Leadership in the Face of Opposition part 2

Well go ahead and take your Bible and turn with me to Nehemiah chapter 4. I'm sure you've already turned there because of our scripture reading. While you're turning there, I'll give you a report on our Bible drillers. We had an associational Bible drill today. I'm thankful that they all did well. They all advanced to state Bible drill, which would be not this Tuesday, but the next. And it will be at First Baptist Church in Brookhaven. So pray for them. They did well, participated well. And like I said many times, it's not just about the competition.

It's about them learning the Word of God, digesting the Word of God, and then them understanding what it means. So it would be really no good for them just to learn it and then not remember it. So pray for them and we'll give you a report when that time comes. But Nehemiah chapter 4, and like I said earlier, we'll be in verses 7 through 15. Nehemiah chapter 4 verses 7 through 15. Now this is our second message in chapter 4. And so far we have learned that the people of God are farther into the work of rebuilding the walls, but if you remember, they are facing increased opposition from Sanballat. Now I called Sanballat's friends his company.

I kind of adopted a new phrase for them this week. I call them a band of bullies. This was that company of individuals that Sanballat called around him to try to bully the people of God as they were working. Now we learned that they circled back around. They had first presented themselves in chapter 2 verse 19 when Nehemiah first came on the scene. But they've come back around with this fierce attack, this psychological intimidation. verses 2 through 3, they show us how they bullied the people with question after question. It was meant to intimidate them, meant to cast doubts in their hearts.

It was meant to undermine their trust in God and really just to discourage them overall as they were in the work. I say this is a fierce attack because remember, they were very, very angry. So it was more than just psychological intimidation. The spirit behind it we learned was anger. It was a very strong anger. But I also want you to remember what else we learned. And that is what I'm calling tonight the other side of the coin of this opposition. And that is how the people of God reacted. We're beginning to see how they are reacting. Through opposition, we are seeing success and good success.

We see the mature leadership of Nehemiah, the fact that he prayed when opposition came to his in this frontal attack. He only prayed. He didn't resort to doing anything in the flesh. He operated in the spirit. Then there is the success of the people in building the walls. But then last, very important, we saw unity develop within the people. That's that inward work. And there in verse 6, we saw that they had a mind or a heart for the work. Now I want to pause here just for a minute. Of course, this is introduction. I want to make a little application.

We must see that God intends inner spiritual growth to come about as a work, as a result of opposition. Now this applies to individuals and to the body as a whole. Remember we're paralleling this work of yesterday with the work of the church today. And opposition is intended to grow the group, the body, and the individuals. We see that with Nehemiah and we see that with the people. They were more unified through the opposition. That's the corporate work. And then we saw a work in Nehemiah. That's the individual work. And that's the same way with us today in the life of the church. I love what Brother Keith was sharing earlier.

Your trial, your opposition, your difficulty could be for the church. Sometimes we personalize it so much. We fail to realize that what we might be going through, God's purpose is so that it would be used in the life of the church. I mean I just wanted to shout amen when Brother Keith was talking about that because some of the trials that I went to prior to coming to the Nola Baptist Church were preparing me for this day and this time. Now at the time all I could see was me. Woe is me. God would you please remove this. I don't like it. But I had to receive it and let God work that out in me.

There's that inner spiritual work, that inner spiritual growth for the individuals but also for the body. But also an application I want to say this. It is easier for leadership to pray at the onset of a work rather than in the middle of a work. Now I don't know Nehemiah's mind. I don't know Nehemiah's heart. I don't know what kind of man he was outside of what we have in the scriptures. But I'll say this from personal experience. It is easier for leadership to pray at the beginning of a work or when we see that work on the horizon than it is when we get halfway through the work or in the middle of the work.

Because once we get in the middle of the work we've got our hands on things. And Nehemiah didn't do that. He's in the middle of the work and in this opposition he prayed. Very very mature. Now we are holding on to the same title. This is a part one, part two. And we are calling this leadership in the face of opposition part two. And we will cover verses seven through fifteen. And we have five truths again tonight. We had five truths out of John this morning. And then we have five truths out of Nehemiah tonight. I didn't plan it that way. It just so happened to fall that way.

And like this morning's message, some of these truths are rather short so don't be fearful of our time. Now you see some of the truths on the screen but I will cycle through the slides so that you can get them at the appropriate time. We have the continued success in the face of opposition. And then we have the continued opposition in the face of success. That's right out of these first two verses. And that really sets up the second part of the message. And so let's go to these verses. Let's read them. Rather lengthy portion of scripture but we've got time to read them all.

Verse seven, "Now it came about when Sanballat, Tobiah, and the Arabes, the Ammonites, and the Aesthetites heard that the repair on the walls of Jerusalem went on and that the breaches began to be closed. They were very angry." There's that spirit of anger again. Verse eight, "And all of them conspired together to come and fight against Jerusalem and to cause a disturbance. But we prayed to our God and because of them we set up a guard against them day and night.

Thus in Judah it was said, 'The strength of the burdened bearers is falling, yet there is much rubbish, and we ourselves are unable to rebuild the wall.' Verse 11, "And our enemies said they will not know or see until we come up among them and kill them and put a stop to the work. And it came about when the Jews who lived near them came and they told us ten times, they will come up against us from every place where you may turn. Then I stationed men in the lowest parts of the space behind the wall, the exposed places, and I stationed the people and families with their swords and spears and bows.

And when I saw their fear, I rose and I spoke to the nobles, the officials, and the rest of the people. Do not be afraid of them. Remember the Lord who is great and awesome and fight for your brothers, your sons, your daughters, your wives, and your houses." We'll stop right there for tonight. So let's look at the first main truth, truth number one, the continued success in the face of opposition. We see this out of verse 7. What do we see right in the middle of that verse? "The repair of the walls of Jerusalem went on and that the breaches began to be closed." So here we see continued success. We saw success mentioned earlier in verse 6.

Now we have success in verse 7. And we see that Nehemiah is communicating in his book on ongoing success in the work. Now two observations I want to make mention of about this success. First of all, the walls were going up. The walls were going up. Isn't that what we see in verse 7? They heard that the repair of the walls of Jerusalem went on and that the breaches began to be closed. Now the new American that I'm reading from reads "went on." The English standard reads "going forward." The amplified, which is a paraphrase. Sometimes I love how it's worded.

It reads "the walls of Jerusalem were going up." Now I like reading it that way, this going up, because we understand the walls to progress had to go up. Now remember, I've referenced this before, modern archaeology tells us that the walls were around nine feet thick. That's rather large. But what do we need to see in this imagery? As the walls are being built, they're going up. The work is going on, but the walls are going up. And this is a rather large and fortified wall. Second, I want you to see the openings were being closed. I've read that earlier.

All of the translations read "breaches." This simply speaks of the ongoing, the openings being closed in, in the walls. So here, it is important for us to see that they have continued success in the face of this opposition. Now in your note taking, I'd like you to write down one word, and that is progress. Progress. The work is progressing. It is progressing. Let me go back and read last week's verse and this week's verse. Verse six, "So we built the wall, and the whole wall was joined together to half its height for the people how to mine a unity for the work." Then that work is interrupted here with this continued opposition.

Now it came about when Sam Ballot, Tabiah, the Arabs, the Ammonites, the Ashdodites, heard that the repairs on the wall went on and that the breaches began to be closed. So what do we see? This is continued success in the work. They are just progressing in the work. All of this is in the face of that opposition. Now I want to turn it around with our second main truth, and I want us to see there is continued opposition in the face of the success. There's continued opposition in the face of this success. We've got to go back to verse seven.

"Now it came about when Sam Ballot, Tabiah, the Arabs, the Ammonites, and the Ashdodites heard that the repairs on the walls went on." See they heard that the work is progressing. The end of verse seven, "They were very angry." Verse eight, "And all of them conspired together to come and fight against Jerusalem and to cause a disturbance in it." Here it is important to see not only has the opposition continued, but it has intensified. It has grown. Again we need to see the spirit of this growing opposition is anger. Again we see that same language from verse six on into verse nine. They were angry. They were very angry.

They were very enraged. Now three observations I want to make about this opposition in the face of their success. First I want us to see this opposition has grown in its intensity. This opposition has grown in its intensity. Now notice what we see when we go back in the scripture, verse seven. Now it came about when Sanballat, Tabiah, the Arabs, the Ammonites, and the Ashdodites heard that the repairs of the wall in Jerusalem went on. We see they became angry. Now I want us to see how this opposition has grown in its intensity by going all the way back to chapter two. Now notice three things about this intensity.

First, we see back in chapter two, verse 19, that they mocked. Remember they mocked. They jeered. They made fun of. It's interesting that we do not see the word angry here or enraged here. It's just mocking. Maybe they didn't take them serious. Maybe they just saw the work as foolish. Then notice second, we see that they ridiculed chapter four, verses one through three. That's what we saw last week. They ridiculed. But we must see that when they were ridiculing, they were angry. This is that psychological warfare that was through this fierce anger. See how it is intensifying?

And then notice third here in verse 11 that we see that they are now making violent threats. Verse 11, "And our enemies said, 'They will not know or see until we come among them and kill them.'" So things have escalated to violent, murderous threats. We are going to kill them. So you see how this opposition has grown in its intensity? They start off by mocking, probably laughing. Then they start off. Then they move on to ridicule, in anger. And now it has moved on to violent threats. We're going to kill them. So the opposition has grown in its intensity. Second, I want you to see the opposition has grown in its breadth.

The opposition has grown in its breadth. Now if we contrast who is mentioned in verse seven with who was mentioned in the verses from last week, verses one and two, we see that there is one group which is added, the asstodites. But if we do some geographical study and notice where these people are from, we will see that truly the breadth of this opposition. We will see that Jerusalem and this work is truly surrounded on all sides. We have the Samaritans. They were mentioned in verses one and two. And in verse seven, they are from the north. Then we have the Arabians. They were mentioned in verse one and two. And then in verse seven.

And they are from the south. Then we have the Ammonites. They were mentioned in both places. They are to the east. And now this new group, the asstodites, they are to the west. So what do we see here? This opposition has grown in its breadth. They are literally surrounded by those who oppose the work. Third, I want you to see this opposition has grown in its depth. This has already been mentioned, but the depth of their hearts has grown to violent killing. For the first time, they have threatened the Jews with death. They first mocked them possibly through laughter. Then they ridiculed them through fierce anger.

And now we see that this opposition has grown in its depth to a serious threat of violence. So, here we see this continued growing, intensifying opposition in the face of this seeming feeble success. As I was studying this week, I thought about it like this. This is almost David and Goliath type material. Very much outnumbered. Very much surrounded by these enemies. This is a feeble group of Jews trying to accomplish this great work with giants all around. Now with these trutrues that we've looked at, this continued success in the face of opposition, this continued opposition in the face of success, we need to make some application.

And I want us to see that we must see that the world's response to the work of God will most often be opposition. We learned that in our message this morning in John chapter 12. The world reviled Christ, what Christ came to do, and the church of God as we continue to study on in the New Testament. In here, it is no different. This is the work of God. These are the people of God. And the world hated them. Again, we're going back and forth between the Jews and the church today. And we need to see that it is no different today. I'll give you a couple of examples and then we'll move on. I automatically think about our friends in India.

I got a report this morning from Luke. I'm going to share with you some pictures and information Wednesday night. I look forward to that. But you know, we pray for those mission points there in India. We sponsor some orphans there in India. We do some work there in India through our friend Luke. But as the political climate has changed in India, that outward opposition has grown. They used to have a political party that was in charge that was more friendly to Christians. And now they are threatened because it is a more Hindu friendly government that is in charge.

And literally places where it was safe to minister in the name of Jesus have become very dangerous. That is outward opposition outside of the church, much like the Jews. They were surrounded from the north, south, east, and west. But then we must see that there is always the threat of opposition in the church. If we're not careful, we can lower the standards and allow the wrong people in the life of the church. God Himself allows tears to be among the wheat at times. I love what Brother Keith says about that parable, that God allows those tears to strengthen the wheat.

And sometimes God allows people and strife and circumstances and opposition even in the church. We all have stories. Many of us have experiences. But I think you get the idea. Let's move on and I want us to see our third main truth. Our third main truth is discouragement and fear creeps in. Discouragement and fear, it creeps in. Now we will cover verses 10 through 14 here. Verse 9, "But we prayed to our God, and because of them we set up a guard against them day and night.

Thus," and there's a transition here, "Thus in Judah it was said, 'The strength of the burden bearers is failing, yet there is much rubbish.' And we ourselves are unable to rebuild the wall. And our enemies said they will not know our sea until we come among them and kill them and put a stop to the work. And it came about when the Jews who lived near them came, and they came up and told us ten times, 'They will come up against us from every place where you may turn.' And I stationed men in the lowest parts of the space, even behind the wall, the exposed places.

And I stationed the people and families with their swords and spears and their bows. And when I saw their fear, I arose and spoke with the nobles, the officials, and the rest of the people. Do not be afraid of them. Remember the Lord who is great and awesome, and fight for your brothers, your sons, your daughters, your wives, and your houses." Here we see this continued escalating opposition is taking its toll on the people. The psychological intimidation and the physical threats that are so ominous are affecting God's people. Now two observations here that I want us to see that show us how the Jews were discouraged.

First of all, notice there is a song of discouragement. Notice verse 10, "Thus, in Judah it was said, 'The strength of the burnbearers is failing, yet there is much rubbish, and we ourselves are unable to rebuild the wall.'" Now notice in your English translation that a portion, this portion of verse 10, is in quotations or maybe it is even set apart. It should be noted as being different. This is because in the Hebrew Old Testament text this was written in poetic form. So here we have this poetic saying among the people.

One of the commentators that I read say that this could have been a song of lament that the people were singing as they worked. So this was internal discouragement which had taken root in the hearts of the people, and it seems to have taken form of a poem and/or a song. So this is a song of discouragement right here in the middle of the work. Then second notice, "They believed the rumors that were spread." Verse 11, "And our enemies said, 'They will not know or see until we come among them and kill them and put a stop to the work.'" And then notice verse 12, "And it came about when the Jews who lived near them," that's the enemies.

"They came up and they told us ten times, they will come up against us from every place where you may turn." See they were surrounded. In verse 11 we see that the enemies spread the talk, that they were going to move on the Jews with some great force to kill them and destroy their work. This phrase ten times seems to suggest that these enemies said over and over and over and over. It is interesting that the beginning of verse 12 seems to indicate that the Jews and these enemies lived in close proximity, thus making it easy for the enemies to propagate this rumor. But notice what took place in verse 12.

"These Jews who were close to the enemy, who seemed to hear this rumor over and over, now they come and they make a report to Nehemiah." You can almost feel the fear and the discouragement in the report. They come back to Nehemiah because they were beginning to believe the rumors that were spread. So here we see that they seem to be singing a song of discouragement. Those near the enemy are bringing this discouraging rumor back to the heart of the work. They are bringing it back to the heart of the leadership. So this discouragement is creeping in. Now it's very important for us to make some good application here.

When we face opposition, and we will, the question is, are we going to allow discouragement to set in or are we going to perform God's work by faith? Are we going to trust in God's sovereign will and plan for our lives? Or are we going to look at our circumstances, the proximity of the enemies, how we feel, and therefore allow discouragement to creep in? Now this is a quotation I've used many times and it fits real well here. I'm going to read this quotation and then blend this in with where we are. A.W. Tozer, he was a great writer, he was a great pastor, preacher, very famous in many different theological worlds, but A.W.

Tozer said, "Circumstances do not make men. It is the reaction to the circumstances that determine what kind of men they'll be." So the Jews were determining to react to these circumstances in the wrong way. They allowed the rumors to affect them. They allowed what they were seeing to affect them. They allowed the circumstances to just cause their trust to wane. Discouragement was setting in. Discouragement was creeping in. And see for you, for me, for us, whether it's an individual trial and opposition or in the corporate world of the church, we will determine the kind of people we will be.

Will we allow the discouragement to get our eyes off Jesus and quit living by faith? Now, some of us need to be honest here. There are people in the life of our church and many churches, many brothers and sisters, maybe they face financial troubles. Those are real. Many times, brothers and sisters will deal with lost family, maybe a lost parent. That's real. Many times, brothers and sisters, people in the life of the church deal with a lost spouse. Many times, I've known brothers and sisters in Christ. They face difficulty at work. But I'll take it a little bit further. I've known ministers of the Gospel who had difficulty in ministry.

What am I trying to show you? If we are not careful, we will allow discouragement to creep in. Now, what do we do? We must keep our eyes on Jesus. We must pray, stay in the Word, stay connected with God's people, be plugged into the life of the church, get godly counsel. But most of all, we must trust in the sovereignty and the love of God and fully embrace the fact that if trial comes, it is for a purpose in our life that He knows best. We embrace it, but we cannot trust our feelings. We many times cannot trust what we see. If we're honest with God, we'll look around and say, "God, I don't like it. I'm angry. I'm upset. This is no fun.

And it just seems like it can never get better. But I trust you." You see? Discouragement and fear was creeping in. Let's move on to our fourth main truth. Notice Nehemiah's leadership through this discouragement. He is leadership through this discouragement. This is scattered all through these verses, verses 10 through 14. I won't read them all because of time, but we will reference them as we continue. So far, we have seen Nehemiah's leadership be very simple. But I think it's been seemingly perfect. Not reacted in the flesh. It's been prayer.

When this opposition hit them square in the face previously, he did not resort to anything but prayer. Prayer, now listen, prayer allows us to determine God's heart and God's plan for a given set of circumstances, and that is the first step. And that's what Nehemiah did. But now let's see how Nehemiah handles the people's discouragement. Four observations I want to make here about Nehemiah's leadership through this discouragement. First, we see that Nehemiah prayed. And that what happened there in verse 9, "But we prayed to our God." So we see that Nehemiah prayed.

This demonstration of Nehemiah's faith and trust in God through prayer is a pattern. We have seen him exhibit this example. He is establishing a pattern. We see this in verse 6 and in verse 10. This is prayer. Second, I want you to notice that Nehemiah took precautionary measures. Verse 10, "But we prayed to our God." Verse 9, "And because of them, we set up a guard against them. Day and night." Here we see that he makes his first physical move. He set up a guard to confront this threat both day and night. Remember, it's after prayer. Then third, Nehemiah prepared for action.

Verse 13, "Then I stationed them in." This was after this very violent threat, this rumor that it set in. "Then I stationed men in the lowest parts of the space behind the wall, the exposed places, and I stationed the people and families with their swordspears and bows." Here we will see that Nehemiah sacrifices labor on the wall to make preparation for battle. We see that in the bare or exposed places where the weakest places in the walls were found, he posted men in these exposed places in the walls. These men would have been seen by the enemy even from a distance with swordspears and bows which would have deterred them from attacking.

Also he grouped them by family which would have provided motivation for them to fight. So Nehemiah prepared for action after he took precautionary measures and after he prayed. Then fourth, notice Nehemiah encouraged the discouraged. Look at verse 14, "When I saw their fear, was after the rumor had been brought back, I saw their fear, I rose and I spoke to the nobles, the officials, and the rest of the people. Do not be afraid of them. Remember the Lord who is great and awesome and fight for your brothers, your sons, your daughters, your wives, and your houses. Just as the enemy, Sanballat had gathered his company, that banned the bullies.

Nehemiah gathered his leadership as well as the people here in verse 14 to encourage them." He offers them two motivations to stand strong. The first motivation was the strength of the Lord. What does he say? "I rose and spoke to the nobles, the officials, and the rest of the people. Do not be afraid of them. Remember the Lord who is great and awesome." So he reminds them the strength of the Lord. Then notice second, "Was the defense of their families." What does he say?

He says, "And fight for your brothers, your sons, your daughters, and your wives, and your houses." So there are two motivations that he brings before them to encourage the discouraged. Remember the strength of the Lord and to defend your families. Nehemiah gathered and encouraged the people to remain strong in the work. So here we see Nehemiah exerts his leadership now in the face of serious discouragement in this escalating opposition. Now in application, I'm going to get very narrow. Nehemiah had the job of leading the people in personal discouragement. You have the nobles, the officials, and the people.

And I don't know if you realize it, but one of our jobs as ministers of the gospel is to shepherd you through the obstacles and the difficulties and the trials and the discouragements of your life. And God will raise some of you up to come alongside your brothers and sisters to do the very same thing. And for us ministers of the gospel, it is called pastoral ministry. Nehemiah just had to put down his plans and come and gather the men, gather the officials, and gather the people, and just love on them and encourage them.

Many times, Brother Keith and I will come alongside you in your marriage troubles, your difficulties in your jobs, your difficulties with your children, your difficulties with health, your difficulties in losing a spouse. The list goes on and on. The list just goes on and on. Discouragement comes. Difficulties come. We just struggle. And it is our job to come alongside here and to lead you and to walk with you and to encourage you and to remind you as a brother and sister in Christ, a born again believer, to lean on the strength of the Lord. Listen, God allows these things to come for His purposes.

So Nehemiah's leadership through discouragement. And then the last main truth, and we didn't read this earlier, is the success of the work. I wanted to save this verse to the very end. Look at verse 15. "And it happened when our enemies heard it, they heard that it was known to us, and that God had frustrated their plan, then all of us returned to the wall, each one to His work." Here we see success. Here we see the results of Nehemiah's leadership. We see the results of his prayer and his action working together. Here we see their violent, murderous threats.

Their show of force just fizzled away because God, through the people's obedience and action, he, that's God, frustrated it. You see that? I want to repeat that because some of you need to hear it. Here we see their violent, murderous threats, their show of force, it just fizzled away because God, through the people's obedience and action, he frustrated it. And notice the end of verse 15. "After the enemy's threats faded away, everyone, everyone, everyone returned to the work." Both hands working on the wall.

And what I want you to see is that when we as individuals face opposition and trial and difficulties, when we allow God to fully work in us according to His will and His plan, it will strengthen the work of the church. Brother Keith hit the nail right on the head earlier in worship. When we as individuals allow God to work through us and then we as brothers and sisters and ministers of the gospel come alongside you to lead you through that difficulty, when God picks you back up and you are where He wants you to be, then you will engage in the work and we will engage in the work and the ministry of the church will be successful.

Listen, everything that comes into our life is to be used in the life of the church. Is it this, the center of God's activity here on earth? You better believe it. Everything that these individuals faced was a part of the work. Those officials who needed strengthening, when they were strengthened, they were better officials. Those nobles who needed strengthening and encouragement, when they were strengthened and they were encouraged, they were better nobles. You see? Now as we close, I want to go back to this title, leadership in the face of opposition. We see Nehemiah's continued leadership in this opposition and in this discouragement.

Now there are two things, observations, comments about Nehemiah I want to make and then we'll close. First, I want you to see that Nehemiah went straight to God. He did not respond in any way. He did not respond in the flesh. Again, just like before, he went straight to God and you can write one word down and that word was trust. He trusted God. He didn't trust himself. He didn't trust their experience. He didn't trust in the orders that he had in his pocket from the Persian king. He didn't trust in anything but God. That's why he went in prayer. He trusted God. And then second, Nehemiah, his trust in God took him to action.

His trust in God took him to action and there are three ways that he acted. First he prayed. You might say, "Pastor, you're being redundant." No, listen. Because he trusted in God, he prayed. First he trusted in God. Second, he took precaution. And then third, he made preparations. Don't you see that progression? All because he trusted in God as a man of God and he did what God said to do. And then God enabled them to have victory through their actions. God did it but he did it through them. Now listen, church. That's the same way that God wants to work through us.

He wants to work through us that we would be victorious in the life of the church but it's not us. It is God working through us. See? Leadership in the face of opposition. Let's pray. Lord, I thank you for how relevant.