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Hey Bible nerds. This is Dr. Manny Arango and I'm your host for the Bible Department podcast powered by Arma. This podcast follows a Bible reading plan we created to help you read the entire Bible in a year. You can head to the show notes or thebibledepartment.com to download our reading plan and join the Journey.

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Family. Welcome to day three 45. We are looking at Nehemiah chapters 11, 12 and 13 today. Today we get to wave bye bye to Nehemiah and tomorrow we say hello to our final book of the Bible. That's right, first and Second Chronicles is originally one book. Now I know there are two books in our modern English translations, but we're down to the wire. Like I cannot believe it. Day 345 means there's 20 days left in the if you've made it this far, I'm insanely proud of you. Especially if you're on a 345 day streak. I want to challenge you actually to never go another year without reading the Bible every single day. It doesn't have to be the whole Bible in a year, but you should read God's Word every single day. It's a manna from heaven. Man doesn't live on bread alone, but on every word that proceeds from the mouth of God. So I'm insanely proud of you. I hope you notice a difference in your own soul, in your own self talk, in your own mind, in your own self control. Anywho, all right, if you've read Nehemiah chapter 11, chapters 11 to 13, then we are ready to rock and roll with context clues, nerdy nuggets and a timeless truth. If you haven't done the reading today, I want to challenge you. Stop this video, pause the audio, go get the reading done and then come back. All right. For our context for the day, I just want to remind you of things we've said. It's our last day in the Book of Nehemiah, so it's not like I'm going to give you some brand new context for the historical or cultural moment. All the context has really been given to you already in order to understand the Book of Nehemiah. The details that I just want to remind you of is that this is obviously a post exilic book of the Bible. Ezra and Nehemiah were originally one book and there are three big words that you're going to have to remember in order to understand both Ezra and Nehemiah. And that is Return, rebuild, repent, Return, rebuild, repent and wouldn't it be awesome if it was that easy. Return to the Lord, rebuild your life, and continue patterns of repentance, daily repentance, that honestly is a framework for the Christian life. But as we are going to realize, or as we are going to discover at the end of chapter 13, man, that repentance part sometimes just doesn't stick. And the renewal, the revival, the repentance that Ezra and Nehemiah fought for, prayed for, it does not stick. And so the book actually does end on this kind of, like, anticlimactic, like, what in the world is going on? Kind of a note. And so we'll get there at chapter 13. Not, like I said, not a ton of context clues today. You already have all the context you need in order to properly exegete the end of the Book of Nehemiah. So let's dive into nerdy nuggets. First nerdy nugget. If you go to Nehemiah, chapter 11, verse 1, it says this. Now, the leaders of the people settled in Jerusalem. The rest of the people cast lots to bring one out of every 10 of them to live in Jerusalem, the holy city, while the remaining nine were to stay in their own towns. So the people commended all who volunteered to live in Jerusalem. So Jerusalem's still not like a dope place to live. Okay, like, so the people, instead of, not instead of, but in addition to giving a tithe or recommitting that they are going to tithe to the Levites, they decide to also tithe one out of every 10 people. They tithe their population into the city of Jerusalem. Because honestly, Jerusalem, Jerusalem is not a very, very desirable place to live. And what good is it if we got a nice, new, fancy, awesome temple and we got these nice, new, awesome, fancy walls, but no humans to go worship at the temple or to be protected by the walls? And so Nehemiah, chapter 11 starts out with the people getting a. Essentially a lottery system going for who's going to volunteer as tribute to go live in the capital. Okay, that is chapter 11, verse one, number two, second nerdy nugget. When we get into chapter 12, I mean, I just love chapter 12. Okay, first of all, we got multiple choirs, we got musicians, we got praise, we got worship. I mean, it's feeling a lot like David again. Remember when we were studying through first, second Samuel, and then we really, like. We're studying the Psalms, which really got us into books like first and Second Chronicles. Those books are gonna really emphasize how much of a worship leader and worship architect David is. And man Nehemiah and Ezra fit in that vein. They are big on worship. Okay? It says this in chapter 12, verse 24. And the leaders of the Levites were, you know, hard name to pronounce. Hard name to pronounce. Hard name to pronounce. Son of. Hard name to pronounce. And their associates, their names aren't the most important for. For the point that I'm trying to make. So I skipped over them and their associates who stood opposite them to give praise and thanksgiving, one section responding to the other, as prescribed by David, the man of God. So Nehemiah and Ezra are reinstituting a style of worship that was prescribed by David, the man of God. And if Ezra is the final architect of the Hebrew Bible, he's a big David fan. And as we gear up to get into first and second Chronicles, you're going to learn quickly that whoever the author of Chronicles is, is a big, big, big, big, big David fan. Then, you know, there's two choirs. Okay, well, actually, let's go to chapter 12, verse 27. At the dedication of the wall of Jerusalem, the Levites were sought out from where they lived and were brought to Jerusalem to celebrate joyfully the dedication with songs of thanksgiving and with the music of cymbals, harps and lyres. The musicians were also brought together with the region around Jerusalem from the villages of the Nitophathites, Neatophathites, Netophethites. Beautiful. We love you, Netophathites. And from Beth Gilgal, from the area of Geba in Azmath. For the musicians had built villages for themselves around Jerusalem. When the priests and Levites had purified themselves ceremonially, they purified the people, the gates, and the wall. I just want you to get the sense of how much of an emphasis there are on musicians, okay? Cymbals, harps, liars, like musicians, are integral to worship in Jerusalem. Okay? In chapter 12, verse 38 talks about the second choir. And then chapter 12, verse 40, the two choirs. And then it gets down to verse 42, the end of verse 42, the choirs, plural choirs, sang under the direction of Jezrehiah, verse 43. And on that day, they offered great sacrifices, rejoicing because God had given them great joy. The women and children also rejoiced. The sound of rejoicing in Jerusalem could be heard far away. You can begin to see this connection between praise and worship and rejoicing that God had given them joy. And on the day they offer great sacrifice, rejoicing because God had given them great Joy, rejoicing because God had given them great joy. And it's almost like a non vicious cycle. It's a good cycle. God gives you joy and so you rejoice. And what happens when you rejoice? You get more joy. And then what happens when you got joy? You rejoice. Talk about the vicious cycle of joy. And so I, I want to highlight really, really quick just how important worship is for the life of the believer. How important worship is for the, the folks who architected worship to be this way. Remember, we've talked about this a lot. That worship was originally sacrifice and that's it. And then it was serving and then David institutes singing. Okay, so music as worship is super, super, super, super, super important. Like, actually, I want to challenge you. Like, you should sing. Like when you're at church. Like, you should sing loud. Like you should rejoice. Like so often, you know, people will tell me, like, oh, no, I'm just being reflective. I'm just being contemplative. No, that's dope. But there's also a place for exuberant joy filled with like thanksgiving and praise. And actually I'm be a little nerdy. Like Martin Luther, the man who led the Protestant Reformation. He actually called music a handmaiden to theology and said music is only second to theology. Like, but what the church needs is theology and music. I don't know if you know this, but Martin Luther, like the great reformer, the great theologian, also wrote hymns. So I remember learning a mighty fortress is our God, a bulwark never failing. Like, I remember learning Martin Luther's hymn when I was in sixth or seventh grade and we were studying it according, like, based on theology. I think that revival always has. Yesterday I said, revival starts with a return to the words of God, to the word, to the written word of the Lord. But revival also carries a sound. And when I think of church movements that have marked the earth, or at least their generation, those movements come with a sound. There's a unique sound that gets released. And music is powerful. Martin Luther said this. This is a straight Luther quote. By the way. Luther's contemporaries didn't like music. Okay, so in contrast to both Earth. Ulrich Zwingli, you may be familiar with, with Ulrich Zwingli. Zwingli. I'm struggling with this man's first and last name. Golly. Ulrich Zwingli. Ulrich Zwingli. Ulrich. In contrast to both Ulrich Zwingli, who allowed no music of any kind in his services, and John Calvin, who would have none of the art and artifice of music and worship, except for unaccompanied congregational songs. So John Calvin was big on acapella. There's actually a whole movement in America today called Church of Christ which don't do instruments. No musicians, just straight voices. Now, because they don't have musicians, their voices are beautiful. I mean, these are some of the most angelic sounding choirs ever. But anyway, it's. It's a massive misinterpretation of scripture. But that's not a here nor there. Luther encouraged the most sophisticated music of his time, Gregorian chant in classical polyphony, together with the simpler congregational song of the choir, the chorale. So there's all this chatter in with Luther's contemporaries about whether or not music is, you know, fleshly or worldly or this or that. But he was a big proponent of it. And this is a straight quote by Luther. He says this. I am not satisfied with him who despises music, as all fanatics do. So he's calling Ulrich Zwingli and John Calvin fanatics. Like, these are. These are fanatics. They don't like music. For music is an endowment and a gift of God, not an invention of man. It also drives away the devil and makes people cheerful, like Martin Luther. K. Like the Catholic monk who protested against the Catholic church who started the Protestant Reformation. That guy like Martin Luther is like. It drives away the devil. Like my man smart enough to understand. Nah. Music like. Like worship music, like praise music drives away the devil and makes people cheerful. One forgets all anger, unchasteness, pride, and other vices. I place music next to theology and give it the highest praise. Music is the handmaiden to theology. That's Martin Luther. And I couldn't agree more. I. I tried to find, like, the nerdiest way to say, you need to sing in church. Like, you need to sing loud. You need to belt it out, man. Like, you got it. You gotta go for it. Like theology and music go hand in hand. I'm a theology nerd. I'm a Bible nerd. But if you don't know me outside of this podcast, you have no idea that I love the presence of the Lord. I love singing to the Lord. Now, I sound terrible when I do it, but I love singing to the Lord. And we cannot have churches where we only focus on the word of God and not the presence of God. Like, because what's happening in chapter 12? We're on the heels of a revival that's been sparked by. By a return to the words of God. And what do we need to do get the choirs out here, man. Get the musicians, dude. Like, let's sing to God. And it drives the devil away and makes people, people cheerful. So I'd say, yeah, I think that music is powerful and music is an incredible tool that God's given us to, to bless his name, to praise him. And I think it should be a massive emphasis. It should be a great focus. Family, the wait is over. My brand new book, Crushing Chaos is out now and available everywhere. Books are sold. Literally. Today I walked into a Barnes and Noble and I signed a bunch of copies at a physical location. So you can grab this book at a physical Barnes and Noble or you can go to a Books A Million or Amazon or anywhere books are sold and grab a copy. If you enjoy reading the Bible from an ancient perspective, if you understand that the beauty of scripture is actually knowing it in context, then you'll love this book. And if there's any chaos in your personal life, I think that reading, reading the Bible from an ancient perspective can actually help to crush the chaos in your life. I think this book is going to be a New York Times bestseller. I really do. I think we wrote a good one. I think you should get a copy today. All right, back to the episode one of the walls that's going to get mentioned. Obviously, Nehemiah is all about rebuilding the walls is the broad wall. And I've been fortunate enough to go to Jerusalem now to go to Israel now four times. Every time I go to Israel, I go to Jerusalem. And the broad wall is a wall, a part of the wall that Nehemiah rebuilt that you can literally go see. So again, whenever archeology just proves the stuff that's happened in the Bible is real. That's always a plus. So the broad wall, just a nerdy little nugget. Okay, so let's move from nerdy nuggets into the close of the book. Nehemiah, chapter 13, you would imagine, right? Like, hey, we returned, we rebuilt, the people repented, our work's done. No, because for whatever reason, it's easy to build a wall and this is going to get into my timeless truth. It's easy to build a wall. It's hard to build people. Cuz for whatever reason, somebody. I was around a pastor recently, his name is Pastor Dino Rizzo. He said, you want to understand, like church planting. Obviously I'm in the middle of church planting, so I'm excited about that. He said church planting is like, imagine you set this table up like this and, and then you, you go to leave and Somebody, while you're gone, just goes.