13:1 On that day the book of Moses was read aloud in the hearing of the people. They found written in it that no Ammonite or Moabite may ever enter the assembly of God, 

 

Nehemiah had been governor of Jerusalem for 12 years. As promised, he left Jerusalem and returned to Persia to serve King Artaxerxes as cupbearer. While he was away, the Levites taught at the temple every Sabbath. They read and taught through the entire Word of God by a Scripture-rotation system. On this Sabbath day, the priests were teaching Deuteronomy 23:3-5. 

 

Nehemiah was in Persia on this day of the Scriptures reading, so the Levites were teaching the people of Jerusalem that no Ammonite or Moabite was able to enter the assembly of God. Since some of the men in this assembly were married to Ammonite and Moabite women and sitting right there in the assembly with them, then this caused a big problem for the community. This violation of the Mosaic Law would cause Israel to be vomited out of the land once again.

 

Ammon and Moab were the daughters of Lot. They lived in Sodom with their father for a while. They were very much influenced by the culture of the Sodomites. After Sodom and Gomorrah was destroyed, they liquored up their father and committed incest with him. Their offspring became the Ammonites and Moabites. Their children carried with them the culture of Sodom and Gomorrah. This culture was so wicked, that God had to destroy them as an object lesson to all of the nations in the future. The divine viewpoint of the holy God who created the heavens and the earth and died for the sins of mankind is that any nation that enters into homosexuality will be destroyed. Sodom and Gomorrah was a warning to all nations.

 

13:2 for they had not met the Israelites with food and water, but instead had hired Balaam to curse them. (Our God, however, turned the curse into blessing.)

 

Israel was chosen by God to become priests to all of the nations. Their divine call was to lead the Gentile nations out of demonism and into the knowledge and worship of the one true God. As Israel was traveling to the Promised Land to accomplish this task, as they were being led by the Shechinah Glory into Israel to lead all nations to Christ, the Ammonites and Moabites resisted Israel’s march into Canaan by refusing them food and water. Both of these tribes were cousins of Abraham, but they had devolved into demonism. The goal of demonism is to kill every Jew and Christian on the planet so that the seed of the woman will not crush the head of the serpent.

 

When the Moabites learned that God protected Israel from any physical attack, they hired Balaam to curse Israel. Balaam was an occultist who worshiped demons. God would not allow Balaam to curse Israel, so Balaam tried a more sinister tactic. He asked the pretty Moabite girls to dance naked in front of the night fires of the Israeli camps. These girls seduced the Israelite men into demonism.

 

The Ammonites and Moabites had violated the Abrahamic Covenant. Therefore, they would be cursed. Their curse was that they could not enter the assembly of the Jewish people. They were forbidden to participate in the temple rituals which gave an object lesson of the Messiah to come. This curse turned into a blessing, because the Jewish people were protected from the seduction of demonism.

 

13:3 When they heard the law, they removed from Israel all who were of mixed ancestry. 

 

Nehemiah had removed these foreign wives during his 12-year reign as governor of Jerusalem. After he left to become cupbearer in Persia, the new Israel relapsed back to these illegal and dangerous Gentile intermarriages. Satan wanted Israel to become multicultural and intermarry with the Gentiles. In this way, he could merge satanism into the Jewish culture.

 

13:4 But prior to this time, Eliashib the priest, a relative of Tobiah, had been appointed over the storerooms of the temple of our God.

 

Eliashib was the High Priest of Israel. Tobiah was an Ammonite who attempted to assassinate Nehemiah. Tobiah was one of the three foreign tribal leaders who was trying to prevent Nehemiah from rebuilding the walls. Evidently, Tobiah married one of Eliashib’s daughters, making the High Priest the father-in-law of a satanist. Then, Eliashib the High Priest placed Tobiah, the foreign satanist, over the storerooms of the temple. The storerooms were supposed to store the offerings which supported the Levitical priests. The storerooms were empty, because the Jewish people were not offering their tithes.

 

13:5 He made for himself a large storeroom where previously they had been keeping the grain offering, the incense, and the vessels, along with the tithes of the grain, the new wine, and the olive oil as commanded for the Levites, the singers, the gate keepers, and the offering for the priests.

 

Tobiah had been an enemy of Nehemiah, but now that Nehemiah was gone, the devil moved his man inside of the temple. Tobiah was now opposing God’s work while acting like he was assisting it.

 

13:6 During all this time I was not in Jerusalem, for in the thirty-second year of King Artaxerxes of Babylon, I had gone back to the king. After some time I had requested leave of the king, 

 

While the devil was running the temple storerooms through Tobiah, Nehemiah was in Persia serving the king as cupbearer. Artaxerxes was called the King of Babylon because his rule over the Persian Empire included Babylon. Nehemiah evidently heard of what was going on in Jerusalem, so he asked the king to allow him to go back to Jerusalem for a second time.

 

13:7 and I returned to Jerusalem. Then I discovered the evil that Eliashib had done for Tobiah by supplying him with a storeroom in the courts of the temple of God. 

 

Nehemiah returned to Jerusalem to check out the situation. It was true that the High Priest Eliashib had moved the devil’s man into the temple storeroom. From this position, Tobiah was not feeding the priests. This meant that the priests could not study and teach the Word of God. It is evil to starve the priests so that they cannot teach the Word of God. Satan does not want the modern church to support Pastor teachers who are faithful to teaching the entire counsel of the Word of Gd at the deeds level. 

 

13:8 I was very upset, and I threw all of Tobiah’s household possessions out of the storeroom.

 

Nehemiah overturned the tables of the evil Tobiah, just as Jesus would later overturn the tables of the evil Sadducees.

 

13:9 Then I gave instructions that the storerooms should be purified, and I brought back the equipment of the temple of God, along with the grain offering and the incense.

 

Nehemiah had the chambers fumigated by cleansing it with the blood of an innocent lamb. The temple of the believer is the body which possesses the Holy Spirit. The Messiah would late come and cleanse out the dirty temple of the believer with His own blood.

 

13:10 I also discovered that the grain offerings for the Levites had not been provided, and that as a result the Levites and the singers who performed this work had all gone off to their fields.

 

Tobiah did not feed the Levites, so instead of studying and teaching the Word of God, they had to work in the fields to feed their families. There are many communities all over America who will feed and support a prosperity preacher, a liberal preacher, a charismatic preacher, or a seeker-friendly preacher, but they will not support a bible teacher who teaches the entire counsel of the Word of God at the deepest level. The devil will make sure that the storerooms of bible-teaching churches are empty.

 

13:11 So I registered a complaint with the leaders, asking “Why is the temple of God neglected?” Then I gathered them and reassigned them to their positions. 

 

Nehemiah registered a complaint with the leaders. He then gathered all of them and reassigned their positions. Nehemiah was an elder who made sure that the Word of God was taught and the temple rituals were in operation. These temple rituals were visual object lessons of the Messiah to come. 

 

It is important to note that the prophet Malachi was alive and well during this time. He was condemning the people for their apathy and disrespect toward God. Malachi was the last writing prophet before the coming of the Messiah.

 

13:12 Then all of Judah brought the tithe of the grain, the new wine, and the olive oil to the storerooms.

 

Judah responded to the prophecies of Malachi and the governmental regulations of Nehemiah. They began bringing their offerings to the storerooms. The priests began studying and teaching the Word of God. 

 

13:13 I gave instructions that Shelemiah the priest, Zadok the scribe, and a certain Levite named Pedaiah be put in charge of the storerooms, and that Hanan son of Zaccur, the son of Mattaniah, be their assistant, for they were regarded as trustworthy. It was then their responsibility to oversee the distribution to their colleagues.

 

After Nehemiah rebuked the religious leaders, he took matters into his own hands. He placed trustworthy men over the storerooms of the temple.

 

13:14 Please remember me for this, O my God, and do not wipe out the kindness that I have done for the temple of my God and for its services!

 

Most people want God to leave them alone and forget about them. Not Nehemiah. Nehemiah asked God to remember him.

 

13:15 In those days I saw people in Judah treading winepresses on the Sabbath, bringing in heaps of grain and loading them onto donkeys, along with wine, grapes, figs, and all kinds of loads, and bringing them to Jerusalem on the Sabbath day. So I warned them on the day that they sold these provisions. 

 

After Nehemiah left for Persia, the Israelites began buying and selling on the Sabbath.

 

13:16 The people from Tyre who lived there were bringing fish and all kinds of merchandise and were selling it on the Sabbath to the people of Judah—and in Jerusalem, of all places!

 

Tyre and Sidon were Phoenician shipping cities on the coast of Israel. The Phoenicians were a world power who controlled the sea trade on the Mediterranean Sea. These fishermen of Tyre were allowed into the Jerusalem gates on the Sabbath so that they could sell their fish. The devil probably had his men mark the fish down on these days to entice the Jews to break the Sabbath.

 

13:17 So I registered a complaint with the nobles of Judah, saying to them, “What is this evil thing that you are doing, profaning the Sabbath day? 

 

It was a capital offense to work on the Sabbath. The penalty was death by stoning. 

 

13:18 Isn’t this the way your ancestors acted, causing our God to bring on them and on this city all this misfortune? And now you are causing even more wrath on Israel, profaning the Sabbath like this!”

 

Working on the Sabbath would cause God to vomit Israel out of the land once again.

 

13:19 When the evening shadows began to fall on the gates of Jerusalem before the Sabbath, I ordered the doors to be closed. I further directed that they were not to be opened until after the Sabbath. I positioned some of my young men at the gates so that no load could enter on the Sabbath day. 

 

Nehemiah ordered that the gates to be closed on the Sabbath. He posted guards at the gates to keep the Phoenician fishermen from entering Jerusalem.

 

13:20 The traders and sellers of all kinds of merchandise spent the night outside Jerusalem once or twice. 

 

The Phoenician fishermen spent the night outside of the city gates, hoping that people would come outside of the gates and buy their fish. They probably offered half-price fish on the Sabbath.

 

13:21 But I warned them and said, “Why do you spend the night by the wall? If you repeat this, I will forcibly remove you!” From that time on they did not show up on the Sabbath.

 

Nehemiah threatened police action if they did not vacate the area.

 

13:22 Then I directed the Levites to purify themselves and come and guard the gates in order to keep the Sabbath day holy. For this please remember me, O my God, and have pity on me in keeping with your great love. 

 

The Levites were to go through a ritual cleansing and then guard the gates.

 

13:23 Also in those days I saw the men of Judah who had married women from Ashdod, Ammon, and Moab. 

 

The Jewish men had signed a pledge not to marry foreign wives. They broke this written agreement and married Philistine, Ammonite, and Moabite women. All of these women were pagan women who were raised in demonic cultures. 

 

13:24 Half of their children spoke the language of Ashdod (or the language of one of the other peoples mentioned) and were unable to speak the language of Judah. 

 

These wives were teaching their children the language and demonic customs of the Philistines, not that of the Jewish faith.

 

13:25 So I entered a complaint with them. I called down a curse on them, and I struck some of the men and pulled out their hair. I had them swear by God saying, “You will not marry off your daughters to their sons, and you will not take any of their daughters as wives for your sons or for yourselves!

 

Intermarriage with foreign women was forbidden by the Mosaic Law. These marriages would force Jehovah into vomiting the Israelites out of the land once again. Nehemiah pronounced a curse upon these men. They were endangering the nation of Israel. It seems that he also pulled off their beards. To lose one’s beard was a disgrace in Israel.

 

13:26 Was it not because of things like these that King Solomon of Israel sinned? Among the many nations there was no king like him. He was loved by his God, and God made him king over all Israel. But the foreign wives made even him sin!

 

King Solomon was the wisest man who ever lived, but even he was not able to resist the demonic seduction of the foreign wives.

 

13:27 Should we then in your case hear that you do all this great evil, thereby being unfaithful to our God by marrying foreign wives?”

 

These Israelites were being unfaithful to God when they married foreign wives and committed spiritual adultery with their demonic gods.

 

13:28 Now one of the sons of Joiada son of Eliashib the high priest was a son-in-law of Sanballat the Horonite. So I banished him from my sight. 

 

Even the grandson of the High Priest intermarried with the pagan wives. Sanballat was one of the pagan tribal kings who attempted to stall Nehemiah’s work on the wall. Satan placed him in the family of the high priest so that he could destroy God’s work from the inside.  Satan still works this way today. He places his men inside of the church as pastors, elders, and deacons. 

 

Josephus recorded that this apostate High Priest (Eliashib) was expelled by Nehemiah. He later became chief priest of the rival Samaritan temple built by Sanballat on Mount Gerizim.

 

13:29 Please remember them, O my God, because they have defiled the priesthood, the covenant of the priesthood, and the Levites. 

 

According to the Mosaic Law, mixed marriages defiled the priesthood. A priest was allowed to marry “only a virgin from his own people” (Leviticus 21:14).

 

13:30 So I purified them of everything foreign, and I assigned specific duties to the priests and the Levites. 

 

Since the priesthood was defiled by this foreign marriage, then ritual cleansing with the blood of a lamb was to be administered.

 

13:31 I also provided for the wood offering at the appointed times and also for the first fruits. Please remember me for good, O my God.

 

Nehemiah administered many strong reforms in Israel. He rebuilt the wall, eliminated the foreign wives, cleansed the priesthood, and strengthened the faith of the people.