Why is personal and corporate renewal necessary?
In the 5th Century BC Nehemiah was called by God to rebuild the walls of Jerusalem and to re-envision the people for being God’s covenant people. Nehemiah helps us understand what corporate renewal looks like in the life of a church.
Nehemiah 1-6: Rebuilding the city walls
The first 6 chapters of the book of Nehemiah are all about rebuilding the wall. Against all odds, in spite of severe opposition, and with much blood, sweat and tears, it only took 52 days to rebuild the city walls. However, the rebuilding of the city walls is not the end of the book; there are 7 more chapters to come. The second half of the book focuses on repopulating Jerusalem (chapters 7 & 10-12) and corporate renewal (chapters 8-9 and 13).
Nehemiah 7-13: Renewing the people’s hearts
Despite being back in the city, and despite the city walls being rebuilt, the people’s hearts were still not fully aligned with God’s heart. There was compromise and impurity among the people themselves, revealed in a number of besetting sins – corruption in the priesthood, abuse of the disadvantaged, inter-marrying with foreign nations, failure to pay tithes to support the priests/temple and failure to observe the Sabbath.
In other words, the bigger issue was not the disrepair of the city walls, but the disrepair of the people’s hearts. One commentator puts it like this:
The wall is regarded as no more than an institutional framework; what counts are the attitudes and activities of the people who live behind it…however important good structures and routines may be, nothing can substitute for he renewal of the natural perverse inclinations of the human heart
H.G.M Williamson, Nehemiah, page 436-440, in the New Bible Commentary
They needed to be renewed through repentance, re-envisioning and re-commitment, which is exactly what the latter chapters of Nehemiah are all about.
How does corporate renewal take place?
Here is how the renewal came about in Nehemiah’s day;
- Re-envisioning (Nehemiah 8) – God’s word was proclaimed to the people through Ezra the scribe. As the people heard God’s word and were convicted, they recommitted to celebrating the feast of booths as prescribed by Moses in the book of Exodus, remembering the 40 years in the wilderness. In other words, the people caught a vision of what it meant to be the people of God.
- Repentance (Nehemiah 9) – After hearing God’s word, the people retell the story of being God’s people, from Abraham through to the exile. They recount the numerous times when their forefathers committed idolatry and how the Lord was repeatedly merciful in forgiving them. As they retell the story and list the sins of their forefathers, the people put themselves within the story; they acknowledge their sin and seek God in repentance.
- Recommitment (Nehemiah 10) – After confessing their sins, we have a list of all those that signed a binding agreement to obey the Mosaic Law again – not to intermarry, or trade on the Sabbath, and to start taking responsibilities for the temple through tithing (giving 10% of their income to the priests). The Jewish people were re-discovering their history, their identity and what it meant to be a covenant people – worshipping and serving the living God together.
- Repopulation & Re-Appointment (Nehemiah 7, 11-12). As the people commit themselves to God again, we hear about Jerusalem being repopulated and the different people that moved in from the surrounding towns to take up residents again. We have several leadership appointments, particularly appointments of those that led the people in corporate worship, directors of music and singers, as had been prescribed by David. This was a reinstatement not just of the law of Moses but also the music of David.
- Rejoice (Nehemiah 12:27-47). Chapter 12 ends with an amazing story of Nehemiah forming 2 choirs and getting them to march around the wall in opposite directions, meeting in the middle to sing heartily. This was a way of dedicating the wall. It’s a wonderfully joyful scene as the people celebrate being given a fresh start.
These themes of re-envisioning, repentance, recommitment, and rejoicing are going to be helpful for us as we come together for RENEW.
For us, we’ll not celebrate the Feast of Weeks; rather, at the end of the two services we’ll celebrate the Lord’s supper, remembering Jesus’ death and the covenant in his blood that assures us of forgiveness and adoption into his family. We’ll spend time in repentance, in recommitment, in being re-envisioned and in celebration, rejoicing in what it means to be God’s people together.
The need for continued renewal
You may have noticed that I haven’t mentioned Nehemiah 13. A number of years later, Nehemiah had to come back to Jerusalem, and to his dismay he found the people committing all the old sins that the people had repented. The people were intermarrying with foreign nations, trading on the Sabbath, taking advantage of the weak and neglecting the temple/priests by failing to tithe. The people’s hearts are full of greed and impurity. They were still compromised and instead of being a holy nation, they were being influenced by the surrounding nations. Nehemiah is distraught and one again takes action to bring transformation to the community, particularly among the leaders.
Scholars think that the prophet Malachi prophesied around this time, because in his book he mentions all these same sins and another moment of recommitting themselves to the Lord. We read in Malachi 3:16:
16 Then those who feared the Lord talked with each other, and the Lord listened and heard. A scroll of remembrance was written in his presence concerning those who feared the Lord and honoured his name.
Once again the people seek God in repentance and renewal, committing themselves to being his people. It’s a helpful lesson for us to realise that we too need to continually be reminded of the story of God that we find ourselves within through Jesus. To continually repent of the sins that stop us living as God’s people. And continually commit ourselves to the Lord and his purposes – that they might represent him in our day, in our city. As Jesus said in Matthew 5:13,
‘You are the salt of the earth. But if the salt loses its saltiness, how can it be made salty again?
Communion
The way we’ll participate in Renew through communion – coming forward to take the bread and the wine at the end of the service. Why is communion, or the Lord’s Supper, so helpful in doing this? Tim Chester, in his book Truth You Can Touch, puts it like this:
“Every Lord’s Supper is a covenant-renewal ceremony…but it might be helpful to have an annual communion service in which covenant renewal is the main focus, a chance to recommit to be members of the church.
We remember our covenant commitments, not just recalling that they exist but recommitting ourselves to those commitments.”
Pg123-124, A Truth We Can Touch – how baptism and communion shape our lives
The covenant we enter into is with Jesus, by his grace and in his blood (Luke 22:20), and so we first give our allegiance and commitment to him. As we do that, we are reminded that we do not do this as individuals but together, as one body, one family and one people. So as an overflow of our recommitment to him, we respond to his call to love one another as he has loved us, and to share his message with a lost world. At Renew, we want to take time do this well and thoughtfully, to strengthen our ties to our Lord, to his family and to his mission, and to rejoice in his goodness to us.
Our commitments
As you prayerfully prepare for the Renew Sundays, Chester gives us helpful examples of what we’re committing to. He continues,
“Think what commitment to Christ involves:
- A radical repudiation of sin, selfishness, self-reliance and pride
- A commitment to look to Christ, and Christ alone, for salvation from sin and death
- A commitment to find our ultimate identity and fulfilment in Christ
- A commitment to deny ourselves, take up our cross, and follow him
- A commitment to obey his every command
- A commitment to extend his reign through the proclamation of the gospel
And think too, what commitment to Christ’s people involves:
- A commitment to attend regularly
- A commitment to pray faithfully
- A commitment to serve fully
- A commitment to give sacrificially
- A commitment to participate in the church’s mission
- A commitment to disciple others, to be discipled, and (if necessary) to be disciplined.
It is not something to be done lightly. There should be a weight to what takes place. These are the commitments we make to Christ, and these are the commitments we make to one another.”
Pg123-124, A Truth We Can Touch – how baptism and communion shape our lives
As we approach these two Sundays please consider these commitments to Christ and his church, and please use the time of communion to commit yourself to these things.
Only by grace – a fresh start
The bread and the wine remind us powerfully that we only make all commitments because of God’s grace and God’s enabling. These commitments only arise because we have first understood what it means to be forgiven and adopted into God’s family by God’s grace through the cross. As the people in Nehemiah’s day retell the many times their ancestors fell into sin, they repeatedly retell God’s compassion towards them. For example, in Nehemiah 9, on four occasions we read about God’s compassion.
You are a forgiving God, gracious and compassionate, slow to anger and abounding in love. Therefore you did not desert them (vs17)
Because of your great compassion you did not abandon them in the wilderness (vs19)
When they were oppressed they cried out to you. From heaven you heard them, and in your great compassion you gave them deliverers, who rescued them from the hand of their enemies. (vs27)
When they cried out to you again, you heard from heaven, and in your compassion you delivered them time after time (vs28)
At the cross we remember the compassion of God to forgive us again and again; we are given the opportunity for a fresh start. Let’s use the Renew Sundays to take that opportunity together.