Rebuild Your Life - Remember Why You Did It
- Paul Downie
- 3 hours ago
- 19 min read
Nehemiah 5:19 NIV
[19] Remember me with favor, my God, for all I have done for these people.
In 1924, mountaineer George Mallory set out to climb Mount Everest, the highest peak in the world. When asked by a reporter why he wanted to try such a daring exploit, Mallory famously replied, ‘Because it is there.’
Mallory did not come home. He and his team froze to death on its north-east ridge.
He perished, but his words lived on and have been used by mountaineers and adventurers ever since to justify their exploits.
In Nehemiah, we see a Bible character who is worthy of our deep respect because of his exploits. He was an immigrant wine waiter who became governor of one of the most important cities of the Middle East and rebuilder of its walls. He also helped reconstruct its religion, its legal system and its culture.
Judaism and the state of Israel owe a lot to this man.
Yet at the heart of everything he did was a desire to do one single thing: to please God.
Look at Nehemiah 5:19; 13:14, 22, 31. This was not a man driven by power or politics, by nationalism or revisionism, by ego or id. This was a man driven solely by one single, and singular desire, to please God.
Now, this is where some of us might misunderstand Nehemiah. After all, he was born in an age of law, not grace. Therefore we might assume that he was trying to achieve blessing or salvation from God through obedience.
There may even be a ring of truth to that.
But what we cannot ignore at all is the fact the idea that we should also live to please God is written in the New Testament in black and white:
Colossians 1:9-12 NIV
[9] For this reason, since the day we heard about you, we have not stopped praying for you. We continually ask God to fill you with the knowledge of his will through all the wisdom and understanding that the Spirit gives, [10] so that you may live a life worthy of the Lord and please him in every way: bearing fruit in every good work, growing in the knowledge of God, [11] being strengthened with all power according to his glorious might so that you may have great endurance and patience, [12] and giving joyful thanks to the Father, who has qualified you to share in the inheritance of his holy people in the kingdom of light.
2 Corinthians 5:9-10 NIV
[9] So we make it our goal to please him, whether we are at home in the body or away from it. [10] For we must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ, so that each of us may receive what is due us for the things done while in the body, whether good or bad.
In fact, Jesus Christ Himself said this:
John 8:29 NIV
[29] The one who sent me is with me; he has not left me alone, for I always do what pleases him.”
John himself taught this:
1 John 2:6 NIV
[6] Whoever claims to live in him must live as Jesus did.
So what I am saying is this: if we want to be followers of Jesus Christ, we must live to please God, just as Jesus did.
As did Nehemiah.
This desire to please God is not just an idle, abstract notion. It doesn’t just affect what we do in church or how we sing our songs or read the Bible. It means so much more than that.
There is an earthy, practical side to it.
The desire to please God ought to change our life entirely.
It ought to be the different drum whose beat we dance to, the North Star we use to navigate to, the centre of gravity that always keeps us adjusted.
The desire to please God ought to be the single most dominant aspect of our lives. All other areas of our life ought to be subordinate to it.
The desire to please God ought to be our number one priority.
This desire caused five aspects of Nehemiah’s life – five aspects that we ought to see in ours too.
The first of these is Passion.
Passion
Nehemiah 1:4 NIV
[4] When I heard these things, I sat down and wept. For some days I mourned and fasted and prayed before the God of heaven.
It took being a missionary in Romania for three years for me to see an aspect of the culture in which I was raised in a completely different light.
Church culture here, certainly at the time, was quite dry, formal and, at times, a little boring.
The prevailing thought seemed to be that showing emotion of any sort in church was vulgar and unspiritual.
Yet outside of church, in football stadiums, every kind of emotion was on display over the ninety minutes of the match, and often it was those same staid, calm Christians who were so worked up.
That perplexed me.
Is God not the maker of our heart? Does He not own it?
So why do we give our heart to sport and not to God?
Why is it okay to show immense enthusiasm in a stadium but boredom in a church?
Should God not inspire our passions more than anyone else?
Nehemiah had a comfortable life. He had an important job where he would have been respected and appreciated. He would have had standing in his community. His home city was a controversial place with a history of sedition and rebellion. It’s people had received the just punishment for their sins.
He had every reason not to care.
And yet what we see in his book is that he did care. He really did care. This privileged man was broken by the poor situation of other people.
Ezekiel states this about the change God makes in our life:
Ezekiel 11:19-20 NIV
[19] I will give them an undivided heart and put a new spirit in them; I will remove from them their heart of stone and give them a heart of flesh. [20] Then they will follow my decrees and be careful to keep my laws. They will be my people, and I will be their God.
This means that when we allow God to change us, one of the first things He will change is our heart. As one Christian thinker once said, ‘The heart of the human problem is the problem of the human heart’. When God makes that chance, we will start to care about things about which previously we did not care. We will be motivated to do things of which previously we were not even aware. We will feel for things about which previously we were indifferent.
In short, our emotions will change.
Nehemiah didn’t need to care. But he did. And that is what made the difference.
As well as passion, we also see that living to please God changes our Vision.
Vision
Nehemiah 2:17 NIV
[17] 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.”
Nehemiah’s vision was remarkable. There is little doubt about that.
As we saw in previous meditations, Nehemiah seemed to be the wrong guy for a job. After all, if you needed some joinery or construction work done on your house, would you ask a wine waiter to do it?
Yet we see a few interesting facts about this vision.
Firstly, it was founded in pain. It came into being because of the pain Nehemiah felt at the state of the city of his birth.
Nehemiah 1:4 NIV
[4] When I heard these things, I sat down and wept. For some days I mourned and fasted and prayed before the God of heaven.
Many, many visions are born in the state of angst between what is now and what could or should be. It is that sense of deep dissatisfaction that things are not what they should be and need to change.
Secondly, it was built in prayer.
And not just five minutes of prayer. Not just what we used to call an ‘arrow prayer’. Nehemiah prayed for four months!
During that time of prayer, he confessed the sin that his people, his family and even he himself had committed, realising that it was this sin that had caused the disaster they now faced.
In other words, he took responsibility for the part he played in the decisions and actions that had got his people into the mess they were in. He didn’t shirk it.
That takes a lot of bravery.
His dedication to prayer resulted in a third aspect of his vision: it was framed in planning. Look at what he said to the king:
Nehemiah 2:7-8 NIV
[7] 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? [8] And may I have a letter to Asaph, keeper of the royal park, 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 on me, the king granted my requests.
Nehemiah may seem to have blurted out his initial response to the king, but his words here make it plain that during those four months Nehemiah wasn’t just praying, he was also planning. He was planning how he would execute this grand project. He worked out what he needed for it to happen.
It may seem bold. It may even seem unrealistic. But Nehemiah knew what he needed.
He saw the mess. And let’s not mince our words: it was a huge mess. But because his heart was aligned with God’s and he was living to please Him, Nehemiah prayed and planned conscientiously.
That is what caused him to come up with his bold plan.
But Nehemiah was not just a man with a brave, bold plan. There was also another aspect of him that was caused by the fact that he sought to please God: that was his Action.
Action
Nehemiah 2:17 NIV
[17] 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 have met many Christians who hear of a need and express their shock, even despair at a bad situation. You can see it in their faces. You can feel it in their tears. You can hear it in their voices.
But they don’t do anything practical about it.
They might mourn and pray, even with fasting, but the practical aspect of doing something about it is absent.
Nehemiah was not just a man of words. He was not just a man of prayer.
He was a man of action.
That is something we must admire about him.
The odds were absolutely against him. His request of the king seems gallus, even audacious. It all seems thoroughly unlikely.
But Nehemiah went ahead anyway. He took action.
And it worked.
Just think about the action he took. He left a comfortable job that likely brought a good pay packet, plenty of honour and a good place to live. He went in a journey that was so challenging that the king sent an armed guard with him (Nehemiah 2:9). He lived in an unwalled city surrounded by enemies. He surrendered to back-breaking labour, working alongside his people. He put himself at incredible risk as their leader and figurehead.
And he did this all for one reason and reason thing only:
To please God.
This proves to me what I have experienced myself, that when you change your life to please God, you honestly have no idea where it will take you or what you will do.
But that’s the thrill of it all.
Apart from being a man of passion, vision and action, we see that living to please God also changed his Reaction to the situations he faced.
Reaction
Nehemiah 6:2-3 NIV
[2] Sanballat and Geshem sent me this message: “Come, let us meet together in one of the villages on the plain of Ono.” But they were scheming to harm me; [3] so I sent messengers to them with this reply: “I am carrying on a great project and cannot go down. Why should the work stop while I leave it and go down to you?”
Nehemiah the perfect example of something every leader needs all the time: he knew when to say ‘Yes’ and he knew when to say ‘No’. He said ‘Yes’ to God; he said ‘No’ to distractions.
His singular focus on his mission is something that is rare and often misunderstood – both in the Christian community and outside. People understand a devotion to a mission if someone is building up a career or trying to raise money or trying to reach a goal, for whatever the cause. They see it. They get it. They understand it.
But when someone is doing what Nehemiah did, with his singleness of vision for an ultimately risky and potentially controversial project?
I’m not sure they would understand.
I see three groups of people to whom Nehemiah was required to react so his vision came to fruition.
The first was his superiors. In this case, the king. Nehemiah showed a strong awareness of how to get things done and what was needed for that to happen (see Nehemiah 2:7-8). He also knew who to ask and how things work.
In the past I have heard many Christians decry either the lack of a visa or the lack of permission to do something or the consequences of a fine they received because things weren’t done right.
Do you know what the solution is?
Show respect to your superiors (Romans 13:1-7; 1 Peter 2:13-17). Seek to do things the right way, even if you don’t think it’s the right way. Commend yourself and your God by the way you deal with the authorities over you.
Even if, or rather especially if they are unfair and unjust.
The second group of people were his enemies.
Nehemiah was a man who was clear on who his enemies were, how they felt and what they intended. He was not taken in by the slimy words or the fake information. He knew that they were seeking to disrupt his project. He knew they only had hostile intent. That’s why, all along, he gave them no room at all to get what they wanted.
Look at his firm, but not offensive responses to them:
Nehemiah 2:20 NIV
[20] I answered them by saying, “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.”
Nehemiah 6:2-4 NIV
[2] Sanballat and Geshem sent me this message: “Come, let us meet together in one of the villages on the plain of Ono.” But they were scheming to harm me; [3] so I sent messengers to them with this reply: “I am carrying on a great project and cannot go down. Why should the work stop while I leave it and go down to you?” [4] Four times they sent me the same message, and each time I gave them the same answer.
Nehemiah 6:8 NIV
[8] I sent him this reply: “Nothing like what you are saying is happening; you are just making it up out of your head.”
Nehemiah was not fooled. Not once.
A very necessary part of picking ourselves up, dusting ourselves down and rebuilding our lives is to identify who are our friends and who are our enemies: who to keep close and who to push away.
The simple truth is that those who support our vision and will encourage us to complete it are our friends. These are people we should keep close. They are seeking our good.
But those who try to mock us or discourage us or do anything to impede us in our vision are our enemies. We should keep them at a distance. They are not seeking our good.
We should allow those who are our friends to have a greater influence on our life, and those who were our enemies to have a lesser influence on our life.
This is where the real challenge comes. Many of those who we once thought of as friends may become our enemies if they disagree with our direction of travel. They may even have been close to us, as Jesus explained:
Matthew 10:34-39 NIV
[34] “Do not suppose that I have come to bring peace to the earth. I did not come to bring peace, but a sword. [35] For I have come to turn “ ‘a man against his father, a daughter against her mother, a daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law— [36] a man’s enemies will be the members of his own household.’ [37] “Anyone who loves their father or mother more than me is not worthy of me; anyone who loves their son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me. [38] Whoever does not take up their cross and follow me is not worthy of me. [39] Whoever finds their life will lose it, and whoever loses their life for my sake will find it.
Choosing who our friends and enemies are will have a big effect on whether or not we will see our vision fulfilled, so choose carefully.
But I want you to notice something very important. Nowadays, if someone is our enemy, we may be tempted to take out revenge upon them for the way they have treated us.
That is not God’s way:
Romans 12:14, 17-21 NIV
[14] Bless those who persecute you; bless and do not curse.
[17] Do not repay anyone evil for evil. Be careful to do what is right in the eyes of everyone. [18] If it is possible, as far as it depends on you, live at peace with everyone. [19] Do not take revenge, my dear friends, but leave room for God’s wrath, for it is written: “It is mine to avenge; I will repay,” says the Lord. [20] On the contrary: “If your enemy is hungry, feed him; if he is thirsty, give him something to drink. In doing this, you will heap burning coals on his head.” [21] Do not be overcome by evil, but overcome evil with good.
By all means, take your anger and frustrations to God – Nehemiah did (Nehemiah 4:5-6).
But leave them there.
Nehemiah’s reactions towards his superiors and his enemies were not the only ones that were governed by his desire to please God. So we’re his reactions towards his people.
It’s here we see just how great a leader this wine waiter really was.
Look at Nehemiah 4. Yes, it is a litany of mocking and plotting and straight up aggressive threatening. There is a lot of posturing and power-play from Nehemiah’s enemies. It might seem a little intimidating. That’s because it was supposed to be.
But look how Nehemiah approaches the needs of his people. This is quite brilliant.
In verses 13-14, 19-20, he sets up both an armed guard and a signalling system in case they are attacked. This is not just a reaction to the threats of their enemies (Nehemiah 4:11), but also to the flagging strength (Nehemiah 4:10) and sense of being intimidated (Nehemiah 4:12) that was felt by his own people. He frustrated their enemies’ plot (Nehemiah 4:15) not just by being alert to it, but also using that alertness to boost the morale of the workers on the wall. His readiness (Nehemiah 4:23) would have signalled to his people that he was not one of those leaders who hid in a castle or a stronghold and let his people fight for him. No, he was armed and ready to fight himself.
But it’s not just their morale he was concerned about – although that is important. He was also concerned about their morality, and in particular the behaviour of the rich towards the poor.
Nehemiah 5:1-13 is a section that we, in our capitalist societies, must read with great care. Nehemiah stood up for those who were being exploited in their poverty by those who would charge them interest on top of their debt.
Now, we might protest here. In our culture, charging interest is a normal way of doing business. The interest here is very low – only 1% (Nehemiah 5:11). If any of us could take out a debt with just 1% interest, we would likely jump at the chance.
But look what the Old Testament law says:
Leviticus 25:35-38 NIV
[35] “ ‘If any of your fellow Israelites become poor and are unable to support themselves among you, help them as you would a foreigner and stranger, so they can continue to live among you. [36] Do not take interest or any profit from them, but fear your God, so that they may continue to live among you. [37] You must not lend them money at interest or sell them food at a profit. [38] I am the Lord your God, who brought you out of Egypt to give you the land of Canaan and to be your God.
Deuteronomy 23:19 NIV
[19] Do not charge a fellow Israelite interest, whether on money or food or anything else that may earn interest.
There was a complete blanket ban on charging any of their Jewish family any form of interest ever, no matter how miniscule.
Why?
Perhaps this will explain:
Proverbs 22:7 NIV
[7] The rich rule over the poor, and the borrower is slave to the lender.
In those days, non-payment of debt was not punished by bankrupcy, it was punished by the selling of everything you owned, and if that was not enough, then you yourself, and possibly your family too, would be sold into slavery.
The Jews had slavery in their history. God had delivered them from it. It was utterly scandalous and shameful that their fellow Jews could sell them back into slavery to pay a debt (Nehemiah 5:5).
But what Solomon taught was that the borrower is slave to the lender whether or not interest has been charged, because, while the debt exists, the lender has an obligation on part of the borrower’s income.
True freedom can only exist when debt is absent.
And by that I – and the Bible – mean all debt: mortgage, credit card, loan, educational, medical.
True freedom cannot exist when we have a financial and contractual obligation to another.
It is not possible to live in the land of the free and the home of the indebted.
Nehemiah realised that the existence of this debt was problematic. Of course it was! Who wants to need to borrow from another? That alone means trading our freedom away. We should only do it if we really need to or if it taking on the debt represents a better stewardship of our financial resources. And if we ever have to take on debt, the clear and unmistakable teaching of the Bible is that we should get out of it as soon as we feasibly can (Romans 13:8).
We should do our best to not surrender a portion of our income to enrich someone else. That is not good stewardship of the resources God has given us
What Nehemiah is dead against here is better off Jews making a financial profit from the misery and poverty of others – even if it seems to be a low percentage of profit. Such a gain is unethical. It’s wrong. That’s why Nehemiah stamped it out.
When he sought to please God, that led him to be involved in social justice, and in particular, the plight of the poor.
Part our recovery is, yes, to be debt free and to stay debt free.
However, it is also to have a heart for the plight of others, and to combat the exploitation of their misery and poverty for the profit of others.
Seeking to please God made a big difference to Nehemiah’s passion, vision, action and reaction. Lastly, it also had an impact on his Determination.
Determination
Nehemiah 5:19 NIV
[19] Remember me with favor, my God, for all I have done for these people.
There is a type of race in the UK called a ‘Tough Mudder’. It’s a combination of an army style assault course and deep, thick mud. People who do this will find themselves climbing over obstacles, swinging from ropes, clattering over walls, crawling under nets and wading through mud sometimes as high as waist deep. And it’s in the UK, so people often do it in the rain.
Not me. It’s not my type of thing at all.
People do it either for the fitness aspect or to raise money for charity. They are motivated by a cause. That is what drives them through the mud and rain, over the walls and the obstacles, under the nets and past the exhaustion. It is the desire to reach the finish line on behalf of their cause.
Nehemiah exhibited that level of determination and more. He faced down huge expectations and impossible situations; enemies without, conspirators within; those who remembered the Word of God and those who forgot it; those who were willing to put their back into incredibly hard work and those who would not.
He faced it all.
When many of us would have wilted or gone home, Nehemiah pressed onwards.
And why?
Because he was driven by a desire to please God.
Not himself.
Not his nation.
God.
That is what drove him. That is what gave him the determination.
And I'll tell you something else: that is what made him succeed.
We need determination to fix our messy lives. We need drive. We need a goal.
We also need targets to hit along the way, that we can hit and congratulate ourselves when we get there. That is how we keep ourselves motivated.
But we need a new direction for our lives. And that is what we find in God:
2 Corinthians 5:14-15 NIV
[14] For Christ’s love compels us, because we are convinced that one died for all, and therefore all died. [15] And he died for all, that those who live should no longer live for themselves but for him who died for them and was raised again.
We once lived for ourselves. We once pleased ourselves. That was what got us into trouble in the first place. That was the root cause of our problems.
So it stands to reason that the solution is to live for someone else, and who better to live for than God?
Jesus is clear about what pleases Him:
John 6:28-29 NIV
[28] Then they asked him, “What must we do to do the works God requires?” [29] Jesus answered, “The work of God is this: to believe in the one he has sent.”
But this not just an intellectual belief. It is instead a deep trust, like someone who believes that a bridge will support the weight of their vehicle and demonstrates their belief by driving across it. We show we believe in God by living to please Him.
That is the difference. That is what makes us determined. That is what makes us strong.
That is what leads us to victory.
Conclusion
Nehemiah 13:31 NIV
[31] Remember me with favor, my God.
I recently heard a German pastor talk about the current generation of young people. He mentioned that they have a desire to be noticed. That desire often drives them to do some things that are outlandish and a little stupid. For example: some have taken selfies in the most ridiculous and dangerous places. Others have tried to recreate unrealistic movie scenes and ended up killing someone. Others have travelled to high risk places. Still others have played pranks that have caused harm to their victims.
Personally, I believe that is entirely wrong. It proves to me that these people sincerely doubt their ability to be recognised by society for making a meaningful contribution. Far from being something that is an example of their ego, it is instead an example of how little they think about themselves: how small and insignificant they are; how deeply in need they are of the validation of their peers.
Nehemiah was clearly not like that.
He believed in a God who notices people – even the most insignificant.
He was in exile. He was in bondage to the king. He may have had an important job, but he was not free.
Yet this man lived for one reason and one reason alone: to please God and to be noticed for doing something worthwhile. Not pranks or high jinks, but something that changed the lives of his people.
Like us nowadays, he faced insurmountable odds. He was hundreds of miles away. He did nor have the resources. He did not even have the right over his own life to determine whether or not he should go.
But he faced those odds. He faced them with God. He faced them with his community. He faced them with his people.
And he overcame them.
You may feel small. You may feel broken. You may feel utterly overwhelmed. You may believe that the only way forward in your life is just internet high jinks because nothing will ever change.
But that is just plain wrong.
Look at Nehemiah. See what he did. See what he achieved.
The path to your recovery begins, continues and ends with one thing and one thing alone:
Living to please God.
If you set the compass of your life to get there, you won’t get lost.
You will be more found than you could ever be.
And your life will be meaningful.
Prayer
Lord Jesus, my life is a mess right now. I know it needs to change. I need Your help. I want it to be meaningful. I want it to be purposeful. I want to live to please you. Amen.
Questions
Why should we live to please God?
What five traits in Nehemiah’s life were affected by this desire?
What needs to change in your life for you to live go please God?
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