Contemplative Bible Reading

Nehemiah 13:15-18 (New Living Translation)

¹⁵ In those days I saw men of Judah treading out their winepresses on the Sabbath. They were also bringing in grain, loading it on donkeys, and bringing their wine, grapes, figs, and all sorts of produce to Jerusalem to sell on the Sabbath. So I rebuked them for selling their produce on that day. ¹⁶ Some men from Tyre, who lived in Jerusalem, were bringing in fish and all kinds of merchandise. They were selling it on the Sabbath to the people of Judah—and in Jerusalem at that!

¹⁷ So I confronted the nobles of Judah. “Why are you profaning the Sabbath in this evil way?” I asked. ¹⁸ “Wasn’t it just this sort of thing that your ancestors did that caused our God to bring all this trouble upon us and our city? Now you are bringing even more wrath upon Israel by permitting the Sabbath to be desecrated in this way!”

This has to fall under the heading what are you thinking!?

I am reading through the Bible using a One Year Chronological Bible from Tyndale. Recently, I have read for days and days about Judah’s troubles, Judah being trampled, Judah being exiled, and Judah suffering beyond what we today can imagine.

After 70 years of exile, some Jews have returned to Jerusalem. And what do they do? They violate the Sabbath: one of the fundamental tenants of the Law. Again, what are you thinking?

How much punishment, how much hard times, how much misery does a group of people have to suffer before they understand the correlation between sin and misery?

I guess we have to ask the same stupid question of ourselves today. How much drunkenness, adultery, greed, hatred, gossip, and other sin must be commit before we realize that God didn’t intend that life for us? Why do we have to live by Satan’s recommendations?

What are we thinking?