Don’t Come Down Off the Wall

“You will never reach your destination if you stop and throw stones at every dog that barks.” Winston S. Churchill

If you are like me, your well-intentioned and well-planned daily schedule often gets sidetracked. Your child wakes up at 3 a.m. with a stomach ache. You get up in the morning and walk into the bathroom barefooted only to step in water that has leaked from the toilet. You get to work with a busy day ahead, only to find it just got busier after finding out that the boss has made commitments of your time that were never communicated to you.

Some of the people and things that cause a change in plans are important and need tended to while others are really just distractions that will keep you from accomplishing what you set out to do. And let’s be honest, some are nothing more than procrastinations; things you really do not want to do, so you push them off.

We so often, at least me, get sidetracked, and then wonder why we never get to our destination. It is really no different when we are doing the work of the Lord. Satan often puts people, things, or events in our path to trip us up, slow us down, distract us, sidetrack us, keep us from accomplishing His goal of sharing the Good News. It doesn’t take much imagination to come up with a list of “distractions” from the past weeks and months.

Let’s look at one such incident, one that tells a story of opposition to God’s plan and the repeated efforts to distract the person who was doing the work of God.

In Nehemiah Chapter 6, we see an interaction between Nehemiah and outsiders as they tried to distract him from building the protective wall around Jerusalem. The city wall had been destroyed by King Nebuchadnezzar (2 Kings 25) and Jerusalem remained wall-less for almost a century and a half. Without a wall, the Jews in Jerusalem were defenseless against their enemies. Without the ways you show people Jesus, they too are defenseless against Satan’s lies and attacks. 

Verses 1 and 2 tell us the enemy knew Nehemiah was building a rock solid wall around the city and tried to entice him to pause that work for a short time and meet two men for coffee in a neutral location, no strings attached, just some friendly chatter. Sound familiar? The enemy doesn’t always come looking like the grim reaper; he often comes looking harmless.

Or maybe even as family, friends, or co-workers. Doing God’s work is often lonely. But in that work, we have a Friend who helps us, guides us, instructs us, and loves us. We all come down off the wall from time to time, it is inevitable. So, don’t beat yourself up. Repent and ask for strength, and climb back up the ladder, grab your hammer again and get back to building.

Here is how Nehemiah responded when Sanballar and his buddy Geshem (two of Nehemiah’s biggest antagonists) invited him to a coffee and blueberry muffin break. In v.3 we read- “And I sent messengers to them saying, ‘I am doing a great work and I cannot come down. Why should the work stop while I leave it and come down to you?’”

They kept at it. The text tells us the two dudes were relentless, asking Nehemiah five times. Undoubtedly Nehemiah was probably worn down but each time, he rebuked their request (temptation). We have to be intentional in our unwillingness to “come down off the wall” and be sidetracked by the crafty serpent, often dressed in pretty clothes and smelling of sweet fragrance.

I encourage you to read story this in context, all of Nehemiah 6.

Don’t come down off the wall, and certainly, don’t throw stones at every dog that barks.

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