Obligations of the Covenant

A person who doesn't know is held less accountable than a person who knows and doesn't do. Dr. Tony Evans says transformation doesn't come from information, it comes from obedience. It is the application of the knowledge of the Word of God that makes the difference in your life. This is the alternative broadcast featuring the timeless biblical teachings from the archives of Dr. Tony Evans.

We don't hesitate to sign on the dotted line when something matters, whether it's a mortgage, a job offer, or even a phone plan, because putting it in writing makes it real. Today Dr. Evans walks us through a moment in Scripture when God's people made a spiritual commitment so significant they documented it. Let's join him in Nehemiah as he unpacks what it means to make a covenant that counts. As we enter into chapter 10, the people demonstrate how really serious they are beginning with verse 38 of chapter 9. Now because of all this, because of all that had been said in chapter 9 about their faithlessness and God's faithfulness, we are making an agreement in writing, and on the sealed document are the names of our leaders, our Levites, and our priests. Now the people, rather than just verbalizing their commitment to God, make it contractual. They sign off on it. They said, God, here is what we're going to do. Now we're going to see in a moment what they decided to do, but it's very instructional to know that they now sign off on it.

Now the leaders signed on behalf of the people. This is a biblical principle of hierarchy or representation. Verse 28 down through 27, it lists the heads of the households that sign off, is given the obligations of the covenant or the agreement, what the people actually sign.

We can break it into three categories. There is a commitment to the word, there is no longer any compromising with the world, and there is a recommitment to the worship. So they make a decision about the word, the world, and the worship.

Those three categories we would like to look at now. First of all, they make a commitment regarding the word. Verse 28 says that the rest of the people, priests, Levites, gatekeepers, singers, temple servants, all those who had separated themselves from the peoples of the land to the law of God, their wives, their sons, their daughters, all those who had knowledge and understanding are joining with their kinsmen, their nobles, and are taking on themselves a curse and an oath to walk in God's law, which was given through Moses, God's servant, and to keep and observe all the commandments of the Lord our God and his ordinances and his statutes. The very first thing that they do is to commit themselves to the authority of scripture over their lives. They have become a ruined community and they ruined people because they had left the ordinances and statutes of God, or to put it another way, they had left the word of God.

Whenever you leave the word of God as the ultimate binding authority by which you, your family, your church, or your society makes its decisions, you are automatically invited to decay into that realm. It's a law of the universe. They had rejected God and now when they write out this agreement, they say we take on ourselves a curse and we make an oath to obey. Now, why did he say we take on a curse? Because whenever you sign a contract, you take on a curse, right? Whenever you sign a contract, you're liable for suit. If you don't fulfill the contract, that's the curse.

You're liable for suit. Well, in the Bible, there are covenantal lawsuits where God sues his people, where he says, you signed, you agreed with me that you were going to serve me and obey me and you didn't do it. You know what the Bible says? It is better not to make an oath to God than to make one and not do it. Now, how many of us, don't raise your hand, have made oaths to God? See, God didn't forget you were on your sick bed and you say, Lord, if you heal me this time, if you please don't let it be cancer, if you please don't let the lump be terminal, then I will serve you for the rest of my life. You forgot that.

He didn't. Lord, if you get me out of this financial mess, Lord, if you give me this house, Lord, if you give me this man, I will serve you. Well, you made an agreement with God you didn't fulfill, and so that calls on a curse. The Bible says, be not deceived. God is not mocked. Whatever a man sows, what you plant is what you reap. You cannot play with God. Now, this commitment was different than other commitments, because this commitment was to walk in His ways. Now, don't misread that. They didn't make a commitment to talk His ways, but to walk His ways.

Now, this raises a fundamental issue. You could bring your Bible here from here to doomsday, carry it under your arm and look holier than thou. Quote, Scripture, till you blue in the face and be deteriorating spiritually. It is not the knowledge of the Word of God that makes the difference in your life. It is the application of the knowledge of the Word of God that makes the difference in your life. It is not what you know. It is what you do. And unless you do, you might as well not know, because when you know and don't do, you're held more accountable.

See, a person who doesn't know is held less accountable than a person who knows and doesn't do. Fundamentally here is a problem of the will. Some of us don't want to change. As a Christian, you have the power to change if you want to change. Now, you may need help in order to change. God has supplied spirit help.

He's supplied counselors and leaders to come alongside and assist you to help. So how can you go through one thing for 50 years and it never be broken, never be overcome? Simple. You don't want to change. See, most people don't want to change. Most people don't want to change. They enjoy their wrong. And they don't want to get rid of their wrong, but they feel guilty about their wrong. So what they want to do is get rid of the guilt without changing the thing that made them guilty. There must be a decision of your will. If you come to me for counseling, or I come to you for counseling for that matter, and you're given steps to take to begin the process of getting victory over those things, but you don't ever do the steps that it takes to get victory over those things, what you're saying is I really don't want to change. What I want is to get an audience so everybody else will believe I want to change and so they'll be patient with me while I don't change. A lot of husbands say to their wives, honey, I'm going to be different this year. I'm going to be a brand new husband. Then they spiritualize it because I told God.

See, they throw God's name in there when they really want it to be believable. I told God that I want to change. Say, show me, vice versa. Ladies say, honey, I know I haven't been treating you with respect, and I know I haven't been being the kind of wife I should be, but I'm going to change.

Say, show me. In other words, what God wants is a change in action so you don't spend time counseling people forever who don't even get started doing something with the little advice they got at first. That's like your kid asking you to give them $5 allowance when every week they lose the quarter they're now getting. You don't give more to people who are irresponsible with less. For the Bible says, to he that hath, more will be given. But to he who does not have, that which he has will be taken away.

So not only do they not get $5, you stop giving them the quarter. Most people don't want to change. You say, Pastor, that's not me. I really want to change. But I can't, okay? If you really want to change, you need to change that statement. There's no such thing as, I really want to change and I can't. The statement is, I really want to change and on my own I can't. Then you got to quote, I can do all things through Christ who strengtheneth me. Christ will enable any Christian to change through the mechanisms that he sets up who wants to change or Paul is lying.

And by two immutable things, it's impossible for God to lie. You may need help in changing, counseling in changing, support systems in changing, but changes will occur. You ought to be different next year than you were this year in certain areas of your life. Now you won't change overnight. It won't happen like hocus pocus, but it will happen progressively if God has your will. But he must have your will.

You must decide by a raw decision of your will. Now here's what we want. What we want is a feeling.

We want the feeling of change. Well, if you've been hooked on drugs for 10 years, the taste for drugs is not going to disappear from your flesh. You've been hooked for immorality for years. The desire for immorality is not going to disappear.

No, that's going to be there until the change has become a pattern. But you make a decision by an act of your will. That's where you start. And that's what the people say. We are going to make an agreement. And that's why they write it down because they wanted to be held accountable for making it.

They want to help be held accountable when the going gets tough for making the right decision. So the first thing is in respect to the Word. Dr. Evans will return in just a moment to show how that commitment began shaping their decisions, starting with how they engaged the culture around them. Before he does though, today's lesson is part of his 15-part sermon series on the book of Nehemiah, a powerful look at how God can use ordinary people to accomplish extraordinary things. As we follow Nehemiah's journey to rebuild the walls of Jerusalem, we're discovering timeless truths about leadership, perseverance, and spiritual renewal, truths that can help us overcome challenges and step confidently into God's purpose for our lives. For a limited time, you can get this complete audio series for yourself on digital download, as well as on either CDs or a USB flash drive, along with Tony's compelling book, One Nation Under God, a timely practical guide to making a kingdom impact in our culture. Just visit tonyevans.org or call us at 1-800-800-3222, make a contribution, and let us send you the Nehemiah audio series and One Nation Under God.

Once again, you can find all the details for this special offer at tonyevans.org or by phone at 1-800-800-3222. Well let's get back to more now from Dr. Evans in Nehemiah chapter 10. Now the second thing is in respect to the world, verse 30, and that we will not give our daughters to the people of the land and take their daughters for our sons. They were involved in inter-religious marriage, not just it was interracial because it was Jews and Moabites and Canaanites, but the Bible has a lot to say about religious intermarriage.

Now let me state this clearly. Under no circumstances, under no conditions, is a Christian to ever think about marrying a non-Christian. And yeah, I know he's a doctor. I understand you're gonna be living on the house, on the hill.

I know he's got a jag. I understand there's a voluptuous bank account, but no matter what he has going for him, under no circumstances is a Christian ever to marry a non-Christian. And not only is he talking about the people getting married, he's also talking about the mothers and fathers because he says we will not give our daughters to them. We will not take daughters from them for our sons. From a parental standpoint, we will manage our homes in such a way that if they get hooked up with those non-believers, they have to do it without any help or assistance from us.

Why? Why is God hard-nosed on this? Because hell and heaven can't live in the same house and get along. It may look good up front, but this thing is supposed to be till death do you part, and God knows if you integrate the family irreligiously.

If you get people who are walking down two separate tracks trying to get it on in the same home, you invite disaster. No matter what you try to do, no clever arrangement of bad eggs will ever make a good omelet. And what we try to do is we try to scramble it, fry it, sunny-side it up it, and it still comes out a mess because we compromise.

You put a bad apple in a bushel with with good apples, the bad will influence the good and it will leaven itself down and all of the apples will become spoiled. You don't compromise. Not on principles. Finally, they are now making a sure covenant about their worship.

Now this involved a number of areas. First of all, verse 31, and as for the people of the land who bring wares or any grain on the Sabbath day to sell, we will not buy from them on the Sabbath or a holy day and we will forego the crops the seventh year and the exaction of every debt. In other words, we will keep the Sabbath. You remember one of the Ten Commandments is keep the Sabbath holy.

Now follow me on this. This is talking about worship. After God did six days of creating, on the seventh day He rested. Now He didn't rest because He was tired. He rested because He was finished. The reason why He rested was because He was finished. There was nothing left to do and resting means He sat back to enjoy what He made. On the eighth day which would have been the first day of the second week, that's the day it appears that Satan came into the garden and he tripped Adam and Eve so that Adam and Eve could no longer enjoy what God had created.

They went and hid themselves. Their marriage was in trouble because that's what sin does. When the second Adam came, he rose from the dead on the first day, Sunday of the week. So that which was Saturday in the Old Testament becomes Sunday in the New Testament. It's not called the Sabbath, it's called the Lord's day.

But the principle is the same. The purpose of that day is the enjoyment of God. That's why you come to worship. You come to worship to praise His holy name. You come to worship to get instruction from Him. The purpose of worship is the exaltation of God, not the good feelings of you.

It's okay to have good feelings, but that's secondary, not primary. But when it comes to worship, oh, it's so lethargic. Oh, I gotta get up in my eyes Sunday. I gotta go to church. Oh no, that means you don't know God.

No, you don't know all He's done and you don't know how bad you're gonna need Him this upcoming week. When you understand where you come from and when you understand that you're gonna need Him where you're going, you better be in worship. You better exalt His holy name.

And so the people said, we're gonna sign a short covenant. We're gonna stop not worshiping you. But enjoying God is more than worship. So this is where these people, you know, some of you were raised where you couldn't look at TV on Sunday and you couldn't, you know, you couldn't go out and play ball on Sunday, you couldn't do that on Sunday.

Now let me explain. Sunday is the enjoyment of God. That's what Saturday was in the Sabbath. That is where you not only enjoy being in God's presence, but you enjoy being in God's world. Many of you have taken afternoon drives on a Sunday afternoon, that feel of being in the open space of God, and that's part of enjoying God. Part of enjoying God is being with family and Christian friends who love God like you do and fellowshipping with them. That's part of enjoying God. So enjoying God is not church only, that's a major center feature, but it's also enjoying the world in which God has graciously placed you. And oh, there's so much of God to enjoy. That's the time to sit around with your family and talk about the goodness of God last week and the need for God this week. Sunday is the day of enjoying God.

Why? Because you're gonna be so busy Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, Saturday, and you're gonna be too tired to enjoy God, too distracted to enjoy God, so there will be one day where God gets undivided attention. And finally, he says, in worship they were to remember their financial responsibility to God. Verse 32, we placed ourselves on the obligation to contribute yearly one-third of a shekel for the service of the house of our God. And then it goes down in verse 36, the firstborn we're going to give you of our sons, the firstborn of our flock, firstborn of the new wine, the tithe, verse 37, of our ground.

What is he saying? We're going to stop robbing you. Now many of us don't like to talk about this, but this is in the Bible we have to talk about. And that is, if you're not giving God what God should get, you're robbing God. A lot of you've been blessed with a job, blessed with a career, and all God gets is the leftovers, if the sermon's okay. That's not how you worship God. You don't worship God with what's left over. He doesn't give you leftovers.

You don't have leftover heartbeats and leftover brainwaves and leftover body functions. He gives you prime working stuff there, folks. God does not want to be left over. So he told him that, number one, I must have the first.

Don't give me your crops after you've installed them away for the year. You give me the first tenth. The minimum that they could ever give God was ten, ten out of the hundred, or ten percent. That was the minimum. In fact, he just knew people would give more than the minimum because he says, I want you to give tithes and offerings.

I know you're not going to be satisfied with the minimum. That's the minimum ever requested in all the Bible, even before the law, because people have a responsibility before God, and he not only wants that much, he wants it first. He wants it before you pay your house note, your car note, before you take care of you. He says, put me first because without me there would be no notes. Without my grace there would be nothing.

So what God wants is to be honored, and the people says, we're going to make a covenant, we're going to honor you. You know, there's a disease I'll call cirrhosis of the giver. This disease was discovered in AD 34 by the husband and wife team Ananias and Sapphira. It is an acute condition which renders the patient's hand immobile when he is called upon to move him in the direction of his wallet or her purse and from Vince to the offering plate. This strange malady is clinically unobservable in such surroundings as the golf club, supermarket, clothing store, or restaurant. Some try to use the false remedy pointing out to the patient, to patients that income tax deduction can be claimed for giving.

The best therapy, and that which leads to a sure and lasting cure, however, is to get the individual's heart right with God. This affliction is actually a symptom of a more basic need of the soul. Listen, you've got to stop robbing God because the Bible says anybody who robs me will be cursed and won't enjoy what they have.

I'll put it in a bag full of holes. So you'll spend it. You may not spend it on God, but something's going to break down and you're going to spend it on it. What God is saying is that he wants to be first. Seek ye first the kingdom of God and his righteousness. He says, put me first. And many of you ought to be ashamed the way you rob God. Good job, a salary.

You've got food in the refrigerator and in the freezer, and you've got another freezer next to the refrigerator freezer. He's covered you well. Dr. Tony Evans, reminding us of the importance of honoring God first with the blessings he's entrusted to us.

And he'll come back in just a moment with a closing word. Before that, though, if you'd like to hear the full-length version of this message, you can receive it as a part of Tony's 15-part sermon series, simply called Nehemiah. And don't forget that special double offer I mentioned earlier. You can receive all the lessons in this series bundled along with his compelling book, One Nation Under God. Both of these resources are yours with our thanks for your donation to help make this listener-supported program possible.

Make the arrangements today at 1-800-800-3222 before time runs out. That's 1-800-800-3222 or visit tonyevans.org. Now, before Tony returns to wrap up today's message, I want to let you know that a new episode of Stories from the Storyteller is just around the corner. The Evans family is off to a 70s party, but when someone gets turned away for not wearing the right outfit, it leads to a meaningful bedtime talk about the parable of the king's banquet. If the kids in your life haven't discovered this heartwarming animated series yet, now's the perfect time to share it. Find out more about Stories from the Storyteller at tonyevanstv.com.

That's tonyevanstv.com. Well, coming up tomorrow, Dr. Evans will reveal God's blueprint for rebuilding broken cities and restoring hope where it's needed most as he continues our inspiring study of the story of Nehemiah. Right now though, he's back with his final challenge for today. So my challenge for you today is give according to your income, let's God make your income according to your giving. Honor him. He concludes at the end of verse 31, thus we will not neglect the house of our God. Why? Because when you neglect the house of God, that reflects a lack of spiritual priorities.