Nehemiah 1:8 (LSB)

Passage

Remember the word which You commanded Your servant Moses, saying, ‘If you are unfaithful, I will scatter you among the peoples;

Nearby Context

Nehemiah 1:6 let Your ear now be attentive and Your eyes open to hear the prayer of Your slave which I am praying before You today, day and night, on behalf of the sons of Israel Your slaves, confessing the sins of the sons of Israel which we have sinned against You; I and my father’s house have sinned.

Nehemiah 1:7 We have worked in utter destruction against You and have not kept the commandments, nor the statutes, nor the judgments which You commanded Your servant Moses.

Nehemiah 1:8 Remember the word which You commanded Your servant Moses, saying, ‘If you are unfaithful, I will scatter you among the peoples;

Nehemiah 1:9 but if you return to Me and keep My commandments and do them, though those of you who have been banished were at the ends of the sky, I will gather them from there and will bring them to the place where I have chosen to cause My name to dwell.’

Nehemiah 1:10 They are Your slaves and Your people whom You redeemed by Your great power and by Your strong hand.

Study Lenses

The verse centers on "faith", "remember", "word", "commanded", "servant", "moses", "saying", and "unfaithful". It is saying that the verse draws attention to "faith" and "remember", so its meaning should be read from those terms before moving to application.

The nearby context moves from verse 7's "We have worked in utter destruction against..." into verse 9's "but if you return to Me and...", so "faith" and "remember" belong inside that flow. In Nehemiah context, the local focus is covenant, worship, and faithfulness.

A plain takeaway is to answer the verse's own emphasis on "faith" and "remember" with trust shaped by these words, not by a vague optimism outside the passage.