Nehemiah 2:18

These verses bring Nehemiah’s private burden into the open. When he first heard that the wall of Jerusalem was broken down and its gates burned, he sat down and wept, and mourned and prayed (Nehemiah 1:3–4). He then asked King Artaxerxes for leave to go and rebuild, and the king granted it (Nehemiah 2:1–10). Arriving in Jerusalem, he went out by night to inspect the ruined walls and burned gates, and he told none of the Jewish leaders what he meant to do (Nehemiah 2:11–16). Verse 17 is the moment he speaks.

“Ye see the distress that we are in.” The word for distress, raʻ, is the common Hebrew word for what is bad or evil, and here it means trouble and hardship: the exposure, humiliation and discouragement of a people living in a broken city. Nehemiah begins with what everyone can see for himself, and although he has come from the king’s court, he says “we”. He counts himself among them and takes their trouble as his own.

He then names the evidence. Jerusalem “lieth waste”, and the word chârêb means parched, ruined or laid desolate. The city carries the visible scars of past judgment and of long neglect. Its gates, the places of entry, defence, trade and the city’s common life, have been burned with fire, so anyone could come in and nothing could be kept safe.

“Come, and let us build up the wall of Jerusalem.” Here the verse turns from the problem to the remedy. The command “come” and the word “us” make a shared trouble into a shared work, because the task is far too great for one man. That spirit carries through the rebuilding, “for the people had a mind to work” (Nehemiah 4:6). The verse ends with the reason: “that we be no more a reproach.”

Nehemiah tells the leaders two things. First he tells them “of the hand of my God which was good upon me”. The hand of God, yad Elohim, joins yâd, hand, a picture of power, means and direction, with ʼĕlôhîym, God. It speaks of God actively blessing, protecting and enabling him. The word for good, ṭôwb, covers what is beautiful, beneficial, pleasant and favourable, and here it describes God’s kindness at work for him. Ezra uses the same expression for his own journey and mission, which he accomplished “according to the good hand of his God upon him” (Ezra 7:6, Ezra 7:9).

Nehemiah puts God first. He credits his success to God’s favour, ahead of his own skill or the king’s goodwill, and that makes the work God’s work from the start. Then he adds “the king’s words that he had spoken unto me”, the earthly proof of that favour. Artaxerxes had given him permission, letters and resources for this very work (Nehemiah 2:7–8), and he had sent an escort with him. God’s good hand was on Nehemiah even in the court of a pagan king, and it worked through that king.

The enemies appear as soon as the people resolve to build. Sanballat the Horonite was most likely the governor of Samaria. Tobiah “the servant, the Ammonite” was an influential Ammonite official with connections among the Jewish nobles. Geshem the Arabian was a powerful Arab leader who controlled important trade routes. While Jerusalem lay weak, these men had extended their influence and territory. A strong, fortified Jerusalem threatened their territory, their trade and their standing in the region. What they “heard” was the news of Nehemiah’s commission and of the people’s resolve to rebuild.

“They laughed us to scorn, and despised us.” To laugh to scorn, lâʻag, is to mock with contempt, laughing in order to belittle and humiliate. To despise, bâzâh, is to look down on someone as worthless and beneath notice. Together they describe men who set out to break the builders’ spirit before a stone was laid, and to make the Jews feel foolish for trying, under the lead of a man who had been the king’s cupbearer. Scripture gives the last word on such laughter elsewhere: “He that sitteth in the heavens shall laugh: the Lord shall have them in derision” (Psalm 2:4).

“What is this thing that ye do?” The question comes with mock innocence, full of sarcasm and hostility. It treats the work as foolish, unauthorised and doomed.

Nehemiah answers them directly and publicly. He calls God “The God of heaven”, Elohei shamayim, a title found especially in Nehemiah, Ezra and Daniel. It was a common name for God within the Persian Empire, used by Jews and by others, and it speaks of his rule over every earthly power, the Persian king included. To men who threatened him with the king, Nehemiah names the King above the king. Daniel uses the same title when he foretells that the God of heaven will set up a kingdom that shall never be destroyed (Daniel 2:44).

“He will prosper us.” The verb tsâlach means to push forward, advance, succeed or be effective, and the Old Testament often uses it of God making someone succeed. When Joseph was a slave in Egypt, his master saw that the LORD made all that he did to prosper (Genesis 39:3). Nehemiah states this as a settled fact, because the outcome rests with God. The rest of the book bears him out, all the way to the finished wall (Nehemiah 6:16). Gamaliel later said the same of the apostles’ work: “if it be of God, ye cannot overthrow it” (Acts 5:38–39).

“Therefore we his servants will arise and build.” The “therefore” ties their work to God’s promise. Because God will prosper them, they will build. By calling themselves “his servants”, Nehemiah answers the charge of rebellion in a word: their allegiance is to God, and their work is done in obedience to him. It echoes Joshua’s resolve, “as for me and my house, we will serve the LORD” (Joshua 24:15).

The whole passage holds God’s work and his people’s work together. God’s good hand comes first, and it moves the king, opens the way and gives the promise. Then his people rise and build and strengthen their hands. Nehemiah is sure that God will prosper them, and that is why they build. The psalm says the same from God’s side: “Except the LORD build the house, they labour in vain that build it” (Psalm 127:1).

Paul holds the two together in the same way. “Work out your own salvation with fear and trembling. For it is God which worketh in you both to will and to do of his good pleasure” (Philippians 2:12–13). “For we are labourers together with God” (1 Corinthians 3:9). The people’s single answer in verse 18 shows the unity that every great work of God needs, as in the body of Christ, where every joint supplies its part (Ephesians 4:16). And whatever work God gives is done “heartily, as to the Lord” (Colossians 3:23).

Opposition is part of the same picture. Nehemiah’s builders were mocked from the day they decided to build, and Jesus told his disciples to expect the same: “If the world hate you, ye know that it hated me before it hated you” (John 15:18–20). He called those blessed who are reviled for his sake (Matthew 5:11–12), and he warned that they would be hated of all men for his name’s sake (Matthew 10:22). Scorn of this kind comes when God’s work goes forward, and it can never prevent what he has resolved to do.

Nehemiah’s work of rebuilding a ruined city and taking away its reproach points beyond itself to Christ. Jerusalem lay waste, and humanity lay desolate and estranged from God through sin. Christ entered our distress and bore our reproach. He “endured the cross, despising the shame” (Hebrews 12:2), and he has broken down “the middle wall of partition” between peoples, making one new people in himself (Ephesians 2:14). Through him God has established a better covenant (Hebrews 8:6).

Nehemiah was mocked and falsely accused of rebellion against the king. Jesus was “despised and rejected of men” (Isaiah 53:3), and he was crucified under a charge that named him King of the Jews (John 19:19).

Christ is also the builder. “Upon this rock I will build my church; and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it” (Matthew 16:18). His people are built upon the foundation of the apostles and prophets, with Christ himself the chief corner stone, into a dwelling of God through the Spirit (Ephesians 2:19–22). Coming to him, the living stone, believers also “as lively stones, are built up a spiritual house” (1 Peter 2:4–5). His servants rise and build today by bearing witness to him in the power of the Holy Spirit (Acts 1:8).

Nehemiah’s last words find their echo too. In Christ believers have obtained an inheritance (Ephesians 1:11), and those who do his commandments have “right to the tree of life” (Revelation 22:14). Those whose names are not found in the book of life are cast out (Revelation 20:15). The work Nehemiah began ends in the holy Jerusalem, a city with great and secure walls where God dwells with his people for ever (Revelation 21:10–27).

These verses show us a God whose hand is good upon his servants, who turns the heart of a king to serve his purposes, and who stirs ordinary people to rise up together for a good work. He gives courage to weak hands and answers the scorn of the powerful with a promise: “The God of heaven, he will prosper us.” Nehemiah faced ruins, mockery and a dangerous accusation with that confidence, and he spoke it plainly. The same God is building his church now, and the gates of hell will not prevail against it. When his people are laughed at for doing his work, Nehemiah’s answer is theirs to give, because the outcome rests with the God of heaven.