# Sunday Setup – Nehemiah 10

Sermon transcript from Cross Church Surprise.
Series: Sunday Setup
Date: February 5, 2026
Watch: https://crosschurchcares.com/surprise/episodes/sunday-setup-nehemiah-10

## Summary

Are you ready to make a commitment that transforms your life? What does it mean to truly follow God and prioritize His house? Join us as we explore Nehemiah 10 and discover the power of our promises to God. Let's dive in together!

## Transcript

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 Hey, Gross Church. Welcome to the Sunday 
 setup. [music] is our time each week 
 that we gather digitally together 
 Thursdays at two o'clock [music] 
 to dive into God's word to prepare our 
 hearts for what we will be studying what 
 we'll be praising through preaching 
 through praying through so we can 
 practice next week and today we're going 
 to be in Nehemiah chap 10 as we continue 
 our series through this book in Nehemiah 
 chapter 10 we're actually going to pick 
 up in verse 38 of chapter 9 it's where 
 we left off last week after they 
 confessed their sins. They have just 
 this time of uh rehearsing how God has 
 been faithful. But in verse 38, it it 
 says in view of all this, it says this 
 is what they decide to do. They we are 
 making a binding agreement [music] and 
 writing on a sealed document containing 
 the names of our leaders, Levites and 
 priests. Those who are on the document 
 were the governor of Nehemiah. And then 
 it goes through and lists these leaders 
 that God is entrusting in Israel that 
 said, "We are going to commit to 
 following God." Skip down to verse 28. 
 It says, "The rest of the people, the 
 priests, Levites, gatekeepers, singers, 
 and temple servants along with their 
 wives, sons and daughters, who is 
 everyone who is able to understand and 
 who has separated themselves from the 
 surrounding people to obey the law of 
 God. They join with their noble brothers 
 and they commit themselves 
 with a sworn oath to follow the law of 
 God given through God's servant Moses 
 and to obey carefully all the commands, 
 ordinances and statutes of the Lord our 
 God. And then it goes into the details 
 of this is what is the commitment? What 
 is the vow? What is the covenant they 
 are making to their God? And they pick 
 up in verse 30. We will not give our 
 daughters in marriage to the surrounding 
 peoples and will not take their 
 daughters as wives for our sons. When 
 the surrounding peoples bring 
 merchandise or any kind of grain to sell 
 [music] on the Sabbath day, we will not 
 buy from them on the Sabbath or a holy 
 day. We'll also leave the land 
 uncultivated in the seventh year and 
 will cancel every debt. We'll impose the 
 following commands on ourselves to give 
 an eighth of an ounce of silver yearly 
 for the service on the house of the 
 Lord. The bread displayed before the 
 Lord. the grain offering, the regular 
 burnt offering, the Sabbath and new moon 
 of offerings, the appointed festivals, 
 the holy things, the sin offerings to 
 atone for Israel and for the work of the 
 house of our God. We have cast lots 
 among the priests, Levites, and people 
 for the donation of wood by our 
 ancestral families at the appointed 
 times each year. They are to bring the 
 wood to our God's house to burn on the 
 altar of our Lord our God as is written 
 the law. We will bring the first fruits 
 of our land and every fruit tree to the 
 Lord's house year by year. We'll also 
 bring the firstborn of our sons and our 
 livestock as prescribed by the law. And 
 we'll bring the firstborn, our herds and 
 flocks to the house of our God, to the 
 priests who will serve in our God's 
 house. We'll bring a loaf from our first 
 batch of dough to the priests at the 
 store rooms of the house of our God. We 
 also bring the first fruits of our grain 
 offerings of every fruit tree of the new 
 wine and fresh soil. A tenth of our 
 land's produce belongs to Levites. For 
 the Levites are to collect the onetenth 
 offering in all our [music] agricultural 
 towns. Verse 38. A priest from Aaron's 
 descendants is to accompany the Levites 
 when they collect the tenth. And the 
 Levites are to take a tenth of this 
 offering to the storooms of the treasury 
 in the house of [music] our God. For the 
 Israelites and the Levites are to bring 
 the contributions of grain, new wine, 
 and fresh oil to the storooms, where the 
 articles of the sanctuary are kept, and 
 where the priests who minister are along 
 with the gatekeepers and singers. We 
 will not neglect the house of our God. 
 And this whole passage has just these 
 undertones of how do we commit to God? 
 How do we truly follow what God has for 
 our lives? And in it, there was just 
 this spirit of what are they sacrificing 
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 in order to truly be committed to truly 
 be allin to giving their lives over to 
 God. And as we begin to process this, I 
 I want us to start kind of praying 
 through this and thinking of who it is 
 that we are committing to, who it is we 
 are following. In this first prayer 
 prompt, I want us [music] to just start 
 with a prayer, a a prompt of praise. In 
 verse 29 when it says they had this 
 sworn oath, they said to follow the law 
 of God and they say it's this is God's 
 servant Moses who gave them but it's the 
 statues of the Lord our Lord and and 
 that's just an interesting language 
 there Lord of our Lord. It's just 
 establishing like those who they 
 followed in Moses like this is the 
 ultimate Lord. And and I just when we 
 think of God as being the Lord of our 
 life, let that be our prayer that God we 
 serve you as Lord because God we serve 
 you as Lord because why is he the Lord 
 of lords? greater than everything is 
 God. We serve you as Lord because think 
 through why our God is so much greater 
 than any other authority in our world. 
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 >> God, we serve you our Lord because you 
 are holy. fully because you are all 
 powerful because you are the creator of 
 the universe because you are sovereign 
 and in control. God, there are so many 
 things that [music] sometimes we 
 fall under the leadership, fall under 
 the influence of other people in our 
 world, but we know that you are above 
 all of them. God, [music] you are the 
 Lord, our Lord. Uh the Lord who gives us 
 these holy scriptures, our Lord who 
 saves us, who [music] changes us, who 
 provides us a different path. Then God, 
 we serve you because you are worthy to 
 be served and obeyed. But we continue on 
 this and we not just serve you because 
 of how great you are, but it gives us 
 details on how we are to serve. And I 
 just see throughout this passage in 
 verse 35 and 36 and 37, there's this 
 repetitive language. We will, we will, 
 we will bring, we will do this, we will 
 not neglect the house of the Lord. We 
 will, we will, we will. And you think 
 about because our God is so holy, 
 because he has saved us, because we obey 
 him, there are things that we should be 
 doing. In the second prayer prompt, as 
 we look inward, because our God is 
 worthy to be served, worthy to be 
 obeyed. God, we will that's our that's 
 our prompt right there. God, we will 
 love our community. God, we will 
 prioritize church. 
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 >> God, we will raise our family in a 
 church family. God, we will pray those 
 prayers to our [music] God. 
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 >> God, because you are so holy, we will 
 follow you, God. We'll devote our lives 
 to you, God. We'll give you our best, 
 our first fruits, Lord. Out of our 
 resources, we'll give them to you. Out 
 of our time, we'll give it to you. out 
 of our energy, we'll give it to you, 
 God. We'll prioritize being a part of a 
 church family, God. We will prioritize 
 having a quiet time to read and pray to 
 you. God, because you are so holy, Lord, 
 we will commit to truly following you, 
 God. We thank you for our cross church 
 family. We thank you that you have put 
 in a burden in our hearts to respond in 
 confession this past week on how we 
 fail. But Lord, to do that in a way that 
 allows us to release the junk of our 
 lives [music] so that we can truly serve 
 you how you have called us to do. God, 
 prepare our hearts for this weekend as 
 we gather together. Prepare our hearts 
 to be able to live out and practice 
 [music] um your word that you place in 
 our lives. And God, just be with us as 
 we continue daily to walk in your light 
 that we will make you known in a great 
 way that impacts the world around us. 
 God, thank you for this time and we lift 
 all this up in Jesus' name. Amen. Hey, 
 thank you guys for joining us today. 
 We'll see you this Sunday. [music] 
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