GOD HAS MADE US TO REJOICE
J.C.Evershed
My immediate point, dear brethren, is the stairs that went down and the stairs that went up; the same stairs, doubtless. It came into my mind at the time of the Lord's supper a week or two ago, in connection with the downward movements of the Lord Jesus and His upward movements. We are not told how many steps there were in these stairs. It is a familiar thing to us to go over the seven steps that the Lord Jesus took downward according to the second chapter of the epistle to the Philippians. He humbled Himself and became obedient to death, and that the death of the cross, but beloved, the Lord Jesus went lower than that; He stooped down into the tomb, He went down to the heart of the earth, was three days and three nights there. Man has been able to go upwards about a quarter of a million miles; when it comes to going downwards I think two miles is about the maximum. It shows how little even the greatest of us has been able to trace the way in which the Lord Jesus went down to the heart of the earth. If it were a physical matter it would be about four thousand miles, but it is a moral thought. I draw attention to it, brethren, because we have young people with us, and even some older ones who may be worried about sins after conversion, or we might become anxious about the vulnerable condition that God has been pleased in His wisdom to leave in the believer. This is not a condition that has to sin, but a condition that is vulnerable to sin, and it might be a cause of anxiety to a believer. But the Lord Jesus has bottomed the whole matter; deep into the heart of the earth. We speak of bottoming things, and it is right that we should, but the Lord Jesus has been right to the bottom of the whole matter of sins and sin, and settled all for the glory of God.
But then, these stairs went up as well. So we can take account of the Lord Jesus in the glorious upward movements which He took in rising from among the dead, moving about in a spiritual way, and yet pleased to take flesh and bones condition as suited His purpose amongst His own; then ascending in the attitude of blessing His people and going up through all the heavens. Think of Him passing through the realm of the angels! They would remember having broken bounds at the time of the nativity, coming down and giving glory to God. What would they do when the Lord Jesus went up in the majesty of His Person and of His own movements? He would pass by all the principalities and powers; they would recognise in Him the Head of all principalities and powers. What about evil beings in heavenly places? They would recognise that their doom was finally sealed. Think too of the Lord Jesus going right up into the presence of the Father. So it is now characteristic, dear brethren, of the believer that he sees Jesus, who was made some little lower than the angels for the suffering of death, crowned with glory and honour.
I think there is more also than that for us in this present time. This book is a very interesting one. It has often been referred to, but having before us the verses which I have read I have thought of two points. One was that we have, writing this book, a man who humbled himself and was exalted, and who raised the tone of the whole of the people of God in Jerusalem in a permanent way. At the end of the book Nehemiah could speak of having made provision for God's service in an ample way. The Lord Jesus humbled Himself and He was exalted. He did not need to be humbled; He was humiliated but not humbled. We may need to be humbled. I believe we often do, but it is in humbling ourselves that it is in God's ways to exalt us. Nehemiah was quite a great man. He was the king's cup-bearer, the last in the chain, I suppose, of the defence of the person of the king, tasting his wine and his food to see that it was not poisoned. Also, it seems that he was a man who was there to cheer up the king, because the king was upset when Nehemiah was sad. But Nehemiah was prepared to sacrifice all in order to be with his humble people, the people of God. He was prepared, moreover, when at Jerusalem, to go out at night to view the city. There was a way that he could not get through, it was too low for his ass to pass. I suppose he had to get off and go on foot. He was a man who demeaned himself, but as such he was one whom God exalted. He used him, as I said, to raise the tone of the whole people of God. These features we need individually, and we are always in need of the tone of the assembly being raised.
Hanani was a man who came and brought news to Nehemiah about the condition of the people. He was deeply concerned about it, and you find, as he took that humble ground that he became ruler of half Jerusalem. Well, that shows that persons are being promoted; that is what is happening; persons who are ready to humble themselves are being promoted, even as Nehemiah was.
It is remarkable the influence that Nehemiah had upon the people, especially in the building of the wall, which I suppose has relation to the protection of God's interests here. This is what we are set for, beloved, to maintain and to protect what is precious to God in this scene in the way of service and testimony. This chapter 12 is one of the most thrilling chapters in the whole of the Scriptures, showing how persons were able to work together in order to accomplish the protection of what was for God's pleasure. What would you think of a building company that included a high priest, goldsmiths, perfumers, young women, street-traders, besides other unnamed persons? But they were all there together, working at the work. One group built about half a kilometre of the wall. They were not just building a piece of the wall; in their own minds they were building the whole wall. They were doing what they could towards it, and I do not think you would have been able to see where one builder finished and where another began. Thus I think it is with us, dear brethren, that whilst we are thankful to have our little work to do over against our own house or wherever it might be, even a second piece, let us have the whole in view in order that we may be working together and working hard. Some of the builders, it says, did not put their necks to the work. There was some reserve, but nevertheless they worked at it and the whole became a wall.
Not only was the wall for the protection of what was for God's pleasure but it was in order that the service of God might be carried on in an ample way and in a way suited to a time of recovery, in which in a certain sense all that had appeared to be lost was now recovered and brought into the praise-system of God. It even says that the choirs stood in the house of God, and it reads as if the service went on in the house of God. On other occasions the glory of God had been in the house and the privilege of service could not go on. But the latter glory of the house was greater than the former, and I think that was because they were able to continue serving God as they did. There were the instruments of David too; they would have been about six hundred years old, but they were not any the worse for that but were brought into use in this time of recovery. What David introduced represents something peculiarly jubilant in connection with the service of God. It was not in the older system, great as it was, but David introduced singing and these instruments of music which appear here in a recovered form. l suppose the instruments of David would be the saints viewed in a sense that they can be made vibrant according to what is needed in the service of God. To what extent, beloved, do our hearts respond or vibrate, as a deep-sounding or a stringed instrument would, in connection with the service of God when the Lord presents Himself to us, when we have the Holy Spirit before us and when we approach the Father? To what extent are these things really true of us or are we put to shame by these men in the time of Nehemiah? I have to ask myself these questions but am making myself bold enough to bring them before the brethren as well.
But this jubilation I wanted to speak about just a little, as to the instruments and the choirs, that the jubilation was not out of control. You will notice that when they went up these stairs, or rather just before that, in verse 36, it says "and Ezra the scribe before them". I think that suggests that there was not only leadership but control in connection with the truth, because a scribe would be one who understood the principles and the value of the truth in the way in which it was brought out and made known and recovered. Then you find in verse 38 that Nehemiah himself went with the people, and there were the rulers as well. It seems to me that the whole matter was under control. I do feel for myself that one needs to raise the spiritual tone of oneself, and would endeavour to do that of one's brethren. So that it says "the singers sang loud", yet there was control, because the overseer is mentioned. Then it says "they offered great sacrifices, and rejoiced; for God had made them rejoice with great joy". Beloved brethren, one may say to me, You do not know how low I feel sometimes. Well, perhaps I do know how low you feel sometimes, but let us get this into our constitution, that God has made us to rejoice, and as we rejoice our joy will be heard afar off, for the Lord's Name's sake.
LONDON
23 February 1982