Reading the book of Nehemiah chapter 1.
Truly all is well as far as our
relationship with God is concerned, but as far
as conditions in this world, all is not
well.
And Nehemiah chapter 1 speaks to that need.
The words of Nehemiah, the son of Hacaliah,
and it came to pass in the month
Chislev in the twentieth year, as I was
in Shushan the palace, that Hanani, one of
my brethren, came, he and certain men of
Judah.
And I asked them concerning the Jews who
had escaped, who were left of the captivity,
and concerning Jerusalem.
And they said unto me, The remnant who
are left of the captivity there in the
province are in great affliction and reproach.
The wall of Jerusalem also is broken down,
and its gates are burned with fire.
And it came to pass when I heard
these words, that I sat down and wept
and mourned certain days, and fasted and prayed
before the God of heaven, and said, I
beseech thee, O Lord God of heaven, the
great and awe-inspiring God, who keepeth covenant
and mercy for them who love him and
observe his commandments.
Let thine ear now be attentive and thine
eyes open, that thou mayest hear the prayer
of thy servant, which I pray before thee
now, day and night, for the children of
Israel, thy servants, and confess the sins of
the children of Israel, which we have sinned
against thee, both I and my Father's house
have sinned.
We have dealt very corruptly against thee, and
have not kept the commandments, nor the statutes,
nor the ordinances, which thou commandest thy servant
Moses.
Remember, I beseech thee, the word that thou
commandest thy servant Moses, saying, If ye transgress,
I will scatter you abroad among the peoples.
But if ye turn unto me and keep
my commandments and do them, though there were
of you cast out unto the uttermost part
of heaven, yet will I gather them from
there, and will bring them unto the place
that I have chosen to set my name.
Now these are thy servants and thy people,
whom thou hast redeemed by thy great power
and by thy strong hand.
O Lord, I beseech thee, let now thine
ear be attentive to the prayer of thy
servant and to the prayer of thy servants,
who delight to fear thy name.
And prosper, I pray thee, thy servant this
day, and grant him mercy in the sight
of this man.
For I was the king's cupbearer.
And God answered that prayer, and God used
him in a wonderful way.
How many times have you and I in
our lives said, I don't care?
Now perhaps we didn't really mean it, but
we said it.
I don't care.
Or perhaps you said it the way the
young people say it today.
Ask me if I care.
You know, it's not easy these days to
have the kind of a heart that cares.
To begin with, all of us have enough
burdens and problems of our own, and why
should we go around borrowing anybody else's problems?
And I don't know if you've noticed it
or not, but if you read the newspapers
or listen to the news or watch the
news on television, you are bombarded with tragedies
and problems and difficulties.
And if you aren't careful, after a while
you get immune.
Have you noticed that?
People are wondering, why is there so much
violence?
Why can a person pull out a gun
and shoot somebody?
We've gotten accustomed to it.
People watch so much of this on the
tube that we are now impervious.
We are immune to really caring.
Our emotions have been so jaded, so saturated.
We've had so much thrown at us that
we've built up a resistance.
And really if we aren't careful, we're going
to find it very, very difficult to care.
Now, that is dangerous.
Because when a person starts living on the
philosophy, I don't care.
Ask me if I care.
He's starting to live an independent, selfish, destructive
life because we have to care.
My friends, the most sensitive thing in your
life is your heart.
And the most sensitive thing about the human
heart is the ability to feel pain and
feel joy.
The ability to be able to enter into,
to weep with those who weep and rejoice
with those who rejoice.
And when we lose that sensitivity, we lose
what it really means to be made in
the image of God.
And we become selfish, independent animals.
This is why today we're looking at Nehemiah
chapter 1.
I'm greatly concerned about myself and about this
flock that we not begin to get isolated
and insulated from the needs around us.
I know you have problems.
Everybody does.
You have burdens.
Everybody does.
Some people live with constant pain and handicap.
There are some people who fight battles that
are so difficult, they don't have any energy
left for the rest of life.
I know this.
But in the midst of all of this,
let's maintain a heart that really cares.
My Bible says, keep thy heart with all
diligence for out of it are the issues
of life.
And if my heart is what it ought
to be, then life is what it ought
to be.
I suppose there are many people in the
Bible we could point to as people who
cared.
But I want us to look at Nehemiah,
one of the forgotten heroes of Jewish history.
And in Nehemiah chapter 1, we find a
picture of a man who cared.
And I'd like for us to examine our
own hearts today, not somebody else's heart, our
own hearts.
Let's take our hearts and put them next
to Nehemiah chapter 1, and let's examine our
hearts to see how much we really care.
For if we really care, then we can
enter into the kind of joy and blessing
and victory and achievement that God wants us
to have as Christians.
It is not the Christian who is isolated
that God uses.
It's not the Christian who is insulated that
God uses.
It's the Christian who is open to the
pain and the hurt and the need of
a world around him.
In Nehemiah chapter 1, I want you to
see four evidences of Nehemiah's concern, four evidences
that he cared.
They're so simple, nobody can miss them.
He cared enough to inquire, verses 1, 2,
and 3.
He cared enough to identify, verses 4 through
7.
He cared enough to intercede, verses 8 through
10.
And he cared enough to intervene and get
involved, verse 11.
Now there it is.
If I can look at my heart today
and say, I care enough to inquire, I
care enough to identify with, I care enough
to intercede, I care enough to intervene and
get involved, then I am keeping my heart
with all diligence and God's going to do
something.
Let's take these evidences one by one and
examine our own hearts.
Verses 1, 2, and 3, he cared enough
to inquire.
Now why in the world would Nehemiah inquire
about a remnant of struggling, straggling Jews a
thousand miles away?
You see, Nehemiah was a big wheel.
Nehemiah was an important man.
He was the cup bearer to the king.
He was the number two man.
He had the ear of the king.
He had fellowship with the king.
It was his job to make sure that
when the wine was poured, it wasn't poisoned.
He had close intimacy with the king.
He lived in a palace.
He was well-dressed.
He was well-paid, certainly.
He was a Jew and he was an
alien, but what difference does it make?
Nehemiah had it made.
Why in the world would Nehemiah be concerned
about 50,000 Jews who had gone back
to the Holy Land after the captivity, Jerusalem,
the city, living there unprotected?
Why should he be concerned?
You see, he could have done what a
lot of us do.
He could have said, well, ignorance is bliss.
Where ignorance is bliss is folly to be
wise.
He could have done what many Christians do.
I don't want to see.
I don't want to hear.
I don't want to know.
What I don't know won't hurt me.
Don't you ever believe that.
What you don't know can hurt you.
A man gets into his car in the
city of Chicago, turns on the ignition, the
car blows up.
Somebody's put a bomb in the motor.
This has happened.
What he didn't know hurt him.
A fella gets an infection in his hand
that starts to move up his arm.
He says, well, it'll go away, but it
didn't go away.
It killed him.
What he didn't know hurt him.
He cared enough to inquire.
He said, how are things going in Jerusalem?
Some of his relatives had made that 45
-day journey from the palace to Jerusalem, a
long arc of a trip down there.
They'd come back.
They'd been gone now for some three or
four months.
And they've come back, and Nehemiah is not
concerned about his own welfare.
He says, how is it going with our
brethren in Jerusalem?
And they say, it's not going so good.
And Nehemiah could have said what other people
have said.
Well, let them stew in their own grease.
It's their own fault.
He didn't say that.
He didn't say, well, it's too bad.
They said, you know, all we have left
is a remnant.
We used to have a great nation.
The nation of Israel used to be the
great nation.
Other nations trembled when they thought of the
nation of Israel.
Now all we have is a remnant, and
that remnant is in reproach, and our city
is in ruin.
What kind of news is that?
The remnant, the ruin, the reproach.
And Nehemiah looked around, and things were good
in the palace.
Everything was clean and polished.
He was well fed, and he could have
said, well, sorry I asked.
But instead, he faced the facts honestly.
It's an interesting thing that many people today
don't want to face facts.
There are Christians today who aren't really concerned
about the state of the church.
As I travel from place to place in
this country and other places, I often meet
folks who used to be members of the
Moody Church, and they'll say, how are things
at the Moody Church?
And they begin to name various people or
various ministries, and I'm glad they're concerned.
There are those who say to you, how
are you?
And so you tell them, but they aren't
listening.
They didn't really mean, how are you?
They were just saying, how are you?
And if you do tell them, they won't
listen.
If they do listen, they won't remember.
If they do remember, they don't care.
It's just a social pastime.
Nehemiah wasn't like that.
Nehemiah was concerned enough to inquire.
He didn't bury his head in the sand
and say, well, it's all going to be
all right by and by.
I had an officer in a church, not
this one, say to me, pastor, I don't
care how many missionaries you ask us to
support, just don't make us listen to them.
An officer in a fundamental church.
Nehemiah wasn't like that.
If Nehemiah were a member of a local
church here today, he'd wait for the prayer
letters to come through and read and say,
how are things going in Oboe?
How are things going over here in Japan?
How are things going down here in Kentucky?
He would inquire.
He'd be looking in the bulletin to find
out where things are going and what things
are doing.
Every once in a while we publish in
our Sunday bulletin missionary letters.
I wonder how many people read them.
The great tragedy today is we don't care
enough to inquire.
Now, secondly, I noticed that he cared enough
to identify.
Came to pass when I heard these words,
I sat down and wept and mourned certain
days and fasted and prayed.
And people were saying, what's the matter with
the King's assistant?
He used to walk around the palace with
a lightness in his step and he used
to have such a joy on his face.
And now he looks like he's sick.
Has he eaten something that's upset him?
No, no.
The King later on knew what it was
when Nehemiah presented his cause to the King
and said, I want a leave of absence.
I'm going down to the Fatherland and I'm
going to do something about the needs.
The King looked at his face and said,
oh, I know what this is.
This is sorrow of the heart.
We don't see much of this today.
Nehemiah cared enough to identify.
He identified with the suffering of the people.
Right now, while we are enjoying the freedom
of the city of Chicago, we have brothers
and sisters in Christ who are in prison.
Right now, while we have enough to eat
and more to wear than we need, there
are brothers and sisters in Christ in places
in this world who are hungry and naked.
While you and I sometimes have to take
pills because we've over eaten, there are brothers
and sisters in Christ who are watching their
children starve.
And we take it all for granted.
Nehemiah cared enough to identify.
He wept.
When was the last time the news of
the needs of God's people made any of
us weep?
And he mourned.
And he stayed away from the palace parties.
And he wasn't fellowshipping in the joyful situations.
He was mourning and weeping and fasting and
praying.
He cared enough to identify with their suffering.
Doesn't the Bible say to us, weep with
those who weep.
Rejoice with those who rejoice.
Remember those who are in prison as though
you are in prison with them.
He cared enough to identify, not only with
their suffering, but he says here, confess the
sins of the children of Israel which we
have sinned against thee.
Both I and my Father's house have sinned.
We have dealt very corruptly against thee.
Now, Nehemiah wasn't there when all of this
happened.
He wasn't guilty of the awful sins that
caused the fall of the people of Israel,
the nation of Judah.
When you read the book of Jeremiah, the
prophet, you find out what happened to the
people of Judah.
They were worshipping idols.
They were not trusting God.
And God had to come along and take
them off into captivity.
And then God had to whip them in
captivity.
And God let a small remnant go back.
Nehemiah wasn't to blame for any of this.
Some of us can recall during those dark
days after John F.
Kennedy was assassinated, that some of the people
on radio and television were saying the whole
nation was to blame.
Remember that?
All of us are to blame.
It's our guilt that has done this.
Quite frankly, I used to pray for Mr.
Kennedy, and I would not want to shoot
him or see him shot.
I did not feel as though it was
my sin that had caused his death.
In the overt sense, no.
In the plotting, the pulling of the trigger,
no.
But you know, all of us are a
part of mankind.
That's why John Donne said, never sin to
know for whom the bell tolls, it tolls
for thee.
We're all part of each other.
And as Christians, we're all part of the
church.
And did you know that when one church
has problems, it affects every church?
And when one church has revival, it blesses
every church?
We belong to each other, and we affect
each other, and we need each other, and
we must be identified with each other.
We can't be like those two ladies who
were taking their first airplane ride.
I've told you about them.
This is back in the days of the
prop planes.
And they were seated there, and the one
looked out the window and said, my, isn't
it beautiful out there?
And the other one looked over on the
other side.
The prop had stopped going around.
Now, I have been over the Atlantic Ocean
and seen a prop stop.
I know what this is like.
And she nudged her neighbor and said, the
motor has stopped.
And her neighbor said, oh, don't worry about
that.
It's on the other side of the plane.
That's how dumb we get.
Nehemiah wasn't that dumb.
Nehemiah cared enough to inquire, what is going
on?
Nehemiah cared enough to identify, I will suffer
with them.
How can I live in luxury?
When my people are under reproach, he identified.
Now, we don't like to do that.
We don't like to identify.
We don't like to say, oh, God, it
is my sin.
Oh, God, it is my suffering.
Here are your people suffering.
And oh, if we as Christians were all
we ought to be, perhaps this wouldn't have
happened.
Oh, dear God, I want to identify.
Isn't that what Jesus did?
All of the great people of the Bible
identified.
Moses chose rather to suffer reproach and affliction
with the people of God than to enjoy
the pleasures of sin for a season.
He identified.
Jesus did.
We wouldn't be Christians today.
There wouldn't be salvation today.
There wouldn't be forgiveness today.
There wouldn't be an open door to heaven
today.
There wouldn't be salvation from hell today were
it not for the fact that Jesus came
and identified.
He took upon himself our sins on his
body on the cross.
I noticed something else about Nehemiah, another evidence
of his caring.
He cared enough to intercede.
He cared enough to inquire, that's facts.
He cared enough to identify, that's feeling.
He cared enough to intercede, that's faith.
He said, I'm going to pray.
I don't know what I'm going to do,
but I'm going to pray.
I sometimes hear people say, well, I can't
do much, but I can pray.
It's the greatest thing you can do.
Never say to a person, well, I can't
do much, but I'll pray.
You say to him, the greatest thing I
can do for you is to pray.
I'm going to pray.
I would rather have God's people praying for
me than anything else I can think of.
Nehemiah said, I'm going to pray.
Now, prayer is not a substitute for caring.
It is for some of us.
We hear about the death of missionaries.
We hear about drought and we hear about
famine.
We hear about financial needs.
So I'll pray.
And after we pray, we forget about it.
That was not so with Nehemiah.
When you truly identify, intercession becomes much more
than a substitute for action.
He said, I beseech the oh Lord God
of heaven, the great and awe-inspiring God.
He begins with the character of God.
He moves into the covenant of God.
He says, you've made a covenant with your
people and I want to come and confess
our sins.
We have sinned.
We deserve everything that's happened to us, but
oh God, can you help me do something
about it?
You see, the purpose of intercession, the purpose
of intercession is not to get man's will
done in heaven.
The purpose of intercession is to get God's
will done on earth.
And I want to warn you, when you
start praying about something and God answers, he'll
move you.
Jesus said, the harvest is plenteous.
The laborers are few.
Pray ye, the Lord of the harvest, that
he'll send forth laborers into his harvest field.
That's at the end of Matthew chapter 9.
At the beginning of Matthew chapter 10, he
calls his disciples and sends them out.
They were praying, oh God, send somebody into
the harvest field.
And God sent them.
That's why many people don't want to pray.
When you really start praying about something, you
say, oh God, here's a need in the
moody church.
Here's an area that needs help.
Oh God, let's do something about it.
God says, fine, I'm going to send you.
I'm sure when Moses was out taking care
of his sheep, he was praying for the
people in bondage in Egypt and crying out
to God.
God said, I've heard your prayer, Moses, I'm
sending you.
And then Moses said, you've got the wrong
man.
Intercession.
He cared enough to intercede.
Are you praying about the burdens and the
needs of God's people?
If someone were to stop you after the
service is dismissed and say, what are you
praying about?
Would you have to think twice?
Or is there on our hearts such a
burden to get the will of God done
that all our waking hours, we're praying, we're
interceding, we're driving down the highway crying out
to God.
When we have that kind of praying, God
really begins to work.
He cared enough to inquire.
Are you so isolated and insulated from the
realities of life that you don't know what's
going on in the lives of other people?
He cared enough to identify.
Does the fact in the head move down
to the feeling in the heart?
He cared enough to intercede.
And finally, he cared enough to intervene and
get involved.
This is the hardest part.
While he is praying, God is speaking to
him.
And finally, he comes and says, oh God,
I am your servant.
That's a great way to pray.
He didn't pray like most of us do.
Oh Lord, help the people in Jerusalem.
Do something for them, them, them.
And God says, wait a minute, when I
work, I do it through people.
I use people.
When I wanted to lead Israel out of
Egypt, I got a hold of Moses.
When I wanted to lead Israel into their
promised land, I got a hold of Joshua.
When I wanted to deliver Israel from their
enemies, I got a hold of Gideon and
Samson and David.
And now I want to do some building
down in Jerusalem and I'm going to get
a hold of another fellow.
And Nehemiah, it's you.
And Nehemiah said, I'm your servant.
He cared enough to intervene.
Now, I could think up a half a
dozen excuses that Nehemiah could have given because
I've used them.
And after I've used my half a dozen,
each of you has got another half a
dozen.
Nehemiah could have said, Lord, it wasn't my
fault.
Why should I go down there and clean
up that mess?
It was my father's who sinned.
He didn't say that.
He said, I have sinned.
Here's a good excuse.
Use this if you want to sometime to
get into trouble.
Lord, there's no need for me to pick
up and pack up and go down to
Jerusalem.
I mean, that's a good 45 days trip.
It's a thousand miles.
And I can be more of an influence
for the Jews right here.
You ever heard that one?
I mean, here I am.
I've got the ear of the king.
And I can lobby.
And you know what, Lord?
I've got money.
I have a pretty good position.
I can pay somebody else to do it.
Money is a great thing in the cause
of Christ, provided it doesn't become a substitute
for our hearts.
But Nehemiah didn't say, it's not my fault.
Nehemiah didn't say, I can have more influence
here.
Nehemiah didn't say, let me give some money
as a substitute for myself.
Nehemiah didn't say something else.
Did you know that they tried to rebuild
those walls years before?
Years before they tried to rebuild those walls
and it stopped.
And Nehemiah could have said, well, Lord, we
tried that once.
It didn't work.
I've heard that in committee meetings all my
life.
Well, we tried that once.
Didn't work.
He didn't say that.
Nor did he say the thing I would
have been tempted to say.
Lord, I'm just one man.
I'm just one Jew.
I'm a cup bearer.
I'm not an architect.
I can't read blueprints.
I don't know anything about hanging up bills.
Gates.
I've been living in luxury here in this
palace.
God, you must have the wrong man.
But Nehemiah didn't make excuses.
He got involved.
A friend of mine has a little slogan
on his calling card and on his stationery
that says this.
If not now, when?
If not I, who?
That's good.
We walk around saying somebody should do something
about this.
Somebody should do something about that.
Well, who's the somebody?
We are.
Nehemiah didn't organize a committee for the salvation
of Jerusalem.
He spent the next four months praying, fasting,
making plans, thinking through, and then finally went
to the king and said, I'm resigning.
I want to leave of absence.
You do for what?
I want to go to Jerusalem.
Now, look at this, the folly of it
from the security of the palace to the
danger of Jerusalem, from the comfort of the
palace to the discomfort of Jerusalem, from the
prestige of being cup bearer to the king,
stepping down to being the governor of a
group of malcontents.
But he did it.
He said, I can't wait any longer.
God has called me.
And you know, the rest of the story.
He went down there, surveyed the situation and
in 52 days finished the job.
They said it couldn't be done, but he
did it.
They ridiculed and they laughed at him.
They attacked him.
They threatened his life, but he did it.
Built the walls and hung the gates and
made the city secure and then dedicated the
people and the city to the glory of
God.
Now, this whole chapter says to me that
God blesses and uses people who care, not
spectators, people who care.
I know all of us can't go to
the place.
All of us can't do what Nehemiah did,
but we can do something.
We can do something more than just simply
watching.
Abraham cared and delivered a lot from Sodom.
Moses cared and delivered the nation from Egypt.
Paul cared and delivered thousands of souls from
bondage.
Jesus cared.
He identified with us.
He prayed for us.
He died for us.
The big question is, do you and I
care?
Has our Christian life become a routine job?
We fill out our check.
We put it in the envelope.
We drop it in the basket.
We say our prayers.
We read our Bible.
But all the while, we really don't care.
God says to me through Nehemiah, do you
care?
Do I care?
Do I care enough to inquire?
Do I really want to know what the
needs are?
Or am I happy and blissful in my
ignorance?
Do I care enough to identify?
Can I feel with?
Can I help to share the burden?
Do I care enough to intercede?
Do I care enough to get involved?
It costs to care.
Once you start caring, you will pay a
price.
But oh, I tell you, it costs not
to care.
I would rather be with Nehemiah weeping and
praying and going around those walls and encouraging,
carrying out garbage and getting something done than
to be back at the palace and saying,
well, I pray for them occasionally.
God bless them.
Yes, it costs to care, but it costs
not to care.
Because you lose that sensitivity of your heart.
Today, while you hear his voice, says the
book of Hebrews, hard and not your heart.
Do Christians get hard hearts?
Yes, they do.
How do you keep from getting a hard
heart by caring?
I'm sure this past week there were people
whose wounds I did not help to heal
because I didn't care.
I'm sure there are people whose story I
didn't listen to because I didn't care.
And I'm the loser.
When your heart begins to calcify, when those
sensitive feelings down inside become very self-centered
and routine, when we start building walls around
ourselves and protecting ourselves and securing ourselves and
losing contact with that great, vast host of
people who need us, then instead of getting
big, we get small.
Instead of enrichment, there comes poverty.
Instead of freedom, there comes bondage.
And instead of enjoyment, there comes the bitterness
of sorrow.
Yes, it costs to care, but it costs
more not to care.
Do you care?
Will you put this care into practice this
next week?
Gracious Father, thank you that Jesus cared.
Thank you that he came all the way
from heaven to identify with us, that he
cared enough to love us and die for
us.
Thank you that there were Christians who cared
enough to pray for us and witness to
us and tell us how to be saved.
We confessed, Lord, there were times we were
angry with them, but now, Lord, we're thankful
that they cared.
Thank you there were Christians who cared enough
to help us grow, who taught us the
word of God and gave us opportunities for
service.
Thank you there were those who cared enough
to pray and to warn and sometimes to
discipline.
Thank you, Father, that there are those who
care today.
Thank you that you care.
You've said, casting all your cares upon him,
for he cares for you.
Lord, help us to care for others.
Help us not, O God, to excuse ourselves,
am I my brother's keeper?
But rather, help us to identify where the
need is to pray and to get involved.
I pray for any here without the Lord
Jesus.
O Father, that they might come to trust
Christ, turn from their sins and believe in
the Savior and be born again.
I pray for selfish saints who need to
be saved from themselves.
O do it today and help us, O
God, to live as those who care and
to put feet to our prayers.
I pray in Jesus' name.
Amen.