11th October 2025

Broken Gates

The wall of Jerusalem is also broken down,

and its gates are burned with fire.

Nehemiah 1:31

Today's Bible Reading: Nehemiah 1:1-4.

Notice the description of Jerusalem. The people were in trouble and were feeling a great sense of disgrace and reproach. The walls of the city were broken down. The gates had been burned with fire and were no longer usable.

If we take Jerusalem as a symbol of our own lives, there are many of us who fit this description. You look back on your life, and you see there are places where the walls have been broken down. There is no longer any ability left to resist destructive attacks. You have fallen victim to sinful habits that you now find difficult to break. That is the kind of ruin that is described here in the opening verses of Nehemiah 1.

Perhaps you have gone along with the ways of the world. You have fallen into practices that the Bible says are wrong, and you know they are wrong. But you have difficulty stopping them. Your defences are gone. The walls of your city are broken down, and perhaps your gates are also burned. Gates are ways in and out. They are the way by which other people get to know you as you really are. Perhaps your gates have been destroyed by wrong habits.

As you examine the walls and the gates of your life, you find much of it in ruins. How do you handle that?

That is the great question many face. But that is why the Scriptures are given to us. The men and women of the past have been through these same difficulties, and they have told us how to handle them. This great book of Nehemiah is one of the most helpful pictures we have of how to recover from broken lives. The steps that Nehemiah took covers seven chapters of this book. They are specific steps, orderly--and very effective! Taken in order, they will lead to a full recovery of usefulness. But the question is:- Are you ready and willing to allow God to expose your brokenness and lead you in paths of healing and usefulness?

Prayer: Lord God, take away any brokenness in my life, and use me for Your glory. In the name of Your Son, I pray. Amen.