Today we looked at Nehemiah. We didn't have time to look at the whole book, we just really looked at the first couple of chapters. To start with we came up with what we already knew about Nehemiah:
- He had a vineyard ( I have yet to check this... but perhaps this is getting mixed up with Naboth??)
- His name means 'Comfort of Yahweh'
- He was a servant to the King - cupbearer
- Rebuilding the walls of Jerusalem
We have to look out for Nehemiah praying - you see different forms of prayer within the look.
2:1-5 The king was asking Nehemiah "what are you requesting?" and Nehemiah prayed before answering - we discussed how this might've been an extremely short one such as "Lord give me strength" without needing to close his eyes either.
His prayer in chapter 1 starts off by recognising God for who he is. He prays for the people as PART of the people - not in between the people and God. v6 "...which we have sinned against you..." He's the same level of behaviour and responsibility as everyone else.
See Isaiah 55:8 'For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways, declares the LORD. 9For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways and my thoughts than your thoughts.'
Everything might look good from the outside but when you look closer theres all these glitches.. take the Earth, for example. It looks perfectly round and flat from really far away but when you look really close you see quite a different picture. No-one standing in the Himilayas is going to say the earth is flat! That was difficult to explain... (anyone care to help me?)
We then looked briefly at the rebuilding of the walls around Jerusalem . It wasn't for a while after the temple got rebuilt that the walls around Jerusalem got repaired (see that diagram I drew, the gap between the 80years rebuilding the temple and when Nehemiah comes into the picture). Nehemiah 2:17 says
"17Then I said to them, "You see the trouble we are in, how Jerusalem lies in ruins with its gates burned. Come, let us build the wall of Jerusalem, that we may no longer suffer derision."
Need to build up the walls to distract us from things of the outside world. Rebuilt - stop people breaking through. Try to do it induvidually - cannot do it. Work together, help each other, encourage each other.
chapter 5:19 reads "Remember for my good, O my God, all that I have done for this people." This sounds pretty boastful but it's Nehemiah needing God's salvation. He's been trying hard but needs God's salvation. It seems boastful but that is probably just the language used.
Our task: Look through Nehemiah and find bits where we think he is praying (If i remember correctly).
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