Whoever oppresses a poor man insults his Maker, but he who is generous to the needy honours him. (Proverbs 14:31). In our series on Ezra-Nehemiah we have reached a point in the narrative (in Nehemiah 5) where the conflict that has come from opposition to the rebuilding of the walls, and the work of rebuilding itself, takes a back seat and a new problem emerges – the problem of hunger and exploitation.

We’re thinking today about being living examples to our community. Of how to be role models for the good.

Our world has many different types of role models. There are role models that have paved a way for future generations – people like Barack Obama Malala, Mary Curie. There are people like David Attenborough, who invested time and energy and caring for the planet and raising awareness of the stewardship needed. Actors and singers can be role models. Olympians and paralympians. Celebrity are a whole new category of role model from the Kardashians to YouTubers like MrBeast. Who are some of your role models? they can be politicians, siblings, activists, parents, minister of faith. Who has been influential in your life who do you aspire to be? Do we think that actually we can be role models and our role models to other people in the way we think an act and behave?

Using this passage in Nehemiah, we’re thinking about problems in the world of hunger and exploitation. It was a situation Nehemiah was facing. They’ve been building the wall, there was opposition. All of this takes a backseat in the face of this new crisis of hunger and exploitation. The people approach Nehemiah with this serious problem that they’re facing, and we get Nehemiah as a living example of how to tackle this reality of hunger and exploitation. We can look at these big global issues and think what can we possibly do, but here we have an example of what one person was able to do in his corner of the world.

Our opening verse this morning was this from Proverbs: ‘ whoever oppresses a poor man insults his maker, but he who is generous to the needy honours him’ if we are generous to the needy to help people in hunger in our little circle influence, then we’re honouring God, and Nehemiah was a living example of this and we can learn from him this morning.

We’re using these books of Ezra and Nehemiah in a series to help us think about this year of discernment. About how we can trust the God will build his kingdom about how through studying Gods word and standing in the gap through prayer we can know more of Gods ways can hear his voice and guidance and today we’re thinking about how we can be living examples of godly behaviour. The people that look out for those that are needy that are suffering from hunger and exploitation.

What can we do to tackle hunger exploitation today in our little bit of the world?

Nehemiah Was able to battle hunger and exploitation because he became aware of the hidden strains in the community. He hears this outcry from them. We read this in the first five verses of chapter 5. There was need for grain some are needing to sell their land, some were even needing to sell relatives. Needs were not being met.

A similar thing happened in the book of ACTS. The Hellenistic Jews were not being cared for in the same way, and this was brought to the attention of the brothers in Jerusalem, and so action was then taken, to make sure that all were being looked after.

What are the strains in our community? Where can we act? Where is the impoverishment where is the need?

Nehemiah saw the situation and was stirred to anger at the injustice. He was controlled and constructive in how he dealt with this situation. He gathered people together and explains that what they were doing, was not right, was not good.

In our Society what are people doing that is not right? where is our anger being stirred up?

Nehemiah wants to redress the wrong that exists – calls them to generosity to enable all to have enough.

Nehemiah has a great pattern of leadership. He sees the strains in society. He seeks to address these wrongs, and does this, because he’s motivated by the love of God, and of his brothers and sisters he dismisses his entitlement. Similar to Paul dismissing his entitlement in one Corinthians, chapter 9. Nehemiah is an example of humility of generosity – he doesn’t laud his power over the people, but shares what he has with his people.

The passage ends with Nehemiah wanting to recognise his generosity.

You might be sitting there thinking well, I’m not a leader, but actually all of us can be leaders – being a leader is to do with influence and we all have influence over certain groups of people within our orbit.

Jesus sums up the law in this way: hear o Israel, the Lord, our God, the Lord is one. love the Lord, your God with all your heart with all your soul with all your mind with all your strength. The second is this love your neighbour as yourself, there is no other commandment greater than these. This is how Jesus is teaching his followers to be living examples in their community

What does this mean for us in our community? we’ve talked about how in this year ahead We’re staying open to what God might be moving us in to. Where is there an outcry in our community? What wrongs can we redress? How can we lead by example?

What are your spheres of influence? what people do you come across day and day out what things do you see around you? That’s good people wear on a mission from God, and as part of that we want to think about what the needs are of our community and how we can be living examples that point people to Jesus. How can we model, loving God and loving our neighbour as our self. we can be people that don’t exploit that don’t take people for granted that generous with what we have as we move into the year of December. What is going to be stirring in us both as individuals and as a whole community. What situations will anger us into action?

Let’s spend some moments reflecting on these questions. In our community Where is there an outcry? What wrongs can we address? And how can we lead by example? Let’s be open to where God is wanting to speak to us and where we can be his living examples.

When I heard these words, I sat down and wept and morurned for days, fasting and praying before the God of heaven (Nehemiah 1:4)

We’ve been looking at the books of Ezra and Nehemiah. To help us in this year of discernment ahead today we’re thinking about the call to fast and pray. Thinking what Nehemiah chapter 1 teaches us of this and how it might impact our discernment in the year ahead.

I don’t know how you respond to the news headlines but sometimes we attempted to turn it off because of the pain that we are faced with. we turn on the news currently and there are world problems and local problems galore. We see violence war and also difficulties with poverty, all impacting our world. Things in our communities and on a global scale that make us question what God is doing and get us thinking about how we can help because it seems to insurmountable.

There is something about this passage about praying for the needs of the world and as we look at the News items to be thinking about standing in the gap between God and the world and lay before God the needs, showing him a heartfelt anxiety about the current situation, laying it all before God.

This is what Nehemiah does in verse four of our chapter this morning – His fasting and praying is his way of standing in the gap of laying out the needs of the world before God.

What is the response when we watch the news? what is our response when we see the needs in our community? what is our response when we see the needs within our church? do we stand in the gap?

In our passage today We are introduced to Nehemiah through his prayer. At this point In the narrative we are probably 13 years after Ezra left for Jerusalem. We find out that Nehemiah is cupbearer to the Persian king, which is a really important role – there is a lot of privilege that comes with that role in terms of having the ear of the king, having access to the King. Between this prayer is chapter 1 and the action that carries on into ch2 there is probably a gap of about 4 to 5 months. Nehemiah has a reputation for being a man of action and we see that in subsequent chapters – but the fact that he’s spent these four months praying shows that for him it was a priority to come before God. Before any action took place Nehemiah shows us the importance of fasting and prayer.

In v 5 to 11 we have this wonderful prayer Of Nehemiah, It sets out a good pattern of prayer that we could follow. we read verse 5 that he focuses on the God of heaven which in fact we do in the Lord’s prayer that Jesus taught us. He recognises God’s greatness knowing who God is. The second part of his prayer inv6-7 shows real humility – there is confession not just for his own sin but for the sin of his people historically. Acknowledging the rebellion and where things have gone wrong. We touched a bit on this last week with the importance of safeguarding and realising where we may have got it wrong in the past and where we might need to improve on it in the future for the glory of God‘s name. There is something about confession that frees us, it’s not about making us feel guilty but it’s freeing us to sit in the gap open armed free of burden. In v8-10 in the build up to his plea. He recounts the history of who God is, of Gods history with his people. And remembers gods promises. That God would restore his people again and stands in the gap culminating in a plea in verse 11 that God would act making it possible for God’s people to again be settled in Jerusalem.

Only after this prayer do we then get the action – in chapter 2 we have an account of Nehemiah making a request of the King to return, we get the account of the journey and then as soon as Nehemiah gets there he makes a survey of what needs doing. In chapter 3 we have the account of him sharing out the workload, and in chapter 4 there is opposition which causes poor morale – Nehemiah acts by praying arming and continuing the work. This action is fuelled by this time of prayer that is represented in chapter 1 a time of discernment and seeking guards before the action commences.

The commentator Hannah Harrington says this about me Nehemiah: Despite Nehemiah’s powerful role he is a man of prayer with all the necessary humility that entails most of his prayers are short but the considerable number of them reveals a lifestyle of spontaneous recourse to Yahweh whatever needs arise, in this instance the phrase day and night indicate sustained prayer on behalf of Israel.

What can We learn from Nehemiahs prayer? We can use scripture to aid our prayers, we can come before God in humility in our prayers with our confession and we can persevere in our prayer life praying for particular things again and again. When we think about a year discernment, sitting and waiting can be uncomfortable particularly for people of action. but there is something in Nehemiah’s pragmatic approach and his humility that meant he realised he needed to begin with prayer and then came the action. Where do we need to fast and pray for the needs of the world but also thinking about discernment for the year ahead both corporately and in our Individual lives. Nehemiah’s prayer teaches us things about this.

Nehemiah’s Praying involved fasting and fasting can come in many shapes and sizes what it boils down to is fasting from things in order to give us more time to set aside for praying with God enables us to have a single focus on him and what we are bringing before him.

Being part of a church means we have a mission from God to be his people in the areas that we are based. Sharing God with our community. how will fasting and praying impact our mission? When we stand in the gap seeking gods well asking him questions what then will he do what will the actions be? The amazing thing about prayer is that all of us can take a part in that in this year of discernment ahead. We can all play a part. How will we respond when we watch the news? how will we respond when we see the needs in our community? how will we respond when we see the needs within our church? Will we stand in the gap? I Wonder what God might be stirring us to do as we take 2024 to discern his will. we can discern this together as we use Nehemiah’s pattern of prayer, as we fast and pray, so that when we do come to a point of action we know it is fuelled by him.

For Ezra had set his heart to study the law of the LORD and to do it and to teach the statutes and ordinances in Israel (Ezra 7:10)

Today, we’re thinking about what it means to study and obey God’s word. What does that mean in the context of this New Year of 2024 – this year where we’re thinking about what God might be calling us to as churches here in central Ramsgate. 

There are  an awful lot of self-help and life hacks around. I wonder what your bookshelf looks like? some bookshelves would be covered with books about living your best life – facing your fears. There are also lots of things on social media called life hacks – ways of making life easier and more efficient. We are in an era of self-help and looking for improved life and if we really do trust and believe in God’s word not just as another guide, but as a way that God communicates to us about how we live and how we should be trusting him, how he has worked in the history of his people and is continuing to work in that way today, then it’s an important book to read and know

In our opening verse we heard that ‘Ezra had set his heart to study the law of the Lord and do it and teach the statues and ordinances in Israel. –  we are introduced to Ezra this leader that is sent and given permission to go back to Jerusalem and he shares the statues and laws with the people – that was his gifting. He was a teacher. He was given his gifting and passion to go back and to teach God’s law to the new community there.

when we are reading the Bibleit is important  to think about the context in which it was written for then and interpret it to where we are now. sometimes there can be a really direct comparison. Sometimes we have to work a bit harder at seeing what that means. 

The people of God had been given opportunity and opportunity to follow God and live in an obedient relationship with him – in this loving relationship. All that had to do was Continue to give God their full attention and obedience. We might think that we are constantly going on about sin but sometimes we need that reminder. God’s people had again and again fallen short. We all do which is why we come to our service every week and say a confession.

In our communion service we often talk of the commandments that Jesus shared with his disciples:  love the Lord your God, with all your heart soul mind and strength and love your neighbour, as yourself. I wonder as Gods people how are we living up to that? And in Ezra’s time how were they living up to that , it seems that they were falling short of  loving God. They hadn’t really known who he was, they hadn’t been reading his word , They hadn’t been into the habit of practising of worship and Ezra is coming back into this time. We had zerubbabel in the first six chapters that we looked at last week, where they came back and were rebuilding the temple and then we’ve got Ezra he returns to Jerusalem and tries to bring about a change of rebuilding the community by the returning to and reading of the law. Ezra is rebuilding the community. At the time there  were people who had never been exiled away they remained but under Babylonian rule,  we’ve got the people that come back with zerubabbel and then we’ve got people that come back with Ezra and they’re quite disjointed bunch of people – they had different backgrounds – and they’re trying to rebuild this community of people again to get a joint identity and Ezra does this by returning to the law, and bringing people back to know what God said, what God has done, and what God will continue to do

What does this mean to us? We are a community of people but we’ve got different backgrounds , we all want to hear in this year ahead of us what God has planned for us in our church as well as about how are we gonna be reaching out and fulfilling our purposes for God here in Ramsgate. Ezra and Nehemiah are hopefully going to help us explore that and go a  bit deeper 

I said we have the second wave of returnees from exile, Ezra is being introduced as someone returning them to the law to rebuild the community of God. In chapter  7 we’re introduced to Ezra and he’s been given permission, as a teacher of the law, to go back to Jerusalem. we’re told that he lived out what he was reading and learning about. one commentator says this says about Ezra: he’s a model reformer in that what he taught he lived and what he had lived He first made sure of in scriptures. with study conduct and teaching put deliberately in this right order Each of these was able to function properly at its best: study, was saved from unreality, conduct from uncertainty and teaching from insincerity and shallowness. We’ve been given a great gift of God in our context today, and it’s got the whole history, from OT and the joy of the new Testament, seeing God fulfilling the promises that were made in Ezra time the word of God is not irrelevant. It speaks into the reality that we’re in and we need to be aware of that –  it’s not uncertain. God promises have come true will continue to come true. and it’s not insincere. We wanna dig deeper into the richness of the Bible so that we can see the riches it provides for our community and ourselves. 

Ezra is given a letter from the king of Persia: it says you are sent by the King and his advisors to enquire about Judah and Jerusalem, with regards to the law of your God, which is in your hand. There are  a variety of thoughts about this, whether the law wasn’t already in Jerusalem and, Ezra had gone back with a copy of the scrolls. its unlikely, it probably was there already, but the significance of this phrase was that Ezra  had been given a task, a  function, a purpose to go back with God’s law, with a specific purpose of teaching and explaining it and reading it again. like I said they might have been out of the habit of the  pattern of worship and so Ezra had a  task  a command to share Gods law  with the people of God

As we go through into chapter 8, we see the list of families returning. on their journey Ezra decides worship is gonna be really important as part of their rebuilding of the community and he finds Levites for the temple, he ready and prepared to find leadership and train those that are going to help to build the community of God. we read about them fasting for protection that God will protect them in their journey, and when they finally get to Jerusalem, they offer the sacrifices and then we get to this point of chapter 9, which was the second part of the reading. 

There is sort of like an presumption given some weight by mention in chapter 10 that between the worship in the temple on arrival and these people coming to Ezra with their concerns that Ezra did teach from the Torah, from God’s law – they’ve been hearing God’s word. The word has been read to them, it might’ve been explained as well but they definitely had it read, and then the people respond to that, they respond to God’s law. After hearing it l they approach Ezra with concerns and these concerns were about intermarriage with the tribes around them. 

 In the context of that day in the context of them being heir of the exodus. we need to go back to the old Testament fir Gods people there was a call to be separate, pure, a holy seed – set apart to be a chosen nation given cOmmanents to be the people he had called them to be.  if we read Exodus 34: 11-16 and Deuteronomy 7:1-4 these verses seem harsh words in our modern sensibilities, it seems kind of really countercultural to our thinking of God as a loving caring God, but God called these people at this time to a high calling. They were holy seed to be set up so that the world could see who God was, could see the holiness of God. They were to be a blessing to others, and that was the kind of deal. If you like God is saying follow me be my people be my holy people and you will get all this. This blessing you will be blessed because I give my blessing to you came obedience 

In our passage in Ezra you may have  realised that the writer has repeated the same pattern of the people in the exodus and Deuteronomy passages – it’s the same list. Don’t be like those people in your in your neighbourhood et cetera. It’s there to remind them that they were an exodus people and now they’re a people are being brought back from exile 

As exodus people they didn’t live up to bargain of obedience, they didn’t live up to standard, it was hard for them, so God is bringing them back again, giving them another chance reminding them that they were these people holy and set apart, but they haven’t been living this way

Ezra is  presented with this fact that they haven’t been living up to that they have been intermarrying. They’ve been dealing with different religious practices that were around. They weren’t focused on worshipping God with their heart, soul, mind and strength. He responds in grief and prayer 

We get this prayer of Ezra and it’s likely that this happened in the ninth month. It’s likely they’ve been in Jerusalem about four months now and it’s probably unlikely, the commentators think, that Ezra had not heard of this before, but there’s almost like a procedure he goes through to acknowledge that the people have come to him and recognised that they’ve not been living How the word of God is telling them to live, and so he sits in silence in v 3 to 4.  He doesn’t really act other than kind of tearing his clothes, and just sitting. He recognises their rebellion. He recognises what they’ve done as a nation that they’ve not followed God And he acknowledges that, but in v8-15 he also acknowledges God’s mercy and his call on them as a people, he recognises that they were a nation and nor There’s a small remnant of them back, but that’s because of God being gracious. We may look around and see the church declining dramatically, seeing morality around us change, seeing tempers raised around us on trains and buses and thinking I really long for peace for you. We are essentially a remnant. 

I think this passage is not saying that in today’s age intermarriage is wrong, or that we are to withdraw from society and not to mix with . I think in general this is calling us to holiness to focus on what sets us apart from the world around us as the Christian remnant today. 

I think it is helping us to think about what does God’s word say how do we obey it and how do we live it out in our society. remember Jesus words about loving the Lords are God, with our heart, soul, mind and strength and our neighbours our self? How are we doing that today? How are we putting God as number one how are we loving our neighbour as ourselves?

We should be encouraging each other to keep God number one in our lives. What is God saying to us and we only know what he’s saying if we study and read and meditate on God’s word. As a church family, we wanna help to keep each other accountable to obeying God’s word, and in living out God’s word by caring for our community.

Ultimately, we’re on a mission from God, got a submission for the whole world to know who he is do we see our lives in this light do we see going to the supermarket as a mission? Do we see our jobs as a mission from God? In every aspect of our lives we are on a mission from God. how we are in our society in our workplaces in our church impacts the lives of those around us. God called his people to be a blessing to others. To be different to stand apart which is the same for us today so in 2024, what might God be staring in us to do? What might he want us to change? Developed an adopt that we can love God with our heart, soul mind, strength, and our neighbours, our mself And see where he’s drawing us to be that presence in the community around us both outside and inside of our church.