Or, The Forgotten Rule of Reformation
Scripture: Nehemiah 13:4-31
Date: August 3, 2025
Speaker: Sean Higgins
The end of the return-from-exile record, all has been heard. And…it’s sort of a let down. Maybe this is the kind of story arc that inspired Tolkien to imagine the need for scouring the Shire after the climax at Mt. Doom. Of course Nehemiah, let alone the Holy Spirit, could have finished the story on the high note, but there are some Very Important Principles we can take away.
There are five final issues Nehemiah addresses.
The first problem is that one of the guys who should have been on Nehemiah’s side made room for one of the guys who was Nehemiah’s nemesis to take up shop in a temple office.
Before looking at the situation, we’ve actually skipped forward some unspecified number of years in the story. Nehemiah writes, While this was taking place, I was not in Jerusalem (verse 6). All five of these issues apparently happened after he went back to see the king in the thirty-second year of Artaxerxes. He’d first come to Jerusalem in the 20th year (Nehemiah 2:1, 445 BC), so he’d been governor for 12 years. He doesn’t say why he went back, but then he asked leave of the king and came to Jerusalem. Artaxerxes died in 424, so Nehemiah’s return was sometime between 433 and 424.
It was on his return that he discovered the evil that Eliashib had done for Tobiah. Eliashib was the name of the high priest (see Nehemiah 13:28). In verse 4 Eliashib was one of the priests “appointed over the storerooms” (see also 12:44). It doesn’t seem that the high priest would be in charge of the closets, but it also seems odd to have two men both named Eliashib subverting Nehemiah in similar ways. Tobiah was an Ammonite (Nehemiah 2:10) who had married a Jew, so he had family ties inside the walls, and clearly had his own ideas for who should be in charge.
Eliashib prepared for Tobiah a large chamber…in the courts of the house of God. It was a big room used for storing the tithes and worship supplies, and now this enemy of the Jews was given a headquarters from which to do business in what should have been the center of Jewish life. What would this even look like today, giving the local head of Planned Parenthood an office next to the pastors’ offices in a local church? They really must not have expected Nehemiah to come back.
And I was very angry, and I threw all the household furniture of Tobiah out of the chamber. He got the temple rooms cleansed.
Remember in Nehemiah 10 when the people made a new resolve to support the work of the temple? And in chapter 12 the people “rejoiced over the priests and Levites who ministered” (verse 45). They’ve already stopped; when the cat’s away the mice quit paying their taxes. Here’s the second issue: I also found out that the portions of the Levites had not been given to them so they left the city and went back to their farms where they could support themselves.
Nehemiah confronted the officials (verse 11). This exact word is used two more times (verses 17 and 25), with the formality of taking them to court. The leaders should have done better; he “set them in their place” (KJV).
In verse 14 we see the first of four calls for God to remember in the chapter. Remember me, O my God, concerning this, and do not wipe out my good deeds that I have done for the house of my God and for his service. It’s fascinating that good deeds translates the well-known Hebrew word hesed, so “loyal deeds” (NASB), “what…so faithfully done” (NIV). It was “personified hesed” (Breneman).
One of the things that made Israel unique among the nations is that God had given them the Sabbath day as part of the Mosaic Covenant, with particular instructions/prohibitions. Their failure to honor the Sabbath day was one of the reasons God judged them through the Babylonians in the first place (verse 18). But they had become slack.
Here is the third issue. Nehemiah saw in Judah people treading winepresses on the Sabbath, and bringing in heaps of grain and loading them on donkeys, and also, wine, grapes, figs, and all kinds of loads (verse 15). They were working, which is exactly what the Fourth Commandment prohibits. Others were trading or buying. There were some who were not Jews that were selling, so apparently some of the Jews thought purchasing food/supplies wasn’t against the Law.
He confronted the nobles (verse 17).
Some of the merchants moved their tables outside the walls. Nehemiah had the gates shut from Friday night to Saturday night, and even stationed some of his own men as guards. On weekends the sellers lodged outside Jerusalem once or twice, and Nehemiah made them a deal they could not refuse. I warned them and said to them…, “If you do so again, I will lay hands on you.” And it’s actually sort of funny, they didn’t come back (verse 21).
Then he set up a more longterm solution, transferring the duties from his servants to the Levites. They were to help keep the temple sanctified, so now also the Sabbaths.
Remember this also in my favor, O my God, and spare me according to the greatness of your steadfast love (verse 22). Nehemiah showed steadfast love for God (verse 14) just as God showed steadfast love to Nehemiah.
The fourth issue also had already been dealt with, by Ezra and by Nehemiah, but continued to require fresh attention.
It wasn’t just the fact of marriages between Jews and non-Jews that got Nehemiah’s attention. Half of their children spoke the language of Ashdod, and they could not speak the language of Judah (verse 24). This was a cultural issue, sure, but even more so a religious issue. How were they going to learn the law of the Lord if they could not understand the language of the law?
So I confronted them and cursed them and beat some of them and pulled out their hair (verse 25). You won’t find this sort of corporal punishment many places in the Bible, by example or by explicit “do this” instruction. Somehow it must have made sense to get their attention. Cursed is what they agreed to in Nehemiah 10:29-30.
He made them vow, and reminded them of the soul-implications from the life of Solomon. Did not Solomon king of Israel sin on account of such women? (verse 26) He really did sin, and no amount of public relations spin could keep his behavior or the consequences hidden.
The other nemesis, Sanballat, is referred to again. A grandson of Eliashib the high priest married a daughter of Sanballat, so Sanballat’s son-in-law. This son must have been in a meeting, and either based on something annoying he said or just his presence irritated Nehemiah so that I chased him from me.
Then this “remember” is different. Remember them, O my God, because they have desecrated the priesthood and the covenant of the priesthood and the Levites (verse 29).
The last section isn’t as much a new issue as it is a summary of Nehemiah’s work to sanctify and supply the worship of the house of the Lord. He established the duties and provided for wood and firstfruits. Rebuilding the house of the Lord in Jerusalem is where it all started with Cyrus’ decree (Ezra 1:2-4).
Remember me, O my God, for good.
Why weren’t there better systems/persons in place to keep things running while Nehemiah left? It’s a reasonable question. That said, Nehemiah kept doing what he could. “If on his first visit he had been a whirlwind, on his second he was all fire and earthquake” (Kidner). Nehemiah’s second admin reforms had even more spoude.
Here are some very important principles.
The real anti-climax of Nehemiah is not about Tobiah’s storage-closet in the temple, but where is the glory of the Lord filling the temple? Where is the King of David?
Of course He did come, four centuries later, and cleanse the temple. He is coming again to judge the world. And yet we who read Revelation 20 as prophecy of future events believe that near the end of the Millennial Kingdom, after a thousand years of the Lion of the tribe of Judah, the Root of David, ruling in perfect justice and mercy, even then a final resistance will be made.
The forgotten rule of reformation is that reformation is always necessary. Only in the eternal kingdom will we not have sin to battle. Don’t like the current results? Praise the Lord, you’re reading the story rightly.
What a day when the walls of Jericho fell. What a day when the walls of Jerusalem were finished. Praise the Lord when He thwarts the wicked. Praise the Lord when He exalts the righteous. And still there are trees that need more manure every Monday. Keep fearing, keep reforming.
Now may the God of peace who brought again from the dead our Lord Jesus, the great shepherd of the sheep, by the blood of the eternal covenant, equip you with everything good that you may do his will, working in us that which is pleasing in his sight, through Jesus Christ, to whom be glory forever and ever. Amen. (Hebrews 13:20–21 ESV)