Seeds for 10/24/2024 - Nehemiah 9:1-5a
Scripture:
1 On the twenty-fourth day of the same month, the Israelites gathered together, fasting and wearing sackcloth and putting dust on their heads. 2 Those of Israelite descent had separated themselves from all foreigners. They stood in their places and confessed their sins and the sins of their ancestors. 3 They stood where they were and read from the Book of the Law of the Lord their God for a quarter of the day, and spent another quarter in confession and in worshiping the Lord their God. 4 Standing on the stairs of the Levites were Jeshua, Bani, Kadmiel, Shebaniah, Bunni, Sherebiah, Bani and Kenani. They cried out with loud voices to the Lord their God. 5 And the Levites—Jeshua, Kadmiel, Bani, Hashabneiah, Sherebiah, Hodiah, Shebaniah and Pethahiah—said: “Stand up and praise the Lord your God, who is from everlasting to everlasting.”
Observation:
Having received with joy the Word of God from Ezra and Nehemiah, the people now turn to a response of conviction and repentance. What do we see?
First, they engage in the standard practices of repentance of their day: fasting, wearing sackcloth, and putting dust on their heads. Fasting does many things like attuning oneself to hunger for God by denying one’s appetite for food and practicing self-denial to experience sacrifice where previously one did not deny oneself of sinful practices. Sackcloth and ashes/dust on one’s head are associated with repentance throughout the Bible, seeming to be a physical representation of one’s recognition of and sorrowfulness for one’s sin. All of this is an appropriate response, as they have come face to face with God’s Law from Moses—the covenant that they had broken.
Second, Nehemiah notes that “they had separated themselves from all foreigners.” It’s important to see in the text what the purpose of this separate was. In context, they are confessing their sin as God’s people against the covenant that they, as God’s people, had made with Him. So, separating from foreigners here indicates that they were not dragging other people into their acts of contrition and repentance. This their mess, not anyone else’s, and they need to get right with God themselves.
Third, they confessed their sins and their confessions were in the context of worship and the reading of scripture. Encountering God and recognizing one’s need to confess is a pretty normal thing. Isaiah, for example, had a vision of God, and immediately realized that he could not stand in God’s presence. The people here have that same essential experience. Worship provides a context for us to get right with God.
Fourth, the end result, the purpose of confession and repentant actions was not simply to do them or be perpetually stuck in them, but to be restored to God. They cried out to God and the Levites reminded the people to “Stand up and praise the Lord your God, who is from everlasting to everlasting.” Confession—and the freedom that comes from it—leads further into worship.
Application:
When have you experienced freedom through confession and repentance?
What else might the Holy Spirit be speaking with you about in the text today?
Prayer: Have mercy on me, O God, according to your unfailing love; according to your great compassion blot out my transgressions. Wash away all my iniquity and cleanse me from my sin. Amen. (Psalm 51:1-2)
“But the seed falling on good soil refers to someone who hears the word and understands it. This is the one who produces a crop, yielding a hundred, sixty or thirty times what was sown.” (Matthew 13:23)
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