Staying Focused: Lessons from Nehemiah's Resilience
Devotional
Sermon Summary
Bible Study Guide
Sermon Clips
### Quotes for Outreach
1. "Have you ever been in the middle of something and you've been just clipping along, everything's going great. And then all of a sudden something steps in and interrupts that flow, right? Like I'm preaching right now. There's a phone. I feel, I'm feeling it. The phone goes off. Yes, we planned that everybody. Good. Right on the mark. But you're clipping right along and things are going great. And then all of a sudden some distractions or some obstacles get in the way. Maybe, maybe you're at work and you're preparing a proposal or something like that. You're in that, you're kind of in the zone and all of a sudden something comes up and interrupts you and you kind of have to start all over again. You try to get in that flow again." [39:52]
2. "Aren't we called to do the same thing? To keep our eyes on the prize, to keep our eyes on the blessed return of Christ Jesus himself. You see, when the world is trying to get us to compromise, when it's trying to intimidate us and trying to get us to stray from God's plan, we can't do it because we know what our hope is. We see a future hope that we've got to keep our eyes on and not waver away from." [01:08:32]
3. "We need God's strength and prayer for Nehemiah. Remember, Nehemiah has 12 prayers all through the book of Nehemiah. This is one of them. It's a short prayer, but it's a great prayer. It's a powerful prayer. Oh God, give me strength. So when we feel the enemy coming against us, we need to reach out to God and call out for his strength. Not to walk in our strength, but to walk in his strength." [01:10:02]
4. "We come and follow and become disciples of Christ because we have to bring in that knowledge of God's word. The wisdom of God's word. The wisdom of walking and following after him. That's what this is all about. That's what discipleship is all about. It's being equipped with wisdom and discernment so that we can withstand the fiery darts of the evil one." [01:11:28]
5. "We pray for them. We pray against them and how Satan is using them, but we pray that God would work on their hearts, that God would change their hearts. And I'll tell you what, when we remain faithful to the things that God has called us to, when we follow after what Nehemiah has shown us, when we show integrity like we talked about last week, when we show these things and we pray against our enemies, God can do amazing heart change things in these people." [01:12:46]
### Quotes for Members
1. "Nehemiah is saying, look, you're trying to get me to go into the temple so that I would get a bad name because I'm sinning, because I'm going against what God has called me to, and you're using this as a way to, drive a wedge between me and God's people. Verse 14, remember Tobiah and Sambalat. Oh my God, according to these things that they did, and also the prophetess Noadi and the rest of the prophetesses, the rest of the prophets who wanted to make me afraid. He's calling out to God to remember them. So we see that there was a sense of entrapment that, that they were trying to bring in against Nehemiah." [01:02:33]
2. "So we see that there are four things that came against Nehemiah, four trials, four obstacles that came against him to try to get him from completing the wall and wielding positive, God-filled, God-led leadership into the people of Israel at that time. But we have a couple things that Nehemiah did throughout all of this that we can learn from. The first thing that we learn about Nehemiah as we read through chapter six, and we look at the obstacles that he was having to deal with, the first thing that we can learn is that through it all, one of the leadership or principles that Nehemiah held on to is that he always kept his eyes on the objective." [01:06:58]
3. "We have to remember that when we look at the stories throughout Scripture, throughout the Old Testament, every story seems so dire, right? It's grueling. When we read through the Bible, I tell you what, it was grueling going through the Old Testament, wasn't it? It was grueling. But I had to continually remind myself that this is God pushing the story forward. This is God moving the ball painfully forward. Because once again, God is providential, and he's moving everything forward to the final coming of Christ." [01:14:02]
4. "As we reflect in Nehemiah 6, let us learn from Nehemiah's unwavering focus and discernment. Despite the enemy's attempts to entrap him with deception, offers of collaboration, Nehemiah stayed true to God's purpose. We too face distractions, but through God's strength, God's power, and not being intimidated, not falling away, we can also see our way to the end, to the objective, keeping our eyes on the prize, looking for the day that our blessed hope comes. And returns." [01:15:35]
5. "What we need to understand is that the enemy will create planned and unplanned detours to derail us from fulfilling God's purpose. God's purpose for Nehemiah was to finish the wall and to establish the nation of Israel. And what Nehemiah wants to show us is that despite these constant distractions, some of these obstacles that are being put in front of him in chapter six, Nehemiah shows us how to stay focused and persevere in God's calling, what he's called us to." [46:32]
Ask a question about this sermon
1. "Have you ever been in the middle of something and you've been just clipping along, everything's going great. And then all of a sudden something steps in and interrupts that flow, right? Like I'm preaching right now. There's a phone. I feel, I'm feeling it. The phone goes off. Yes, we planned that everybody. Good. Right on the mark. But you're clipping right along and things are going great. And then all of a sudden some distractions or some obstacles get in the way. Maybe, maybe you're at work and you're preparing a proposal or something like that. You're in that, you're kind of in the zone and all of a sudden something comes up and interrupts you and you kind of have to start all over again. You try to get in that flow again." [39:52]
2. "Aren't we called to do the same thing? To keep our eyes on the prize, to keep our eyes on the blessed return of Christ Jesus himself. You see, when the world is trying to get us to compromise, when it's trying to intimidate us and trying to get us to stray from God's plan, we can't do it because we know what our hope is. We see a future hope that we've got to keep our eyes on and not waver away from." [01:08:32]
3. "We need God's strength and prayer for Nehemiah. Remember, Nehemiah has 12 prayers all through the book of Nehemiah. This is one of them. It's a short prayer, but it's a great prayer. It's a powerful prayer. Oh God, give me strength. So when we feel the enemy coming against us, we need to reach out to God and call out for his strength. Not to walk in our strength, but to walk in his strength." [01:10:02]
4. "We come and follow and become disciples of Christ because we have to bring in that knowledge of God's word. The wisdom of God's word. The wisdom of walking and following after him. That's what this is all about. That's what discipleship is all about. It's being equipped with wisdom and discernment so that we can withstand the fiery darts of the evil one." [01:11:28]
5. "We pray for them. We pray against them and how Satan is using them, but we pray that God would work on their hearts, that God would change their hearts. And I'll tell you what, when we remain faithful to the things that God has called us to, when we follow after what Nehemiah has shown us, when we show integrity like we talked about last week, when we show these things and we pray against our enemies, God can do amazing heart change things in these people." [01:12:46]
### Quotes for Members
1. "Nehemiah is saying, look, you're trying to get me to go into the temple so that I would get a bad name because I'm sinning, because I'm going against what God has called me to, and you're using this as a way to, drive a wedge between me and God's people. Verse 14, remember Tobiah and Sambalat. Oh my God, according to these things that they did, and also the prophetess Noadi and the rest of the prophetesses, the rest of the prophets who wanted to make me afraid. He's calling out to God to remember them. So we see that there was a sense of entrapment that, that they were trying to bring in against Nehemiah." [01:02:33]
2. "So we see that there are four things that came against Nehemiah, four trials, four obstacles that came against him to try to get him from completing the wall and wielding positive, God-filled, God-led leadership into the people of Israel at that time. But we have a couple things that Nehemiah did throughout all of this that we can learn from. The first thing that we learn about Nehemiah as we read through chapter six, and we look at the obstacles that he was having to deal with, the first thing that we can learn is that through it all, one of the leadership or principles that Nehemiah held on to is that he always kept his eyes on the objective." [01:06:58]
3. "We have to remember that when we look at the stories throughout Scripture, throughout the Old Testament, every story seems so dire, right? It's grueling. When we read through the Bible, I tell you what, it was grueling going through the Old Testament, wasn't it? It was grueling. But I had to continually remind myself that this is God pushing the story forward. This is God moving the ball painfully forward. Because once again, God is providential, and he's moving everything forward to the final coming of Christ." [01:14:02]
4. "As we reflect in Nehemiah 6, let us learn from Nehemiah's unwavering focus and discernment. Despite the enemy's attempts to entrap him with deception, offers of collaboration, Nehemiah stayed true to God's purpose. We too face distractions, but through God's strength, God's power, and not being intimidated, not falling away, we can also see our way to the end, to the objective, keeping our eyes on the prize, looking for the day that our blessed hope comes. And returns." [01:15:35]
5. "What we need to understand is that the enemy will create planned and unplanned detours to derail us from fulfilling God's purpose. God's purpose for Nehemiah was to finish the wall and to establish the nation of Israel. And what Nehemiah wants to show us is that despite these constant distractions, some of these obstacles that are being put in front of him in chapter six, Nehemiah shows us how to stay focused and persevere in God's calling, what he's called us to." [46:32]
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