Year 2, Day 51: Nehemiah 4

For the next 3 days, we will talk about oppression and resistance to the work that God has set before us.  Sometimes that oppression is external.  Sometimes it is internal. Sometimes it is overt.  Other times it is covert.  But there is one true statement: wherever there is the work of the Lord there will be resistance against it.

External Resistance

In Nehemiah 4 we get a picture of the most basic type of resistance: external ridicule.  This is the easiest resistance for the opponents of God’s will to organize.  Anyone who sees something going on that they don’t like can talk about what they don’t like.  Anyone who sees something going on of which they might be afraid can talk about what is going on in negative terms to try an attempt to destroy what momentum has begun.  External ridicule is so simple for the enemies of God’s work to use that it can almost be said to be second nature to human beings.

Think about it. 

• Imagine that a person who makes a commitment in their life to read their Bible every day.  The people around them might be challenged by that decision of faith.  Rather than respond with support or even by being challenged into action themselves, they try to tell the other person that the other person doesn’t have the strength to accomplish their goal.  Or maybe they talk about how hard the Bible is to understand and try and get the other person to believe that they are destined to fail.  Rather than rise to personal challenges, it is easier for outsiders to tear down those who do try to rise up.
• Imagine a person who wants to go serve people in another place on a mission trip.  They might need to raise a bunch of money, get several sets of legal permissions, sacrifice time with their family, and a few other things.  Those around the person who see the spiritual response and who are afraid to face the fact that perhaps God is calling them to respond similarly will begin to convince the person committed to the trip that they won’t be able to accomplish the task.  Maybe they will talk about the potential danger or the unknown.  Maybe they will talk about not being able to raise the financial support necessary.  Again we see how easy it is for people to tear down the other rather than join God’s movement.

Whatever the reason, I think we can see how people feel threatened by spiritual growth and use external ridicule to stop the momentum that may be happening.  It is sad to say, but this kind of resistance is very common in our world.  In fact, I daresay that any movement of the Holy Spirit faces this kind of resistance within moments of the initial calling from the Holy Spirit.  Human beings seem to be hard-wired to react to the movement of the Holy Spirit with external ridicule.  I think a good part of this is that human beings don’t like change and that is precisely where the Holy Spirit tries to bring us.

Detecting and Dealing With External Criticism

Thankfully, although this kind of resistance is the most common resistance we face, it is also the easiest resistance to detect.  Just about any time a person outside of a group lifts up a word of discouragement it is this kind of resistance at work.  It might be evidence of fear of change in the other person.  It might be a sign of jealousy in the other person.  It might be a sign of laziness or lethargy in the other person.  There are plenty of other reasons to which external ridicule may point.  But it is easy to spot because it is almost always present against any movement of the Holy Spirit.

Since it is almost always present, those who desire to be in spiritual leadership need to brace themselves for its presence.  Weak leaders will crumble under this kind of resistance.  But those who are strong in the Lord will find ways to overcome this form of resistance.

Look at what Nehemiah does here to resist the external ridicule that he and the Jews faced.  He brought the Jews together and made sure nobody got isolated where they might be influenced more by the resistance than by the faithful.  Nehemiah set up an intentional network of protection so that nobody found themselves working without being able to trust that someone was watching their back even as they worked.  Nehemiah also trained the whole community to know various warning calls so that if trouble came in another area of the city people could rally to the defense of the place under attack.

We can really learn some lessons from Nehemiah here.  If we are going to do the work of the Lord, then we will come under external ridicule.  We need a network of support around us.  We need to work in the company of others who are going to watch our backs as we work.  We need to also know that there is an even larger community of support that will be there to rally and protect us if we need them.  What we can learn through Nehemiah’s example is the importance of a spiritual community around us that supports us.  We can now see that it is actually through our spiritual community around us that God musters the support we need to survive against external ridicule.

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