Nehemiah Rebuilds the Wall Bible story for kids

"Why is your face sad, since you are not sick?"

That is a king talking. And the man he is talking to is holding the king's cup.

But that comes later. First, let me tell you who he was.

His name was Nehemiah. He lived far away from Jerusalem, in the king's palace at Susa. Do you remember Queen Esther? It was the same great palace where she once lived. But this was many years later, and there was a different king. Nehemiah was this king's cupbearer, the man who served the king his drinks.

One day his brother came with some men from Judah, and Nehemiah asked them about Jerusalem.

The news was not good. "The wall of Jerusalem is also broken down," they told him, "and its gates are burned with fire."

Nehemiah sat down and wept. And he prayed to the God of heaven, day and night.

He told God that his people had gone the wrong way, and he had too. And he asked God to remember His promise. If His people turned back to Him, even from far, far away, God had said, "I will gather them from there."

Then months went by. And Nehemiah went on serving the king.

Now, Nehemiah had never been sad in front of the king. Not once. Until that day.

The king looked at him. "Why is your face sad, since you are not sick? This is nothing else but sorrow of heart."

And Nehemiah tells us, "Then I was very much afraid."

Maybe his heart went thump, thump, thump.

But he answered, "Let the king live forever!" And he told the truth. The city where his family came from was broken, and its gates were burned.

Then the king asked, "What is your request?"

And Nehemiah says, "So I prayed to the God of heaven."

Right there, in between the question and the answer. Maybe he didn't even say it out loud.

Then he asked the king to send him to Judah, so he could build the city again. The queen was sitting beside him. And the king said yes!

Nehemiah asked for letters, too. Letters for the governors along the way. And a letter to the keeper of the king's own forest, for timber. Wood for gates, and wood for the wall.

The king gave him everything. Nehemiah says it was "because of the good hand of my God on me." He even sent horsemen to ride along.

Nehemiah came to Jerusalem, and three days went by. Then he got up in the night, with a few men, and only one animal, the one he was riding. He told nobody what God had put into his heart to do.

Out through the Valley Gate. Toward the Jackal's Well. Along the broken wall and the burned gates. In one place there was no room for his animal to get through at all.

And the leaders of the city didn't know where he had gone, or what he had done. Not yet.

Then Nehemiah told the people. "Come, let us build up the wall of Jerusalem." He told them about the good hand of God on him.

And the people said, "Let's rise up and build." So they strengthened their hands for the good work.

And oh, little one, so many people came. The high priest and the priests built the Sheep Gate. Another family built the Fish Gate. Priests worked above the Horse Gate. A Sheep Gate, a Fish Gate and a Horse Gate. Those are their real names!

Goldsmiths came. Perfume makers came. Shopkeepers came. Whole towns came. A man named Shallum came, "he and his daughters."

Do you remember Jericho, where the walls came tumbling down? Here, "the men of Jericho built." This time, Jericho was helping a wall go up.

And some families mended the part of the wall right across from their own front doors. Side by side, gate by gate, all the way round.

But not everybody was happy. Some neighbours did not want the wall built. Two of them were named Sanballat and Tobiah.

Sanballat made fun of the builders. "Will they finish in a day?"

And Tobiah, standing beside him, had a joke ready. "What they are building, if a fox climbed up it, he would break down their stone wall."

A fox! Imagine one little fox tiptoeing along the top, and the whole wall going wibble, wobble, crash.

But the builders kept going. And the wall was joined all the way round, up to half its height, "for the people had a mind to work."

The neighbours grew crosser, and they made plans to stop the work. But Nehemiah tells us, "we made our prayer to our God, and set a watch against them day and night."

The builders grew tired, too. "There is much rubble," they said. And some of them worried that the neighbours might come and stop the work.

So Nehemiah said, "Don't be afraid of them! Remember the Lord, who is great and awesome."

And God brought the neighbours' plans to nothing. Everyone went back to the wall, "everyone to his work." Some kept watch while others built. And they worked from the rising of the morning until the stars appeared.

Can you picture it? Tap, tap, tap, as the sky goes dark. And the first little star coming out over a wall growing higher and higher.

And then, one day, the very last gap was filled.

The wall was finished in fifty-two days. That is a little more than seven weeks!

Even the grumpy neighbours could see it. "They perceived that this work was done by our God."

God's good hand, and lots and lots of busy hands.

Later, the people gathered to thank God for the wall. Two great choirs went up on top of it, one going each way, with harps and cymbals and trumpets. "The singers sang loud." "God had made them rejoice with great joy." And "the women and the children also rejoiced; so that the joy of Jerusalem was heard even far away."

And that wall a little fox was supposed to knock down? Now whole crowds of singing people were walking along the top of it.

And God was with him. God was with her. God is with you, too.

All done for today, little one. May the same God who helped crowds and crowds of builders finish a whole city wall in fifty-two days... finish every good thing He has started in you.