FBC Morning Light – March 30, 2022

Faith Baptist Church

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Well, a good Wednesday morning to you. Let me ask you this, when was the last time you did a little bit of a review, if I can put it that way, of your spiritual history?

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A review of your spiritual history. What am I talking about? Well, in today's Bible reading, in Nehemiah chapters 9 and 10, and the chapter 9 passage begins at verse 22, it's right in the middle of an extended passage that Nehemiah is recorded for us.

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But in this passage, Nehemiah is doing a little bit of that. He's reviewing some spiritual history.

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I want us to look at this, he's reviewing the nation's spiritual history. I want us to look at this and ask ourselves the question, have

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I done this on a personal level, reviewed my own spiritual history?

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In doing so, we can ask ourselves a series of questions that come out in this passage. For example, in verses 22 through 25, ask yourself, in your spiritual history, what has

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God graciously done for you? What has he graciously done for you? Look how

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Nehemiah does this in verses 22, chapter 9, verses 22 and following. He says, moreover, you gave them, that is the

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Israelites, the Jewish people, you gave them kingdoms and nations, and you divided them into districts.

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They took possession of the land of Sihon, the king of Heshbon and Og, the king of Bashan. You also multiplied their children as the stars of heaven and so forth and so on.

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He goes on to talk about how the Israelites went in and possessed the land of Canaan, and God gave them that land.

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They took strong cities and they gathered riches from those cities, they possessed houses and so on and so forth.

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God graciously provided all this, he did all of this for the people of Israel.

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I think it's helpful for us from time to time to stop and just reflect over the years of your walk with the

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Lord, how has he been gracious to you? What has he graciously done for you on a personal level?

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Think that one through. Then a second question to ask is, how have

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I failed the Lord and suffered the consequences, and not just once, but repeatedly?

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This comes out in verses 26 to 30 of chapter 9. He first of all rehearses all of the ways

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God has been gracious to them, but then in verse 26, there's this pivot word, nevertheless.

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Nevertheless what? Nevertheless, they were disobedient and rebelled against you.

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They cast your law behind their backs, they killed your prophets who testified against them to turn them to yourself, and they worked great provocations.

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You delivered them into the hands of the enemies, you punished them, but then when they cried out to you, you gave them deliverers.

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But after they had rest, verse 28, they again did evil before you, therefore you left them in the hand of their enemies.

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When they returned and cried out to you, you heard from heaven, and many times you delivered them according to your mercies, and you testified against them that you might bring them back to your law.

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You have to personalize this, I do. We have to personalize this and recognize, if we're honest, we can be critical of the

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Old Testament Israelites, can't we? For their repeated failures. But why are we not so critical of ourselves?

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How many times have you done this? Maybe not repeating the same sin over and over again, but you've failed the

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Lord, you've turned away from the Lord, and he in his kindness and grace, he sent a message and a

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Holy Spirit to take that message and drive it home to your heart, and bring you under conviction, brought you to repentance, and you confessed that thing, you repented of it, you turned from it, and God gave you rest graciously from that.

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But then after a while, you went back, fell back into some other kind of sin, and God brought harsh punishment, he chastened you for that, you felt the pain and the affliction of that sin, and you finally recognized what it was, and you turned from it, and you went back to the

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Lord, God sent a preacher or pastor to preach the word, and that word convicted you, and you repented, and so forth.

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That's happened repeatedly in your life. I think it's helpful for us, it's humbling, but beneficial for us to review over some of those ways in which we have failed.

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Not to grovel in it, but just to recognize the faithfulness of our

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God, and his kindness and grace, and his mercy toward us. And then in verse 31, and here's the point that I just made, it comes out in verse 31, he says,

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Nevertheless, in your great mercy, you did not utterly consume them, nor forsake them.

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For you are God, gracious and merciful. Reflect, how has the

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Lord been faithfully patient and merciful with you? Think back over the years, how has the

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Lord been faithfully patient and merciful toward you?

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And then another question is, do I need to acknowledge the role of my sin in my present condition, if I'm in a miserable plight, a miserable condition?

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Is there some sin that is behind that? Is the Lord chastening me?

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Now, the basis for asking that question is what he goes on to say in verses 32 and following.

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He says, Now therefore, our God, the great, the mighty and awesome God, who keeps covenant mercy, do not let all the trouble seem small before you that has come upon us.

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And he talks about that trouble, that our kings and princes, our priests and prophets, our fathers and all your people, from the days of the kings of Assyria until this day, have really suffered greatly and are enduring difficulty.

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He says, You are just in all that has befallen us, for you have dealt faithfully. But here's the thing, we have done wickedly.

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Neither our kings, nor our princes, our priests, nor our fathers have kept your law, nor heeded your commandments and your testimonies with which you testified against them.

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So what Nehemiah is doing here is he's looking at the condition of the nation as a whole, which is not really a nation.

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They don't have a king over them, over the people. Jerusalem, the wall around Jerusalem's been rebuilt, yes.

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The temple's been rebuilt, yes. But they don't have a nation. And they don't have a nation, he acknowledges, because of our sin, our wickedness.

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And yet, he acknowledges that God has acted faithfully in bringing this plight upon us.

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He has acted faithfully, because we have done wickedly. That takes a great deal of brutal honesty.

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And yet, I think it's an important point to come to, even as New Testament Christians, to be able to look at our plight and consider, am

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I enduring this because I have forsaken the Lord? And do some honest evaluation.

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Just do some honest evaluation. It's not something you have to broadcast and grovel in and all the rest of that kind of thing.

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But if you recognize there is a direct connection, a direct link between your current condition and sin that has brought you to that condition, then you deal with the sin.

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You deal with the sin. This is, of course, what Nehemiah and others have done. That then leads to what comes next in chapter 9, verse 38, and through chapter 10.

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This kind of review of your spiritual history should bring you to the place of making some firm commitments of consecration and rededication of your life to God and His Word.

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So that's what happens in verse 38. He says, because of all this, we make a sure covenant and write it.

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Our leaders, our Levites, and our priests seal it. And then in chapter 10, he talks about all who sealed it and what the covenant and commitment covers.

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And if you read through that, you're going to find that the commitment covers personal obedience, willing sacrifice, faithful worship, a refusal to neglect

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God's house. And so even that itemization of the points of the commitment give us some things to think about and to evaluate our own lives, don't they?

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How committed am I in personal obedience? How committed am

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I in sacrificing my own goods and stuff for the sake of the work of God?

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Am I faithfully worshiping God? Am I faithful in the worship of God's people, with God's people, in God's house?

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Or am I neglectful of God's house? These are things to think about. This review of our spiritual history should bring us to this place of rededication and reconsecration of ourselves to our

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God. Let's give some thought to that. Our Father and our God, help us to think honestly and faithfully, reflecting upon all that you have done for us, all the ways in which we have forsaken you, and yet you have been gracious and merciful to us.

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And may this reflection bring us to a firm place of commitment and rededication of our lives to you.

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This we pray in Jesus' name, amen. All right, well, have a good rest of your Wednesday, and I trust the