Do you have childhood memories that you will never forget?
I'm sure you do. Even as you get later in your
years, you still have those things that you look back to and
you remember from your childhood.
And I have some stories like that too, which which I've told
you before. My wife always makes fun of me
because I remember the dumbest things but forget the most
important things, which is pretty typical of my memory.
And one of the things that I remember as a child is, is here
living in Leamington, out in, in the county, is we would hitch
our, our wagon, our trailer to the back of the lawn tractor and
we would drive it around. I don't know, has anybody else
ever done that before? That's a, that's a good time.
But we only had 1/2 of an acre. And so when we would get bored,
we would venture beyond the borders.
And I remember that there was a field next to our house and, and
as one day we, we were looking for somewhere else to drive the
tractor and the trailer and, and I looked out into the field and
I saw what looked to like a really dumb 13 year old Joe, a
field of weeds. And I thought, here is my
racetrack. And so with, with siblings in
the back, we raced out into the field, making circles and U
turns and then going all over the place.
And, and we had a great time. And, and I remember it was a few
days later, I'm sitting on the couch and I hear a knock at the
door. And it's the, the next door
farmer. He wanted to talk with my mom
and, and, and they talked for a few minutes and then he gave her
an earful of, of what stupid young kid drove over all his
winter wheat. But it was fun.
We had a blast. It was a good time.
But my family learned a very valuable lesson that day.
And it's don't hitch your trailer to Joe's tractor or else
you're in for some big trouble. Now, my sermon title this
morning is who are you hitched to?
Who or what have you hitched yourself to?
Who or what are you hitching your wagon to in hopes that you
will have success or fame or fortune?
Who or what are you hitching to? Hoping that it will satisfy you.
You'd better be careful who you hit your wagon to, or else
you'll end up, you know, in the problem that we were You'll end
up with a farmer who's very angry at you.
But but the truth is that it can be far worse than that.
You can hit your wagon to a desire for wealth, a desire for
fame, a desire for fortune, and come to the end of your life and
find out it was meaningless. That's exactly where the
Israelites had found themselves. And if you've been with us, with
us, we've started the book of Nehemiah back in the beginning
of the year. And as we begin, we found them
suffering the consequences of hitching their wagon to the
nations and the people around them.
They had hitched their wagon to the wrong thing, and now they
were suffering the consequences of God's judgement for their
disobedience. They were following their own
sinful fleshly desires and that is why they were suffering.
Thankfully, through the work of God's Spirit through Nehemiah,
they turned back to God and rebuilt the wall of Jerusalem,
reinstated their worship, and put God's word back at the
center. And as Jake talked to us last
week, he talked about lead this, leading the people of Israel to
confessing their sins as a nation before God.
This morning we're going to see them intentionally hitch
themselves back to God and how God blesses them for it.
But before we do that, let's pray.
Lord, we thank You for Your Word to us.
Your Word teaches us who You are and how we are to live and how
we are to be glorifying to You with all that we are.
And Lord, we pray that you would help us as we think about
hitching ourselves and, and how, what, what sorts of things in
life we find joy and pleasure and satisfaction.
And we pray that much like the Israelites, as we're going to
see today, that we would hitch ourselves to you, knowing that
when we follow your word, when we follow your ways, you will
bless us and bring glory and honor to yourself.
So Lord, would you help us to commit to you and your word.
We thank you in Jesus name, Amen.
The first thing we learn as the Israelites are are are hitching
their trailer back onto God. The first thing we learn is that
is that you should look for leaders who are hitched to God
and what is the most important quality that you should look for
in a leader? That they have a heart and a
devotion to love the Lord. They have their wagon hitched to
God. Their desire is to be faithful
to God and obedient to Him, to love Him and follow His Word.
And as we begin our passage this morning, that's exactly what
we're going to see. We're going to see these
Israelite leaders stepping forward and setting the
precedent for hitching themselves to God in His Word.
They've recognized and confessed their sin at this point, and now
they are putting their names on a covenant, a sealed, signed
covenant promising to be faithful to God in His Word.
Would you open up your Bibles with me this morning to Nehemiah
chapter 10? Nehemiah chapter 10, And I'm
going to begin at the verse just before that, Nehemiah Chapter 9,
verse 38. Again, Pastor Jake talked to us
last week about these people and repenting, confessing their sins
before God. And this leads to verse 38.
Because of all this, we make a firm covenant in writing.
On the sealed document are the names of our Princess, our
Levites, and our priests. Continuing in 10 chapter,
chapter 10, verse one, on the seals are the names of Nehemiah
the governor, the son of Hakalaya, Zedekiah, Soraya,
Azariah, Jeremiah, Pashur, Amaraya, Malkaja, Hatush,
Shabbinaya, Malik, Harem, Miramoth, Obadiah, Daniel,
Ginathan, Barrack, Mashulam, Abijah, Mijamin, Meiziah,
Bilgai, Shamaya. These are the priests and the
Levites, Joshua the son of Azanaya Binui, of the sons of
Hinad Kadmil and their brothers, Shabanaya Hodaya Kalita, Pelaya
Hainan Micah Rahab Hashabaya zakour Sharabaya Shabanaya
Hodaya beni beninu. The chiefs of the people perosh
pay hath Moab Elam zatu beni booni asghad babai adonija bigvi
Aden ater hezekiah azur hodaya Hashem bazai harif anathoth
nabai magpiash and mushulam hazar Michelle zabel zadak jadua
pelotaya Hainan anaya hoshaya hinanaya Hashem hallowhesh
pillha shobek rehem hashabna mehsaya aihaya Hainan ainan
malek harem bayana. That's a long list of names,
isn't it? You're probably wondering why on
earth would you read that long list of names so badly and do
such a bad job pronouncing all those names, Doesn't this?
I am so glad that all of these names are recorded because
doesn't this show you that God sees every individual?
Doesn't it show you that God knows your name?
And if we were to sign a covenant here today, wouldn't it
be so cool to go Jacob, which 40 of you would?
We'd have to put last names in there, right?
Because so many of the John and and Isaac and Margaret and
Sarah. And isn't that so cool that the
Lord is so intentional to put names in there?
I, I sort of got that joke from Joe and I sorry, I stole that
from him. But it was, it was a good point
that the Lord sees every one of us and that's such an important
factor. But these men, I'm so glad that
they were willing to let their names be printed.
Why? First they confess their sin.
How many of us are willing to put our name on a sealed signed
document that confesses our sin? And then in the same thing to to
write and sign and seal their names in a document saying we
promise to obey God's word. Those are the leaders of Israel.
That's who you hit your wagon to.
People, men like that who are willing to stand on the truth of
God's word. These are exactly the kinds of
leaders that we should be hitching ourselves to as people.
Leaders who love the Lord, leaders who love following His
Word, leaders who have the courage to do hard things that
God tells them to do. Now we think of God's Word.
God's Word constantly has things it written in it that are really
hard for us to do right. Love the love your enemies, Pray
for those who persecute you, Forgive those who sin against
you. Those are all really hard things
to do and you should hitch yourself to leaders who are
willing to do those hard things because of their love for the
Lord. Look for leaders who are hitched
to God and what do you do when you find a leader who is hitched
to God? You follow them.
Follow leaders hitched to God. And this is exactly what the
Israelites do as as these leaders stand up and sign this
covenant saying we will be faithful to God in His word, all
the people join in signing the covenant.
Look at verses 28 and 29 with me, the rest of the people, the
priests, the Levites, the gatekeepers, the singers, the
temple servants, and all who have separated themselves from
the peoples of the lands of the to the law of God.
Their wives, their sons, their daughters, all who have
knowledge and understanding, join with their brothers, their
nobles, and enter into a curse and an oath to walk in God's law
that was given by Moses the servant of God, and to observe
and do all the commandments of the Lord, our Lord and His rules
and His statutes. Here the people had found the
right leaders, leaders who had hitched themselves to God in His
Word. They were devoted to it.
And what was the people's response?
To join the leaders? We join with you in making this
covenant. We are going to hitch ourselves
to you because we see your love for the Lord.
We see the wisdom of what you are doing.
And so they joined in, in separating themselves from the
peoples of the land, right? We're no longer going to follow
the ways of the nations around us.
Now we're going to be devoted to God and His Word along with you
as the leaders. And they understood what that
meant. We've been going in our church
Bible reading plan through the Old Testament and in the
Leviticus, the Lord lays out the blessings for obedience and the
cursing for disobedience, doesn't He?
He says you will be blessed if you follow my word, but if you
don't, then I will discipline you.
And so the Israelites understood they were entering into a
covenant. It was very serious what they
were doing, and they understood that, but they were following
leaders who had hitched themselves to God.
And this is exactly what we must do as well.
We must find godly leaders who are devoted to the truth of
God's Word, to read it, to understand it, to obey it.
And we must follow them. We must hitch ourselves to them.
If you ever see a leader, or any Christian for that matter, who
is not willing to practice what they preach, you should run the
other way and maybe you should hang around and share the gospel
with them. But you understand what I'm
saying. You should not follow that
person. If someone is willing to say, Oh
yeah, I believe the truth of God's Word, but they don't live
it out, don't follow their example, don't hit yourself to
them. Instead, find godly people who
trust and believe in the power of God's Word, who are obeying
it and walking in it, and hit yourself to them.
Follow their example and find people like that that you are
following and learning from because they believe in the
power of God's Word working in US.
And so those are the men and women that you should follow,
those who love God, who love his Word and obey it.
And if you find leaders hitch to God's word and you follow them,
then what should you do? Worship the God that you're
hitched to. Ultimately, we must recognize
that that our decisions and choices that we make in life,
that we're ultimately choosing whether or not we're going to
hitch ourselves to God and that we must follow his way.
And what is the greatest display of worship?
As beautiful as it was for this team to lead us this morning,
that's not worship. That's not the greatest display
of worship. The greatest display of worship
is obedience is to trust and believe God's word and, and, and
singing is obedience. I'm not I'm not, I'm not
discounting that what a joy it was to sing with you all this
morning and to praise our Lord. We're commanded to do that.
Obedience is worship. When we read God's Word and we
follow it, that is worship. And that's exactly what the
Israelites here are committing themselves to do.
And as I read through this next passage of Scripture, I want you
to notice that it affects every area of their life.
It isn't just that Sunday morning over there.
When we come to the temple on Sunday morning, that's when I
get, that's what I give to God. No, God's word is going to
instruct their entire lives from their personal decisions to
their business decisions, then moving forward to how they
worship together as a people. So let's read together in verses
30 through 39, verse 30. We will not give our daughters
to the peoples of the land or take their daughters for our
sons. And if the peoples of the land
bring in goods or any grain on the Sabbath day to sell, we will
not buy from them on the Sabbath or on a holy day and we will
forego the crops of the 7th year and the exaction of every debt.
So first we've seen they're willing to to say we, we are not
going to intermarry with the peoples around us.
We're God's word. It said you are to to stay
within the people of Israel. We would see this in the New
Testament. We would say don't be unequally
yoked. You should only marry believers.
And so they are commanded in their personal lives to obey
God, and then that moves to their business life.
Well, the work that we do, we're not going to do work on the
Sabbath. If people come and want to trade
on the Sabbath, we're not going to do that because God's Word
says not to do that. The Sabbath is a day holy to the
Lord where we worship Him. Now let's continue.
And now we see where it transitions to how they're going
to provide for the temple and also provide for the temple
servants in their ministry. 32 We also take on ourselves the
obligation to give yearly a third part of a shekel for the
service of the House of our God, for the showbread, the regular
grain offering, the regular burnt offering, the Sabbaths,
the new moons, the appointed feasts, the holy things, and the
sin offerings to make atonement for Israel and for all the work
of the House of our God. We, the priests, the Levites,
and the people have likewise cast lots for the wood, offering
to bring it into the House of our God according to our
Father's houses, at times appointed year by year to burn
on the altar of the Lord our God, as it is written in the
law. We obligate ourselves to bring
the first fruits of our ground and the first fruits of all
fruit of every tree, year by year, to the House of the Lord.
Also to bring to the House of our God, to the priest, to
minister in the House of our God the first born of our sons and
of our cattle, as it is written in the law, and the first born
of our herds and of our flocks. And to bring the first of our
dough and our contributions, the fruit of every tree, the wine
and the oil, to the priests, to the chambers of the House of our
God. And to bring to the Levites the
tithes from our ground. For it is the Levites who
collect the tithes in all our towns where we labour.
And the priest, the son of Aaron, shall be with the Levites
when the Levites receive the tithes.
And the Levites shall bring up the tithe of the tithes to the
House of our God, to the chambers of the storehouse for
the people of Israel. And the sons of Levi shall bring
the contribution of grain, wine, and oil to the chambers where
the vessels of the sanctuary are, as well as the priests who
minister, and the gatekeepers and the singers.
We will not neglect the House of our God.
So here we see their commitment to worship God.
They are signing this sealed covenant to say we will be
faithful to obey God's word in everything that we do, our
personal lives, our business lives, and when we come and when
we worship God. So that again, as we talked
about, we've been talking about through the series, God dwelt
among his people, then through the Tabernacle.
And so long as the Israelites were faithful to follow God's
law in terms of the Tabernacle and the sacrifices and
everything, God would dwell in their midst and lead and guide
them. And now they needed to get back
to that. So God would lead and guide and
be with them again. And His Word affected every area
of their lives. And this is exactly what the
Lord wanted them to do, to be faithful to His Word, to obey
His Word, to walk in holiness, to walk in righteousness.
They were hitching themselves to the God of the universe who was
worthy of their worship and obedience in every area of their
life. And we need to understand that
for our lives as well, that if you want to be hitched to God,
if you want to follow Him, if you want to serve Him, that
means giving over every area of your life.
He doesn't just want a part of you, He wants to affect every
part of you. He wants, he wants to change
every aspect of your life, the way you spend your time, the way
you spend your money, the way that you give and spend your
gifts and your talents. The Lord wants control of all of
those things because He wants to transform your life.
He wants you to experience the joy of worshipping Him and
giving everything to Him through obedience to all of His Word.
But the truth is that as we all know, we could never fully live
in full obedience to every single one of God's commands.
We always fall short. And that's exactly why Jesus
said in Matthew Chapter 11 verses 28 through 30, Come to
me, all who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest.
Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and
lowly in heart, and you will find rest for your souls.
For my yoke is easy and my burden is light.
The truth is, God doesn't want to weigh you down.
Do you ever feel like that? Do you ever read God's law and
go man, like all these laws, all these commands, how could you
keep them straight? They're like a, like a filling a
backpack with rocks and carrying it around all day.
It's this burden that I have to carry around and how, how could
I possibly obey every single command?
God doesn't want to burden you. He doesn't want to take all of
these these difficult, hard things and, and put them on your
back so that you feel way down. He wants to give you rest.
He wants to give you peace. He is giving you His Word so
that you'll find true life. God is not a harsh taskmaster
ready to punish you every single time you go astray and every
single time you disobey. That's not God's heart.
His heart is gentle and lowly. Those words should shock you.
Speaking of the God of the universe, His heart is gentle
and lowly. He wants you to find rest for
your soul, rest from all the work.
Aren't you so sick and tired of trying harder?
Aren't you so sick and tired of saying if I just had a better
job, if I just had a better wife?
Hopefully you're not saying that if I just had more money, if I
could just enjoy more experiences, then I would be
happy. Then I would be fulfilled.
Aren't you so sick and tired of that?
Because every time you do one of those things, you all know the
feeling. I do too.
It's emptiness. The Lord is is showing you His
heart so that you'll turn to Him and find life and rest and
peace. So you'll stop trying harder,
but you'll come to Christ and give over your burdens to Him
because He cares for you. He will take that burden and He
will put a yoke on you. But guess what?
It's not a yoke that weighs you down.
It's a light yoke. It's an easy yoke.
It's a yoke that truly helps me to understand the joy of
following God in His Word. The Lord is calling you today.
Come to Him. Take His yoke upon you, allow
Him to lift the burden off of you and give you rest and give
you peace. And when you come to God through
faith in Jesus Christ your Lord and Savior, He washes and
cleanses all the sin away. He fills you with His Holy
Spirit to give you strength and energy to live for Him, leading
and guiding you by your Word so that you'll find true life.
Come to Him, He will give you wrath.
Let's pray. Father, we thank you for your
word. We thank you for the example of
these Israelites and their commitment to your word, their
desire to be hitched to you. We thank you for the example of
the leaders or we just praise you for men and women who
through the generations, we're willing to confess their sin,
we're willing to acknowledge where they went astray, and
we're willing to come back to you, come back in faithfulness
to you. And that takes courage.
It takes courage to say I'm a Sinner and I am messed up and I
need help and I can't do this on my own.
Lord, would you give us the ability to come to you with our
burdens? I pray for anybody here this
morning who has not given their life to you.
Lord, I pray that you would open their hearts, that you would
open their eyes to their sin. Lord, and would you cause them
to turn to you? Would they realize that Jesus
Christ is the only Savior? Would they turn to you and find
that your yoke is easy, your burden is light?
Would they find rest for their souls?
Lord, for us as your children, I pray that you would strengthen
us again, not to not to carry our burdens on our own, but to
bring them to you because you love us, because you care for
us. And Lord, would we willingly do
that, knowing that you are faithful to ease our burden, to
give us a life and to give us hope and to lead and guide us by
your Spirit, working through our word so that we may be faithful
examples to you. This we ask and pray in Jesus
name, Amen.