Nehemiah 3:28 - Homiletics

Doing good near home.

"Every one over against his house." The priests and others ( Nehemiah 3:10 , Nehemiah 3:23 , Nehemiah 3:29 , Nehemiah 3:30 ), whose houses were near the wall, repaired that part of the wall which was opposite each of their dwellings. This suggests an important rule for Christian workers.

I. THE ORDER TO BE OBSERVED IN SEEKING THE GOOD OF OTHERS . Let every one do the work which lies nearest to him. Let him begin with his own family. No amount of good work elsewhere will compensate for neglect there. Christian parents can do most good to the community by training well their children. Then, as ability and opportunity permit, let each seek the good of his dependents, friends, neighbours, the congregation with which he worships, the city or town, the country, the Church at large, the world.

II. REASONS FOR ADOPTING THIS ORDER .

1. That which is nearest is usually best known. Its needs can be best perceived, and how to meet them.

2. It appeals most powerfully to our hearts. Partly because best known. The eye affects the heart ( Lamentations 3:51 ). Partly because of the natural affections which belong to the closer relationships. Now the emotions of the heart are both a call to duty and a qualification for its efficient performance. Words spoken, gifts bestowed, with feeling, are most powerful for good.

3. It has the first claim upon us. God has placed men in close relationships and proximity in order that they may be mutually helpful as occasion arises. We violate the Divine order when we care for the distant to the neglect of the near.

4. We can most easily reach it.

5. We may hope for more success in dealing with it. Because our work will be with more knowledge and more heart, and less waste of resources; and will carry with it the weight of known character, of personal sympathy, and the thousand influences which spring from family life, friendship, neighbourhood, etc. A man can nowhere work with so much effect as "over against his house."

6. In caring for it we may be most effectually protecting our houses. As those priests and others who built up the piece of wall nearest them. There are perils to us and our families which may be averted by doing our duty to those nearest to us; perils from the sullen enmity which indifference and neglect may generate in them; perils from their ignorance, grossness, or vice; perils from their diseases , etc.

7. When each does the work nearest to him, the whole work will be most surely and rapidly done. Christians have yet thoroughly to follow this order. Nevertheless, it must be admitted that there is much to be done which cannot thus be reached. There were many parts of the wall at Jerusalem which were opposite the house of no one, or of none able to repair them; and there were many able and willing to assist in the work whose dwellings were not in Jerusalem, or, if in the city, not near the wall. And so they had to labour at a distance from their houses. In like manner, there is much Christian work to be done where no Christians exist, or none capable of doing it; and so there is ample room for those organisations which enable the benevolent to do good at a distance, and even in far-off lands.