Cleaning Up National Failures
The Ammonite and Moabite Question (1-3)
On Wall-Dedication Day, the Jews came upon the passage in Deuteronomy 23:3-5. This passage instructed that no Ammonite or Moabite be permitted to enter the assembly of worship because they had nationally refused to provide bread and water for Israel when on their way to the Promised Land. Instead, they had hired Balaam to curse Israel. Moab and Ammon were the nations that descended from Lot through his daughters. Balaam, a prophet, could not curse Israel for Moab, so he taught Moab how to bring a curse on Israel through intermarriage with their idol-worshiping daughters.
In the end, God turned the whole episode into a blessing, but it was after some great harm and curse had befallen Israel. Upon reading the passage in Deuteronomy, the Jews were compelled to dismiss from worship those who had not embraced faith in Yahweh and were of Moabite and Ammonite descent (1-3). It’s important to note that this was not a spiritual censure but a political one. Those who expressed complete devotion to Yahweh from any nation were welcomed to worship.
Tobiah Thrown Out (4-9)
After Nehemiah’s first term as governor of Judea, he went back to Persia to have his appointment renewed. In his absence, the Jews relapsed into sinful behavior, which Nehemiah had to deal with upon his return. The rest of chapter 13 deals with those behaviors (6).
It wasn’t long after Nehemiah’s return that he learned that Tobiah, governor of Ammon and a man of Jewish descent, used his contacts within the priesthood to obtain a storage room in one of the temple chambers used to store the tithes. Tobiah turned the storage room into a personal warehouse for his possessions. He wanted to set up an office in the temple area and gain influence over Jerusalem and Judea in case Nehemiah’s governorship was not renewed (4-5).
When Nehemiah returned and discovered the evil alliance Eliashib had made with Tobiah, he became angry and threw Tobiah’s personal property out of the warehouse, had the room rededicated to Yahweh, and reloaded the area with returned sacred tithes (6-9). It is hard to believe that so quickly after reading the Law concerning Moabites and Ammonites on Wall-Dedication Day, the Jews so quickly ignored God’s will and not only allowed an Ammonite to enter the Temple but essentially gave him an executive office.
Tithe Ignored (10-14)
Additionally, the officials ceased collecting the tithe so that the Levites and singers had to go work their fields to survive. If worship is corrupt at any level, worship becomes corrupted at all levels.
Nehemiah addressed the issue by:
confronting the officials about robbing God of the tithe (Malachi 3:8) and abandoning their holy commitment not to forsake the house of the Lord (10)
gathering the Levites and reappointing them to their holy work (11)
restoring the tithe and appointing a committee of four reliable priests and Levites he could trust to distribute the tithe to the Levites (12-13)
It would seem it was mostly the singers and Levites being neglected and not being given tithe money. The priests seemed to be taking the tithe they needed to keep their more political roles but had abandoned the care of the Levites living throughout Judea. Nehemiah then prayed and asked that God’s mission to restore worship not be wiped out (14).
Sabbath Abuse (15-22)
Not only were the priests robbing Yahweh by keeping the tithes, but they were also treading grapes and selling their harvest, along with opening the food markets, on the Sabbath in Jerusalem, the city which had been devoted to worship (15). Foreign merchants, especially those from Tyre, were also entering the city and selling all they could on the Sabbath, as the whole nation was coming to Jerusalem that day, not to worship but to browse the market to do some personal shopping. Commerce had become an idol over the worship of Yahweh (15). Nehemiah rebuked the nobles and defined the practices as evil (16), reminding the Jews that it was the violation of the Sabbath that had led to their forefathers (Jeremiah 17:27) being taken into captivity for 70 years (17-18).
Nehemiah then moved to have the gates closed from evening to evening on the Sabbath to prevent any from entering or leaving on the Sabbath. He stationed some of his servants at the gates so passengers could come and go but not with loads on the Sabbath (19). Once or twice, some merchants were seeking to do business outside the city wall on the Sabbath (20), but Nehemiah warned them that if they were to return, he would use force to remove them (21).
After the first wave of cleaning up the commerce activity on the Sabbath, Nehemiah established a more permanent solution by having some Levites consecrate their lives to Yahweh as the ultimate Love of their lives and then commissioned them to watch the gates on the Sabbath on a more permanent basis.
Nehemiah prayed again and asked that all he was doing for the worship of Yahweh have an enduring effect on the nation due to Yahweh’s unfailing love (22).
Failure of Separation (23-29)
Not only had the Jews desecrated the temple, stolen tithes, and profaned (to abuse the sacred nature of a thing) the Sabbath, but they had also intermarried with foreign women. These women could not speak Hebrew, and their children were not learning the Hebrew language, which was threatening to erode the worship culture of the nation. The compromise of the Jews was working directly against Yahweh’s mission to be Israel’s only God (23-24).
Nehemiah confronted those intermarrying with committed pagans of other cultures and cursed them for breaking their oath from a few years before not to do so (10:30).
Finally, Nehemiah demanded that those who defiled marriage receive a beating, pull out their hair, and renew their oath in the name of Yahweh, committing never to give their mixed-race children in foreign marriages (25).
Nehemiah reminded the Jews that even Solomon, a beloved and wise king, was brought to sin through marriage to idol-worshiping women (26). Nehemiah then expressed shock and outrage that they had been so foolish in his absence to engage in such a destructive practice (27).
Nehemiah turned to the grandson of the High Priest Eliashib, who had married one of the daughters of Sanballat. Nehemiah threw him out of the city and defrocked him of his priestly stature (28).
Once more, Nehemiah prayed, asking God to remember those who had made the priesthood an unacceptable institution and treat them accordingly (29).
Nehemiah made a thorough cleaning of everything foreign, everything that threatened to remove Yahweh as the ultimate God whom Israel worshiped and loved, and then made sure the structure for priestly and Levitical ministry was well established, right down to the wood for sacrifices and the yearly firstfruit offerings (30-31).
Nehemiah closed the book with one final plea, that he be remembered for the good he had attempted to do.
Psalms 120-134 are all “Pilgrimage Songs” and were written to be sung by the Jews on their way up to Jerusalem for the three feasts held there each year [the feasts: Passover, Pentecost, Booths]. Ten of the Psalms are anonymous, four are attributed to David (122, 124,131,133), and one to Solomon (127)].
I have written these chapter devotionals as Jesus would have sung them and heard them as He was going to Jerusalem to celebrate feasts as a Boy, as a Man, and then ultimately in His final ascent to Jerusalem as the Passover culminated at Calvary. I will especially let these Psalms flow from Jesus’ own lips as we imagine a bit of what might have been going through His mind as He walked His disciples to that city 3,800 feet above sea level—the city in these Psalms referred to as Jerusalem and Zion.
Some imagine these Psalms were written for Solomon's Temple, each Psalm written for the fifteen steps leading up to the inner court—one Psalm at a time sung by the Levitical choirs accompanied by musicians as the priest made his way up each step.
Others imagine the Psalms were written for the exiles returning from Babylon to Jerusalem. Still others place them at 445 B.C. during Nehemiah's time, after the walls were built, when the Jews ascended to the temple for the Feast of Tabernacles.
Whenever these Psalms were written, they became songs sung by Pilgrims moving toward Jerusalem for one of the three feasts of Israel.
Psalm 124
The Psalm of Escape
This Psalm was authored by David; the occasion is completely unclear. Some place it at the end of David's life as a reflection of God's care. This is where I place the writing of this Psalm as I write this review. David was aware of all the times Israel had faced predatory armies and been Divinely delivered.
The Psalmist recognized, “if not for Yahweh,” he himself would have been little more than a bird destroyed and eaten on his way to becoming king at Jerusalem.
Preserved from Peril (1-5)
This Psalm is lyrics created from the memoir David had written of his life of following God.
If not for Divine intervention, he and Israel would have been swallowed up by greater powers and absorbed into the beast of another political system.
David composed a song to be sung where Israel would not merely fill their minds with the knowledge of divine intervention but would also announce, “If it had not been Yahweh who was on our side …” (1-2).
The full wrath of monstrous nations had been focused upon Israel's destruction more than once. Their raging force was like a flood that would have sent them running, engulfed them, and finally would have swallowed and buried them as a nation to be remembered no more (3-5).
David likely was an old man remembering the last battle of Saul when Saul and Jonathan were killed. Israel was overrun by the Philistines driving the armies of Israel across the Jordan River. The nation lay lifeless and open for complete occupation and annihilation. They were without a king and without government. The Philistines were ready to pounce and finish off the last of the Israeli forces.
It was Yahweh who had raised up David, and Yahweh who, through David, would unify Israel and defeat the Philistines in less than a decade. Engraved on David's mind would have been the sentiment, “If it had not been Yahweh who was on our side …”
As Jesus was making His way to Jerusalem, He would remember how Israel had been flooded by the monstrous powers of Nebuchadnezzer and taken captive to Babylon. He would have remembered, “if it had not been for Yahweh,” Israel would have been buried alive in Babylon, never to be heard from again.
As Jesus was making His way to Jerusalem, He was warning the Jewish leadership of the coming destruction of the temple, the city, and their nation by declaring, “the axe was at the root” of their being. Jesus had been sent by Yahweh to gather them and save them from the catastrophe.
Had it not been Yahweh who had sent Jesus, then all Israel and the promises with them would have been lost.
In a moment of eternal wisdom, however, Jesus, God's secret, was revealed. Yahweh was having Jesus become Israel to save Israel and the whole world. Jesus, to the core of His heart, was singing, “if not for Yahweh …”
Praise for Preservation (6-7)
David then compared Israel to a defenseless bird. First, Yahweh saved Israel from being devoured by the teeth of the beasts of government, who desired to greedily guzzle down Israel in their savage wrath (6). The second picture is of Israel’s being captured and ensnared by wild bird hunters.
David sang on—Israel was not devoured, but they were ensnared. Yahweh broke the snare and Israel like a bird caught air and flew away (7).
Jesus, marching up to Jerusalem, would certainly have thought of the amazing ways God had broken the traps of Egypt and the traps of Babylon in freeing Israel. But now Israel was in a Roman trap, and more, Jesus had called out to Israel telling them they were in a far more serious trap than a Roman trap; they were in a sin trap. This was an unarguable truth, for all die as a result of the sin they are trapped in.
Jesus would have been singing high praise as He was anticipating Yahweh’s coming to deliver Israel from their sin trap.
Jesus would also be aware the only way to break the trap would be to shatter the teeth of death, the teeth of the one setting the snares.
Jesus would need to die to destroy death.
The song is thrilling, “Yahweh is on our side.” The song is also sobering, at least for Jesus—”our help in the name of Yahweh”—as the kind of help necessary was going to require sacrifice.
Praise the Name of Yahweh (8)
David then reaches back to Moses, declaring Israel's help was in the name of Yahweh. The meaning of Yahweh's name, I AM WHO I AM, as given to Moses, was the meaning behind Yahweh's name. Every time Yahweh's name was invoked, His presence grasped the hearts of those who proclaimed His name in allegiance.
David, in the Psalm, was declaring THE PRESENT ONE was present in Israel to HELP, and the very One who was present to help is the Maker of heaven and earth (8).
Jesus sang this last verse; He sang it for His disciples knowing that they were about to face the week of Jesus' passion. “Our help” is in the utterance. “Our help is in the name of ‘YAHWEH’; He is here to help you.”
Jesus would also have been saying, “Yahweh is here to help Me; I will not be left dead but will rise to break the teeth of death and free souls from sin to fly to Yahweh.
Yes, My help is in the name of Yahweh. No matter how forsaken I feel, Yahweh is present to help.”