The Battle Isn't Over | Nehemiah 7 | Week 3

God doesn't call us to stop after the victory.

In Nehemiah 7, the walls of Jerusalem are finally complete—but Nehemiah knows the mission isn't over. He appoints trustworthy leaders, strengthens the city's defenses, and reminds God's people that success can become the moment we're most vulnerable.

In this message, Pastor Tim explores what biblical leadership looks like after the work is finished. You'll discover why spiritual victories must be protected, how the enemy changes tactics, and why character and integrity matter just as much as vision and hard work.

If you've ever wondered what comes after God answers your prayer or brings you through a difficult season, this message offers a timely reminder: the work isn't finished until God says it is.

In this message you'll learn:

Why finishing the project isn't the end of the mission
How the enemy attacks differently after a victory
The importance of integrity and trustworthy leadership
How to protect what God has built in your life, family, and church
Practical lessons from Nehemiah 7 for every follower of Jesus

📖 Scripture: Nehemiah 7:1–4

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:00

Hey, good morning, everybody. Good to see you this morning. For those of you who don't know me, my name's Pastor Tim, one of the teaching pastors here at Grace. It's a joy to be able to continue the series on Nehemiah with you this morning. We're looking at biblical principles of leadership, things that apply not only for the people of God collectively, but things that apply in your life where you lead. And this morning we're going to read a passage from chapter 7 of Nehemiah. It fits almost right in the center of the passage and of this book. And the reason for it is that God wants us to understand the dynamics of leadership in the battle. Because what Nehemiah accomplished with the people of God in Jerusalem was nothing short of incredible. What we've already seen through Pastor David's leading us through the Word a couple of weeks ago is the call on the leader, how the leader responds to that, the holiness of the leader, the prayer life of the leader, things that cause the people of God to be able to accomplish the tasks of God through a godly leader. Secondly, we saw last week in Pastor Rob's message the reality that the logistics of carrying out a project for God is requiring all of God's people, not just some, not just a leader who sits in an ivory tower, but rather all of the people working together to accomplish the task. 480 kids coming tonight, but 250 volunteers in order to make it happen, right? And make no mistake, while we're excited about the kids coming, I know as pastors, we're just as excited about the people of God who, like these Israelites building the wall, all pitched in and using their gifts to achieve what God wanted. Now, let's read the passage right here in the center of the book and take a look at the biblical leadership idea of recognizing when the work is done. Here we go. Nehemiah chapter 7, verses 1 through 4. After the wall had been rebuilt, and I had set the doors in place, the gatekeepers, the musicians, and the Levites were appointed. I put in charge of Jerusalem my brother Hanani, along with Hananiah, the commander of the citadel, because he was a man of integrity and feared God more than most people do. I said to them, The gates of Jerusalem are not to be opened until the sun is hot. While the gatekeepers are still on duty, have them shut the doors and bar them, and also appoint residents of Jerusalem as guards, some at their posts and some near their own homes. Now the city was large and spacious, but there were few people in it, and the houses had not yet been rebuilt. May God add his blessing to this, the reading of his word today. Well, the wall has been built, and you see from the description that the city was large and spacious, which tells you something about the scope of the project. An incredible project. And you would think, in light of the story that we've looked at, the Jews coming back to Jerusalem, rebuilding the wall of Jerusalem, the blessing of the king upon Nehemiah to accomplish that, the way that the people pulled together, that this is a great victory, and that the story would just end. We all like a happy ending. The people came back, they rebuilt the wall, they've established the gates. Yeah! Right? This is a book about victory. The people have accomplished something significant. It took them a while. It took leadership, it took the hand of God, it took the timing of God. All of these things working together, and a significant thing was achieved. You know, it's not just collectively among the people of God that significant spiritual achievements are one. In your life, if you've walked with Christ for any length of time, you know that there have been battles you've fought, there have been projects God has called you to, there have been assignments that the Lord has laid on your plate that required power from on high, significant cooperation from various places in life, a commitment on your part to see it to the end, and then God did something special and gave you a spiritual victory. And we don't celebrate enough the spiritual victories that God gives us sometimes. But some of us have seen God deliver us from addictions. Some of us have seen God heal people that we've prayed for, some of us have seen a growth over a particular sin in our life where we were able to resist it after having yielded to it for years. These are spiritual victories. They're from the hand of God. And we all enjoy a happy ending to a story. I wish Nehemiah would just close the book here. Why did the Holy Spirit have him keep writing beyond this passage? Because there's an important lesson in leadership for Nehemiah, for us, and for you. That this accomplishment is a part of a task, not the be-all-end-all of the task. So I want to look and see that right as soon as Nehemiah writes these things, he makes these appointments. He sets a man who he says is more holy than most. More holy than most. That's an interesting phrase. And as I was reading and studying that, I'm like, I wonder if that's like a true compliment or a backhanded compliment. You know? Well, he's the holiest guy we got. No, but you know, he was, apparently. And Nehemiah appoints him along with his brother and sits them right at the center of the governance of Jerusalem. And now he gets to protect a city that doesn't have anybody living in it. How would you like that assignment? Your job is to protect the city. There's nobody here yet. Okay. Why does he do that? Because he realizes that the battle is not over. That the battle is only half over. And so I want to take a look at that with you this morning. So let's go to the next slide where we recognize this reality. The enemy does not rest, and he will not attack in the same way. So let's think back now on the story to this point as it relates to the enemies of God's people. And by the way, you have enemies. You've named the name of Christ. We've placed his name on our building. We say that we're a Jesus church. And I think the only thing missing from the picture when we show the pictures of our building, and the beauty of it being remodeled and will be completed here shortly, is we probably ought to put a bullseye on the top and paint it right on top of the roof. Because that's the reality. You and I, as God's people, have said we belong to Jesus. We've taken his name and we've placed it right on our door. And if I remember the words correctly of Jesus, he says, This world has hated me. Therefore it will hate you. And God's clear that we have enemies called the world, enemies called the flesh. Some of you came in here this morning, and your flesh has just been beating you up. And you know, as you sit here this morning, that that enemy has gone hard after you because that enemy goes after all of us every single day of our life. Paul says, In my flesh dwells no good thing. You know, that's the reality we live with. We're not redeemed fully yet. We're promised salvation, eternally, glorification when all of this sinful stuff is gone. But right now, if you walked in here today and you're a believer and you've walked with the Lord for any length of time, you know that when you prayed to receive Christ, your battle got stronger, not lesser. The world, the flesh, and Satan himself, the devil, conspiring hard to keep you from achieving what God has in mind as a plan for you individually, for your family, for this church, and for his people worldwide. So God appoints, neo, through Nehemiah, God appoints people to guard the city because the task is not done. What were the challenges that these people faced before the wall was completed? Let's just review them quickly. There are two people named as adversaries of Nehemiah and the people of God as they try to build the wall. One of them is named Sanbalet, who is uh apparently has some political favor there in that area. The other is named Tobiah. And both of these men together are political strong men who've had their way in that city and in that area. They haven't had anybody come in and protect Jerusalem. They've pretty much had, they're just like warlords. They've had control of the area. Now Nehemiah comes, he's going to build the wall, and these two men oppose him viciously. They attack him verbally. They ridicule the people. In fact, Tobias says, that wall is so pathetic looking that if a fox walked on top of that wall, the whole wall would collapse. You know? What are you trying to build? Look at what you're doing. That thing is, that thing, you gotta be kidding, right? And they try to discourage the people of God from accomplishing the work. Then the Bible says that inside of the Jewish people themselves, some of the people started to complain about others of the people because they were being charged interest rates to be able to try to rebuild their homes. So there was a battle outside the walls with the enemies of God, and there was a battle inside the camp among the people of God. And this is what Nehemiah is trying to deal with as he works the project. This is what they experienced. Now, the first chapters tell us how they navigated those challenges, right? Which was some extreme commitment on Nehemiah's part. The assignment of people to guard the walls at night so that the enemies wouldn't come and destroy it. Just a full-hearted, complete commitment to getting the task done that required serious commitment. And they did it, they got it done. And the story says to us what when you're involved in something that God's doing, oftentimes, as you're building it, you can see the enemies, they're clear and they're easy to spot. They got names. You can name them Sanbalet, Tobiah, these people that were the Jews who were charging interest on their loans. High, too high of an interest. And you can solve those problems. You can name them, you can see them, and you can work to overcome them. And that's what the first part of the book of Nehemiah is. These people working together. And did God do a great thing through them? Boy, I say. You know how long it took to build the walls? Get this. This spacious city, it took them from the time they started 52 days. You know, the overtime that those volunteers were being paid to get that project done. That wall goes up in 52 days. That's incredible. The kind of logistical expertise needed to pull that off, to be able to figure out how to assign the workers to the various parts. And you remember, if you've ever read the book, there's whole sections of the book of Nehemiah which tell you that family built that part of the wall and they built it 200 yards, and then that family picked it up and they built it so many lengths. And these people built the gates, and those people built that gate, and they all work together. And can you imagine the logistics, how FedEx and UPS got all those deliveries made in Jerusalem? Amazing. Logistical genius is what Nehemiah was. And apparently that was his role in the kingdom, because yeah, we'd say cupbearer, we think somebody brought food to the kingdom. No, no, no. This is somebody who organized the logistics of all the food of the kingdom. That's why God put his hand on him. Because he had the capacity within his gifting and the experience from his calling to be able to logistically make the project happen. Do you think God ever appoints leaders for his people who aren't, if the people are walking with God and the leaders are walking with God, do you think God just brings leaders to you accidentally? Or is he trying to use specific gifts, skill sets, and abilities on the part of the people that are leading so that God's people can be blessed? Now you'll notice that Nehemiah appoints two people by name to logistically, now that all of the gates are built and all of the walls are built, he appoints two people to be able to kind of watch over things. His brother, who is the first person in the book of Nehemiah, who tells Nehemiah just how bad things are in Jerusalem. So Nehemiah's got a family relationship and he knows he can trust his brother. Secondly, Hananiah, who is said to be more holy than most, who is a military commander, he's a military guy. And he gets appointed not because he's a general, he gets appointed because of his character. So what are the two things that Nehemiah is looking for as he's doing God's work? And what are the things that God is looking for in your life as he's doing in his work in this world through you? These things are always the same. Number one, can I trust you? And number two, do you have character and integrity to know that my assignment for you must be carried out as I've assigned it? And God is looking for that in every person's life, whether you're the leader in your home, whether you're working for a company, whether you're pastoring a church, whether you're building a wall, whether you're protecting what's been built. God needs those things in people if God's people and if your family and if you are going to be able to succeed at the assignment he's given you. Can God trust you? And do you have the integrity and the character to be able to know who really is in charge? Nehemiah never thought for a moment that he was in charge, really, of the project. Because he's a good leader, trying to accomplish God's will, he's able to recognize his skill set, he's able to act on his burden, but make no mistake, Nehemiah again and again says, the hand of God was upon me. He knew whose project this was, he knew whose people they belonged to. They weren't his people, they were God's people. And you know you are the people of God, aren't you? God says he calls you his most precious possession. I was reading that this week, and I thought, of all the things that God prizes in life. Of all the things he prizes in life. Man, we're going to look at his creation all this week in Bible school. I think he should be pretty proud of that. And when he said it was very good, right? Of all the things that God says he prizes as his possession, the number one things he says that is his most precious thing, my precious, is you. In fact, you were so precious for him and to him that he gave the most precious thing he owned in order to buy you for himself. I was reading uh this morning about a uh 1902 baseball card, a Hannes Wagner die-cut baseball card. And it was it was restored, and this guy happened to have it, and he put it, he bought it, he put it in the case, it was restored, and he used it as a paperweight. It was just like on stacks of his paper in his office. He was a sports reporter, news reporter. And he had this. Finally, somebody said to me, you know, you really should get that appraised. So he got it appraised, and like it came back like this is one of the originals. Like, they're gonna, you know what he did immediately? He's gonna send it to auction. This was precious. This thing's gonna fetch probably at least a million dollars at the auction for a 1902 little die-cut baseball card that's been restored. I'd like to know who's buying that. I'd like to ask them. No, never mind what I'd like to ask them. A treasured possession. God took his most precious possession and he auctioned it at the cross. And with the payment of his blood, he bought you. That's how prized you are. And if you walked in here today not feeling so prized or so loved, the Bible's passages and messages never change. You were made in the image of God, he values you above angels and above his creation. He loves you so much that he wants you to be with him forever along with his son, and he wants to make you just like his son because God wanted a bigger family. And you are his best possession, his most prized treasure. How does that make you feel this morning? Oh, I'm why would he feel that way about me? I'm pretty messed up. Well, the Bible says, whoever's been forgiven much, the same will love much. If you really grasp how much God loves you, how much he did for you so he could buy you back for himself, oh, your love for him, your love for him would be so immense. You're his precious possession, and as a result, the enemy of your soul, the enemy of your faith, and the enemy of your life wants to do anything and everything he can to ruin you, to cause you to fail, to cause you to lose your faith, to cause you to be an image that's been so marred that God can't even recognize you. Just as much as your God prizes you as his treasure, so the enemy hates you as your God's special possession. And so here we are. We're at halfway part of the book, the wall's been built, the priests and the Levites they tell the people of Israel, go celebrate what God has done. And while they're out celebrating what God has done, and the God renews their interest in the Word of God, and Ezra the priest begins to read to them the word of God, and their hearts are stirred, and now they realize there's parts of their faith they haven't been engaged in. They get re-engaged, and now they're going to start walking with God. Jerusalem can become again a place where the name of God can be praised and where the people of God can dwell to bring glory to his name. And it's right at that moment that Nehemiah says, Let's protect, because the work is not finished. Now, maybe you think that God's work in your life is finished. Maybe you think, oh, I've reached a certain age. I've been kind of out of touch with my faith for a while, or just not that important to God. I mean, after all, I just am this, that, or the other thing, however, you might define yourself, and you think, well, you know, pretty much it's sit back and wait for eternity. And, you know, we had some good runs, and we've accomplished a lot, and God's blessed us a ton. And it's time now to take off the work clothes, to sit back, and to relax, and to enjoy our victory. Well, that's good. The people of God were told to enjoy their victories. But you know what else they were told? Your enemies are still at work. When you get beat, the enemy of our soul, when he gets beat one way, he retreats. And he plans a different strategy and he attacks in a different way moving forward. So here's what we know to be true from the story. Nehemiah is concerned because he, as the leader, recognizes the work's not done. There are some stories in life about people who thought the work was done and then they found out it wasn't, and a whole bunch of problems happened as a result. Let me tell you a story. I like this story because it's just so human. Some of you have flown into the Denver Airport, DEN on your flight rate R24. Denver Airport. Some of you have flown in there, you've made connections there, it's the gateway to the west. The government pumped in $500 million when they built that airport in 1994. And because they saw how important it was to travel and commerce. And the mayor of Denver, he was all about it, and they found this place 20 miles from Center City. And out there in the plains, they bought 56 miles of land and built this very beautiful airport. And they had this architect who built the airport so that it resembles the Rocky Mountains. And you know it sits on a plain, and in the distance are the Rockies if you've ever been out to Denver. And this is supposed to be a symbolic, you know, art art. It's architectural art. And they made good progress on this airport. And they had it all done. The terminals were finished, the parking lots were finished, the runways were finished, and they had this incredible system of mechanical baggage movers that was robotics and computers. It was all driven that way. And it was going to be the crowning achievement of the Denver airport. And in fact, United, which uses Denver as their hub even more than Chicago O'Hare, said they wouldn't move to the airport unless the city built this underground luggage transport system. So they built it, and in May of 1994, they brought the press in, the grand celebration of all that they had achieved. And they brought the cameras and they turned them all on and they flipped the switch and they started running and they put a couple of bags on it. And the bags didn't get very far until boom, it just spit the bag right off of the right off of the belt. They got cameras watching all of this. Wonder how much they spent on PR firms to try to fix that. Anyhow, the whole thing is a mess. They thought they were finished. They thought they were done. This beautiful airport above ground. And this incredible machine system underneath the ground. And none of the stuff underneath the ground worked. In fact, it took them 16 months and $1 billion so that the airport did not open in May of 1994, it opened in August of 1995. And guess what? Normal baggage handlers were handling the bags because they never did get the system fixed. Now, as a result of that failure, the conspiracy theorists of our world, and apparently there's like one in every other seat, there are more conspiracy theories in the world, I think, than there are people in the world. Anyhow, the conspiracy theorists say that the reason that the belt didn't work is because underneath the airport, that was sacred Navajo ground to which they had committed it to the lizard people of the aliens. And as a result, the aliens weren't going to let their underground tunnels be used by an airport because, after all, at the end of the tunnel is the Illuminati. And beyond the Illuminati are secret chambers for all of the government people who are part of the swamp, so that when the whole world gets destroyed, they can run there and hide. And if you walk into the airport, there's horses with red eyes and symbols on the walls that conspiracy theorists say are alien language, when in fact they're just Navajo symbols. But nonetheless, their failure had to be blamed on something. Must be the demons and gargoyles underneath the airport that are causing the problem. It's either that or human beings are filled with pride and think their ideas will always work. And oftentimes, as in many cases of building projects, the overruns are immense and people get embarrassed. So, anyhow, the new mayor of Denver, who got elected, because obviously the old guy leader, he couldn't get it, make it happen, uh, he he finally, you know, convinced them to just go back to normal usage of bags. And now you see the little truck and the little carts, and they move the baggage, and and you wait too long at the baggage pickup place. Well, you ever feel that you've achieved something? And now you can rest on your laurels and the grand celebration, the grand opening, and and and you know what? Nehemiah is smarter than that. Nehemiah says, We've accomplished a great project. We haven't destroyed or eliminated our enemy. You have to remember that because the New Testament is filled with this truth, especially to leaders and churches. Paul recognized this and understood it. The challenges after the wall are the challenges that are different. There's nobody outside the wall trying to smash it in. No. Up to this point, they're fighting an enemy they can see. But after this point, they're going to fight an enemy that they can't wall out. Here's what I find interesting about the last half of Nehemiah. Remember that guy Tobiah, I mentioned at the beginning? That fella was, you know, he's the guy that made the comment about the fox on the wall would knock it over. Well, he was a warlord and a power broker before the walls, but the walls kept him out. The Jewish people were inside, the non-Jewish people, and Tobiah was an Ammonite of a tribe of people that had long opposed Israel through the years. But he was the warlord there and the power broker. And you read about how the wall kept him out, and Nehemiah confronted him, and you would think, good, the enemy of God has been dispelled. But if you keep reading the book of Nehemiah, here's what you'll find. One of Tobiah's relatives lived inside and had married apparently a Jewish woman. And he went into the area reserved for the priests and the Levites, which was filled with food storage items to pay or to feed the Levites who were the priests. And he cleared out this room of all of its grain and supplies, and he built a little room for his relative, Tobiah, to dwell there. You see, before the gate, the walls were put up, he was trying to destroy it from the outside in. Once the walls were up, what we read is the people opened up the door and let him walk right in. And not only did they let their enemy walk right into their midst, they built him a room in which to live. The same thing can happen to you, to me, to this church. Just because you've had a victory, and just because you're resting on the great accomplishment, doesn't mean your enemy has given up to try to destroy you. In fact, he will use other alternative ways to get what he wants, which is your destruction. And if he can't do it from the outside in, he'll do it from the inside out. He just needs to find one way in. Just find one. And so that's why in the New Testament, as the leaders of the New Testament church, the earliest apostles and those who were leaders in the early church, like Nehemiah, what did they recognize? They recognized that the work of the church is not done once the church is started, once it's having great worship services, once it has a pastor, once it has a building. The work of the church isn't done. In some ways, it's just beginning. And the work is a work that is an unseen spiritual work, right? God looks in the heart. God works in ways that we can't always see. And the enemy is someone you can't see except until his plots are revealed. Well, Paul knows this. Other passages of scripture relate to this. But here's what Paul writes to the Ephesian elders, or what he says to them, is recorded for us in the book of Acts in Acts chapter 20. Remember, the enemies of Jerusalem went in after Nehemiah went back to his role. And even though he appointed gatekeepers and watchers, the enemies still got in. And Paul knows that the same danger is possible for the people of God in today's world. It might not be a wall around Jerusalem that you're building, but maybe it's a church in a community that's going to rescue the lost and save them for Jesus or minister to 480 young people in Bible school, some of whom we don't know, will get saved, and maybe some of them will change the world for Christ. We don't know. God knows. And I will tell you this the spiritual battle for those souls is real. And if God wants to use people, you can be sure Satan wants to destroy them. Well, here's what Paul writes I know that after I leave, savage wolves will come in among you and will not spare the flock. Even from your own number, men will arise and distort the truth in order to draw away disciples after them. Now, what's Paul's concern? He had spent two years in Ephesus building that church. He had sent Timothy there, his right hand man, to be the pastor of the church. The apostle John, who wrote the book of Revelation, was an elder in that church after his imprisonment. They had incredible Bible teaching in that church. They had wonderful people who love Jesus in that church. They love the scriptures in that church. And Paul says, Listen, when I'm gone, there will be people who are going to come in. They're wolves and sheep's clothing. And their desire is to take the disciples that have been made. What's their desire? To piggyback off the work of the apostle and raid the people of God for their own ambition and purposes. That's what he's saying. So when a church is doing something for Jesus like this one is doing, I mean, there's great stuff happening here. There's people's lives being changed. There's love that's happening. People are being blessed as we share our wealth with each other. There's children coming to know Christ. There's exciting, exciting stuff happening here, right? Amen? You agree with that? It's been a joy for me to watch it. I'll tell you, it's what a joy. But if you're an elder appointed by God to be an elder, your job is to protect the flock. Your job is to keep it from being ruined by the wolves. And that's really hard stuff. But it's real. And that's why, church, when God talks about who are you going to assign to be the people who guard the flock or guard the city, it's got to be somebody you trust and it's got to be somebody of character. Perfect, no. There's none of us perfect. But that's what it requires. Now, in your home, in your family, you might have had some great spiritual battles and perhaps some spiritual victories. But please don't go to sleep, but go to rest and think that now your assignment is done. No, no, no. Your assignment continues, and you need to be vigilant. Vigilant. There we go. Notice what Jude says. And this is a book that has only one chapter in it. And he quotes from an apocryphal text called the Book of Enoch that he quotes from here in this book, where in the book of Enoch, the Book of Enoch says there were angels who fell, Genesis chapter 6, and all of that. Enoch takes from that book and quotes it, and then he makes an application of that to the church, and he says, There are going to be people that come in. They are ungodly people. They pervert the grace of God into a license for immorality, and they deny Jesus Christ, our only sovereign and Lord. All right, the first warning is about people who are ambitious. The second warning is about people who distort the doctrines of grace. Now, grace is the name of our church, isn't it? Isn't it an awesome name? For by grace have you been saved through faith. We have received this grace. But grace is not a license to sin. Grace is a gift from which we become holy. And so Jude's warning to the church is you can live in a day and age when purity matters, things like sexuality become a ho-hum kind of a thing. And everybody has failed, and everybody has fallen, and everybody's given into sexual temptation, and therefore it doesn't matter. The grace of God covers our sin. Let's all just all sit here and sing nice praise songs to Jesus. And Jude says, no, no, no. The church must protect the purity of holiness. We can't take the same opinion about sexual immorality that the world does. You know that the apostles, when they talked about the things that Paul should preach to the Gentiles, there was only two things they said to him. Two things that we have to have you do. Number one, make sure you take care of the poor, and number two, tell them to abstain from sexual immorality. Why'd God pick that one? Why does Jude warn that the angels were thrown into hellfire because they distorted this? Why does he warn us in a sexually promiscuous society that your purity really matters? Well, because that's one of the ways that Satan gets in through the front door. We just say it's okay, God's grace is greater than your sin, and it is. And we believe there's any sin can be forgiven, right? And by God's grace, the precious blood of Christ cleanses us from all unrighteousness, including sexual sin. But knowing that that is true doesn't mean that we should be any less dedicated to the reality that God calls his people to be holy as he is holy. So, in your life, here's what you need to remember. Whether it's you, whether it's your family, or whether it's the church, you have an enemy. He will do his best to destroy. God gives you the victory. As we sang this morning in those songs, those were great, right? The battle is the Lord's. He is stronger than the enemy, and he will give us the victory. But it requires us to pray, it requires us to worship, it requires us to walk in the Spirit of God. And when we do these things, we will have the victory God longs for us. Good leaders remind their people the battle is not done. Lord Jesus, thank you for being our victor. Thank you that we can have victory over the enemy. And Lord, whatever projects that we are involved in, whatever tasks you've assigned to us, may we be diligent and may we overcome, and may we achieve all that you desire for us. Help us to remember, Lord God, that the work is not done. I pray in Jesus' name. Amen.