My recent posts based on Nehemiah 8 have focused us to pray that the Word of God might be restored to its rightful place in our churches.

• May we gather as one man to hear Your Word (Nehemiah 8)
• Give us ears to be attentive to Your words alone (Nehemiah 8:3)
• one sign of revival: attentiveness to the Word of God (Whitefield's Journals)
• "People cannot take preaching...People are dying through lack of knowledge." (ML-J)

As we look through the Word of God, we can't help but see how much God values and treasures His Word, and we ought to do the same. So much of the Church today has been guilty of not treasuring the Word and not giving the Word of God its rightful place. That's why I am continuing to post on this theme (and expect to continue to do so with at least a couple more posts from Nehemiah in the coming days, D.V.). If we don't have our foundation set rightly in the Word of God, we will end up going all wrong. In the past several years, we've certainly reaped what we've sown; we've seen the sorry fruit of that over the past many years now.

For today's post I'm returning once again to Nehemiah 8.

As you read and reflect on the passage below, please notice how the ministers of God were used by God to read and teach the Word of God to give understanding to the people of God. (You may also like to read my related posts here, here, here and here.)

Lord God,

We are Your people. The sheep of Your pasture. We thank You that while we had gone astray each to our own way, You laid our sin on Jesus Christ, the Lamb without blemish. We thank You for redeeming us with His precious blood. We thank You for giving us the gift of Your Word to sustain us day in and day out.

We are Your people. You have given us Your Word, but apart from Your Holy Spirit we can have no true and right understanding of Your Word. As we read and listen to Your Word, we pray You would continually guide us, protect us from error and lead us into all truth.

We are Your people. You have given us Your Word. In addition to Your Holy Spirit, You have ordained and gifted and sent men and women today in the Church to give us understanding from Your Word. We pray You would protect those You send from error and lead them into all truth. We pray You would give us ears to hear Your voice and to flee from the voice of strangers.

We see in Nehemiah 8 how You ordained and sent and gifted leaders who

We pray You would send us such ministers today!

We confess how so many of our leaders no longer read from the Book at all! Preachers and teachers in the church and parachurch organizations look to their own ideas or to the words of men in other books or on television or the internet. They go everywhere else for messages but to You, O Lord. O, how foolish we are! You alone have the Words of life. So many confer with other men but they have neglected to sit and commune with You, living God, and listen to You speak to them through Your precious Word. We confess there are so many leaders out there who center and ground their teaching on any and all things but Your precious, life-giving, life-changing Word.

Forgive us, Word of God, for neglecting the holiness and the absolute centrality of Your precious Word.
Be gracious to us. Restore Your Word to its rightful place in our churches.
We are Your people. The sheep of Your pasture. We are hungry for true and living Bread.
Send us ministers after Your own heart,
ministers who love You and Your Word,
ministers who will

We confess how so many of our leaders may read from the Book but they do not read from the Book clearly! Forgive us, Word of God. We confess how so many of our leaders have taken Your wholesome words and made them unwholesome. They have taken the living waters and made them stagnant. There is no life in the words they speak. They have not preached Your Word with authority. They have not preached Your Word with Your Holy Spirit power. They have not preached Your Word as if it were truth. They preach no differently than Pilate who asked our Lord, "What is truth?" They preach as if the Bible is just another book and its teachings not authoritative or vital to us. So many make no clear distinction between the broad way that leads to destruction and the narrow, straight gate that leads to life.

Forgive us, Word of God, for devaluing the authority and uniqueness of Your precious Word.
Be gracious to us. Restore Your Word to its rightful place in our churches.
We are Your people. The sheep of Your pasture. We are hungry for true and living Bread.
Send us ministers after Your own heart,
ministers who love You and Your Word,
ministers who will

We confess how so many of our leaders no longer give the sense as they preach and teach but rather they end up confusing their hearers! We confess how so much preaching and teaching today does not clearly lift up Jesus Christ as the way, the truth and the life. Your Gospel is to be proclaimed, not to be debated. The Word of God is to be expounded, to show forth Christ clearly from beginning to end. Satan is a deceiver and a liar and the father of lies. The devil wants to keep people blinded and entangled by his lies. Misinformation, disinformation and confusion are his specialties. He delights to keep people wrapped up in his kingdom of darkness, in the shadows, in confusion, without a true sense of reality, blinded and unable to see the light of Your glorious Gospel and hear the good news of great joy proclaimed. Your Word is to be preached and taught clearly so it might bring light to those in darkness, to set the prisoners free, to bring oil of joy for mourning. Yet how often is the Gospel message clouded and blurred today, so no sense is given, but only nonsense is taught and souls remain lost and in the dark, apart from You, the true Light. So many who sit under such teaching never understand their true spiritual condition: that they are lost sinners with no hope apart from the Gospel. How can lost sinners believe on Christ unless they hear preaching that gives the sense?

Forgive us, Word of God, for obscuring the light and truth of Your precious Word.
Be gracious to us. Restore Your Word to its rightful place in our churches.
We are Your people. The sheep of Your pasture. We are hungry for true and living Bread.
Send us ministers after Your own heart,
ministers who love You and Your Word,
ministers who will

We confess how so many of our leaders do not impart understanding to their hearers! We confess that some leaders have been enamored with intellect and scholarship and the esteem of men that they no longer preach the simple message of Christ and Him crucified. We confess that other leaders have added layers and layers upon the simplicity of the Gospel, to confound it, to make the Gospel about us and our works rather than about Jesus Christ and His work done for us on the cross and continuing in us through His Holy Spirit. You, Lord of the universe, invited the little children to come to You. Even the common people heard You, Lord. The glorious Gospel is foolishness to the world, but to those being saved it is the power of God. Yet today we confess that so much of what is preached and taught complicates, confuses, clouds and confounds those who hear it. So many leaders today do not clearly lead and shepherd the hungry sheep into green pastures and the thirsty sheep to still waters. We confess so many of our leaders no longer impart understanding of Your Word to Your people, but rather cause much misunderstanding, so the flock remains hungry and thirsty. Our leaders neglect to clearly proclaim that the Gospel of Jesus Christ is the only power to save sinners; that Christ is our wisdom, righteousness, sanctification and redemption.

Forgive us, Word of God, for being ashamed of and stumbling at the simple wisdom of Your precious Word.
Be gracious to us. Restore Your Word to its rightful place in our churches.
We are Your people. The sheep of Your pasture. We are hungry for true and living Bread.
Send us ministers after Your own heart,
ministers who love You and Your Word,
ministers who will

My posts/prayers this past week have focused on our attitude toward the Word of God as we've looked at Nehemiah 8:1-8:

• May we gather as one man to hear Your Word (Nehemiah 8)
• Give us ears to be attentive to Your words alone (Nehemiah 8:3)
• one sign of revival: attentiveness to the Word of God (Whitefield's Journals)

Nehemiah 8:1  And all the people gathered as one man into the square before the Water Gate. And they told Ezra the scribe to bring the Book of the Law of Moses that the LORD had commanded Israel. 2  So Ezra the priest brought the Law before the assembly, both men and women and all who could understand what they heard, on the first day of the seventh month. 3  And he read from it facing the square before the Water Gate from early morning until midday, 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. 4  And Ezra the scribe stood on a wooden platform that they had made for the purpose. And beside him stood Mattithiah, Shema, Anaiah, Uriah, Hilkiah, and Maaseiah on his right hand, and Pedaiah, Mishael, Malchijah, Hashum, Hashbaddanah, Zechariah, and Meshullam on his left hand. 5  And 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. 6  And Ezra blessed the LORD, the great God, and all the people answered, “Amen, Amen,” lifting up their hands. And they bowed their heads and worshiped the LORD with their faces to the ground. 7  Also Jeshua, Bani, Sherebiah, Jamin, Akkub, Shabbethai, Hodiah, Maaseiah, Kelita, Azariah, Jozabad, Hanan, Pelaiah, the Levites, helped the people to understand the Law, while the people remained in their places. 8  They read from the book, from the Law of God, clearly, and they gave the sense, so that the people understood the reading.

Too much of the Church has departed from the preaching of the Word of God. So many no longer have a hunger or thirst for the Word of God. We are so often attentive to any and all things but the Word of God.

I would like to continue on in the same vein by presenting here the account of Dr. Martyn Lloyd-Jones' address at the jubilee meeting of the Scottish Evangelistic Council on May 9, 1980 in Glasgow (from Iain Murray's "David Martyn Lloyd-Jones: Volume Two: The Fight of Faith, 1938-1981," Banner of Truth: 1990, reprinted 2004, 733-734).

According to his own words, ML-J was "not a well man" at the time: "My friend, Mr Murdoch persuaded me to come and I thank God He has given me the health and strength to be here." ML-J died the following March.

Here's Murray's description of the events of that day:

    But they were not assembled, he [ML-J] went on, to talk about the past. The best way to celebrate a jubilee was to consider what the SEC was to do at the present time. The need of the hour, he believed, was for the prophetic note, to show what the Bible has to say to the present world situation. This brought him to his text, the twelve verses of Psalm 2, upon which he proceeded to preach for almost the whole of the following hour, beginning with the word, 'Why do the heathen rage, and the people imagine a vain thing . . .' .

    I cannot attempt to describe the sermon. The tape is available and should be heard by every reader of these pages. [Murray gives Ian M. Densham, 15 Ayr Terrace, St Ives, TR26 1ED, UK as the contact information to obtain this tape; I don't know if this is current or not. If you're interested, you may wish to contact the Banner of Truth Trust.] The frail, dying man was, in truth, am ambassador from heaven. Knowing the message he had to deliver, and the time he would need, I believe he tried to husband what strength he had but there was no holding back. The message took over the man and every last vestige of energy was poured out in both word and action. The divine wrath, of which the Psalm speaks, was to him a terrible, present reality and he asked the congregation:

    The final verse of the Psalm was alive with light and power as he pleaded, with failing voice, 'Kiss the Son, lest he be angry . . . Blessed are all they that put their trust in him'.

(end quote)

As Dr. Lloyd-Jones said:

Romans 10:4  For Christ is the end of the law for righteousness to everyone who believes.

5  For Moses writes about the righteousness that is based on the law, that the person who does the commandments shall live by them. 6  But the righteousness based on faith says, “Do not say in your heart, ‘Who will ascend into heaven?’” (that is, to bring Christ down) 7  or “‘Who will descend into the abyss?’” (that is, to bring Christ up from the dead). 8  But what does it say? “The word is near you, in your mouth and in your heart” (that is, the word of faith that we proclaim); 9  because, if you confess with your mouth that Jesus is Lord and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved. 10  For with the heart one believes and is justified, and with the mouth one confesses and is saved. 11  For the Scripture says, “Everyone who believes in him will not be put to shame.” 12  For there is no distinction between Jew and Greek; the same Lord is Lord of all, bestowing his riches on all who call on him. 13  For “everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved.

14  But how are they to call on him in whom they have not believed? And how are they to believe in him of whom they have never heard? And how are they to hear without someone preaching? 15  And how are they to preach unless they are sent? As it is written, “How beautiful are the feet of those who preach the good news!”

I've previously written about my concern for Christians to be holy in doctrine and behavior and along with that our need to be united together in Christ (e.g. - please see here and here). The only true unity we have comes through the Holy Spirit, the Word of God and the Gospel of Jesus Christ; I've expressed my deep concern about our need to be rooted in and united in the Gospel.

I've been chewing on the book of Nehemiah for a while now here as well as on my other blog (please see here for the links to those posts). I would like us to consider Nehemiah 8 and 9, specifically to focus on and reflect on the centrality of the Word of God we see there and pray God might give us a similar passion for His Word in our own lives, our congregations and the life of the Church as a whole. The purpose of this website is to be praying for revival in the Church. All the true revivals of religion have had associated with them a return to Biblical preaching. Some might say the preaching spurs the revival; others might say the revival spurs the preaching, but regardless, Biblical preaching is central to any true revival of Christian religion.

I would ask you to read through Nehemiah 8 and 9 on your own and reflect on the emphasis on the Word of God we see there and ask yourself:

Today I would like us to look at just the first few verses of Nehemiah 8, and D.V., I hope to continue on with more from these chapters in coming days.

Nehemiah 8:1  And all the people gathered as one man into the square before the Water Gate. And they told Ezra the scribe to bring the Book of the Law of Moses that the LORD had commanded Israel. 2  So Ezra the priest brought the Law before the assembly, both men and women and all who could understand what they heard, on the first day of the seventh month. 3  And he read from it facing the square before the Water Gate from early morning until midday, in the presence of the men and the women and those who could understand...

Holy Father, Son and Spirit,

We see your people gathering together as one man here. What were they doing?

They were asking for the Word of God to be read! Their leaders read from the Word of God! They were listening to the Word of God! They listened to Your Word for hours on end. How wonderful! How often does that happen in our churches today?