Don’t Drift | Nehemiah 13
“Don’t Drift”
Today is the last week in our teaching series on a book of the Bible called Nehemiah. Next week we’re starting a new series called Something To Give, and it’s about how everybody gives their life to something. The question isn’t, are you giving your life to something? It’s what are you giving your life to?...What are you giving your life to, and is what you’re giving your life to worth it?...That’s the question we’ll be exploring next week. But this week we’re finishing our series on Nehemiah called Rise and Build. It’s a series about God bringing restoration from the rubble, because God uses Nehemiah to bring restoration to the broken walls and broken lives in Jerusalem. The text we’re studying today is about drifting... It’s about spiritually drifting...If you’ve gone surfing or swimming in the ocean, you know what it’s like to drift. You’ll start in one place, but then the waves slowly drift you along the shoreline. Sometimes you’ll drift so far, you can’t even see your beach chairs anymore. That’s how drift works. It slowly pulls you off course. A cold marriage or dating relationship—starts with a drift...A broken parent-child relationship—starts with a drift...A destroyed diet starts with a drift—a cheat meal turns into a cheat day, and then a trip to Steak and Shake. Not just a steak burger, not just a shake, but both the Steak and the Shake. That’s how drift works. It slowly pulls you off course.
Now when we spiritually drift, it’s often very slow too. It’s one decision or compromise, that leads to more decisions and compromises, and then we slowly spiritually drift. You don't have to reject God to drift from God. You just have to let something else slowly take his place. What is it for you? What’s been slowly taking God’s place in your life?...What small decisions or compromises are causing you to drift?...If you’re a skeptic, seeker, or somebody exploring faith, you’ve been putting other things at the center of your life. You’ve drifted into thinking other things can satisfy your life more than the God who created your life, but none of it’s worked. You need what we all need, which is for God to be the center of your life, and that’s what we’re talking about today. Let’s turn to Nehemiah 13 and get into it. If you open your Bible to the middle, keep turning left, you’ll find Nehemiah. We’ll be in Nehemiah Ch. 13:1-31. Title of the message is Don’t Drift, and the big idea is we spiritually drift when our devotion to God becomes seasonal instead of central...We spiritually drift when our devotion to God becomes seasonal instead of central...
Here’s your context. The book of Nehemiah is a historical record of a time when God brings restoration to the broken walls and broken lives of the people in Jerusalem. The people were living in persistent sin, so God allowed them to live in Babylonian exile for over 70 years. But the Persians defeated the Babylonians, and eventually let the Jews return home. In chs. 1-6 Nehemiah starts praying, and God gives him a plan to restore their broken walls and broken lives. So Nehemiah and the people start rebuilding, they face heavy opposition, but they keep praying and pressing forward. In chs. 7-12 they finish rebuilding the wall, but God isn’t finished rebuilding their lives. God keeps rebuilding their relationship with him, and the people respond by repenting for their sins and promising to follow the Lord. But in ch. 13—they drift. So let’s check it out.
Nehemiah Ch. 13:1-31 states, “At that time the book of Moses was read publicly to the people. The command was found written in it that no Ammonite or Moabite should ever enter the assembly of God, 2 because they didn’t meet the Israelites with food and water. Instead, they hired Balaam against them to curse them, but our God turned the curse into a blessing.” It seems like God is being harsh in commanding that the Ammonites and Moabites can’t enter the temple. But it isn’t harsh, because they hated the Jews. We get a glimpse of their hatred in vs. 2, where it says they hired Balaam to curse the Jews. In fact in 1st Samuel 11 the Ammonite King Nahash said he’d make a treaty with Israel, but only if he could gouge out all their eyes and humiliate them. In Judges 3 the Moabite King Eglon oppressed Israel for 18 years, and it was an intense period of suffering for the Jews. Both the Ammonites and Moabites weren’t the kind of people you wanted as neighbors. They often attacked the Jews and wanted to curse them. So God’s being holy and just to a harsh and unjust people. But he’s also gracious and merciful, willing to show grace and mercy to any Ammonite or Moabite who repents of their sins. Ruth is an example of this, because she was a Moabite woman who put her faith in the Lord. She’s an ancestor of Jesus, which shows salvation is available for all people groups. It’s available for anyone who repents and turns to the Lord. Proverbs 28:13 says, “Whoever confesses and renounces their sins will find mercy.” Psalm 51:17 says, “A broken and contrite heart, O God, you will not despise.” The Ammonites and Moabites were being excluded from the temple, because they wouldn’t repent and turn to the Lord.
Vs. 4, “Now before this, the priest Eliashib had been put in charge of the storerooms of the house of our God. He was a relative of Tobiah 5 and prepared a large room for him where they previously stored the grain offerings, the frankincense, the articles, tenths of grain, new wine, and fresh oil prescribed for the Levites, singers, and gatekeepers, along with contributions for the priests. 6 While all this was happening, I wasn’t in Jerusalem, because I had returned to King Artaxerxes of Babylon in the thirty-second year of his reign. It was later that I asked the king for a leave of absence 7 so I could return to Jerusalem. Then I discovered the evil Eliashib had done on behalf of Tobiah, by providing him a room in the courts of God’s house.” So Nehemiah had to go to Babylon to work for King Artaxerxes in 433 B.C., which is roughly 12 years after he first arrived in Jerusalem to rebuild the walls. We don’t know how long he was with the king before he returns to Jerusalem in ch. 13—we just know when he returns, he discovers the priest Eliashib has drifted. Eliashib has drifted by becoming a relative of Tobiah through some marital connection. Tobiah’s one of the enemies who’s been harassing Nehemiah and the people since ch. 2. While they were rebuilding the wall, Tobiah kept mocking them, threatening them, sabotaging them, even participated in an assassination attempt against Nehemiah. He was an enemy of Nehemiah and God’s plan to rebuild the broken walls and broken lives in Jerusalem. In ch. 10 they promised the Lord they wouldn’t intermarry with their enemies, but the priest Eliashib drifted from that promise.
Now that drift, that compromise, leads to a greater drift and compromise. Eliashib provides Tobiah with a large room in the temple, in the house of God. It was a sacred room that stored the supplies and provisions for worship and for those who led worship. Eliashib was now letting one of their greatest enemies stay in this sacred room. But Tobiah was also an Ammonite, which means he shouldn’t even be in the temple! The enemy who tried to stop God’s plan to rebuild the walls is now living inside the walls. He moved into the house of God not by force, but by personal invitation from Eliashib. What enemies have you invited into the temple of your heart?...What enemies, sins, have you given a personal invitation to live in the temple of your heart?...We spiritually drift when we let enemies, sinful things have a place in our hearts where God belongs.
Vs. 8, “I was greatly displeased and threw all of Tobiah’s household possessions out of the room. 9 I ordered that the rooms be purified, and I had the articles of the house of God restored there, along with the grain offering and frankincense.” Nehemiah’s response to this spiritual drift is to throw out Tobiah and purify the space where he was living. He throws out everything that’s causing this spiritual drift, and makes room for God to be a central part of their lives again. This needs to be our response when we experience spiritual drift. We need to throw out the Tobiah’s, the enemies, the sins, the things that are causing us to spiritually drift. Then we need to purify ourselves by repenting of our sins, and making room for God to be a central part of our lives again.
Vs. 10, “I also found out that because the portions for the Levites had not been given, each of the Levites and the singers performing the service had gone back to his own field. 11 Therefore, I rebuked the officials, asking, ‘Why has the house of God been neglected?’” He’s rebuking the officials because they let all this happen. He’s rebuking them for drifting, for neglecting the house of God so much, that the Levitical priests and worship leaders had to work in the fields to survive off the land. In vs. 12-13 Nehemiah brings the Levitical priests and worship leaders back, and the people respond by giving supplies and provisions to help restore the house of God again. The people respond by worshiping God in the temple and making God a central part of their lives again.
Vs. 14, “Remember me for this, my God. Don’t erase the deeds of faithful love I’ve done for the house of God and for its services.” Nehemiah’s praying for God to remember his devotion in fighting against spiritual drift. To remember his devotion in fighting to keep God central.
Vs. 15, “At that time I saw people in Judah treading winepresses on the Sabbath. They were also bringing in stores of grain and loading them on donkeys, along with wine, grapes, and figs. All kinds of goods were being brought to Jerusalem on the Sabbath...17 I rebuked the nobles of Judah and said, ‘What’s this evil you’re doing—profaning the Sabbath day?” The people are now spiritually drifting on the Sabbath. In ch. 10 they promised they wouldn’t let productivity and profit be their gods. They promised to keep the work-rest Sabbath rhythm by taking one day off to rest, enjoy life, and worship the Lord. But they’re drifting by neglecting the Sabbath, by letting productivity and profits be the central part of their lives instead of God. This spiritual drift can lead to a successfully busy life, but a spiritually depleted soul. You can fill your schedule, fill your bank account, but spiritually drain your soul. It’s a spiritual drift a lot of us wrestle with. We’re so busy trying to build a successful life that we neglect to pause, enjoy life, and fill our souls with the Lord. We sacrifice today to save for a prosperous tomorrow. We sacrifice today, for a tomorrow we aren’t even guaranteed to live. Jesus says in Mark 8:36, “What does it profit a man to gain the whole world, but forfeit his soul?” What does it profit YOU to gain the whole world, but forfeit your soul? We aren’t guaranteed tomorrow, so we need to be filling our souls with the Lord today!
In vs. 19-21 Nehemiah restores the Sabbath to make God a central part of their lives again. He locks the city gates and closes the marketplace on the Sabbath, which is what we need to do. We need to close the gates on whatever is running our lives. Close the gates on whatever is causing us to spiritually drift away from the Lord being central in our lives. Close the gates and create healthy work-rest habits that remind us God is central, not our productivity and profits. It’s habits like daily prayer, reading Scripture, prioritizing coming to church consistently, not seasonally. It’s habits like creating margin in your schedule for an actual Sabbath day to unplug, rest, enjoy life, and worship the Lord. The point is if the Lord isn’t central, then shut the gates on whatever is.
Vs. 22, “Remember me for this also, my God, and look on me with compassion according to the abundance of your faithful love.” Nehemiah prays for God to remember him again. He prays for God to remember his devotion in fighting against spiritual drift, to keep God central.
Vs. 23, “In those days I also saw Jews who had married women from Ashdod, Ammon, and Moab. 24 Half of their children spoke the language of Ashdod or the language of one of the other peoples, but they couldn’t speak Hebrew. 25 I rebuked them, cursed them, beat some of their men, and pulled out their hair…28 Even one of the sons of Jehoiada, son of the high priest Eliashib, had become a son-in-law to Sanballat the Horonite. So I drove him away from me.” Nehemiah’s aggressive response reflects his civil authority in that culture, but it isn’t a good strategy for discipleship in our culture. Jesus doesn't teach us to pull out people’s hair when they sin. Instead he teaches us to take spiritual drift seriously, take sin seriously, and repent for it. The spiritual drift Nehemiah’s addressing here is once again about spiritual purity, not racial purity. He’s addressing a recurring issue with them marrying people who worshiped other gods. That includes the priest Eliashib’s son now marrying into Sanballat’s family, who’s another enemy ally with Tobiah.
Now these spiritual drifts, these compromises, lead to even greater drifts and compromises. It leads to many of the Jewish children not being able to speak Hebrew anymore. That doesn’t sound like a big deal to us, but for them that meant their children lost the language of their faith! It meant their children couldn’t read scripture anymore, so they were becoming ignorant in their faith. This is a good caution to parents that when your devotion to God is seasonal, it’s teaching your children a lifestyle of spiritual drift. You’re teaching your children a lifestyle of spiritual drift, and it’s causing them to become more ignorant in their faith. They're becoming more fluent in the ways of the world than the ways of the Lord. Every day we have a choice to be molded by the ways of the world or the ways of the Lord. To be molded by our culture or molded by our Creator, but either way we’re being molded by something. Everything we read, watch, listen to can cause us to drift away from Jesus or draw closer to Jesus. So we need to guard our hearts and our family’s hearts by keeping Christ central. We need to read God’s Word to be molded by the Lord, instead of the world. Nehemiah’s fighting for these people to be molded by the Lord, instead of the world.
Vs. 29, “Remember them, my God, for defiling the priesthood as well as the covenant of the priesthood and the Levites. 30 So I purified them from everything foreign and assigned specific duties to the priests and Levites. 31 I also arranged for the donation of wood at the appointed times and for the first fruits. Remember me, my God, with favor.”Nehemiah prays one last time, for God to remember his devotion in fighting against spiritual drift, to keep God central. This is how the book of Nehemiah ends. It begins and ends with a prayerful dependency on God. It’s because we spiritually drift when our dependency and devotion to God becomes seasonal instead of central. It’s something that happens to all of us. It’s like the verse in the hymn Come Thou Fount: “Prone to wander, Lord I feel it. Prone to leave the God I love.” In the words of theologian J.I. Packer, “Our spiritual life—is a fragile convalescence that’s easily disrupted.” By fragile convalescence, he means it’s like being in the hospital waiting to fully recover after being healed from a sickness. You have to pay careful attention to your diet, your meds, your vitals, or else you’ll fall back into sickness because you haven’t fully recovered yet. Packer says that’s what the Christian life is like. We’ve been healed from the sickness of sin and death through faith in Jesus, but we haven’t fully recovered yet. So we have to pay careful attention not to relapse into old habits that’ll make us feel spiritually sick again. “Our spiritual life—is a fragile convalescence that’s easily disrupted.”
But the good news of the gospel is if we drift, Jesus is the great physician who can restore us back to health again. He’s our Lord, God, and Savior who never spiritually drifted, and he died on the cross for those who did. He died on the cross for every drift, compromise, sin we let move into the temple of our hearts. So the question isn’t will you drift; it’s will you turn to Jesus for restoration when you do drift?...Will you turn to Jesus for salvation, restoration, and everyday transformation?...Will you keep fighting for Jesus to be central in your life, until he makes your recovery eternal...Something we say often at City Awakening is that the gospel is more than a way to eternal life; the gospel IS our life. What we mean by that is we need to focus on Jesus for our salvation, but also for our everyday transformation. We need Jesus to save us, but also to sustain us. We need Jesus to secure our future, but also to shape how we live in the present. It’s because the same Jesus who saves us, is the same Jesus who sustains and transforms us. We experience real life transformation when Jesus is at the center of our lives, but we drift when he isn’t.
The big idea of the message is we spiritually drift when our devotion to God becomes seasonal instead of central...We spiritually drift when our devotion to God becomes seasonal instead of central...The Jews spiritually drifted, but Nehemiah confronts them so they’ll put God at the center of their lives again. Like I said before, if you’re a skeptic, seeker, or somebody exploring faith, you’ve been putting other things at the center of your life for a long time. You’ve drifted into thinking other things can satisfy your life more than the God who created your life, but none of it’s worked. You need what we all need, which is for God to be the center of your life.
If you’re a believer, what are some areas in your life where you’ve been spiritually drifting or compromising on your faith?...What’s moved into the temple of your heart where God belongs?...What’s started to become more central in your life than God?...Whatever those things are, give those things an eviction notice today, and put Jesus back at the center of your life where he belongs. But don’t do it just because you feel guilty—do it because you know Jesus is worthy. Do it because you know Jesus is worthy of being not seasonal, but central in your life...Let’s pray...