Moreover, from the twentieth year of King Artaxerxes, when I was appointed to be their governor in the land of Judah, until his thirty-second year—twelve years—neither I nor my brothers ate the food allotted to the governor. But the earlier governors—those preceding me—placed a heavy burden on the people and took forty shekels of silver from them in addition to food and wine. Their assistants also lorded it over the people. But out of reverence for God I did not act like that. Instead, I devoted myself to the work on this wall. All my men were assembled there for the work; we did not acquire any land.
Furthermore, a hundred and fifty Jews and officials ate at my table, as well as those who came to us from the surrounding nations. Each day one ox, six choice sheep and some poultry were prepared for me, and every ten days an abundant supply of wine of all kinds. In spite of all this, I never demanded the food allotted to the governor, because the demands were heavy on these people.
Remember me with favor, O my God, for all I have done for these people. (Nehemiah 5:14-19)
Nehemiah was careful not to put extra burdens on the people. He knew that they had all that they could contend with just creating walls around their city. Previous governors had placed difficult requirements on the Jews, but Nehemiah’s yoke was easy, and his burden was light. I use that phrase particularly to evoke Matthew 11:28-30, in which Jesus said:
Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy and my burden is light.
Throughout the book, Nehemiah serves as a picture of Jesus and the Word of God, which calls us to build our spiritual walls. The message from this passage is that we should compare the burden of Satan’s yoke to that of our Savior’s. When we live a life of sexual immorality, we are submitting to Satan’s yoke. Like the governors before Nehemiah, Satan will exact a heavy price from us. But when we choose to take on Christ’s yoke by putting away sexual immorality, we find that it’s much easier to bear.
If we could remember how heavy Satan’s yoke is, we would think twice about committing sexual sin. If we could remember the guilt, the depression, the disappointment that follows the sin, we would steer clear of his temptations. But we forget. The further we get from the pain, the less real it seems to us. I found that it helped me to sit down and make a list of all the negative consequences of sexual sin. Then, I made a list of all the benefits of walking with the Lord in this area. Reviewing those lists helped me remember whose yoke I preferred.
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Nehemiah’s almost done with the walls. When your walls are up, Satan switches tactics. We’ll see how in the next chapter.
