Sermons from August 2020
Discord Among God’s People
Nehemiah 5:1-19 Whenever God is at work, the enemy will never be far behind. Nehemiah always seemed to be facing new problems and challenges. But in today’s passage the difference is that the problem came from within his own people. Jews were exploiting fellow Jews resulting in poverty, resentment and disunity between them. So serious was the problem that Nehemiah stopped work on the wall to address it. People matter more than building programmes and institutional structures. Unless Christians genuinely…
Building and Battling
Nehemiah 4 Whenever God’s people do God’s work in the world, they are sure to encounter opposition. Nehemiah 4 shows us the forms this opposition can take and how we, as those called to live for and proclaim Christ in this world, should respond when we face it.
The People of God at Work
Nehemiah 3:1-32 Nehemiah chapter 3 gives us a long list of names of those who were involved in re-building the wall around Jerusalem. Doing the work of God in Nehemiah’s generation meant re-building the wall. Today, as Christians, building the people of God together means pointing people to Christ – both believers and unbelievers. But how we engage in God’s work is much the same today as it was then – every Christian has a role to play, and we…
Time for action
Nehemiah 2 After months of desperate prayer and seeking God, Nehemiah steps into action. As those who are, like Nehemiah, called to do God’s work, Nehemiah’s actions have much to teach us. Above all, Nehemiah’s going to Jerusalem points us to Christ, the one who went from the comfort and privilege of heaven to the brokenness and disgrace of our world, in order to accomplish the redemptive purposes of God.
Broken walls and a broken heart
Nehemiah 1:1-11 This message begins a new series on the book of Nehemiah, with a look into the heart of this great leader. Sad news from Jerusalem moved him to tears, then to prayer, and then into the presence of King Artaxerxes, at that time the most powerful man on the planet. How do we respond in the face of sad news? Nehemiah has much to teach us still today.