Further opposition and how Nehemiah met it
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📚But it happened that when Sanballat 📖 heard we were building the wall, he was angry and enraged, and mocked 📖 the Jews. 2 📚And he spoke in the presence of his brothers and the army of Samaria, and said, “What are these feeble Jews doing? Are they going to fortify themselves? Will they offer sacrifices? Will they finish in a day? Will they restore the stones from the burned heaps of rubble?”3 📚Now Tobiah the Ammonite was with him, and he said, “Even if a fox goes up on what they are building, it would break down their stone wall”.
4 📚Hear, O our God, for we are despised; and turn their reproach back on their own head, and give them as prey in the land of captivity, 5 📚and do not cover their wickedness and do not let their sin be blotted out from your presence. For they have provoked you to anger in the presence of the builders.
4:4-5 For note and references on similar prayers against enemies see Ps 35:8. Opposing a work of God is a very serious matter. But observe that Nehemiah himself did not act against his enemies, but left the matter in God’s hands.⚜
6 📚So we built the wall, and the whole wall was joined together up to half its height, for the people had a mind to work.
7 📚But it happened that when Sanballat and Tobiah, and the Arabians and the Ammonites and the Ashdodites, heard that the walls of Jerusalem were being restored and that the gaps were beginning to be closed, they were very angry,
4:7 Ashdod was one of the old cities of the Philistines which had come under the rule of the Persians. Opposition to the Jews increased on all sides.⚜
8 📚and all of them together made a plot to come and fight against Jerusalem and to disturb it. 9 📚Nevertheless, we made our prayer to our God, and because of them, set a guard against them day and night.
4:9 They did not pray without posting a guard, or post a guard without praying. They did their part and looked to God to do His part – an example to us all.⚜
10 📚And Judah said, “The strength of the labourers is failing, and there is much rubble, so that we are not able to build the wall”.
11 📚And our adversaries said, “They will not know or see till we come into the midst of them and kill them and stop the work”.
12 📚And it happened when the Jews who lived near them came, that they told us ten times, “They will attack you every place where you may turn”.
4:10-12 Growing opposition from without, growing weakness and discouragement within. Compare 2 Cor 7:5.⚜
13 📚Therefore I placed men in the low places behind the wall and on the high places. I placed the people according to their families with their swords, their spears, and their bows. 14 📚And I looked around and got up and said to the nobles and to the rulers and to the rest of the people, “Do not be afraid 📖 of them. Remember the Lord 📖, who is great and awe-inspiring, and fight for your brethren, your sons and your daughters, your wives and your houses”.
15 📚And it came about, when our enemies heard that it was known to us, and that God had brought their counsel to nothing 📖, that all of us returned to the wall, each one to his work.
16 📚And from that time on, it happened that half of my servants worked on the job, and the other half of them held the spears, the shields, the bows, and armour. And the rulers stood behind the whole house of Judah.
4:16 The picture here suggests two aspects of the Christian’s life on earth – work and spiritual warfare (1 Cor 3:10; 15:58; Eph 6:10-12; 1 Tim 6:12; 2 Tim 4:7). These go on simultaneously. We would gladly work without the warfare, but our enemies will not let us alone, just as the Jews’ enemies would not let them alone. Compare Ps 120:7.⚜
17 📚Those who were building on the wall and those who carried burdens, each took the load with one of his hands and did the work, and with the other hand held a weapon. 18 📚For each one of the builders wore his sword at his side as he built. And the trumpeter was with me.
19 And I said to the nobles and to the rulers and to the rest of the people, “The work is great and spread out, and we are separated on the wall, one far from another. 20 📚Therefore wherever you hear the sound of the trumpet, rally to us there. Our God will fight for us 📖”.
21 📚So we laboured in the work. And half of them held the spears from the rising of the morning till the stars appeared. 22 📚At the same time I also said to the people, “Let everyone with his servant stay inside Jerusalem, so that they can be a guard to us by night, and work by day”. 23 📚So neither I, nor my brethren, nor my servants, nor the guards who were with me, none of us, removed our clothes, except that everyone removed them for washing.
4:23 God’s work always demands earnestness and willingness to suffer and travail. Compare 2 Cor 6:4-10.⚜