“The end is just the beginning”
Nehemiah 6:15 through 7:3
Last weekend...just one week ago...60 of our men were up on a mountain for a retreat. We were planning and had our ideas of what the weekend would look like. HOW we would keep the men busy and active and engaged…and then came the almost non-stop rain. Over 5 inches falling in the 40 hour span we were there...but it didn’t dampen the impact of the weekend!
We were praying that God would meet us on the mountain and He did.
He spoke through our guest speaker about ENGAGING the enemy, and CONFRONTING SIN with a “take no prisoner’s” attitude. He spoke to us about COMMUNICATION and how to LOVE our wives. He illustrated the “SERVANT’S HUMILITY” of Jesus in His washing of the disciples’ feet and challenged us to come back as a group of servant leaders in our church.
Friday evening...almost every man drove a nail through a piece of paper bearing the sins and struggles to a wooden cross as a symbolic at of recommitment.
Sunday morning...we opened up our closing meeting for a time of “SHARING” and TWO hours later...the men were still opening up their lives to each other and praying for each other.
WHAT DOES THIS MEAN FOR OUR CHURCH?
-Everything in our lives and marriages is perfect?
-That all church struggles and believers relationships are righted?
-That these men will never struggle with FEAR or PRIDE or LUST or ANGER again?
NO! In fact, I guarantee that some of these men came to church this morning with a little dread that some of their Christian brothers might walk up to them TODAY and ask how they are doing with that struggle that they surrendered last weekend...and they are ashamed because they “gave in”...they struggled again this past week!
MY GOAL this morning...and this is such a perfect place to be in Nehemiah...is to URGE the men from the retreat…and those who made commitments or recommitments to Christ in the services here last week...or at the women’s gathering yesterday...or at the “Just Give Me Jesus” conference a couple of months ago...or at Promise Keepers in the Fall...TO KEEP ON KEEPING ON...to “Walk by Faith” and to “Get up again by faith when you stumble and fall”.
QUOTE:
“We conquer– not in any brilliant fashion– we conquer by continuing.” George Matheson
1.) God’s people WIN: Their commitment pays off
Nehemiah 6:15 & 16: “So the wall was completed on the twenty-fifth of Elul, in fifty-two days. When all our enemies heard about this and all the surrounding nations saw it, our enemies
lost their self-confidence, because they realized that this work had been done
with the help of our God.”
They’ve endured THREATS and OPPOSITION
They’ve endured mounds of RUBBLE and dreadfully difficult WORK
They’ve endured FAMINE
They’ve endured INTERNAL STRIFE and STRUGGLE………...but because
God gave Nehemiah a PASSION and a VISION for this task and they STUCK TOGETHER!!!
The wall is COMPLETED
The SPEED of the project’s completion shouts...God was in this!
Friends...this is a MIRACLE!
-It was only 9 months earlier that Nehemiah was in the court of Artaxerxes and hearing about the dilemma in Jerusalem for the first time.
-THEN he spent 4 months in PRAYER
**Think about this: The task was so HUGE...so DAUNTING that the Jews living in and around Jerusalem weren’t even TRYING to do anything about the broken-down walls.
But a PRAYED-UP, FIRED-UP man of God arrives and people complete the job in less than 2 months!
The RESULT of the project’s completion...their enemies lose their self-confidence
Sanballat, Tobiah and the rest of the enemies of this project have been pretty BOLD. They have viewed this as a battle of WILLS and WITS between themselves and Nehemiah…
Chapter 2, verse 10– They are upset that someone has come to help the Israelites.
Chapter 2, verse 19– They mock and ridicule the Jews and accuse them of rebellion.
Chapter 4, verse 3– They ridicule the work: “You call that a wall?...If a fox jumped...”
Chapter 4, verse 11– They threaten that they are coming to fight and kill the Jews.
Chapter 6 is FULL of threats and deceit and rumors
BUT now, even they recognize that this wall was rebuilt with the help of God and it really SILENCES all but one of these loud-mouths (and we’ll see why that one persists in a moment.)
Wouldn’t this be a great point for Nehemiah to end this account? To say, "It’s done!" Nehemiah...sign off! Conclude the book! You’ve helped the people
do what no one said could be done! The wall us UP...now put the GATES in place…
lock them...don’t worry about your enemies anymore!
Right??
You know better than that!!
Once you saw your need, came with repentance to Jesus Christ, committed yourself to a new way of thinking...acting...living, did the enemy shrug his shoulders and walk away?
OF COURSE HE DIDN’T...but listen carefully...That DOES NOT MEAN that your prayer wasn’t heard or that your commitment was PHONY. It caused the enemy to change his strategy!
2.) The enemy changes TACTICS: Pressure from the outside didn’t work...now he works to infiltrate.
In fact, one of Nehemiah’s enemies, Tobiah, HAD already infiltrated the community within Jerusalem because he had married into a prominent Jewish family and had struck business deals with many of them.
Nehemiah 6:17-19: “Also, in those days the nobles of Judah were sending many letters to Tobiah, and replies from Tobiah kept coming to them. For many in Judah were under oath to him, since he was son-in-law to Shecaniah son of Arah, and his son Jehohanan had married the daughter of Meshullam son of Berekiah. Moreover, they kept reporting to me his good deeds and then telling him what I said. And Tobiah sent letters to intimidate me.”
Tobiah’s friends PLEAD HIS CASE
“He’s not a bad guy...he has done a lot of good things!” FORGET the fact that he’s been accusing and threatening you Nehemiah! I know he said he was going to kill you...that little scamp! He’s really got a very big heart!
Their motivation: What they OWE him.
Why are they doing this? Because Tobiah is FAMILY to some of them and BUSINESS PARTER and LENDER to others. (that’s what "many under oath to him" means!)
Tobiah is an ENEMY of God and of these people, in reality, but they’ve let him become an in-law. How do we know this? Look at Nehemiah 7:10 “The list of the men of Israel...of Arah– 652” Arah was one of the FIRST men to return from the Babylonian captivity and his son, Shecaniah, gave his daughter in marriage to Tobiah. NO WONDER there was so much knowledge on the part of Sanballat and Tobiah of everything that was going on in the city of Jerusalem...every time Nehemiah made a move, there was someone RELATED to Tobiah or that OWED HIM MONEY ready to report it to him.
Why does the Bible warn us: “Do not be yoked together with unbelievers” in marriage or business partnerships? For this very reason! When you are connected to or otherwise committed to someone who does NOT LOVE GOD, your loyalty to God is also compromised! Listen to MORE of what Paul says in 2 Corinthians 6...it’s powerful:
“What do righteousness and wickedness have in common? What fellowship can light have with darkness? What does a believer have in common with an unbeliever?”
**Your COMMITMENT or RECOMMITMENT to Christ is the BEGINNING of a process of finding the connections and relationships in your life that will need to be changed (and some of them ended) so that you can walk in a way that pleases God. Not every relationship will help you and not every option will be possible. Many of these Israelites, when they returned to Jerusalem, made “unholy alliances” and broke the law of God to save their KEESTERS...now EVERYONE is praying the price for THEIR compromise!
3.) The strategy becomes WISDOM and VIGILANCE
Nehemiah 7:1-3 “After the wall had been rebuilt and I had set the doors in place, the gatekeepers and the singers and the Levites were appointed. I put in charge of Jerusalem my brother Hanani, along with Hananiah the commander of the citadel, because he was a man of integrity and feared God more than most men do. I said to them, “The gates of Jerusalem are not to be opened until the sun is hot. While the gatekeepers are still on duty, have them shut the doors and bar them. Also appoint residents of Jerusalem as guards, some at their posts and some near their own houses.”
Workers now become WATCHMEN
There was a time during the rebuilding of the wall that “the workers were also warriors” and had a rock in one hand and a sword in the other.
NOW that the wall is rebuilt...swords and spears don’t get put away...some are specifically appointed to be GATEKEEPERS and others are GUARDS. (I love what Nehemiah does...he purposely places many of the guards NEAR their own homes knowing that they will fight harder if it’s to protect their families and property!)
Two men are given charge over the entire city and it’s welfare: Hanani and Hananiah. Their qualifications: They were men of integrity who feared God!
Gates will be OPEN to...
allow people in and out to do business, BUT only for a few hours each day!
**A city that never opens it’s gates is a prison.
Gates will be CLOSED...
keep the enemies out.
**A city that never closes it’s gates is inviting disaster!
Essential to your spiritual well-being is a willingness to keep the gate of your life guarded ...and wise, godly discernment to know when to open it and when to close it.
Application:
-Picture your LIFE as a city...with many interdependent relationships (not island!)
-The foundation of your city is a relationship with Jesus Christ. (Essential!)
-Each decision and commitment that you make to Christ builds the wall of that city.
(These decisions, commitments, re-dedications are a GOOD thing!)
-BUT every compromise that you make with ANGER, or FEAR, or LUST, or APATHY, or SELFISHNESS, or PRIDE threatens that wall.
-And if your “city gates” are not watched and guarded...if they are left open so that anyone and anything can come in and wander around, then YOU and those that God has placed in your life are in GRAVE DANGER!
I’m calling you this morning to BUILD THE WALL.
I’m urging you to SET THE GATES in place and put WATCHMEN in place.
I’m warning you that the enemy’s tactics demand that you be WISE and VIGILANT.
The United States did not consider itself vulnerable to attack from outside enemies prior to September 11, 2001. For years, American public enjoyed unparalleled freedoms, including conveniences of freedom to travel with very limited security checks before boarding an airplane. All that changes on September 11 when we became painfully aware that our “freedoms” could be exploited by our enemies and actually used against us. Some of our conveniences we enjoyed proved to be an easy way for an enemy to get in position to do grave damage.
