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Who are these who are busily engaged repairing the Sheep Gate and the wall beyond it; they are the priests, who have left their work in the temple courts close by, and who, with their loins girded and their long white tunics turned up, are leading, as it was right they should, the van of Nehemiah's effort. Heading these priests, and superintending their work, is Eliashib the high priest.
'Let me look on you! And a more passionate worship came into his tranced gaze. But Barstein, feeling duped, replied sternly: 'Where do you do your dentistry? The question seemed to take some moments penetrating through Nehemiah's rapt brain, but at last he replied pathetically: 'And where shall I find achers? In Russia I had my living of it. Here I have no friends.
And the king, quite understanding from Nehemiah's speech that he wants something from him, asks immediately: 'For what dost thou make request? Oh, what a critical moment! How much depends on Nehemiah's answer to this unexpected question! What shall he say? What dare he propose? The whole future of Jerusalem may hang on his answer to the king's question.
The heavy stone is rolled a little way up hill, and, as soon as one strong hand is withdrawn, down it tumbles again to its old place. The evanescence of great men's work makes much of the tragedy of history. Our passage is particularly concerned with Nehemiah's efforts to enforce Sabbath observance.
But although we know nothing of Nehemiah's death, we know much of his life. We have watched him carefully and closely, and there is one thing which we cannot fail to have noticed, and that is that Nehemiah was emphatically a man of prayer. In every trouble, in each anxiety, in all times of danger, he turned to God.
Our master, the king, may be deceived by you, but I, Sanballat, see through your hypocrisy and your wicked designs. Nehemiah's answer was clear and to the point. Three things he would have Sanballat know: We have higher authority than that of man for what we do. 'The God of heaven, He will prosper us. We intend to go on with our work in spite of anything you may say or do.
The fraud of the intention, the groundless claim to knowledge, made Nehemiah's scheme seem multifariously guilty in some sort; while Tyler Sudley and his wife, albeit no wiser mathematically, had all the sanctions of probity in their calm, unpretending ignorance.
It was the work of the Lord, a grand work, a glorious work, which those builders of Nehemiah were doing, and God noticed and marked, and put on His list of honour every one who joined in it. Times have changed, manners have altered, kingdoms have passed away, since the eastern sun streamed upon Nehemiah's workmen, but there is still work to be done for the Lord.
It was so with Nehemiah's work. He toiled for twelve years in Jerusalem, and then returned for 'certain days' to the king at Babylon. The length of his absence is not given; but it was long enough to let much of his work be undone, and to give him much trouble to restore it to the condition in which he had left it.
The blood rushed to Nehemiah's head; he was dizzy for a moment; he heard his heart thump heavily; he saw, or he fancied he saw, the luminous distention of Leander's eyes as this Goliath of his battles was thus delivered into his hands.
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