Repentance

When Nehemiah surveyed the city of Jerusalem to assess the damage, it could have been overwhelming to him to try and imagine how he was going to accomplish such a momentous task. But instead of letting fear control him, he rallied the people of Jerusalem to work together to rebuild the walls and the gates. Every family worked on the section of wall that was directly in front of their own neighborhood. Slowly and steadily the walls and gates were rebuilt by a community of like-minded people.

They prayed to the Lord for protection but, because their enemies wanted to thwart their efforts, they stationed look outs to keep watch day and night. God expects us to be practical; He wants us to talk to Him, asking for the things we need to survive but He also expects us to put rubber on the road.

The late J. Vernon McGee use to say that someone sitting in a lawn chair looking at his car in the driveway, thinking about going to church will never actually get to church unless he gets up and gets into his car and drives there. Our salvation is kind of like that where just thinking about Jesus is not enough. Indeed it’s the first step towards salvation but unless we put our trust in Christ, believe and put our faith in Him, we will just be sitting in our lawn chair going nowhere.

I sat in church for much of my adult life. I have been a worship leader, bible study leader and an associate pastor. Much of what goes on in our modern day evangelical settings is like the man sitting in the lawn chair on his front lawn thinking about getting to church. Folks, until we repent and clear the rubbish out of our lives we can’t be holy and set apart for God’s use.

You can’t live like hell and expect to land in heaven. True salvation is a gift from God and we can’t earn, purchase or work for it. However once we put our trust in Christ, we are new creatures. The old man passes away and we are “Born Again”. We have to repent and turn our lives over to God. We need to allow God access to the secret places in our minds and take steps towards a life that reflects God’s will.

I believe many sitting in church on Sundays are fooling themselves into thinking that they are saved when their lives are full of habitual sin and they are not making an effort to change. Going inside McDonalds doesn’t make you a hamburger so why should going to church make you a Christian?

“I beseech you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, that you present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable to God, which is your reasonable service. And do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind, that you may prove what is that good and acceptable and perfect will of God.” Romans 12:1-2.

The bible teaches that we all need to evaluate our lives, how we live, the way we treat our loved ones and especially the way we treat each other. We must put off the old man and turn towards God, living in a way that is pleasing to Him. Jesus use to say of the religious leaders of His day that they were like whitewashed tombs that are full of dead men’s bones. He went on to say that they took pride making sure the outside of the cup was clean but the inside of it was full of filth.

Just like in Nehemiah’s day, we all need to work together to build up God’s kingdom. We need to not be so concerned about keeping up appearances but rather in  making sure that our hearts are clean. The bible also teaches that it’s not what goes into a man that defiles him but rather what comes out of his heart. God’s Holy Spirit will help us to break addictions that bind us from moving closer to Him. If we are to be filled with the Spirit ready to use by God to build up His kingdom then we must empty our cups of all filth.

You see, our bodies are the temple of the Holy Spirit and God has prepared good works for us to do if we will only surrender to Him. Every one of you who truly hears the Shepherd’s voice is a living stone that God is building His kingdom with. Let us encourage each other to good works as the Day draws near!

Building walls

The nation of Israel, more specifically the tribes living in and around Jerusalem, had been taken captive for seventy years in Babylon. In the year 530 B.C. the Persians captured Babylon allowing the Jewish remnant to return to their country and to the city of Jerusalem. Immediately some fifty thousand of them did return and set about the task of rebuilding the temple. Discouraged by opposition from their new neighbors, lack of resources and manpower they soon abandoned the work with only the foundation of the temple rebuilt.

Sixteen years later God raised up two men, Haggai and Zechariah who challenged the people concerning their condition and way of life and pointed out their neglect of the things of God. The people were inspired by these two men and the work of the reconstruction of the temple was once again revived. The temple was completed some twenty years after the first group had returned from captivity.

Sixty more years passed by, when another group of Jewish men and women returned to Jerusalem under the leadership of Ezra in the year 458 B.C. Ezra was a priest who could trace his lineage back to Israel’s first priest, Aaron. Ezra set out upon the task of revitalizing the peoples’ moral and spiritual health. They had been living in a deplorable state, challenged on every side by their enemies, lack of resources and reinforcements from the Persian king.

For some ninety years after the first group of Jews returned to rebuild the temple, the gates and walls of the city still remained broken and desolate. In the year 445 B.C. fourteen years after Ezra’s return God spoke to another man, Nehemiah, and began preparing him for the task of rebuilding the walls and gates.

One day Nehemiah’s brother and some other Jews returned from Jerusalem and reported to Nehemiah the horrible conditions of its gates and walls. God’s glorious city of grace was in shambles and they were to blame for it. As Nehemiah heard his brother’s account, he fell down and wept, and he mourned, and he fasted, and he prayed.

Jesus would also one day weep over the city of Jerusalem and see its inhabitants as lost sheep without a shepherd. From the Mount of Olives He saw its future destruction and mourned for it even agonizing over it only days before His own brutal death on a cross. And just as the wall and gates around the city of peace would one day be restored under Nehemiah’s leadership, Jesus three days after His death would burst forth from the tomb in glorious resurrection.

Nehemiah asked God to allow him to go to Jerusalem and rebuild the walls and gates. Being the cup bearer to the Persian king was not a job that you could just step away from and keep your head on your shoulders. It was not as if you could just ask the king for a paid vacation or sick leave.

Nehemiah prayed and asked God to open the doors for him preparing the way. And so the king agreed to grant Nehemiah’s request and in addition also gave him rights to vast resources in the king’s forests. We are totally inadequate to accomplish any meaningful task in our own strength and with our own resources without first asking and recognizing God as the source of the works of our hands.

Soon Nehemiah was in Jerusalem quietly surveying the damage under the cover of night. He took his time to investigate and plan for a united attack on this massive building project. Nehemiah knew that the walls and gates could only be rebuilt if everyone worked together in unity. Neighbors working hand in hand with each other.

God is so good! I’m incredibly overjoyed to announce that right here in Alpine, through another modern day Nehemiah, another wall is being rebuilt. Through the sacrifice and hard work of many men, women and young adult volunteers the new Youth Center is thriving. Many kids are spending hours having fun and fellowship at the facility located at 2153 Arnold Way. Its a safe haven where young adults and teens can make new friends and get reacquainted with old ones while enjoying video games, billiards and basketball.

Lives are being changed and hearts healed as the adult volunteers supervise all teens and their activities. Everyone is learning to respect themselves while respecting others. There is an incredible united front of unity that exists as volunteers from many different organizations and churches come to join hands and help build lives. Just as in Nehemiah’s day there is a mountain of work to be done. The Youth Center only exists because of donations from its gracious donors. Won’t you be a Nehemiah and help build up the wall for the youth of Alpine?

Daniel

Every word, every letter, every punctuation on the pages of the Bible are all there by God’s design. Ezra and Nehemiah chronicled the times when the Jews were allowed to return to Jerusalem to rebuild the temple of the Lord and city walls.  70 years before them Daniel was taken captive and hauled away from Jerusalem to Babylon. Daniel grew up in a foreign land, with foreign customs but did not once forsake the God of his forefathers. Daniel ate well, worked hard and never compromised his relationship with the one, true and living God.

Daniel spent most of his adult life in Babylon. He brought with him sacred scrolls from Jerusalem and had been reading from the scroll of Jeremiah. He knew from the text that Jeremiah had foretold that they would be in captivity for 70 years. Daniel was now in his 90’s and knew that their days of captivity were nearing an end.

Daniel was a man of prayer. On one such occasion he positioned himself with his face toward the Lord God to make request by prayer and supplications, with fasting, sackcloth, and ashes. “O Lord, great and awesome God, who keeps His covenant and mercy with those who love Him, and with those who keep His commandments, we have sinned and committed  iniquity, we have done wickedly and rebelled, even by departing from Your precepts and Your judgments.”

Now while Daniel was still praying, Gabriel, who he had seen in a vision, came flying swiftly to him and proclaimed “Seventy weeks are determined for your people and for your holy city, to finish the transgression, to make an end of sins, To make reconciliation for iniquity, to bring in everlasting righteousness, to seal up vision and prophecy, and to anoint the Most Holy.” Daniel 9:24.

Gabriel outlined for Daniel, seventy weeks of years or 490 years that would determine the coming of the Messiah and the future time of tribulation. He went on to predict the time when the Messiah the Prince would present Himself to the world. “Know therefore and understand, that from the going forth of the command to restore and rebuild Jerusalem until Messiah the Prince, there shall be seven weeks and sixty-two weeks;  The street shall be built again , and the wall, even in troublesome times.” Daniel 9:25.

Recorded here in the book of Daniel is the date, in advance, of the Messiah’s first coming. Unfortunately for Daniel, at this point in time the command to rebuild Jerusalem had not yet been given. It would be some years later that Nehemiah would record the actual calendar reference “And it came to pass in the month of Nisan, in the twentieth year of King Artaxerxes, when wine was before him, that I took the wine and the bread and gave it to the king.”  Nehemiah 2:1.

While serving the king bread and wine Nehemiah first prays then asks the king if he may journey to Jerusalem to rebuild it. The king grants Nehemiah’s request which is the trigger that starts the clock ticking in Gabriel’s prophecy to Daniel.

The prophecy goes on to say “And after the sixty-two weeks Messiah shall be cut off, but not for Himself;” Daniel 9:26.

If you do the math, account for different calendars, 173,880 days from the declaration of Artaxerxes calculates to April 6^th, AD 32 which is the exact day Jesus rode into Jerusalem on a donkey.

This was the day the psalmist prophesied about “This is the day the Lord has made; we will rejoice and be glad in it. Save now, I pray, O Lord!  O Lord, I pray, send now prosperity. Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord!” psalm 118:24-26. Jesus and His disciples sang this psalm as they left the Passover meal.

Zechariah wrote 520 years earlier “Rejoice greatly, O daughter of Zion! Shout, O daughter of Jerusalem Behold, your King is coming to you; He is just and having salvation, lowly and riding on a donkey, a colt the foal of a donkey.” Zechariah 9:9.

But after the 69 weeks were fulfilled, Gabriel told Daniel that the Messiah would be “cut off, but not for Himself.” This was the crucifixion where He was cut off for us. Jesus died so that we can be forgiven.

This good news is too wonderful to ignore! Won’t you ask Jesus to be your Lord, King and Savior? Read, believe and ask Him into your heart and you will never be the same again! God is trying to reach you and today is the day of salvation! Confess with your mouth and believe in your heart that Jesus Christ is Lord and God has raised Him from the dead and you will be saved.