After all the celebrations, amens and newly revived spirit toward God and His Word, this chapter tells us the Jews quickly moved away from God because Nehemiah left for a little while, Exodus 32:1.
We read here about the honesty of the people in their efforts to keep the law. When they read in the law that they weren’t to join themselves in any way to the Ammonites or Moabites, they excluded the Ammonites and Moabites from their fellowship, Genesis 12:3 / Deuteronomy 23:3-5 / Ezra 10:15-44.
The problem was the Jews wanted to be friends with everyone, and so, when they allowed foreigners to come in with their teachings about other gods and other ways, they caused the Jews to start following after their false way.
Some of these foreigners like the Ammonites and Moabites were specifically named. Instead of greeting the children of Israel and treating them kindly, they decided to hire Balaam to curse them, but that didn’t work because God intervened and turned that curse into a blessing, Numbers 22-24.
Nehemiah had apparently left and gone back to Persia to see the king, but we don’t know how long he was gone.
Eliashib was the high priest, Nehemiah 3:1, but he had a strong connection with Tobiah, neither marital relationships nor relationships through relatives were to be maintained if they led to compromising or violating the law of God.
Eliashib was related by marriage to Tobiah, Nehemiah 6:18, he was an Ammonite, and a person who previously joined in opposition to Nehemiah, Nehemiah 2:9-10 / Nehemiah 2:17-20 / Nehemiah 4:6-9 / Nehemiah 6:1-3.
Because of this relationship, he had defiled the house of God by taking over a room that was used to store things according to God’s Law and made it a room for Tobiah, Matthew 23:13-36.
When Nehemiah finds out about what had happened, he dealt with the problem straight away, he had all the things in that room that we set up for Tobiah, who was a Gentile, thrown out, and he had the room purified and then all the things that were supposed to be in there were restored, Matthew 21:12-13 / Mark 11:15-17 / Luke 19:45-46 / John 2:13-17.
Here we read that not only had the house of God been defiled by the high priest, the rulers and the people had stopped paying their tithes. This was a failure of leadership that led to the lack of support for the Levites and temple servants.
Notice again Nehemiah’s leadership skill, he deals with the problem by asking them why they had neglected the house of the Lord and gets them to start giving their tithes again.
Because the people failed to support the Levites, they had to return to their fields and raise crops for food. During Nehemiah’s absence, while he was in Susa, it seems that the people failed to carry out their promise to support the Levites, Nehemiah 12:44-47 / 2 Corinthians 9:6-7.
This occasion must have broken Nehemiah’s heart, especially after everything he’s done, hence, why he prays again to God to remember all that he did to make the people get back right with God.
The Sabbath was a sign of the covenant between God and Israel, Exodus 20:1-8, but while Nehemiah was gone from Judah on his trip back to Susa, the local people were carrying on with their normal business on the Sabbath, despite making an oath that they wouldn’t, Nehemiah 10:28-39.
They were working on the day of rest and trading with foreigners. Their working on the Sabbath is described as a ‘wicked thing’ because they were breaking their covenant with God, Jeremiah 17:21-27. Obviously today as Christians we’re not under the Old Testament law, and not required to keep the Sabbath Day, Colossians 2:16-17.
It appears that these traders from Tyre were more concerned with making a profit than honouring a Jewish Sabbath, Ezra 3:7. Notice Nehemiah rebukes them, not for trading, not because they were Gentiles who weren’t under the law of Moses, but because they were trading on the Sabbath, which in effect would have tempted the Jews to break the Sabbath rules.
In an effort to stop the Gentile traders from doing their business in Jerusalem, Nehemiah instructs them to close the gates of the city at sundown on Friday and didn’t open them again until after the Sabbath, Matthew 24:20, which, although we’re not told, the other towns and villages would have done too.
Notice once again that Nehemiah prays to God to spare him from what the Jews were doing.
The Jews had married foreign women and some of their children couldn’t even speak the language of Judah.
Notice again Nehemiah’s leadership skill in dealing with this problem, he fought with them, beat them and even pulled their hair out until they would swear by God that they would not intermarry with the foreigners anymore.
Then he gave them the example of Solomon and how he sinned against God because he married all those foreign women, 1 Kings 11:3, and he allowed them to influence him to set up buildings and altars for their various false gods, 1 Kings 11:6-10.
The prophet Malachi prophesied about this corruption of the priesthood in Malachi 2. These priests had intermarried with their enemy and had made them their ally and so, in order to preserve the identity of Israel in Palestine, all the foreigners had to go.
Nehemiah drove Joiada away because of this unlawful practice. Ezra had made the people commit to this, but by the time of Nehemiah’s arrival, they had forgotten their commitment, Ezra 10:1-44.
Notice again that Nehemiah prays to God that he will remember these men who had corrupted the priesthood.
He purifies all the priests by telling them to get rid of any foreign ties from their families, and he gets the priesthood back to what it was supposed to be doing, Nehemiah 11:10-22.
Then one last time Nehemiah prays to God that He will remember the good that he had done.
Sadly, only a few years from now, the Israelites would once again get involved in sin, break their vows and covenant relationship with God, oh how they needed grace, Romans 8:3.
When we think about Nehemiah’s leadership skills, we see that he was a man who was sensitive to the people’s needs, Nehemiah 1:4, he was a man who was totally reliant on God, Nehemiah 1:4-11 / Nehemiah 2:4.
He was a man who was full of ambition for God, Nehemiah 2:5-8, he was a man who used the wisdom of God to deal with problems and get things done, Nehemiah 4:16-22.
He was a man who simply wouldn’t give up, Nehemiah 6:1-15, and he was a man with very high standards, that is, God’s standards, Nehemiah 10:29-39.