They want me to be fearful

BIBLE STUDY #852 CHURCH IN THE HOUSES FROM: APRIL 7 - APRIL 13, 2015

Topic: "They want me to be fearful" Nehemiah 6: 11-17

Fear makes us flee, to be worried, desperate and causes to lose faith to continue to do what God has called us. Fears make us weak. Fear paralyzes the man or woman that God chose. It is the subtle way the enemy uses to not fulfill what God wants you to do. The psalmist mentions the wickedness of those who seek to harm a servant of God. In Psalms 35: 7 says, "... Since they hid their net for me without cause and without cause dug a pit for me." This is the form the enemy uses to paralyze what God wants to do in the lives of those who love Him. He wants to paralyze anyone who is an instrument of God in His work. And if you're paralyzed, God is hindered. THE WAR IS THE DEVIL AGAINST GOD! The devil’s war is not with you, because you are son and God takes care of you directly. In addition, you are as nothing to the devil, his great war of envy is against the great God. You absolutely do not have any power that the devil will envy or want. What Satan envies is the power, the throne and all that is of the Lord. That is why we see that the devil wanted to stop and destroy Jesus. All the time he wanted to corner Him so that He couldn’t speak the truth. Matthew 16:1 says, "The Pharisees and the Sadducees came to Jesus and tested Him by asking Him to show them a sign from heaven." Those evil men wanted the Lord to show them a sign, they did this to tempt Him. Jesus answered them in Matthew 16: 4 "A wicked and adulterous generation looks for a miraculous sign, but none will be given unto it, except the sign of Jonah.” Jesus then left them and went away. They had the word, Jesus’ sermon and did not want it. In John 8:3-6 we read that they brought to the Lord a woman who had been caught in adultery and asked: "Now what do you say? (John 8: 5) They were using this question as a trap, in order to have a basis for accusing him. (John 8: 6) They wanted Jesus to seem unimportant; they wanted to make Him look bad. They brought the adulteress to kill her. "But Jesus bent down and started to write on the ground with his finger." (John 8: 6) They were mistaken about the Lord, He is the Rock and never took into account what those high Pharisees and Sadducees were saying, for that reason He did not fear them. No one could stop or paralyze the Lord; they could not catch Him in the "net" or throw Him in "the hole!" Throughout Chapter 6 of Nehemiah we see the same intention on behalf of the devil to intimidate and frighten the man of God. Using different persons the devil wanted to stop Nehemiah so he wouldn’t rebuild the wall and re-establish the religious order in Jerusalem. Among those people there was a certain prophet named Shemaiah, who was the son of a priest, an intimate friend of Nehemiah. This Shemaiah pretended to be endowed with the gift of prophecy and told Nehemiah to hide from his enemies in the temple of God. Nehemiah knew that the temple was for worship and not a hiding place. Nehemiah 6: 10-11 "One day I went to the house of Shemaiah son of Delaiah, the son of Mehetabel, who was shut in at his home. He said, “Let us meet in the house of God, inside the temple, and let us close the temple doors, because men are coming to kill you – by night they are coming to kill you.” But I said, “Should a man like me run away? Or should one like me go into the temple to save his life? I will not go." Such false prophet received bribes from those who were of the same ilk as the Pharisees and Sadducees. Nehemiah 6:12 "I realized that God had not sent him, but that he had prophesied against me because Tobiah and Sanballat had hired him." The same happens today with those who walk scheming evil and know nothing of God; the devil knows them from top to bottom. They are the same ones who walk in hatred, envy, jealousy, anger, etc. The threat of Shemaiah to Nehemiah

was death; such lie was to frighten him and that would be "the hole" for the man of God. Everything was an evil plan to fill him with fear and to surrender him to the enemies. Watch where you are going and with whom, and why! Do not be intimidated or fooled, his lies and threats are the loop and net to catch you and throw you in the hole. They bribed someone who should have had the strength and courage to trust that God had sent Nehemiah to rebuild the wall and encourage the people. But, envy led them to a battle to destroy the holy. Nehemiah could return to his position as a chief butler with his king who loved him, but, if he feared and fled he would sin. They would take action to flee to discredit the reputation that Nehemiah had before the people and the king would be mocked by the disgrace of his envoy. But, NEHEMIAH WAS NOT GOING TO DO SOMETHING LIKE THIS FOR NO ONE WHO SEEMED TO BE A PROPHET OR FRIEND! Fear takes away a lot from those who God calls; he will be mocked, discredited and removed. Then, someone like Sanballat (Vs. 14) would take the place of the one who is filled with fear. "Sanballat" is in every corner, he wants power, he wants to be seen; he does not love. All the "Sanballats" wanted to produce fear to those called prophets or religious of his time. Nowadays it is the same. By not becoming afraid Nehemiah finished the wall in fifty-two days (Vs. 15). If Nehemiah had become fearful the work would have stopped; Nehemiah would be mocked. But, the opposite happened to what the wicked intended, for the fear and dread invaded the enemy when they saw the handiwork of Nehemiah (Vs. 16). They, the enemies, felt humiliated! NOT NEHEMIAH! It frightened them that in only fifty-two days he performed such great work. The reason: the builders worked with the ardor of religious zeal, as men employed in the "work of God"! What the devil wants is to stop those who have been employed in the work of God bringing fear to them. People like "Sanballat" want to paralyze and stop us from doing the work of God to later turn our honor into mockery. But that, NEVER!!!! Amen.