ERRONEOUS IDEOLOGIES IN THE CHURCH SOULD BE EJECTED
Nehemiah's passion for the truth of
God’s Word, whatever the cost or consequences is regrettably missing and sorely
needed among pastors and leaders today. ...
Before this, Eliashib the priest had been put in charge of the storerooms of the house of our God. He was closely associated with Tobiah, and he had provided him with a large room formerly used to store the grain offerings and incense and temple articles, and also the tithes of grain, new wine and olive oil prescribed for the Levites, musicians and gatekeepers, as well as the contributions for the priests. But while all this was going on, I was not in Jerusalem, for in the thirty-second year of Artaxerxes king of Babylon I had returned to the king. Some time later I asked his permission and came back to Jerusalem. Here I learned about the evil thing Eliashib had done in providing Tobiah a room in the courts of the house of God. I was greatly displeased and threw all Tobiah’s household goods out of the room. I gave orders to purify the rooms, and then I put back into them the equipment of the house of God, with the grain offerings and the incense.
I also learned that the portions assigned to the Levites had not been given to them, and that all the Levites and musicians responsible for the service had gone back to their own fields. So I rebuked the officials and asked them, ‘Why is the house of God neglected?’ Then I called them together and stationed them at their posts. All Judah brought the tithes of grain, new wine and olive oil into the storerooms. I put Shelemiah the priest, Zadok the scribe, and a Levite named Pedaiah in charge of the storerooms and made Hanan son of Zakkur, the son of Mattaniah, their assistant, because they were considered trustworthy. They were made responsible for distributing the supplies to their fellow Levites.
Remember me for this, my God, and do not blot out what I have so faithfully done for the house of my God and its services. NEHEMIAH 13:4-14.
‘Tobiah’ the Ammonite in the passage above had been one of Nehemiah’s archenemies, who had opposed the wall-building in the city of Jerusalem. However, during Nehemiah’s absence from the city for a few years in order to return to the Persian king Artaxerxes’s court, Tobiah moved into the temple. When Nehemiah returned to Jerusalem he was shocked to find that ‘Eliashib’ the high priest in Judah had prepared a large room in the temple for Tobiah.
The chamber he occupied had been one of the temple storerooms, ordinarily set aside for the storage of tithes and other offerings such as grain. Eliashib and Tobiah were closely related by familial ties and Tobiah used this influence over Eliashib to his advantage to enter the temple and oppose God’s work while pretending to assist it.
Eliashib had once joined in restoring the walls but now he had allowed an opponent to reside inside the temple complex. Nehemiah took a drastic action, in which he ‘threw all Tobiah’s household goods out of the room… gave orders to purify the rooms, and then… put back into them the equipment of the house of God’, which expressed his anger and which reminds us of Christ’s holy anger against money changers in the temple area. Nehemiah not only rebuked the Jewish officials who had neglected their duties overlooking the work of the temple, but he also took action to correct the problem and he was able to plead with the Lord;
Remember me for this, my God, and do not blot out what I have so faithfully done for the house of my God and its services.
Nehemiah was one of the few leaders whose motive throughout his ministry was genuine and dedicated to simply please and to serve the Lord wholeheartedly. His passion for the truth of God’s Word, whatever the cost or consequences is regrettably missing and sorely needed among pastors and leaders today.
I have read an interesting article on “Psychology and the Evangelical Church”, in which the author T.A. McMahon appropriately likens ‘Tobiah’ who hindered Nehemiah’s project for the Lord from within to “so-called Christian psychology”, putting it:
The Book of Nehemiah gives us a picture of what's happening in the church. Nehemiah (his name means "Jehovah is our comforter") is a type of the Holy Spirit. God sends him to rebuild and strengthen Jerusalem. Under the guise of helping Nehemiah, enemies of Israel attempt to subvert the restoration. Incredibly, the priest gives one such adversary, Tobiah, a room within the Temple. So it is with so-called Christian psychology today. How serious is this psychologizing of the church? Although devastating even now, Scripture tells us that it will far exceed what we can imagine. The Apostle Paul is emphatic in his warning (2 Timothy 3:1-5) that "in the last days" man's condition will be "perilous." That warning begins with a characteristic that is the cornerstone of humanistic psychology and which Paul indicates (verses 2-5) is the source of a host of evils: self-love.
In it the author lists three erroneous ideas and he explains each of them in detail, reminding us of the fact that psychology and the Bible are basically opposed:
1.Psychotherapy is a scientific endeavor
2.Counselling is for professionals only
3.Christian psychology reconciles science and faith.
The following is an editorial review of the book ‘Psychology and the Church’ by amazon.com.:
For nearly two thousand years prior to the rise of modern psychiatry and psychotherapy, the church ministered to believers who were experiencing mental, emotional, and behavioral problems by using the teachings of the Scriptures and through the power of the Holy Spirit. Contemporary Christianity’s embrace of psychology raises an important question: Was there an insufficiency on the part of God’s Word and His Holy Spirit during those two millennia, making it necessary for the church to turn to modern psychotherapy in order to more effectively address a Christian’s problems of living? In the history of contemporary Christendom, no secular enterprise has had such a profound influence on Christianity as has psychological counselling. The critical question raised by these developments is: Have they been helpful or harmful to the body of Christ? Dave Hunt and T.A. McMahon, co-authors of The Seduction of Christianity, unearth the roots and expose the results of Christianity’s embrace of the beliefs of Freud, Jung, Rogers, Maslow, and others. Using content compiled from past feature articles in The Berean Call newsletter, the authors also contribute new material and tackle answers to tough questions in a special Q&A section.