Sermon Transcript
Then Eliashib the high priest rose up with his brothers the priests, and they built the Sheep Gate. They consecrated it and set its doors. They consecrated it as far as the Tower of the Hundred and as far as the Tower of Hananel. And next to him the men of Jericho built. And next to them, Zaccur the son of Imri built.
The sons of Hassenaiah built the Fish Gate. They laid its beams and set its doors, its bolts and its bars. And next to them, Meremoth the son of Uriah, son of Hakkoz, repaired. And next to them, Meshullam the son of Berechiah, son of Mesheshebel, repaired. And next to them, Zadok the son of Baana And next to them, the Tekoites repaired, but their nobles would not stoop to serve their Lord.
Well, we salute Laura for her fantastic pronunciation of all of those ancient names. If you have been wondering why we switched to someone reading the scripture before the sermon instead of the preacher, reading the passage during the sermon, now you know, the preacher didn’t wanna read all those names. That was clever, huh? That’s not really why, but it worked out well. This isn’t just a list of names though, is it?
I mean, this is the kind of chapter you might skip if you are trying to read your Bible every day. And we actually only had Laura read the first 5 verses out of a possible 32, because I honestly didn’t think you could stand to hear the whole chapter. People have probably died during a public reading of Nehemiah 3, and I didn’t want any blood to be on my hands, so we cut it off at verse 5. But setting our attention span aside, this is more than a list of names. This is a list of people who worked to restore the strength and health of the people of God in their day.
The Israelites had been dispersed. Babylon had come in and wiped out their capital city 140 years earlier. They carried people off into exile and scattered others far and wide all over the region. Then Persia came in and wiped out Babylon and everything was reshuffled once again. Then Nehemiah, the man at the center of this narrative, happens to be in a position of access to the king of Persia who is named Artaxerxes.
By God’s grace, Nehemiah is given permission by Artaxerxes to go back and rebuild his ancestral home of Jerusalem, which is the city that Babylon destroyed. So Nehemiah goes back, he rallies the people, and now in this chapter, they get to work rebuilding the wall around Jerusalem. We’re gonna put a picture of the wall up here on the screen so you see what we’re talking about. Nehemiah chapter 3 details how they rebuilt this wall. The description starts up at the top at the Sheep Gate and then proceeds counterclockwise all the way around back to where it started.
What isn’t explicit in Nehemiah 3 is that the wall around the city is, it’s more than a wall. It’s an infrastructure that will allow people to thrive, to worship, to play without constant threat of attack, to conduct safe commerce, Nehemiah, he’s not just rebuilding a wall, he’s really rebuilding a people. Again, like we said earlier, he’s restoring the strength and health of God’s people in his day.
We, as a church, need our strength and health restored, don’t we? It feels like we, we need to rebuild. In a sense, we have been scattered like the Israelites were scattered. We are not all gathered together in the same location. And like Nehemiah told his people that they would put back together what had been torn apart, I’m telling you, we will, by God’s grace, put back together what has been torn apart in our day.
In the not too distant future, we will gather again and we will put back together what seems so fragmented right now. So I have one objective for this sermon. Of course, I have 3 points, of course, but one true outcome that I really hope to see I want you to prayerfully discern how you will give your time and serve at Bridges Community Church. Notice I didn’t say prayerfully discern if you will serve at Bridges Community Church. I said prayerfully discern how you will serve at Bridges.
Throughout the message, we will hear from 3 wonderful people who already serve at Bridges, and I, and I know many, many of you many, many others of you do as well. But our, our goal again is for all of us to find a place to serve. So let’s listen to, to one person who has found such a place to serve already. Hey everyone, if you don’t know this other guy on the screen with me, this is my friend Andrew Spolar. Who has been at the church his whole life, and he faithfully serves at Bridges Community Church.
So he’s going to tell us a little bit about where he serves and the joy that it has brought him.
Awesome, thanks, Dan. Yeah, like you said, my name is Andrew. I’ve been here my whole life, and I have been serving for the last handful of years in the youth ministry with DK and the other leaders there. And I specifically serve with the high school students. I’ve been doing that ever since I entered college.
So it’s been about almost 6 years now. And it’s just been a pleasure to do so. I think 2 things stick out when I think of the main joys that come out of serving in youth ministry. The first one is the team I get to serve with. We just get to fill each other up.
We, we have been with each other for a while. And so there’s a closeness, there’s a bond that you don’t really get without serving alongside fellow believers. So that’s something that just really is impactful for me. And then the second thing is obviously just getting to hear the heart of the students, just to see lights switch, hearts change towards the Lord. Lord, and just see students’ lives change.
And I think back when I was in youth ministry myself, it was such an influential time, an impactful time, a time where my relationship with God really took off. And just being able to be a part of that on the front lines alongside these students, it’s just really a blessing to be a part And something that brings a lot of joy to my life and I’m sure the lives of the other youth leaders. That’s awesome, man. Yeah, such a pivotal moment in our lives when we’re in school, and we are so glad that our student ministry has you in it. So thank you for serving.
We’re so grateful.
We want everyone to have that kind of excitement and joy from finding a place to serve. We don’t want joy through service to be reserved for only a few select individuals. We want everybody in, everybody in. From our Nehemiah passage and from how the New Testament speaks of the church as a body, we believe everyone has a role to play at this church. And when we come back together, we need everyone all in, every single person.
Okay, so let’s look at Nehemiah chapter 3. We’re gonna see who worked, how they worked, and what they prioritized. Who worked, how they worked, and what they prioritized. So first, who worked? Everyone.
Almost, almost everyone got in on the work. Numerous times throughout the passage it says rulers of different little districts came to help with the strenuous manual labor. The rulers didn’t say, we’re too good for this, you know, somebody else can do it, we can pay somebody to do that, or we’ve worked our whole lives, it’s time for the younger people to step up. They didn’t say any of that, the rulers came, got on their hands and knees, and did the backbreaking labor of rebuilding the wall. It says goldsmiths and perfumers came to rebuild the wall, verse 8.
So Giorgio Armani is out there. These guys aren’t exactly construction workers, right? It’s not like they had a hard hat sitting in the closet that they already knew how to use. It would be easy for them to say, Hey, you know, we’ll come and decorate that wall after you build it, but we’re not gonna build it. They didn’t say that.
They just got to work and did what needed to be done. One guy brought his daughters, verse 12. So young people worked, women worked. It was everyone. Everyone contributed to this effort.
Even the priests were out there. That’s verse 1. Listen, at Bridges, we want everyone contributing to what we are doing. Everyone, especially when we regather. But even now, there are ways that you could be contributing.
You could be making phone calls or writing letters to make sure everyone feels connected and remembered. On our website, we have buttons where you can click, I need help, or I can help. So we want you to go there, click that button, and let us know ways that you could be contributing, helping other people, whether it’s small repairs or rides to the doctor’s office or grocery shopping, little ways that you could be helping other people. You can tell us how you might be able to help others. You can prepare meals for people who don’t have the resources to provide meals for themselves.
When we gather back together, you’ll have a chance to, you can be a part of delivering those meals. Right now, it only can be one person delivering, but you can sign up still help prepare those kind of meals. So there are ways that you could be involved right now. But as we are on the verge of coming back together in person, we want you to pray through the possibilities of how you can serve at Bridges when we regather. So we’ve made a handy list for you that we want you to fill out and get it back to us.
You can navigate to connectbcc.org/serve. That should be appearing on the screen right now in this area. If you are more comfortable with pen and paper, you could print out the sermon notes and mail it to us. A little button on the side of the screen that says sermon notes, click on that and print out the list and circle what you’re interested in, mail it to us. But for those of you who are comfortable with navigating the internet, go to this website, which is still Look at all the areas of service and pray about where, where God wants you to serve.
We want every one of us to serve in some capacity at Bridges. We need people to drive our bus. Students or other groups take trips and somebody needs to drive the bus. And we have a shortage of bus drivers right now. We need people to serve in our preschool.
Children’s ministries, student ministries. But the people who serve in those ministries, we really want you to be able to be there like twice a month because the way students and kids work is that they need consistency in their lives. They don’t need an army of random people who they only see once a year. They need people they actually know. In the same way, we need people to serve as buddies on Sunday mornings for students.
Or children with special needs. We need somebody to be their buddy, to provide attention and encouragement for our friends with special needs. Sit next to them in the service, be in Sunday school class with them. We need people in the choir, orchestra, band, tech team, security, welcome team, ushers, greeters, first impressions team, women’s ministry planning committee. There are so many ways that you can serve So go to this website right now, connectbcc.org/serve, and we will get you ready to serve in our church when we regather.
In the New Testament, the church is described as a body, right? There are feet, hands, eyes, a nose. Each part of the body has a different role and each part must perform their role role if the body is going to function to its, to its full capacity. So just think what would happen if an eye, an ear, a foot isn’t doing its job. What happens to the body?
You could actually find out right now if you don’t already know. You could pause the video, close your eyes, and just start running around your house.
That’s not going to end well. But in some ways, right, that’s what happens to a church when someone isn’t engaged. A part of the body is missing. We need you engaged here. For Nehemiah, there was only one group that didn’t contribute to the rebuilding effort.
Verse 5, it’s the nobles of the Tekoites. It says they would not stoop to serve the Lord.
They probably watched the reconstruction effort, they were probably glad the walls were being rebuilt, they certainly would benefit from the walls being up, but they did not participate. You read Nehemiah chapter 3 and you think, how could they have not been involved? How could they just sit there? And you even kind of laugh a little, like, this is the only mention of the nobles of the Tekoites in all of Scripture. It’s the only thing we know about them at all, that they didn’t contribute.
Like, I’m sure they’re not that bad of people, right? But this is the only thing that we ever know about them. It’s like, kind of poor them, right?
Right? We don’t want you sitting out. We want you engaged.
So let’s hear from another person at— from Bridges who certainly isn’t sitting on the sidelines. Hey everyone. Well, if you don’t know this lady on the screen with me, this is my friend and faithful servant around here at Bridges Community Church, Sujana Pantulu, and we are so grateful for all the ways that she contributes to what we’re doing. So she’s gonna tell you a couple of ways that she serves around the church and the joy that she has found through doing it. Hi, Dan, thank you very much.
And yeah, I’ve been serving in different areas around church. Just to name a few, I’m on the Deaconess Board, And the board serves, uh, with the senior care, the memorials, um, we, uh, visit new babies, we help with the communion, we help with the baptism, a whole lot of things on that board. Um, I also work with the transportation ministry, which not many people are aware of that we have at Bridges, but it’s there. And I work with the high school girls. I lead a life application Bible study for the high school girls.
And I lead the homeless ministry through Much Hope, and we serve the community around us, the homeless and people in need, by being hands and feet of Jesus.
Yeah, that’s awesome.
Yeah, what— where have you found just maybe one story of joy that you have found in one of these many areas where you serve? Serving is always— it gives me great joy because it helps me show God’s love to other people the way God showed us his love. And it’s living out the Great Commandments. So each area has its joys. So when I meet the seniors, they have a wealth of knowledge and their wisdom is amazing, and the love they show me, it touches me deeply.
When I serve the high school girls, they are giving me insights to— as to how a teenager’s brain works so I can be a better mom for my teenager. And, um, with the homeless ministry, every time I go thinking, oh, I’m going to serve them, but I come back being blessed. God uses each opportunity to turn it around to be a blessing for me. Um, one example from the very recent past I would like to share is, um, our family was taking, um, supplies for the families displaced by the wildfires on the coast. And as we were driving by, we stopped at a produce stand, and a little kid, an elementary school kid, was manning the store with a laptop in hand.
And we got talking, and I asked him what was he doing there, and he said he was doing school while he was running the store. And he shared his story and how things go on, and we’ve learned that life is extremely difficult for them despite the hard work they put in. So we as ended up realizing the need that they needed school supplies. So he called a few of his friends and we put together a list of what is needed for him and his friends. And the next day we took some school supplies for them.
And I got the most amazing note from a girl who’s in 8th grade. And she said she’s the oldest in the family with a lot of siblings, and the parents were not able to afford sending them to school. It’s not as much sending, it’s simple things like pens and pencils and paper. And the parents were not able to buy those, and she was asked to quit school and start working in the farm. Um, but she is a believer, and she started praying about it.
Uh, her family and friends made fun of her when she prayed for a miracle, but she wrote that me giving her those few pens, a calculator, and a couple of notebooks turned it around for her. So because now she has the school supplies and the siblings have the school supplies, she doesn’t have to quit school. And she wrote, you got me a little closer to my dream of becoming a nurse. Never in my dreams would I think that a small thing like providing pens and pencils could touch somebody like that. And her faith and her trust in God, that God can still do miracles in today’s time and age, was an experience for me, was a blessing for me.
It’s a reminder how I’m faithful enough, and I get scared when things happen. So it was a blessing for me to see her be so strong and amazed at how God can turn the smallest obedience into something of glory for him. That is such a cool story. Wow. And you do such a good job just representing Christ wherever you go, whether it’s in the church or when you’re doing your homeless outreach.
When you’re in the middle of a farming community, I guess. We’re, we’re so grateful for you and that you are part of, a very important part of what, of what Bridges Community Church is in this area. Thanks, Sujana. Thank you, Dan.
Those are cool stories, right? Those are pretty good stories.
We want them to be your your stories.
We want you engaged and serving.
Okay, so on Nehemiah’s team, almost everyone worked, but how did they work? They worked together in unison. Nehemiah’s team worked together in unison. The most repeated phrase throughout this chapter is, and next and after them, these people worked on this section, and after them, these people worked here, and then next to them, these people worked here. They are working together, they are working in unison, they are working toward one common mission.
No one is rowing oars in opposite directions. Nobody appears to be out for himself or herself. No one seems to be seeking their own glory in this rebuilding. No one is asking, well, what am I getting out of this, right? Nobody’s asking that.
Nobody’s pushing their own agenda. They are all working together in unison. Sometimes when people volunteer, they want to do things a bit sideways from the direction of the group. Like, I’ll volunteer, but I’m gonna do it my way. And since I’m a volunteer, you can’t really complain.
You should just be grateful that someone has come to help, right? I’m gonna teach what I wanna teach and how I wanna teach. If I’m on the tech crew, I’ll shine the lights wherever I think is best. I’ll show up to the rehearsals or I’ll show up to hospital visitations when I want to show up. And if I’m late, hey, at least I’m there, right?
If I’m planning an event, I’ll share the details of the event with others, with leadership, whenever I get it together, and if I only get the event planned a day before it takes place, well, at least I planned something, right? If it’s my job to follow up with first-time guests to our life group, maybe I’ll follow up with 2 out of 10 people. At least I followed up with someone.
Sometimes volunteers can have that kind of attitude, and if they do, it’s actually counterproductive. Instead of actually helping, it is slowing down the mission. Someone has to stop their job and go do the other job correctly, so something isn’t getting done. And, and we’re back to closing our eyes and running around the house again because part of the body is missing. Or part of it’s malfunctioning.
Nehemiah’s team was all going in the same direction. And they were so efficient, we find out in chapter 6, they built the entire wall in 52 days. The wall went up so quickly that the opposition couldn’t get organized. We’ll talk more about opposition next week, but one commentator noted a reason the opposition was unsuccessful was how efficiently the wall went up. Nehemiah’s team was better, quicker, faster, so they prevailed.
I want you to dream about what could happen in our community and in our church if we were all serving in some way. What could we accomplish if we were all headed in the same direction?
Direction. Well, let’s talk with another one of our church members who is certainly all in, um, and never operates, uh, sideways from what needs to be done.
Well, hey everyone, I’m here with my friend. Uh, if you don’t know the gentleman on the screen with me, his name is Dick Smith, and he has been, uh, a faithful servant at Bridges for decades, really. We are super thankful for the various ways that he has served around the church, and so he’s going to tell you a little bit about where he has served and the joy that it has brought him.
Well, I first attended the church in April of 1968. Happened to be Palm Sunday. Someone— I was looking for another church, and someone suggested, try First Baptist in Los Altos, I think you’ll like it. Well, think you’ll like it was very short of the truth. I was really impressed even that first Sunday with the choir and Dr.
Craft’s preaching and so on, and I didn’t have to look any further. This is where I want to be. So I’ve been there almost 53 years now.
I almost immediately was in the choir and have always been very pleased. We, we are so used to good music, I’m not sure that we know how blessed we are. And over all those years with different directors and different participants and so on, we have kept that excellent excellence.
Up, and I’ve very much enjoyed that.
I began working with Christian Service Brigade and worked for 20 years or so with that, generally handling some of the administrative part of it, ordering supplies and paying bills and so on, which is a story of my life. Handle money in and out. And served on the missions committee for 22 years, very much enjoyed that, getting to know our missionaries more intimately than you do just hearing what they say in a congregational meeting. You get to know some of the things that go on behind the scenes, some of the struggles they have, some of the real successes they have. I still have a number of friends when they show up at the church.
It’s exciting to see them.
I— Dan mentioned earlier when we were discussing it that I’ve worked with Fusion helping cook. I am not a cook. I and chop and so on, but other people do the cooking or you wouldn’t like it if I did it. I’ve enjoyed that. It’s a great crew to work with.
For about 34 years, I worked in the finance area of the church. Again, making bank deposits, paying bills, keeping the records, making that various reports were filed on time and things like that. I enjoy working with numbers. I knew that when I was in grade school, and it was frankly, for me, it was an ideal job.
I often said I loved 85% of it, the other 15% is what made it a job. It was a I was able to work not only with church finances but also with the schools because they’re an integral part of the budgeting and finance side and very much enjoyed— I’ve worked with Los Altos Christian School almost from the beginning and have really enjoyed that relationship over the years. Years. I, of course, served on Finance Committee because of my employment, and I mentioned Missions Committee. Served on the school board some years, not a majority of that time, but some of it.
And you have been everywhere. Pretty much covers the territory. Of course, I’ve been— yeah, that is so neat. Been retired for the last 7 years, but I even had— until we had to close the office for a couple of years, I helped out with the receptionist area in the church office and enjoyed being back in, in-house, so to speak, after my retirement. Yeah, we— and it’s been so good to get to know you in the office here, always so willing to help whatever we’re doing.
God has greatly blessed me. You’ve been a fixture at family fun night too. Oh, you were gonna say something. Go ahead. The biggest thing is that I met Nancy at the church.
Of course, it took a long time. People were thinking they’re never gonna get hitched. We did. It lasted for 22 years until the Lord took her home.
I can’t imagine— special— can’t imagine having been married to anyone else.
That’s, that’s a special testimony over a long period of time, Dick. We are, we are so grateful for all the ways that you’ve served for so long. I know to countless children around here, you’re kind of a grandfather figure because you’re always, whether it’s at Fusion or Family Fun Night or even on a Sunday You’re, you’re saying hi, you know their names, uh, you get to know them, um, you’re, you’re interested in everybody’s life. It is, uh, it is every bit as much of a joy for us, um, to serve alongside of you as it is, uh, that you were sharing. Thank you.
It is on your end. I sometimes said I don’t have any children of my own, so I have to borrow other people’s kids. Yeah, that’s such a great thing about the church, right, is we really are a family. And no matter what our biological family looks like, we have— being connected to other people in the body of Christ means that we, we, we have a full and wondrous family to be a part of.
What I love about his story is that it’s not only serve at one event, although serving at one event one time is a great way to get started. And we want you to do that to get your If that’s what you need to do to jump in, we want you to start with just one event. But what we see in his story is someone serving wherever the need is for the long haul.
Back to Nehemiah, almost everyone worked, they worked together in unison. So what did they prioritize?
Preparing for war. They prioritized preparing for worship.
Nehemiah starts his description of the rebuilding effort, verse 1, with the priests coming to build the Sheep Gate. That’s what Nehemiah talks about first. Now, for those of us who have never been to ancient Jerusalem, we can put the map back up here. The Sheep Gate up there at the top is the gate closest to the Temple Mount.
Where followers of God would bring their sacrifices as part of their worship. Animal sacrifices were required for proper worship in the Old Testament because sin is a big deal. Sin causes death. Sin separates us from God. Hebrews 10 explains the sacrifices in the Old Testament, which were the ones offered annually, were a reminder of sin.
So, by bringing an animal and having it killed, they were able to see very tangibly the effects of sin. Something was broken between them and God. When they saw that, it was supposed to make them long for the day when God would come and make it right. That was their worship. That was part of their worship, this visual representation that my actions have separated me from God, right?
Kill the animal and long for the day for God to make it right. Apparently, that is what is on top of Nehemiah’s mind when he starts rebuilding. The Sheep Gate is verse 1 one of the rebuilding effort. Now you might think, I might think, if you’re rebuilding the fortress around a city, um, Nehemiah would start with maybe the tower so he could see the enemy coming. He might start with defense mechanisms.
He might start with wells or some kind of subterranean system to divert water into the city so you’d have something to even if the city was under siege.
But no, the description starts with the Sheep Gate.
The Israelites were first and foremost preparing to worship. All that other stuff needs to get done. It is super important in a city to have a tower and a water system, but only in its proper place. Proper time. First priority, set up the mandated means for worship.
Bridges, let us never forget what we’re really doing here.
We are here to celebrate, to adore, to encounter, to make much of the God who came to reconcile us to him, Jesus Christ, God in the flesh, the Lamb of God, who unlike the lambs in the Old Testament, those lambs were brought in through the Sheep Gate to be sacrificed partly as a reminder that our relationship with God was broken. Jesus, on the other hand, the ultimate Lamb of God, was brought out through the gates of the city on top of a hill next to the Sheep Gate where he was crucified for our sins, thus reconciling us to God.
And now, instead of sacrifices being a reminder of our broken relationship with God, Jesus’ final sacrifice Yes, we don’t offer sacrifices anymore. If you’re new around here, churches don’t do that. You don’t need to bring an animal to church. We don’t offer sacrifices because Jesus’ final sacrifice provides our complete, unending reconciliation with God. That’s why we put crosses in churches, to remind us through our faith in his sacrificial work, we are united to God forever.
Let’s pray.
Father, thank you for making us as a church your body. Lord, thank you for giving each one of us a position and part to play in this mission of bringing you to the world, Lord. We pray, Lord, that each of us would find the exact place where you have called us to serve and we would joyfully serve in that capacity. Lord, direct our attention to you and remind us what we’re really doing here. We are here to worship you.
To celebrate you, to make much of you, Lord. We pray those things in Jesus’ name. Amen.
