Who Are You Listening to?
Nehemiah 4
Do you know someone who
BELIEVES
everything he is told?
Some things are better heard
after one has
STUFFED
his ears!
All of us are prone to lean into
the SWAY of THEY!
Everyone needs a place where they can be
ENCOURGAGED!
You can get DISCOURAGED anywhere!
The “Right” THEY
will keep us above the fray;
The “Wrong” THEY
will turn us into the fray!
Nehemiah 4:1-2
1 When Sanballat heard that we were rebuilding the wall, he became angry and was greatly incensed.
He ridiculed the Jews,
2 and in the presence of his associates and the army of Samaria, he said, "What are those feeble Jews doing?
Will they restore their wall? Will they offer sacrifices?
Will they finish in a day? Can they bring the stones back to life
from those heaps of rubble-- burned as they are?"
(NIV)
Characteristics of the “WRONG” They:
• The “WRONG” They are WHINNERS, not WINNERS;
MOCKERS, not MENTORS!
Nehemiah 4:3
3 Tobiah the Ammonite, who was at his side, said,
"What they are building-- if even a fox climbed up on it,
he would break down their wall of stones!"
(NIV)
It is not the critic who counts; not the man who points out how the strong man stumbled or where the doer of deeds could have done better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena; whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood; who strives valiantly; who errs, and comes short again and again, because there is no effort without error and shortcoming; who does actually try to do the deed; who knows the great enthusiasm, the great devotion and spends himself in a worthy cause; who, at the worst, if he fails, at least fails while doing greatly.
Far better it is to dare mighty things, to win glorious triumphs even though checkered by failure, than to rank with those poor spirits who neither enjoy nor suffer much because they live in the gray twilight that knows neither victory nor defeat.
• The “WRONG” They speak in “CAN’TS”, not “CANS”!
Thomas Edison invented the microphone, the phonograph, the incandescent light, the storage battery, talking movies, and more than 1000 other things. December 1914 he had worked for 10 years on a storage battery. This had greatly strained his finances. This particular evening spontaneous combustion had broken out in the film room. Within minutes all the packing compounds, celluloid for records and film, and other flammable goods were in flames. Fire companies from eight surrounding towns arrived, but the heat was so intense and the water pressure so low that the attempt to douse the flames was futile. Everything was destroyed. Edison was 67. With all his assets going up in a whoosh (although the damage exceeded two million dollars, the buildings were only insured for $238,000 because they were made of concrete and thought to be fireproof), would his spirit be broken?
The inventor’s 24-year old son, Charles, searched frantically for his father. He finally found him, calmly watching the fire, his face glowing in the reflection, his white hair blowing in the wind. "My heart ached for him," said Charles. "He was 67--no longer a young man--and everything was going up in flames. When he saw me, he shouted, ’Charles, where’s your mother?’ When I told him I didn’t know, he said, ’Find her. Bring her here. She will never see anything like this as long as she lives.’" The next morning, Edison looked at the ruins and said, "There is great value in disaster. All our mistakes are burned up. Thank God we can start anew." Three weeks after the fire, Edison managed to deliver the first phonograph.
Swindoll, Hand Me Another Brick, Thomas Nelson, 1978, pp. 82-3, and Bits and Pieces, November, 1989, p. 12.
________________________________________
• The “WRONG” They think HORIZONTALLY, not VERTICALLY!
Nehemiah 4:7-8
7 But when Sanballat, Tobiah, the Arabs, the Ammonites and the men of Ashdod heard that the repairs to Jerusalem’s walls had gone ahead and that the gaps were being closed, they were very angry.
8 They all plotted together to come and fight against Jerusalem and stir up trouble against it.
(NIV)
Horizontal = GROUP RULE
Vertical = GOD RULE
Nehemiah 4:4, 9
4 Hear us, O our God, for we are despised….
9 But we prayed to our God and posted a guard day and night to meet this threat.
(NIV)
Characteristics of the “RIGHT” They:
• The “RIGHT” They has
HE in the middle of they.
Nehemiah 4:14-15
14 After I looked things over, I stood up and said to the nobles, the officials and the rest of the people, "Don’t be afraid of them.
REMEMBER THE LORD, who is great and awesome,
and fight for your brothers, your sons and your daughters,
your wives and your homes."
15 When our enemies heard that we were aware of their plot and that GOD had frustrated it, we all returned to the wall, each to his own work.
(NIV)
• The “RIGHT” They speak FAITH, not FEAR!
Fear comes when False Evidence Appears Real! When the lies look real, fear grows. How do we stifle the voices of fear and tune into the voice of faith:
Romans 10:17
17 Consequently, faith comes from hearing the message, and the message is heard through the word of Christ.
(NIV)
Nehemiah 4:19-20
19 Then I said to the nobles, the officials and the rest of the people, "The work is extensive and spread out, and we are widely separated from each other along the wall.
20 Wherever you hear the sound of the trumpet, join us there. Our God will fight for us!"
(NIV)
Always play for an audience of ONE!
• The “RIGHT” They are
COURAGEOUS, not COWARDS.
Nehemiah 4:21
21 So we continued the work with half the men holding spears, from the first light of dawn till the stars came out.
(NIV)
Become and unyielding, but yielded “YES” man. We have decaffeinated the idea of a YES man. We’ve made him out to be milk-toast, weak, and anemic. But when a person is yielded to God unyieldingly, that man or woman is a force to be reckoned with! They are strong and courageous.
Which THEY do you listen to?
