Admitting the Problem

NEHEMIAH 1

Nehemiah’s response was repentance. He freely owned up to the failure of himself, his family and his people to remain true to God and admitted that their surrender to worldliness had brought this punishment upon them. After all, why should God hitch his reputation to the outrageous and ungodly behaviour of Israel as it prostituted itself to the nations? He recalled the word given through Moses before the people came into the Promised Land that God would scatter them among the nations if they were faithless and disobedient. He also recalled that through Moses God had promised that if Israel returned to God and kept his teaching by actually doing it, that he would regather them out of the nations and establish them as his people in Jerusalem once more. Nehemiah appealed to this very promise in his prayer. He asked for personal success in stepping towards that promise by faith.

Being able to recognise there is a problem with the church in our time is not enough. We need to admit our part in it. Nehemiah’s repentance is a perfect model for ours. Get God to search your heart until he exposes your part in the compromise that makes the church weak. Get yourself on God’s side in this argument – argue on his side against yourself! Confess your compromise. And if you find it hard to feel bad about it, recall the passages in the Bible that announce his judgement on you who treat his concerns lightly. Find the promises he makes to regather, rebuild and reform you and his church. Turn them into your prayers for yourself, your family and the church – this church. Until we take our place as squatters among the ruins of the church and admit that we have contributed to its weakness, we cannot expect to be part of the solution. It is really easy to point out the faults of others, but Nehemiah-type repentance means that we are ready to turn back to God ourselves.