None of us will ever be immune to crisis. The fallen world specializes in bad news. Anyone living in this world will encounter them. But what makes the difference between people is how they respond to crises. Some will morn and go into a state of depression and distress to a point of resignation. Some will be saddened by the circumstances, but they are not passive, they turn to God for solutions. Why? Because they know God has the whole world in His hand. Nothing can ever happen to the community of God without His permission. And for that matter, nothing can happen to us without God’s approval. So instead of being fretful, a person who trusts God will turn and seek Him. This was precisely what Nehemiah did.
Hence, Nehemiah explicitly said in verse 4 that “When I heard
these words, I sat down and wept and mourned for days; and I was fasting
and praying before the God of heaven.” He turned to God. He knew that the
one that could make the change in the circumstances of his nation was the God
of heaven, the God whom they as a nation had a covenant relationship with. He is
the “God of heaven” because that's where His throne is and from there, He
reigns over all the earth for time and eternity. Nehemiah said that he was
before this Sovereign God. Who could better give a solution in times of crisis?
Smart move!
Weighed down by the matter, all levity left Nehemiah. He could not
live life flippantly nor sit idly by watching his beloved community languishing
in desperation. Knowing that the answer was with God, Nehemiah turned to Him.
He did not only seek Him for one day but for many days. We are not told exactly
how many days he sought God, but we surmise that he persisted because he
needed clear directions and steps to deal with the crisis. One critical
lesson we need to take note of when seeking God is this: We must seek Him in
urgency, but we must at the same time wait on Him patiently. It is His answer
that we need and that requires time to discern.
In this verse, we are told that he was fasting and praying. These
are important spiritual disciplines. Notice they are put in the continuous
tense. In other words, he did not just do it once and stop. He did it
continuously and persistently. There was a sense of urgency. Jerusalem and her
people were living far below what their covenant with God had promised. Nehemiah
knew that unless God broke into their circumstance, they would continue in their
desperation. His fasting shows us how important and urgent the matter was to
him that he would sacrifice his meals to seek God. His Praying tells us that he
knew that without God there would be no solution or positive outcome to the
situation. Wisely, Nehemiah tarried before the Sovereign God.
Are we facing a crisis? We live in times where divine intervention is more needed than ever. In the escalating crises in our world, without divine intervention, the church and the world will careen uncontrollably and helplessly down the nasty path. Like Nehemiah, we can no longer continue in our felicity and live in our wrongly perceive eutopia. It's time for us to rise and seriously seek the God of heaven in fasting and praying. We need a revival!
No comments:
Post a Comment