The Remnant in Jerusalem
Nehemiah 9
It was a great recovery from God's word, the celebration of the feast of tabernacles, after so long disuse; it presented, whether they apprehended it or not, the great ingathering after divine judgment whether in discernment or in vengeance (typified by the harvest and the vintage). They were probably as unintelligent about it as most Christians are now in the fog that prevails over Christendom. Even as to order there was lack and confusion still. Their assembling on the first day of the seventh month was quite in the spirit of that feast of trumpets, which is yet to summon the outcasts of Israel into the land when fulfilled in power. But it is remarkable that they seem to have slipped by the day of atonement on the tenth of the month, while they observed the feast of tabernacles with its eighth day. Had they been better instructed, they would have humbled themselves on that day of making reconciliation before the feast of joyful rest and universal blessing. It was thoroughly due to the Lord, and their souls felt the need, that they should afflict their souls before Him; but it was an unperceived incongruity to do so after that feast, instead of before it. Still it was done on the day after; and our gracious God was not unmindful, and here gives an affecting account of it.
“And on the twenty-fourth day of this month the sons of Israel were assembled with fasting and with sackclothes, and earth upon them. And the seed of Israel separated themselves from all foreigners, and stood and confessed their sins, and the iniquities of their fathers. And they stood up in their place, and read in the book of the law of Jehovah their God a fourth part of the day; and [another] fourth part they confessed, and worshipped Jehovah their God. Then stood up upon the stairs, of the Levites, Jeshua, and Bani, Kadmiel, Shebaniah, Bunni, Sherebiah, Bani, [and] Chenani, and cried with a loud voice unto Jehovah their God. Then the Levites Jeshua, and Kadmiel, Bani, Hashabneiah, Sherebiah, Hodiah, Shebaniah, [and] Pethahiah, said, Stand up and bless Jehovah your God from everlasting to everlasting; and blessed be thy glorious name, which is exalted above all blessing and praise.
“Thou [art] He, thou alone, Jehovah, who hast made heaven, the heaven of heavens, with all their host, the earth and all things that [are] thereon, the seas and all that [is] in them, and thou preservest them all; and the host of heaven worshippeth thee. Thou [art] Jehovah the God, who didst choose Abram, and broughtest him forth out of Ur of the Chaldees, and gavest him the name of Abraham; and foundest his heart, faithful before thee, and madest a covenant with him to give the land of the Canaanite, the Hittite, the Amorite, and the Perizzite, and the Jebusite, and the Girgashite, even to give it unto his seed, and hast performed thy words; for thou [art] righteous. And thou sawest the affliction of our fathers in Egypt, and heardest their cry by the Red Sea; and showedst signs and wonders upon Pharaoh, and on all his servants, and on all the people of his land; for thou knewest that they dealt proudly against them; and didst get thee a name, as it is this day. And thou didst divide the sea before them, so that they went through the midst of the sea on the dry [land]; and their pursuers thou didst cast into the depths, as a stone into the mighty waters. Moreover thou leddest them in a pillar of cloud by day; and in a pillar of fire by night, to give them light in the way wherein they should go.
Thou gavest also thy good spirit to instruct them, and withheldest not thy manna from their mouth, and gavest them water for their thirst.
“Yea, forty years didst thou sustain them in the wilderness, and they lacked nothing: their clothes waxed not old, and their feet, swelled not. Moreover thou gavest them kingdoms and peoples, which thou didst allot after their portions: so they possessed the land of Sihon, even the land of the king of Heshbon, and the land of Og king of Bashan. Their children also multipliedst thou as the stars of heaven, and broughtest them into the land, concerning which thou didst say to their fathers, that they should go in to possess [it]. So the children went in and possessed the land, and thou subduedst before them the inhabitants of the land, the Canaanites, and gavest them into their hands with their kings and the peoples of the land, that they might do with them as they would. And they took fenced cities, and a fat land, and possessed houses full of all good things, cisterns hewn out, vineyards, and olive-yards, and fruit trees in abundance. And they did eat, and were filled, and became fat, and delighted themselves in thy great goodness. Nevertheless they were disobedient, and rebelled against thee, and cast thy law behind their back, and slew thy prophets which testified against them to turn them again unto thee, and they wrought great provocations.
“Therefore thou deliveredst them into the hand of their adversaries, who distressed them; and in the time of their trouble, when they cried unto thee, thou heardest from heaven; and according to thy manifold mercies thou gavest them saviors who saved them out of the hand of their adversaries. But after they had rest, they did evil again before thee: therefore leftest thou them in the hand of their enemies, so that they had the dominion over them. Yet when they returned, and cried unto thee, thou heardest from heaven, and many times didst thou deliver them according to thy mercies; and testifiedst against them, that thou mightest bring them again unto thy law. But they dealt proudly, and hearkened not unto thy commandments, but sinned against thy judgments (which if a man do, he shall live in them), and withdrew the shoulder, and hardened their neck, and would not hear. Yet many years didst thou bear with them, and testifiedst against them by thy spirit through thy prophets; but would they not give ear: therefore gavest thou them into the hand of the peoples of the lands. Nevertheless in thy manifold mercies thou didst not make a full end of them, nor forsake them; for thou [art] a gracious and merciful God. Now therefore, our God, the great, the mighty, and the terrible God, who keepest covenant and mercy, let not all the travail seem little before thee, that path come upon us, on our kings, on our princes, and on our priests, and on our prophets, and on our fathers, and on all thy people, since the time of the kings of Assyria unto this day.
“Howbeit thou [art] just in all that is come upon us; for thou hast dealt truly, but we have done wickedly. Neither have our kings, our princes, our priests, nor our fathers, kept thy law, nor hearkened unto thy commandments and thy testimonies, wherewith thou didst testify against them. For they have not served thee in their kingdom, and in thy great goodness that thou gavest them, and in the large and fat land which thou gavest before them, neither turned they from their wicked works. Behold, we [are] servants this day; and [as for] the land that thou gavest unto our fathers to eat the fruit thereof and the good thereof, behold, we [are] servants in it. And it yieldeth much increase unto the kings whom thou hast set over us because of our sins: also they have power over our bodies, and over our cattle, at their pleasure, and we are in great distress. And because of all this we make a sure [covenant], and write [it]; and our princes, our Levites, [and] our priests, are at the sealing” (vers. 1-38).
It will be noticed that they do not rise to the ground of promise, though recounting the covenant made with Abraham, but take their stand on the legal conditions of Sinai, as their fathers did before them. Not so the generation to come, who will have Messiah and the new covenant, when subjection to the Gentile power passes forever. As yet, all was but provisional; yet God is always God, and good to all who call upon Him.