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Tuesday, March 29, 2016

God created you on purpose and with a purpose. Chances are, you will not be able to fulfill His purpose for your life on your own; more than likely you will need to enlist the help of others. In short time, you will find yourself having to lead that group of people and you will face the challenge of keeping them headed in the right direction. You will  also face the fact that no sooner as you start leading the work, others will find a way to profit from the workers.

 

Nehemiah 5:1-5 NLT

 About this time some of the men and their wives raised a cry of protest against their fellow Jews. They were saying, “We have such large families. We need more food to survive.” Others said, “We have mortgaged our fields, vineyards, and homes to get food during the famine.” And others said, “We have had to borrow money on our fields and vineyards to pay our taxes. We belong to the same family as those who are wealthy, and our children are just like theirs. Yet we must sell our children into slavery just to get enough money to live. We have already sold some of our daughters, and we are helpless to do anything about it, for our fields and vineyards are already mortgaged to others.”

 

These men and women along with Nehemiah had committed themselves to the rebuilding of the walls in Jerusalem. They put their jobs and responsibilities on hold to complete this project. However, shortly after beginning the work they began to run out of food to feed their families and money with which to pay their land taxes to the Persian government. Upon seeing this situation, there was no shortage of people looking to profit from what they saw as an opportunity. They sold wheat to the workers and loaned them money to pay their taxes at exorbitant interest rates. Sadly, when the workers were not able to repay their debt, these opportunists would repossess their properties.Often times the workers had to sell their children into slavery just to make their loan payments.

 

Nehemiah 5:6-11 NLT

 When I heard their complaints, I was very angry. After thinking it over, I spoke out against these nobles and officials. I told them, “You are hurting your own relatives by charging interest when they borrow money!” Then I called a public meeting to deal with the problem At the meeting I said to them, “We are doing all we can to redeem our Jewish relatives who have had to sell themselves to pagan foreigners, but you are selling them back into slavery again. How often must we redeem them?” And they had nothing to say in their defense.  Then I pressed further, “What you are doing is not right! Should you not walk in the fear of our God in order to avoid being mocked by enemy nations? I myself, as well as my brothers and my workers, have been lending the people money and grain, but now let us stop this business of charging interest. You must restore their fields, vineyards, olive groves, and homes to them this very day. And repay the interest you charged when you lent them money, grain, new wine, and olive oil.”

 

 Nehemiah did two things in response to the abuse:

 First, he thought things over. He did not act out of compulsion instead he paused to analyze the situation. Too often, we act and speak before thinking things through and this can cause your team to detach themselves from the vision.

 Secondly, he decided it was best to confront the nobles and officials publicly rather than in a private setting. Nehemiah wanted to let his team know that he was on their side and that there would be no backroom deals.

 Nehemiah 5:12 NLT

They replied, “We will give back everything and demand nothing more from the people. We will do as you say.” Then I called the priests and made the nobles and officials swear to do what they had promised.

As you fulfill God’s purpose for your life, you will need the help of others and you will face challenges. Nehemiah is an excellent example of how we should respond to those challenges. Nehemiah never engaged in knee-jerk responses; when he wasn’t busy praying about things he was busy thinking things through and adjusting his strategies when necessary. What an example to follow!