[0:00] We look forward to it. Now tonight we're in the book of Nehemiah.! And you'll see why we stop there in just a few moments.
[0:36] So Nehemiah chapter 2 verses 1 through 10 will be our text this evening as we just continue to make our way through scripture and we've reached this far.
[0:48] Let's pray. Father we thank you so much for this day. We praise you that we have the opportunity of gathering together. What a joy it is to come into fellowship with one another, to be encouraged by our time together.
[1:01] Lord to be able to share a meal with one another. Lord we also rejoice that we can open up the pages of your word. So Father we pray now as we look at the word of God that you would speak to our hearts and minds.
[1:12] You would help us to understand it. To see it with clarity and in truth. And Lord as we look at it that Christ be magnified. That we understand it not only with our minds but also with our hearts.
[1:29] And Lord give us a desire to want to follow it and to live according to it for your glory and honor. We pray that you be with those working with our youth, with our children. As always we ask that in all manners and in all ways that Christ be magnified throughout this place tonight.
[1:46] We praise you for the season that you have brought us into. And Lord we rejoice that we have the opportunity to celebrate the coming of Christ to dwell among men.
[1:56] Lord lead us tonight as we look at your word and we ask it all in Christ's name. Amen. The book of Nehemiah is a really powerful book.
[2:08] It has been used by a multitude of pastors and believers throughout the years to help us to understand what it looks like to labor for the Lord.
[2:19] And rightfully so. As we see our passage before us tonight it will kind of help you understand a little bit more. Charles Spurgeon, his publication which he put out in print was called The Sword and the Trowel.
[2:34] And it was based upon the book of Nehemiah that there were those who were laboring and building the wall with a sword in one hand and the trowel in the other. Throughout the years it has been a great text if you will, even a textbook to show you what it looks like to labor for the Lord and to be attentive to his leading.
[2:54] The passage before us tonight found in Nehemiah 2 verses 1 through 10 is really one such passage. It shows us as believers what it looks like to look for and to walk through God's open door of service.
[3:10] So I want you to see this evening God's open door of service found in Nehemiah chapter 2 starting in verse 1. And it came about in the month Nisan.
[3:21] In the 20th year of King Artaxerxes that wine was before him and I took up the wine and gave it to the king. Now I had not been sad in his presence so the king said to me, why is your face sad though you are not sick?
[3:36] This is nothing but sadness of heart. Then I was very much afraid. I said to the king, let the king live forever. Why should my face not be sad when the city in the place of my father's tombs lies desolate and its gates have been consumed by fire?
[3:53] Then the king said to me, what would you request? So I prayed to the God of heaven and I said to the king, if it please the king and if your servant has found favor before you, send me to Judah to the city of my father's tombs that I may rebuild it.
[4:09] Then the king said to me, the queen sitting beside him, how long will your journey be? And when will you return? So it pleased the king to send me and I gave him a definite time.
[4:20] And I said to the king, if it please the king, let letters be given me for the governors of the provinces beyond the river that they may allow me to pass through until I come to Judah. And a letter to Asaph, the keeper of the king's forest, that he may give me timber to make beams for the gates of the fortress, which is by the temple for the wall of the city and for the house to which I will go.
[4:41] And the king granted them to me because the good hand of my God was on me. Then I came to the governors of the provinces beyond the river and gave them the king's letters.
[4:52] Now the king had sent with me officers of the army and horsemen. And when Senballat the Horonite and Tobiah the Ammonite official heard about it, it was very displeasing to them that someone had come to seek the welfare of the sons of Israel.
[5:09] I want you to see this evening what it looks like to walk through God's open door of service. Nehemiah is a political figure.
[5:20] He is first a political figure within the courts of the Persian Empire. He is a cupbearer to King Artaxerxes, which many of us have the misconception to think that he is just a butler.
[5:34] But to be a cupbearer at that time was to be a confidant and a trusted fellow of the king. One that would have to be skilled in common practices.
[5:47] One that would have to have an understanding of current events because quite often the king would look to these individuals as counselors as well. He was living within the comforts of the king's palace in Susa when he heard of the shambles of the walls around Jerusalem.
[6:06] When his brothers came back and returned to him and told him of how disrepaired the city was and how depraved the people that were living within that city were living.
[6:19] It is then that his heart is broken and he begins to feel the stirring of his mind and in his conscience. He is a man who seems to have a mission set before him.
[6:30] But the overall question that must be asked is how do we know when it is time to do what God seems to be burdening in us to do? When we have this sense in our own terminology, this sense of leading or calling, and we have this sense of urging, and we see a need.
[6:51] When do we know it is time to act? Charles Spurgeon wrote a book called Lectures to My Students. It's actually a collection of his teaching to the students of the pastor's college.
[7:06] Charles Spurgeon was called the Prince of Preachers. He had a way with words. He had a way with teaching scripture. He could preach for hours and hours on end and people would listen to him.
[7:19] Preach to magnificent halls of individuals. But he was also, as I have found most statesmen have been throughout the years, including pastors, he was also a very honest individual.
[7:34] And he would tell people exactly what they needed to hear, not always what they wanted to hear. One of the accounts that Spurgeon tells is when people would come and make admission to the pastor's college and want to be trained to be a pastor, he would always ask them, tell me about what you've been doing.
[7:51] And he said, occasionally there would be an individual say, well, I did this occupation and I failed and I did this occupation and I failed and I did this occupation. I failed because the Lord is calling me to ministry.
[8:01] And Spurgeon would look at him and say, if you failed in everything you've done, why do you think you will succeed at preaching? Go do something else. Because God would call those, Spurgeon would say, who had succeeded in other areas, that had been found faithful.
[8:20] Now that's not just true for pastors. That is true for all individuals. That what God calls us to do is not because everything else we have tried to do has failed.
[8:31] Quite often when he calls, he calls us away from something. Nehemiah is such a man as that. He is called away from the palace in Susa, away from being the cupbearer to the king and into Jerusalem.
[8:48] But what does it look like? How do we know when the door of opportunity for that service and that burden stands before us? Because if we believe the New Testament scripture that teaches that God has good works prepared before the foundations of the world were laying for all of those in Christ Jesus, then we also know there is something that God has prepared for each and every one of us to do in Christ.
[9:14] He has something, a calling, a leading for us to do. And so it is very becoming of us to walk in such fellowship with him, those burdens.
[9:25] People say, well, pastor, what should I do? I said, well, what excites you? What burdens your heart? What concerns you? What can you not quit thinking about? What are you passionate about?
[9:36] And now I'll begin to wait on the Lord and to see how things would happen. That's our first one, by the way. The door of opportunity happens first when we wait before the Lord.
[9:52] Nehemiah hears of the great need. Nehemiah is in a position, a political position, and evidently in an economic position where he can affect the need that he hears about.
[10:03] But what we realize in the first chapter that when he heard of the need, the first thing, and we saw this already, the first thing that Nehemiah did is he sat down and he wept and he fasted for many days.
[10:16] He didn't hear of a need and immediately go do something about it because if we're not careful, that is exactly what each and every one of us would do. Men, we have a tendency to do that.
[10:27] It is our natural disposition, which is a good disposition to have because God has wired men that way, see a need, meet a need, fulfill a need, move on, let's go do something else. And that's why we have to be careful because the reality is, is that when it comes to the burdens and the callings of the Lord, quite often the first thing, not quite often, I would say every time, the first thing we must do is to be still.
[10:50] And you say, well, if I wait, if I don't act now, then the opportunity will pass me by. Listen, I believe in the sovereignty of God who controls the time of the universe in the palm of his hand.
[11:03] And I believe I have to kind of, kind of resolve myself to this reality that God in his good timing will bring things about as he sees fit, not as I want to make it happen.
[11:16] Nehemiah takes time and he is still and he waits before the Lord. It tells us in the opening verse there, the second chapter, and it came about, I love that, and it came about.
[11:30] See, in chapter one, we are told there's a great need. In chapter one, we're told there are people that are living in a pitiful situation. In chapter one, we are told that Nehemiah has a burden.
[11:43] In chapter one, we're told that Nehemiah is broken over it. In chapter one, we're told that Nehemiah is praying and fasting over it. And in chapter two, it tells us it came about.
[11:55] Because when God calls and God burdens, it doesn't say, and Nehemiah did. It says, and it came about. He who brings the burden and the calling and the concern will also orchestrate the days and the times to bring it about.
[12:16] One of the beautiful things of scripture that we've noticed in the early pages of scripture in the book of Genesis. Genesis, it was now nearly 10 years ago, to be 10 years ago in February, that we opened up Genesis 1 together.
[12:30] And we started making our way through it as a church. And if you remember, if you were here, very few of you were here then. But if you were here and we opened up Genesis 1, and you've heard me talk about it since. And we see that Adam is in the garden.
[12:41] And Adam's in this beautiful garden. And all these animals are before Adam. And God has Adam name all the animals. And he's naming them. And whatever he calls them, that is their name.
[12:52] Adam is given responsibility. He has to name them. And they walk before him. And we say, well, that's pretty cool. Adam got to name all the animals. No, what God is doing, he's doing something so much more than that. Because do you know what that account ends with?
[13:06] For each animal that passed by, Adam gave them a name. And there was no suitable helpmate found for Adam. Adam noticed after looking at all of creation, everything had a perfect match.
[13:18] Everything had a perfect mate. There was male and female, male and female, male and female. God created them. But for Adam, there was no helpmate. Then God put Adam to sleep.
[13:30] And he took the rib out of his eye. And he fashioned a woman. What did God do? God brought a burden upon Adam. Adam had a need. Adam needed something he didn't know he needed until he did something else.
[13:41] Right? He named the animals. And in naming the animals and doing the work God gave him, God showed him what he really needed was a helpmate. And then when the need was made aware to him, God met the need.
[13:54] It came about. God knew the need. God could have just created woman. And said, there you go, Adam. Here's Eve. But Eve didn't know how much she was needed.
[14:07] Adam didn't know how much he needed Eve until God gave him something else to do first. Nehemiah has a task. And it says, and it came about. And it tells us it is the month Nisan.
[14:18] And you need to know if you go back. And you see there in the first few verses of chapter 1, this is about two to three months in Jewish reckoning calendar. It's kind of hard for us to reckon exactly when it is because it tells us in the first part, the month that was brought to him was either the end in the month Chislev there in verse 1 of the first chapter.
[14:39] It's kind of our mid-December to mid-January. And Nisan is mid-March to mid-April, so a span of about two to three months. There's about two to three months of waiting.
[14:53] We have no activity of Nehemiah recorded during that time. And the whole time, let's, you say, well, it's just two to three months. But for about three months, Nehemiah knew that his kinsmen were living in awful conditions.
[15:11] For about three months, Nehemiah knew that the walls were destroyed. For about three months, Nehemiah knew that the enemy was having their way. And for about three months, Nehemiah did nothing but wait.
[15:27] He said, oh, Nehemiah should have acted quicker. No, Nehemiah waited. Brothers and sisters, sometimes when the Lord God is calling us, the greatest thing that we can do is wait before him and see how he's going to make it come about rather than seeing what we can do with it.
[15:49] We patiently wait. I've told you this before. I believe that one of the giftedness, and I don't mean this boastfully, and I don't mean this in any way bragging because it is actually one of the gifts that I wish possibly I didn't have.
[16:05] I believe God, one of the spiritual gifts he gave me was a gift of being a visionary. So not like prophetic visionary like I'm casting visions, but I believe he's given me the gift of being able to see things as he's going to make them be.
[16:21] And sometimes those are five to seven years ahead, and my personal ambition is to want to make them that way now. But what God has disciplined me and taught me is to wait and to pray towards that manner and to long for that and to anticipate that.
[16:39] And it's a patience that he's built in me that I did not necessarily want. I didn't ask for because I'm a very impatient person at times, but it leads me to wait before him as I long for what I want to see him do because that is the greatest way we can long for the door of service to reach is to wait before the Lord.
[17:03] I prayed three years before God moved me from where I was pastoring it before to here. Three years. For three years I knew God was moving me. Without a shadow of a doubt, I knew it.
[17:19] And I waited, and I waited. There were times I pushed, and then he'd make me wait again. By the way, I'm not praying that direction at all. Right now I have no leading. I'm praying the opposite direction.
[17:31] God, keep me, keep me, keep me. Make their hearts soft towards me. But anyway, we wait before the Lord. While we wait before the Lord, number two, we work before man.
[17:43] We work before man because waiting does not mean laziness. As a matter of fact, Paul admonished the churches he wrote to.
[17:53] If you remember, he was writing to the churches in Thessalonica because there were so many people that were looking for the coming day of the Lord and they were so excited about the coming of the Lord that they quit their jobs.
[18:08] And in quitting their jobs, they said, we're just going to wait for the Lord to come back. And Paul told the church there, hey, they don't eat. If a man doesn't work, he doesn't eat.
[18:18] He said, sure. He said, sure. And by the way, 1 and 2 Thessalonians, if you read 1 and 2 Thessalonians, every chapter of both of those books has a reference to the second coming of Christ.
[18:31] Every chapter. They're the earliest writings of Paul, by the way. And Paul, in every chapter, 1 and 2 Thessalonians, made a reference to the soon coming of Christ.
[18:43] And he anticipated the coming of Christ. And those are his earliest books. But what did Paul do even after writing those? Planted a multitude of churches, right? Raised up pastors and elders and leaders and deacons.
[18:54] And every church was imprisoned and shipwrecked. And all these wonderful things. Wrote a multitude of letters after that. Paul was looking for and hastening the coming day of the Lord. But he didn't quit working. Nehemiah had a burden for the people in Jerusalem.
[19:10] And the walls around Jerusalem. But look at what it says. In the 20th year of King Artaxerxes, that wine was before him. And I took up the wine and gave it to the king. It's such a subtle statement there.
[19:22] We can just read by it. But remember, that's Nehemiah's job. It's a good way of saying Nehemiah didn't quit his day job just because he felt like God was calling him to do something else.
[19:36] Nehemiah says, I was the cupbearer to the king. And while he was waiting before the Lord. And he had this certain burden. And we know he has a burden. Because later on in the chapter, he lays out that burden.
[19:48] I'll get to that in just a moment. And he's thought about it. And you can't convince me that he didn't think about it. Because he had a detailed plan. He asked for everything in advance that he needed. He had thought every matter through. Even needing the timbers.
[19:59] And he needed all the official letters to go past all the people that were in that region. He knew exactly what was before him. So he didn't just wait and just do nothing. No, he was thinking about it. Constantly thinking about it.
[20:10] But while he was thinking about it, he was also the cupbearer to the king. He was still working before man. And he was still fulfilling his obligations.
[20:20] And he was still doing what God had given him to do at that moment, at that time. Why? Because one of the beautiful things about Nehemiah is that Nehemiah shows us that every work is a sacred work.
[20:36] What if Nehemiah said, there's something better for me to do. I'm going to quit being the cupbearer to the king. Well, if he had quit being the cupbearer to the king, then the door of opportunity would have never opened up the way it does.
[20:51] He continued doing the work and the labor because he saw it now as a sacred means to be set apart for the glory of God. One of the beauties, and I was speaking with Brother Jamie about it this afternoon.
[21:05] And he's given me a book to read. And it's a wonderful book going through it. One of the beauties of the gospel is that the gospel reminds us of the worth of man. And scripture tells us that man was created in the image of God.
[21:17] And in doing that, and I think we forget this sometimes, it elevates man to this high position. Since we are all image bearers, that means that we are as much an image bearer in anything we do as we are in anything else.
[21:30] I don't bear more of the image of God because I stand up and preach behind a pulpit. I'm as much as the image bearer of the Lord God Almighty when I'm laying under a vehicle working on it and skinning my knuckles up.
[21:44] Sometimes I feel like I'm reflecting another image there too. But that depends on how angry I get at the car. But we understand that whatever our occupation, whatever it is we're doing, now all of a sudden becomes a holy work.
[21:59] Because whatever we do, we do as unto the Lord and not unto man. And the greatest testimony and the greatest witness we can ever have is our work before men.
[22:11] It was Warren Wearsby who highlighted the reality that God often calls individuals at work. Think about it. When we read through scripture, most of the time God calls an individual, he finds them working.
[22:33] Right? The Lord Jesus, when he called his disciples, each one of them were working. Some of them were sitting behind a tax collector's desk. Some of them were mending their nets.
[22:44] Some of them were in the boat fishing. We can go even all the way back in the Old Testament when Elijah found Elisha. What was Elisha doing? He was plowing a field behind the yoke of oxen.
[22:55] Right? He was working. And he cast his mantle upon him. What about Gideon? What was Gideon doing before Gideon was that valiant warrior who delivered with 300 men? Gideon was threshing wheat in the wine vat. Now he was scared.
[23:06] He was in the wine vat, which makes no sense. Because there's not a lot of airs turned. But he was still threshing wheat. He was working. And over and over again in scripture, when we find God calling people, often we find, if not every time, we find him calling people who are busy working.
[23:23] Doing something. Laboring. Because whether we want to admit it or not, that labor and that work is a good thing. And we see this testimony here.
[23:35] This work before man that God had given Nehemiah to do. And he continued doing it until God opened the door. Which leads us to the third thing.
[23:47] We wait before the Lord. We work before men. The third one is pretty simple. Watch for the opportunities. Nehemiah is bringing the cup to the king.
[23:58] And the king said to him, it tells us, Why is your face sad, though you are not sick? This is nothing but sadness of heart. You say, well, what kind of opportunity is that?
[24:09] Well, we have to understand the culture just a little bit. Maybe you understand the culture of the Persians and the Medo-Persian Empire. But it was quite literally against the law and offensive to be sad in the presence of the king.
[24:23] To be sad in the presence of the king was to tell the king, There is something better than being close to you. For one, you weren't supposed to depress the king. You weren't supposed to make him upset.
[24:34] But you were also to reflect to the king that the greatest place I can ever be is in your presence. And you were to reflect that with your persona. And you were to reflect that with your habits.
[24:45] And you were to never show displeasure or sadness about being in the presence of the king. It was such a critical matter. Nehemiah says, so I was greatly afraid. Why? Because you could be killed for being sad in the presence of the king.
[24:59] He could take your life. It was offensive. And the king looks at him and says, what is this sadness? You're not sick, but it's sadness of heart.
[25:12] And Nehemiah understood the weight of it because he says, I was greatly afraid. I was greatly afraid. But he also saw the opportunity here because the tendency would be this.
[25:25] My tendency, maybe it wouldn't be your tendency. Is to be so afraid to live apologetically and say, well, I'm sorry, king. I shouldn't have done it. Please have mercy on me and let's go on about the rest of our day, right?
[25:39] To try to wash over it or to try to make up for it or to say, well, king, I'm not really upset. There's nothing bothering me. But Nehemiah, he had been waiting before the Lord. He had been praying about this matter.
[25:49] And now when the king asked him why he's sad, he not only has the boldness to say that I was very much afraid, but he has the audacity to look at the king and say, why shouldn't I be sad? Because there is something weighing on my heart greater than me being in your presence.
[26:09] Now, he professes allegiance to the king. He says, may the king live forever. But why shouldn't I be sad when the city of my father's lays in ruins? By the way, for biblical study, this is one of the reasons, this text here is one of the reasons why some, if not most Bible, biblical scholars believe Nehemiah, was of the tribe of Judah.
[26:33] Because he says his father's tombs are in Jerusalem. Which would make sense because most of the people carried out of Jerusalem that were put into the courts of the kings of Nebuchadnezzar and later on the Medo-Persians and then the Persians were people of royal lineage.
[26:53] But it doesn't mean Nehemiah is a king. He's just a cupbearer to the king. But still what we find is what could have been used by the enemy to scare Nehemiah into silence was rather used by the Lord.
[27:10] To show Nehemiah the opportunity. To ask. He says, why shouldn't I be? And he begins to declare what's going on and it says, and then the king says, what would you request?
[27:27] I love this. He says, so I pray to the God of heaven. It's one of those very quick prayers. So in Nehemiah we see so many different prayers. We see the first chapter where he is patiently waiting and sitting and fasting and mourning and weeping for a number of days.
[27:41] And now we see one of these instantaneous prayers because there's no way Nehemiah hit his knees and had a 30 minute prayer session in front of the king when the king says, what do you want? But rather it's just Lord help me.
[27:55] It's that praying without ceasing. And Nehemiah says, so I prayed to the Lord God of heaven and I said to the king, that is he put prayer and action together. Why? Because he recognized the opportunity that God was given him.
[28:08] Friend, if we wait before the Lord as we work before men, the opportunity will come about. But we have to be willing to have the boldness to walk through that opportunity.
[28:22] When something could be used of the enemy to scare us, we say, now here's the opportunity. Trusting in the Lord God, trusting in the fellowship and the communion with him that we have built before we went into that season.
[28:39] But now standing before him saying, yes, Lord, now I know it's time. We have the time to testify. And it says, he laid his plans out before the king and they were detailed plans.
[28:54] He'd been thinking this through. He'd been waiting on this. He recognized the opportunity that God was giving him simply because the king asked him a question. How easy it would have been to say, oh, king, nothing's wrong.
[29:08] But no, this is what he's been praying about. He does something that is so out of the ordinary for cupbearers. But yet he does it with the confidence that God is calling him because he has this burden.
[29:26] Fourth and finally, we notice not only do we wait before the Lord, we work before men and we watch for opportunities. The fourth one is probably of utmost importance. And if we're not careful, we'll miss it.
[29:36] Number four, we walk with a concern for others. I've been guilty of this. And I would dare say that just about anyone who's read the book of Nehemiah would be guilty of this.
[29:51] That we would say that Nehemiah is the great wall builder of Jerusalem and we would leave it there. And he is. But that only takes 54 days. He's there 13 years as governor the first time.
[30:06] It only takes 54 days to rebuild the walls. But our focus tends to be on what physical work he did. He rebuilt the walls. But actually, Nehemiah didn't rebuild the walls.
[30:18] Nehemiah had a whole bunch of people around him rebuilding the walls. But we ascribe to Nehemiah this great deed, this thing that was done.
[30:29] Because, if we're not careful, when we read the first chapter, the greatest need we see are the shamble of ruins around the city Jerusalem.
[30:41] And we see these walls in bits and pieces laying everywhere. Because King Nebuchadnezzar and his captain of his guard, Nebuchadnezzar, knocked them all down. And there are rocks upon rocks upon rocks.
[30:53] And the city has been burned. And when we're looking, we're seeing these ruins. But that's not what Nehemiah saw. See, Nehemiah didn't desire to promote himself by being the great wall builder and the great political leader.
[31:14] As a matter of fact, he took a demotion in the political realm when he left the capital of Susa to go be governor of Jerusalem. And his burden wasn't to be known for doing this grand deed.
[31:27] And we kind of have it highlighted for us here. He had all the details. He needed letters. He needed permission. He needed wood. He needed timbers. He needed all these things.
[31:39] And he lined all of that up. Why? Because, as a cupbearer, he would have been an individual who knew these things. Much like Ezra knew where all the ethics and the writings were left.
[31:51] Nehemiah was the man that God had fit to understand the organization. And he was a great administration guy. Something that I'm very weak at. But Nehemiah was a great administrator. By the way, some people, one of the greatest things you can ever do in church administration is to read the book of Nehemiah.
[32:07] It's kind of how you lay things out. I went through a church administration class one time, and it was all in the book of Nehemiah. It's wonderful about getting everybody on board and doing it.
[32:18] Nehemiah did a fantastic job at that. But that's what it is. Look, it's that last statement there. When he went, he didn't go like Ezra.
[32:30] Ezra went, and he had some Jewish people with him. And Ezra didn't want to ask for an escort, a royal escort from the king, because he wanted to show that God could keep them and preserve them.
[32:41] And so 15 to 16 years prior to Nehemiah's coming, Ezra had went, and God had kept them faithful. Nehemiah goes, and he has a royal entourage of escort with him, right?
[32:52] He's got horsemen and guardsmen, and he's got all these things. Why? Because he's from the king's court. He's one of the royal officials. He's kind of a political leader. But he's going into kind of the outskirts of the domain there.
[33:06] And so he goes with that favor. But this one statement at the end really shows us what it's about. We meet the two enemies of Nehemiah for the first time, by the way.
[33:16] And we don't meet them until Nehemiah begins to do something. Because, friend, listen to me. Your enemy is content as long as you are still. But the moment when that opportunity comes and you say, yes, I see the opportunity.
[33:30] I'm going to begin to do what God has called me to do. And I'm going to begin to do what God has burdened my heart to do. And I'm going to begin to send him. I promise you, the moment you do that, your Samballot and Tobiah will show up.
[33:43] Because they're always waiting. And it tells us there in verse 10, When Samballot the Horonite and Tobiah the Ammonite, the official, heard about it.
[33:53] By the way, Samballot probably is in danger of losing some of his sway in that area. Tobiah, many people believe he is a servant of Samballot.
[34:04] So, therefore, he has a lot of allegiance to that man. But when Samballot the Horonite and Tobiah the Ammonite, the official, heard about it, it was displeasing to them. Now, here's the statement I want you to see.
[34:14] It was not about someone coming to rebuild the walls.
[34:28] It was about someone coming to seek the welfare of the sons of Israel. Those walls surrounded people. It was the people that were in need.
[34:41] It was the people that Nehemiah was concerned about. The walls could lay there in disrepair into infinity and it wouldn't matter. But it was the sons of Israel that were unprotected.
[34:54] It was the people that stood in danger. It was the people that stood in want. It was the people that were put in harm's way. And Nehemiah was concerned about the people.
[35:06] And since he was concerned about the people, he rebuilt the walls. If all we want to be known for is what good thing we do, then we have our reward.
[35:18] But we ought to walk with a burden and a concern for people. And then whatever thing we have to do for the people becomes secondary.
[35:34] May our concern not be about rebuilding walls. But may we be those who upset the enemy because we show up and we have a concern for the people that are there.
[35:48] There are many, many great non-Christian organizations doing great things and meeting physical needs.
[36:01] But that's the extent of their reach. But it's only those who labor for the king who can really carry a concern and a burden for people to show them their greatest need of all time.
[36:18] Anybody could have showed up and rebuilt the walls. But Nehemiah showed up concerned about the sons of Israel in that area. And that's what upset the enemy. If it was an empty city, so what?
[36:32] But it's not. It'll be the city that the Savior presents himself in. It'll be the city that brings salvation and redemption unto man. It's the people that Nehemiah was concerned about.
[36:47] So as we look for God's open door of service, may it be those who wait before him, work before others, watch for the opportunities, and walk with a burden and concern of the people that are affected for the glory of the Savior.
[37:00] Nehemiah 2, verses 1 through 10. Thank you, my brothers.