Episode Transcript
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Well good morning.
It's another beautiful morningand it's I'm excited about this
chapter.
Nehemiah eight.
I am so excited about thischapter and there's just little
nuggets throughout thescriptures that I've always
enjoyed.
And this happens to be a littlenugget that we're coming up on
here.
And I hope you're doing well.
I've got my Bible in front ofme.
I hope you got your Bible infront of you and as always
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you're welcome to throw in somelittle comments along the side
if you want and Chat about thatand certainly meditate upon
these things as well as we goalong so Yeah, it's a beautiful
portion before us.
And I think what we'll do is, istake this chapter up in maybe
two sections here because of thefact that it is so rich.
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So nuggets, you know, I'vealways thought about these trues
to be something like somethingalong the lines of a fine steak
that you're sitting there andIt's so nice to be able to just
evenly just slice the steak intothin strips and then just enjoy
the morsels together and Sothat's what I look forward to
doing today.
Hopefully if the Lord's helpingtogether and always enjoy
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hearing from those as well thatare Watching if you're watching
on the on the live Thank you,and I appreciate it being on the
live if you want to watch on therewind then that's great, too
certainly Look forward togetting through this together.
So Nehemiah 8 says, Now all thepeople gathered together as one
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man in the open square that wasin front of the water gate.
And they told Ezra the scribe tobring the book of the law of
Moses, which the Lord hadcommanded.
So Ezra the priest brought thelaw before the assembly of men
and women and all who could hearwith understanding on the first
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day of the seventh month.
Then he read it in the opensquare that was in front of the
water gate from morning untilmidday.
Before the men and women andthose who could understand and
the years of all the people wereattentive to the book of the
law.
So Ezra the scribe stood on aplatform of wood, which they had
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made for the purpose and besidehim at his right hand stood.
Methathiah, Shema, Ananiah,Uriah, Hilkiah, and Massiah.
And at his left hand, Paddaiah,Mishiel, Malkijah, Hishom,
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Hashabadan, Zechariah, andMeshulam.
And Ezra opened the book in thesight of all the people, for he
was standing above all thepeople.
And when he opened it up, itopened it.
All the people stood up and Ezrablessed the Lord, the great God.
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Then all the people answered,amen, amen, while lifting up
their hands.
And they bowed their heads andworshiped the Lord with their
faces to the ground.
Also, Jeshua, Benny, Shurah,Baya, Jamin, Akbub, Shabbat,
Thalia had a jaw messy.
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I, kelita, Azariah, Jozebed,Hanan, Peliah, and the Levites
helped the people to understandthe law.
And the people stood in theirplace.
So they read distinctly from thebook, the law of God, and they
gave the sense and helped themto understand.
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The reading.
Well, there's a little bit ofword, a little bit of names
sitting there, but let's just gothrough this starting back up at
the first verse here.
And I think it's veryinteresting to see when you see
a phrase like this talking aboutthe people gathered together as
one man in the open square thatwas in front of them.
You know, that's, that'sinteresting.
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One man, they gathered as oneman, there was one purpose.
One purpose that they wanted tohave and that was to gather
together to hear the word of Godnow Interesting enough.
This is a progression chapter 8is a progression of things here
Where in you know, just again, Ihate to always bring a recap
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here, but we have Back in, backin chapter six, we had the work
of the, of, of, of thegeneration of the wall coming
together.
The wall was coming together inchapter six, and then chapter
seven, we looked at the order ofthe people, And, and everybody
was put in order, and now thereis, now the word of God is being
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brought forth to us to beestablished, beautiful thing to
see.
the order in which we'reprogressing now through
Nehemiah.
But they came together here in,in verse one as one man gathered
together in by the water gateand that is a beautiful thing to
have one central purpose to hearthe word of God.
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But let's look a little bitabout what what they said there
and with how they came.
They told Ezra to bring this toEzra, the scribe, to bring the
book of the law of Moses, whichis beautiful.
And so he brings it before themso they could all hear.
And I just wanted to tohighlight this right here.
It says the assembly of the menand women who could all could
hear with understanding on thefirst day of the seventh month.
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And I thought this wasinteresting here where we have
the ability to have both men andwomen and Children.
This is a beautiful thing.
This is where there is a premisein the word of God To say that
there is definitely times whenmen and women and children hear
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the Word of God together?
This is one of those times thatyou would see that.
And there is going to besomething there, you see here.
It says, Before the men andwomen of those who can
understand in the ears of thepeople were attentive to the
book of the law.
You know, that is an interestingthing about having our ears
attentive.
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What's the psalmist say?
The psalmist says somethingabout let my ears be opened, you
know, sometimes we can hearwhere you can listen, but we
can't hear, right?
Sometimes our ears are nothearing.
They're listening, but nothearing.
And sometimes our hearts are ina situation where.
We have so much going before us.
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And let me give you, it was, itcame together as one man.
Consider the fact this, we haveso much distractions today.
We have so much distractions.
We've got cell phones that areon our, just are now.
at us.
By the way, this cell phone isput on silent so nice to have
that feature to put things onthe side.
I do not want to be distractedwhen I'm listening to the word
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of God.
And so I put the, thisparticular phone, the Apple
phone has a little click buttonthere to just shut everything
down.
It's a beautiful thing to haveit to have to be when we're
gathered together.
Either, and I'm speaking formyself too on a personal level
as well, is that we can, weoftentimes have the problem of
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being distracted, distracted,distracted can come from the
cell phones.
I see it in a collectiveassembly as well, myself
included.
I'm not pointing the fingersbecause I fight it as well.
How do I fight the distractionsso that basically when we come
together to understand, I can beattentive.
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to what's being said.
Now I can also be distracted toowith, with, with, with, with
regards to those that are thingsand thoughts and solutions and
problems I've been thinkingabout, and I'm bringing that
into.
the situation of hearing theWord of God too.
And that is a challenge as well,is sometimes I can't wipe my
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slate clean as I come in to hearthe Word of God.
You know, I'll tell yousomething interesting and I'm
going to speak specifically forthose of us in North America.
We just had the New Year's acouple days ago or whatever.
And I don't know what you didfor New Year's.
We had a lovely time at somefolks house and such.
But I was asking this youngbrother who happens to be over
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in India.
I was asking him, I said, whatdid you do for New Year's?
He says, well, I went to mygathering assembly church and we
prayed from 9pm to 1, 1am.
I thought, how solemn there arethose believers that are sitting
there praying for three or fourhours about the new year.
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And yet those of us in affluentsocieties do not do so as much.
I thought that was prettysolemn.
And they're gathered togetherfor the purpose of prayer.
That's a different topic.
But here we have before us the,the, the purpose of gathering
together to hear the word ofGod.
Now I have, I'm going to sharewith you my one of my favorite
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verses here.
And this verse was written inmy, one of my first, second
Bible from my dad.
And this comes out of Hebrews 4.
12.
For the word of God is living.
and powerful and sharper thanany two edged sword piercing
even the division of soul andspirits and joints and marrow
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and as a discerner of thethoughts and intents of the
heart.
And I just want to dwell on thisfor just a second here.
The word of God is living andpowerful.
Obviously the King James isquick and powerful, living and
powerful, quick and powerful.
It's living.
That's the beautiful thing aboutit.
It's living.
And then we're seeing thesefolks here with Ezra.
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Preaching out of the, on thepulpit there with all the
brothers around him, and thepeople we're going to read about
the impact upon the people inthe word of God is living.
And here's a sharpened two edgedsword piercing in the division
of soul and spirit.
And you know what?
We have a soul and we have aspirit.
We have a body.
But the soul and the spirit areones, the soul is the, is the
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aspect of what I like and don'tlike.
And the spirit is my Godconsciousness.
Everybody has a spirit.
And the problem is, is sometimesthe, sometimes the soul, the,
the, the things that I getcaught up with my likes, my
dislikes, et cetera, get caughtup with my God consciousness.
If I'm in my spiritual state.
And sometimes the word of Godneeds to come in and splice
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those two apart.
And so it says, piercing eventhe division of soul and spirit
and joints and marrow, and as adiscerner on the thoughts and
intents of the heart.
That's why the word of God isnot wanted to be heard is
because that last sentence is adiscerner of the thoughts and
intents of the heart.
Okay, Hebrews 4.
12, take it down.
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It's a beautiful verse.
It's been a very muchencouragement to me to
understand that the word of Godis indeed powerful and quick and
living to, to, for that.
So moving on here.
So Ezra, the scribe stood.
stood on a platform of wood,which they made for the purpose.
And so they made a purpose,isn't that beautiful to have a
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purpose to come together.
You know, listen, it's just alittle work here.
I'm just taking up Nehemiah.
I'm purposing in my heart to bewith everybody to share this out
for like two weeks, maybe threeweeks or something like that at
a specific time during the day,early in the morning, if you
will.
That's my purpose.
And I'm hoping it's your purposeas well to, to on your own, get
up in the morning as well.
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Hopefully it's the morning timeto be able to meditate and
consider the things of the Lord.
But the purpose that we have,it's a beautiful thing to have.
And here they had the purpose ofthey made a platform and made a
platform for that purpose.
And then there were those thatstood with him, right?
There was stood, those thatstood with him on those left
hand and his right handtogether.
And we read about all those.
And, and if you've got a betterway of saying those names, let
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me know, but it's a beautifulthing to see.
There was unity, unity.
And then he opens the book inthe sight of all the people for,
he was standing above all thepeople and he opened it.
All the people stood up.
There's an interesting reverencetoo, for the word of God.
They all says all the peoplestood up and that beautiful.
I just, I just.
It's just amazing to see thesethings that, that when they,
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they, they are, they, they stoodup.
But if you look down here, thevery next verse, very next
verse, then all the peopleanswered.
Amen.
Whoops.
Amen, amen.
Okay.
So they said, amen, amen.
I'm getting back to my placehere while lifting up their
hands, While lifting up theirhands and they bowed their heads
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and worship the Lord with theirfaces to the ground.
So that's what the impact is, isthe word of God is.
Is the word of God, they standfor reverence, but then by the
time they're saying they bowtheir heads and worship the Lord
with their faces to the ground,when we come into God's
presence, we want to bereverent, but the impact upon us
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is that we bow our heads.
It's an amazing thing to seethis, you know, I so enjoyed
Solomon.
If you look at the Solomon andthe dedication of the temple
when he was dedicating thetemple, why you see him standing
as he's praying with his handsoutstretched.
to God.
And it's a long prayer and youcan pick it up there as he's
dedicating the temple, but thevery end of it, he's on his
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knees with his hands out.
And that's the impact that makeswhen we're, we're in the
presence of God in a collectivemanner too, And so the Solomon,
that's the prayer here.
We were talking about thesituation as it relates to
reading the word of God and theyare in, they are, actually throw
their faces to the ground.
That's the impact that the wordof God has.
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Now I want to, I want to getdown into verse seven here and
it says, and help the people tounderstand the law.
So there's ones listed and thepeople stood in their place.
And it says in verse seven, helppeople understand the law.
And then it also says eight.
So they read distinctly in thebook of law and they gave the
sense and help them tounderstand the reading.
This is important.
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This is important there.
These folks have just come outand they came out 50, 60, 70
years before out of Babylon.
And we're going to read later onhere.
They had lost some of them lostthe Hebrew tongue, They couldn't
understand the Hebrew tongue.
So there's that essence of beingable to give them.
The sense, if you will, in termsof a translation of side of
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things, but they gave the senseand help them understand the
reading.
And today, this is a beautifulthing to do is what is going on
today with this generation isthere is becoming ignorance of
the word of God, ignorance atthe highest level, and by having
the ignorance, we are feelinglike the fact of how these ones
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are, there's ones that are trulyseeking God's face.
These ones were seeking God'sface, but they were ignorant of
the word of God.
So they asked for the word ofGod, but there are those that
gave the sense of the word ofGod.
And we need those today to beable to help give the sense of
the word of God.
What does that mean is to bringit into plain language, to give
the context of where it is andalso rightly dividing the word
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of truth, As Paul was tellingTimothy rightly dividing the
word of truth.
We have to understand howscripture fits together.
And it's very important to dothat.
If we understand how the puzzleall puts together it, the puzzle
comes together when you see it,how it all fits together.
And so that's a beautiful thingto do as well, to have those, to
be able to give the sense of thelearning in terms of how it all
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fits together, scripture isexplaining itself and how it all
fits together.
So that's how we do that with,with this they get, they read
distinctly from the book of thelaw in the book and the law of
God, they gave the sense andhelp them to understand the
reading.
Okay.
So, and, and so look at thatverse nine there for a moment.
This is beautiful.
And it says in Nehemiah, who wasthe governor and Ezra, the
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priest and the scribe and theLevites who taught the people,
there is unity between, betweenthe between Nehemiah and the
governor, right?
I'm sorry, Nehemiah is thegovernor, but Ezra, the priest,
isn't that beautiful to see thefact is, is that we have the two
together.
Working together in differentcapacities to very different
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capacities, as was the priestsand the scribe.
He was able to do what he wasable to do.
Read the book prior to Nehemiahand Nehemiah was able to do what
he's able to do.
And he was the governor.
And now they come together onthis platform specifically built
to give the Word of God, theysay to the people, this day is
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holy to the Lord.
Your God do not mourn nor weep.
Okay.
Well, that is an interestingphrase as well.
I picked this up here from MrRossier you want to take down a
note, take down Ephesianschapter two, verse 11 through
18, because it applies to thissection.
Rossier says we must rememberour condition as sinners.
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But we are to enjoy ourcondition as saved.
Interesting.
We remember our condition assinners, but we're to enjoy our
condition as saved.
And so that's a, that's anotable thing is, is we must
remember when we were lost inour sins.
but know the fact we are seatedin Christ.
And that's what Ephesians andColossians are going to bring up
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as well.
I also wanted to bring forthwhat I have the slides up here
as well.
And I thought this was very,very powerful for this chapter.
This is Mr.
Kelly saying you will never findthat men grow in knowledge in a
false position.
And this is what was saying upuntil this point.
Now Nehemiah chapter eight, theywere in, they were gathered
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there.
They had the temple.
They had the altar there alreadyestablished, but their position
was still not fortified.
And so once their position wasput together, if you will, and
the wall was put up by Nehemiah,now they're going to grow in
knowledge.
And now we got chapter 8 beforeus because people are going to
find out, these people rightthere, the men and the women and
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the children, are going to findout what impact the word of God
is having upon their lives.
Now they're going to grow inknowledge.
And that is the beautiful thingabout what is going on.
So that is about it for rightnow.
Nehemiah eight, we just coveredthe first nine verses or so.
And I, I'm going to wrap up withthis last little phrase here at
the end of verse nine, it saysfor all the people wept when
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they heard the words of the law.
When was the last time we heardpeople weeping over the word of
God?
You know, if you look back intothe historical accounts of early
America in the early 1800s andsuch, middle 1800s, there were
revivals where people wereweeping when they heard the Word
of God.
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Do you think the Word of God hasthat ability today?
Do you think the Word of God inits true unadulterated form, in
other words, it's pure, the pureWord of God giving, giving, is
that, is that the possibility tohave the Spirit of God use the
Word of God?
Is that still available today?
Yes, it's available today.
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For all the people wept whenthey heard the words of the God.
So anyway, those are some briefportions there.
I know, as I said, on the top ofthe program to be able to just
chunk this chapter eight up alittle bit here, because it is
such a beautiful, beautifulchapter that I wanted to take it
up slowly and methodically, and,and I just so enjoy this
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particular.
Piece of it here where Nehemiahis an Ezra.
Now Nehemiah and Ezra arejointly put together in working
for the Lord.
So, you know, you can alwayslike, and subscribe on the
program here.
I just let you know that indoing so that kind of helps the,
the YouTube channels grow.
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And you like, and subscribe it'sallowing, it's allowing the word
of God to go out.
What happens is for those thatdon't know is.
It by liking and subscribing itgives the algorithms to pick up
stuff if people are watchingalong the way and so With that I
want to say good day to you aswe now start the rest of the day
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And may we continue to enjoy theWord of God tomorrow if the Lord
will we'll continue on inChapter 8 and so I look forward
to that time as well becausethere's some real choice nuggets
that are going on here And sowith that I look forward to
seeing you tomorrow if the Lordwill