Greetings in the name of the Lord

Firstly, I would like to tell thank a bunch for the very special chance to share the word of God. Secondly, I would like to show my greatest love to chin people (especially lai people) again; I would like to tell I love you all because you are a part of my life.

Today ,I am going to preach my favorite Bible story about Nehemiah and the bible verses is taken from Nehemiah 2:18 Then I told them of the hand of my God which was good upon me; as also the king’s words that he had spoken unto me. And they said, let us rise up and build. So they strengthened their hands for this good work.

Nehemiah 1:1-2 The words of Nehemiah the son of Hachaliah.And it came to pass in the Month chisleu,in the twentieth year,as I was in Shushan the palace.

V.2 That Hanani, one of my brethren, came, he and certain men of Judah; and I asked them concerning the Jews that had escaped, which were left of the captivity, and concerning Jerusalem.

Introduction

Israel do not obey God

God chose the nation called Israel to be his special people (Leviticus 20:26). He wanted the people to love him and to worship him. And he wanted them to obey him. In the city called Jerusalem, which was their capital, they built a great temple. The people worshipped God and gave sacrifices to him in this temple. Israel became a powerful nation.

But the people in Israel did not obey God (Nehemiah 9:16-18, 26). They worshipped the gods of the other nations. So God caused the people in Israel to suffer trouble and difficulties.

The Israelites continued to sin against God (Nehemiah 9:28). God sent many prophets to warn them about this. But the Israelites did not listen to these men. Instead, the Israelites continued to do bad things (Nehemiah 9:29-30). So God allowed them to suffer terrible difficulties. God loved the Israelites because they were his people. He only allowed them to suffer like this so that they would remember him. He wanted them to obey him. Then he could do good things for them again. The nation divided into two parts

A .    A Vision begins   at a concern

Let’s look at Nehemiah 1: 1-11
When Nehemiah heard about the condition of Jerusalem, there was nothing he could physically do to remedy the situation. It seemed as if he was in the wrong place, with the wrong job, working for the wrong guy. But Nehemiah was not inactive. The four months between hearing about the condition of the walls and finally being able to do something about it was a productive time for Nehemiah.
Nehemiah did two things to prepare for the time when God would lead Him to pursue his vision.

1. He prayed – Prayer is critical to vision development. Why? Because we see what we are looking for, and often miss what we don’t expect to see. Prayer keeps us looking. It keeps our eyes and our hearts in the expectant mode. When God begins to move, we are only going to see it we are ready and watching. Notice that Nehemiah did not pray for God to rebuild the wall. He prayed for an opportunity to go rebuild it himself. That is the difference between a dreamer and a visionary. Dreamers dream about things being different. Visionaries envision themselves making a difference. Dreamers think about how nice it would be for something to be done. Visionaries look for an opportunity to do something.
2. He planned – Nehemiah thought about what would be needed to accomplish this vision (or at least get started). If God has given us a vision, we need to go ahead and start developing a plan. Assuming you had the resources, what would you do? Assuming you had the time, what would you do first? Nehemiah laid out steps of how to pursue this vision. He made sure that if he got an opportunity to present his vision to the king, he was ready.

Pray for opportunities and plan as if you expect God to answer your prayers.
The problem is that many of us fail to pray and fail to plan..If the person you have been praying for were to ask you about your relationship with Christ, do you know what you would say?
If you suddenly had the opportunity to switch jobs or careers, do you know what steps you would need to make the transition successfully?

Conclusion and application

As we all are appointed to be a leaders, so we need to lead people wisely  and according to the will of God .We need to Cast our vision to the appropriate people at  the appropriate time like Nehemiah did his people. People will give what they can afford to meet a need. But they will give sacrificially toward a vision that bears the marks of God’s involvement. There will always be needs, but when an opportunity comes along to invest our time and resources in something God is up to, it is amazing how much more time and treasure people are willing to invest. When Nehemiah finished casting the vision, the people responded “Good! Let’s rebuild the wall.”

Yours truly

Van Noi Ding @ Angelay