From Confusion to Revival

Kids of Little District. Kids of Little District. Good morning, everyone. Good morning. It's good to see you. It's good to see you.

It's good to see that a few of you filed in I think like right when we were doing call to worship. We had like three and I was like, "All right, it's race day. I get that." All right. And and and don't judge me. I'm I know I'm dressed down a little bit um than what I normally am, which I don't really dress up anyways.

Um but you're thinking, man, he's already sold out. like he's just wearing it's Indie 500 day. He's just wearing the cars. How dare you judge me for that? Actually, this shirt is from the North American Mission Board, which in the first four years of our church gave $100,000 for us to plant the church here in Indianapolis. All right.

And so I'm celebrating that on this day, even though they are indie cars and we are going to the race afterwards. But um that's beside the point. Let me ask you a question this morning. What do you think about when you hear the word revival? Many scholars and theologians, they put the activity of God into two categories. Uh the ordinary means of grace and the extraordinary means of grace.

Or in other words, the ordinary work of the Holy Spirit and the extraordinary work of the Holy Spirit. I like to think of it in two categories of a faucet and floodgates. Um, ordinary would be God turns the faucet of heaven on and he uses the preaching of God's word and prayer week in and week out to mold the church into the image of Jesus. People get saved, begin serving, disciples are made. This is the ordinary work of the Holy Spirit that can take years. It can take decades in order to see a lot of change happen.

And it's totally good. It's wonderful. It's beautiful. It is what the majority of the Christian life experiences. That's what we do. That's that's why I get up and do this every single week is because we want to see the ordinary work of the Holy Spirit.

That's what's going on. At the same time, there's the extraordinary work where instead of just turning the faucet on, there is a moment in which God opens up the floodgates of heaven and takes the ordinary means of grace, preaching and prayer, and ignites a movement that changes individuals, changes families, changes communities, changes cities, and dare I say, changes nations. What usually takes maybe decades might take a few months or even maybe a couple of years. This is what we refer to as revival. In the early 1960s, I'll give you an example. There was a rise in secularism.

And I want you to pay attention to this because there's nothing new under the sun. And so a lot of times people might think that um because of what's going on today, we've never seen this before. And what I'm saying is is throughout history, what we're seeing today has happened already. All right? There are moments where we just pendulum swing kind of eb and flow in society. But in the 1960s, the Supreme Court ruled that they banned prayer and Bible reading in public schools.

And I'm not here to debate whether or not they should be in public schools. But what happened in that time was it showed that there was definitely a shift in the nation toward a more secular public education system. At the same time, there was a rise in secular humanism with a book that came out called The Secular City. In 1965, theologian, not necessarily a good one, but theologian Harvey Cox published a book, The Secular City, which argued that modern urban life should be free from religious influence. This book became the manifesto for secularism promoting the idea that Christianity should retreat from public affairs and focus only on personal spirituality. So Christianity should not have involvement in the public square but instead uh just deal with however you want to be a Christian in your own home.

Then there was also the sexual revolution which saw a dramatic shift in sexual ethics. This was fueled by the rise of contra contraception, free love and the rejection of traditional morality promoting the idea that Christianity should um only deal with that again in the home. And it showed that secularism or secular society had a clean break from biblical teachings on marriage and sexuality. Also during the 60s we saw a decline in church attendance and a rise of what is called the religious nuns. And I'm not talking about Catholic nuns. I'm talking about nes nuns which meant that more Americans identified as having no religious affiliation than having a religious affiliation.

the first time in American history at that point. There was so much widespread rise in secularism and decline in Christianity that Time magazine released this cover um in 8 in April 8th, 1966 asking the question, is God dead? like Christianity in the 40s and 50s had such a rise and such a prolific um fingerprint on culture and shaping culture that the that the the wide swing of the 60s literally Time magazine's putting out the question, what happened to God? Is he dead? Then in California, a man by the name of Chuck Smith was preaching the Bible verse by verse. And instead of secluding himself from the strung out hippies, he started engaging them with truth.

Searching for meaning beyond materialism and rebellion. Thousands of hippies, drug users and wanderers started coming to church because they didn't find the answers on acid. Basically, they started coming to church. They started wanting truth. Such revival broke out that at a place called Pirates Cove, which is uh in LA around that area, Southern California, thousands of people came to get saved. And on June 21st, 1971, Time magazine put this cover out.

So just five years after them believing God's dead, irrelevant to society, the winds are shifting in that direction. I think God took it personally and entered back into the scene and said, "No, no, no. Let's let's open up the floodgates." And a revival happened and thousands upon thousands came to Christ. And here's my question for us today. Do you want that to happen here?

Do you want that in Indianapolis? Because there's nothing wrong with the ordinary means of grace, the ordinary work of the Holy Spirit. But I would love at least once in my lifetime to experience the extraordinary work of the Holy Spirit in this way where we see a movement spread across the city that can only be explained by God alone. by God alone. I want to see that and to show you where we are going. This happened in the time of Nehemiah.

To orient you a long, long, long time ago, there lived a man who wasn't famous, wasn't a king, a seemingly nobody. But God chose him, a man named Abram. One day, God spoke to Abram and said, "Leave your home. Go to a land that I will show you, and I'm going to make you a great nation." So much so that he changed his name from Abram to Abraham because Abraham means literally the father of a multitude, many nations. Abraham's family grew and grew and the descendants became the Israelites and life wasn't always easy for them.

They ended up in Egypt where they were forced to work as slaves. That's when God sent Moses, a brave leader, to rescue them. Moses led them out of Egypt through the parting of the Red Sea. Another miracle that happened. And they then wandered in the desert for 40 years before finally reaching the land that God had promised to the people. Fast forward a few hundred years.

Israelites had kings, some good, some bad. One of their greatest kings was a man by the name of David who loved God with all his heart. He also had a son named Solomon who built the most magnificent temple that this world's probably ever seen. But after Solomon, things got messy again. Again, there's nothing new under the sun. Great times, bad.

Great times, bad times. The kingdom split into two. Israel in the north, Judah in the south. And because they kept turning away from God, enemies came and conquered them. When you turn away from God, there's consequences that come. And one of the consequences of their disobedience is that they were conquered by the Babylonians.

I want you to just remember with God strong, without God weak. That's how your life's going to go. That's how it went for the Israelites. ians destroyed Jerusalem and they took many Israelites far away to Babylon. And they lived there in exile for over 70 years lost, confused, and just longing to return to the good old days where they were with God and he was their God and they were his people. And with courage, faith, and teamwork, Nehemiah shows up on the scene.

He was living in Persia at the time when he heard that Jerusalem was still in ruins. His heart broke. He prayed to God. The king of Persia at the time again another king we talked about the king with with um um Zerubbabel we talked about which was Cyrus. We talked about the king with um uh Ezra as well. And then now we're talking about Arda Xerxes, another king who sends Nehemiah back to his people.

Pagan kings. Like when God wants to move, God will move. and he'll use anybody in order to make it happen. He sends Nehemiah back full of sadness and says, "Go rebuild your city." So Nehemiah gathers the people together and they rebuilt the walls of Jerusalem even though enemies tried to stop them. With courage, faith, and teamwork, they finished the walls, and Jerusalem was strong again.

But was it because of the walls? Was it because of the temple that Zerubbabel rebuilt? Was it because Jerusalem was being featured on the latest episode of Fixer Upper? No. Here's why they were strong again. The people of God were experiencing something that we would call a revival.

But the question I want to answer for you today is how? And if we're going to see it happen among us, then we can learn from what happened in Nehemiah's time. Not that it will guarantee it for us, but it will best position us under the floodgates. Turn with me to Nehemiah chapter 1. Nehemiah chapter 1, starting in verse one. And it says the words of Nehemiah the son of Hackaliah.

Now it happened in the month of Chisv in the 20th year as I was in Souza the citadel that Hannah one of the brothers came with certain men from Judah. And I asked them concerning the Jews who escaped survived exile and concerning Jerusalem. And they the remnant there underline remnant if you're highlighting or underlining or maybe just make a mental note. The remnant there in the province who had survived the exile is in great trouble and shame. The wall of Jerusalem is broken down and its gates are destroyed by fire. Again, remember this is the same word that Zerubbabel received as well as Ezra that everything you remember about Jerusalem, everything you remember about the people of God is seemingly lost.

They've all lost it. They aren't living in the good old days of Christianity. Everything is seemingly lost. The people are in great trouble. And they're also filled with shame. The city is in ruins and the walls have been destroyed by fire.

Whatever made Israel great, they seem to have lost it. Our house, I didn't give ask permission, but I'm going to share the story anyways. In our house, I don't know what's normal in yours, but in our house, bless her heart, Kelsey loses things all the time. All the time. It's a daily occurrence. Phone, keys, AirPods.

Um, did you find my dad's keys? All right. My dad's keys are currently lost as well. Uh, which means he just has to stay in town for a little bit longer. Um, I could not find them this morning, but anyways, because I needed to drive the car to get here. Um if it but here's I think the funny thing is oftenimes I ask one question that usually is the first question that I ask but it's the most frustrating question that you ask someone who has lost something.

Where did you last hide them? If they knew we wouldn't be looking for whatever it is. It's a stupid question but there is some logic to it because to find what's lost you have to know where you lost it. You need to know where it was. Here's the big idea for us today. God always reserves a remnant for a revival, but it has requirements.

The people of God because of their consequences of their sin and their exile and so forth had become a remnant and they are longing for a revival. How do we get back to where we lost it? And what I want to show you today is the requirements that God has for us in order for us to best position ourselves for him to open the floodgates because I believe the faucets's always on. This is how do we best position ourselves for the floodgates? Look at verse four. As soon as I heard these words as Nehemiah speaking, I sat down and I wept and I mourned for days and I continued fasting and praying before the God of heaven.

Here's the first thing that we have to do. The first requirement, you sit down to weep and pray. You sit down to weep and pray. Let me ask you a question. When was the last time you wept over the sin in your life and also wept for the purposes of God in our generation? When was the last time our hearts were broken over the sin that we still wrestle with on a daily basis?

And also, when was the last time that our hearts were broken for the lost? for those who don't know Jesus, for those who don't have hope like we do when we do wrestle with our sin and we have Jesus to be able to run to and say, "Here's where I've messed up." And he says, "I've already taken care of it for you. I'm going to be faithful and just, I'm going to continue to forgive you all the days of your life because of the work that I've done on on the cross." Brokenhearted compassion for the lost. You've heard me be continue to say that over the last several weeks.

We need God to break our hearts for our sin and for the people who are far from him. Just like Nehemiah's was broken for the people who were exiled and far from God's blessing and comfort. Look at this verses 5 through 11. And I said, "Oh Lord God of heaven, the great awesome God who keeps covenant and steadfast love with those who love him and keep his commandments. Let your ear be attentive and your eyes open to hear the prayer of your servant that I now pray before you day and night for the people of Israel, your servants, confessing the sins of the people of Israel, which we have sinned against you. Even I and my father's house have sinned.

We have acted very corruptly against you and have not kept the commandments, the statutes, and the rules that you commanded your servant Moses. Remember the word that you commanded your servant Moses, saying, "If you are unfaithful, I will scatter you among the peoples. But if you return to me, keep my commandments, and you do them. Though your outcasts are in the uttermost parts of heaven, from there I will gather them and bring them to the place that I have chosen to make my name dwell there. They are your servants and people whom you have redeemed by your great power and by your strong hand. Oh Lord, let your ear be attentive to the prayer of your servant and to the prayer of your servants who delight to fear your name and give success to your servant.

Today grant him mercy in the sight of this man. I want to give you a bit of a sequence, sort of an equation if you will, of what God instructs of us in order to receive blessing that he's praying for. Number one is it begins with humility. humility. We come to the Lord humbled because of the fact that we're not perfect. The fact that we have sin in our lives, the fact that we're not holy, righteous God, but we are imperfect, unholy, unrighteous, and the only reason why we're able to be called righteous is because of the righteousness that Jesus gives us.

And so when you realize that it's not because of what I've done, but it's because of what he's done, that humbles you. It humbles you. You have to be humble in order to return to the presence of God. You cannot enter into God thinking, "Look how awesome I am now. Bless me." That's not how that works.

You have to enter in with humility. Which is why Matthew tells us, "Blessed are the humble, the meek, for theirs is the kingdom of God." It's why James tells us, "Blessed are those who hear the word of God and do it." Which is what leads to obedience. So we have humility. You you are you are meek.

You are humble before God. And he'll bless that. At the same time, that blessing lands on obedience. When we are humble and we come to God and we say, "I don't know what I'm doing. I haven't figured things out yet. I don't know how to live right."

He tells us, "Here's how you live, right? Here's how you follow me. Here's how you trust me. Here's how you walk in step with my spirit." We say, "Okay, I trust you. I'm going to follow you.

I want to live. I'm going to be obedient to the commands you have for me." The commands he has for us isn't just because God loves rules. He loves you. He loves you. And therefore, he says, "Live this way because it's for you.

It's good. It's one of the reasons why like most yards when especially with young children, you put a fence around the backyard because you don't want them wandering down. Literally, we have a pond out behind us. We don't want them wandering down when they're two years old to the pond. It doesn't work out well. It's why when they're usually playing out in the front yard, you want eyes on them because if they kick a ball and it starts rolling and it goes out and you start seeing a car coming, they are not looking for the car.

You're looking out for them because you love them and you create boundaries and you say, "No, you can't go past this spot because I want you to flourish. I want you to have life and have it abundantly." And so, he calls us to obedience, not because he's trying to limit us, but because he's actually trying to give us all things. That's blessing. And blessing always leads to praise. We're thankful for what God has done for us.

We're thankful for what God provides for us. But here's the issue is that if you have humility and obedience and blessing and if it doesn't lead to praise, it leads to something else which is called pride. Look at it. Blessing that doesn't go to praise turns into pride. Some of you were born on third base believing you hit a triple. It's just true.

When blessing is not praise, it turns to pride. Look what I did. Look how awesome we are. And that leads to sin, which does not lead to humility necessarily, but leads to humiliation. And that's where Israel is at. They're in shame.

They were prideful. Thought they could do things on their own. We don't need to follow you anymore. And they reap the consequences of it. They led out into exile, which again, when you go back to Zerubbabel means son of or born in confusion. Now they're just living confused.

We don't know what we're doing with our lives. We don't know where we're going with our lives. We don't know. But we need to get back to what was right, what was good, what was a blessing. Because blessing that leads to praise, as you'll see here, blessing that leads to praise leads to satisfaction. That's what we're after, right?

We don't want sin. We want satisfaction. We want to be pleased. We want to be content with our lives. And when you're satisfied in worshiping Jesus because of what he's given you, that again starts the cycle over. It humbles you.

And when you're humble, you again come back to whatever you want from me, Lord. Whatever you're leading me in. And it just begins rolling the cycle back to humility, obedience, blessing, praise, satisfaction, humility, obedience, praise, satisfaction. That's what we want. But in order for them to get there, not only did he have to sit and weep over his sin, he also had to confess and repent. That's number two.

One of the requirements we have is we need to sit and weep. Feel that conviction of our sin and then confess it and repent of it. That's verses 5 through7. As we said there, let your ear be attentive and your eyes. We have sinned against you. Even I and my father's house have sinned.

We've acted corruptly against you and have not kept the commandments, the statutes, and the rules that you commanded your servant Moses. Here's the issue. In our culture, we do not confess sin. In our culture, we do not own sin. We recategorize sin so that we never have to feel like sinners. That's what we do.

We recategorize it. Here's how the world works. When you sin, I become a judge. When I sin, I become a defense attorney. I'm trying to justify why I did what I did or blame it on someone else and say, "I'm not the guilty one. They are."

And as a culture, we think all we do is make mistakes. I'm sorry. I've made a mistake. We don't own it as sin. Which is why if it's just making mistakes, it's why our culture believes all you need is a life coach. If you're just making mistakes, you just need a life coach to better you.

Don't make the mistake anymore. When in reality, we're all sinners in need of a s. It's not about making good people or bad people good. It's about making dead people alive. That's what we need. Here's the last thing I want to show you about Nehemiah.

Number three, you prioritize the purposes of God. So, we need to have a brokenhearted compassion. We need to weep in our sin and confess it to the Lord, repent of it, which is all right, Lord. I now understand that it wasn't just a mistake. It's because I'm a sinner. I need to stop doing that.

I need to tell you what I did because it's not necessarily that you didn't know. He already knows. But there's something freeing about being able to come to the Lord and getting it off my chest and saying to the Lord, "Here's where I have sinned against you in a way in which he, the Holy Spirit that's living inside of us, helps us to understand, uh, yeah, that's not what I have for you. That's not what I want for you. I want you to walk in righteousness. I want you to walk in joy.

I want you to walk in pleasures as you enjoy your relationship with the Lord. Sin separates you from that. And I don't want you to be separated from your father. I want you running and hiding like Adam and Eve did. I want you playing and laughing. I want you enjoying him.

And so when we confess that and then repent and turn from it, we're saying, "You're right, Lord. I don't want to live that way anymore because it didn't work out for me. It felt like I was in exile. It felt like I was not in the house of the Lord all the days of my life. It felt like I was wandering around in a desert. There were no joys forever more.

There might have been some temporary ones that we think are good, but they don't last. And that's why you need more and more and more. You're believing the lie that what you need in life is more of what you already have. And what he's telling us is, "No, no, no, no. I want you to have a deep contentment and joy where you're able to rejoice in your life regardless of your circumstances. You're able to rejoice because of what he's done.

And when you get into that place, the third thing that we get to do is that we then prioritize. You're right. I don't want to do that. I want to sacrifice some things and I want to focus my life on the purposes of God. Listen to what Nehemiah says. This is the very last part of chapter one.

there he says now I was a cup bearer to the king. I was a cup bearer to the king. Nehemiah left his high position in order to go and help the people of God in order to prioritize what truly mattered in life more than his own efforts. Now sometimes people will look at categories or they'll look at characters in the Bible and just automatically assume it's like they're all pastors. They're all the spiritual elite. They're all the the Christian professionals.

Nehemiah was not one of those. He's a cup bearer to the king, which is a high um um position with the king, but he's also then hired as basically a governor for the Israelite people. He's literally just a politician. And when he gets to Jerusalem, he basically just becomes a general contractor. So, we're not talking about him being some professional um um pastor or anything along those lines. If you want to give a title, that's Ezra.

He's the scribe and the priest. So Nehemiah here shows us that it doesn't take the professional Christians in order to bring about a revival. It can take general contractors. It can take politicians. It can take real estate agents. It can take whoever you are.

having a broken heart for the sin in your life and for the people around you that moves you to begin praying for them and praying for yourself as well that God would do a work in you so that you're able to confess your sin and repent of it and turn from it and then start prioritizing the purposes of God. God can take a remnant of nobodies and transform a city. Which is why I actually love the fact that we're a little bit light in here today because it proves my point. God can take what's in this room right now, right now, in this room, which I would even say is more than the 12 disciples that he started off with. He can take what's in this room right here and position us under the floodgates of heaven and spark a revival like we've never seen before in our lifetime. He can do that.

The question is, are we willing to do the requirements that best position us under that looking at verse one as Nehemiah comes in, general contractor, they obviously they get Jerusalem rebuilt, they get the walls rebuilt, all that happens. We all know that story. You probably thought when we're going to do this Nehemiah 3-week series, we're going to be talking about like I'm going to walk away knowing how to build a wall. That's not where we went. We all know the walls get rebuilt. That's fine.

I want to see what happens among the people in this season. Nehemiah chapter 8 verse one. All the people gathered as one into the square before the Watergate. I love that. the Watergate. All right, talk about an analogy for positioning yourselves under the floodgates.

And they told Ezra the scribe to bring the book of the law of Moses that the Lord had commanded Israel. So again, Nehemiah, just picture yourselves here. He's rebuilt the walls, secured the cities, led the people to their own sin, to own their sin, to confess and repent. And this becomes the response. It breaks out in a revival, a gathering. You want to know how I know?

Because Ezra and Nehemiah didn't have to send out emails and social media posts and text messages reminding everyone when worship was going to be. They didn't have to make fancy graphics and try and appeal to the creative eye of folk and catch their attention in hopes that they might show up on a Sunday. No. What does it say? The people gathered as one in the square and they told Ezra, "Bring out the book." You catch that?

In ordinary means of grace, it often feels like pastors are begging people to come hear the word of God. It's what it really feels like. in extraordinary means of grace, in a revival, it's the people who beg the pastors to preach the word of God. I love that. Listen, church, revival starts with reformation. The two the difference between the two of those revival is a return to the spirit of God.

Reformation is a return to the word of God. Those work in tandem. Okay? Wherever the spirit of God is active, it's because the word of God is being preached. And wherever the word of God is being preached, the spirit of God is moving and active. Oftentimes in our current modernday culture, the way in which we try to spark a revival is we just get together and we try to pray that the Holy Spirit would come down and just do a work amongst everybody.

All right. Well, that didn't work. Let's do it again. come tomorrow night, let's just get together. Let's have a bunch of people. Let's pray.

Let's have the Holy Spirit fall on us. I mean, they're looking for Pentecost basically if the word of God is not being preached. The spirit of God is not going to move. Because again, what happens when the spirit when the spirit of God moves without the instruction of God? Mass confusion. Mass confusion.

This is why Paul when he goes into Corinthians and he's telling them, "Here's how you order your service." He says, "Look, guys, make sure that the priority is the preaching of the word of God, not just speaking in tongues and the and the the gifts of the spirit because it's going to cause a bunch of confusion for people. Make sure that you're preaching the word of God. Prioritize it. That's the primary means. I'm never going to put the Holy Spirit in a box and say he can't fall when they're praying and and something miraculous happens.

Absolutely, that can happen. But what I'm saying is the primary means in which this happens is when the people of God are oriented around the word of God and they're then praying for the spirit of God to fall and do a work among them as they are then advancing the word of God in their community and culture. All the people gathered as one in the square and they told Ezra to bring out the book. And so Ezra the priest brought the law before the assembly, both men and women and all who could understand what they heard. And on the first day of the seventh month, and he read from it facing the square before the Watergate from early morning until midday. Listen up, church.

That's a six-hour sermon. Okay. I I don't want to ever hear any complaints. Like I try to get y'all laughing. I try to get it down to like 35 to 40, but that's hard because I talk about what I love and I'm talking about it a lot. And here's where I'm going to settle it in my own heart.

You took the time to get up this morning. You took the time to get the kids ready, which is not easy. You took the time to drive here. Some 15, some 20, some 40 minutes. Some are coming from Ohio. It feels like it's Greenfield.

We got some coming from Michigan, which is basically Westfield to get here because I believe you want to hear from God. That's what I believe. That's why that's why I believe you're here this morning is you want to hear from God. You want the word of God preached in your soul. You're screaming, "Bring out the book." So that's what I'm going to do week in and week out.

Sometimes 45 minutes, sometimes 65 minutes. It happens because I want to give you what you need and what you truly came for unapologetically. Let's continue reading. in the presence of the men and the women and those who could understand. And the ears of all the people were attentive to the book of the law. And Ezra the scribe stood on a wooden platform that they had made for the purpose.

And beside him stood m um Mattathiah, Sheima, Annayiah, Uriah, Hilkayiah uh and Messiah on his right hand. And then Padiah Michelle um you know you see the words there on his left hand. And then Ezra opened the book in the sight of all the people for he was above all the people not in a prideful way but because of what he was doing. They wanted to position him above so that they could submit to what he's preaching. You catch that? The reason why they're in exile was because they were not submitting to God's law.

They were not submitting to what God was instructed to them. And they ended up in submission to pagan kings and pagan rulers who led them in exile where they did not flourish. But they wanted him up above them preaching the word of God. not to be over them per se as a as an individual, but to be with them under the word of God as they are in submission to life. They want life. They want to get back to what was good.

And so Ezra opened the book in the sight of all the people, for he was above all the people. And as he opened it, all the people stood. And Ezra blessed the Lord. That's why we sang that song this morning. Bless God. Ezra, bless the Lord.

the great God. And all the people answered, "Amen." Amen. Lifting up their hands. That's biblical. You can lift your hands and worship.

You can. All right. You don't have to be like frozen chosen sitting there just like, "All right, Lord. I feel a little something, but you know, it's good. It's good. You can bless the Lord.

You can lift your hands. And they bowed their heads and worshiped the Lord with their faces to the ground. Humility, word of God being preached, sitting under it in submission, receiving the word from it, worshiping the Lord, it humbled them. You return to the word of God, repentance is what is produced. Because as you are reading the word, the word is reading you. It's the only book in all the world that calls itself living and active.

When you're reading the word of God, it's reading you. Which is why you can read other books and you might be like, "Oh, that's a cute little love story." Or, "Oh, that's a good nugget thought for business, corporate, whatever." When you read the word of God, you're like like it breaks you. You start seeing who Jesus is and you start seeing who you are and you're like, I'm reading Jesus. He's reading me.

Oh man, there's a pretty big gap between the two of us to where he's holy and I don't feel like I am. It reads you and it convicts you. And the reason why you feel that conviction when you're reading it is because the spirit of God doesn't like sin. Is uncomfortable in sin. It grieves him. And so when the spirit of God is living inside of you because you trust in Jesus and you follow Jesus and he's your Lord and Savior, when the spirit of God is living inside of you and you're reading the word of God and you're learning it, you're starting to continue to see more clearly the parts of you that are not like Christ and the spirit of God inside of you is saying, "You're right.

That's not like Christ. I'm confirming that." And it convicts you to where you start feeling uncomfortable about the sin in your life. That's conviction. And that's what helps us with repentance. I don't want that anymore.

I want to live free. I don't want to have shame and guilt. I want to have life and abundance. I want to have peace in my life. That's what the word of God produces in us. It's not so that we just always walk around woe is me.

We crucify the flesh with Jesus and we say, "You're right. We are sinners. We are awful." At the same time, he has made us righteous. He has taken us from sinners and made us saints. And so there's this already not yet that we're working out in our lives where yes, we are sinners, but he has made us saints.

Well, I don't feel like a saint. I don't feel like Jesus. I don't feel like I'm living a righteous life. That's because he's transforming you into what you already are. And that takes a lifetime. Absolutely.

It takes a lifetime. But it's good work. It's in that process of becoming what you already are that you receive joy every single day of your life. Every single life. Because there's no condemnation when you see your sin. Because Jesus already says in Romans 8:1 that there's no condemn con condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus.

We are then able to walk in step with the spirit of God as we continue on with him. So Nehemiah begins with a brokenhearted compassion that makes him sit down to pray for his sin, for the people, for blessing, for a return to the favor of God, for restoration, for all of it. That's the first requirement for a revival. The second requirement for a revival is a return to the word of God. So we have to return to prayer. We have to return to the word of God.

When the people of God humble themselves to pray and then hunger to grow in and understand the word of God, we position ourselves under the Watergate as the people were in Nehemiah's time. that God might open up the floodgates of heaven and pour out the spirit of God on us and through us in an extraordinary as you see there in verses 9 through 12. It's an overwhelming experience. Let me read it for you. And Nehemiah who was the governor and Ezra the priest scribe, the Levites who taught the people said to all people, "This day is a is holy to the Lord your God. Do not mourn or weep."

So remember, like revival breaks out. They're under the word of God. They're praying. They're confessing. They're repenting. And they're mourning and weeping as Nehemiah did back in chapter 1.

For all the people wept as they heard the words of the law. Then he said to them, "Go your way, eat the fat, and drink sweet wine, and send portions to anyone who has nothing ready, for this day is holy to our Lord. and do not be grieved for the Lord or or for the joy of the Lord is your strength. So the Levites calmed all the people. I love that. Calmed all the people.

Reassured them. Don't walk around weeping constantly. Live in the joy that you have been returned to the Lord. Be quiet for this day is holy. Do not be grieved. And all the people went their way to eat and drink and to send portions and to make a great rejoicing because they had understood the words that were declared to them.

I love that they experience this overwhelming moment. But it's also a cause for rejoicing as Ezra and Nehemiah encouraged the people to no longer weep, but reje, drink the best wine, invite over your neighbors to share in the feast, and throw a party because God is your God and you are his people. Throw a party because of that. One of the problems with modern day Christianity is that um it's not that we party too much, it's that we don't party enough. And when I say party, I'm not talking about like debauchery. I'm talking about partying and enjoying the ble the pleasures of the Lord, enjoying the fruit of the land, like enjoying what God has blessed us with and provided for us and then sharing it with those around us as well.

We don't invite others in to share in what we have and what we get to see and what we get to savor and what satisfies us. Like that's evangelism. Inviting others into share what satisfies you. Let me close with just a couple of points of application. What might God do among us if we humbly prioritized? And I'm going to give you a very specific one.

You can pray whenever you want to pray. Sunday morning at 8:35. Some might not know, but every Sunday morning at 8:35, we come into this room and we pray. We pray. Why? Because even though preaching the word of God is a priority, it is equally as prioritized as the ministry of prayer.

What might God do among us if we humbly prioritized Sunday prayer at 8:35 a. m.? That's just a start. You can leap off of that. What might God do among us if we prayed every single morning? I love um a quote from Martin Luther who basically says,"I have so much to do today that I'm going to spend the first three hours in prayer."

That doesn't sound like a good prioritization of your time. If you're looking at it from a secular worldview, you got so much to do today. Why would you sit and talk to something invisible for three hours? Why don't you get some work done? But that's what he did because he knew in order for him to accomplish everything that he needed to get done, he was going to need the source to provide him the strength and the energy and the blessing and the favor to be able to do as 1 Corinthians 10:31 tells us, "Do whether you eat or drink or whatever you do, do all things for the glory of God." Number two, what might God do among us if we hungered and thirsted for more of God's word?

What might he do among us if we hunger and thirsted for God's word? If we elevated God's word just like the people did, hey, put that man on a wooden platform so that when he preaches, we are postured already in submission to the word of God. How might our lives look differently if we posture ourselves every single day? Man, the number one thing that I got to do today is get in the word of God before I do anything else. In the middle of doing everything, I got to get in the word of God before I end my day. I got to get in the word of God.

I got to be submitted to it because it is literally what is guiding every aspect of my life to make sure that I'm walking in step with the spirit of God and not walking in step with the spirit of the age. What might God do among us if we hungered and thirsted for more of God's word and not just dusting it off on Sunday mornings and bringing it with us? And number three, what might God do among us if we confessed our sins, repented, and began rejoicing in the spirit of God that lives in us and frees us from our guilt, shame, and condemnation? Like what might God do among us if we lived free instead of in shame all the time because we're not doing the work of confessing and repenting and humbling ourselves before the Lord. Again, remember Romans 8:1. There is therefore no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus.

Is there work to do? Yeah, we're going to be constantly working out our lives when it comes to sinning and worshiping and sinning and worshiping and walking in step with the spirit of the age and walking in step with the spirit of God. But if Christ is in us, we have everything that we need to be free to be forgiven, to live satisfied, to live rejoicing as we work that out, knowing that, yeah, I still I still messed up today. I still sinned against you. I still did things that that I should not have done. And he says, "Look, there's no condemnation.

I've already paid for that at the cross, and I've already made you a sinner to a saint. I've already saved you. I've already forgiven you, and I want to send you rejoicing." That's why like the the people in Nehemiah's time, they've come in. I mean, they're now like words of God are preached and and spoken, and they're just weeping. They're mourning.

They're confessing their sin. They're struggling. They're feeling the shame and the guilt. I can't believe what we did in exile. You won't you can't imagine, Lord, the the foreign gods that we were serving and the sacrifices that we were making and and the blending of other religious studies and other religious ideologies, all the things that we were doing from a world view, you won't even believe it. And God said, "You won't even believe the fact that I covered all of that because of the work of my son that he did in his death, burial, and resurrection on the cross.

And that's why we come to this meal at the end of every service is because what this meal represents is that we are free to go and eat the good food and drink the best drinks and enjoy the rest of our day. Because what brought you in here weeping? Jesus cancelled it when he died for you on the cross. Did you lose your cool this week with your kids? I did. Did you argue too much with your spouse?

I probably will afterwards because of the example. Were you lazy at work and did a poor job? Did you say something you shouldn't have? Did you judge someone unfairly this week? I've already told you before, cards on the table. Every time I get in a vehicle, I judge everyone because I just want people to drive the way they're supposed to drive or how I want them to drive.

Did you look at someone else with lust in your mind this week when your you wanted to hang out? Did you lie about being too busy just because you're too introverted? Some of you, you felt that. I could go on and on and on. But when we return to the word of God and read it, it reads us and it makes us feel uncomfortable. That's called conviction.

Because the spirit of God that dwells inside of us does not enjoy sin. It grieavves him. And the more we understand what grieavves him, the more it convicts us to stop, confess it, turn from it, trust Jesus for forgiveness, and by faith walk with God that we were once far off and exiled, but by grace we've been brought back. And so this meal, let this meal be a reminder of what Jesus did for you, but let it also be an instruction for you to go and eat the good food and drink the best drinks and enjoy what God revealed to you today as we continue returning to the word of God and bring out this book every week. Amen. Amen.

Would y'all stand with me? As we come to this time of communion, man, I there's so many similarities between us and the Israelites at the time of Nehemiah. So many similarities. I want to see the floodgates open. And the only way that's going to happen is if we stop the exile and just trying to figure life out our way and we return to the word of God and we return to prayer and we say, "Lord, we want to hear from you and we need you to come and we need you to do a work among us in our hearts. Break our hearts for our sin.

break our hearts for the lost that are far off. Help us move away from our sin towards Jesus. And then help us move Jesus towards those who are around us. And we get to do that because Jesus moved towards us first. He came to the world to break his body and shed his blood for the removal and forgiveness of our sins. And not so that we stay in that place of weeping in sackcloth and ashes as they use as an example in the scriptures, but that we that we come out of that knowing that there is no more condemnation because his wrath was satisfied at the cross and that he now tells us, "Hey, not only have I judged that in him on the cross, but I've also then adoped adopted you as sons and daughters in which you now get to come and enjoy all that I have for you.

It's like going home with God and there's a pantry and there's a backyard and there's all these things in there that you get to enjoy. Hey, go in, eat the good food, drink the best drinks. Go out back. Look at this massive fun slide that I have for you. Look at all these wonderful things. Like there's perfect grass that you can mow and get all the best stripes.

There's anything you want that will bring you pleasure and satisfaction. It's yours because of what he has done for us. And so this meal allows us to be able to come and see what he has done for us, but also as a reminder to be able to go and enjoy the life that he's provided for you. Eat and drink your fill. Rejoice. And that's what Nehemiah was closing out with the people.

Don't continue weeping. Go home rejoicing because the Lord has brought you back. And the same thing for us. Don't go home condemning yourself. Don't go home weeping. On this day, rejoice in what Jesus has done for you.

If you believe that he's done that for you, he's broken your bo his body for you. He shed his blood for you at the cross. If you believe that, I invite you to come down, grab the elements, bring them back to your seats. We're going to sing a song during that time. Let it be a time in which you reflect, in which you do some work with the Lord. Maybe some of those examples that I gave, you're like, "Yeah, I did that.

I messed up this week. I made mistakes. No, I sinned, Lord. I sinned against you, and I'm sorry. but because of your son Jesus who broke his body and shed his blood. I believe that you forgave me of those things and that you freed me from those things and that you take my shame and my guilt away from me and I just want to thank you.

I come to you humbly thanking you and I want to obey you. I want to obey you. I want to turn from those things and I want to walk in step with your spirit. Do that work as we walk through this song. And may it begin as it did for the for the Israelites, be able to lift your voices, lift your heads, lift your praise to say, "Thank you, Jesus. It turns to praise instead of pride."

Father, we thank you so much for your goodness to us. We thank you that you love us, that you came to us. We thank you that you sent your son Jesus when we were broken. When we were ashamed, when we were sinful, when we were enemies of you. You sent your son Jesus to live the perfect life we could not live. To die the death that we deserved.

And because you were satisfied with his punishment, with his payment, you brought him back to life three days later, guaranteeing for any one of us who believe in your son Jesus and the work that he did, you will also grant us life, eternal life, raised to walk in the newness of the spirit of God in us. It's in Jesus name we pray. Amen.