Re-Build - It's None of Their Business by Steve Craig

Father, I just thank you for today.

Thank you for this beautiful uh weekend that uh that you've given us the opportunity to all be together.

Thank you for adopting us as your children and Holy Spirit.

We just thank you for being our guide and our teacher.

Please teach us this morning.

Please speak into each of our hearts so that we can each know as we leave that you had had spoken something to us today.

So we thank you and we trust you.

And Jesus, we just praise you.

Thank you for being our Savior, for giving us a way to reconnect with uh with our Father, for showing us what He is really like, for being our friend and being our advocate and our help, and we just uh praise you, and it's in your name that we pray.

Amen.

Well, we're looking together at what I think is one of the greatest books that's ever been written.

It's about uh achieving incredible things together with God.

It's not a biography, it was written 2,500 years ago.

It's uh the book of Nehemiah in the Old Testament.

At that time, Persia was the world power, Artaxerxes uh was the king.

Nehemiah worked for Artaxerxes, and he lived in the capital city of Susa, which is now uh a city in Iran.

It's about 800 miles from Jerusalem.

One day Nehemiah's brother comes to visit uh Nehemiah, and he tells him about the terrible conditions that are in Jerusalem.

And in Nehemiah 1, verse 3 it says, They said to me, Things are not going well for those who return to the province of Judah.

Nehemiah 1:3

They are in great trouble and disgrace.

The wall of Jerusalem has been torn down, and the gates have been destroyed by fire.

When I heard this, I sat down and wept.

In fact, for days I mourned, fasted, and prayed to the God of heaven.

The destroyed wall in Jerusalem was four and a half miles long.

It was twenty feet tall, sixteen feet wide, and right now it's four and a half miles of just rubble, burnt wood, and disaster.

It was critical.

It was their main protection for the city of Jerusalem.

They lived in dangerous times.

And without that wall, they didn't have a moment's peace.

They had no uh joy, no excitement, no real future.

So as Nehemiah's brother said, they were in great trouble and disgrace.

But six months later, they literally would be dancing in the streets, shouting so loud with joy that the people for miles around could hear them.

And you might be in trouble and disgrace.

Feel as if your life or part of your life is in ruins.

Sooner than you know, it can be you.

It can be you dancing in the streets, full of joy.

It's a God thing.

We have a loving Father, everything is possible.

And one of the favorite things, one of his favorite things, is to restore and to rebuild and to renew our lives.

And he's showing us how through Nehemiah.

We might not be in a rebuilding mode, and thank God for that.

You know, some of us have rebuilt, and now we're in a strengthening and uh, you know, creating permanency type of uh mode.

You know, really uh making strong what God already has done.

Um and that is obviously great as well.

Well, Nehemiah decides that enough is enough, that it is time to rebuild that wall.

And so he asks God for help.

Specifically, he asks that that he would make the king kind to him.

He then awaits and plans for four months.

Now, during that time, he always stays cheerful and positive and helpful to the king.

It's the way he'd already been all with the king.

Then at just the right time, he asks the king for help.

And then the king gives him everything he needs and even more.

And with that, Nehemiah heads to Jerusalem.

He has permission to go, he's got commitment for lumber and supplies, he's got an armed escort from the king.

This is where we left off last week.

That 800 miles later he arrives in Jerusalem.

Now, one of the first things that he realizes when he makes that trip, when he gets to Jerusalem, is that there's going to be opposition.

But when Sambalot the Horonite and Tobiah the Ammonite official heard of my arrival, they were very displeased that someone had come to help the people of Israel.

So he just mentions it now.

He's going to show how to deal with it later.

And then he goes on.

So I arrived in Jerusalem three days later.

I slipped out during the night, taking only a few others with me.

I had not told anyone about the plans God had put in my heart for Jerusalem.

We took no pack animals with us except the donkey I was riding.

After dark I went out to the valley gate, past the jackal's well, and over to the dung gate to inspect the broken walls and bird gate burned gates.

Then I went to the fountain gate and to the king's pool, but my donkey couldn't get through the rubble.

So though it was still dark, I went up the Kidron Valley instead, inspecting the wall before I turned back and entered again at the valley gate.

So Nehemiah again demonstrates what it takes for us to build something, to rebuild something with God.

He makes an honest appraisal of what his situation is.

How can he begin to repair if he doesn't know exactly what the damage is?

He inspects the wall and uh it's bad.

He can't even get through the rubble on his donkey.

And what's interesting to me is that Nehemiah isn't disappointed or discouraged by the level of damage.

You know, he doesn't even mention it at all.

And we know it's worse than he thought it was gonna be, because he thought he was gonna be able to just ride around the wall on his donkey and inspect it.

But as he went, he cut it.

He had to take a whole detour, a whole different route.

But he doesn't react.

It's not a negative.

And the reason he doesn't react is because his inspection was completely successful.

He'd got what he needed.

What he needed was the truth.

He needed to know exactly what the situation was so he could start to rebuild.

And that is a key to building and rebuilding for us, knowing exactly what our situation is.

Sometimes, like Nehemiah, it's worse than we think.

Other times it's better.

Either way, it's okay.

The main thing is that we know.

It happens a lot if we decide that, you know, it's time for us to really rebuild our marriage.

And so we have an open and an honest conversation with each other.

Maybe we have that with another couple, with the marriage counselor, because it's safe and we're both, you know, on our best behavior and all that.

And so for the first time in a while, we're just really open and we're honest with each other.

And usually one of one of us is like, whoa, it's a lot worse than I thought.

I didn't realize.

It's a lot worse than I thought.

See, our marriage hasn't gotten worse, our relationship hasn't gotten worse.

In fact, we've just taken a giant step forward.

It's an honest inspection of our situation.

We know exactly what we're dealing with.

And it's there that we can start to rebuild.

Those of us that value peace and like to avoid conflict, this is a tough one.

You know, but we do need the truth.

You might be a parent that has lost a relationship with an adult, a grown child.

Sometimes it's hard to make that transition, you know, from a parent child to an adult, adult, more friend relationship.

But if we can just humbly go to the child, ask what the problem is.

Inspect the situation, find out what the truth is.

See, then we can start to build and rebuild that relationship.

If you have trouble with drinking and uh drugs or or a different addiction, you know, we can pretend it's under control or we can face the truth.

You know, sometimes the truth faces us, you know, a DUI or another blackout or or or that type of stuff.

Whatever it is.

To say I have a problem is not to take a step down.

It's not a step backwards, it's a giant step forward.

Facing the situation, inspecting the situation, understanding exactly what our situation is.

Because it's only with an honest appraisal that we can rebuild.

I've had to do it, a lot of us have.

But we can do it.

You can do it.

God will help you.

It's true in so many situations.

How many of us have not wanted to do a budget?

Or uh definitely not want to add up our debt?

How many of us have not done our taxes just because we don't want to know?

You know, it's uh it's because we don't want to know the truth.

But the real truth is that we can rebuild our finances.

God will help us.

But we can't skip this step.

We gotta suck it up and make an honest inspection of the truth.

Know what our situation is.

It's not a step backwards to know, it's a giant step forward.

Because we know where to start.

You know, sometimes things are better than we think too.

But that's not really the point.

The point is that good or bad, if we discover the truth, we can really start to build.

And that's exactly what Nehemiah did.

He keeps telling the story.

The city officials did not know I'd been out there or what I was doing, for I had not yet said anything, want anything to anyone about my plans.

I've not yet spoken to the Jewish leaders, the priests, the nobles, the officials, or anyone else in the administration.

Now, everything Nehemiah tells us is for a reason.

If there's one thing I've noticed with Nehemiah, he is so purposeful as he writes.

Now, he said this twice.

He said it, you know, a couple verses earlier, and he says it again.

He hadn't told anyone about his plans.

See, Nehemiah demonstrates something that's such a key to building and rebuilding in a big way.

He didn't tell everyone what he was gonna do until he was ready to start doing it.

I know this seems like a very small thing, but this was actually kind of one of those big light bulbs coming off, on, coming off.

This was a big light bulb coming off.

The uh, no, it was actually a light bulb going on thing.

You know, um the the first big one in Nehemiah was that idea that we could actually ask God to put kindness in somebody else's heart towards us.

I didn't know that.

And this was not, see, that's a supernatural thing.

This is more of a principle of wisdom thing.

But there's so many applications to what uh what Nehemiah is teaching on here that we don't want to talk too much about it when we can just get started doing it.

Proverbs 14, 23 says, Work brings profit, but mere talk leads to poverty.

See, when we tell people all of our great plans, you know, we get instant gratification.

Because people are usually a little impressed with what we're intending to do.

But we also set ourselves up.

We set ourselves up for embarrassment, we set ourselves up for discouragement, and we set others up for disappointment.

I'm not saying there's never a time that we get a little wisdom from someone or that we set ourselves up for a little bit of accountability with someone else.

But we can really botch things up when we accept praise for doing good, when it's really only an intention, when we tell everybody what we're planning to do, but we haven't even got it started.

So if I'm a salesperson, say it's my last quarter of the year that I'm going to uh going into and I decide, you know, I'm gonna do 50% more sales calls.

I can go proudly tell my spouse, and she's gonna be excited, admire that good intention.

I can tell the boss he's probably gonna be relieved, you know, that type of thing.

But see, I've already taken some of the reward.

I don't know if that makes sense.

I've already taken some of the reward for an accomplishment that I haven't even started to do.

The only thing I've done is had a thought about how hard I was gonna work.

How much better just to do it?

Just to get up tomorrow, get organized, focused, set a personal goal for myself, get after it.

See, when the sales come in, I get to surprise my spouse.

We've got more income than we thought we were gonna have.

My boss is surprised.

Wow, what's going on?

Your sales are are really going up.

But most importantly, and this is big.

Most importantly, in my home and in my job, I'm becoming known as a doer, not a talker.

As a doer, not a talker.

James said, don't just be a hearer of the word, be a doer.

Walt Disney said, the way to get started is to quit talking and begin doing.

It applies to other parts of our life as well.

You know, for the first five years after we started our business, we were really broke.

And uh, you know, now it's all just reminiscing.

Then it was like we didn't know how anything was gonna turn out, you know, and and we were just really broke.

And um, and I was optimistic, and and I knew things were gonna turn soon, and I wanted to relieve the pressure.

And so all the time I was telling Susan about how great things were gonna be.

Oh, you know, I know we we can barely eat now, but next month we're gonna be able to go out on a good date, you know, and and to the to the kids, you know, I really think you know by summertime we can go to Disney World, you know.

And um, see, I could create one pound of excitement on the spot, and about a hundred pounds of disappointment when it didn't happen.

And so I learned not to talk, not to make promises of something in the future until we're all ready to start.

Until I knew it could happen.

I was actually certain that it would happen.

Because then you get to experience the joy, all the joy, without that constant disappointment.

And we can't predict everything.

I mean, there's times we make plans and they change.

A couple years ago, you know, the stock market's just tumbling and the economy is uh is tanking, and we had a family ski trip planned, and we just we canceled it because we had to, because we we couldn't afford it.

You know, those types of things happen, but that in our lives is a real rarity now.

Because we don't talk about something until we're pretty sure that we're gonna do it.

Here in Nehemiah, God has given us a great principle for success as we build and we rebuild.

Nehemiah did not talk about it until he was ready to do it.

He hadn't told anyone.

But now the time came to build as a team.

See, up to now the applications have pretty much been individual.

You know, it's Nehemiah and God, his interactions with God.

He hears about the problem and what God speaks to him, then he has a one-on-one interaction with the king, and it's it's it's all him and God.

But here there's going to be a turn in the story.

Because the great things in life that God accomplishes, he does as a team.

And so here in Nehemiah is when they start doing something together.

It says, but now I said to them, he's talking to the people in Jerusalem, you know very well what trouble we are in.

Jerusalem lies in ruins, and its gates have been destroyed by fire.

Let us rebuild the wall of Jerusalem and end this disgrace.

Then I told them about how the gracious hand of God had been on me, and about my conversation with the king.

They replied at once, yes, let's rebuild the wall.

And so they began the good work.

See, God was using Nehemiah to come up with a plan.

But it was Jerusalem with Nehemiah and God that was going to build the wall.

They're going to build it together.

And we'll build things individually, us and God.

The great things we will build with God together.

Remember how Nehemiah he first gets into Jerusalem?

The first thing he hears is opposition.

These guys, you know, opposed to what he's doing.

If you guys are not happy about how the wall's being rebuilt, it says, but when Sambalad, Tobiah, and Geshem heard of our plan, they scoffed contemptuously.

Contemptuously.

What are you doing?

Are you rebel rebelling against the king?

They asked.

I replied, The God of heaven will help us succeed.

We, his servants, will start rebuilding this wall.

But you have no share, legal right, or historic claim in Jerusalem.

Five words that deal with a lot of opposition.

It's none of your business.

It's none of your business.

See, these three guys aren't going to go away.

We're actually going to see them again and again.

We'll learn more about them.

But the first way Nehemiah deals with them is short and sweet.

It's none of your business.

See, as you build and rebuild individually, as families, us as a team, people are going to tell you, you can't do it.

You should quit.

You'll never make it.

Five words.

It's none of your business.

If you have an addiction, all your drinking and drugging buddies are not going to be excited about you getting sober.

It's going to be, oh, you think you're better than us.

Oh, you're not fun anymore.

Here's the truth it's none of their business.

You have a life to build.

God will help you.

You can build it.

You'll have new friends.

It's none of their business.

Six months after Susan and I were married, I went to work for Dunham Bratt Street.

It was a uh it was a total God thing I got this job.

I was so unqualified.

It was an entry-level job.

I made$9,400 a year.

And I was on the phone talking with insurance agents.

And our goal was to have a significant conversation with 40 insurance agents a day.

Andrew was doing a couple months.

I had a second job.

Susan was working, but man, we were just broke.

This was the first time.

But we really, I mean, we just didn't have enough to uh to live.

And so I decided that my goal was gonna be 80 conversations a day.

You know what's I'd come in real early and I'd take a very short lunch, and I'd stay really late.

Well, after a few of day, after a few days of that, some of my coworkers, the people on the team, came and said, Man, what are you doing?

I mean, you're making us look bad.

You gotta stop.

The goal's 40 a day.

Well, a week later, my supervisor calls me in and sits me down and says, you know, you're uh you're kind of messing up the team dynamics here.

Uh everybody's kind of upset.

And could you just, you know, back it off?

You know, you don't need to do uh um 80 conversations a day.

Now, looking back on our entire life, this was a really important decision point for me.

Because I really wasn't sure exactly what to do.

But I decided it was none of their business.

It's okay if they're satisfied with their lives where they're at, but mine was in rubble.

I had a wall to rebuild.

It was none of their business.

People are gonna want us to back off.

People are gonna want us to say this, stay the same, people are gonna want us to give up.

You know, God used me doubling those calls to give me recognition and a promotion and create a big upswing in our life.

You know, the same's been true with uh with his hands.

You know, I think a lot of times it's true when we're doing something together, kind.

With with God.

I would say that never in our lives have we received as much criticism and opposition and that kind of stuff as we have doing this.

It's really unbelievable the intensity sometimes.

I mean, religious people can be psycho.

But right after we had uh started, we had bought the property and and and we're beginning construction.

I get a letter from a local pastor.

And it's uh it's three pages long, and it's basically you shouldn't do this, you'll never make it, you're wasting your money, you're wasting your time, and especially you're not cut out for it.

And uh so I sat down, you know, and and and I read that and and I showed it to uh to Susan, you know, and what we decided was none of his business.

It's none of his business.

See, there's always gonna be people fine with with how things are, and that's okay, but we're getting to build something together with God.

We're building a wall, we're building a place of safety and joy and peace and excitement.

So ultimately, it's none of their business.

We got something to build.

You know, I want to say that in each of our lives, every now and then, a person who truly loves us and truly has our best interests in mind is gonna say to us, whoa, slow down.

Gonna give us some good advice.

And we should stop and we should consider it.

But when it's the naysayers and the bad friends and the haters, just go all nehemia on them.

It's none of your business.

And don't do it.

Don't let people tell you you can't do it.

Don't let people tell you you can't make it.

It'll never change.

You can do it, you will make it, and it will change.

If God's for us, who could be against us?

God is helping us, and we're helping each other.

So if the worship team wants to come up, we'll uh we'll finish in a moment and we'll just uh praise God one more time together.

Let's stand and get ready for that.

You know, if we're gonna build something together with God, the first thing that we've got to do is get connected with God.

And it's Jesus that gave us the way.

I mean, he really is our Savior.

And it's so simple.

It's obvious we need his help.

It's just turning to him and saying, please help.

And he makes us come alive inside.

And he teaches us, and he gives us the strength to do the hard parts of building.

And you can do that anytime.

It doesn't have to be here.

You can do that anytime.

In your own words.

In fact, in your own words, it's the best way because it's the start of a real relationship with God where you're really talking to Him in your own words.

You can do that anytime, you can do that any place.

But the sooner the better.

The sooner the better.

Because the sooner we get connected with God, the sooner we can start building and rebuilding with him.

You know, he's a great God.

He's a great God.

And he loves you.

He loves you.

So next week we're gonna look at one of my favorite parts of the whole story in Nehemiah.

Let's pray.

Father, we praise you.

Thank you for being such a great God.

Thank you for loving us, for being for us, for building our lives, for rebuilding our lives.

We're looking forward to the joy.

We thank you.

We love you.

We trust you.

In Jesus' name we pray.

Amen.