Overcoming Discouragement Series

Nehemiah 4 Discouragement

I remember it like it was yesterday. I was a young youth pastor, in my late 20s. I had been a part-time youth pastor at that church for about a year. I was beginning a new study called Prayer Life. By the way, if you eat a study to help you with your prayer life, I highly recommend the one. It’s good stuff.

So, I was starting a new study, and one thing they tell you to do is to get someone outside your study group to be a prayer partner with you during the time you’re going through the study. So, I asked Charlie D. MclCintock, an older member of the church if he would be my prayer partner during the time of the study. He agreed, so once a week he was to come over to my house and we would pray together.

The first week we met, shortly after he walked into the house, and before we had even started praying, he said, “You know, not every in the church likes you.” Isn’t that special? Wouldn’t you like someone that you’ve invited to come and pray with you, in your home, to begin your time together like that?

It’s one thing to face opposition from without. It’s one thing to face opposition or criticism from the world. We expect that. My word, we’re invading the Devil’s kingdom, and trying to rescue captives he’s held forever. We’re trying to stand on the word of God, against a world that has turned its back on God. We’re trying to say that there is a right and a wrong, in a world where people don’t want anyone to tell them that something they want to do is wrong. So, you’re going to have opposition. Jesus Himself said in.

> John 16:33 I have told you these things so that in me you may have peace. You will have suffering in this world.”

We expect it from the world, but it’s a little different when the opposition comes from inside the church family, or inside your own family. What do you do when you find yourself discouraged? What do you do when you find opposition not only from without, but also from within, from some of those closest to you?

Open your Bibles this morning and turn with me please to the book of Nehemiah. Nehemiah chapter 4 . . . as we see this morning, how to deal with discouragement.

- Read Nehemiah 4:1-23

I. RIDICULE

1. From outside

- Read vvs 1-3

Ridicule. Oh, the sting and power of ridicule. Mocking & scoffing, sneering and jeering, constitute some of our foes strongest weapons, for such tactics always hurt.

Sticks and stones and all of that stuff. . . Words can’t really hurt. Really? You may try to sell that bunk to your children, but you’ll not sell it to me. Words hurt. It’s much easier to fix a broken bone, than it is to repair a broken heart, or to rebuild a broken spirit. It’s much easier to bandage a wound than it is to bandage a woman or a child who’s been told they’re no good, or they can’t do anything right. It’s much easier to fix a broken leg, than it is to fix a man whose wife has repeatedly told him he doesn’t measure up, or he can’t provide well enough. Ridicule hurts.

Sanballat knew this, and so did his shadow Tobiah, always standing by his side and speaking as a faint echo saying, “Even if a little fox walked on it, it would fall apart.

Discouragement from outside. Its hurts, but we expect it. The Bible tells us,

> 1 Peter 5:8 Be sober-minded, be alert. Your adversary the devil is prowling around like a roaring lion, looking for anyone he can devour.”

Opposition is out there. We expect it from out there, but not in here.

Opposition, ridicule from the outside. But then, opposition, from the inside.

2. From outside

- Read vs 10

Did you notice who this was from? This was Judah. Do you remember in Genesis 49, when Jacob gathered his 12 sons around him to bless them before he died?

He spoke a blessing, or a description of the future for all of his 12 sons. Of Judah he said,

> Genesis 49:8-10 Judah, your brothers will praise you. Your hand will be on the necks of your enemies; your father’s sons will bow down to you. Judah is a young lion—my son, you return from the kill. He crouches; he lies down like a lion or a lioness—who dares to rouse him? The scepter will not depart from Judah or the staff from between his feet until he whose right it is comes.

Judah is supposed to be the strong tribe. The royal tribe, the tribe the others look up to. But here in verse 10 they say,