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The hope of Mars Hill since the beginning is that Seattle is a great city and what it needs is a great city within that city, a city that loves Jesus, a city that believes Scripture, a city that lives for the good of the whole city, not just its own self‑interest. And so Mars Hill started off as an experiment to see if we could build a city within the city that would love the city and seek the transformation of the city as the city meets Jesus.

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Good evening, Mars Hill. You guys ready to get to work? We’ll be in Nehemiah 4. My name’s Mark, one of the pastors here good to have you with us. If you’ve got a Bible, go to Nehemiah 4. We’re taking a good number of months to run through a very important book. It deals with the dual themes of building a city and building a church as a city within that city, has a lot of great application for our mission here at Mars Hill. So good to have you all with us. I’ll go ahead and pray, and will just get right to work since we’ve got a lotta work to do tonight.

Father, we begin by thanking you for being a great, glorious, wonderful, sovereign, personal, loving, living God. We thank you that you have intentions for us personally for us in regards to our families and our friendships and our places of employment and our areas of ministry service. We thank you that you have purposes for our church and for our city and for our world. And so, God, as we open your Word tonight, we are asking for you to please do you s in the kind favor of sending us the Holy Spirit to convince us of sin, to give faith to those who not have believes, to give strength to those who are growing wearing, to give clarity to those who are confused.

And, Jesus, as we study, we are asking that you would be the subject of our study, the object of our affection, and, ultimately, the one for whom we labor until we see you face to face. And so, God, we do love you. We thank you for loving us first so that we might love you. And we ask that as we open your Word, this time would be pleasing to you, and that it would be profitable to us and our church and our city as we ask this in Jesus’ good name, amen.

I’ll get into it by explaining the backdrop of Nehemiah for you. There was a man named Nehemiah working in the capital city called Susa. Quite a bit of journey, actually, from his hometown of Jerusalem. That city has been destroyed 141 years earlier. The church there had been destroyed. The walls encircling the city had been broken. The gates protecting its citizens had been burned. God’s people had scattered. The worship of God had essentially ceased in that city for a good long while. Nehemiah was well aware of this. And then one day, God gave him the heart of Jesus for the city of Jerusalem, the same city over which Jesus many years later would, in fact, also pray and weep as Nehemiah did.

He then spent three or four months praying to God and making a plan, asking God what God would have him to do to see that city and that children rebuilt so that God might be worshiped there as he rightly deserved. He then took his plan to the king. Got permission to relocate to Jerusalem. Got the funding and support to begin that endeavor. He took a few‑mile journey into Jerusalem. And upon arriving, he was met in Chapter 2, Verse 10, we are told by two guys. Sanballat, Tobiah. I call ’em Pete and Repeat. They’re a couple a bloggers who were nothing but a pest. And they’re just there to criticize him, discourage him, nitpick, create all kinds a drama, trouble. These are guys who don’t wanna see God worshiped in that city. They don’t want to see a church built in that city. They don’t want to see that church rebuilt because the glory of God is not their primary – their own comfort and ease is, in fact, the object of their most dedicated affection.

So immediately what starts as a little bit of criticism you will see this week in Chapter 4 and for the remainder of the book, quickly escalates into a long season of opposition, a coalition that comes around the point of opposing God’s work and opposing God’s people. Some of you have experienced this personally if not corporately as we are a church family. Some people don’t like the God of the Bible. Some people don’t like us obeying the God of the Bible. Some of you are here and you’ve turned to the Lord Jesus for new life. You’ve started reading Scripture and you’re trying to obey God and immediately you find that there’s all kinds a neat nicks and critics and cynics and opponents, and everybody wants you to do what they say. Nobody wants you to follow the God of Scripture and what he would have for you to be and do.

The question is how will you respond to that. The first thing I would say is to be very encouraged because opposition only rises up for those who are doing something. There are whole people that will live their whole life without being criticized ’cause they’re laying on their couch with their finger up their nose and there’s really no opposition that needs to come against them to keep them from doing anything, because they’re not doing anything. So there’s no reason to oppose such people. If you’re doing something, somebody’s gonna squawk. Somebody’s gonna squeak. Somebody’s gonna complain. Somebody’s gonna send an e‑mail. Somebody’s gonna gossip, malign you. That’s the way it goes. So be of a good cheer. Be encouraged. If you love God and you’re serving him and you’re living for him, somebody somewhere is gonna get ticked off, and that’s a good encouragement to us all.

And you’re gonna find, too, as we study this book that there are various people that oppose individuals, churches, movements, organizations, for a wide variety of reasons. Some people, for example, are simply threatened. If you are rising up in your place of employment, if you are being more influential in your family or circle of friends, if God is using you in ministry, by virtue of you being used of God, others who are perhaps not doing so well, they are threatened by that because you’re more influential and powerful.

How many of you have seen this even in your place of work? You work hard. You get a promotion. All of a sudden, everybody in the office is trash talking you, not ’cause you did anything wrong, but because now you have a more important position than they. You have more power and influence than they. It’s no different with organizations and churches.

Some people rise up in criticism and opposition as well simply because they’re jealous, alright? You ever seen this with an attractive gal? Everybody’s in a restaurant eating. Attractive gal walks in, bunch of other gals are, “Pfft, I bet she can’t read?” just immediately it’s just jealousy. What did she do? Nothing. She was born. She looks like that. Say, “I hate her. She’s skinny. Nah, nah, nah, nah, nah.” I know. I know. I know. I know.

How many of you guys have seen this? Some people are just jealous. Their marriage is painful. Your marriage is going pretty good. They’re jealous, so they talk trash. Your ministry’s going good. Your job is going good. Theirs is going bad. Rather than having the humility to come and say, “Hey, I’m struggling. You’re succeeding. How can I improve? Could you encourage me, coach me, give me some insight?” some people just become jealous. It’s covetousness. It’s a sin. It’s pettiness.

We covet other people’s life, their health, their relationships, their income, their appearance, their IQ. There’s all kinds of jealousy that happens organizationally as well. Some people also just have simple agenda conflict, right? You wanna live for God. They don’t wanna live for God. You wanna obey the God of the Bible. They don’t want you to obey the God of the Bible. It’s just conflict. Happens with church as well.

I don’t know if you know this. Not everybody in Seattle has the same agenda as we do. Our goal is to read the Bible and love Jesus. I don’t know if you know. That’s not the most popular agenda in Seattle. Getting naked and riding a unicycle probably has a greater thrust of impetus behind it than reading your Bible and loving Jesus. There’s just different missions, right? Just different objectives, agendas. Our goal, many of you are single, is to get you to love God and walk with him in holiness, maybe get married, have a few kids. Only get naked with the person you’re married to. That’s kind of our thing. Others, totally different. They don’t want you to read your Bible and get married. They want you to get naked and make a video. Just different objectives for your life, okay? You need to accept that.

Some people, too, get frustrated, petty, because they feel excluded. “You’re not listening to me.” “That’s ’cause you talk nonsense.” “You’re not doing what I say.” “Well, that’s because you’re wrong.” How many of you got people in your life right now telling you what to do that’s totally wrong and they take it personally when you don’t take their counsel ’cause they’re feeling like you’re not listening? The reason is, you’re not listening. And you shouldn’t be listening if they’re not giving good, sound, biblical advice, if they’re not speaking a place of wisdom or helpfulness.

And in organizations, people feel, “You’re not listening to me. I sent 27 e‑mails. Did you get them?” “Yes, and I did this, click, click, click, click, click, click, click, click, delete. That’s what I did. We erase them.” Some people in organizations and churches, they wanna be heard. They wanna be powerful. They wanna be in the center. They wanna be known. They wanna be influential, but they don’t have the character to do so. Such people tend to rise up, become opponents and critics. Some people, too, just because you’re doing well, it makes them look bad, right?

You to go to work. You do your job. Somebody who’s not is really ticked off ’cause you’re making them look bad. Say, “What are you doing, doing your job? You’re making the rest of us look bad. We’re over here playing World of Warcraft trying to download free porn on the Internet. What are you doing actually doing your job? You’re gonna ruin everything.” This is how it works in the world. Some people just don’t do their job. They don’t do what they’re supposed to be doing. And you do what you’re supposed to be doing, they immediately say, “Hey, you’re making me look bad,” so they take it personally.

Same thing happens with churches. I dealt with a pastor a year ago. He was trash talking all the time, talking about our church real negatively, just a real critical guy. Finally met with him. I said, “Dude, why do you hate us so much? What did we do? I never even met you. What’s your deal?” He said, “Well, you’re making us look bad.” “Making you look bad? What are you talking about? I never even met you.” He said, “Well, I told our people you can’t grow a church in Seattle. People can’t come to Jesus. Young people won’t worship God. You can’t teach the Bible. This is Seattle. Everybody’s going to hell. It’s not people, it’s kindling. It’s just an illusion. The key is to read books on the rapture and get canned goods and bottled water and firearms and put a doily on your wife’s head and just wait for the end.”

I mean I’m paraphrasing, but that’s kinda what he’s telling his people. And he said, “Then, people are coming to Mars Hill and you’re growing and it makes us look bad.” I said, “Well, it makes you look bad ’cause you’re bad. I mean, you’ve lost hope. You’ve lost sight of your mission. You lost sight of your objective. Don’t criticize, but participate in the work of God in our cities.” Some people, too, are just traditionalists. Traditionalists are just people that hate change, okay?

If you’re here and you’re a traditionalist, you’re gonna hate our church ’cause we’re committed to strategic chaos. It’s just a value of ours. But some people just they’re traditionalists. They hate change. And it doesn’t matter what the change is. I mean it doesn’t matter. It could be good change and they oppose it. And these people find their way into churches all the time and they say, “Well, we don’t want the music to change, the service times to change, the service order to change. We don’t want anything to change.” But what’s curious is, they do want different results, which is clinically, by definition, insanity.

Insanity is, “I wanna do the same thing and get different results.” That’s like I keep putting my head in the lawnmower and I want Skittles to come out. I want there to be a different result. It’s like it doesn’t work like that. It just – it doesn’t work that way. I’ve met with churches, and I’m like, “Okay” – as a consultant – “what would you like to see?” “We would like to see all of this change in our significance, our growth, our effectiveness.” “Well, what changes are you willing to make in the organization?” “We’re not willing to change anything. We just want different results.” And it doesn’t work that way.

Even if you went to public school, you say, “It just doesn’t work like that.” I know that. You can’t keep doing the same thing and expect different results. But that’s the way traditionalists work.

I got into an argument with one guy at a church one time. I said, “Well, you got a lotta people coming. It’s great. You need to go to two services to free up seats for more people.” This guy said, “That’ll never happen here. That’s a lotta change. We’d have to change our times. We’d have to work more. Somebody else would be sitting in my seat. You’re talking about changing everything.” “Yeah, totally,” because it’s about God, not about us. It’s about people meeting God, not about our convenience. And traditionalists who oppose change sometimes do so simply because they look in the mirror and think that’s the most important God on the earth that needs to be appeased at all costs, and that’s not who God truly is.

And some people, they’re demonically inspired like Judas. They’re just – they hate God and his people. It doesn’t matter what you say or do. You’re never gonna work it out. And lastly, there are some people who just seek revenge. And I’ll tell you what. As a pastor, this is the last favorite part of the job. Some of the people that have trash talked the most, caused the most difficulty, blogs, e‑mails, have people over for dinner, gossip, protest, I mean the whole thing, oftentimes it’s people who were having sex outside of their marriage, committing adultery, and we found out about it and we confronted ’em and they freaked out. And rather than saying, “Yeah. I shouldn’t be having sex with somebody I’m not married to. I’m married to this person and I’m having sex with this person. It’s made the top ten list. It’s not something I probably should be doing.”

Instead of repenting, sometimes they’ll become very self‑righteous. “This is my personal life. Who are you to tell me what to do? Do you think you’re better than me?” “No. But I have my pants on, and I would recommend that you do the same.” It’s just amazing. I’ll tell you this too since I’m just – we don’t have a time limit here and I’m full of Red Bull and just sorta frustrated all of a sudden, I’ll just go with it, is that some people – they believe in this thing called confidentiality, and I’ll just say this as an excurses. We don’t believe in confidentiality at Mars Hill.

Like I’ve had people come and meet with me say, “I’m cheating on my spouse and I think I’ve got AIDS.” I’m like, “Well, I’m gonna tell ’em,” and they’re like, “Well, I thought we had confidentiality.” “No. We’ve got Heaven and Hell. We don’t have confidentiality. We don’t.” “Well, I thought you were supposed to keep it secret.” “No. I’m not gonna keep it secret. If you’re molesting your kid, if you’re cheating on your spouse, if you’re ripping off your employer, I’m pulling the fire alarm. That’s how we do it. We walk in the light as he is in the light. We tell the truth.”

I had one guy, “I think I got AIDS. Don’t tell my wife.” “You know what? I need to tell your wife. You’re gonna go home and sleep with her. You’re gonna maybe give her AIDS and then she’s gonna call me and say, ‘I’ve got AIDS.’ And then I’m gonna go visit her in the hospital and preach her funeral and get up and say, ‘Well, hey. I kept a good secret for Jesus.’ Did you not wear a bike helmet as a kid? Of course, that’s not how we do it. We tell the truth.” We encourage people to repent. And sometimes if they fail to or refuse to, they just get furious. It’s like water on a cat, man. They’re just freaking out. That’s cool, though. Water on a cat.

Anyways, the reason I tell y’all this is ’cause as we get into the book of Nehemiah, beginning in Chapter 4, there is an escalating opposition. Everybody’s angry, freaking out, blogging, letters to the editor. Out of context quotes. Nehemiah’s on the front page of the paper. People are rising up against him. And many of them have all kinds of different motivations, reasons, leanings, many of which are not holy by any stretch of the imagination.

So their first attack, the first opposition to God’s people in their mission to serve their city and build their church comes in Chapter 4, Verse 1. “Now when Sanballat heard that we were building the wall” – their serving God, doing what they’re supposed to be doing. He didn’t bake cookies – “he was angry, greatly enraged, and he jeered the Jews. And he said in the presence of his brothers and of the army of Samaria, "What are these feeble Jews doing? Will they restore it for themselves? Will they sacrifice? Will they finish it in a day? Will they revive the stones out of the heaps of rubbish—and burned ones at that?”

Sanballat’s a political leader. He’s a pretty powerful guy. He’s got a staff. He knows how to write a press release. He’s got a blog. He’s got a column in the local paper. He’s a pretty big dude. He’s got a little army behind him. He could really be a problem. He’s not a believer. He doesn’t worship the God of the Bible. He doesn’t pretend to. He likes the fact that the city is destroyed. He likes the fact that the church was burned to the ground. He likes the fact that it should be that way for another 141 years.

And he rises up and he starts with criticism. He starts with psychological attacking of moral. And another dude signs up to join him, Tobiah, Verse 3. “The Ammonite was beside him, and he said, "Yes, what they are building, if even a fox goes up on it, he will break down their stone wall.” So these two guys come together like two barrels on a gun and they’re going to oppose God’s people and the mission that God has called them to. And the freakish thing here is that Tobiah, unlike Sanballat, most commentators agree, he probably was a guy who went to the church in that day and professed to worship the God of the Bible. But here he is opposing God and God’s people. He’s one of those dude’s with a reversible Jersey that conveniently find himself on or against God’s team, depending on upon what’s most expedient for his own agenda.

These are the most confusing people. These are the, “I’m gay and everybody’s going to Heaven,” Christian. “Err, what?” That’s very confusing ’cause it’s wrong. It just is. These are the guys who care about their power, their pleasure, their prominence – not about the truth, not about the God of the Bible, not about what God would have commanded for his people. They will claim faith. Whether or not they possess the faith that they profess is in question, and ultimately Jesus in the end will sort out the teams. But until then, there are guys who wear a jersey, but aren’t on the team.

Tobiah is just that kinda guy. And here’s what’s freakish. Tobiah and Sanballat, they come together to oppose God’s people. In this, you will see coalitions form against the work of God that otherwise would never come together. I’ll give you two examples. We at Mars Hill, if you don’t know this, we’re theologically conservative, culturally liberal. I didn’t say politically. We’re politically divided. But we are theologically conservative, and we are culturally liberal, meaning this. We love the Bible. We believe it’s all true, inerrant, inspired of God, authoritative, perfect to which everything it speaks. We love Scripture. It’s all about Jesus. We believe every word of the Bible. We’re Bible believing conservative evangelicals.

But when it comes to matter of culture, if the Bible doesn’t say anything, if the Bible leaves freedom of conscience, if the Bible leaves freedom of Christian liberty, we do, too. So we leave a lot of flexibility where the Bible doesn’t speak, and where the Bible speaks, we’re really tidy. Now the problem is, fundamentalists have this hand. They fight over everything. Liberals have this hand. They kinda are open‑handed and flexible about everything. And so we are hated by both sides, praise be to God.

Fundamentalists love our theology and hate the fact that I wear jeans, that our band is very loud, that I say things that are funny that they don’t know they’re funny ’cause they don’t have cable TV or a sense of humor. They get frustrated about that. Or that occasionally we drink alcohol though it’s a sin to get drunk and it’s an issue of conscience and obey the law and Christian liberty. It doesn’t matter what we say.

Now on the other side, the liberals get very frustrated ’cause they say, “We love the sort of quasi hippy, laid back, easy going. Granola‑eating justification by recycling vibe at Mars Hill. But what we’re really frustrated by is you keep talking about Jesus and sin and the Bible and Heaven and hell. And do we need to take all of that literally?” And so what happens is they’ll come together to coalesce into opposition so that the dude in the suit and the dude in the dress all of a sudden are on the same team. What a gift we are to the body of Christ, to cause that kind of unity. The dude in the dress and the dude in the suit saying, “Hmm, we’re on the same team. Finally, we agree on something. We hate Mars Hill.” And that’s how it goes.

That’s what you get here with Tobiah and Sanballat, the non‑believing pagan politician and the guy who, on Sunday, is in church, or woulda been Saturday in their day. And yet the next day, he’s out campaigning against God’s people and his own church. How will they respond? That’s the issue. How will you respond when you’re criticized? How should we respond as a church when the critics rise up and lies are told and things are said that are not, in fact, true, or they’re just critical and they’re not really any effort to be of help or assistance or correction?

And this is the distinction between critics that are helpful because some of what they’re saying is true. You’re a sinner. I’m a sinner. Our church makes mistakes, sins. We have weaknesses, failures, flaws. There’ve been times I’ve said and done things that even I agree were not right, that requires repentance and confession and honesty and change. Sometimes critics have things that are absolutely true. Even if they’re mean‑spirited and they mean no positive kindness in it, we still need to receive it saying, “Is there something here that’s true and I really need to hear?”

But sometimes there are people who just hate God. They just hate his people. There’s nothing you can do to make them happy. I had a guy like this. I meet with him about a year ago. He used to always criticize and create all kinda drama, trouble. I met with him. I said, “What can I do to make you happy? What can I do to make you happy?” He said, “Die.” I said, “That seems like a lot to ask. If the only way we’re gonna like hold hands and sing the theme song to ‘The Sound of Music,’ and skip down the road together for Jesus is if I step out into traffic and take one for the team, it’s just not gonna happen. I love ya, but we’re probably never gonna be on the same page.”

There are some people that their criticisms can be helpful. There are others who are just saying, “We hate God. We hate what God told you to do. And as long as you’re doing what God tells you to do, we’re gonna hate you, too.” How many of you have these people in your life right now? It doesn’t matter. You can meet with them. It just makes it worse. It puts more logs on the fire of controversy. You could respond to their e‑mails, their phone calls. It gets worse. You could say, “I love you and I’m praying for,” and then they really hate your guts.

You can say, “Okay. I hate you and I’m not praying for you,” and they still hate your guts. And at some point, you realize speaking with them is not helpful. Speaking about them is not helpful. Maybe just praying for them is all I can do. I give you permission not to return every e‑mail. I give you permission not to return every phone call. I give you permission if that member of your family is driving you absolutely nuts, taking all your time and emergency ’cause their life is nothing but baggage and carry‑ons and it’s distracting your ability to walk faithfully with God, maybe it’s time to also free up a little space in your schedule and do something else on your holidays than hang out with even family members that are nothing but critics and nothing but discouragement, and nothing of redemption.

I love Nehemiah. He doesn’t argue with them. He doesn’t get into this escalating blog war. “My press release is more inflammatory than your press release.” He prays for them. That’s it. Sometimes that’s all you can do. He does so in Verse 4. He does so throughout the book. When you act for God, people react to you. The question is then how will you respond to them. He’s gonna respond with prayer. “Hear, O our God, for we are despised; turn back their taunt on their own heads, and give them up to be plundered in a land where they are captives.” “God, open a can.” That’s what he’s praying.

“Do not cover their guilt. Do not let their sin be blotted out from your sight; for they have provoked you to anger in the presence of the builders.” What’s he’s saying is this. “God, you’ve told us what to do. We’re not picking fights. We’re not looking for trouble. We’re busy doing what you told us to do. We don’t have time and energy to waste returning every critic’s negative correspondence. We don’t have time to try and make everybody happy. Because at the end of the day, some people will never be happy unless we sin against you, unless we disobey you, unless we give up living our lives for you and reading Scripture, and doing what you command us to do.

“So I’m praying for them. I’m praying for us. I’m praying that you deal with them and I’m praying that you encourage us.” The result is that God answers his prayer, and the people don’t get distracted from their mission. If God has given you something to do, finish your education, get married, love your spouse, make babies, serve God, do ministry, whatever God has convicted you to do, if it’s in agreement with Scripture and godly counsel has confirmed it, then don’t get off your mission. Stay very focused on what God has called you to do.

That is what happens in Verse 6. “So we built the wall” – they did their job – “and all of the wall was joined together to half its height, for the people had a mind to work.” The people said, “We’re not gonna waste our time and energy. We’re gonna stay focused on building our church, worshiping our God, serving our city. That’s what we’re here to do.

Now, you would have hoped that at that point the critics, the enemies, the opposition, woulda said, “Well, they love God. They won’t stop. We tried. We give up.” It doesn’t ever work that way. Some of you are under a myth that if you walk with God a little longer, if you have a little more longevity, if God should bless you a little bit more that it’ll silence your critics. It won’t. It will cause them to respond with even greater force.

We experience this at various seasons in our church. It’s sort of a quiet period right now, but I assure you, it comes and goes, and there’ll be another season of whatever. And at that point, we must maintain our focus on our mission. And I’ll call you back to the words of Nehemiah. But what happened was, these people didn’t escalate the fight. They didn’t pick the fight. They didn’t create any trouble or drama, and the opposition grows. We see that in Verse 7.

“But when Sanballat” – he’s up at the north – “and Tobiah” – he’s at the east – “and the Arabs” – they’re in the south – “and the Ammonites” – they’re in the east with Tobiah – “and the Ashdodites” – they are in the west – “heard that the repairing of the walls of Jerusalem was going forward and that the breaches were beginning to be closed, they were very angry, and they all plotted together to come and fight against Jerusalem and to cause confusion in it.

Now it goes from a couple a guys to a coalition. And they’ve surrounded the city north, south, east, and west. And they’re devising a plan to attack God’s people. And they are declaring that the only thing that will make them happy is if that city does not have a church in which God is worshipped. That’s the only thing that will make them happy. Not everyone is like this. But in our city, in every city, there are people like this that all they want is for the God of the Bible not to be worshipped. That is their objective and mission.

There is no way to please those people unless we sin against the God of the Bible and say, “We can’t worship you, obey you, and listen to you. We’ve selected another God. It’s these critics over here. We’re going to submit to them. We’re going to please them. We’re going to listen to them and honor them and obey them. We’re going to neglect what you said so we could do what they say. We’re not going to live for the glory of your name, because we want them to be nice to us.” It’s an escalating issue. This will test the resolve of God’s people. How truly important is the worship of God to them. It’s always this way. It never changes. So how will they respond?

I love Verse 9. Maybe my new life verse. The first attack was criticism. The second attack was surrounding and threats. They responded to the first attack with prayer. They answered the second attack with prayer and security guards. Verse 9. Jack Bauer Ministry, Verse 9. “And we prayed” – which is good – “to our God, and set a guard as a protection against them day and night.”

Are they picking a fight? No. God’s people should not pick a fight. And, they shouldn’t lose one. That’s the point. That’s the point. They’re not looking for trouble. They’re not picking a fight. They’re not repaying evil with evil. They’re being gracious. They’re staying out of the fray. They’re just doing what God has asked them to do. And you need to know that Christianity includes the ability to defend yourself.

For example, somebody breaks into your home. Don’t run downstairs, gentlemen, and say, “Oh, I’m gonna read the Psalms. I’m read the Psalms to you.” No, dude. You extend the right hand of fellowship. I know it’s outta context. But you extend it. You say, “But the meek will inherit the earth.” Six feet under, they will. That’s what I’m talking about. You have the right to defend yourself. Somebody breaks into your home, is threatening you and your family, you have a right to defend yourself. Don’t go looking for trouble.

They’re not out picking a fight. They’re not out looking for grief. It’s the same way in a church. We have the right to gather together. We have freedom of speech, freedom of religion. We have the right to gather. We have the right to worship. That’s why we have security detail.

How many of you walking into Mars Hill initially are freaked out like, “Those are big guys. They have headsets on. They look serious. They went to the gym. I think they had a cracking heads for Christ ministry. What kinda ministry is that?” Chapter 4, Verse 9. We got a light verse for those guys. Pat, the security guard’s on the way out. They maintain safety because there’s always somebody who wants to make the news. Somebody who wants to be on TV, somebody who’s got some agenda. And Mars Hill’s a good place to show up ’cause there’s thousands of people if you wanna make the news.

Address, occasionally, party in the evening services right around happy hour, people like to fight me, and occasionally, someone wants to get up on stage and make a go at the old man. And I’m kinda down with that. It’s exciting, but it really is disruptive. I’ve had guys actually try and fight me. The last one was a drunk guy. I was preaching on Heaven and Hell, and he was offended ’cause he didn’t think he was going to Hell. And so his way of proving his case was cussing me out while drunk, and then trying to beat me up, which I might suggest is not the best case that you’re going to Heaven insofar as being able to prove your point. Right? Like, “I am not going to Hell and I’m gonna kill you.” Well, that’s probably not the best case that you’re a faithful worshiper of God.

Sometimes, too, it becomes very real threats. We had a guy in the 5:00 service last year – I was talking about how you need Jesus to go to Heaven, and he pulls out a machete, tries to make a run at the stage to turn me into a shish kabob. Yeah. I mean that’s the down side of the job, right? You’re like, “Dude. You need Jesus, man.” Some people are really determined to make sure that Jesus is not lifted up and the God of the Bible is not proclaimed. And sometimes they bring weapons to church.

That’s why we have security. We have security detail. We also have police, both plain clothes and in uniform. We post people around the building for safety. We want you all to be safe. It’s a deterrent to those who would break the law. And we operate by all of the law. That’s why we have security, too, in our children’s ministry. There are some churches who don’t. You can walk in off the street and go in and see the kids. You could be a pedophile and walk in and see the kids.

One friend of mine, they went to a church they were visiting. I’ll give you an example. They were new. There was no security. They walked into the kids’ ministry. They went into the kids’ classroom for their age kids and they were waiting for the teacher to show up. The teacher wasn’t there yet. Other parents started showing up, leaving all of their kids, thinking that the first‑time‑visitor family were the teachers. You can walk in off the street and have 15 little kids all to yourself. Nothing more frightening than that.

We have security. We have security to defend our children. We have security to defend our services. We have security for our technology. We have security for our finances. We have all kinds of security measure that are in place. Why? You say, “Can’t you just pray about it and trust the Lord?” No. You pray and protect. That’s the point. That’s the point.

You gotta do the same thing in your life. You just can’t go buy a house. You better put a front door on it with a lock. Alright? You can’t just buy a car. You better make sure the car has a door that locks. It’s not just enough to build something. You have to then protected what you have labored to create, and it’s no different with the church.

We don’t pick fights. We don’t look for fights. We’re not looking for trouble. We would love to have just a boring future. God’s people here, they’re not picking a fight. They’re not looking for trouble. They’re not bullies. They’re not thugs. They’re not jerks. They’re just wanting to live and worship God freely as they have the legal right to. They’ve been given permission by the king. We have a legal right to worship. We have a legal right to speak. We have a legal right to gather, and others will seek to take that away through intimidation.

How do the people then respond? Verse 10. The people are freaking out. They were like, “This was cool and we got a T‑shirt and we’re gonna do something big for God, but they’re talking about whacking us now and hurting us. And somebody said a mean word to me. My inner child got spanked, and I don’t know if I’m up for this.” In Judah, it was said, “The strength of those who bear the burdens is failing” – people were getting tired. It’s hard work – “there is so much rubble. It’s too big a task. We can’t do it. Let’s give up. By ourselves, we will not able to rebuild the wall, and our enemies said, ‘They will not know or see till we come among them and” – what – “and kill them and stop the work.”

Do we get threats? Yes. Occasionally, I do, we do, yes. And the people here are freaking out. No need to freak out. Keep going. “At that time, the Jews who lived near them came from all directions and said to us ten times, ‘You must return to us. Stop. Don’t serve God. Don’t serve the city. Don’t obey God. Don’t gather together for worship. Don’t build the church. Run for your life. Everything’s in danger at this point.’”

They got a little bit of progress. There is resistance. They made a little more progress. The resistance grew, escalated, intensified. Now there’s death threats. I fully get this. This has been – it’s been my life, to be honest with you. The question is what will they do.

Nehemiah tell us in Verse 13 – this is a chapter from his personal diary. This is a guy who is having a hard day. High‑stress. He’s recruited people to help plant this church and serve this city. They signed up, and now they’re staring death in the face. They’re surrounded, north, south, east and west by enemies who are all agreed on one point. God’s not gonna be worshipped in this city.

“So in the lowest parts of the space behind the wall, in open places” he says, “I stationed the people by their clans. I put ’em together by family.” You wanna let a guy fight? Put his mom and his sister and his daughter next to him. “With their swords, their spears, and their bows.” These were just regular folks with jobs. Things have gotten very serious.

“And I looked, and arose and said to the nobles, to the officials, to the rest of the people, ‘Do not be afraid of them. Remember the Lord’” – it’s amazing. In moments of fear, we could totally lose sight of God. We could lose sight of our mission, of our calling to make his name great. We could just cower in fear. For some of you, all it takes is one criticism, one poor glance, one off‑handed remark, one negative word, and you crumble. “’Remember the Lord who is great and awesome, and fight for your brothers, your sons, your daughters, your wives, and your homes.’”

He looks his men in the eye and he tells them this, “What’s at stake is the worship of God in the city for the future.” One generation after the next for 141 years had seen frail, weak, flaccid, imprudent, cowardly men, who at some point when it started to hurt too much, they tapped out and quit. Nehemiah’s looking his men in the eye, as I would look you men in the eye, and say that the burden of responsibility begins with us. And it has been more than 141 years, that there has not been a sincere and concerted effort to see the God of the Bible widely worshiped in our city.

There have been a multitude of Tobiahs. “I love God and do whatever I want, disobey most of the Scriptures. I’m open‑minded, tolerant and diverse, except, of course, when someone is literally worshiping the God of the Bible. And then if find myself being a very narrow‑minded, bigoted fundamentalist who stands in opposition.” The hypocrisy is sickening.

And he’s look at his men, asking this question. “Will God be worshiped in this city in the future? Will we quit? Will we tap out? Will the pain be too much for us? Is the cost too high? Are your knees buckling? Is your voice trembling? Are your hands shaking? Are you done or will you fight?” And this is always the issue. If these men would have decided with their families and their futures to say, “There will be no worship of God in this city today,” that would have declared that there would have been no worship of God in that city forever, because the precedent would have been set. As soon as there is some progress, it is met with resistance, and then we stop. We fold. We quit. We cry. We wander away. And we give up.

And God wouldn’t have been worshiped in that city. And I assure you of this, it is no different in our day. Whether or not God will be worshiped in the city in the future is dependent upon those who worship him today, and the real issue on the table that Nehemiah is illustrating is that there is no progress in anything without pain. Pain is the price for progress, period. That’s how it is. You wanna have progress financially, progress physically, progress spiritually, progress relationally, progress maritally, progress in regards to your ministry. You wanna raise your daughters to be chaste. You wanna raise your sons to be noble. It will cost you, and that price is pain. It’s financial pain. It’s physical pain. It’s emotional pain. And that’s the price to be paid for progress.

And the great lie that is continually told is that there can be progress with no pain. You can have an easy, carefree life. You can make money without working. You can be married without conflict. You can raise children without effort. You can worship God without sacrifice. It’s a lie. It’s the same lie that Satan told Jesus. He came to Jesus and said, “Jesus, no need to suffer. No need to die. No need to go to the cross. There’s a shortcut to progress that requires no pain. All you must do is worship me.” Satan continually offers himself as the false God of comfort, and it only leads to death. It does not lead to the worship of God.

There’s no nobility. There’s no courage. There is no legacy in it. Some of you worship the God of comfort. When it comes to sexual purity, you choose pleasure, not Christ. When it comes to finances, you choose convenience and not Christ. When it comes to ministry, you choose whatever is your other God. That’s where your time and your energy and your money and your devotion and your heart goes. That’s where your marriage will go. That’s where your children will go. That’s where your grandchildren will go, and it’s death. There’s no life.

Somebody say, “But I read a book, gave me seven steps and four things to do and pray this section of the Bible like a pagan mantra. And it said I could lose weight and be attractive and walk with God and live a carefree victorious, triumphant Christian life.” Look at Jesus. Our God comes in a human history. What’s the experience? Pain.

Isaiah says, “A man of sorrows familiar with suffering, despised, rejected, not esteemed, tempted by Satan himself, spiritual pain, flat broke, homeless, financial pain, betrayed by close friends, relational pain, abandoned by his own disciples, ministry pain, considered by his own family to be insane, familial pain, lied about, falsely accused, falsely charged, false witnesses brought against him. His whole identity, his whole reputation was destroyed, much pain. Flogged, beaten, bled, pain, physical pain. Went to the cross. Our sins were laid upon him. He was punished, suffered, and died in our place. Pain. The father turned his back on the son. Jesus cries out, “My God, my God. Why have you forsaken me?”

Pain, spiritual death, pain, physical death, pain. And without pain, there is no progress. Without pain, there is no progress. We are Christians, those of us who worship the God of the Bible and not the false God called comfort. And the God of the Bible, the Lord Jesus Christ said that to be a Christian means that we pick up our cross and we follow him. And I know it’s not popular and I know I won’t get a lot of book sales on that one. I know that telling you that Christianity is a religion, not just of life, but life through death, and death through pain does not sell, but it’s the truth. It is the truth.

If you wanna get married and be faithful to your spouse and work through your sin and pay your bills and worship your God and raise your children and leave a legacy that others can follow in, it does hurt, and life is about plain hurt. That’s the way it is. I’m not gonna lie to ya.

[Applause]

Where I find my encouragement is this. In Chapter 3, three was a long list of people who were enduring this pain, beginning with these men as the head of their households, including their wives, their children, their sisters, their friends, their sisters in faith. Some commentator, shame on them, skipped Chapter 3. Said, “Oh, there’s just a list of names.” No, it’s not. It’s a list of regular people who love God and paid the price of pain to see the forward progress.

And what you’ll find is later in the book, there’s other lists of names, people who moved into the city who got saved, who joined the church, who got their sins forgiven, who got reconciled to God, who got new life. And they did so because there was a lit of people in Chapter 3 that were willing to pay the price of pain, financial pain, ministry pain, relational pain. They paid that price.

And they didn’t have comfort, but they had a legacy. And the God of the Bible was worshiped in that city that day, and every day forward to this very day. His name is Jesus. I invite you to Jesus. I don’t invite you to comfort. The lie is as well – here’s the great lie, that you can have a life of comfort. Some of you have tired and it’s failed and that’s why you’re here. You’ve tried just getting high and getting laid and getting rich and sleeping in and getting drunk and being happy and making money and finishing your degree and pursuing all of your idols. And it is not making you happy. You’re not comfortable. You’re afflicted. God is relentless, compelling you to toward repentance, new life, and more.

There is no such thing as a carefree, pain‑free life with no price to be paid for progress. But the pain that comes for the Christian is purposeful, not purposeless. It is pain that perfects us. As Hebrew says that Jesus was himself perfected through suffering, not that he didn’t have a cognizant awareness of the difficulty of toil and strife and pain. He did. But he experienced it. Though he was sinless and perfect, he was perfected all the more, Hebrew says, through his suffering.

Our suffering is not pointless. It’s not purposeless. It’s fruitful. It’s for legacy. It’s for tomorrow. That’s why Scripture says to fix our eyes on Jesus. Consider him who endured such opposition so that we don’t grow weary and lose heart, we don’t tap out because it hurts. We play hurt, and we continue forward paying the price of pain to see the fruit of progress.

I invite you to the Lord Jesus, not the false god comfort who is really nothing more than Satan in disguise. I’m calling you to the hardest life that there could possibly be. That is acknowledging that there is one God, that you are not that God, and that you are to live for the glory of that God, because that is what you made for. And apart from that, you’ll have no joy because you will not be doing what God has made you to do. And you will not be comfortable. He will continually afflict you because God will not allow you to settle for anything less than his glory and your joy, and those are exactly the same thing.

Some of you need to become a Christian tonight. Jesus says you’re for him or against him, period. If you’re not for him, you’re against him. And if you’re like Tobiah or Judas Iscariot, and when things get difficult, you change teams, tap out, and participate in the work of the enemy, you are against him. But the Lord Jesus suffered much pain that we might have much progress so we confess our sins to him and we receive his victory as ours. And we pick up our cross and follow him gladly.

When you’re ready, those of you who are Christian or become a Christian tonight by giving your life and sin to Jesus and walking away from the god of comfort, we’re going to partake of communion. Let me explain this to you. It’s a reminder of pain, the broken body and shed blood of God for salvation. Don’t partake unless you accept the pain that was endured by Jesus, and you are likewise willing to endure pain for his name.

We’ll give of our tithes and offerings, and then we’re gonna sing and celebrate the God of the Bible that he would go to such great lengths, endure so much pain that we might have the joy of progress spiritually in our own life, healing in our own relationships, hope in our own hearts, purpose in our own days, and a legacy in our future. Oh, pray.

I’m gonna ask each of you men who is a Christian to raise your hand. He lays the burden on the men. Paul says that holy men should lift holy hands in prayer. Join me in prayer. Father God, I pray for my brothers. I pray Lord God for an army, not of bullies, not of thugs, not of jerks, but of men who when needed will fight, will fight for holiness and purity and sound doctrine, will fight for the love of their wife, will fight for the raising of their children, will fight for the wellbeing of their city, will fight for the wellbeing of their church.

Lord God, we pray against the enemy, his servants, and their works and effects. We pray against many generations of apathy, those who at varying levels of pain, tapped out and decided that the god of comfort was a better choice to be had. God, we pray that you would send your Holy Spirit to break us individually and corporately, beginning with the men.

I pay, Lord God, for a future in this city, that we would continue to see your hand of kindness upon us, that we would listen to those critics who have truth to tell, even if they have hatred in their heart. But for those, Lord God, who are simply used of Satan, like Sanballat and Tobiah, and those who aligned with them, that Lord God, we would not answer to them, that we would pray for them, and that we would proceed with the work that you’ve called us to do.

Lord God, I pray, I pray for us. I pray for us this day, that as we now enter into the worship of you, that this would be our way of declaring in faith that we will worship you tomorrow, and that in our legacy, will come the worship of our children and our grandchildren, that they worship of the God of the Bible, the Lord Jesus Christ, the making much of his name is what we’re about, whatever the price to be paid. However much pain to be endured, we endure it gladly and we endure it wholeheartedly, and we endure it as your sons and daughters for which we are exceedingly glad. Amen.