Who do you belong to? (Neh 11)
Neh 11:1-36
A friend of mine was part of a growing church with wonderful relationships and a sense of belonging. However, given its growth, the leadership eventually decided to split the group and start a new church-plant with some key people. Understandably, my friend found the transition hard and missed the close fellowship she used to enjoy with some people who were now in the new church-plant. Nevertheless, she recognised the importance of what the church was doing. Such change raises the question of belonging and priorities. What comes first for us, our attachment to our friends or the purposes of God?
The exiles faced a comparable challenge as they looked at the sparse population of Jerusalem. The city was central for restoration, the place where God’s temple stood, where atonement was made for sin and where His presence dwelt. Although the walls were finished (Neh 6:15), the holy city without enough people was meaningless (Neh 7:4). After the people’s celebration of God’s goodness, their confession and re-commitment (Nehemiah 8-10), we return to the next step they needed to take in God’s purposes for them.
Repopulating Jerusalem
The people cast lots to decide who should move to Jerusalem, a common method for seeking God’s guidance in the Old Testament and later (cf. Acts 1:26), but there was also an obvious willingness to go (Neh 11:1-2). Those who lived elsewhere would have had ancestral land outside of Jerusalem, so that relocation involved leaving personal interests and connections behind. Given the tight-knit nature of the exilic group and the way ancient cultures were much more rooted in a place and a local community, this was a considerable sacrifice. Additionally, Jerusalem would always be the focal point of tension or trouble because of its significance, so its inhabitants would be the first to experience any threat. No wonder the rest applauded those who were willing to make the move (v.2).
Looking towards God’s purposes
What follows is a detailed list of those who lived in Jerusalem from the tribe of Judah and Benjamin (Neh 11:4-6, 7-9), as well as from the priests, Levites and gatekeepers (Neh 11:10-14, 15-18, 19). Significantly, there are military overtones to the description (‘men of valour’ or ‘valiant warriors’, translating the same Hebrew word, occurs in Neh 11:6, 14), which recognises the potential of future conflict and the need to be ready. This is appended with some additional remarks about men in charge of the various groups (Neh 11:21-24), as well as a list of settlements where the exiles were living (Neh 11:25-36). Here again, the expression ‘encamped’ suggests a military perspective (v.30). It envisages the exilic community as the wilderness generation, encamped around the tabernacle and moving forward towards settlement in the Promised Land.[1] It recognises that God has already acted in their lives by bringing them out of exile, but looks to the future with the hope of full restoration.
We are not our own
As the people both wait for God to bring this about, as well as work to make it happen, they do so with a conviction about their own identity. We have already seen how the exiles brought a tithe of their agricultural products to support those who ministered in the temple (Neh 10:37-38). The tithe is, in effect, a token given back to God in recognition of the fact that everything the people had belonged to Him. Now the exiles ‘tithed’ themselves by sending a tenth of their community to live in Jerusalem (Neh 11:1) and with it acknowledged that they all belonged to God.
Today when so many of us feel uprooted and isolated from family or home and lack those links that create emotional stability in our lives, we understand the significance of belonging. In fact, many churches appeal to people to join them by promising just such a sense of belonging, of being family. Not all are able to live up to their inflated rhetoric, but the ones that do create a strong attachment for those who join. The trouble with this kind of focus, however, is that sometimes unwittingly, it makes God secondary in the equation. We belong to each other more than we belong to God. The exiles’ story challenges us to ask where our attachments lie and to recognise that our life is not our own, we are His. While this may mean sacrifices along the way of God’s will, we have a deep anchor in the Lord who holds us steady.
[1] H.G.M. Williamson argues from the parallel text that lists members of the exilic community (1 Chronicles 9) that there was a view among the exiles which modelled itself on the wilderness generation encamped around the tabernacle and, in fact, identified the Second Temple with the tabernacle or tent of meeting (1 Chron 9:19, 21, 23). He believes that similar language in Nehemiah 11 echoes this idea. Ezra, Nehemiah, WBC 16 (Nashville: Thomas Nelson, 1985), 353.
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