,
does he? He leads in it. He leads in what
needs to be done. And well, the Lord Jesus led
in what needed to be done because He did it all. Because no one
else could do it. If one sinner contributed one
iota of righteousness or works to our Lord Jesus' work, it's
all undone. Because you can be obedient in
all the points of the law, you offend in one point, you're guilty
of all. And we know, and we said last night, our Lord Jesus was
without sin. And He had to be without sin
to be our Saviour. And He had to suffer in our place
for sinners as the sinless substitute to be our Saviour. And nothing
can be added that is fallen, and He cannot enter into anything
which is other than the holiness of God. He's separate from sinners,
and that makes Him a Saviour. That makes him a saviour. So, he effectively completes
the work. Now, Nehemiah did that, in a
lesser sense, for a temporary time, didn't he? He effectively
completed the work. So, he enters the ruin personally.
Jesus became a man. He was born of a virgin. He was conceived of the Holy
Spirit. And all his life, he walked in
humanity. He was found in fashion as a
man and he became obedient. He took the form of a servant.
He was obedient even under death and death upon a cross. Because
that was God's assessment of what needed to be done. And then
finally he effectively completes the work. Now, it's a wonderful
thing to see that nothing is ever uncertain. Here he is before
the cross. Here he is when he's about to
be betrayed into the hand of sinners. Here he is when the
disciples are going to despair that everything... You know,
we had thought, they say, after these events of late in the Gospel
of John, these events after the cross and the betrayal, they
thought, well, we thought he was the one who was going to
restore. And they're walking away. That's... Human understanding
can only ever bring you to the point where you really walk away
from the Gospel. You walk away from the reality of what's done
and choose some lesser way. And it's a way of oppression
and sadness, sorrow. There's no joy there. Tomorrow
night we're going to see what the strength of God's people
is. And Nehemiah will point that to us too. But first we've got
to see the work and the sufficiency of it that God has done. And
the fact that there was never any uncertainty as to when it
would be done and who would do it and that it was finished.
even before the foundation of the world. And Jesus comes and
he's before the cross, it's before the betrayal, it's before his
death, his burial, his resurrection, his ascension. And in John 17,
he lifts his eyes up to heaven and he speaks these words, Father,
the hour has come. Glorify thy son, that thy son
also may glorify thee, as thou hast given him power over all
flesh. that he should give eternal life
to as many as thou hast given him. And this is life eternal,
that they might know thee the only true God. And Jesus Christ,
whom thou hast sent, I have glorified thee on earth. I have finished
the work that thou gavest me to do. I have finished the work
that thou gavest me to do. Now, Every denizen of hell and every
benighted sinner in Jerusalem at that time was in opposition
to our Lord Jesus. In that, Nehemiah points us to
the opposition that he had. You see there in Nehemiah chapter
6. And what do they want Nehemiah
to do? He's about to work. They want
him to come down, don't they? They want him to stop. They seek to entrap him. How often did the Pharisees,
the Sadducees, the Herodians, the lawyers, the scribes, what
did they seek to do with Jesus in his words? They sought to
trap him. Even the disciples became afraid.
And when he decided to go down to Bethany and told them that
Lazarus was dead, Thomas said, well, let's go too, to die with
him. And when he told Peter what he was going to do, Peter said,
No, Lord. And you know what the Lord said
to him? Get thee behind me, Satan. You
know, even those that had walked with him for three years, they
were afraid, and they ended up in opposition. That word Satan,
it means opposer. It means the enemy. And here's
Nehemiah, he describes very much for us, and Sambalat and Geshem. And so we're not surprised about
that. But then he goes down a bit further. They say, you're a rebel
against the king. Pharisees and Sadducees said,
we have no king but Caesar. Pilate said, well are you a king
then? And they wanted to change the inscription. He said he was
the king of the Jews. But they made this accusation
that Jesus was saying, our Lord Jesus Christ was saying he was
another king. And here they make this accusation that these people
are wanting to rebel against Artaxerxes, the king. Trying
to dissuade and accuse in every way. And of course these things, as
with our Lord Jesus, when they brought those witnesses, and
they could find nothing against him, because they were false
witnesses. Nehemiah says in verse 8, Then I said unto him, There
are no such things done as thou sayest. And where does he look for strength? He says, Now therefore, in verse
9, Now therefore, O God, strengthen my hands. Now, it's a mystery
to me. I don't understand a lot. I see
our Lord Jesus in my mind's eye. I hear the testimony of John
and others, and he falls to the ground, and he cries out, and he asks
the Father if it were possible to deliver him. But he says, nevertheless, Not
my will, thy will be done. God sends an angel, his father
sends an angel to strengthen him. Oh God, strengthen my hands.
I don't understand that. But I know it's his true humanity,
his perfect humanity, his utter dependence and his true divinity
in indissoluble union as he comes to do the father's will. And
I've got to rest in that, because that is all my salvation. It's
all there in that, in the obedience, the active and passive obedience,
the obedience of a saviour, of a son, of one who is sent, and
he's the saviour of the city of God. And the work was finished. And that's what Nehemiah says
about his work. Now those walls are going to
come back down. He's not going to be around to see it, probably,
good thing. But everything in this life that's
material and national and geographical is going to end. One day the
walls are going to come down. But the city of God will not
end. It's going to be the jewel and the crown of a new creation.
and God is going to dwell among us, and He's going to be the
light of our city. And it's because of what was
done outside Jerusalem. The Lord Jesus went to the cross.
Now, they wanted Him to come down. If you look at Mark chapter
15, this is what they said to Him. Even,
you know, You can never cease to wonder at the brutality of
humanity when faced with the suffering of a fellow man. We're
a brutal race. And these people, they were animated
against him. And they said to him, ah, thou,
this is Mark chapter 15, ah, thou that destroyest the temple.
That's what they said to him. Buildest it in three days. This
is verse 29. Save thyself and come down from
the cross. Now that false prophet said to
Nehemiah, come and save yourself. Come into the temple. They're
going to seek to kill you. Jesus knew why he was going up
to Jerusalem. He knew he was going to be betrayed in the hands
of sinners. He knew they were going to kill him. He knew he
was going to ascend onto the cross. And He would not come
down to prove anything to anyone. Because if He had come down,
He wouldn't have finished the work that the Father had given.
A work that was finished before the foundation of the world.
A work that He prayed to His Father and said, I have finished.
But a work that had to be done. A work that had to be done. And still sinners cry, come down
off the cross. They want every other way. But
the way that comes through Jesus Christ, offering up his life,
hung between heaven and earth, bearing the justice of God, bearing
the just punishment for the sin of his people, being accounted
guilty, who was innocent. our substitute and our savior.
He finished the work and he satisfied God's law and he established
a righteousness that is forever and a righteousness that is infinite
and a righteousness that is imputed to his people and inherited in
a new world when we are remade. Now that's not yet. It's pretty
obvious, isn't it? But this is the great hope. We
are not going away from everything that is good and satisfying and
valuable as we age, as we're struck with infirmities, as diseases
and different things make this world an unhappy and a harder
place than we had hoped. These things are common to all
who live in a world that is ruined in sin. that there's an uncommon
grace that will bring us into the next world because of the
work of him who would not come down off the cross. You know,
they asked him twice. They said it again. He saved
others himself he cannot save. Let the Christ, the King of Israel,
come down from the cross that we may see and believe. That's a stickling point, isn't
it? That atonement. That is particular and limited
to His people. Take that away and we'll believe. But what does He do? He answers
in not a word. But He answers His Father. He
cries out to His Father. And He says, It is finished. And that's not a hopeless cry.
That's a cry of completion. And then He yields up His Spirit.
Now that's the greater work. And all those men who we read
of, who were moved by the Spirit of Christ under the old covenant
to seek the welfare of the children of Israel, that's the work they
could never do. And that's why we're under a
new covenant that's endless, it's not temporary. And we're
going to inherit a new creation. And we have a new and living
hope. I believe that's where Nehemiah,
under God's good providence, can only ever lead us. And I
trust that comforts your heart, brothers and sisters. It comforts
mine. And we looked at the one, and you
could look it up in 1 Peter chapter 2, who lays a stone in Zion. Nehemiah laid a lot of stones.
But our God has laid a stone in the heavenly Zion. What does
Zion stand for? What's it another name for? Jerusalem. And then to that living cornerstone,
other living stones are added by the work of God. One day,
all his people will be called. That'll be the day when he will
come.