Built to Last

Here's what's actually happening. We don't have a temple that we go to be in the presence of God. Instead, what we see in the New Testament is that when Jesus died and rose again, all of a sudden, the presence of God can indwell with us with the Holy Spirit. And often, we're not giving out rooms of our church to our enemies, but we are giving rooms in our heart to the sinful enemies that are out in our worlds. But today we're going to be wrapping up our series, this study through the book of Nehemiah. And if you have a Bible, go ahead and open up to Nehemiah chapter 13. Nehemiah chapter 13 is where we are going to be today. And as we dive into that text, I want to just set your heart and kind of create some unrest in you as we dive into this text and see what God has for it. But I want you to wrestle with this question a little bit. This is somewhat of a morbid question, but how will you be remembered? How will you be remembered? Recently, uh I have been leaving my house and my daughter, my oldest daughter Arya has asked me is like, "Why are you all dressed up?" Now, if you know me, if I'm wearing a blazer, it's dressed up. All right? I do not wear a blazer often. And she knows that if I wear a blazer, it's I'm going to one of two places. Either to a wedding or to a funeral. And recently it is like you know there's wedding season. We've been in funeral season. I don't know people are you know it's passing away in this time. Over the last couple months I've been going to a lot of funerals. I've been hearing a lot of people speak. I've been watching a lot of slideshows. Actually got me thinking of what I want on my slideshow in the music I want playing behind my slideshow. Um Pastor Jackie and I in agreement that I can only imagine is not going to be played at our funerals. All right. That is not there. Um, I got some hardcore underro songs from my uh teenage years I'm going to put behind slideshow pictures during that time. But as I've been at those services and hearing people talk, this question has constantly been in my mind is how will we be remembered? How am I going to be remembered? Am I going to be remembered for the things I achieve in my job or the the house that I get in or the car that I drive or the stories that I make with people? or am I going to be remembered for something more? Today, as we get into the book of Nehemiah, Nehemiah actually ends the entire book in chapter 13. And he says these words in Nehemiah chapter 13, the very end, he says uh when he's after everything he has gone through through this big narrative, he says, "Remember me, my God, with favor." Nehemiah is going to show us what he was truly remembered for. He's going to show us the things that mattered more than else. And here as we wrap up this series, I think there's this reflection that causes us to ask this question is how will we be remembered? As we reflect on the book of Nehemiah, are we going to be remembered the way our world wants to be remembered? They write books. They erect statues. They dedicate buildings in their honor. Our world strives to be remembered online and through social, of becoming creating an audience. We're almost in this weird time right now. It's so awkward where we have all these social media platforms we build and we don't give the passwords to anybody. And now we're still friends with people who have died, but they're still my friend on Facebook. I'm like, is anyone going to deactivate that? Um, just this past week, a guy who passed away three years ago that I used to pastor, it said, wish him a happy birthday. I'm like, I don't think he's going to see it. All right. Um, he would have ignored it anyway, but now he's really not going to see it. All right? He's not there. And we ask this question of how are we going to be remembered? But Nehemiah shows us the path in Nehemiah chapter 13 of how he is remembered. And here's what I love about this as we dive into this text is Nehemiah could have been remembered about the cup bearer that was an exile who worked his way up and got sent to a distant land who became all of a sudden a project manager to build this wall, these walls that had been laid in waste for 150 years. He orchestrated it through his leadership and through God's sovereignty to be built back up in 52 days. He could have put that on his resume in his obituary. He could have been the guy who said, "I was a good politician. I had all these relationships. I led all these people. I achieved all these things." But at the end, what we are seeing is Nehemiah wanted to be remembered by God and not the world around him. And as we go down this path, how do we follow the path of Nehemiah? not to build our worldly resume but to spiritually be remembered by the God of the universe who can change everything. And we start our time in Nehemiah chapter 13 starting in verse one. It says, "At that time the book of Moses was read publicly to the people." This is the Bible in the Old Testament that they had. It says, "The command was found written in it that no Ammonite or Moabitete should ever enter the assembly of God because they did not meet the Israelites with food and water. Instead, they hired Balam against them to curse them. But our God turned the curse into a blessing." When they had heard the law, they separated all those of mixed descent from Israel. Here's the first thing as we dive in to see who was this guy Nehemiah. What what what mattered to him? What was something that was set him apart? And the first thing we see is Nehemiah is remembered as a man of God's word. I love how they start here. The first thing we see in this chapter is about Nehemiah's legacy is that whenever anything needed to stir inside the people, he pulled out the word of God and they started reading it. And you notice what's happening here is the people, they're reading scripture publicly, and then when they encounter a command, something that challenges their everyday life, they obey that command instead of closing the book. Now, let's be honest, how much do we do that in our quiet time? We're like reading it and you're like, "Wait, that causes me to do something different." The easy thing is to close the book and be like, "I'll come back to that later. Maybe God will have a different word for me that's not so challenging to my heart." And but instead, they heard the word of God. It challenged them and they're like, "We need to obey this." And and the word of God is doing what the word of God does. That's convicting sin and compelling repentance. And here here's what it was calling is in this time it said that they were to be separated from the Ammonite and the Moabitete people. Now, this was not about racial exclusion. This was about holiness. You see, these other tribes, these other people groups were idol worshippers. They worshiped false gods. And as they worshiped false gods time and time again as Israel intermixed with the world around them, it was drawing them away from serving Yahweh, the God of the Old Testament, the God of the Bible. So here when the people are hearing the word of God, it it's convicting their idolatry that got them in here and they respond by separating themselves from those influences. And here's what I love is Nehemiah didn't have to manufacture conviction. He just let the word do its work. I think about how we try to change people. You we read a lot of leadership books on how do you win friends and influence people? Great classic, right? How do we make sure we read marriage books is of how do I get my spouse to do the things I want. All right? Like how do I get my husband to fold laundry? I cannot fold laundry. All right. I try and my wife's like do it like this and then I do it like that and it doesn't look like hers looks and then um then she just refolds everything I fold. I don't know. Right. And and we we we asked he's like, "How do we influence other people?" And a lot of times the world's tactics are to do that through manipulation, to do that through maybe like deceit to try to work people to get to the end result we have. But Nehemiah, what I love here is he doesn't do any of that. Instead, he has them just open the word of God and read the word of God and let the word of God do what the word of God does, which is convict our sin and tell us to change. And here as we start this and we think about how do we want to be remembered? Do we want a life that is remembered of people that are of people of God's word? People who know God's word, who love God's word, who let God's word shape us, who let it confront us, let it convict us. This morning, I just completed day 53 of a year-long study to start the year. And and as I do this time and time again, what I love about these is even those times that I'm not all the way awake, when I'm reading scripture, I still feel God's tug in conviction as he pulls my life to a different direction. But Nehemiah wasn't just a man of God's word. It also continues on in the story. Check out verse four. This is now before this, the priest Ilashab had been put in charge of the storooms of the house of our God. He was a relative of Tobias and had prepared a large room for him where they had previously stored the grain offerings, the frankincense, the articles, and the tents of grains, new wine, and fresh oil prescribed for the Levites, the singers, and the gatekeepers along with the contributions for the priests. He he's saying there's this there's this room where they stored all the things they needed in order to worship God, in order to provide the duties of the temple. But he's saying, and maybe you recognize this name, Tobaya. Tobio was an enemy of the Israelite people. But for some reason, someone gave him a room inside the temple, the church of that day, and they cleared out all the things they need to worship and instead let their enemy reside in their midst. Verse 6, while all this was happening, Nehemiah said, "I was not in Jerusalem because I had returned to King Art Xerxes of Babylon in the 32nd year of his reign. It was only later that I asked the king for a leave of absence. He had returned to give a progress update on all the stuff they were doing. He said, "So I could return to Jerusalem. Then I had discovered the evil that Elishab had done on behalf of Tobaya by providing it a room in the courts of God's house." And listen to verse 8. Nehemiah when he hears this, he's saying, "This isn't right." He says, "I was greatly displeased and I threw all of Tobiah's household possessions out of the room." If you have any adult children in your house you can't get rid of, just start throwing their possessions out of the house. All right, that's a Nehemiah's trick. He's like, "Hey, just say the Bible told me to do it." All right, I'm just learning from God's word. Um, you need to find a new place to live. Good luck. Um, in verse 9, I ordered that the rooms be purified. I already called the cleaners. They're already cleaning you out. I'm sorry. It's already done. But he had the articles of the house of God restored there along with the grain offering and frankincense. And skip down to verse 14. Remember me for this, my God. Hear Nehemiah's heart in this. And we're going to see this phrase time and time again. Remember me for this, my God. And don't erase the deeds of faithful love that I have done for the house of my God and for its services. You see, Nehemiah was not just a man of God's word. He was also a man of God's house. And as the story shifts, this is where we start get things getting a little spicy here. Nehemiah, he had to return to King Artic Xerxes, as we said, for a period of time. But when he came back to Jerusalem, he found all the progress that they had made, all of a sudden they had just taken about 20 steps back and all the all the progress they made in previous chapters of serving God, of being faithful. They just undid it here and and they let their enemy all of a sudden have this room inside the temple. And like I said, this was not just any room. This was a store room. what was supposed to be for the offerings they would offer to God. Now, here's what's happening here is this is a physical picture of a spiritual reality is when we let the enemies of God take up residence in places for worship, we compromise everything. But look at how Nehemiah responds in verse 8 when he says he's greatly displeased. He just threw out all Tobiah's household goods out of the room. He didn't form a committee. He he didn't send a strongly worded email. He didn't send a text message. Instead, he just straight threw it out. I just I I have this picture in my head of like Nehemiah going and be like, "Hey, Elisha, you're a loser. Come here." Um he's like, "Uh, grab the other end of that couch. We're going to take it outside." We're like, "Where are we taking this? We're taking it to the dump." And he's like, "Should we take the stuff to Goodwill?" He's like, "Forget Goodwill. We're throwing this stuff away." All right. Any Goodwill fans out there? Uh last Monday was half price day. My wife went to three Goodwills. One day, three Goodwills. All right. True story. Um, I made the offer. I'm like, "Hey, uh, you know, uh, you can go with your friend, uh, just let the kids come over because it's President's Day." I was like, "I have the day off." And I had seven kids from 8:00 a.m. to 12:00 p.m. while they were at Goodwill. All right. Um, I'm just like, "Don't break anything or each other's bones, and you guys will have a fun time." Um, I did feed them lunch, too, so nobody died. It was great. But he's like, "We're not even taking this stuff to Goodwill." Instead, he's like, "We're just throwing it out. They're cleansing this room. They're just seeing how like this is not right. We're cleaning it out. Now, you're like, "Okay, any rooms in the church that we need to clean out of junk?" Probably. But that's a different story. Here's what's actually happening here. When we talk about this is we don't have a temple that we go to be in the presence of God. Instead, what we see in the New Testament is that when Jesus died and rose again, all of a sudden, the presence of God can indwell with us with the Holy Spirit. And where two or more gathered, we know the presence of God is there. But God comes to reside and live within us. And here's what's often is we're not giving out rooms of our church to our enemies, but we are giving rooms in our heart to the sinful enemies that are out in our world. And too often we let things into our heart that we know are bad for us. We let pride and jealousy and lust and envy and whatever it else, we let it inhabit store rooms in our heart instead of clearing that out and giving it to God for his worship. And we see Nehemiah when we see this when we are neglecting the the form of God, the house of God that he comes to reside in us, we don't just talk about it. We don't just let it linger. Instead, we clear it out. We get rid of the junk that is in our lives. And I love in verse 14 after he corrects this problem, Nehemiah prays, "Remember me for this God." He wasn't looking for a plaque on the wall of like Nehemiah kicked out Tobaya. Great job. He wasn't looking for recognition from the world. Nehemiah wasn't looking for attabo for the people around him. Nehemiah was looking to be noticed by God. He was building an audience of one to remember his faithfulness. But Nehemiah's story continues. Check out verse 15. It says, "At the time I saw people in Judah tra treading wine presses on the Sabbath. They are also bringing in stores of grain and loading them on donkeys along with wine, grapes, and figs. All kinds of goods were being brought to Jerusalem on Sabbath day. So I warned them against selling food on that day. The Tyrans living there were importing fish and all kinds of merchandise and selling them on the Sabbath to the people of Judah and Jerusalem. He says, "I rebuked the nobles of Judah." And he said to him, "What is this evil you are doing? Profigning the Sabbath day." They had this day reserved to rest and to worship God. And they were profaining it. Skip down uh to to verse 21 as he starts to address the merchants who were then selling this stuff. In verse 21, he says, "But I warned them, the merchants, why are you camping in front of the wall? If you do it again, I'll use force against you." Nehemiah's a baller, and we're going to see it a little bit more. All right? He is not a guy to be messed with. He literally looks at the merchants, he's like, "Dude, if you do this again, we're going to go to blows." And he says, "After that, they did not come again on the Sabbath." Clearly, his threats meant something. All right? If I threaten a guy after road rage, they might not be as intimidated. All right? Um but Nehemiah, when he was intimidated, they're like, "We're listening to him." In verse 22, then I instructed the Levites to purify themselves, to guard the city gates in order to keep the Sabbath day holy. And he goes into this prayer again. Remember me for this also my God and look on me with compassion according to the abundance of your faithful love. Nehemiah is not just a man who is remembered of a man of God's word and a man of God's house but also remembered as a man of God's day. Nehemiah continues to reform the people through this process. He looked around and he saw people working and saw people doing life on the Sabbath day that was supposed to be set aside for God. Now, the Sabbath was not about legalistic rulekeeping. It was really the Sabbath was about trust. The Sabbath was actually is a declaration to God saying, "I trust you enough that I can rest on this day. I can worship you and that you will provide." The Sabbath was really saying to the world around them that God, I think you can do more in six days than the rest of the false idols can do in seven. That that is what they were declaring to God. That I can take a day off and I can devote it to you and you're still going to provide. You're still going to move forward. Now, the Sabbath was meant to be protected space for Israel to worship, to meditate on scripture, and enjoy their God. But they had turned it into just another business day. And when this happened, Nehemiah rebuked them. He even calls them out. He says, "What is this evil thing you are doing?" And he tells them, he's like, "Didn't isn't this exactly what our ancestors did that got us in exile in the first place?" He's like, "Remember your history that those are the sins of the past that are coming up against?" How often when we reflect on our lives, do we repeat the sins of maybe our parents or the sins of the people are before us or the sins of our past and we let those keep popping up rather than ridding them of our lives and starting a new path. He's like, "Learn from your history. Don't keep doing it." And then he took action. I love this. He He ordered the gates shut before sunset. He stationed guards when merchants camped outside the walls hoping to sell. He's like, "You do this again, it's going to go bad." He He's like, "Try me, man. See what happens." >> Right >> now, as we hear this, we might be like, "All right, so is there a day of the week that we just need to completely set aside and do nothing, right? And just watch football all day. If only that was what it was actually calling about." And today we see actually that the Sabbath is not about legalistic rule. We actually see in Romans, Paul says that the Sabbath is something that is to benefit our worship. is to and it's a matter of conscience of how we keep it. But here is the question we need to ask is am I reserving time in my schedule whatever that may look like that I can devote to meditation to prayer and to rest in God. >> And in this culture we live in a hustle culture that you got to work all the time. You got to never be off. recently the GM for the Minnesota Vikings, he was fired because he he was there at his kid's birth and he took some time off after. All right, true story. Uh and they said it's like in the NFL, it's a hustle culture. You got to keep moving forward. That's the culture they've created. And if you take that back, there will be consequences. And now don't hear me because I think my generation is lazy as heck. So they need to work harder. So millennials, plug your ears. If you're older than that, uh you can hear this a little bit more. But we need to work hard for the Lord. But we also need to take time out to say, "I'm not going to be a workaholic. I'm not going to fill every inch of my schedule. I'm not going to overload myself that I never have a break so that I'm not finding rest and meditation and worship and relaxation in God." Here's the deal. All of us can fall into this trap. My wife knows this. If something is not on the calendar, uh I do not do it cuz I can't remember that I was supposed to do it. Just yesterday, I failed at this cuz I had a church member. I told him I would call him between 1 or 2 o'clock and and I was actually doing it so I could get I need to talk to him about stuff and I was going to get him out of home stuff he had to do. And then he texted me at 7:00. I was like, "Dude, you never called and I was saving it in my calendar and the before when we talked and I never actually hit save. So, I forgot to do it and I didn't call him." So, I sent him a gift of Michael Kane from Batman saying, "I failed you and I'm sorry. Um, and I'll make it up." But it's like all of us, we maximize every inch of our schedule. And that's great. But are we making time? Are we scheduling time? Are we setting aside time? Are we prioritizing our time with God so that we can rest and relax in him? And here's the thing is Nehemiah was not piling up works to earn God's favor. Instead, he's asking for mercy. He he knows his faithfulness is imperfect, but he is trusting in the steadfast love of God. That God, if I trust you with this, you will be sufficient. But his story keeps going in verse 23. And in 23, it says, "In those days, I s also saw Jews who had married women from Asad, Aman, and Moab." Moab, exactly the place they weren't supposed to intermar with. It says half their children spoke the language of ash isad or the language of the other peoples, but they could not speak Hebrew, the language of the Israelite people. Verse 25, I rebuked them. I cursed them. I beat some of their men and I pulled out their hair. This is in the Bible. It says, 'I forced them to take an oath before God and said, you must not give your daughters in marriage to their sons or take their daughters as wives for your sons or yourselves. Skip down to verse 29. Remember them, my God, he flips this a little bit. He's not saying, "Remember me anymore." So he's saying, "Remember them, my God, for defiling the priesthood as well as the covenant of the priesthood and the Levites." You see, Nehemiah wasn't just a man remembered as a man of God's word, of God's house, of God's day, but he was also a man of God's people. This is where the the story keeps building and starts to get extremely intense here because Nehemiah saw that Jewish men had had married men or had married women from other cultures. And as they intermarried, the problem in this was that they had forsaken their relationship with God and started to adopt these false gods and these false idols. So much of this uh to the point is they didn't even speak the same language that the Bible was written in anymore. They didn't know Hebrew. So they couldn't understand the Old Testament at that time and they couldn't understand what God had called them to anymore. They were literally forgetting their spiritual heritage and moving to something else. And as Nehemiah sees this and as Nehemiah sees that the next generation was losing their identity, all of a sudden he responds to this and he says he rebukes them. He curses them. He beats some of their men and he pulled out their hair. Now as you hear that and you think Nehemiah might be a little crazy, right? He's got a little anger side on him and like pulling out hair. Like that's a new one, right? Uh my kids have not figured out how to pull each other's hair out and I'm hoping they don't adopt that. They like to bite each other sometimes, which isn't good, but like bite wounds heal. Uh you can't put hair back in after it's been ripped out. All right, it's just got to grow back. It sounds very painful. Uh but actually part of this is he was actually this is part of a judicial and humiliation ritual. So as he's doing this, this was him like enacting justice that as the governor of Jerusalem, he had every right to do this. And he's showing this is this is the consequences for your actions. You fast forward a little bit and it's almost similar to what we see in the New Testament is as Jesus was flipping tables in the temple, kicking out people just like he kicked out Tobaya, he was also punishing the people, whipping them for defiling God's word. We see Nehemiah doing this in the Old Testament. But then he reminds them of why he's doing this. He's saying, "Hey, here's the lesson that we are need to learn here is God set this standard." But then in verses 26- 28, he tells them of King Solomon of Israel. He said, "King Solomon was the wisest man on earth. King Solomon accumulated all this wealth. King Solomon built this great empire, but King Solomon drifted from his faith because he married all these foreign women. Having multiple wives is not a good idea. There's another lesson there. We don't have time for that sermon. But he had all these foreign women who drew his heart away from God and drew it to idols. And King Solomon got obsessed with building his own empire. the guy who literally built the temple that they had to rebuild. The guy who was the pinnacle of Israel's uh of Israel's dominance at that time, he got him so obsessed with building worldly things that he forgot the mission that God had called him to. And as Nehemiah is going through this story, he says he drives the people away that are defiling what God because he cared more about God's people than about being popular. He cared more about protecting the next generation than about keeping the peace. And actually, he's so so in here, it's so crazy in verse 29. He doesn't even really extend grace to the people who did this. He's like, "God, remember them." And he's saying, "Enact judgment on them for they have strayed away the next generation." I've said this over and over again is there are two things I want to pass on to my kids. First, I want to pass on that we chair for Arizona sports, no matter how miserable it is. And it is miserable. All right. Even yesterday, the Suns, man, they went to double overtime. Jaylen Green hit a game-winning three. It was a great game. We had a dude break his hand and probably has a calf injury. and Devon Booker for a week. So, our whole team's on IR. Despite the good moments, the bad moments come right there. And I'm like, I tell my kids, we're going to cheer for Arizona sports. And if you're miserable, I don't care. But this is what we do. But the second thing, and the more important thing is we're going to go to love. We're going to go to church and we're going to love Jesus. And I can't make you love Jesus, but I can bring you to church. I can make sure you hear the word of God. I can show you how I'm in love with Christ. And hopefully that will infect you and pass down to you from generation to generation and continue this faith line. Nehemiah is calling out the people because they got away from this and they wanted to be remembered for things that were not important instead of being remembered for what God had called them to do. And it all leads to verse 30 and how this book wraps up. I just love this. It says, "So I purified them from everything foreign." He starts the process of bringing them back to God's assignment. He said, "I assigned specific duties to each of the priests and Levites." Verse 31, I also arranged for the donation of wood at the appointed times and for the first fruits. And the last line in this entire book, remember me, my God, with favor. That's it. That's how it ends. There's no slideshow or PowerPoint presentation of how awesome Nehemiah was. For man, this this wall, it was it was in waste for 150 years. Yeah, I rebuilt that in 52 days. I was the project manager. Put that on my resume. He didn't say that. He didn't say like, "Hey man, I was a cup bearer in exile in a foreign land. I came here and I became the governor of Judah. I'm that dude. Put that on my resume." He didn't say that. He He didn't brag about like, man, every time they screwed up. I whipped these people. I pulled their hair out. I got them back on. And all of a sudden, we're back on track for God. He didn't put that on his resume at all. Instead, he said, he's saying these last two verses, God, I pointed people to you. I was faithful to your calling. God, remember me for what I have done. And here is the thing is Nehemiah was more concerned about being remembered by God than being remembered by the world around him. And here's what's crazy as you think about this happened 2500 years ago is there were some other important people. The guy he answered to was King Ard Xerxes II. He was son of King Ard Xerxes, the dude from 300, the bad guy in there. But his son, his son isn't remembered for everything. 2500 years later, he was the most powerful man in the world. Now, he is a footnote in the Bible and probably not any other history books, but we talk about Nehemiah 2500 years later because he was focused on being remembered by God and not people. But you see, here's the thing is as you read this whole book, you get to this point and you're like, well, here's the depressing part is even though Nehemiah was so awesome, even though Nehemiah was so great, the people still failed after this and they still failed and they still fell short. They still right after he enacted all this change, they just kept going down that dark path. It led to 400 years of silence from God. And all of a sudden, the people were as messed up as they had ever been before. Because even though Nehemiah was such a great man, he was still just a man and he could not save them. And here's the point of this is this may be where the book of Nehemiah ends, but this is not where the Bible ends. Because you see from here, here's what I love. And here's the honest truth about Nehemiah is that the people drifted but but it ultimately pointed to someone who is greater is Nehemiah was this great guy who read the word of God. He pointed people to the word of God and it should ask us do we are we people of God's word. Do we point to the word of God? He did that and Nehemiah could read the word of God. But here's the deal. He was pointing to Jesus who Jesus is the only one who could breathe out the word of God. That Nehemiah, as great of a leader as he was, he could cleanse the temple. He could be all about God's house. He could restore this. But only Jesus could become the temple. In the New Testament, Jesus makes everyone mad when he says, "I'm going to tear this temple down." They think he's talking about that temple and I'm going to rise again. He said, "The real place where you get to be in the presence of God is right here in Jesus Christ, not in a building." >> Amen. >> Nehemiah could enforce the Sabbath, but Jesus was the only one that said, "Come find rest in me." >> Nehemiah could could Nehemiah could call people to repentance. He could convict them the with the word of God. But only Jesus could die on the cross for our sins, could raise again so that we could find true salvation, repentance in him. You see, Nehemiah was just a foreshadow to what would come in Jesus Christ. that even though he was a great leader, he was an imperfect leader, but he points to the perfect leader in Jesus Christ that ultimately we find our fulfillment in our salvation in. And when we see how Nehemiah is remembered, he is remembered as one piece of the line that leads to Jesus. And it begs the question for us today is how are we going to be remembered? What do we need to do? What is the truth that we need to walk away with in our lives today is we need to build what God remembers, not what man recognizes. You see, here's what the world recognizes. The world recognizes the cars we drive, the houses we live in, the clothes we wear, the money we gain, the influence we garner, the power we have. The world recognizes all those things. And even at funerals, man, if you go to a funeral for someone who didn't know Jesus, it is so depressing because you hear about the good old days. You hear about the fun stories, but there is no hope. There is just grief. There is no forward thinking. There's just looking back and mourning. But when we don't focus on what the world recognizes, but what God remembers, here's what God remembers. God remembers that we are saved by Jesus Christ. in that we pointed other people to him. This past week, I put on my blazer and went to one another one of those funerals. And I got to do a funeral of a 45-year-old man who died too soon. But his name was Derek. And I met Derek about eight years ago when he came to our church over in Cross Church, Phoenix. And Derek had just gotten out of jail recently. had got clean, was clean for a number of years, but always had fought with that addiction coming back into his life. But as Derek came to our church, he's like, "How can I help?" And I'm like, and we were a new church plant. We had just started not long ago. And I was like, "What can you do?" He's like, "I can make coffee for everyone in the church." And and before as they get here, I'll have hot coffee ready for them. And I'm like, former uh convict with a drug problem making coffee for the whole church. I'm like, "Let's do it." Right? Do you have a pulse? You said, "Yes, you're in charge. You got it." And Dererick served faithfully for a season. He Heard the word of God. We actually got to baptize him in our church and see how God just took a hold of his life. But Derek still struggled over the years in and out. He'd be clean and then relapse. But despite his struggles, one of the things Dererick did is he somehow brought people to church. He invited his parents Dana and Karen who had a church background but had for many years strayed from God and he brought them to the church. They got involved. They started serving. Then they started inviting people. One of the couples they invited was Roger and Kenu. And what I love about Roger and Kenu is as they were baptized in our church, they kept inviting family members and friends. And one of the people they brought was Roger's mom, Rosie, who near the end of her life in her 80s a few years back, she was baptized and declared her faith in Christ after living a life far from him. Just about a month ago, I got to go to Ros's funeral and see the gospel hope that people shared of how she knew Jesus and how it changed everything. And what's crazy is you look at the life of Derek and the world will say that guy spent over half his life in and out of prison dealing with drug problems. But what I see is a guy who gave his life to Christ. A guy who invited other people who invited other people's whose salvation were changed because he was faithful to say yes to Jesus and to spread that love of Christ to the world around him. You see, our world might remember us for a lot of things, but will they remember the eternal impact that knowing Christ has on the world around us? When you're dead and gone, nobody cares about your social media page. Nobody cares about the money you leave behind. Nobody cares about how great your house is. But they will care. God will care when you are heaven. and they will care if you shared the hope of Christ with them. So today as we end our time, I want to give you some time to reflect and pray to the God of the universe and to take these words that we see from Nehemiah in verse 13 is this is our one prayer prompt. This is between you and God is remember me my God with God. Remember me with what? With my love for the Savior. With my sinful life that has been covered by the blood of Jesus Christ. Remember me with my faithfulness to share my faith. And as we go into this time of prayer, I'm I'm going to say if you're able to maybe adopt a physical stature of prayer because as I read this passage, I don't think Nehemiah was just having that casual conversation. Hey God, remember me. Like that'd be great. I'd really appreciate it. I have a feeling Nehemiah was on his knees, maybe on his face, pleading before God, tears running down his face where he looked at the legacy of everything he tried to do. The people just kept pushing back. But through the tears, pleading with God, God, remember me because you are gracious. because you are abundant. Because you are faithful and I want to share that faithfulness with the world around us. If you are able in this time, I would encourage you to adopt a stature of prayer on your knees. If you need to lay down on the floor, just don't lay on anyone you can. But just spend some time praying to God our father that he would remember us for our relationship with Christ and he would remember us for how we share that with the world around us. Let's pray to our father.