Rebuilding The Walls
Nehemiah 3
- The Sheep Gate-the gate where the sheep are led
- The Fish Gate-the fish of the sea; good and bad fish, fishers of men
- The Old Gate-remembering the ways of God, The Ancient One
- The Valley Gate-the suffering and trials of life
- The Dung Gate-the sin or old ways thrown out
- The Fountain Gate-the ever-flowing gift from Jesus, The Holy Spirit
- The Water Gate-the river of living water, Jesus
- The Horse Gate-the spiritual war that is ongoing through one’s life
- The East Gate-the Promised One’s Return to receive all believers and to make known to all when every knee shall bow
- The Inspection Gate-the judgement of our lives through Jesus’s eyes not ours
How perfectly is God’s design in this illustration of the ten gates or parts of rebuilding the walls between Himself and us. Looking at chapter 3 in Nehemiah at first, it just looks like Nehemiah is rebuilding the walls for God’s people long ago. But reading this long-ago written book of the Bible, we can see how perfect Nehemiah’s words were as he tells the story giving record to each named person that helped in the rebuilding and the named gates. Nehemiah being a prophet of God, received his directions from God to assign the task of rebuilding the gates and each section walls to individual groups that became responsible for their tasks. How we miss that same kind of responsibility give to us in tasks God assigns to us to help rebuild the walls of the broken. Our jobs (the assignments from God) seem so small or of little importance to us that we sometimes do not take them seriously and we miss out on blessing from God. What those blessings look like is not a big house or fat bank account, but a spiritual blessing that goes unseen to our naked eyes. Jesus does not miss anything. It is all recorded down so when the “inspection gate” time arrives, we are rewarded or cast out into the outer darkness where there will be gnashing of teeth. So, we must complete the eight steps that are before us while we wait on the redeeming power of The Son as He comes through the East Gate on His victorious return to earth. What a thought that is to think about as the Savior of this world returns as THE KING that was laughed at when He was here teaching and warning of who He was, why He was there, and what is to still come for all to see. It is not an “if” but the WHEN He returns will we have believed that it was possible.
Mark 9 gives us a clear example of how much a spirit hates to lose one soul. In Mark 9, we read that the boy’s father said that the evil spirit had prevented him from speaking and terrorized both the boy and his family and others that may have seen the violent things it would do when the spirit seizes him. What Jesus is doing is making clear here a few things. The arguing of the crowd and some of the teachers of religious law as Jesus and the disciples arrived, the unbelief of the people all around that had no faith, the reason of the evil spirit in the boy, all things are possible if we just believe, the rebuke of the spirit, the displeasure of the evil spirit when it must leave a person, and finally what it takes to remove an evil spirit from someone.
There are seven principles that are laid out for us to see in this one small teaching moment of Jesus in verses 14-29. Let’s look at each and exam them for a moment.
The Arguing-what was that all about? The subject must have been about how to remove the spirit from the boy. The process of which, we can only assume, was the teachers of religious law had said this and that had to be done to make the spirit leave, ritual cleansing in a certain way had to be done step by step for this is what had been taught for thousands of years by their ancestors. We can also assume that many thought someone, the boy or parents, had done something to cause the evil spirit to possess the boy. But that is not what is explained in this text but just the assumption of the crowd and mainly the teachers of the law.
The Unbelief-this points to a few things about the crowd and teachers and even the parents. Nothing that anyone had tried gotten rid of the evil spirit. This shows the path of the teachers, and their teachings are now gone. And does not work after Jesus appeared on earth as a man.
The Reason-this tells us that not just the boy but us as well are evil by nature and that we all have evilness in us without Jesus because the leading of this boy was done by an evil spirit. The no speaking and seizes of his body whenever the spirit felt like taking control. It also lets us know that it was not because of sins from his parents or of the boy. This is a clearly shown metaphor for how sinful each of us are when we come into this world. There is also one other thing that is made clear as well, just believe. And without believing nothing is possible and everyone remains evil until…
The belief-this cannot be an ‘if’ from us. With an if, we really can’t or don’t believe we or someone can change. Removing evil from us has to start with belief. Belief in Jesus; the Savior and the Healer, of our brokenness that rebuilds the walls within our hearts and bodies to become a fisher of other men to tell how Jesus repaired what was broken that nothing outside of Him can repair. Jesus was a little sarcastic in verse 23 because the boy’s father didn’t really believe. He said, “What do you mean, If I can?” Then Jesus said. “Anything is possible if a person believes.” In verse 19, He also showed His discuss with the father and everyone around that was listening and watching. The father instantly cried out that he believed in verse 24 but added help me overcome my unbelief.
The Rebuke-how many times does a person that comes up to the altar at a church do you witness a rebuking of the evil spirit within them after believing? I would say none unless someone felt that person was possessed. But shouldn’t it be standard for a rebuking to happen automatically as Jesus taught here in Mark 9:14-29? A rebuking of evil within a person not just possession by an evil spirit because the spirit was in the boy for a long time. Which lets us know that the possession must have been possibly from birth, because we are born evil and with a sinful nature from the start. The rebuke of this kind of spirit can’t be removed by some kind of ritual saying or dunking or waving our hands in some kind of ritual form. Jesus said first for the spirit to listen in verse 25! Once Jesus had that spirit’s attention, He then commanded with power for it to come out and never return to the boy again. This shows the power of which the belief in Jesus and who He was then and who He is today in our lives too. Rebuking the evil spirit that is within us all from birth has to be rebuke in the power and name of Jesus. We all have the evil spirit of sin that is in us from birth like it or not. We have to take the authority that Jesus shows us and gave us to possess that will be looked at in step seven. The power of rebuke is there to anyone that just believes.
The Displeasure of the evil spirit-hate to lose! Losing is not taken well by evil. When that grip is lost, there is a war that starts that must be fought. A war can’t be seen if there is not an outward seizing that we can see. Most of the time the seizing comes from our thoughts and actions that don’t look harmful to most people on the outside looking and arguing. The fight of this kind can only be helped by Jesus and the power He gave us. Satan hates to lose the battle of one’s soul. That is why there is so much screaming and seizing violently when we find the belief that Jesus showed us in this passage. The rebuke that came before the displeasure starts this war that never ends. The displeasure of satan and evil is not a one time and he is done deal. That is played out throughout one’s life of suffering and trials that we must endure to the end believing Jesus is the One that paid the price for us to see Him again one glorious day.
The Way-So many get tripped up on the way. The way is simple and starts with belief and prayer. The kind of belief that only comes from prayer. What kind of prayer? It is not a prayer that you can recite. That is ritual teaching that can’t help and won’t help. It will not rid a person of the evil spirit that fills them from birth. The kind of prayer has to come from belief only. Yes, I know many will disagree with teaching such as this, but I ask you this one question. Does Jesus know a person’s heart or not? If you answer YES to this question, then do you want to take a chance on being inspected by Jesus after His Glorious return to find out that the evil spirit never left because your prayer was not from a heart healing but a ritual dealing?
There is not a prayer a man or woman can say for you on a matter as important as this. Jesus is in the business of rebuilding a heart and giving us the tools to rebuild it His Way. If you see yourself as Jesus sees us all with that evil spirit deep within us, then cry out in a loud rebuke of the spirit and command it to leave this very day! And never return again. A heart healing is what Jesus wants to see from each person that the evil spirit loose a grip on today. He is ready to help in a moment’s notice with His hand held out just for you.