Escuela de idiomar (Language School)

Today was my first day of group classes at Ole language school. It was really, really good! I had three classes and two of them were one-on-one which is handy. The other class I have a German guy studying with me which is also cool. I am learning lots and my Spanish is improving rapidly! I now have classes Monday to Friday for 3 hours a day. Please pray that these classes will be effective and also that I will not be too busy with all my activities.

I want to share just a few thoughts and encouragements from the bible - I have been studying Nehemiah along with the Scripture Union Encounter With God aid and I was blown away reading Nehemiah 8-9 so I wanted to share it with you.

So check out Nehemiah 8-9 and follow along!

First of all, the people had just finished rebuilding the walls of the city - a major project. They had just settled in their towns. They then came to the city gate and told Ezra the priest to bring out the Law of Moses. The people went to their leaders and asked for God´s word to be read to them! How often do we have this sort of commitment and thirst for God´s word? How often do we actively seek its blessing and direction, instruction and correction?

Next, the whole assembly of men, women and anyone who could understand listened from daybreak till noon and they all listened attentively! They listened attentively all morning! How often I find myself distracted or my mind wandering during a 30 minute sermon or when I´m reading God´s word. Once again, they had a thirst for God´s word that is a testimony to us.

As Ezra opened the book, all the people stood up. I can picture the 50,000 odd people all standing up at once. Then when Ezra praised God, everyone lifted their hands up and responded "Amen! Amen!" Imagine that for a worship service!! It´s more like the whole of the AFL Grand Final praising God - how awesome would that be!?!

Then the Levites, the spiritual workers appointed by God, who studied the word and worked in the temple, read from the word and explained it to the people. They made it clear so the people could understand. What a blessing it is to have godly spiritual leaders to make God´s word clear to us. We should recognise these people, pray for them and support them.

Then everyone celebrated!!! They had a party to mark this holy time of reading God´s word. They didn´t mourn, they were happy because they had received God´s instruction and understood it. They had this amazing joy - how good is that!! I was reading the other day that "the joy of the Lord will be your strength." It certainly was for these people.

The next day they gathered again around Ezra - the family leaders, priest and Levites - to read God´s word. The next bit is super-cool! They found out something new from reading God´s word and they were like "Oh no! We´re not following God´s word! We need to do this right away!" So they got straight to it! They went out and obeyed what God had said in his word. What a massive lesson for us! How often we hear sermon after sermon of good teaching and we read God´s word only to fail in obeying it. "It´s too hard" we say, or "we´ll start that once we get this other thing fixed up." No - the people get straight to it and we should also have that kind of immediate obedience.

From that obedience, they had massive joy. It says that they hadn´t celebrated the festival like this, with as much vigour, since the days of Joshua son of Nun. That says to me that it was massive! Then every day they continued to read from God´s word. Obedience to God brings us real joy as we follow him. Can you catch a glimpse of the joy that these people experienced as they celebrate God´s goodness and God´s direction.

They go on in chapter 9 to fast and spend a quarter of the day reading God´s word and a quarter of the day confessing their sins and worshipping God. They praise God and recount his hand in the lives of their people, the Israelites, and how he has been gracious, compassionate, loving and patient with them. God is the same yesterday, today and forever and we can remember his goodness to his people and to us constantly.

I was so encouraged by this passage and I hope you are too. There´s many more lessons and applications in this rich part of scripture, but these were just some lessons that jumped out at me.

¡Adios!

Phil