Neh No.13 Christian Atmospherics

And we begin to read from verse 9. Nehemiah 8, chapter 9. And Nehemiah, which is the Tishshashath, and is rather priest, the scribe, and the Levites, that taught the people, said unto all the people, this day is holy unto the Lord your God. Mourn not, nor weep, for all the people wept when they heard the words of the law. Then he said unto them, go your way, eat the fat, and drink the sweet, and send potions unto them for whom nothing is prepared.

For this day is holy unto the Lord. Neither be ye sorry, for the joy of the Lord is your strength. So the Levites stilled all the people, saying, hold your peace, for the day is holy.

Neither be ye grieved. And all the people went their way to eat, and to drink, and to send potions, and to make great mouth, because they had understood the words that were declared unto them. And on the second day, we are gathered together the chief of the fathers of all the people, the priests, and the Levites, and Israel the scribe, even to understand the words of the law.

And they found written in the law which the Lord had commanded by Moses, that the children of Israel should dwell in booths in the feast of the seventh month. And they should publish and proclaim in all their cities, and in Jerusalem, saying, go forth unto the mount, and fetch olive branches, and pine branches, and myrtle branches, and palm branches, and branches of thick trees, to make booths, as it is written. So the people went forth, and brought them, and made themselves booths, everyone upon the roof of his house, and in the courts of the house of God, and in the street of the water gate, and in the street of the gate of Ephraim.

And all the congregation of them that were come again out of the captivity made booths, and sat under the booths. For since the days of Joshua, the son of Nun, unto that day had not the children of Israel done so. And there was very great gladness.

Also day by day, from the first day unto the last day, he read in the book of the law of God. And they kept the feast seven days. And on the eighth day was a solemn assembly, according unto the manner.

May God bless this reading to us, and to his name be the praise. This day is holy unto the Lord your God. Mourn not, nor weep.

For all the people wept when they heard the words of the law. This day is holy unto our Lord. Neither be ye sorry.

For the joy of the Lord is your strength. We come to the 13th study from this particular book. As we have been examining it from one Sunday morning to another.

And I want today to speak to you from the context of these two verses. On what I think I would call Christian atmospherics. Christian atmospherics.

I will remember some years ago being invited by the principal of the college, where I was a student, the end of my course, to stay on and for a while at any rate, help in the lecturing program of that institution. And he went on to say that if I did accept his invitation, then I had to bear in mind that I should maintain the ethos of the place. And what he meant by that was simply, there was a pastoral and an academic atmosphere in that college, which was conducive to work and helpful to the spiritual nourishment of the students.

And that should be maintained. There were atmospherics, if you please, in that college. And that leads me on to the topic in hand for today, because it seems to me that the very context of this chapter suggests that there is such a thing as a Christian atmosphere.

There is one quality above all that should pervade the redeemed community whenever they meet together as we are doing throughout today. And that quality is joy. Ezra has been somewhat quiet during the chapters preceding the eighth of this volume.

You remember he has been exercising a ministry prior to the advent of Nehemiah at Jerusalem, but it was when Nehemiah, the Persian king's cupbearer, came that he was able to harness all the energies of the Jews and get the citizens of Jerusalem to attend to the task of building the walls and hanging the gates. And when that job was finished, as we recognized it was toward the end of the sixth chapter, then Ezra, the preacher, the pastor, came into his own. And last week, we were looking at the address that Ezra proclaimed to the thousands of people who came out from their homes in Jerusalem.

The priest-cum-pastor ascended the pulpit that they had particularly made. An out-door meeting was held, and Ezra, the Whitefield of his day, proclaimed the word of God, read to the people with his colleagues from the book of Deuteronomy, and as the preceding verse, the eighth verse tells us, he gave the sense so that they all understood. It was an amazing piece of exposition.

The Jews who enthusiastically had requested such ministry from the word of God, previously with arms extended, you remember, verse six, lifted them to the Lord and asked for his blessing. Then they bowed their heads and fell on their knees and they worshiped the Lord their God. And at the end of the ministry, they were cut to their hearts.

Each one of them fell as the scythe of the word was applied to their own personality. And there resulted tears and mourning and sorrow. But Ezra, with Nehemiah, and also Ezra's colleagues, corrected the people.

And they said after that initial display of conviction and repentance, they were to realize, verse nine, this day is holy unto the Lord, your God. Mourn not, nor weep, for this day is holy unto the Lord, neither be sorry for the joy of the Lord is your strength. Now I want to take those twin verses and use them as a lever and apply some pressure to the word of God to lift open scriptural teaching concerning what I call Christian atmospherics.

For though this was just one occasion, the festivity and the exposition of the word was to span several days. And there was rejoicing all the way down. And in the 12th chapter, you find once again, the Jews gathered together for the dedication of the walls and the rejoicing to such an extent that the people in the villages yonder can hear.

Now in the New Testament, we're told by the Apostle Paul, rejoice in the Lord always. And again, I say rejoice. So logically, you have to hand it to me that my observation that the atmosphere of the Christian community should be filled with a sense of joy is an accurate one.

Both testaments combine to bring out this pronouncement. Well, and as I say, let me take these two verses as a lever and add a little bit of pressure. And the first thing that strikes me that must be brought to your attention is I think this joy is the surprise of it.

Then I want you to look with me at the nature of it. Then the effects of it. And in the last couple of minutes, the nearness of it, the surprise of it.

The people were flabbergasted that Ezra and Nehemiah and all the other pastors should say, stop crying, rejoice. They were expecting because the word of God had been applied to their own situation for the censure. The Bible refers to God's word in terms of a hammer and it had come down on the people and shattered them.

No way were they believing that Ezra and his colleagues would say, stop your mourning, stop your tears and start to praise God. And to be happy. Neither was it what they deserved.

The law book had been read and the requirements of God upon the people were in no way matched by their action day by day. Their lifestyle was alien to what God desired. They didn't expect to be told not to weep and they didn't deserve to be told to praise the Lord.

And it seems to me, my dear friends, as we update this and run a parallel to the 20th century and to you and to me in the tabernacle this morning, that in no way could we expect to be filled with a sense of praise and ecstasy and elation as we come before a great and a holy God, as we present our lives before this book and examine our own lifestyle, how desperately we needed the gospel of redeeming grace, how desperately we needed the Christ of God to die on the cross to save us, for he never broke any of the law, but we have broken so much. And well might the word of God become as a sword that penetrates into our innermost being and does terrible damage to us as it hurts us and cuts us. And well might the tears course down our cheeks and the whole of our clothes be saturated with moisture, but that's not what God would want us to do, not alone.

Listen to Charles Spurgeon. He says, certain fabrics need to be damped before they will absorb the glowing colors with which they are to be adorned. The glad news of the gospel can only be written on damp paper.

And it's when these people's hearts were softened and when the tears were shed that then they could enter into the joy of sins forgiven and they could praise and magnify their God. Weeping and dancing are almost allied concepts in the word of God. The prodigal over there in the far country looks into his own lifestyle and he's disgusted that he should have flitted away all the blessings that his father gave in terms of finance, that he should be reduced to taking company with these swine and feign feeding his belly on what the swine would eat, that a man of such noble pedigree as he should be reduced to such circumstances.

It was revolting. And he turned back and with sorrow, dogging his footsteps, he went home and found his father with arms extended, ready to meet him. And his father, you remember, put the ring upon his son's finger and put his garment around him and embraced him with his love and with his tears and took him back into the mansion and there he threw a party, saying, this my son was dead, but he's alive again.

He was lost, but he is found. The dancing quickly followed the morning and nothing surprises me in my own heart more than this, that God having dealt with my sin fills me with elation and gives me the opportunity to praise him. This is not a day for tears.

This is a day to rejoice and the joy of the Lord will be your strength. The surprise of it, but then the nature of it, the joy of the Lord. One day, I want to write a book entitled Wrong Ideas About God.

And there are many in the 20th century you would think that the God and father of our Lord Jesus that we worship in this tabernacle, if you listen to some people, was a stern, forbidding person, austere, not wishing to communicate with the likes of us. But this of course is as far removed from the truth as it ever could be. It's in the book of Job.

There's hardly time for me to turn to it this morning, but take it from me that this is found in the book of Job towards the end of that book, which bears the name of that much stride man, that God speaks to Job and he talks about the creation of the universe. And he says that the sons of the morning danced together. When God had completed his work of creation, there was praise and festivity, not in this universe, but in all the universes.

God is a God of joy, a God of jubilation. In thy presence, says the psalmist, is fullness of joy. There's not some sort of mechanical ritual that goes on in heaven, sometimes is reflected in our style of worship down here.

That's an exuberance. In thy presence is fullness of joy. Not something that's always so quiet and always so still, although that comes into it.

Not something that's rigid, not something that's stereotyped. Joy in the presence of the Lord. Jesus puts down a parable on one occasion and he commends someone who, if the parable is interpreted, has been serving God, faithful in his life.

And the Lord Jesus says, enter thou into the joy of thy Lord. Did you get that word? Joy, J-O-Y, joy. That means that God is joyful and that any true joy that is in this world that's worth having comes from God himself.

Alas, there's a lot of tinsel, a lot of counterfeit joy that is offered men and women today and sometimes we're fool enough to follow after it, but the real joy that satisfies is a joy that has its source in heaven. All the tributaries of joy that flow around this world today can be traced back to the ocean of joy which is in God himself. Well, the strength of the Lord is your joy.

The joy of the Lord is your strength. You can have it either way. Scripture agrees to both.

And this is surprising, I say. So surprising that when C.S. Lewis was converted, you remember that Oxford professor of literature, he wrote a book on his own testimony and he had to entitle it, Surprised by Joy. I thought that joy, said Lewis, was in the academic world.

I thought it was in literary attainment. And this Christian business, well, I became an agnostic so earlier on. But one day I discovered that God, the joyful God had sent the Lord Jesus to die for me and my heart was filled with joy, said Lewis.

And I never stopped being surprised. God took delight in his Son. You remember the scene of the baptism of our Lord Jesus.

John the Baptist has performed the act and a voice speaks from heaven of the Son of God and says, this is my beloved Son in whom I am well pleased or better, in whom my soul delights. When two people are in love, they enjoy one another's company. To the extent that they want to get married so that they can live with one another and share one another in every aspect of that word that is possible.

Now, all this comes from God. He is the God of great joy. And this is what the preacher was telling the people centuries ago there in Jerusalem.

The joy of the Lord is your strength. The surprise of it, the origin or the source of it. But then the effects of it, that too is in my text, is your strength.

The joy of the Lord does something and it's all heaped up into this one word in my scripture. The joyful man is a strong man, you know. You ask the managing director of any company in this land, what sort of staff he requires, what type of work people he really wants and he'll say contented people.

These days, most big firms have a personnel department. Now the personnel officers themselves don't really produce anything in terms of something that's physical. Rather, if they're good in their employment, they produce something that if you like is spiritual, a sense of well-being, they're attending to difficulties, they're the troubleshooters.

A contented workforce is economically productive. So the joy of the Lord makes men strong in the service of God. Nehemiah is a classic example.

Do you remember when pressures are heaped upon him for him to defect and to join forces with others? Nehemiah says, should such a man as I flee. There's strength you see in this. A joyful man is always a strong man.

A joyful man is a generous man. Ezra and Nehemiah combined to instruct the people, go your way, eat the fat and drink the sweet and send portions unto them for whom nothing is prepared. Scrooge wasn't generous.

The very words Scrooge and generosity are opposites. The man who gives a lot is the man whose heart is joyful. So the New Testament tells us that the Lord loves the cheerful giver.

Well, there's really only one sort of giver and he is cheerful. And so these people whose hearts are filled with the joy of the Lord will be generous and they will look after those who are poor. A joyful man's a strong man, a generous man.

He's also a sociable man. And reference this to the people, verse 12, going home to eat and to drink and to send portions and to make great mirth. I suppose you can be joyful on your own but the normal context, the natural context of joy is in company with others.

I wonder if you're joyful to that extent. Can we see your joy? I love to look down from the pulpit here from my vantage point and see folks who look joyful. You know? And when they sing all people that on earth do dwell, you can tell that there's a smile, that they are filled with mirth instead of all people that on earth do dwell.

You know? It may look as though you came out of the Puritan era but it does nothing for you neither for the ministry of the church the testimony of the Puritans who were essentially joyful people. They rejoiced in the Lord. The effects of this joy, it makes a person strong.

It makes him generous. It makes him sociable. The joy of the Lord is your strength.

I say that it's a surprising thing. The nature of this joy is in God himself and the effects of it are threefold. But finally, what about the nearness of this joy? How can it come to me? Perhaps I'm addressing someone here in the congregation and you agree so far with what I've said from scripture.

It seems to be a reasonable statement, a reasonable exposition. But how can this joy be mine? You know, we're anything but joyful at our house. My, I even come to church under the pressure of exerted by my husband or by my wife.

Is that the case? You'll find it very, very hard to be joyful. Well, I say that this joy is near you. It's a possibility for you to harness in your own life.

How did these people become joyful in the Lord? Well, they listened to the word of God. The word of God met them at a point of their need. They asked Ezra to do the preaching.

He preached and the word cut them. But in the very cutting process, they entered into the experience of salvation and they moved from mourning into dancing. They listened to God's word.

As many and many a person has listened to the gospel being proclaimed from this pulpit and elsewhere. And first of all, it cut them, but they listened. And as the word of God was preached, not only did they listen, but they received it.

You can hear God's word. You see, without receiving it, Jesus put down a parable to that end, a seed which fell upon various types of ground. And when he interpreted that parable and he spoke of good growth, he said, these were people who, when they received the word of God, they received it with joy.

They acknowledged that Jesus had died for them and they entered into an experience of salvation and they became elated. They listened to the word, they received the word and what's more, they obeyed the word. Again, you see all these characteristics lived out by these people here.

They obey what the word of God says. They've heard ministry from the book of Deuteronomy, references being made to the feast of tabernacles, all the people coming together in Jerusalem, erecting their separate booths and they're spending days in convention, praising God. Now this hasn't happened for centuries.

They realize that they're in default. So what do they do? Well, they've heard the word of God. They've rejoiced to hear the word of God.

They've received the word of God. Now they obey the word of God. And it's very often in the area of disobedience that we're faulty.

Oh yes, all this I accept, I acknowledge, but when it comes down to obeying God's word, well, that's not for me. With the net result that joy is bypassed. The Lord and his strength, which is our joy, can only belong to us, worked out in our lives through obedience.

Also very often, I tell you, my friend, so very often in my vestry are visiting people with personal problems, domestic issues at home. They've asked why this has gone wrong and why the other's gone wrong. They've always tended to heap the responsibility on others, but more often than not, it's a personal thing.

And when they're dealt with on a personal level, they don't want to know because they are lacking in obedience. You could still be joyful and have a domestic situation which is not your fault, which is unhelpful to you. But you can still know the joy of the Lord in your own heart.

For this joy is a personal thing, not conditioned itself by environment. Indeed, these people were to know political problems in the days that were to come, and yet they were still to retain a joy. Paul and Silas knew joy in prison, but their environment was anything but conducive to that joy.

You see, this is the thing about the joy of God. It's something that's personally directed to you. It's a perpendicular thing.

Horizontals in themselves don't come into it. Kari Ten Boon tells how that she and her sister in the German concentration camp with beds that were filled with lice, were able to praise God. They spoke of how the joy of the Lord still filled their hearts when naked, they were exposed to the lustful eyes of German soldiers.

This joy of the Lord is a unique joy which strengthens men and women, and is yours, my friend, within the grace of God for the taking. And it all stems from listening to the Word of God, receiving the Word of God, and obeying the Word of God. I come back to my opening observation that Christian atmospherics are filled with joy.

Not misery, not problems, but joy. Romans 14, verse 17, here Paul spells it out. The kingdom of God is not meat and drink, but righteousness and peace and joy in the Holy Ghost.

1 Peter chapter one and verse eight dovetails and says exactly the same thing. Speaking of Jesus, whom having not seen ye love, in whom though now ye see him not, yet believing, ye rejoice with joy unspeakable and full of glory. The joy that we shall have comes from God, and it strengthens us.

It's a surprising thing. Its origin is remarkable, its effects are tremendous, and I want to say that you're near it right now. And if you ask Jesus to be the Lord and the Savior of every aspect of your life, then you can have and know his joy in all its fullness.

Amen. The chorus again, or else Mr. Jesus, Jesus, Jesus, Jesus, Jesus, Jesus, Jesus. Amen.