A WORD IN SEASON TO THE WEARY
🌷🌷🌷 August 28🌷🌷🌷
“Judge me, O God, …O deliver me from the deceitful and unjust man” (Psalm 43:1).
In Neh. 6:8,9 because of the false and wicked charges of the enemies there came a fear in the heart of Nehemiah, the servant of God, but he immediately called upon God beseeching Him to strengthen his hand. We have had similar experiences but have seen the enemy’s devices fail when we ran to the Lord in prayer at the time of his severe attack. When people accuse us falsely we need not waste our time in arguing with them to defend ourselves. Only persevering prayer can defeat all the skill and cleverness of the enemy in all his attempts to harm us. The enemy becomes completely powerless when at the time of his attack we give ourselves to prayer.
From vs. 10-12, we see that when Sanballat and Tobiah failed in all their former plans and attempts they thought of yet another scheme. They hired Shemaiah, one of Nehemiah’s co-workers to give him a harmful advice by misleading him. In verse 10 we read that this Shemaiah advices Nehemiah to hide himself in the temple in order to save his life. If Nehemiah had accepted his advice and had hidden himself in the temple, he would have given room for an evil report and reproach against himself.
The enemy uses the same weapon against believers these days also. He often uses our friends and close relatives who are worldly-minded to give us wrong advice to hinder us in our working for the Lord. That is how many believers have lost their faith in God. As believers we should not consider the advice of worldly friends and relatives. When God’s heavenly will and advice are available to us through prayer, then the advice of our worldly friends and relatives should not be accepted. According to Matt.12:46-50 only those believers who do the will of God are the Lord’s brothers and sisters. In the work of God we should not be governed by the advice of our worldly friends and relatives. We have seen many servants of God, failing in such matters. When they are in need of money for the work of God, such as purchasing a piece of land or constructing a pandal, instead of trusting in God, they use worldly wisdom, and approach their worldly friends for financial help. They think that there is nothing wrong in borrowing money as long as it can be returned since it is only for the work of the Lord. Quite unknown to them such worldly methods of getting money invariably results in barrenness.
Nehemiah discerned that Shemaiah gave him a wrong advice. Many times some worldly people create unnecessary fear in the hearts of believers. They say that God has spoken to them to warn people about certain matters and thus they bring unhappiness and doubts in the hearts and homes of many. We should take a warning from God’s Word that we should never be deceived by such subtle people. God’s Word is given to us for our daily instruction and guidance.
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