Nehemiah, Sanballat & God’s Promises

19 But when Sanballat the Horonite, Tobiah the Ammonite official, and Geshem the Arab heard of it, they laughed at us and despised us, and said, “What is this thing that you are doing? Will you rebel against the king?” 20 So I answered them, and said to them, “The God of heaven Himself will prosper us; therefore we His servants will arise and build, but you have no heritage or right or memorial in Jerusalem.” (Nehemiah 2:19–20)

"Horonite" was a title given to Sanballat. He was an enemy of Nehemiah and was probably a native of Beth Horon in Samaria which explains why he was hostile to the rebuilding of Jerusalem. Many of those who were originally from the northern kingdom would have been anything but sympathetic to the restoration of the southern kingdom from their captivity. After all, the Northern Kingdom had not been restored from their captivity at all! They were still a mass of mixed peoples, foreigners, unbelievers, and who knows who else?

Once they had gone into their captivity in Assyria in 722 BC they never really returned. Some of those who desired to be faithful to God fled, at that time, to the South and lived in the area of Judah and Jerusalem. They retained some of their distinction, but were eventually assimilated into "Israel" as a unit. The genealogies of the North were lost and so no one really knew who was truly who anyway. The only "record" was Aunt Tess and Uncle Sy's memory; and, reliable as that was, it was not official.

As the years went by, their official nation identity began to be lost. Over the centuries Israel's national identity was tied up, not only in their National identity together, but also in their tribal identity. They belong to Israel, but that identity was a religious identity. Jerusalem was where they went to make sacrifice. It was where they went to relate to God. And they did that yearly. Jerusalem was where there can live. It was where they sent their taxes. It was a "large" identity.

But on there every day scale, they were a tribal, even a family group. They were Rubenites, Gadites, one of the 10 tribes that had been lost forever now. When serious came they came and they destroyed not only the "Northern Kingdom" per se, but they destroy all the records and all else that made up that Northern Kingdom. They left nothing for anyone to come back to. All that was remaining was Jerusalem and the Southern Kingdom, Judah and Benjamin.

It is entirely possible that Sanballat and the other two are thinking one of two things when they laugh at Nehemiah here.

• Either they are trying to undercut him, which is what I suspect they are doing or
• They are cynical and expecting God to do the same thing in the south as He did in the north.

More realistically, I suspect it is a combination of the two.

To see God demonstrating mercy and extending patience to His people, among them members of that same Northern Kingdom, would not have been a pleasing thing to those who were still rebellious. There was nothing left for he and his family. His home, where he originally live had been destroyed. The Assyrians had made definite work of it. Oh, the general place was still there, but it was not what it was before the captivity. The north was no longer "a land flowing with milk and honey."

What they, and so many others had forgotten, was that God had made promises to Abraham, and those promises demanded to be fulfilled. There was a Messiah coming. And that Messiah, one day, had to set His eyes toward Jerusalem. Outside of Jerusalem there's a hill called Mount Calvary and on that hill that Messiah, according to the foreordained plan of God, our Lord Jesus Christ yielded His life, body and blood, to satisfy the wrath of God for the sins of His people, Israel.

The patience of God shortly has it's purpose, doesn't it? God doesn't withhold or do anything for no reason. The Scripture says that a sparrow doesn't fall out of the sky that doesn't escape His notice. We sing a beautiful hymn that picks up that idea: "His eye is on the sparrow, and I know he's watching me".

God dealt with the nation of Israel as a unit. Both the Northern and Southern Kingdoms together, demonstrate the reality God's character, His Holiness, His justice, and His patience and mercy! God is holy and just; sin must be punished He cannot allow it to pass by without seeing to it that it receives what it deserves. The Northern Kingdom demonstrates that truth for us, God judged them for their sin and sent them off into oblivion forever, away from His presence and blessing, never to return.

But the southern kingdom tells a far different story. Sinful, as the northern kingdom was, but still the recipient of God's patience and mercy. They also were sent into captivity, just as the northern kingdom was. But after a time brought back to the place of sacrifice, the place that was typical of He who was coming.

You see, there had to be a Jerusalem for God's Messiah, His holy Son, the Lord Jesus Christ, to set His eyes toward! Were there not, there would be no salvation for anyone. And that just would not do.