Have you ever started to see progress in a great work for God, only to be hit with discouragement soon after? Perhaps just as your Sunday school class is growing, another wave of sickness keeps a good percentage of the attendees away. Maybe the Bible study group you started in your home is beginning to see fruit when life’s busyness halts the momentum. It may be that a relationship is just beginning to be restored when another disagreement threatens to wedge its way between you. All the effort you’ve put into the relationship seems to be lost and you’re just not sure it is worth trying to make it work. Whether it’s your ministry, your relationships, or your personal walk with the Lord, no ground is sacred when it comes to discouragement. We may call it Murphy’s Law—that anything that can go wrong will go wrong—but it is actually something much more significant than that. You see, there is a Devil, and he does not want us to succeed in any work that God has given us to do. He will do anything in his power to discourage us just as we are making progress.
If you’re experiencing this kind of attack right now, you are not alone. Nehemiah and the children of Israel would understand. Just as the work on the wall was taking off, discouragement came for the workers. Nehemiah 4:1-2 says, “But it came to pass, that when Sanballat heard that we builded the wall, he was wroth, and took great indignation, and mocked the Jews. And he spake before his brethren and the army of Samaria, and said, What do these feeble Jews? Will thy fortify themselves? Will they sacrifice? Will they make an end in a day? Will they revive the stones out of the heaps of the rubbish which are burned?” From these verses we see that Sanballat mocked the workers’ ability to build the wall (feeble Jews), and wrongly characterized their job as impossible (will they make an end in a day? Will they revive the stones out of the heaps of the rubbish which are buried?) Basically, Sanballat told them, “You can’t do this job! And even if you could, it’s an impossible job!” Not only did Sanballat mock the Jews, but he did it publicly so that others could join in the jeering. And that’s exactly what Tobiah did, adding in verse 3, “Even that which they build, if a fox go up, he shall even break down their stone wall.” According to Tobiah, even what the Jews’ did accomplish was worthless. One setback, and it would all come crashing down!
That’s how the Devil works. He waits to see if you are serious about serving God and then he sends something to discourage you. How did Nehemiah respond to the Devil’s discouragement in the form of Sanballat and Tobiah? Nehemiah and the people did three things that we can do when we are faced with discouragement.
The first thing that Nehemiah did when faced with discouragement should not surprise us. Nehemiah is known as a man of prayer because . . . well, he made a habit of prayer. Prayer to the God of heaven, to his God, was Nehemiah’s mode of operation. And Nehemiah’s prayer was often characterized by boldness. This prayer was no different! Nehemiah asked the Lord to visit retribution on the discouragers, the enemies of the children of Israel. Nehemiah asked for God to turn the tables on their enemies. He prayed, “Hear, O our God, for we are despised: and turn their reproach upon their own head, and give them for a prey in the land of captivity: and cover not their iniquity, and let not their sin be blotted out from before thee: for they have provoked thee to anger before the builders.” (Nehemiah 4:4-5) Nehemiah’s prayer wasn’t just for relief for the workers, so that they would no longer have to endure taunting from the discouragers. His prayer went further than that. Nehemiah asked for the discouragers to experience the same kind of reproach they had been shelling out to the workers. He asked for God to pour out his righteous vengeance for His own name’s sake. Since Nehemiah recognized God’ sovereignty over the workers and the work, he recognized the discourager’s taunts as against the Lord Himself. We can ask boldly, when we are asking for the sake God’s reputation and His glory.
The second way that Nehemiah and the people responded to discouragement was to fortify their minds. The very next verse, after the conclusion of Nehemiah’s prayer, says this: “So built we the wall; and all the wall was joined together unto the half thereof: for the people had a mind to work.” (v. 6) Nehemiah and the people continued their work even amidst the discouragement. God had not yet thwarted the enemy. Yet they kept working through the discouragement. How could they do that? They pushed through it because they had fortified their minds. The battle against discouragement really is a battle for the mind. The bad guys didn’t go away. In fact, they had gathered together to fight against the people of Israel! (v. 7-8) But as long as their minds were on God and the work, the discouragers would not get the best of them. To fortify something means to protect or strengthen against attack. As Christians, we need to protect and strengthen our minds against the attacks of the enemy. We can only do this by habitually filling our minds with God’s truth. For example, Nehemiah told the people, “Be not afraid of them: remember the Lord.” (v. 14) How can we put fear or discouragement out of our minds? We can put fear out of our minds when we put the Lord in our minds. We can make our minds dwell on God and His promises, rather than the problems in front of us. One such promise is found in I John 4:4, which says, “Ye are of God, little children, and have overcome them: because greater is he that is in you than he that is in the world.” Our minds will be fortified against attack when we are dwelling on the One within us rather than the problems outside us.
In addition to praying and fortifying their minds, Nehemiah and the people prepared. They prayed, they got their minds in the right place, and then they did what they knew to be the next right thing. After they heard of Sanballat’s conspiracy against them, Nehemiah 4:9 says, “Nevertheless we made our prayer unto our God, and set a watch against them day and night, because of them.” We see from this verse that prayer and preparation go together. Sometimes the sentiment expressed by the phrase “thoughts and prayers” is criticized as an alibi for inaction in the face of problems. When it is used as a substitute for action, then it is rightly criticized. But prayer and action are not mutually exclusive! They go hand in hand. The first (prayer) informs the other (action). In the same verse that Nehemiah tells the people to put the Lord in their minds, he also tells them, “Fight for your brethren, your sons, and your daughters, your wives, and your houses.” (v. 14) Nehemiah 4:18-20 says, “For the builders, every one had his sword girded by his side, and so builded. And he that sounded the trumpet was by me. And I said unto the nobles, and to the rulers, and to the rest of the people, The work is great and large, and we are separated upon the wall, one far from another. In what place therefore ye hear the sound of the trumpet, resort ye thither unto us: our God shall fight for us.” These verses demonstrate that Nehemiah did not downplay the immensity of the work or the reality of the threat to that work. Neither did Nehemiah shirk their responsibility to prepare for fighting against that threat. Still, Nehemiah did not just mention their part in this preparation; he also mentioned God’s part. He said, “Grab your swords,” but then he also said, “God shall fight for us.” In other words, they were ready to do their part while relying on God to do what only He could do—His part. Too often we use “trusting God” as an excuse not to do what we know to be right at the moment. While we must certainly trust God with everything, we should not expect God to move mountains and part waters when we refuse to do what we can. We cannot be lazy and hope that God will fulfill His part of the plan. God responds to faith, and faith, by definition, is an action. Faith is doing what we know God has told us to do, even when we don’t understand how it will all work out. Faith is obedience to God, trusting that He will do what only He can when we have done what we ought. May we be Christians of both prayer and preparation.
The hard truth is that anything worth doing will come with its fair share of discouragement. The good news is that discouragement does not have to stop us. Take heart! If discouragement is picking on you, then you are in good company. Like Nehemiah and the wall builders, we can deal with discouragement if we will pray first, fortify our minds, and prepare to do what we can.