Nehemiah Leadership
Nehemiah Leadership – 1
Dealing with disappointmnet
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Christian Leadership
- Studies on Nehemiah’s Leadership
- lecture notes
- read through the books of Joshua, Nehemiah as well as the synoptic gospels (Matthew, Mark, Luke)
1, 3 elements of spiritual leadership
First, of what is being demanded.(Verse 4)
Let’s see verse 4 “when I heard these things,”.
when he heard about horrible things that had taken place, he listened to themintently.
It is a basic condition for a leader to aware of what is being demanded.
Second, to God(verse 4)
After he heard of the problems of his people, he fasted and prayed.
” I sat down and wept. For some days I mourned and fasted and prayed before the God of heaven.”(1:4)
in verse 4, we hear the prayer of Nehemiah.
Faithful leaders always go to God first with problems.
Leaders must put prayer at the highest of highest priority.
Third, responsibility for the problem(verse 6-7).
In verses 6 and 7, Nehemiah took responsibility for the problem.
“…… I confess the sins we Israelites, including myself and my father’s family, have committed against you”
- Leader’s plan (2:7-9)
To go with faith does not mean doing things without .
When King Artaxerxes granted his request to rebuild the walls of Jerusalem,
Nehemiah said,
“” 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? 8And 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?”(1:8-9)
He prayed for 4 months, and constantly .
Without these plans, he would not have been able to make these detailed and
specific requests when the King let him go to Jerusalem and rebuilt the walls.
The soldiers during the Civil War are known to have said,
“Depend on God, but don’t let your power get wet at the same time.”
S-Leaders Pray, but plan and the risks.
If he didn’t plan ahead, you can imagine what would have happened.
- Motivating Others(2:17-18)
- Through factor
There are two ways. One is through external factors . Another is through internal factors
In companies, if you exceed your sales goal, you will get things like “Christmas bonus
or “Hawaii Vacation”.
This is the way to reward people using materials, so that it gives them the reasons to apply themselves.
Motivating through external factors plead to our nature.
- Through factors(2:17-18)
The second way is through internal factors, and that is to plead to the .
Nehemiah 2:17 says,
“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.”
In this scripture, We now have to focus on two words here.”” and” “.
In order for Nehemiah to motivate the people for rebuilding the walls, he did not promise any materialistic returns for their commitment.
He did not make any promises of material reward or vacation for those who work the
hardest, the fastest.
But, Nehemiah just said “Look at the trouble we are in. We are in ruins.
Don’t you see we need to rebuild these walls?”
Then the people said, “Let us start rebuilding.” ( 2:18)
Why did the citizens of the city commit to Nehemiah’s project?
It is because he was able to plead to the what the people had inside.
Especially, internal motivating people must be considered deeply in Africa.
- Handling the opposition and criticism(2:19, 4:3-9)
We must also remember that Nehemiah immediately faced opposition to .
There always will be some direct or indirect criticism about the plan.
When the people started the work, they faced a strong opposition.
“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?””(Nehemiah 2:19).
One of the qualified leader must have is the to handle criticism.
This is a very important thing for a leadership to have.
If you are not at all, you can’t do anything. If you do not have to your plans, you also can’t do anything.
The opposition never left.
They(Samballat, Tobia, Geshem) were always around until the walls were completed.
When it was about half way done, they cursed and said, in chapter 4, verse 3
“Tobiah the Ammonite said, “What they are building if even a fox climbed up on it, he would break down their wall of stones!””(4:3)
What did Nehemiah do on this opposition and criticism?
There are three important things in his response to criticism.
- He told God about the criticism and like this:
“Hear us O our God for we are despised…..”(4:4-5)
He prayed again to God
- He was to his duties
In spite of that, he never wavered in carrying out his duties.
In Nehemiah 4:6, it says,
“So we rebuilt the wall till all of it reached half its height for the people worked with
all their heart.”
- He a guard (4:9)
What did Nehemiah do when facing continued opposition?
As he had always done, he his prayer.
Verse 9 says “But we prayed to our God and posted a Guard day and night to
meet this threat.”(4:9)
He did not only prayed, but also posted a guard day and night to meet opponent threat.
You must use your to come up with reasonable countermeasures.
Are you afraid someone might come and rob your house?
Depend on God, but don’t forget to lock your doors.
Are you looking for work?
Pray, but also prepare your resume and send it to where you want to go work.
Have you lost your job?
Pray, but don’t forget to look for jobs as well. Write your resume.
And Go out there look for jobs.
Apply to as many positions as possible.
The Lord helps those who initiate the move.
“There is no leader who is not at all”.
‘Do not pray to avoid criticism, but prepare yourself to fight against disappointment
when you faced it.
Next topic is dealing with disappointment .
- 5. Dealing with disappointment -Cause and Treatment(Nehemiah 4:10 -23 )
You can see why Nehemiah was disappointed.
in Nehemiah 4:10. “Meanwhile, the people in Judah said, “The strength of the laborers is giving out, and there is so much rubble that we cannot rebuild the wall.””
we can see here that the culprit who disappointed Nehemiah was no one else but the people of .
This is a very surprising thing.
Not only it came from the people of Judah, Verse 12 tells us another reason for Nehemiahs’ disappointment.
“Then the Jews who lived near them came and told us ten times over, “Wherever you turn, they will attack us.”” (4:12)
These Jews warned about the threats that continued for more than 10 times.
Genesis 49: 8-10 shows you a little bit about the people of Judah.
They were specially chosen by God and they were the tribe who praised God.
The first disappointment came from the people of Judah.
The second disappointment came from Jews
This also is very significant thing.
Nehemiah has plans to rebuilding of Jerusalem city, but his first disappointment came from the people of Juda and second disappointment came from the Jews.
How do you think on it ?
I have had experiences that one of my closest friends betrayed me.
And also your friend can be your enemy. Do you want to say ‘No, No, it would be never happen to me in my life. Okay, I hope so.
In Nehemiah chapter 4, we can learn 4 causes why he was disappointed.
- 4 causes of Nehemiah’s disappointment(4:10-12)
1) Loss of S (verse 10),
“the people of Judah said, ‘the strength of the laborers is giving out,…”
And 4:6 tells us that it’s about half way done. “…all of it reached half its height.”
I am sure everyone climbed a mountain once or twice in their lifetime.
They look at the top and said, “it looks like another hour, hour and a half.”
Five hours later, you are just at the half way and look at how long you’ve come, and let out a sigh, “I didn’t know it was this high.”
Halfway always disappoints us.
If you lose your physical strength, you will lose your emotional strength as well.
2) Loss of H(4:10)
Look at what the people of Judah said, “There are so much rubble that…”(4:10).
This leads to the next sentence.
Their strength is giving out.
They have worked so hard for so long, but there is still so much rubble.
People are tired, but there is so much left to do.
People have lost hope to complete the walls.
We can lose hope because of the rubble we have to go through after working so hard
for so long.
3) Loss of C .
The biggest cause of disappointment comes from losing your conviction.
The laborers were tired and they were emotionally drained.
The walls are about half way through, but there still is so much rubble.
They let out a sigh, “we cannot rebuild the wall.”
When you lose your strength and hope, the next thing to lose is .
When you lose it, feeling of disappointment, desperation attacks us from all angles.
The bible says they wanted to do this good work.
But they lost that heart.
When they lose conviction, they lose .
In other words, they lose the motivation to achieve.
There can be many causes for that, but the feeling of void is always one of them.
This is something that is so powerful that we cannot overcome easily.
4) Losing sense of S .(4:11)
Verse 11 says, “also our enemies said, ‘before they know it or see us we will be right there and will kill them and put an end to the work.”
Many Christian leaders have said God uses the times of disappointment to give us new directions or plans.
we become disappointed by facing unwanted changes in our environment, and through that, God is preparing for another for us.
It may sound strange, but disappointment caused by losing what we see is to lead us into an incredible accomplishment.
Look at Abraham. He had to leave his home town, his family, and the house of his father in order to become the source of all blessings.
Were there times when you wanted to get away from it all?
Were there times when you wanted to give it all up?
But after experiencing this disappointment, you will be given a chance to do things you can never even dream of.
You may be standing at the door of change of chance.
You know that change makes like to be chance .
You lose your strength, your hope, your conviction, and your sense of stability.
Deep inside of you, you are feeling like ‘this just isn’t happening to me.’
But wait.
You are about to do something that may be the greatest of your life. Amen.
Then,
- How can we treat disappointment? (4:13-23)
We see five different treatments he used in the Bible.
1) by families(4:13).
“…………..posting by family…..”
There is an important fact here.
The laborers were living away from their family to work .
So Nehemiah brought those people together by family.
Family is the source of all basic .
His laborers were losing courage.
So he said, let’s get together by families; He reunited the people by their families.
What is a family ?
God created the garden of Eden. This is a creation that God did His best to create; he needed rest afterwards!! It was a beautiful place in God’s eyes. He gave a beautiful and perfect Eden to Adam, but he was not happy. God knew why, so put Adam to sleep. While Adam was asleep, He took a rib and gave him Eve. Then, Adam was overjoyed and made this confession: “this is now bone of my bones and flesh of my flesh” (Genesis 2:23). This is a confession that we are one body.
What is a family? How do you explain on family?
We know on it, but it is not easy to define of family.
But also it is not difficult to come up with a simple definition.
Family is more precious than the universe that God took 6 days to create. When Eve wasn’t there, Eden was to Adam.
But when he met Eve, Eden became .
There was to a law in England that put age limits to becoming a king and getting married: for a king it was 18 years of age, but for a marriage, the age limit was 20. A prince asked the king. “How do you explain age limits of 18 for someone to become a king and 20 for someone to get married and to become a husband/wife to a family?” The king said, “it is more important and more difficult to become a husband/wife of the family than to become a king of a country. So the age limits we have now are reasonable.”
There is another saying in Russia that is, “it is a dangerous thing for your son to navigate in the ocean, but pray for this son a day. If there is a war in the country and your son is out on the battlefield, it is even more dangerous than for him to go out navigating out in the ocean, so pray for this son a day. But if this son gets married and has his own family, pray for this son times a day.”
I can talk a lot more about this, but through the word of God, through the word of truth from experience, family is that important.
It is a foolish thing to neglect your family. When family struggles, your life struggles, your society struggles, your world struggles, and your church struggles.
In my church ministry, when my family stable, unstable church become stable , but my family unstable, stable church become unstable. You understand what I mean.
Then let’s look at what happened while Nehemiah was reuniting the people by family.
He stopped the after meeting family.
The best thing you can do in disappointment is to , take a deep breath,
and take some time off.
There is an ancient Greek saying, “if you keep bending the bow, it will break.”
When have you relaxed your bow?
We always experience some tension when we work.
Workaholics can never become great .
You must be able to take some breaks every now and then.
Nehemiah stopped the work and said, ‘let’s get together by tribes, by families.’
Meeting families will have tremendous on treating disappointment.
2) Put on the Lord(4:14).
He put the focus of the people back to the Lord.
They were looking at the rubbles, but they now needed to see the .
Verse 4:14, “……..Don’t be afraid of them. Remember the Lord, who is great and awesome, and fight for your brothers, your sons and your daughters, your wives and your homes.””
This is the most basic thing a leader should do.
“Remember the Lord” sounds good, but how do we actually do that?
We can do that by remembering what the Lord has done.
Isaiah 26:3-4
Philippians 4:6-7.
So Nehemiah brought them back together under one common goal.
He had to stop the project and let them take a breather.
Then he put their focus back on the Lord.
3). Keep the balance between and(4:14-17).
What did Nehemiah do next to treat the sense of disappointment?
He demanded ,
‘Now you should fight’ ‘Here are things you must do; take up your swords.”
Verse 14 says,
“Fight for your brothers, your sons and your daughters, your wives and your homes.”
Verse 17 also says,
“……those who carried materials did their work with one hand and held a weapon
in the other.”
This is the basic element of Christian life, not just that of a leader.
Charles Swindoll says “I am tired of Christians who spend all of their time criticizing, complaining, and arguing. But I cannot agree with those who say we should never fight.
I support the philosophy of a balanced life that looks at construction and struggle equally”.
Don’t be swayed by false teachings that tell you to stand behind and do nothing as God will do everything.
The Bible continues to encourage us to stand firm, fight for your faith, become stronger in your battles, and become a great warrior.
But we must also be able to our faith and our actions.
4) Set the point of (4:19-20)
The fourth thing Nehemiah did was to set the point of concentration.
In verse 20,
“Wherever you hear the sound of the trumpet, join us there. Our God will fight for us!””
Where was the point of concentration?
It was one place and that was where you hear the sound of the trumpet.
Nehemiah said to join together wherever the sound of is heard.
This principle is that don’t try to fight the battle by .
Don’t ever say, “I don’t need anyone.”
This is a wrong attitude and does not reflect the spirit of Christianity.
If you are a child of God, then you must say,
‘ I can’t do this by myself. But Oh God, if you can lead me to brothers and sisters who can give me support and encouragement through your spirit, I will be with you until the last day of the judgment.’
Nehemiah said, “Wherever you hear the sound of the trumpet, joint us there.”
This is the point of concentration where there are and .
5). D volunteerism(4:21-23).
Nehemiah’s focus was that “look, we need help. I command you to help one another;
we can’t do these things by ourselves.”
Verse 23 says,
“Neither I nor my brothers nor my men nor the guards with me took off our clothes; each had his weapon, even when he went for water.”
When they went to the well to draw out water for bath, they could not lower their guard. When they were in trouble, they helped .
Nehemiah says,
“Let’s not sit around and lick our wounds; we are needed and we need .
Let’s help one another; let’s serve .”
Disappointment is a disease that starts and ends within.
This starts with doubting yourself.
Through fear and negative influence, it becomes stronger and larger.
Soon, we lose our guidance, we become weak, we run, and hide.
As we continue doing this, we become someone who is useless and a complete failure.
We easily lose the battle against those who disappoint us and render us ineffective.
We must rise from the disappointment, and leaders must give back to those who have been disappointed.
Group discussion and presentation
Make small groups of 5-7. After your discussion about what we have covered thus far, the group leaders will need to make 20-minute presentation for their respective groups, while the other students will be required to submit a report, 4-5 pages in length, double spaced, before starting the next
lecture.
Assignments will need to be sent via email.
Assignment-1
- When you were confronted by problems within your community like Nehemiah did, did you feel responsible for such and diligently work towards a resolution?
- How ?
- How did you work towards a problem
- Do you also make a plan, in addition to kneeling down in prayer?
- What plan did you make after prayer recently?
- What do you do first, pray or plan?
- Explain what Nehemiah did to motivate the people working on rebuilding the walls of Jerusalem.
- How did you handle opposition and criticism that came your way as you started working on your plan?
- How did you handle opposition and criticism from those closest to you?
- How did you handle disappointment that came from the aforementioned opposition and criticism.
- What disappointed you the most recently, and what caused it? Is it people or the work itself?
- Did you ever think a sudden change in your environment could turn out to be a chance for you?
- When you lost hope and fell into despair, did your family help you?
If so, what kind? And how to ?
- What did you do when those who follow you were suffering through disappointment and despair?
- a) Were you able to give them hope like Nehemiah did?
- b) How did they respond?
- Each question to be explained with 1-2 page size.
