Nehemiah 2:10-20

[Re]Vision II: Strategies for Pursuing God’s Call

Today, we continue in our sermon series where we have been studying the Book of Nehemiah. And as we have learned, the Book of Nehemiah is about rebuilding. It’s about how God seeks to rebuild and restore his movement upon this earth and how God seeks to rebuild and restore broken people and broken lives.

And what we’ve come to understand, is that when God wants to move his movement in this world forward, He always does it through people … people who are servant leaders. And God speaks to servant leaders through their passion. This is why it is so important that we learn to identify and articulate our passion.

When God says in the Bible that “God will give you the desires of your heart,” this is what it is talking about. When our lives become aligned with Jesus Christ, our desires and our passion will become the same as God’s desires and passion. This is what it means to “take on the mind and the heart of Christ”. Our goal is to become servant leaders whose passion is to accomplish God’s purpose in this world.

And as we talked about last week, servant leaders who are successful are successful because they are able to translate their passion into strategic actions. It is their strategic actions that keep servant leaders moving forward through whatever challenges or obstacles they may face in pursuing God’s call.

Today, we are in the 2^nd chapter of Nehemiah and here we have identified 6 strategies that successful servant leaders build their lives upon. Last Sunday we talked about the first three of these strategies … the first being “Preparation”. Preparation precedes progress. Successful people are diligent in preparation. If you fail to prepare, you fail to succeed. The second strategy for success in pursuing God’s call in life, is to develop a network of “Strategic Partnerships”. We will talk a little more about that today. And the third strategy for success in pursuing God’s call in life, is that servant leaders “Trust in the Providence of God.” This is why servant leaders are risk-takers. As Christians, we are willing to step out in faith and to pursue God’s call in our lives, because we know and trust that God is going to take care of us. The God who placed that passion in your hearts and calls you will see you through and give you the victory.

Today, we are going to look at the 3 remaining strategies that we find in Nehemiah chapter 2, beginning with the 11^th verse. Nehemiah has stepped through the door of opportunity that was presented by the king to pursue God’s call and by this time, he has made the 2 month journey from where he is to Jerusalem. And in verse 11 he says, “I came to Jerusalem and was there for three days. Then I got up during the night, I and a few men with me; I told no one what my God had put into my heart to do for Jerusalem. The only animal I took was the animal I rode.”

And then, we hear about how Nehemiah does “diligent preparation”, like what we talked about last week. He begins by assessing the work, before he tries to begin the work. He begins to assess the extent of the devastation and what the needs are, which will determine how he strategically puts a team together to begin the rebuilding task.

Now, as you read, you will see how he is very specific in how he assesses the situation. And Nehemiah comes to the point that would discourage most people. He discovers that the destruction and the debris are so great, that it is impassable. But this does not discourage Nehemiah.

Let’s pick it up in verse 16: “The officials did not know where I had gone or what I was doing; I had not yet told the Jews, the priests, the nobles, the officials, and the rest that were to do the work. Then I said to them, “You see the trouble we are in, how Jerusalem lies in ruins with its gates burned. Come, let us rebuild the wall of Jerusalem, so that we may no longer suffer disgrace.”

I told them how the hand of my God had been gracious upon me, and also the words that the king had spoken to me. Then they said, “Let us start building!” So they committed themselves to the common good.” – Nehemiah 2:16-18. Folks, those are the only kind of people I want to hang out with. I want to be around people who are committed to doing the good work of God.

Let’s continue in verse 19: “But when Sanballat the Horonite and Tobiah the Ammonite official, and Geshem the Arab heard of it, they mocked and ridiculed us, saying, ‘What is this that you are doing? Are you rebelling against the king?’”

In other words, are you going against the things that have been happening for the last 150 years? In 586 the walls of Jerusalem were destroyed. Now, it is 445 BC when the walls are going to be rebuilt. It’s been almost 150 years that people haven’t done anything. They’ve become accustomed to the destruction and the status quo. I wonder if there is a word here for the church today? They became accustomed to the status quo.

“What is this that you are doing?” they ask, “Are you rebelling against the king?” Then in verse 20 Nehemiah replies, “Then I replied to them, ‘The God of heaven is the one who will give us success, and we his servants are going to start building;’”

Here, we get a good picture of the kind of servant leader Nehemiah was. Let’s talk about some of the keys to his success. We talked about the first three last week. Now let’s take a look at the others. The fourth strategy of people who are successful in pursuing God’s call in their lives is patience. Successful servant leaders practice the strategy of patience. God uses people with patient spirits.

We live in a time where the commodity of value is “speed” and “innovation”. And what this has done, is to create a culture of hurry. In other words, if we are going to be successful in the time in which we live today, we have to become an expert in multi-tasking. We have to be able to do a variety of things well at the same time. Those of us who are parents know about this. How do you juggle jobs, travel, relationships, children’s activities, and all the things that go along with being a family? To be successful, we have to do all of those things well. But here’s the consequence. It can result in a spirit that is shallow and harried.

Nehemiah had the practice of taking time-outs, where he would connect to the heart of God. We saw this in the first chapter, where he said, “I sat down… I wept … I fasted … I prayed.” And then, here in chapter 2, we see that when he arrives in Jerusalem, he doesn’t immediately start the work, he rested for three days. You remember that Jesus had the same practice. We often read about how Jesus, even after a long day of work, where people were constantly around him and demanding his time, he would still create this margin of devotion, where he would get away from people to refresh his spiritual perspective.

A lesson that I continue to learn the hard way, is that “Tiredness robs us perspective and peace.” You remember how Elijah had had great success for God against the priests and those who were following the god Baal. But, as often happens, after this period of great success and hard work, Elijah finds himself extremely fatigued and depressed to the point of wishing for death. And when the Angel of Lord shows up to minister to him, listen to the prescription that the Angel of Lord brings. It wasn’t, “Get up off of your rear, you lazy bum, and get back to work.” The angel says, “Eat and sleep.” Before we can go forward in pursuing God’s call, we have to take time to refresh our spiritual perspectives by taking care of ourselves.

You see, God uses people who understand this … people who have a patient spirit. I mean, we know how such patience does wonders in our relationships with other people. When I am harried in my spirit and I come home, what am I like? I am impatient with those who are closest to my heart. You see, God can’t do much with impatient people.

Patience also allows us to control our tongue. Notice what Nehemiah says in verse 12. He says, “I told no one what my God had put into my heart to do for Jerusalem.” Several times we read how Nehemiah has control over his tongue. Has anyone here, in your impatience, ever said anything that you wish you could take back? Or in your impatience, have you ever spoke too soon and made commitments that you couldn’t keep? This is why God uses people with a patient spirit.

I love the quote by Abraham Lincoln. He said, “I’d rather be quiet, so no one think I am a fool, than open my mouth and prove it.”

Another thing that patience does, is that “it fuels perseverance.” Miracles are not made in a moment. We tend to want everything to happen right now. We want success in our relationships and in our jobs, right now. And we want God to just propel us forward in achieving our goals in life. That’s called magic. But you see, God is not into magic. Miracles are the consequence of patiently waiting upon the Lord and the result of a life-long commitment in the same direction.

And it is through this patience, that we gain an inward assurance that “The God of heaven is going to give us success.” God uses people who have a patient spirit to move things forward in this world … people who are willing to “wait upon the Lord,” as Isaiah says, “and renew their strength, so they can mount up with wings as eagles.”

The second strategy that we are going talk about for pursuing God’s call in our lives, is that servant leaders are “problem solvers, not blame assessors or excuse makers.” And what I see in this chapter are 5 Characteristics that make for effective problem solving.

The first thing is that problem solvers are not “reactive”, they are “proactive”. Look at verse 12. After Nehemiah rested for three days to reconnect and refresh his spiritual perspective, he said, “I got up during the night…” Now, what Nehemiah is telling us here is that when the time was right, he didn’t wait, he sat out to find a solution.

Remember that the walls of Jerusalem were destroyed in 586 by the Babylonians. A historian claimed that from 5 miles away one could hear the explosions. What was going on was that as the city burned, the moisture in the rocks heated up to a point that it caused the rocks to explode. They became like bomb exploding with shrapnel. And this debris has laid there from 586 BC to 445 BC. So, we’re talking about a real mess here.

How many people rode by that mess over those 150 years and said, “There’s just no way.” You see, they were “blame assessors.” They were “excuse makers.” But Nehemiah was proactive and he set out to find a solution.

Have you ever noticed how reactive people always have an excuse list. There is always a reason that it is not my fault. Here’s one you may have heard your children say: “My teacher just doesn’t like me.” Or “It’s my spouse. You’d drink too if you were married to who I am married to.” I have heard people say, “It is my geographic location. We can’t expect anything any better. Nothing is going to change.” Or folks will blame their past, or the economy, or they’ll blame their social context. But folks, nothing will ever change, until somebody gets proactive about finding God’s solution.

Look at Jesus. He was born in a barn … to an unwed teenager. He was a minority in a Roman dominated culture. And he was executed because of his message. But Jesus was a problem solver who persevered through every obstacle, including execution. You see, problem solvers are “proactive”, not “reactive”.

The second characteristic of problem solvers is that they are “team-builders.” In verse 12, Nehemiah says, “I got up during the night, I and a few men with me;” Notice that word “few”. Problem solvers are selective in their relationships. Remember what we talked about last week, how part of the strategy for success in pursuing God’s call is to develop “a network of strategic relationships”. Problem solvers are selective in who they choose to be in relationship with. Problem solvers don’t have the time to relate their lives to negative people … to resisters or excuse makers. As we talked about last week, we have to examine our relationships in life and ask the question, “Are the people we are related to pulling us forward in pursuing God’s purpose in our lives or are they pulling us backward?”

Jesus was the same way. He ministered to the multitudes, but he focused on the twelve. He invested his life into those twelve who would strategically take God’s purpose forward. Understand, that all people are equally important to God, but not all people are equally strategic. Like Jesus, we are to love and minister to all people, but we have to be selective and strategic about those who we are in close relationship with. Are the people we are related to pulling us forward in pursuing God’s purpose in our lives or are they pulling us backward?

The third characteristic I see of problem solvers in this passage is that problem solvers are committed to doing the right thing, rather than the popular or expected thing. No one expected that the City of Jerusalem could be rebuilt. It had lain in ruins for 150 years. And it definitely wasn’t the popular thing to do, because look at all the opposition that Nehemiah received. But it was the right thing to do, because it was the God-thing to do.

Now, in order to fully understand the Book of Nehemiah, you need to also read the Book of Ezra, because they go hand-in hand. And in the 3^rd chapter of Ezra we read about Zerubbabel’s return to Jerusalem. He actually came back to Jerusalem before Nehemiah and it was Zerubbabel’s job to rebuild the Temple. But the old Temple that Zerubbabel built didn’t look like the old Temple. And this is what it says in Ezra 3:12,

“Many of the older priests and Levites and family heads who had seen the former temple wept aloud when they saw the foundation of this temple being laid, while many others shouted for joy.”

You see, Zerubbabel was a problem solver who was committed to doing the right thing, not just what’s popular or expected. He understood that God was seeking to do a new thing and he was committed to helping bring that about. And people, I believe that God is seeking to do a new thing among us.

The fourth characteristic that I see among problem solving people is that they are “truth-tellers”. They don’t live in denial or candy-coat the situation. Look at what Nehemiah says in verse 17, “You see the trouble we are in, how Jerusalem lies in ruins with its gates burned.” I think about the city of New Orleans. Look what happens when people live in denial. Folks knew for years that those levees would not stand a major surge, but they just kept pretending that nothing would ever happen.

We can’t wait until we are on the brink of divorce to go seek a counselor. We have to tell the truth. We have to name the broken places in our lives. We have got to name the broken places in our families. We have to name the broken walls of our churches. We have to name the broken walls of our nation and our world. Because nothing is ever going to change or get fixed, until we “tell the truth” and name the brokenness.

Here’s the 5^th characteristic of successful problem solvers: they “activate faith” … they don’t wait. When they hear the word of God, they don’t sit on the word of God, they act on it. Look at what Nehemiah says in verse 17, “Come, let us rebuild the wall of Jerusalem.” In other words, “let’s get to work.”

You know, the Bible says that if we hear the Word of God and we do not act upon the Word of God, then it’s dead … and God is not going to bless you or resource you. In James 2:17 it says, “Faith by itself, if it has no works, is dead.” God is no respecter of persons. You could be the worst reprobate in this room, but if you activate faith and you act on God’s Word, then God is going to bless you. God will bless you, because you are going to help move God’s purpose forward. God uses people who are willing to activate their faith.

Okay, we’re talking about the strategies for successfully pursuing God’s purpose in our lives and we’ve talked about “Patience”, we’ve talked about “Problem solving”, and next we’re going to talk about “Contagious Promotion”

People who are successful in pursuing God’s call in their lives, are selfless in the promotion of God’s purpose and God’s presence. And other people can see it. When you look at true servant leaders, you see that it is not about personal ambition or self-promotion. They exemplify Christ-like servant leadership.

Now, it would be easy to overlook this insight in the text, but take a look at verse 12. Here he is talking about his means of transportation. He says, “The only animal I took was the animal I rode.” Now what is he saying here? What I think he’s saying, is that “I didn’t show up in a Mercedes Benz.” In other words, he didn’t want to draw attention to himself. Being a member of the king’s court, he could have had an elaborate entourage. But remember, he traveled by night … under the radar, so he would not thwart the purpose of God and draw attention to himself. He was selflessly promoting the purpose and presence of God.

Humility is the hallmark of one who follows God. Look at Jesus. Jesus was equal to God, but he did not grasp hold of that privilege. He came to serve, not to be served. Remember those passages of when Jesus would pull off some incredible miracle, like giving sight to a man who was born blind or raising Lazarus from the grave. Man, I would called channel 8 and channel 10 news. I’d want to show it to everybody. But Jesus would often say, “Don’t tell anybody.” And even though Jesus and the Father are equally one, Jesus always pointed to God and said, “I didn’t come to do my own thing, but rather to fulfill the purpose of the One who sent me.” Selfless promotion.

And because of this selfless promotion of God’s purpose and God’s presence, servant leaders tirelessly promote God's vision for life and family.

Every day, I try to get up and live for one purpose … to know God more fully in my own life and to make God known to others. I want to become more like Jesus every day and I want to help connect others to Jesus. I want others to know what Jesus can do in their lives and through them. That’s my passion.

And one of the primary places where that has to be lived out is in our families. We have to be like Joshua, who said, “I don’t know about you, but as for me and my house, we’re going to serve the Lord.” Just ask my children about this. They don’t have a choice. I have often heard parents say that they don’t want to push religion on their children. They want to let them choose their own way as they grow up. Folks, that’s not Biblical.

Statistics tell us today that from age 0 – 13 we have a window of opportunity to reach children with the Christian faith. If by the age of 13 they have not accepted the Christian faith that chance drops in half. And if they have not accepted the Christian faith by age 16, the odds are that they never will. We have to take our ministry with our children and our families seriously.

As it says in Deuteronomy: “Hear, O Israel: The Lord is our God, the Lord alone. You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your might. Keep these words that I am commanding you today in your heart. Recite them to your children and talk about them when you are at home and when you are away, when you lie down and when you rise. Bind them as a sign on your hand, fix them as an emblem on your forehead, and write them on the doorposts of your house and on your gates.” As servant leaders it has to be our passion, to tireless promote God's vision for life and family.

And because of this selfless promotion of God’s purpose and presence, wherever they go servant leaders’ lives become an invitation for others to join God’s team. Servant leaders don’t go out and condemn, judge, and beat people over the head with the Bible. It’s the aroma of their life that just makes other people want to get involved. Have you ever known people like that?

In verse 18, Nehemiah said: “I told them that the hand of my God had been gracious upon me, and also the words that the king had spoken to me. Then they said, ‘Let us start building!’ So they committed themselves to the common good.” Because of who Nehemiah was and the spirit that he brought to the task, people where enthusiastic about being a part of the team to rebuild the wall.

Do you remember when Jesus was recruiting his disciples? What did he say? “Follow me and I will make you fishers of men (people).” His whole purpose in recruiting those disciples was so that they could live lives that would reach others. His whole purpose in coming to our world was to get us to follow God’s purpose in our lives and reach others.

Let me ask you a question. When people are around you, are they drawn to be a part of God’s team? Last week, we talked about the influence that others have upon our pursuit of God’s purpose … what about your influence? Is the life you are living giving out an aroma that is inviting others join God’ team and to pursue God’s purpose in their lives? Or are we being a stumbling block to God’s purpose? Wherever they go, servant leaders’ lives become an invitation for others to join God’s team.