They said to me, "Those who survived the exile and are back in the province are in great trouble and disgrace. The wall of Jerusalem is broken down, and its gates have been burned with fire." – Nehemiah 1:3

 Today's Scripture Reading (September 29, 2020): Nehemiah 1

Poet Clementine von Radic writes in "Mouthful of Forevers" that "The good news is you survived. The bad news is you're hurt and no one can heal you but yourself." The bottom line is that all of us are survivors. We have survived what life has thrown at us. And the universal truth is that we are all broken, whether we want to admit it or not. And the even more uncomfortable truth is that nobody can fix us. Social media friends can't heal us by responding to our pleas or liking our posts. Healing begins with us.

Oh, it doesn't finish with us. God brings others into our lives as they can help. But first, we have to be willing to receive that help, and to do something, walking in faith with God, that will heal our brokenness. Survival is good, but it is definitely not the end of the journey.

Those that came to Nehemiah came with a powerful message. "Those who survived the exile …" This is the good news of the passage, that there were those who survived the exile, and they were back home. But things had changed. The survivors were home, but not to the Kingdom of Judah that their ancestors had left a couple of generations ago. They were back in the province of Judah. And they were broken, hurting, and disgraced.

The walls of the city were broken. Only backwater towns with nothing to protect existed without walls. Walls were needed to keep the thieves and the murderers out and to preserve everything good that existed within the city. The idea that Jerusalem was without walls meant that it was no longer important. People could no longer find refuge in the city. And the city's brokenness was reflected by the brokenness of the people.

And as Nehemiah received the message, he is broken. And he wants to do … something. Maybe in the description of the survivors of the exile, Nehemiah recognizes that he numbers among them. He may have risen to a high position in the house of the king, but he is still nothing more than a survivor of the exile. And only he can decide to go beyond just being a survivor toward something more. Only he can choose to leave the comfortable place where he finds himself and go to Jerusalem to heal himself of his brokenness and help others heal. The answer to Nehemiah's brokenness began with Nehemiah.

But this is also our identity. We are broken survivors, but that is not the end of God's plan for our lives. If we decide to be more, God has promised what he wants for us; for Jerusalem, for Nehemiah, and for everyone who reads this blog. God has a plan, and Paul outlined it. "No, in all these things we are more than conquerors [maybe we could say that we are more than survivors] through him who loved us. For I am convinced that neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither the present nor the future, nor any powers, neither height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord (Romans 8:37-39). This is God's plan for us, but what our life actually looks like is up to us. We can stay as survivors, or we can become more than conquerors. God will accomplish this in our lives, but the decision of who we are and the basis for our identity remains with us.

Tomorrow's Scripture Reading: Nehemiah 2