Living On A Building Site
This article is based on a talk on Nehemiah chapter 2, first given by David Couchman at Above Bar Church, Southampton, on Sunday 30th April 2006. It may be reproduced in print or on other web sites, subject to the copyright notice below.
The new Wembley Stadium has been more than six years in the building, and it is now long overdue. It was meant to host the Cup Final on May 13th. But it is not finished, and now the developers say that there will not be any major events until next year. Pop concerts with the Rolling Stones and Robbie Williams have been moved to other venues, or postponed.
It is over-budget as well as over-due: the builders stand to lose £45 million or more. There are reputations to be lost, as well as fortunes.
Something has been started, but not finished, and this is a difficult time. Nehemiah lives in a time like this.
Things are going well for him. He lives in Susa, one of the capitals of the Persian Empire. He has a good job - he is the king's cup-bearer. It is well paid, secure, has good career prospects (as long as no-one tries to poison the king). The king trusts him. He is a good Jew, and worships the one true God. Not only that, but he lives at a time when God's promises to the Jewish nation are coming true.
Nehemiah knew the story of his people. His prayer in chapter 1 shows that he knew that God had brought them out of slavery into the Promised Land. He knew that the people had disobeyed God, and that they'd been evicted from the Land.
But now, they are back. God has kept his promises. The Exile is over. It is a good time to be alive. And yet... and yet:
- The Jewish people are not free: the king of Persia rules the Promised Land. Judah itself is now a tiny province, about the size of Hampshire.
- Some of them are back in the Land, but many have chosen not to go back, and Jerusalem is very sparsely inhabited. There may only have been four to five thousand people living in the city. Before the exile, there had been twenty five thousand.
- Worship has been re-started, but there are enemies all around, and Jerusalem's defences are in a poor way.
Chapter one records how Nehemiah learned that things were not going well in Jerusalem:
'Those who survived the exile and are back in the province are in great trouble and disgrace. The wall of Jerusalem is broken down, and its gates have been burned by fire.' (chapter 1 verse 3)
Nehemiah could so easily have said 'that's really sad,' and turned back to getting the King's next drink ready. But instead, he says:
When I heard these things, I sat down and wept. For some days I mourned and fasted and prayed before the God of heaven. (verse 4)
Rather than just carrying on with his life, Nehemiah begins to get with the programme - to line himself up with God's purposes for Jerusalem, and in the end, for the whole world.
God calls him to put his promising career on hold, to leave his comfort in the capital, and go away to a crummy job on a provincial building site (in his case, it was literally a building site, as he focussed on rebuilding the walls of Jerusalem.)
What about you? Is God challenging you to do something? Are you lining up with his purposes, or are you comfortable where you are, with your career, and your security?
What about us as a church? Are we content where we are? Or are we willing to do whatever God tells us and go wherever he sends us?
So what does living on a building site look like? What did it look like for Nehemiah? What will it look like for us? Let's take a closer look at Nehemiah chapter 2.
1. Taking risks
Building sites are dangerous places! We have all seen the signs 'Hard hats must be worn in this area.'
For the people building the new Wembley Stadium, out there, high up in the scaffolding, working on cranes, or steel girders, there are dangers that they will fall, or that things will fall on them.
In July 2004, one man was killed and another was seriously injured when some scaffolding collapsed.
For Nehemiah, living on God's building site was a risky business:
In the month of Nisan in the twentieth year of King Artaxerxes, when wine was brought for him, I took the wine and gave it to the king. I had not been sad in his presence before; so the king asked me, 'Why does your face look so sad when you are not ill? This can be nothing but sadness of heart.' 'I was very much afraid, but I said to the king, 'May the king live forever! Why should my face not look sad when the city where my fathers are buried lies in ruins, and its gates have been destroyed by fire?' (chapter 2 verses 1-3)
You were not meant to bother the king with your personal troubles. There are relief carvings from Persepolis which show people coming into the king's presence with their hands over their mouths, so they would not contaminate him with their breath.
Nehemiah had to take a risk. He could have lost his job, perhaps even his life, without achieving anything for God's purposes.
What about you? Are you willing to take risks for God? What about us as a church - are we willing to take risks?
As Christians, we can be very risk-averse. We are reluctant to take risks individually, and perhaps we are reluctant to take risks as a church.
When people take risks, there is always the possibility of failure - that is the definition of risk, isn't it? And when someone fails at some spiritual task, we tend to condemn them. What we should be doing is giving them medals for taking the risk in the first place. God loves risk-takers. Think about Peter getting out of his boat to walk on the water to Jesus. Jesus did not tell him off for being too adventurous. He told him off for not having enough faith!
Nehemiah took the risk because he was depending on God. This showed itself in how he prayed. You can see this in chapter one. In fact, he prayed and waited for four months before he let the king know about his concerns. We do not know whether he needed that long to pray before he was ready, or whether he just had to wait that long for a good moment.
We see Nehemiah depending on God again in verses 4-5:
The king said to me, 'What is it you want?' Then I prayed to the God of heaven, and I answered the king, 'If it pleases the king and if your servant has found favour in his sight, let him send me to the city in Judah where my fathers are buried so that I can rebuild it.'
As Nehemiah stood before the most powerful ruler in the world, he knew that he was actually standing before a greater king: 'I prayed to the God of heaven, and I answered the king.'
This pattern is repeated through the book of Nehemiah: 'I prayed to the Lord, and I...' did what I could. Nehemiah expected God to work, through what he did, but also in ways beyond anything he could do.
What about you and me? Do we depend on God? Does this show itself in how we pray, and in what we do? What difference does it make? How can the people around us see that we are depending on God, rather than just depending on our own planning and organising and fund-raising? How are we any different?
Living on a building site means taking risks, because you are depending on God.
2. Planning and preparing
When it is finished, Wembley will be the biggest covered stadium in the world:
- The roof covers 11 acres
- It has 90,000 seats
- It has taken 23,000 tonnes of steel
- There are thirty five miles of heavy duty power cable
- 90,000 cubic metres of concrete
- The four biggest restaurants in London, and...
- 2,600 toilets
A big project like this does not just happen. It has taken years of planning, gathering information, building models, of getting permission for this and that, organising contractors. You cannot imagine starting a project like this without lots of careful planning and preparing.
Nehemiah could have depended on God and taken risks, and just gone for it. But he did not. He went at it with foresight and careful planning. When the king asked Nehemiah what he wanted, he had it all worked out. He did not just say the first thing that came into his head. He had thought it all through very carefully. He knew exactly what he needed to make it happen:
Then the king, with the queen sitting beside him, asked me, 'How long will your journey take, and when will you get back?' It pleased the king to send me; so I set a time. I also said to him, 'If it pleases the king, may I have letters to the governors of Trans-Euphrates, so that they will provide me safe-conduct until I arrive in Judah? And may I have a letter to Asaph, keeper of the king's forest, so he will give me timber to make beams for the gates of the citadel by the temple and for the city wall and for the residence I will occupy?' And because the gracious hand of my God was upon me, the king granted my requests. So I went to the governors of Trans-Euphrates and gave them the king's letters. The king had also sent army officers and cavalry with me.' (verses 6-9)
Nehemiah was not ashamed to ask the king for help. He was not embarrassed by the king sending soldiers along to defend him.
Some Christians see planning and preparing as the opposite of depending on God. Others see it as a substitute for depending on God. Nehemiah got the balance right. He saw it as the means of depending on God. He planned and prepared; he did what he could, but he expected God to do the things that he could not do.
We see Nehemiah the planner and organiser at work again in verses 11-16, as he explores the walls secretly, by night, to find out just how bad the situation is. We are not going to look in detail at his journey round the walls.
The important point is that Nehemiah did not just launch out after a time of prayer. He did not just sit down and think things through. He gathered the data.
If God is calling you to some project for him - if he is calling you to get involved on his building site - what information do you need, so you can move forward in God's purposes?
If he is calling us as a church to take some risks for him, what information do we need?
I wonder whether you noticed that Nehemiah did his research secretly?
I had not told anyone what my God had put into my heart to do for Jerusalem. (verse 12)
As yet I had said nothing to the Jews or the priests or nobles or officials or any others who would be doing the work. (verse 16)
Why was this?
There is a pattern in Christian leadership. I have seen it too often to be a coincidence, and it is too important to ignore:
People in leadership positions can be very resistant to change. They will often use the information that is gathered to justify not doing something. They can have an agenda to stop change - sometimes they do not even know themselves that they have this agenda, but it is still there. And if your heart is set on stopping change, you can always find good reasons for not doing something.
What would have happened if Nehemiah had gone to the leaders in Jerusalem and said 'The Lord has given me this vision to rebuild the walls'? I think they might have laughed at him. 'You haven't seen the problems.' By the time he came back, after he had done his research, they would all be insulated against hearing what God had to say through him.
But they would have been resisting what God wanted to do. Is that you? Is it me? Especially if you are in any kind of leadership position, do not be someone who hinders God's work and finds reasons for not doing anything.
But Nehemiah was both a man of faith, and a shrewd leader - so he did his research secretly, before he said anything. .
Living on a building site means taking the initiative. What about you and me? What about us as a church?
3. Building Vision and Consensus
Someone first had the idea of building a new Wembley Stadium. I do not know who it was. But he - or she - had to get others on board with the same idea - probably first just a small nucleus of influential friends and leaders, and then a wider circle as the plans became more definite.
That individual would not have achieved very much if they had turned up on the site of the old stadium, with a hod and a shovel, and started trying to build a new stadium single handed. They had to mobilise others. They had to get other people to buy into the vision - in some cases literally buy into it, by putting huge wads of cash into the building.
Nehemiah had to do the same thing. He had to build vision and consensus, to mobilise and lead other people:
Then I said to them, 'You see the trouble we are in: Jerusalem lies in ruins, and its gates have been burned with fire. Come, let us rebuild the wall of Jerusalem, and we will no longer be in disgrace.' I also told them about the gracious hand of my God upon me and what the king had said to me. (verses 17-18)
Leadership does not just happen. Someone once said that the main requirement of a leader is that they have people following them! Leaders have to be able to share the vision God has given them, so that others are motivated to act on it too.
You might be saying, 'I'm not a leader. I'm no good at motivating people.' But the reason this happened was not just because Nehemiah was an inspiring leader! It had much more to do with the fact that he was lining up with God's purposes. God was at work through him, motivating other people to join in. Nehemiah had to do what he could, but it was not all down to his abilities and efforts.
So Nehemiah shares his vision and builds consensus and motivates people. And the end of verse 18 tells us that...
They replied, 'Let us start rebuilding.' So they began this good work.
So living on a building site means taking risks, because you depend on God; it means taking the initiative for God - planning and organising; it means building vision and consensus to mobilise others.
4. Facing the opposition
There has been tremendous hoopla about the new Wembley Stadium. But there have also been huge difficulties:
- At one point, the builders discovered that the wrong kind of concrete had been used for the foundations. Dig the whole lot out and start again!
- In August 2004, there was a strike when two hundred men were sacked in a dispute over working hours and breaks. There have been other industrial disputes along the way.
- There have been death threats to people working on the site.
- Right now the contractors are locked in an ugly court case with one of their main subcontractors, suing and counter-suing each other.
No great project, whether it is a huge building, or a work of God, has ever been completed without problems. For Nehemiah, rebuilding the walls meant dealing with all kinds of difficulties and facing all kinds of opposition. The first hint of this is in verse 10:
When Sanballat the Horonite and Tobiah the Ammonite official heard about this, they were very much disturbed that someone had come to promote the welfare of the Israelites.
Again in verse 19:
But when Sanballat the Horonite, Tobiah the Ammonite official and Geshem the Arab heard about it, they mocked and ridiculed us. 'What is this you are doing?' they asked. 'Are you rebelling against the king?'
Sanballat was the governor of Samaria, to the north of Judah. We know a bit about him from history outside the Bible. A papyrus discovered in Egypt, dated to 407 BC, talks about 'Delaiah and Shelemiah, the sons of Sanballat, the governor of Samaria.' So Sanballat is a real person, and he is a powerful enemy.
Then Tobiah: archaeologists have discovered huge estates belonging to the Tobiah family in Jordan. These come from the third century BC. It seems as if the Tobiahs were a very wealthy family who ruled Ammon, to the east of Judah.
Geshem is another powerful political ruler that we know about from inscriptions outside the Bible. He controlled a federation of tribes stretching from Egypt to Arabia.
So Nehemiah is squeezed between powerful enemies: to the north, Sanballat, to the east, Tobiah, to the south, Geshem.
He faces ridicule and lies and threats all the time. So shall we, if we line up with God's purposes.
God's purposes are never going to be achieved without a fight!
The danger is that - like Jade Goody running the London Marathon - when the going gets tough, we think we have got it wrong, and we just give up.
Someone said that all God's projects go through three stages:
- In the first stage, it looks like they are impossible - they are not going to be achieved at all.
- In the second stage, the building has begun, but there are still huge problems in the way. They look difficult.
- And the third stage? Well, in the third stage they are done. Something that started out looking impossible has been finished.
Impossible... difficult... done. There are no other stages. There is no stage marked 'easy,' or 'coast through this one.' God's purposes are never achieved without a fight! But Nehemiah did not let himself be deterred or deflected by the opposition. So he says:
'The God of heaven will give us success. We his servants will start rebuilding, but as for you, you have no share in Jerusalem or any claim or historic right to it.' (verse 20)
Conclusion
Nehemiah lived on a building site. He lived on a literal building site, as he rebuilt the walls of Jerusalem. He also lived on a spiritual building site. God had started to achieve his purposes, but not yet finished them.
Although the book of Nehemiah comes about half-way through the Old Testament, he actually lived at the end of Old Testament history - around 440 BC. The next thing that happened in God's plan was the coming of Christ.
Nehemiah did his part - he rebuilt the walls of Jerusalem. He served God's purposes faithfully in his generation. Perhaps if he had not done that, four hundred years later, Israel would not have existed as a nation. But Nehemiah did his part, and in God's purposes, four hundred years later, Jesus was born.
God's purposes were nearer completion then, but they still were not finished.
Like Nehemiah, like the Christians in the New Testament, we too live on a building site. God's purposes are started, but not finished. Yes, we are nearer the opening ceremony than Nehemiah was. We are nearer than Jesus was when he first came, but we still live on a building site.
One day, it will be finished. Meanwhile, God has given us a part to play in our generation. Do we believe that? Do we believe that we as individuals have a part to play in God's purposes? Do we believe that we as a church have a part to play?
God wants us to learn from Nehemiah what living on a building site looks like, as we line up with God's purposes, even when that takes us way outside our comfort zones:
- taking risks, because we are depending on God
- Planning and preparing
- building vision and consensus together
- facing the opposition, and not being deflected by it
Will we do it?
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