What a short verse this is, but what a heartfelt blessing. Especially to a church group. Let us think today about what each word means. Jesus excelled in both showing mercy to thousands who called on Him, and taking pity on many who were diseased or handicapped. So must we.
The short letter of Jude is not written to correct or teach us, but to encourage us to keep going. The early disciples could not have imagined that it would be more than 2000 years before Jesus returned to finish what He had started. They thought it would be sooner.
Jude opens his short letter by identifying himself. But interestingly he does not give us his full identity! He is the brother of James who also has a letter in the Bible. They both identify themselves as a servants of Jesus. But these two were also half brothers of Jesus.
As Ezra read from the scriptures, the people were touched and all ended up in tears. Tears of sadness for the sins of their forefathers, and tears of joy because they were in their homeland where they belonged, and tears too because at last they understood what God had said.
Everyone was now settled, the walls completed, the city secure, and it was time to really find out more about the rules God had laid down for them. They had lived more than 60 years in exile caused by disobedience, and this generation did not want that to happen again.
Can you imagine the excitement of those people going home? Most of them to a place they had only heard about through their parents and grandparents, and the songs they had sung in the temple. There would be such joy in the Lord as they returned to this sacred city.
Chapter 7 tells us that everything was completed; the doors and gates as well as the whole city wall. Those workers must have praised the Lord about that. Nehemiah then appointed the gatekeepers to keep the city safe, and the musicians and the Levites to praise God for this victory.
How did Nehemiah know? Was it just intuition? Nehemiah must have been sad to find people from his own camp in the pay of the enemy, but recognising immediately the problem he refused the fear. He had not come so far to not see this job through to its end.
If people were afraid they would tire quickly and not finish the work. The things of the mind have powerful effect on our bodies. More than we understand. Much of the medical world today recognises that disputes, anxiety and other nervous mental activities can have serious effect on our bodies.
Nehemiah must have been feeling satisfied with all that the builders had accomplished. The wall was finished. There remained only the doors to be put in place. But the enemy was feeling that he must attack because he really did not want all entries to the city to be blocked.
EN 
FR