Hope In Action (Part 2) | Northstar Church

“Put your hope in the LORD. Travel steadily along his path. He will honor you by giving you the land. You will see the wicked destroyed.” – Psalm 37:34.

In the last devotional, we talked about turning good intentions (hope) into action by being patient and being dependent on God. In this devotional, we talk about being prepared and then starting to build.

It is one thing to have hope, but it is another thing to be prepared to turn that hope into action. In Nehemiah 2:5 Nehemiah tells the king: ”If it please the king, and if you are pleased with me, your servant, send me to Judah to rebuild the city where my ancestors are buried.” In Verse 6 we hear the king’s response: says. “…How long will your journey take, and when will you get back?” It pleased the king to send me; so I set a time.” So in summary, the cup bearer of the king had convinced the king to allow him to leave his service in order to rebuild the wall around a city that in years past posed a military threat to this area. He convinced the king to lend financial support to the building project and procured letters from the king asking the governors in the area for safe conduct along the way. Nehemiah also organized and equipped the inhabitants of Jerusalem and began construction on the wall. It that was not an example of a prepared plan to build a wall, I’m not sure what was.

When preparation is done, it is time to start doing. Whatever spiritual wall you need to rebuild, the final piece to put your vision into reality, your words into deeds, your plans and faith into action. Nehemiah began to rebuild the wall. He worked with many people, was very strategic, and solved many problems including internal and external opposition. But he continued to motivate people and to do what he set out to do. “So on October 2, the wall was finished—just fifty-two days after we had begun.“(Nehemiah 6:15) He showed great faith and did the seemingly impossible. But the key to success was God: “…The God of heaven will help us succeed…” (Nehemiah 2:20)

If you want to be a builder of broken walls, if we want to turn hope and good intentions into action, we ultimately need to do what we need to do. Build. Build these broken walls. But build with God as Nehemiah did: “When our enemies and the surrounding nations heard about it, they were frightened and humiliated. They realized this work had been done with the help of our God.” Nehemiah 6:16) Only with His help, will you be able to finish the wall you begun. It will not always be easy: you will face opposition, problems will arise. But with God’s help you can turn around a bad relationship, conquer an addiction, cure your bad temper or whatever other hope that you want to turn into action in 2019.

Discussion Questions:

What can we learn from Nehemiah on the importance of preparation?
What can we learn from Nehemiah on doing?