What an objection some people have to strong measures! They see around them, among those under their influence, a great deal going on which is downright evil. You call upon them to put a stop to it, and to do all in their power to prevent it.
But what do they say? They tell you they will go gently and quietly to work, but they do not like to hurt other people’s feelings, or to tread upon their prejudices. They have no objection to trying gradually, quietly and gently to turn the tide of evil into a good and holy channel, but they hate and abominate anything in the shape of strong measures.
And yet there are cases where nothing short of strong measures will be of any avail. Here is a man who has a diseased hand. For some time the doctor has been trying gentle remedies: the poultice, the ointment, the medication, have all been tried. But now the doctor sees a change in the appearance of the hand. He sees very clearly that gangrene is setting in. No poultice, no ointment, no medication will be any use now. Nothing but the amputation of the hand will save the man’s life. What a foolish doctor he would be, if he refused in such a case to take strong measures!
Nehemiah was the Martin Luther of his age, the great reformer of his nation, and never did he feel the need of strong measures to be so great as when he came back to Jerusalem after his absence in Persia.
Four glaring evils were staring him in the face.
In the temple itself a grand reception room had been prepared for Tobiah the Ammonite.
The people had refused to pay tithes or contributions to the temple service, and consequently all the Levites had left the sanctuary.
The Sabbath day was desecrated and profaned; trade went on as usual both within and without the city.
So common had marriage with heathen people become, that even the very children in the street were chattering in foreign languages.
Four evils, all of them very serious and deep-rooted, were calling for instant reformation at his hand.
How does Nehemiah go to work? Does he shrink from giving offense or hurting people’s feelings or calling things by their right names? No, he feels his nation has sinned; the disease of sin is spreading; gangrene is setting in and nothing will do but strong measures. The offending members must be cut off, that the whole body may be saved.
He began first with the temple. Going into the inner court, and taking with him a band of his faithful servants, he threw open the door of the great store-chamber and began his work. He bade his servants to clear out all Tobiah’s goods, and he himself gave a helping hand and led them in the work. The grand sofas, the elegant cushions, the elaborate mats and the bright-colored curtains were all dragged out and cast outside. And then, when the great chamber was empty, he had it thoroughly cleaned and purified and put in order, to receive again the temple vessels and stores.
It was certainly a strong measure, but a very necessary one. If Nehemiah had stopped to think what Tobiah might happen to say the next time he came to Jerusalem, or if he had held back because he was afraid of hurting the feelings of Eliashib the high priest, the sin would never have been stopped; the temple would never have been cleansed.
The Apostle Paul tells all those who are Christ’s that they themselves are God’s temple. “Know ye not that ye are the temple of God, and that the Spirit of God dwelleth in you?
If any man defile the temple of God, him shall God destroy; for the temple of God is holy, which temple ye are.”
You are the temple of God; you yourself are God’s dwelling-place. Examine then the secret chambers of your heart. Are any of Tobiah’s goods there? Is there any secret sin hidden away in your heart? If so, be your own Nehemiah; cleanse the chamber of your heart, or rather cry unto God to do it for you. “Cleanse Thou me from secret faults.”
This is an all-important matter, for, unless the hidden sin is removed, you will receive no answer to your prayers, and therefore to attempt to pray about other things is useless. “If I regard iniquity in my heart, the Lord will not hear me.”
Then, too, the Holy Spirit will be grieved and will cease to move you, and without His help you can do nothing; He cannot inhabit that temple in the secret chambers of which cherished sin is to be found. In such a case nothing but strong measures will avail. That sin must be given up, or your soul will be darkened; that chamber must be cleansed, or the holy presence of the Lord cannot be enjoyed or felt.
Do you say, It is hard to give it up, to clear it out; it has become a second nature to me, and I know not how to rid myself of it? Surely it is worth making the effort, however much pain and suffering it may cause. Amputation, however much agony it may entail, is necessary if gangrene has set in. “If thy right eye offend thee, pluck it out, and cast it from thee: for it is profitable for thee that one of thy members should perish, and not that thy whole body should be cast into hell. And if thy right hand offend thee, cut it off, and cast it from thee: for it is profitable for thee that one of thy members should perish, and not that thy whole body should be cast into hell.”
The first evil was dealt with and cleared away. Tobiah and his goods had been cast out of the temple. Nehemiah now passed on to the next thing which had so greatly shocked him on his arrival in Jerusalem, namely, the neglect on the part of the people with regard to the payment of what was due from them for the temple service.
Again, Nehemiah took strong measures. He called together the rulers, as the leaders and representatives of the rest, and very strongly he gave them his mind on the subject. No smooth words or gentle hints would do. “Then contended I with the rulers” (that is, I reproved them and argued with them), “and said, Why is the house of God forsaken?”
Then, without waiting for a response to his appeal, he sent around to all the Levites and singers, bidding them with all haste to come up to the temple and to take up their work again. And the people, seeing he was determined, and that there was no possibility of his allowing the matter to drop, came bringing with them the corn, the wine and the oil to fill once more the empty chamber. “Then brought all Judah the tithe of the corn and the new wine and the oil unto the treasuries.”
And, in order to prevent such a thing ever happening again, Nehemiah appointed treasurers to look after the temple stores. Eliashib the high priest had been the storekeeper before (Neh. 13:44And before this, Eliashib the priest, having the oversight of the chamber of the house of our God, was allied unto Tobiah: (Nehemiah 13:4)), but he had shown himself unworthy of such responsibility. Four men were chosen to collect the stores, and afterward to deal them out to the priests and Levites. One was a priest, one a Levite, one a layman and the fourth a scribe (verse 13). Nehemiah tells us why he selected these four men. “They were counted faithful,” and as faithful men they could be thoroughly depended upon.
Now, having set the temple in order, Nehemiah proceeded to fight the battle with regard to the observance of the Sabbath.
Again he used strong measures. He once more spoke strongly to the nobles, for they had been the leaders in the desecration of the Sabbath. They liked the freshest fruit and the daintiest dishes for their Sabbath feast, and they had, therefore, encouraged the market-people to go on with their Sabbath trade. There were plenty of people who, for their own self-pleasing, were ready to argue in favor of breaking the Sabbath.
Nehemiah reminded the nobles that the destruction of Jerusalem, the overthrow of that very city which they were taking so much trouble to rebuild, had all been brought about through desecration of the Sabbath day. For what message had Jeremiah brought their fathers? “If ye will not hearken unto Me to hallow [keep holy] the sabbath day, and not to bear a burden, even entering in at the gates of Jerusalem on the sabbath day; then will I kindle a fire in the gates thereof, and it shall devour the palaces of Jerusalem, and it shall not be quenched.”
God’s Word had come true. Their fathers, despising the warning, had continued to break the Sabbath, and Nebuchadnezzar had burned and destroyed the very gates through which the Sabbath burdens had been carried. What safety, then, could they hope for now? How could they expect to keep their new gates from destruction, if they followed in the footsteps of their fathers, and did the very thing that God, by the mouth of Jeremiah, condemned?
“Then I contended with the nobles of Judah, and said unto them, What evil thing is this that ye do, and profane the sabbath day? Did not your fathers thus, and did not our God bring all this evil upon us, and upon this city? yet ye bring more wrath upon Israel by profaning the sabbath.”
But though Nehemiah began by rebuking the nobles, he did not stop there. He took up the matter with a high hand. He commanded the gate-keepers to shut the gates on Friday evening, about half an hour earlier than usual. On other nights they were shut as soon as the sun had set. But now Nehemiah ordered them to close the gates on Friday evenings, as soon as the shadows began to lengthen and the day was drawing to a close. They were also, in future, to be kept shut the whole of the Sabbath, so that no mules, donkeys, camels or other beasts of burden might be able to enter the city on the holy day.
The little gate, inside the large gate, by means of which foot-passengers might enter and leave the city, was left open, in order that people living in the country villages might be able to come into the city to attend the temple services. But Nehemiah took care to place some of his own trusty servants at this smaller gate, and gave them strict instructions to admit no burdens, no parcels, no goods of any kind into the city on the Sabbath day (Neh. 13:1919And it came to pass, that when the gates of Jerusalem began to be dark before the sabbath, I commanded that the gates should be shut, and charged that they should not be opened till after the sabbath: and some of my servants set I at the gates, that there should no burden be brought in on the sabbath day. (Nehemiah 13:19)).
Very naturally, the merchants and the salespeople did not like this. They did a lot of business on the Sabbath day, and they would not lose their large profits without a struggle. So what do we find them doing? They were refused admittance into the city, so they set up their stalls outside the walls. If the people of Jerusalem could not buy from them because of that straitlaced, narrow-minded Nehemiah, still the country people who came in to attend the temple services could shop at their stalls on their way home. In this way they might maintain a certain amount of their Sabbath business, and still receive at least part of their Sabbath profits. Not only so, but surely many Jews from the city itself, as they strolled through the gates on the day of rest, might pass by their stalls. In the conveniently loose folds of their robes, many even of these inhabitants of Jerusalem might conceal a pomegranate, a melon, a piece of fish, a bunch of grapes, a handful of figs or a freshly-cut cucumber, and might easily escape detection by Nehemiah’s servants standing at the gate.
Nehemiah, seeing this state of things, felt that once again strong measures were required. He must make a clean sweep of these traders at once. So, going out to them, he gave them warning that they would be arrested and imprisoned the very next time that they came within sight of the city on the Sabbath day.
“So the merchants and sellers of all kind of ware lodged without Jerusalem once or twice. Then I testified against them and said unto them: Why lodge ye about the wall? if ye do so again, I will lay hands on you.” That put a stop to it. “From that time forth came they no more on the Sabbath.”
Then, from then on, Nehemiah held the Levites responsible for the strict observance of this rule. His own servants had guarded the gates in the first emergency; now he told the Levites to take their place, and to do all in their power to enforce and to maintain the sanctity of the holy day.
Surely we need a Nehemiah today. We need some of his strong measures to stop the growing disregard of the Lord’s Day, which is creeping slowly but surely like a dark shadow over this country of ours. We need a man who will not be afraid of being called straitlaced or narrow-minded or peculiar or Jewish or Puritanical, but who will speak his mind clearly and decidedly on such an all-important point. We need someone who will not hesitate to use strong measures to put down the utter disregard of the Lord’s Day which is so prevalent today.
Let each of us ask himself or herself, What am I doing in this matter? How do I myself spend the Lord’s Day? Do I spend it for Him, or do I spend the best of its hours in bed? Am I careful not to spend the day in pleasing myself? Or do I think it no shame to amuse myself on that day as I choose, by whatever means that I have at my disposal? Am I anxious to dedicate the day wholly and entirely to God, setting it apart entirely for His service?
And, if I myself keep the Lord’s Day as a day set aside for Himself, do I see that those over whom I have influence are doing the same? Am I anxious that my children, the visitors who come to see me, all who are in my home on the Lord’s Day should do the same? Do I help them by every means in my power? Do I strive that in my home at least God shall have His due?
“FOR THE MOUTH OF THE LORD HATH SPOKEN IT.”