I'm Doing Work Here: Stay Focused on God

``Because of their simple act of obedience, stacking a rock, using the mortar, showing up day after day to do what it was that God gave them to do, not getting distracted, not getting overwhelmed, not succumbing to fear or temporary glory, and just doing the simple obedient monotonous thing. God did this exponential explosion with it to show himself to everybody who noticed. [00:56:23] (31 seconds)  #SmallObedienceBigImpact

When Nehemiah spotted the contradiction with scripture, it was in that moment he knew, well, this isn't of God. Because if it doesn't line up with what God has said, it's not of God. I love when people come to me and they're like, God told me to, marry this unbeliever. No, he didn't. God told me to do this thing that's like clearly against scripture. No, he didn't. You have to know the truth to spot the lie. [00:50:05] (33 seconds)  #KnowScriptureSpotLies

You gotta understand. In second Corinthians, it says that Satan disguises himself as an angel of light. And the reason that's a problem is because as you flip through scripture starting in Genesis one, light's a good thing. But Satan doesn't come to sky looking like a devil with a pitchfork. He disguises himself as light to make it look good. [00:51:42] (22 seconds)  #BewareFalseLight

If you stay focused on prioritizing faith in your family, you need to be prepared to be accused of being holier than thou. If you start saying no to participating in certain things that you used to participate in, you might condescendingly get asked maybe in front of other people, why'd you change, dude? When you face accusations, you just gotta remind yourself, I'm doing a great work, and I'm not gonna let this distract, intimidate, or stop me from doing what it is that God has called me to do because I recognize this for what it is. [00:46:00] (43 seconds)  #PrioritizeFaithIgnoreCritics

And this guy comes up to Nehemiah and says, hey, dude. They're coming for you. Why don't we go to, like, the best place we all think of, this place that Ezra and the people just built that we're all really proud of? Let's go to the temple. Go inside the doors. Shut the doors behind us, and you'll be protected. You know, in Leviticus, some guys tried to do this. You know what happened? It's a crazy story. They get incinerated by fire. It's a wild true story in scripture. And this is what they're being accused or being invited to do. Yes. Whoever said fire, that's what happened. What's Nehemiah gonna do? [00:47:50] (40 seconds)  #MissionOverComfort

And you can live with confidence and courage when you walk in the light Because there's no if there's no truth to the things that somebody's accusing you of, if there's no secret life, if you're not living a double life, then you don't have to walk around in fear. And that evidently was Nehemiah because he just kinda rejects it out of hand and just keeps on going. [00:44:23] (25 seconds)  #LiveInLightNoFear

So Nehemiah identifying this right from the jump is everything. Because the moment that you see the resistance to you doing what God wants you to do for what it is or from whom it's from, it'll harden your resolve to continue. And if you're competitive like me, when I recognize that the enemy is against something, I wanna do it more. [00:37:22] (22 seconds)  #OppositionMeansProgress

The enemy wasn't just trying to distract or personally entice Nehemiah this time. He was appealing to Nehemiah's pride and the fear of what if other people hear this false accusation and believe it. It didn't even matter that it wasn't true. It's just that everybody would hear it. And how in the world would he be able to convince everybody that this wasn't true? It might make Nehemiah just nervous enough to stop building the wall just long enough. But Nehemiah wouldn't be fooled. [00:42:49] (30 seconds)  #RejectPrideAndFear