Missionary work and identification

What is Nehemiah's reaction to the news from the exiles? "As soon as I heard these words I sat down and wept and mourned for days, and I continued fasting and praying before the God of heaven." Nehemiah was a man who was willing to weep over the city and the people of God. He loved the city and the nation. The first thing we must look for in our leaders, particularly church planters, is a passion like Nehemiah's, a passion willing to weep and mourn over the condition of the city and the people we are called to serve.

Nehemiah identified with the people in Jerusalem, he didn't see himself as their savior and he didn't respond by just praying for them. He also didn't romanticize the situation and plead with God for justice to be done based on the innocence of the nation. His prayer to God is based in two things that all our prayers need to have in common, God's faithfulness and our sinfulness. He doesn't ask why, he knows why. His prayer is based in reality.

Nehemiah's plea to God to hear his prayer is based in God's self-disclosure to Moses in Exodus 34 and grounded in the belief that God cares about His people and the promise we see in 2 Chronicles 7 that when the people, called by His Name, return and repent He will hear from heaven and restore them. Nehemiah follows that pattern of confessing the sins of the people but he doesn't confess "their" sins, he confesses "Even I and my father’s house have sinned." He is not standing above the people, he stands with them.

When we think about missions and, in particular, church planting, do we see ourselves as Nehemiah, one of them, or do we see ourselves as the one who brings the Good News as an expert or a righteous one imparting wisdom and knowledge to pagans? We do well to recall Nehemiah's attitude towards himself as a missionary as it is Jesus' way as well. Jesus identified with us sinners by taking the baptism that is for the repentance of sins even though he was without sin. Nehemiah and Jesus have this in common, their ministries began with identification with the sins of the people they were preparing to serve.