I want to begin with what we have studied so far in the New Year’s series “Rebuild Broken Our Lives/Walls and Others” based on the Book of Nehemiah. An Israelite captive living in Persia named Nehemiah heard the sad news about the damaged wall and gates in the temple of Jerusalem. With a broken heart, he wept before “the God of heaven” (Nehemiah 1:5) and brought that ruined city to the Merciful God in prayer. Nehemiah received His permission, provision and protection at God’s appointed time to rebuild the destroyed temple. After returning to his homeland, Jerusalem, and examining the temple sites, Nehemiah shared a mission report with the people of Israel. In that testimony, he pointed out not only the destructive items around the temple but also the dishonoured name of God due to its brokenness. Nehemiah told the people about the gracious hand of his God and encouraged them to fix their eyes on the Mighty God. The people of Israel decided to rebuild the house of God together.

In our Old Testament reading for today, under the leadership of Nehemiah, the people of Israel were assigned to do God’s good work. They worked on God’s recovery project as a Heavenly Team. Everyone participated in a sacred duty over the tabernacle of Jerusalem. One frequent statement from this scripture is something like this: ” A gate was repaired by a group of people; they rebuilt it and put its doors in place.” Another repeated phrase is “next to him or them.” In this chapter, ten gates were refurbished at the time of the renovation. Various groups of participants restored the Temple gates and the wall in Jerusalem. They were not professional builders. As ordinary people, they had different occupations or professions. With a harmonized spirit, they repaired each destroyed section of Jerusalem. They all wanted to complete their God-given tasks.

In our New Testament reading for today, the Apostle Paul compared the Body of Christ, the Church, and its members, with a physical body and its different organs. According to Paul, all the body parts, whether in spirit or the flesh, are essential. Each instrument’s functions are vital. All are connected one way or the other. Can we imagine a person being poked on their finger by a thorn of a rose? Does it only hurt the finger? Not at all. A mouth expresses how painful it is; eyes want to examine the hurtful area; a brain starts thinking of treatment options; legs may lead that person to a hospital. All units of the body try to deal with that challenge together. The Apostle Paul has been known as the most outstanding Bible scholar. Traditionally, he has been recognized as the author of more than half of the entire New Testament books, 13 or 14 epistles out of 27. Think about how profound insights we can learn from his teachings. Paul frequently began his letters with the names of his coworkers. For instance, he greeted the Thessalonian believers in the following statement: “Paul, Silas, and Timothy to the church of the Thessalonians in God… Grace and peace to you from God the Father and the Lord Jesus Christ” (2 Thessalonians 1:1). When he introduced himself to his readers at the beginning of the epistle, he often called himself a servant of Christ Jesus. Paul did not consider himself higher than other people since he believed that God would equally appreciate all the followers of Christ. Paul put his trust in divine partnership and motivated all the believers to do their God-given duties diligently and cheerfully in unison (Romans 12:8).

The Creator God cares about diversity. When the Triune Lord, God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit, created something out of nothing, Three Divine Persons in one made each universe with a tremendous amount of its kind. Due to the various creative work of the Lord, our God-inherited gifts and talents are different and unique. All these diverse skills and abilities are greatly acknowledged for God’s ministry. We cannot do all of God’s recovery assignments on our own; however, we each can take some responsibility for the Great Commission with our brothers and sisters in God. According to our church’s mission statement, God wants us as His holy assembly to “communicate faith, hope and love by supporting and serving our congregation and the local community.” Communicating or sharing our faith in Christ alone, our hope in Heaven, and our love for God and His people based on Jesus’ love is a marvellous task that we, as a church, have been entrusted with to do. With the help of the Holy Spirit, we have supported and served our congregation and community in deed and word over the years. About five years ago, at St. Andrew’s Fenelon Falls, we dedicated new church entrance doors once the old ones were replaced. The purposes of that renovation proposal were both to put new doors at our church and to place our spiritual arms wide open to all the people in our community.

Today, once again, we are reminded of God’s holy calling as Christ’s church. This sacred charge can be overwhelming for us as a small congregation to accomplish. This morning we are asked to recall the recovery ministry done in Jerusalem and remember the collaborated work done by the people of Israel. From our kid’s object lesson, we learned that we, as Christ’s followers, were called to be “the salt of the earth” (Matthew 5:13). When salt was added collectively in the tube, a piece of fragile tissue paper covering the roll with a rubber band appeared to become much stronger than before. We are also called to be “the light of the world” (Matthew 5:14). Like the salt illustration, when Sun lights are collected on a certain spot by a magnifying glass, they can make a fire. In other words, when we all focus our whole hearts on our God-privileged mission, we can make the corrupted and darkened world much purer and brighter than before. Togetherness in spirit can make a big difference. In God, we cannot say to others something like this: “I do not need you, or you do not need me” since we all need one another. We are better together!

One of God’s blessings upon us as a church is oneness. For a more extended period, I have seen our church friends and members as spiritual builders building up God’s ministry in various ways. Your presence, your prayers, and your partnership with this assembly have strengthened God’s temples in Glenarm and Fenelon Falls. I am confident that the Lord has been delighted to see all of you contributing your talents and gifts for God’s Kingdom. Now God wants us as a church to rebuild some damaged areas of the House of God since we have recently come out of the Covid era. We are thankful to the Lord because we have experienced God’s provision and protection over our community, our church, our loved ones and us during those unprecedented times. As the newly amalgamated congregation, we are excited to continuously progress God’s dwelling place. At the same time, we are aware that we need to be patient since the Covid crisis has affected many congregational lives in the last three years. When we keep doing the right things before God with endurance and a united spirit, the Lord will renew and revive God’s ministry in our church and our community in the coming days.

Another fascinating thing I have noticed in the Book of Nehemiah is related to the names of the temple builders. When we encounter long lists of characters in the Bible, we may be tempted to skip those parts or not pay attention to those sections. In today’s Nehemiah chapter, more than fifty people’s names were written by God. Whether we realize it or not, God takes note of what we, as His people, are doing for Him, His church, and His people. All the names of the temple builders were recorded in God’s database. Things we have fulfilled for the Lord and even things we have done behind the scenes have been stored in God’s Reward Book. The Bible says, “And without faith it is impossible to please God, because anyone who comes to him must believe that he exists and that he rewards those who earnestly seek him” (Hebrews 11:6). Our Lord Christ reminds us of what this scripture means in the following declaration: “Look, I am coming soon! My reward is with me, and I will give to each person according to what they have done. I am the Alpha and the Omega, the First and the Last, the Beginning and the End” (Revelation 22:12). Since Christ knows all and everything about us from the beginning of our spiritual race to the end, He has the right to evaluate, and his observation is more than accurate. Because of God’s Promised Present in heaven, the Apostle Paul kept fighting “the good fight of faith” (1 Timothy 6:12) and “pressing on toward the goal” (Philippians 3:14) of becoming “in every respect the mature body” of Christ (Ephesians 4:15). Friends, are we glad to realize that our names will be placed in the Hall of Christians Fame when we give ourselves continuously “fully to the work of the Lord” (1 Corinthians 15:58)?

I want to conclude this message by introducing the first repaired gate called the Sheep Gate in this text for today. If you have ever been to Jerusalem, you may find this gate in the northern part of the temple. When I searched for a genuine Christian community some years ago, I volunteered for a Kibbutz ministry in Israel. During my stay there, I visited the biblical temple site in the Old City of Jerusalem several times. One remarkable scene I still remember is many people standing against the Western Wall, called the Wailing Wall and praying before the Lord. Some people wrote their prayer request on a piece of paper and put it into the wall’s cracks. I have heard more than a million prayer notes are inserted each year. Today, one or two temple gates are used in public. While in the temple area, I spent some time at a popular tourist attraction called Via Dolorosa or “the way of the cross.” Its starting point is close to the Sheep Gate, and the ending spot is a historic site called “Golgotha” or “Skull,” in Aramaic words or “Calvary” in Latin. That place is believed to be the site of Jesus’ crucifixion and looks like a skull-shaped rocky hill. As I stated before, each gate in the temple of Jerusalem has a name and a godly story. Jesus identified who He was through the “I AM” statement in the Gospel of John, “Very truly I tell you, I am the gate for the sheep. I am the gate; whoever enters through me will be saved. They will come in and go out and find pasture. I am the good shepherd. The good shepherd lays down his life for the sheep” (John 10:7-11). When we examine the restoration plan of the temple gates, we can discover that the people of Israel started with the Sheep Gate and ended up with the same gate.

Due to this spiritual background, our spiritual recovery plan needs to begin with Jesus Christ and start at the Sheep Gate. We need to ask ourselves whether our sacred gates known as our spiritual hearts, are broken or damaged. The Prophet Jeremiah made a very interesting description of our hearts. It is the most critical organ in our body. At the same time, it is the most deceitful thing. It is hard to understand that all the good things as well as the bad come out of the same spot called the heart or mind. That is why it is crucial to repair the broken spirit. We need to begin by building up our spiritual hearts. We need to renew our minds. Having refreshed spirit within us can make our church renewed and revived. We cannot rebuild our broken souls on our own. We need to humbly ask the Holy Spirit to lead us to the way of the cross of Christ in repentance. We need to honestly ask the Wonderful Counselor to give us the power of the crown of Christ in faith. With God’s forgiveness and eternal life, we can start again dreaming our God-given dreams and having our God-given visions in our faith journey. God is the God of second, third, fourth, and even more chances. Christ is the gate of mercy and grace and protection and provision. The Good Shepherd has everything and wants to provide us with everything we need once we rebuild the Sheep Gate in our hearts and have the right relationship with Him. With the supernatural power and significant wisdom of the Holy Spirit, we can not only rebuild our broken divine wall but also attempt a great thing to the Lord and expect a great thing from the Lord.

Friends, let us remember who the Lord our God is. He is the Creator. He is the Greatest Builder of the universe. He has the wonderful blueprint of Christ’s church and Christ’s followers. Let us examine the destructive areas through the spiritual mirror, the Word of God, repent of our sins before Christ and rebuild the damaged places starting from our sacred hearts together. Amen!

*In this sermon, I have used some thoughts from the various messages based on the text: Nehemiah 3:1-5, 28-32; Romans 12:3-8.