Sermon for March 14, 2021 Lent 4 B House of Prayer Lutheran Church

Nehemiah 2:1-6, 11-18; John 3:14-21 Rev. Karl-John N. Stone

Sermon Series: The Blessing of Adversity

Today’s Theme: Restore Broken Walls

When I was a little boy, one of my favorite things was building with wooden blocks. I’d build a castle, a fort, a house and I’d be so proud of my creation as it stood there on my bedroom floor. Sometimes one of my best friends, William, would come over to play. The first thing he always liked to do was to run into my bedroom and knock down my blocks! When I built whatever it was I built, I guess I liked the feeling of satisfaction of looking at the finished product. But William saw things differently--the blocks weren’t meant to be a permanent installation like a sculpture in a museum--we were supposed to knock them down so we could build something else! Of course, I’d always be upset that whatever I had created now lay in ruins. But there we were, two friends playing together--so if we wanted to enjoy our time, we’d have to find a way through our disagreement, and work together to build something new. Seeing as how Will and I are still best of friends to this day, I guess we must have restored the broken walls and worked things out.

When you’re a little kid, playing with the blocks is a big deal. As we get older, though, the stakes get higher when “walls get broken” (so to speak) in our lives, and things crumble and need to be rebuilt or restored. It could be relationships with friends or family or neighbors; it could be the circumstances of a job; it could be the breach of your ethical standards; it could even be challenges to your spiritual life. These are all examples of things we can spend a great deal of time and effort building, and yet they might get knocked apart and need to be rebuilt.

We see this in the story of Nehemiah in the Old Testament. This is a follow-up to the story we heard a couple of weeks ago from Jeremiah, when the leaders of Jerusalem were sent into exile in Babylon. Now in Nehemiah we are looking at 70 years later, 70 years after the exiles were starting to return to Jerusalem. Even though Nehemiah had never been there before, God had given him a special passion for the city where his ancestors were buried--for Jerusalem, and for the well-being of that city. Nehemiah had been praying to God that the king of Babylon would give him the opportunity to go to Jerusalem and rebuild the city walls that had been laying in ruins for 70 years. As we look at the steps Nehemiah followed to rebuild the walls of Jerusalem, we can learn a strategy for restoring the “broken walls” in our own lives--and these steps--there’s three steps that are described in chapter 4 of the book “The Blessing of Adversity” by Barry Black.

First is to ask God for favor. This is another way of saying “accept God’s grace”. As much as he wanted to accomplish his goal, before he could really get going Nehemiah had to first ask for God’s grace and favor. From where he lived in Babylon, it was almost 1,700 miles away from Jerusalem. Rebuilding the walls wasn’t a project he could do on the weekends, this was a major life-changing undertaking. As much passion as Nehemiah had for the project, he couldn’t simply rush into it. He needed the right circumstances, or he would not succeed. He needed God to open the way for him--and then if God gave him grace and favor, Nehemiah could work together with others and put his plans for rebuilding into action.

We also need to ask God for grace and favor, because God wants us to know the kindness and love of Christ in our lives. And before we are able to share God’s grace with others, we first need to accept God’s grace for ourselves. So we begin to ask for God’s grace and favor by looking first to the cross of Christ. He was lifted up on the cross and willingly gave his life for us--because, as the gospel of John teaches us: “God so loved the world...God did not send the Son into the world to condemn the world, but in order that the world might be saved through him.”

Jesus knows the sinfulness that hides within our hearts--he knows what our struggles are, the things that influence us to not live up to the way of life he calls us to. Since he knows, he therefore went to the cross to forgive our sins--and when we accept this grace and favor that Jesus has already given us, then we can learn how to be free of our desire to be judgemental of others. Because Jesus loved us first, we can love others--we can follow the way of Christ, as we try to understand where others are coming from, what their struggles are, what has influenced them--and instead of us doing the judging, we can leave the judging to God, since he’s the only one who knows what’s in each heart to begin with.

This is the grace Jesus gave us on the cross--and so it is the cross that rebuilds the rubble between God and humanity. His cross becomes a bridge that connects us to new life for today, and salvation for eternity. Ask God for the grace of the cross of Christ to be part of your life--then when God opens a way you’ll be able to work together with others to rebuild and repair the “broken walls” you’ve experienced in life.

The second thing we learn from Nehemiah is to be prepared for doors of opportunity to open. When the King of Babylon asked Nehemiah what he wanted, Nehemiah was ready to answer because he had already spent lots of time praying and dreaming about his passion for rebuilding Jerusalem. The king knew this wasn’t a spur of the moment request, this came from something much deeper; something really spiritually grounded. And so the king said yes, in answer to all of Nehemiah’s prayers.

God opens doors of opportunity for us all the time, but we can choose to say yes or no to them. Just because we’ve said no doesn’t mean God has not been at work. And just because we’ve encountered difficulty or adversity doesn’t mean God is not offering us opportunities. While none of us would have chosen to live through a pandemic, God has still been at work this past year, opening the doors to lots of opportunities.

Just as an example, think of how many of us have grown in our knowledge and use of technology. Many of us had no idea what “Zoom” was a year ago, or that with a few basic tools we could livestream a worship service on the internet, or that we could broadcast a worship service on FM radio. Now, maybe these are not your preferred ways of doing things, and that’s okay. And today, even though we know that these things don’t replace our need for in-person interaction, they are still new opportunities to communicate the Word of God--just like the printing press was a new technology during the time of Martin Luther, and through it God opened new opportunities for sharing the love and grace of Christ. With the technologies of today, I’ve learned how these can help us connect with people, and even help people connect with God and with each other. And House of Prayer has already been able to connect with new people that we may never have had the opportunity to meet before, through the help of the opportunities of new technology.

And a third lesson from Nehemiah is to expect opposition--but don’t panic; stay calm. Our scripture passage for today highlights the people who caught the passion of Nehemiah for rebuilding Jerusalem. Keep reading this book of the Bible, and you’ll learn that not everyone supported him--but he didn’t panic. He knew that the opposition he faced was just one part of what it would take to rebuild Jerusalem, so he stayed calm. Likewise, when we try to “restore the broken walls” in our lives, some people will want to be part of that, and others won’t. Differences of opinion are a natural part of life, as we see with Nehemiah and

his opponents. What helps us through these rough patches is taking the time to listen to one another. Through Christ we can have differences of opinion without becoming opponents, especially when we take the time to listen to one another, and to listen for Jesus through the Holy Spirit--and we listen for Jesus through prayer, through the Bible, through the people he sends our way, and through the opportunities he opens or closes for us. Jesus’s opinions and guidance are ultimately the ones that matter most as we try to repair the broken walls in our lives. Amen.