Walls and Gates of Safety

WALLS AND GATES OF SAFETY

The story continues of God’s people returning from the seventy years captivity in Babylon and the rebuilding the temple and now, the walls and the city gates of Jerusalem. This entire story is like a second Exodus of Israel coming out of captivity and entering into the Land, with this re-entering taking many long years like the first Exodus. This re-entry spanned the reigns of three kings in Babylon and Persia, with many delays and disruptions because of the enemies in the region.
Zerubbabel led the first wave of returning exiles out of Babylon and some years later there came the arrival of Ezra for the rebuilding of God’s Word into the peoples’ hearts.
The Temple had now been built, the sacrifices were now being offered, the Word of God had now been restored, but there were still no walls and gates of safety and security for God’s people and they were still open to enemy attack. 
So now God sends Nehemiah to return from Babylon to oversee the rebuilding the walls and gates of the city. This was the final work needed for the reset and rebuilding of God’s people as his witness to the nations. So we see again in this continuing story the parallels of Israel experiencing a reset after their world had come to a standstill and the Church today preparing to experience a reset just as our world has also come to a standstill in this global crisis we are living in today.

Just as God moved the hearts of world rulers and intervened sovereignly in history for his people under the leadership of Zerubbabel and Ezra, God now moves history for Nehemiah through the Persian King Artaxerxes to finish the rebuilding of the temple and the walls of Jerusalem. He uses these unlikely allies to fulfil His promises of restoration for His people. 

It was the task of Nehemiah to see both the restoration of the walls and the rebuilding of the gates of those walls. 
Nehemiah 1:3 "Those who are back in the province are in great trouble and disgrace. The wall of Jerusalem is still broken down, and its gates have been burned with fire."
The lack of walls around the exiles who had returned from captivity over those last few years meant that they were living an unprotected life in the sense that they were allowing alien and sometimes hostile influences from the outside world around them to bring confusion into their lives. 
It also meant that they allowed themselves to wander out into the surrounding regions where corrupt cultural values and practices caused many of them to be enticed into an ungodly lifestyle.
Nehemiah 2:17 Then I said to them, “You see the trouble we are in, how Jerusalem lies in ruins with its gates burned. Come, let us build the wall of Jerusalem, that we may no longer suffer derision… The God of heaven will make us prosper, and we his servants will arise and build
Nehemiah returned and had to teach the people how to build and how to fight the enemy at the same time, and the enemy’s tactics were sometimes subtle and sometimes brutal. They were being discouraged, and their values being despised and mocked. Sanballat, who was one of the leading adversaries of Israel’s return and rebuilding was continually conspiring to hinder the work and spoke these words of derision to the work of Nehemia; 

Nehemiah 4:1-6. "What does this bunch of poor, feeble Jews think they are doing?" he scoffed. "Do they think they can build the wall in a day if they offer enough sacrifices? Will they revive the stones out of the heaps of rubbish, and burned ones at that?” 4 Then I prayed, "Hear us, O Lord God, for we are being mocked…..for they have despised you in despising us who are building your wall…So we built the wall… for the people had a mind to work.

This same thing happens to God’s people today and God wants his people to maintain rule over their spiritual and natural lives, and to rebuild the walls and gates of safety and security around their souls and minds. God is giving us spiritual authority in these days I believe, through faith in His Word and the empowering presence of The Holy Spirit. We are challenged in the Scriptures to maintain this authority.
Proverbs 25:28 Whoever has no rule over his own spirit is like a city broken down, without walls.
Notice in that prayer to God that Nehemiah called the wall ‘your wall’. The wall of faith that we build around us is God’s wall. 
They also had a challenging problem with all the broken down rubble left around from the old wall. 

Neh 4:10  Then some of the leaders began complaining that the workmen were becoming tired; and there was so much rubble to be removed that we could never get it done by ourselves. (TLB) 
This speaks to us of the brokenness and vulnerability that our lives have suffered, but that is where God shows his miracle working power to redeem all the things in our lives that have been broken down.
Satan tries to get us spiritually and emotionally fatigued by us walking around in our minds in the rubbish of our own past mistakes or failures. Our soul can become emotionally fragmented and our minds overcome with negativity and stress. These blows can turn healthy solid pieces of building blocks into rubble.

The spiritual building blocks that God builds into our lives make up the many diverse aspects of who we are, and the good news is that God takes all these experiences and turns them into fresh opportunities to look at the situation His way – The Holy Spirit is waiting to show us what God is saying to us in these experiences. He builds our wall – he surrounds us. Self destructive attitudes of fear can be changed into healthy attitudes of faith when they are placed in the safety of God’s walls of refuge.
Psalm 32:7 You are my place of refuge, You preserve me from trouble; You surround me with songs of deliverance.
Nehemiah took all the rubble and recycled it into building material, just as God does with our lives, and even the dust and dirt and gravel was mixed with clay to make mortar for the stones. God won’t waste a thing! God turns our weaknesses into our strengths – to bind our wall together and to strengthen his wall for our lives. Nehemiah and all the people finally completed the work and rebuilt the walls and the ten gates that had been destroyed and burnt down. The gates were where the elders of the city sat and made decisions for the government of the city. There is also an individual gatekeeping ministry that we each can exercise in our coming in and going out through the spiritual and natural gates of our lives in this world in which we live at his critical moment in time. Having walls and gates does not mean living a life cut off from the world. It does not mean exclusivity but it does mean selectivity. When we look at the name and the nature of the ten gates that were rebuilt we can see a spiritual application in them for finding wisdom as to what we convey through our spiritual gates into and out of our lives. We can also find we are given gatekeeping occasions for helping others in their gatekeeping management decisions. 
The ten gates were in order; The Sheep gate, the fish gate, the old gate, the valley gate, the refuse gate (garbage gate!) the fountain gate, the water gate, the horse gate, the east gate, and the gathering gate.

Let us look at an example of a few of these gates; Some speak for themselves and only need a brief mention.
The sheep gate speaks to us of always being open to the forgiveness and mercy of the Lamb of God slain before the foundation of the world for our sins.
The fish gate speaks of the word of Jesus to his disciples to making us   ‘fishers of men’
The old gate speaks of the established ways of God that never change in guiding our paths
Jeremiah 6:16 Thus says the Lord: Stand by the roads, and look, and ask for the ancient paths,where the good way is; and walk in it,
The valley gate speaks of going through the valleys of grief and suffering in our lives.
The refuse gate - garbage gate. Remember what I said earlier Satan tries to get us spiritually and emotionally fatigued by us walking around in our minds in the rubbish of our own past mistakes or failures. Get rid of that at the garbage gate.
The fountain gate speaks of allowing the fountain of living water to spring up from our innermost being John 7:37 Now this he said about the Spirit, whom those who believed in him were to receive… This is the powerful flow of life of His Spirit
The water gate is the actual cleansing of our spirit from the water of his Word. 
Ephesians 5:26 that He might sanctify and cleanse her with the washing of water by the word,
The horse gate – This speaks of the power we have in spiritual warfare.
Zechariah 10:3 and will make them like the powerful horse in battle. 
Job 39.25 He laughs at fear and is not dismayed;he does not turn back from the sword.
he cannot stand still at the sound of the trumpet.When the trumpet sounds, he says ‘Aha! 

The east gate. In Ezekiel the east gate faced towards the direction of the mount of olives, looking for the coming of the Lord in the end time. This gate is sealed shut until he comes.
The gathering gate. This speaks of the calling together of the gathering of God’s people. We have experienced the Covid safety challenges to the keeping of this gate in these times in which we live. Nonetheless ‘unto him shall the gathering of the people be’ (Genesis 49:10)

Nehemiah 6:15 So the wall was finished on the twenty-fifth day of the month Elul, in fifty-two days. And when all our enemies heard of it, all the nations around us were afraid and fell greatly in their own esteem, knowing that this had been the work of God.
52 days is a very short time – but to see in Nehemiah chapter thee the names of all the people in there helping one another. I gave up counting them. We are to be like them, there with one another for on another. It is an attitude of being beside each other in prayer and care, in willingness to help in whatever way we can so that the same will be said of them, that just as in the verse we just read – All the nations round about them saw them rebuild the gates and knew that this was the work of God. It is our lives together here on earth revealing that there is a God in heaven.