Time to Regroup

This is such a great time of just loving each other and talking to each other. I can’t think of a better time. And we’re going to be talking about church family in just a little bit.

We’re going to have a little time of prayer now. And I love the fact that Jeremy has kind of started us with prayer before we preach. I think that’s just such a neat thing to do. And Wednesday night we did a thing where we actually talked about lamenting. You know, there’s a book in the Bible, Lamentations, that’s just about that. And, you know, in prayer we talk about there’s different types of prayer. One of them is called intercessory, where you intercede for someone else. You pray for the needs of someone else. And if I was to ask you right now, can you think of some folks right now that need prayer? I think there’d be two or three people that come to your minds right away.

And so what I want you to do in this time of prayer today is just kind of gather in small groups around the sanctuary for just the next few moments. I’ll close it up. And I just want you to intercede for somebody. That’s what coming to worship is about. It’s giving Him worth in the fact that we give it to Him. Say, Lord, I need You to intercede in the life of another person who right now may be hurting, have sickness, or whatever, whatever the issue. And I need You to intercede. So I want you to do that right now, just kind of get in small groups like we do on Sunday mornings. And just this morning, let’s just spend some time, intercede. It’s not about us today. It’s about somebody else. So let’s do that right now.

Father, thank You. Thank You for the fact that You never, gosh, You never get tired of hearing from us. Gosh, we get tired of hearing from ourselves and not You. And we don’t need someone to come between us and You. We can go straight to the throne. But sometimes, Lord, we just want to remember on our hearts and our minds and bring to You someone who we care about. Care about. And, Lord, there’s a lot of folks in our lives that need You in one way or another. We may even need You right now. My prayer is that You’ll just make Yourself real to them. That You will come. You’ll wrap Your arms around them and love them. And as we remember them, just come to their aid. Make Yourself just so real, so personal. They’ll not mistake who You are. So, Lord, we give them to You. We give their needs to You. We give their pain to You. We thank You. We give them to You. That sometime there’s going to be a time where You’re going to have to take it. I’m sure there’ll be meetings for that.

If you do have it, we are in Nehemiah chapter 4. We’ll be looking at verses 1 through 14 today. So, I’m just going to read that. Gosh. It’s just an incredible story. So, if you’ll stand for the reading of God’s Word. I know this may seem a little bit long this morning, but in honor of it.

Now, when Sanballat heard that we were rebuilding the wall, he became furious. He mocked the Jews before his colleagues and the powerful men. And he said this, what are these pathetic Jews doing? Can they restore it by themselves? Will they offer sacrifices? Will they ever finish it? Can they bring their burnt stones back to life from the mounds of rubble? Then Tobiah the Ammonite, who was beside him, said, Indeed, even if a fox climbed up what they are building, he would break down their stone wall. Listen, our God, for we are despised. Make their insults return on their heads and let them be taken as plunder to a land of captivity. Do not cover their guilt or let their sin be erased from Your sight because they have angered the builders.

So, we rebuilt the wall until the entire wall was joined together up to a half its height. For the people had the will to keep working. And when Sanballat, Tobiah, and the Arabs, and the Ammonites, and the Ashadites heard that the repair of the walls of Jerusalem was progressing and that the gaps were being closed, they became furious. They all plotted together to come and fight against Jerusalem and throw it into confusion. And so, we prayed to our God and stationed a guard because of them day and night. In Judah, it was said, The strength of the laborer fails since there is so much rubble. He will never be able to rebuild the wall. And our enemies said, they won’t realize it until we’re among them, can kill them, and stop the work. And when the Jews who lived nearby arrived, they said to us time and again, everywhere you turn, they attack us. So, I stationed people behind the lowest sections of the wall at the vulnerable areas. I stationed them by families with their swords, their spears, and their bows. And I made an inspection. I stood up and said to the nobles, the officials, and the rest of the people, don’t you be afraid of them. Remember the great and awe-inspiring Lord and fight for your countrymen, your sons and daughters, your wives, and your homes.

Thank you for standing. I know that was a little long this morning. I’m a Rocky guy. I saw the first Rocky six times in the theaters, okay? I mean, I was, that was 1976. I’m in college. I’d grab a friend. I took my mama to it. I mean, I was taking everybody to go see Rocky. And even Beth today, if it’s on TV and I’m flipping through the channels, I stop at Rocky. I don’t care if it’s Rocky one, two, three, four, five. I don’t care. I’m watching. And she’ll just go, really, Rocky again?

There’s a scene in Rocky three. It’s the one where Rocky’s fighting Clubber Lang. You know, he’s played by Mr. T. And there’s a scene where they meet in the middle right before the first round begins. And do you remember what Clubber Lang says to him? He looks at him and goes, I’m going to bust you up. Remember Rocky’s response? Go for it. Almost named the sermon, go for it. Because I just kind of just looked at, this is kind of the picture. You know, you got something good going on and all of a sudden someone comes in and wants to bust it up.

This wall is going up. And these people, and they’re trying to maintain their dignity. They’re trying to maintain their will. They’re trying to maintain the strength they’re going to need to do this. And it’s like everything in the world is falling in on them. Have you ever felt that way? You have. I’ve felt that way. I mean, I’ve gone to God and said, God, I don’t see you anywhere. I know you’re there. Gosh, I’ve taught about you. I’ve preached about you. I don’t see you. And sometimes God is just saying, you just hang in there.

And what I want us to look this morning is I want to look at that we need to regroup sometimes. As Christians, we need to just take a step back and say, because what I want us to look at, I want to give you first a quote. This is by Hudson Taylor, the great missionary to China. He said this, God’s work done God’s way will never let God supply. And that’s true. If God calls you to do it and he’s putting you there and he’s getting everything ready, he’ll give you what you need to do. He’s doing that. I’ve seen that already here in Sauldam.

But I want you, there’s another one I heard this week by a guy named, a pastor named Alistair Begg, who I love. He said though, when God’s people does God’s work God’s way, it will not go unopposed. So you may get all the stuff you need. You may sit there and be doing God’s work and you’re doing it his way and you’re ready to go. But I want to tell you, there’s going to be folks that are against it. It’s tough.

So the question we need to ask ourselves this morning, because you’ve got to answer this almost every day when you wake up, is it worth it? Is it worth it? Because some days you’re sitting there going, I don’t know if it’s worth it. You lose people, things just happen. It seems like you’re taking two steps back and sometimes it almost seems like you’re taking three or two steps forward, three steps back. And you’re trying and you’re trying and you’re just not seeing what you want to see. It’s tough. You need to ask yourself. And I’m sure these people in this passage were kind of going, is it worth it? Really, is this wall worth it? I mean, we’re only halfway up. We’ve only gone halfway up. Now we’re connected. We’re filling in the gaps. We’re all working together. And then all of a sudden they’re hearing, they’re hearing the junk. They’re hearing the stuff. Well, if you Plan to be involved in God’s work at any level, I’m going to give you four things real quick that you’re going to, you’re going to need, that you’re going to face. Number one, you’re going to face discouragement. The Bible says even in this package, they’re laughing at these folks. I almost think that Sanballat and Tobias and the Arabs and all these folks are out of place where they can’t, they relish getting up in the morning saying, we get to go out and just, just lay it on these Jews that are putting on this wall. I mean, listen to what they’re saying. What are these pathetic Jews doing? Can they restore it by themselves? Will they offer sacrifices? Will they ever even finish? Can they bring these burnt stones, these, these, this rubble back to life? And then, then a guy kind of throws in a little joke, Tobias. I don’t think it’s a real funny joke, but, but everybody there probably thinks it’s funny. You ever been laughed at? You know, he goes, man, even if a little fox got up there, that wall would crumble under his weight. You ever been laughed at? It’s not a good feeling. It’s, can you imagine what these people are feeling like? There’s discouragement. There’s division. There’s despair. There’s dryness. And I want to tell you folks, that’s in all walks of the Christian life, especially if you’re any kind of leadership position, whether you’re a pastor or you’re a chairman of a committee, you’re a staff member, it doesn’t matter.

I was, I was looking at some, some statistics. Listen, there’s 38% of all pastors, almost four out of every 10 pastors just this morning are thinking about quitting the ministry. Do you know how many pastors will, will retire as pastor that start in the pastorate? One out of 10, 10%. Most pastors are out of ministry within first five years of ministry. I mean, that blows me away. Of, of the, this is as of the end of 19, 20, 21 of the 38%, almost half are under the age of 45 that want to leave. 50% of all pastors are 56 years and above. 80% of pastors believe the mission of the church is to reach the lost. Only 45% of practicing Christians do. However, 72% of pastors report working between 55 and 72 hours a week. Most of them put in between probably, I would say at minimum 10 to 15 hours, just working on a sermon a week. Most 84% of pastors feel they’re on call 24 seven. 65% of pastors feel their family lives in a glass house. Not listen to this. I thought this was 90% of pastors report the ministry was, report that the ministry is completely different than what they thought it would be like when they first entered.

I can remember being in seminary and I’m wearing that we’re in chapel and we had this giant hall for chapel. And I remember we’re there and we were, we were the new class coming in. And I remember a guy got up behind the pulpit up on the stage and said, these words, now, if any of y’all can find something else to do, go do it. And I’m thinking, what, what is he saying? I mean, what kind of word of encouragement is that? I understand. You know, if, if, if, but, but think about it, if you’re in any kind of management or any kind of position, whether it’s in the church or it’s in the secular world, I think about Arthur and his own business. And, and I think about other folks in this church and their businesses, there are always folks under you that think they can do it better. Is that not true? Folks that work for you, they can, they can, everybody can do it better. And I want to tell you, if that bothers you, don’t, don’t get into management or leadership because you just gotta, you gotta work through that.

I’ll never forget in one instance in my own life, I’m a young first lieutenant. I’m a, I’m a missile site commander in Germany. I’m 24 years old, missile site commander in Germany. What does that say about the U S army? Not a lot. And so I, I can remember I’ve got, I’ve got 10 nuclear weapons on my site and we’re doing an exercise. This, we’re not at war or anything. We’re just doing an exercise. And I remember my site was co-located with the headquarters. So our captain was there and I remember he had us doing something and I remember I looked at him in his office one day and I said, sir, that doesn’t make any sense. And I’ll never forget his response to it. “That may not, but you’re going to do it anyway.” Do you remember my, can you guess what my response was? “Yes, sir.” That’s right. ’Cause the attitude was this: one day you’ll get to be a captain and you’ll be, you’ll have yours and you can do it the way you want to do it. But right now we’re going to do it this way.

I just want to share some things with you. If it’s not about, if it’s just about preference or how you like it, or it’s something different, you know, go with it. I mean, if it’s not unethical or unbiblical or just plain un-Christian, go with it, give it a shot. We can always back up 15 and punt.

But the thing is, is, is, is, and Nehemiah’s in that situation. He’s looking at his people and he’s trying to keep, you know, their enthusiasm up and their encouragement up. And he’s trying to get them to get what seems like the impossible done. And they are facing major discouragement. There’s division among their ranks. We see that in here. There’s despair. There’s even a song that they’re singing. Look at verse 10. They’re singing a song about their despair. “In Judah it was said, ‘The strength of the laborer fails. Since there is so much rubble, we will never be able to rebuild the wall.’” I’d like to be singing that all day while you’re trying to rebuild the wall. That’s encouraging to the next guy that’s working beside you. And that’s kind of where they’re at.

And there’s dryness. I’m sure there’s, at some point, there’s dryness in Nehemiah’s life. You know, folks, you can’t pour out what you don’t have. One reason we come to church is to get filled back up, get poured back into, be around Christians. Have someone, you know, look at someone else’s life and say, “I can do that.” Look at someone else’s, and I can pray for that. Listen to the Word of God. He’s talking to me. That’s why we do what we do. That’s why we come to church. That’s why we’re around believers. That’s why we’re in the Word of God. That’s why we have an active prayer life. You’ll never be strong, any strong spiritually than your prayer life. I can tell you that right now. But you’ve got to be poured into. Sometimes we even got to pour into Jeremy. That’s why he goes to conferences. That’s why he went to the Cove. That’s okay. Somebody’s got to pour into us. So He can pour into us.

And you need this because even with success, you face discouragement. And sometimes we just got to pause. You know what I find? I find it interesting. I’m watching ball games all day yesterday. You know, I find out that was halftime in every ball game. Isn’t that amazing? Why didn’t they just play all four quarters? Why did you have to have a halftime? I mean, you’re in a boxing match. Why do they got to have 12 rounds? Why don’t they just have one until God goes down? Because everybody needs a break. Everybody needs a break. Christians need breaks. There’s times we need to, what I call, regroup. So that’s the answer: is we regroup.

In Ephesians 4, 7 through 9, it says these words, basically, the whole point is this. We are never just knocked down. We are never out of it. God is always there to pick us up. We Christians need a halftime. So what do we do? Well, let’s look at Scripture in verse 4. At the beginning of the book of Nehemiah, Nehemiah has a long prayer. He’s praying. He’s back in Susa. He’s there with his Persian king. He’s a cupbearer. He’s got it pretty much made, but his heart is sad. He says, “I got to do something. I got to go to Israel.” And he prayed. It’s a long prayer. In between that prayer and some others, there was these short little prayers. And Nehemiah is watching his people, and he has a special prayer for them. And it’s right straight to God. Listen to what it says. It’s just a short thing. “Listen, our God, for we are despised. Lord, make their insults return on their own heads. Let them be taken as plunder to a land of captivity.” But He ain’t cutting any slack here, is He? “Do not cover their guilt or let their sin be erased from Your sight, because they have angered the builders.” Lord, they’re trying to stop what You’re doing. Lord, I’m asking You to intercede and help us. And sometimes, folks, that’s what We need to do. See, the answer is that when we have these halftimes, we’ve got to do a couple of things. Number one, we pray. We pray. Now, pray is not just sitting down and just throwing your wish list before God. Prayer is sitting there having just a time with God that is so personal that you can feel Him right next to you. You ever had those kind of prayers? But prayer is not inactivity, because what does He do? He prays, and then He says, “Okay, I need to take some action.” He’s taking action. He’s posting guards, and then He’s asking them to protect each other.

Ladies and gentlemen, you may be somewhere at work where you’re like the only light in the darkness. And you’re going, “God, why did You put me, why didn’t You put me with a bunch of Christians? Work would be a whole lot better. It would be a whole lot easier. We could talk about stuff like, you know, during work or when we get a break, we could talk about what’s going on and as far as our Christian walk.” God doesn’t do that. God wants to reach the world, and you may be that only light in that world, and God says, number one, I want you to go pray.

Or maybe you’re about to have a conversation with someone in your life that is giving you fits, and you know this is not going to be a good confrontation. Or it’s one of those conversations that you need to have and you don’t want to have, but you know you need to do it. Let’s just go pray. You ever prayed this, “Lord, would You send Your Holy Spirit before me? Will You send Your Holy Spirit to soften the heart of somebody before I even get there to talk to them? Lord, this conversation is coming. I don’t think it’s going to be good. I don’t want to mess it up. I don’t want to say the wrong thing the wrong way at the wrong time. Would Your Holy Spirit go with me?” And God says, “I think I can do that.”

How many times have you done that? And then you get there and it’s almost already handled. Folks, I can count. I don’t know how many times that’s happened in my life. I’m having an encounter I don’t want to have that I don’t look forward to. And I said, “God, would Your Spirit just go?” And I’m telling you, He works that way. What tells you this, that when you pray, you’ve got to post those guards. Send that Holy Spirit. Bring, do things in your life if you’re struggling that will help guard your heart and your mind, as the Bible says, in Christ Jesus our Lord.

And then the other thing is this, you’ve got to protect. You’ve got to protect what’s valuable, which is your walk with Him, the people around you that matter. You’ve got to remember what’s going on in this book. Jeremiah is rebuilding the wall. He’s not building the wall. Do you understand there’s a difference? He’s rebuilding the wall. Jeremy, as he comes here as our young pastor, is not rebuilding the church. I mean, building the church. He’s rebuilding it. This church got built in 1841. It’s been on the lives of some great guys. And he’s taking what we have, and he’s looking to take us into a new chapter in the world, in this world that we call Ravenel, and what’s coming in this direction, whether we like it or not. He’s rebuilding this wall, and he’s building on some great foundation. It’s what makes us who we are.

And Dr. Martin Lloyd-Jones, I don’t know if you’ve ever, you may or may not have ever heard of him. He was, he wrote, he wrote a commentary on the book of Romans that is 12 volumes about this thick, just on the book of Romans. Brilliant guy. But he didn’t always, wasn’t always a minister or a pastor. He was a doctor. He went to the medical school there in London back in, back in years ago, almost a century ago. And he’s, and a brilliant guy. He had incredible social standing. And here’s his first assignment. He’s helping the physician that is the doctor to the royal family. I don’t know if he can get any better than that. And he’s pretty good at what he does. He’s pretty smart. And you have to realize that if he just stays in that profession, that one day that guy’s going to retire. You know who’s going to move in that position? He is. He’s got it made. He’ll probably be made A member of the House of Lords just from the position and from the social status of his family. And then he gets saved. And Dr. Martin Lord Jones all of a sudden becomes a pastor. And his first church for years was a little seaside church in Wales. And he would look at his own ministry and he would sit there and he would go, “Why do I feel I have more in common with a little fisherman’s wife down on the wharf than I do in the great halls with guys that have my education and social standing talking about medicine?” And then he realized what it was. It was that Christ was in his life.

And what I need you to understand is this. He said this: we’re Christians first. Our Christianity goes underneath our backgrounds, our country, our social standing. It even goes below our sin. It is the bedrock foundation for everybody. And what brings this church together, the bedrock foundation is we have Christ in our life. No matter whether we agree, no matter what sins in our life, no matter where we come from, what our background, what our parents did, what kind of job we have, no matter what it is, the very best, what unites it. And it unites us with everyone else in the world who’s a Christian. It’s that bedrock foundation. That’s what makes us who we are.

We, again, we’re not building. We’re rebuilding with each other. You ever know, how many of y’all even know what our mission statement of our church is? Know what it is? If I was to ask you, it’s a great mission statement. Here’s grounded in the past, serving in the present, building toward the future and striving to fulfill the great commission, the great commandment.

You know why, you know why we take halftime folks and we take a step back as Christians? We all do this probably at least a year. It’s a go, I need to regroup. What Nehemiah is telling them, folks, we need to take a step back. We’re only halfway up the wall, but let’s take a step back and regroup. Let’s pray. Let’s post guards. Let’s protect. And I want to share something with you. You can’t build a wall and guard at the same time. So he posts guys, people that are supposed to guard and he’s got laborers that are working and the work continues. He’s got them taking care of each other. We post guards. We protect. We protect what’s valuable. And sometimes it’s hard to step back and refocus.

I’m looking at Jeremy and Becca there with that little one, little honor. I’m thinking, man, think about that. Okay, they got three now under the age of five. Imagine how much fun that is. Okay. And that’s every day. You know, we see them. It looks awesome right here in church, but then they got to go home and diapers. You know, diapers here, diapers there, diapers, diapers everywhere. I mean, that’s kind of their life. And they’re going, and can you imagine sometimes just the mental strain and, you know, plus that’s just put on, put meals together, cleaning the house, just doing normal work. You know, Jeremy trying to do his job too. And I mean, just everything, the family. And then they throw in Anna and Luke. I mean, just throw everybody in.

Until we refocus and remember the mission. See, the mission is that little honor, little Luke, little Annie, get through this time in their life. It ain’t about diapers. It’s about getting them through this life so they become mature one day Christians to be used and served of the Lord. That’s the mission. See, sometimes what we’ve got to do as Christians is take a step back and say, is it worth it? I mean, are we grounded in the past? Are we actually serving in the present? Are we rebuilding for the future? Because I want to tell you folks, especially at my age, I’m not doing it for me. I’m doing it for generations to follow me.

I want to tell you that’s what Mary Newton did. Mary Newton planted seeds that trees would grow and bear fruit that she would never eat of, okay? And that’s how I’m looking at my life. I’m starting, I want to plant seeds that trees will grow and there’ll be fruit that I’ll never get to eat of and enjoy. But that’s okay. Sometimes I got to eat my fruit because there are people behind me that did the same thing. And there’s those kinds of folks in your life. And what do we do? We protect the family. I like what he does at the end of this passage. He finds the most vulnerable areas, which is a good military move, okay? If you’ve ever been to the military, that’s a good military move. You find where they’re most vulnerable and that’s where you stick folks. But he doesn’t just stick the men there. Look who he sticks there. He sticks the families there. I mean, he stationed them by families with their sword, their spears, and their bows. He doesn’t say, okay, let’s grab the women and children and take them and we’ll put them in this part. They’re all together because he knows this. I’m going to protect my family. I’ll fight for my family. That’s how we ought to be about our spiritual family.

I like what one guy was talking about. He said, church is not something you go to, it’s something you belong to. Church never refers to a building, but to a people called to follow Jesus. And this was a Navy ensign who wrote this. The church is not a place where perfect people gather to say perfect things or have perfect thoughts or have perfect feelings. The church is a place where imperfect people gather to provide encouragement, support, and service to each other as we press on in our journey to return to our heavenly Father. So the church is. And I want to tell you, just as kind of, I’ve been a member, I’ve been coming here for a little over two years now and I love it. There is no place I would rather be than at Sauldam Baptist Church right now. Walking with and following my pastor, Jeremy Simmons, as God leads Him. There is no place I would rather be than guarding, building, working side by side with the family of this church. Tell you that. Folks, we’re in a good place. There’s a lot of churches. They’re just going through the tough. We’re going to hit some tough roads.

So, so what do we realize? You have to realize, number one, that it’s all worth it. That no matter how insignificant you may feel, you’re part of something bigger. And that your life and your eternity matter to something bigger. So why do we do it? Why do you guard your heart and your mind against the schemes of the world, the flesh, and the devil? Because it is worth it. Why do you bring yourselves and your family to church and make sure the next generation is grounded? Because it is worth it. Why do you go out of your way to talk to someone else about Jesus? Because it’s worth it. Why do you lose sleep, humble yourself, put your own preferences aside so that others will know Christ like we do? Because it is worth it.

There was a song this week that I couldn’t get out of my brain. I actually heard the words as I was kind of just doing some research this week. And I’ve asked Donnie to come and sing it this morning. It’s a 1951 song. It was an old gospel song written by three guys, sung by a lot of people. It was sung by Elvis, but it was made famous in 1951 by a black gospel artist named Mahalia Jackson. You may have seen her if you’re old. You maybe saw her on the old Ed Sullivan show, incredible voice. But the name of the song is “Someone Bigger Than You and I.” And what I want you to do this morning is this. I want, if Donnie sings this, I want you to just kind of take a step back and regroup a little bit. Is it worth it to you? Is coming to church worth it? Is loving each other, is being a Christian worth it? Is making it your light, going to a dark place? Is it worth it?

Because I want to tell you what happened here. Nehemiah didn’t ask these folks not to be afraid. Listen to what he says. He says, don’t be afraid of them. See the difference? He said, don’t be afraid. We’re all going to get afraid sometimes. He said, you don’t be afraid of them. Remember the great and awe-inspiring Lord and fight for your countrymen, your sons, your daughters, your wives, and your homes. That’s why it’s worth it.