A Study in Nehemiah Week 6

(Get your Bible and study along with us)

Nehemiah Chapter 10

Verses 1-13 – Here is another of those lists which we are prone to skip over and are uncertain why God chose to include them in His Word.

One of the reasons these lists are there is that they give testimony to a part of God’s nature: His supreme organization and His attention to detail. Here is a list of the people who signed an agreement with God to follow Him and Him only. The list included leaders and lay people.

Verses 14-27 – This is a list of the leaders who signed the agreement. Again God keeps a record of who entered into the covenant with Him.

God still keeps records. The records He keeps now are those whose names are written in the Lamb’s Book of Life. He will not make any mistakes in His record. If you repent of your sin and trust in, and only in, the finished work of Christ at the cross of Calvary, your name will be there.

Verses 28-31 – The agreement the people signed included not allowing daughters to marry the people from surrounding nations, not allowing the daughters of surrounding nations to marry Jewish sons, setting aside the 7^th day as a holy day and the 7^th year as a time to let the fields rest as well as a cancellation of all debts.

Verses 32-39 – They also imposed a 10% temple tax to pay for the work of God’s house, which they thought to be the temple. This tax was to be paid once per year and consisted of crops and fruit. There was also a fixed amount of money to be given: 4 grams of silver.

These resources were used to pay the Levites so that they could spend their time serving God and taking care of His temple and did not have to work the fields.

In the New Covenant we realize that WE are the temple of God, not some building. We are to give as the Lord lays on our hearts.

Of course, ultimately, even the people who signed the agreement turned away from God again. This is the nature of man. It is his sinful nature. It is the reason why man needs a savior (Messiah).

Like all of us, Israel could not keep the requirements of the Law. They strayed from it time and time again. As Paul writes in the book of Romans, the Law is perfect, but we have all disobeyed it. Disobedience means eternal death. But God has obeyed the Law for us in the person of Jesus Christ.

Because Christ has kept the Law for us, He has gained for us eternal life!