More Than Bricks: How an Ancient Wall Points to Christ’s Mission

[00:04:14] [SPEAKER UNKNOWN]:
For more information visit www.fema.org
[00:04:58] Let's pray.
[00:05:46] Let us pray.

[00:06:02] [SPEAKER SPEAKER_00]:
Good morning, I'm Shelly Byrne.
[00:06:04] And I'm Lisa Mooney.
[00:06:05] Welcome to Peninsula.
[00:06:06] We have a few things coming up to put on your radar this morning.

[00:06:10] [SPEAKER SPEAKER_01]:
First, if you're new to Peninsula or if you've been here for a little while and want to know more about how to get connected, missions, membership, we'd love to see you at Starting Point.
[00:06:19] This will be February 1st at 12-15 p.m.
[00:06:23] Lunch and childcare will be provided and you can register for this online.

[00:06:27] [SPEAKER SPEAKER_00]:
And on that Friday, February 6th, we have our annual marriage event, Two Steps Closer, the sequel.
[00:06:33] This is for married or soon to be married couples, whether you're newlyweds or seasoned professionals.
[00:06:39] It's a night of fun, encouragement, challenge, and connection.
[00:06:42] Pastor Daniel will be building on the theme from last year, Two Steps Closer.
[00:06:47] So we're looking forward to part two of this teaching.
[00:06:49] This is a free event.
[00:06:51] We provide dinner.
[00:06:52] We provide child care.
[00:06:53] But space is limited.
[00:06:54] So please register online and please do that very soon.
[00:06:58] So do I need to have attended last year to come this year?
[00:07:00] No.

[00:07:01] [SPEAKER SPEAKER_01]:
If you were not here last year, you are welcome to join us and jump right in.
[00:07:04] Awesome.
[00:07:05] Also starting in February is our next Bible study.
[00:07:08] It's through the book of Joshua.
[00:07:10] We'll be having this on Tuesday nights from 630 to 8.
[00:07:13] It'll be starting on February the 10th.
[00:07:15] We'll have groups for men and women.
[00:07:17] They're going to take place at the same time but in separate locations.
[00:07:21] The Bible study is for everybody.
[00:07:23] Child care is provided and you can register for that online as well.
[00:07:26] Yes, it is open for everyone.

[00:07:28] [SPEAKER SPEAKER_00]:
Even teenagers can attend with their parents.
[00:07:31] As a reminder, if you're looking for ways to serve in our local community, you can check out opportunities listed on the mission page of our website.
[00:07:39] We'd love to have you join with us as we work with our local ministry partners.

[00:07:44] [SPEAKER SPEAKER_01]:
Also on the On Mission page you'll see two opportunities for international mission trips.
[00:07:49] We'll be going to France April the 23rd through May the 1st and then to Guatemala in October.
[00:07:54] There will be an informational meeting about both of these trips on Sunday February 8th at 8 45 a.m. You can find the link to register for that as well.

[00:08:04] [SPEAKER SPEAKER_00]:
It's hard to believe that summer camps are just around the corner.
[00:08:08] We have several camps for our kids in elementary school.
[00:08:11] Centric Kid Camp is one of those.
[00:08:13] It's an overnight camp at Gardner-Webb University for completed second through fifth grade students on July 6th through 10th.
[00:08:20] Registration is open already at peninsulabaptist.com slash kids.
[00:08:25] And while you're there, you'll see a very exciting update about Winshape.
[00:08:28] Ooh, Winshape is always exciting.
[00:08:30] Absolutely.
[00:08:30] We can't leave out our youth as well.
[00:08:32] Our youth summer camp is May 31st through June 6th for current 6th through 12th grade students.
[00:08:38] They're going to be traveling to Clayton, Georgia and will host a camp for kids in the local area.
[00:08:43] It's a great chance for our teenagers to bond, to grow in their relationships with one another, and to grow in their relationships with Christ.
[00:08:50] They also get a great taste of ministry.
[00:08:53] If you would like for your teen to be a part of this trip, it's very important to attend an informational and registration meeting on Sunday, January 25th at 3.30pm in our Youth Center.
[00:09:05] You can check out the Youth tab on our webpage for more information, but it really is important if you want to get in to be at that meeting.

[00:09:12] [SPEAKER SPEAKER_01]:
because that camp sells out pretty quick it does usually fills up at that meeting yep we have got a lot of things going on around here so check out what is happening at peninsula on our website at peninsula baptist.com thank you again for being here with us today we look forward to worshiping together well good morning

[00:09:42] [SPEAKER SPEAKER_03]:
How are you?
[00:09:43] Is there something going on right here?
[00:09:45] Does anybody want to move up to the more expensive seats in the house?
[00:09:51] Hope you're doing well.
[00:09:53] I know you've been watching the weather.
[00:09:54] You're wondering what it's going to do this afternoon.
[00:09:56] And I'm going to tell you, nobody knows.
[00:09:59] And so we're just going to kind of watch it as it goes on.
[00:10:01] So glad you're here today as we continue in the book of Nehemiah.
[00:10:05] I want to read the first portion of the first song we're going to sing together today.
[00:10:10] And I want you to catch this because there's a couple lines in here that really nails what we're talking about today in the scripture when we get there.
[00:10:17] It says, this is the first part of the song, I am holding on to faith because I know you'll make a way.
[00:10:23] I don't always understand and I don't always get to see, but I will believe it, I will believe it.
[00:10:29] You make mountains move.
[00:10:31] You make giants fall.
[00:10:33] You use songs of praise to shake prison walls.
[00:10:36] I will speak to my fear.
[00:10:38] I will preach to my doubt.
[00:10:40] This is the two lines right here.
[00:10:41] That you were faithful then, you'll be faithful now.
[00:10:48] The God of yesterday, today, and tomorrow never changes.
[00:10:51] And that's the God we celebrate today.
[00:10:53] Amen?
[00:10:54] So glad that we can be a part of that.
[00:10:55] Well, before we get started, I want to lead us in a time of prayer.
[00:10:59] And if you would here and in the video venue stand and join us in a time of prayer as we kind of get our hearts and our emotion ready to be able to sing and to worship the King of Kings and the Lord of Lords.
[00:11:11] Let's pray together.
[00:11:12] Father, we thank you so much for an opportunity to be here today to celebrate who you are.
[00:11:17] and also who you are in our lives help us to be able to reflect through song through your word through fellowship today of just your goodness because we know you are for our good but it's ultimately for your glory help us to be about that today we're seeing Jesus name we pray amen

[00:11:57] [SPEAKER SPEAKER_05]:
I am holding on to faith Cause I know You'll make a way And I don't always understand And I don't always get to see But I will believe it
[00:12:18] Yes I will believe it Cause you make mountains move You make giants fall You use songs of praise To shake prison walls And I will speak to my fear I will preach to my doubt That you were faithful then You will be faithful now
[00:13:00] I am standing on your word Calling heaven down to earth You will fight my enemies And this will end in victory
[00:13:27] You make giants fall You use songs of grace To shake prison walls And I will speak to my fear I will preach to my doubt That You were faithful then You'll be faithful now That You were faithful then You'll be faithful now
[00:14:17] Yes, I know that I know that you never will
[00:14:23] You make mountains move.
[00:14:26] You make giants fall.
[00:14:30] You use songs of praise to shake prison walls.
[00:14:36] And I will speak to my fear.
[00:14:40] I will preach to my doubt.
[00:14:43] You were faithful then.
[00:14:46] You'll be faithful
[00:18:07] I've decided to follow Jesus No turning back, no turning back
[00:21:14] Christ upon Jesus Look full in his wonderful face And the things of earth will grow strangely dim In the light of his glory
[00:21:48] In the hillside where justice and mercy embrace There the Son of God gave His life for us And on measure His dead was raised
[00:22:28] I adore you, behold you, a Savior ever true O Jesus, we turn our eyes to you
[00:24:01] Our King will return for His own
[00:25:21] Oh, Jesus, we turn our eyes to you.

[00:25:45] [SPEAKER SPEAKER_04]:
Jesus, we do turn our eyes to you today, God.
[00:25:47] And we thank you, Lord, for all that you do.
[00:25:49] For you are a God who is good.
[00:25:53] Lord, you care about every aspect of our lives.
[00:25:57] Lord, we just give our life to you.
[00:25:59] Lord, we thank you for this time of worship where we can lift you up.
[00:26:03] Lord, we bless your name, we praise you, we thank you.
[00:26:07] And as we continue in worship through your word, Lord, I pray that the Holy Spirit move freely in this place and touch the hearts of the people.
[00:26:16] God, we thank you for this in Jesus' name.
[00:26:18] Amen.
[00:26:19] You may be seated.

[00:26:43] [SPEAKER UNKNOWN]:
Let us pray.

[00:26:55] [SPEAKER SPEAKER_03]:
What a sweet time of worship.
[00:26:57] Thank you for being here today as we're continuing in Nehemiah.
[00:27:00] We're going to be in Nehemiah chapter 2 starting somewhere right around verse 9 and we'll continue in that.
[00:27:07] I hope that you have been able to be a part of a connect group on Sunday mornings because what the connect groups are currently doing is studying the same
[00:27:17] Scripture text that is being spoken about in here.
[00:27:21] And it's always a little bit different because there's so much richness in Scripture.
[00:27:26] And I hope you can be a part of that.
[00:27:27] If you're not a part of the Connect group, I encourage you to go and be a part of one so that you can engage in that.
[00:27:35] One of our Connect group leaders is Jay.
[00:27:37] He's sitting right over here.
[00:27:38] He always waits to see if I'm going to say something that he didn't study for his Connect time.
[00:27:44] And we have fun
[00:27:46] I remember a conversation that Pastor Nate and I had years ago.
[00:28:03] We were probably sitting at Caribou.
[00:28:05] I can't remember exactly where it was.
[00:28:06] We were sitting at Caribou and we got to talking about the attributes of God.
[00:28:11] And one of the attributes in particular that we were talking about was His love.
[00:28:16] Creativity.
[00:28:17] He is Creator.
[00:28:17] He is Creator of the universe.
[00:28:20] And the conversation went down this path.
[00:28:22] We were talking about how He is Creator, but it couldn't have stopped at Genesis 3 because He is the same yesterday and tomorrow.
[00:28:31] He is always creating.
[00:28:33] He is still creating.
[00:28:35] And it's kind of that thought process that brings us into the conversation today.
[00:28:40] I am going to look at Nehemiah chapter 2 today, but I'm also going to dial the objective lens back a little bit so that we can see how Nehemiah fits in the narrative of the Bible, of God's working, of him
[00:28:55] I want us to understand that we don't just, oh, we're studying the book of Acts now, and that's it, like it's a silo that's standing all along by itself, and now we're studying the book of Nehemiah, and it's a silo.
[00:29:17] The narrative of the story from Genesis to Revelation is connected.
[00:29:22] And I love connecting the dots and that's where we're going to spend the greater part of today in connecting the dots because I really feel like that something that was impressed upon my heart as I was getting ready for this text was this question.
[00:29:37] What are we doing here?
[00:29:40] What is it that we're doing when we get into
[00:29:44] Scripture.
[00:29:45] What are we doing in life in general?
[00:29:48] So I want to ask you a question, and it's not necessarily a churchy question, but I think it's a real question.
[00:29:55] I think it is one that will make us ponder, is God still actually at work?
[00:30:05] Is He still doing something?
[00:30:06] Are we seeing God work or are we managing the decline with good intentions?
[00:30:15] Have you ever looked at culture, the direction that seems like the world's going, the state of things around us, and thought, is there really any point to what we're doing other than just maintaining?
[00:30:29] Is God still writing a story, or are we just trying to survive one?
[00:30:37] That's the question I want us to kind of think about as we're looking at the Scripture text today and dialing the objective lens back from Scripture a little bit to see how Nehemiah fits in the narrative.
[00:30:53] I think today we're going to see Nehemiah come to life.
[00:30:56] I don't mean the man.
[00:30:59] That would just be creepy, right?
[00:31:01] Oh, I was at Peninsula today and Nehemiah came to life.
[00:31:04] We'd have people coming from all over the world to come see that, right?
[00:31:07] No, I mean the book.
[00:31:08] We're going to see the book Nehemiah come to life because
[00:31:12] We ask this question because when the world feels like it's going crazy, it's unstable, culture feels hostile, when faith seems to be extremely marginalized in our lives and everything gets louder and darker and more confused, it's easy to shift from advancing the mission to trying to protect and preserve what is left.
[00:31:37] It's easy to move from vision to just maintenance.
[00:31:43] It's easy to move from calling to just coping with what the world is throwing at us.
[00:31:50] And if we're honest, some people carry that sentiment into every area of life, into faith, into family, our work, and even the church.
[00:32:02] That question, why am I doing this?
[00:32:05] Why am I fighting for this?
[00:32:06] What is the point of me trying to fight for this particular thing?
[00:32:10] What is going on here?
[00:32:13] And Nehemiah 2 was written into that exact same kind of moment.
[00:32:19] So that's why I want us to look at this.
[00:32:22] This is Nehemiah chapter 2, starting at verse 9.
[00:32:26] It says, Then I came to the governors of the province beyond the river and gave them the king's letters.
[00:32:32] Remember, Nehemiah had heard a report that Jerusalem, the walls had been destroyed, the gates had been burned, it was in ruins, and they were kind of exposed.
[00:32:43] And so when he got that report, he spent four months praying about that.
[00:32:47] He had an opportunity to go before the king.
[00:32:49] He went before the king as a cupbearer.
[00:32:51] And the king asked him, what's your problem?
[00:32:54] And he said, why shouldn't I have a problem?
[00:32:57] The land where my ancestors are buried is lying in ruin.
[00:33:01] And the king says, what do you want?
[00:33:03] And he said, I want to be able to go and fix it.
[00:33:05] I want you to give me letters that grants me access and gives me resources and allows me to rebuild.
[00:33:11] And the king grants him those letters.
[00:33:13] So now he's taking the king's letters and says, Now the king had sent with me officers of the army and horsemen.
[00:33:20] But when Sanballat the Horonite and Tobiah the Ammonite
[00:33:26] Servants heard this.
[00:33:27] It displeased them greatly that someone had come to seek the welfare of the people of Israel.
[00:33:33] So I went to Jerusalem and was there three days.
[00:33:36] Now this is just the beginning of it.
[00:33:37] This is the beginning of the account of him being there.
[00:33:40] This is where he kind of goes in and looks around at some things.
[00:33:45] Let's look at why they had a problem with it.
[00:33:47] This guy named Sanballat.
[00:33:50] He was probably from Samaria.
[00:33:53] And he had rejected probably the fact that Jerusalem was the center of worship to begin with.
[00:33:57] We see this evident in Jesus' time when he was walking on the earth and he says, we're going to cut through Samaria and his disciples say, why are we going through Samaria?
[00:34:08] Because the people didn't believe that Jerusalem was the holy central.
[00:34:13] So they were negating that fact.
[00:34:16] And then the guy named Tobiah
[00:34:19] Tobiah actually his name actually means Yahweh is good but the people were borrowing religious language without covenant loyalty so these people that were mentioned in here in this chapter they're not outsiders they're not just outsiders stepping up against Nehemiah and saying you have no right they're actually villains because they are opposing what God is building
[00:34:50] And so at the beginning of Nehemiah walking into Jerusalem here we see it looks like it's a political mission or a government assignment or a construction project of some sort.
[00:35:01] But what God is doing here is far bigger than administration.
[00:35:06] It's redemptive.
[00:35:09] This is where I want us to be able to pull on this as I'm saying I'm going to scale back and connect some dots for us that it's not just building a wall.
[00:35:17] There is a whole lot more going on here that I want us to be able to lean into.
[00:35:23] This really makes sense a whole lot more to us when we understand the weight of Jerusalem.
[00:35:29] Jerusalem is not just a dot on the map.
[00:35:32] It's actually what I would call a theological address.
[00:35:37] It is the city of David, the dwelling place of God, the center of worship, the location of promise.
[00:35:44] That's what Jerusalem kind of pulls on.
[00:35:47] This is the city that God chose to place His name on.
[00:35:51] It is the city where God promised that a king would come from.
[00:35:54] This is the city through which God said salvation would flow.
[00:35:59] We're going to connect those dots in just a moment.
[00:36:02] But when Nehemiah arrives, it is broken.
[00:36:05] The gates are burned, the walls are destroyed, the people are discouraged, and the nations around them are mocking.
[00:36:14] From the outside, this looks like a pointless project.
[00:36:19] But from heaven, it is a necessary one.
[00:36:25] Because God had already promised that a Savior would come from this place.
[00:36:30] So before God sends His Son, He sends a servant named Nehemiah.
[00:36:37] Before God reveals His glory, He rebuilds the ground on which it will stand.
[00:36:46] To Nehemiah he is rebuilding a wall, but to God he is preparing a stage.
[00:36:55] You're going to see the connection, I think, more as we go on.
[00:36:59] This is where we need to pause because we're not just studying a book, we're actually looking at God making history here.
[00:37:06] I want to show you a picture of today Jerusalem.
[00:37:11] You'll be happy to know that I took that picture
[00:37:16] With my iPhone standing in front of a poster.
[00:37:28] I was in Israel though when I took the picture.
[00:37:31] I tried to take pictures of Temple Mount in Jerusalem and none of them turned out good and as I was actually getting on the plane walking down the gateway there was a poster on the wall and I thought, for crying out loud.
[00:37:45] I just took that picture.
[00:37:48] I want to leave that up there for a few minutes because I want us to understand the power of Jerusalem.
[00:37:55] The city had been destroyed for over a hundred years when Nehemiah steps into it.
[00:38:00] The temple had been burned, the people had been scattered, and it looked like God's promises were buried under rubble.
[00:38:08] But God had already said, a Messiah will come, a King will reign, redemption will flow, and so God moves in history.
[00:38:15] He moves on Cyrus to release the people, He moves on Ezra to restore the Word, and now He's
[00:38:23] Are you moving on Nehemiah to rebuild the wall?
[00:38:26] Are you starting to see the flow of God, what He's doing here and how Nehemiah plays into this?
[00:38:31] Because redemption is not only theological, it's geographical too.
[00:38:39] God does not just redeem people, He prepares places for people to come in connection with Him.
[00:38:46] And this is where the story gets even bigger.
[00:38:48] During the 400 years of silence, that's what we call it, between the Old Testament and New Testament.
[00:38:54] We call that the 400 years of silence.
[00:38:57] Nothing new was recorded for us to read.
[00:39:00] That's why we call it 400 years of silence.
[00:39:03] But the silence was not inactivity.
[00:39:06] This is where I want us to lean into.
[00:39:08] God was quietly preserving a city that Nehemiah had rebuilt.
[00:39:16] He was sustaining a people and he was preparing a moment so that when the time was right Jesus would arrive not randomly but intentionally into a city God had been keeping for him all along.
[00:39:35] So you've got Nehemiah now building walls
[00:39:40] That's going to prepare for the city to grow and to be a strong religious work to the point of Jesus coming in.
[00:39:48] Are you starting to grab how it's fitting in the context of what Jesus is doing?
[00:39:53] Because the city Nehemiah rebuilds is the city where Jesus will walk.
[00:39:59] It is the city where the temple courts will hear his teaching.
[00:40:03] It is the city whose gates will see him ride in on a donkey.
[00:40:08] It is the city outside whose walls he will be crucified.
[00:40:12] It is the city near which the tomb will be found empty.
[00:40:15] And it is the city where the Spirit of God will fall as we saw in the book of Acts.
[00:40:21] And scripture doesn't just tell us how God prepared a city for Christ's first coming.
[00:40:27] It also tells us He is preparing for His return.
[00:40:32] That's why I'm putting a modern day picture of Jerusalem in front of us.
[00:40:39] The New Testament doesn't end with a church scrambling in confusion, but with a people watching and waiting and bearing witness.
[00:40:48] What feels like disorder now is not delay or neglect.
[00:40:56] What feels like disorder for us is God quietly preserving Jerusalem until the right time and the moment.
[00:41:06] He is even now sustaining His church, us, refining us in our faith, purifying our witness and holding history steady until the appointed time when Christ will return, not to chaos but to ultimate fulfillment.
[00:41:24] Jesus Christ will return.
[00:41:28] Amen?
[00:41:31] Listen to the words of Jesus in Luke 24 verse 47 talking about this city.
[00:41:38] And that repentance for the forgiveness of sins should be proclaimed in his name to all nations beginning from Jerusalem.
[00:41:49] What is Nehemiah doing 400 years prior?
[00:41:53] He is setting the stage for this.
[00:41:56] Then remember Acts chapter 1 verse 8.
[00:41:59] But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem and in all Judea and Samaria and to the end of the earth.
[00:42:11] It never really hit me that part about Samaria until I understood the pushback that Nehemiah got from a possible Samaritan to restore the walls.
[00:42:23] And now the scripture text in Acts chapter 1 verse 8 is saying, and yes, in Samaria too.
[00:42:31] The gospel does not launch in Rome.
[00:42:33] It doesn't launch in Athens.
[00:42:36] It doesn't take off in Alexandria.
[00:42:38] It launches in Jerusalem.
[00:42:43] Nehemiah rebuilt the city so the Messiah could come.
[00:42:49] Jesus redeemed in the city so the Spirit could fall, and the Spirit fell in the city so the world could be reached.
[00:43:03] The pattern is what God does throughout all of Scripture.
[00:43:08] In Nehemiah, a city is rebuilt, the temple is protected, people are gathered, and the covenant is renewed.
[00:43:16] In the book of Acts, we see the Spirit is poured out, people are gathered, gospel is proclaimed, and the church is formed.
[00:43:23] It's the same rhythm, new covenant.
[00:43:27] All of Scripture is connected.
[00:43:29] Nehemiah has its place because of what he's doing.
[00:43:35] This is kind of a fun way that I would say we could look at it.
[00:43:40] Nehemiah tells the story of restoring the container.
[00:43:44] Acts tells the story of it being filled with His glory so that it could spill out to the world.
[00:43:53] And that's the pattern.
[00:43:54] City, temple, people, mission.
[00:43:59] God has always worked that way.
[00:44:01] And when we zoom out, the timeline is even more stunning.
[00:44:05] This is how we can understand the book of Nehemiah and how it fits.
[00:44:08] Let's look at this.
[00:44:10] In 586 B.C.
[00:44:11] the city was destroyed.
[00:44:13] We see that in history.
[00:44:14] In 538 B.C.
[00:44:15] the temple begun.
[00:44:17] In 458 B.C.
[00:44:19] people were reformed.
[00:44:21] You can follow this through the Old Testament.
[00:44:23] In 445 B.C.
[00:44:25] around there the city's rebuilt.
[00:44:26] That's Nehemiah.
[00:44:27] That's where we are in Nehemiah chapter 2 where he's walking into this.
[00:44:31] Somewhere around 4 B.C.
[00:44:33] Messiah arrives in AD 30.
[00:44:36] The cross and resurrection in AD 30.
[00:44:38] The church is launched.
[00:44:40] Nehemiah sits exactly in the middle of the structural hinge between promise and fulfillment.
[00:44:50] Nehemiah means something now, a little more to me, realizing this.
[00:44:53] This is not accidental.
[00:44:55] This is design.
[00:44:57] Here's what gets me every single time I read this.
[00:45:01] Knowing that it was setting of the stage, Nehemiah never sees the cross, the empty tomb, Pentecost, or the church, and yet he obediently builds.
[00:45:17] He invests in something he will never personally benefit from.
[00:45:21] And that is one of the most consistent patterns of Scripture.
[00:45:24] Abraham never sees the nation.
[00:45:27] Moses never enters the land.
[00:45:29] David never builds the temple.
[00:45:30] Nehemiah never meets the Messiah.
[00:45:33] But they all build for what comes after.
[00:45:36] Faithful obedience always outlives the one who obeys.
[00:45:45] Faithful obedience always outlives the one who obeys.
[00:45:51] Which tells us something profound, I think, about God.
[00:45:56] God prepares environments before He reveals His glory.
[00:46:00] God is not dependent on environments.
[00:46:04] But He started with the Garden of Eden.
[00:46:06] He chooses to work through prepared environments.
[00:46:11] God builds infrastructure before He sends power.
[00:46:14] This does not mean if you build it, God owes us His power.
[00:46:19] But it does mean God often chooses to pour His power where He has already shaped structure.
[00:46:28] God shapes foundations before He displays fruit.
[00:46:33] God is not interested in visible success built on invisible weaknesses.
[00:46:38] He is always more concerned with depth than display.
[00:46:43] And that's how He works.
[00:46:46] And so as you read on down in Nehemiah 2 here, I'm not blind to the fact that the opposition is there, but it also fits into the same thing that happened in the book of Acts.
[00:46:57] Let me do a quick tie-in and connect dots for you.
[00:47:01] In Nehemiah, you have Sanballat, Tobiah, Gishom who are mocking, threatening, and resisting.
[00:47:08] In the book of Acts, you have the Sanhedrin, the Pharisees, and the priests who are imprisoning, beating, and threat.
[00:47:15] It's different names.
[00:47:16] It's the same resistance.
[00:47:19] Why?
[00:47:19] Because the enemy does not care about the walls.
[00:47:23] He cares about what the walls protect.
[00:47:31] In Nehemiah, the walls were to protect the covenant identity.
[00:47:37] In the book of Acts, the gospels advance.
[00:47:43] This is the real battle.
[00:47:44] In Nehemiah, the walls were about security, identity, and covenant distinction.
[00:47:48] And in the book of Acts, Jerusalem becomes the preaching center, the persecution center, and the sending center.
[00:47:58] I want you to, this would be really cool if Nehemiah could have seen this
[00:48:03] After he had helped build the walls.
[00:48:05] Acts chapter 5 verse 28.
[00:48:08] This makes me chuckle inside a little.
[00:48:11] Saying, we strictly charge you not to teach in this name, yet here you have filled Jerusalem with your teaching and you intend to bring this man's blood upon us.
[00:48:24] Jerusalem is now filled with the gospel of Jesus Christ.
[00:48:32] Nehemiah
[00:48:33] Restoring a wall, restoring a covenant for the world to see, to set the stage for Jesus to enter.
[00:48:44] This is not an accident.
[00:48:45] The same city once broken is now saturated with the gospel.
[00:48:51] Nehemiah's bricks become the backdrop of the apostolic boldness.
[00:48:59] And now with all of that in mind, listen to what Nehemiah says when he stands in front of the opposition that is in front of him.
[00:49:07] Listen closely because we talked about last week God's hand and authority being on our lives and that no king can stop what God is doing.
[00:49:16] No situation can stop what God wants to see happen.
[00:49:20] Listen to what Nehemiah now says starting at verse 17.
[00:49:24] Then I said to them, You see the trouble we are in, how Jerusalem lies in ruins with its gates burned?
[00:49:31] Come, let us build the wall of Jerusalem that we may no longer suffer derision.
[00:49:37] And I told them of the hand, remember we talked about the hand, that means power, active authority, moving forward in control.
[00:49:46] So basically he's saying, And I told them of the power and the authority and the in control of my God that had been upon me for good, and also of the words that the king had spoken to me.
[00:49:58] And they said, Let us rise up and build.
[00:50:02] So they strengthened their hands for the good work.
[00:50:05] Their strengthening of the hands is a little bit different word, but it's the moment where vision becomes action.
[00:50:13] For us, this is the vision of moving forward and growing and providing a little bit more space for people called the pathway project.
[00:50:21] And then we ask the church to commit to the pathway project.
[00:50:25] That's what you see happening here.
[00:50:26] We're strengthening our hand toward the vision.
[00:50:30] Turning into action where belief becomes obedience, where God's initiative becomes human participation.
[00:50:36] But then moving on it says, But when Sanballat the Horonite and Tobiah the Ammonite servant and Gisham the Arab heard of it, they jeered at us and despised us and said, What is this thing that you are doing?
[00:50:51] Are you rebelling against the king?
[00:50:53] Then I replied to them, The God of heaven will make us prosper, and we his servants will arise and build, but you have no portion or right or claim in Jerusalem.
[00:51:08] This is not optimism.
[00:51:11] This is not hype.
[00:51:14] It's not leadership flexing on Nehemiah's part.
[00:51:19] It's theology.
[00:51:22] Nehemiah is a man standing in the middle of rubble and saying, God is not finished.
[00:51:31] It's Nehemiah looking at the opposition and saying, you do not get a vote in what God is saying.
[00:51:39] It's Nehemiah declaring, we are not managing decline, we are participating in design.
[00:51:49] Oh, if we could grasp that from Scripture and understand that the God who loves us, who purchased us back with His shed blood of His Son Jesus,
[00:52:01] that is walking with us daily.
[00:52:03] The providential God who is sovereign that is walking with us not only as a corporate body but as individuals.
[00:52:09] If we could grasp that, it would change our outlook on all things in life, period.
[00:52:18] We would look at life differently.
[00:52:20] Nehemiah is not saying we hope this works.
[00:52:24] He's saying the God of heaven will make us prosper.
[00:52:28] That word prosper means to advance, to break through, to move forward.
[00:52:33] In other words, God Himself will push this forward.
[00:52:38] And then we His servants will arise and build.
[00:52:44] God initiates, God empowers, but God involves His people.
[00:52:48] What we see in that one verse right there is divine sovereignty and human responsibility in one sentence.
[00:52:58] That is the story of the Bible.
[00:52:59] That's the story of the church.
[00:53:01] That's the story of redemption.
[00:53:04] And here's the part, honestly, that leaves me awed.
[00:53:09] I hope that you will be in awe of this.
[00:53:12] Nehemiah thought he was rebuilding a wall.
[00:53:16] God was preparing a world.
[00:53:20] Nehemiah thought he was restoring a city.
[00:53:22] God was setting the stage for salvation.
[00:53:26] Nehemiah thought he was answering a burden.
[00:53:29] God was advancing a promise, which means when God asks His people to build, He is never thinking small.
[00:53:42] I'm not talking about size of facility.
[00:53:44] I'm talking about the usability of it and what He's got in mind for it.
[00:53:50] We think one thing, God's thinking much bigger.
[00:53:56] Sometimes the most spiritual thing we can do is build infrastructure for what God has not yet revealed.
[00:54:05] This is where this meets us because there are seasons when God calls His people to not just gather, but to build.
[00:54:13] Not just attend, but to invest.
[00:54:16] Not just preserve, but to prepare.
[00:54:21] Not because everything is easy, not because everything is clear, but because God is still writing the story.
[00:54:31] The creative God, who is the same always, is still creating.
[00:54:36] We are not building programs, we are building pathways.
[00:54:43] We are not maintaining tradition, we are participating in mission.
[00:54:51] And like Nehemiah, we may not see everything God intends to do through us in our programming and in our discipleship and in our building, but He's not going to stop from using it because we just don't see how He's going to use it.
[00:55:08] God has never waited for the world to look promising before He started building, not with Abraham, not with Nehemiah, not with the cross, not with the cross, not with the church, and not
[00:55:21] Waiting now.
[00:55:25] So if you're wondering, is God still at work?
[00:55:32] Is what we are doing worth it?
[00:55:37] Is this going anywhere?
[00:55:39] Nehemiah's answer is yes, eternally.
[00:55:46] And the book of Acts answers, it worked.
[00:55:54] Some of us, this isn't just about cities or centuries of work, it's about our own lives.
[00:56:06] There are places in your life that feels broken.
[00:56:12] There are things in your life that feels delayed.
[00:56:15] There are probably things in your life that's extremely unclear.
[00:56:22] There are seasons where it feels like nothing is happening.
[00:56:27] This passage reminds us that silence is not absence.
[00:56:33] Delay is not denial.
[00:56:37] And confusion is not the end of the story.
[00:56:42] The same God who prepared Jerusalem for Christ's coming is still at work today.
[00:56:53] Often quietly, demanding patience, but preparing for what He intends to reveal in His timing.
[00:57:09] Nehemiah built a wall, and the wall led to the world.
[00:57:19] The obedience led to the gospel.
[00:57:23] The faith led to salvation and that same God is still writing the story.
[00:57:36] Let's pray.
[00:57:43] Father, as we look into the book of Nehemiah, help us to understand that you've allowed us to hear this story, to see this story, to resonate with this story, not just so that we can know a portion of history and be strengthened by your moving back then, but to understand that you are a God today that is the same you were then.
[00:58:03] Nehemiah stepped into opposition.
[00:58:05] Nehemiah stepped into the unknown.
[00:58:07] He had a burden on his heart that moved him forward.
[00:58:09] And it was probably unclear to Nehemiah where you were taking him and what you wanted him to do.
[00:58:14] Even though the task was clear, how you would use it was unclear.
[00:58:23] And that meets us where we are today.
[00:58:27] When we ask the question, Father, are you still working?
[00:58:32] Are you still doing a thing?
[00:58:35] Help us to know that you are.
[00:58:45] You're still there.
[00:58:49] It didn't stop at creation.
[00:58:51] It didn't stop at the end of the Old Testament.
[00:58:53] It didn't stop when Jesus ascended.
[00:58:56] But God, Your working hand is still moving forward to an ultimate fulfillment of Your promise.
[00:59:08] And we get to play a part in that.
[00:59:10] We get to join You in that energy and that effort.
[00:59:14] Help us to be encouraged today to know that on the big scale, the large scale, you're still working.
[00:59:24] But that also on the small scale, those little things that burden our heart day in and day out, you're still there, you're still caring, you're still loving, you're still holding, you're still working it for our good, but for your glory to refine us, to make us more like your son Jesus.
[00:59:47] Help us not to neglect communion with You.
[00:59:50] Help us not to overlook the things that You're doing in our life that's going to take us into tomorrow.
[00:59:58] But help us with confidence.
[01:00:01] Father, help us with confidence to walk into what we're facing, saying that this situation, this problem, this issue, this thing that we're trying to navigate has no part
[01:00:16] has no say because you are a providential sovereign God guiding our steps.
[01:00:25] Thank you for salvation.
[01:00:27] Thank you for making our relationship right through the shed blood of Jesus.
[01:00:32] And may we walk with that security.
[01:00:35] In Jesus' name we pray.

[01:00:37] [SPEAKER SPEAKER_04]:
Amen.

[01:00:50] [SPEAKER SPEAKER_05]:
The weapon may be formed but it won't prosper When the darkness falls it won't prevail Because the God I serve knows only how to triumph
[01:01:28] I'm not backing down from any giant Cause I know how the story is I'm gonna see a victory I'm gonna see a victory
[01:01:57] The battle belongs to you, Lord I'm gonna see a victory I'm gonna see a victory For the battle belongs to you, Lord You take what the enemy meant for evil You turn it for good You turn it for good
[01:02:33] You turned it for good, You turned it for good Cause I'm gonna see a victory, I'm gonna see a victory For the battle belongs to You, Lord I'm gonna see a victory, I'm gonna see a victory
[01:03:03] I'm gonna sing your victory For the battle we won't see you go I'm gonna sing your victory

[01:03:36] [SPEAKER SPEAKER_02]:
We would say we are thankful for an opportunity to worship together today.
[01:03:39] I want you to know as well, if you are new or here with us at Peninsula, guests with us, we just want to say thank you for being here with us to worship today.
[01:03:46] And we'd love to have an opportunity to say hello to you and connect with you at the Welcome Center.
[01:03:51] If you haven't done so already, we'd love for you to stop by there after the service.
[01:03:54] We've also got an event coming up in just a couple of weeks on February 1st called Starting Point.
[01:03:58] So if you're new or here to Peninsula, that's a great way.
[01:04:01] We can learn about how to get involved here at Church Life and groups and ministry for you and your family.
[01:04:07] That'll be after our second service.
[01:04:09] It's a lunch we have provided.
[01:04:10] We've got child care.
[01:04:11] You can register for that online, but we'd love for you to be there with us on February 1st.
[01:04:16] Also, Friday, February 6th is going to be our annual marriage event.
[01:04:20] We're really excited about this.
[01:04:22] If you remember last year, it called Two Steps Closer.
[01:04:24] This year it's called Two Steps Closer Part Two.
[01:04:27] Okay, so it's kind of a follow-up to that.
[01:04:29] and we look forward to that it'll be Friday February 6th there is limited space for that so make sure you register for that I know that there are already a lot of couples and families already registered and so we look forward to that and love for you to join us
[01:04:44] The last thing for you to know as you leave today, we've got these little bottles that are kind of at some of our doors, our welcome center, different areas.
[01:04:51] This is a really easy way for us to be able to support one of our ministry partners, the Community Pregnancy Center of Lake Norman.
[01:04:57] You can take these back over the next couple of weeks.
[01:04:59] Don't worry, we will remind you about bringing them back.
[01:05:04] You can kind of sit there.
[01:05:04] You can put a check in here, cash, change, wherever you like.
[01:05:08] I know our kids love to fill up coins that they've got around.
[01:05:11] It's a way that they can help serve whatever that looks like.
[01:05:14] There's also instructions on there about giving online if you would prefer to do that.
[01:05:18] That's a great way.
[01:05:19] I want to lead us in reading together from Nehemiah chapter 2 in verse 20 and being reminded of the Lord is the one who sends us and uses us this week so let's read together Nehemiah chapter 2 verse 20
[01:05:38] Then I replied to them, The God of heaven will make us prosper, and we his servants will arise and build, but you have no portion or right or claim in Jerusalem.
[01:05:51] This week we are sent out by the God of heaven.
[01:05:53] He is the one who is working, building, using us to see people come to faith in our community.
[01:05:57] And we pray this week that he would use us as we go.
[01:06:00] Have a great week.

[01:34:15] [SPEAKER UNKNOWN]:
Thank you for watching!
[01:34:58] Let's pray.

[01:35:46] [SPEAKER SPEAKER_00]:
Good morning, I'm Shelly Byrne.
[01:36:04] And I'm Lisa Mooney.
[01:36:05] Welcome to Peninsula.
[01:36:06] We have a few things coming up to put on your radar this morning.

[01:36:09] [SPEAKER SPEAKER_01]:
First, if you're new to Peninsula or if you've been here for a little while and want to know more about how to get connected, missions, membership, we'd love to see you at Starting Point.
[01:36:19] This will be February 1st at 12 15 p.m.
[01:36:23] Lunch and child care will be provided and you can register for this online.

[01:36:27] [SPEAKER SPEAKER_00]:
And on that Friday, February 6th, we have our annual marriage event, Two Steps Closer, the sequel.
[01:36:33] This is for married or soon to be married couples, whether you're newlyweds or seasoned professionals.
[01:36:39] It's a night of fun, encouragement, challenge, and connection.
[01:36:42] Pastor Daniel will be building on the theme from last year, Two Steps Closer.
[01:36:47] So we're looking forward to part two of this teaching.
[01:36:49] This is a free event.
[01:36:51] We provide dinner, we provide child care, but space is limited.
[01:36:54] So please register online and please do that very soon.
[01:36:58] And so do I need to have attended last year to come this year?

[01:37:00] [SPEAKER SPEAKER_01]:
No, if you were not here last year, you are welcome to join us and jump right in.
[01:37:04] Awesome.
[01:37:05] Also starting in February is our next Bible study is through the book of Joshua.
[01:37:10] We'll be having this on Tuesday nights from 630 to 8.
[01:37:13] It'll be starting on February the 10th.
[01:37:15] We'll have groups for men and women.
[01:37:17] They're going to take place at the same time but in separate locations.
[01:37:21] The Bible study is for everybody.
[01:37:23] Child care is provided and you can register for that online as well.

[01:37:26] [SPEAKER SPEAKER_00]:
Yes, it is open for everyone.
[01:37:28] Even teenagers can attend with their parents.
[01:37:30] As a reminder, if you're looking for ways to serve in our local community, you can check out opportunities listed on the mission page of our website.
[01:37:39] We'd love to have you join with us as we work with our local ministry partners.

[01:37:44] [SPEAKER SPEAKER_01]:
Also on the On Mission page you'll see two opportunities for international mission trips.
[01:37:49] We'll be going to France April the 23rd through May the 1st and then to Guatemala in October.
[01:37:54] There will be an informational meeting about both of these trips on Sunday February 8th at 8 45 a.m. You can find the link to register for that as well.

[01:38:04] [SPEAKER SPEAKER_00]:
It's hard to believe that summer camps are just around the corner.
[01:38:08] We have several camps for our kids in elementary school.
[01:38:11] Centric Kid Camp is one of those.
[01:38:13] It's an overnight camp at Gardner-Webb University for completed second through fifth grade students on July 6th through 10th.
[01:38:20] Registration is open already at peninsulabaptist.com slash kids.
[01:38:25] And while you're there, you'll see a very exciting update about Winshape.
[01:38:28] Ooh, Winshape is always exciting.
[01:38:30] Absolutely.
[01:38:30] We can't leave out our youth as well.
[01:38:32] Our youth summer camp is May 31st through June 6th for current 6th through 12th grade students.
[01:38:38] They're going to be traveling to Clayton, Georgia and will host a camp for kids in the local area.
[01:38:43] It's a great chance for our teenagers to bond, to grow in their relationships with one another, and to grow in their relationships with Christ.
[01:38:50] They also get a great taste of ministry.
[01:38:52] If you would like for your teen to be a part of this trip, it's very important to attend an informational and registration meeting on Sunday, January 25th at 3.30 p.m. in our Youth Center.
[01:39:05] You can check out the Youth tab on our webpage for more information, but it really is important if you want to get in to be at that meeting.

[01:39:12] [SPEAKER SPEAKER_01]:
because that camp sells out pretty quick it does usually fills up at that meeting yep we have got a lot of things going on around here so check out what is happening at peninsula on our website at peninsulabaptist.com thank you again for being here with us today we look forward to worshiping together

[01:39:39] [SPEAKER SPEAKER_03]:
Well, good morning.
[01:39:40] So glad you're here today to worship with us as we continue in the book of Nehemiah.
[01:39:45] We're going to be going into chapter 2 a little bit further today.
[01:39:47] We're going to do something a little bit different with the text today.
[01:39:50] We're not going to dive down so deep into it.
[01:39:52] We're going to kind of scale back a little bit and see how the book of Nehemiah is connected to the greater story of what God is doing.
[01:39:59] And not only the Old Testament and New Testament, but in our today.
[01:40:03] So we'll be able to apply it to the picture of Scripture, but also to our lives today.
[01:40:08] With that, I want to read the first part of the first song that we're getting ready to join in singing together here in just a moment.
[01:40:15] This is what it says.
[01:40:17] I am holding on to faith, cause I know you'll make a way.
[01:40:22] I don't always understand and I don't always get to see.
[01:40:27] But I will believe it, I will believe it Now listen to the chorus
[01:40:32] You make mountains move.
[01:40:34] You make giants fall.
[01:40:36] You use songs of praise to shake prison walls.
[01:40:39] Reflection of the book of Acts.
[01:40:41] I will speak to my fear.
[01:40:43] I will preach to my doubt.
[01:40:46] That you were faithful then.
[01:40:47] This is the catch.
[01:40:48] You were faithful then.
[01:40:49] You will be faithful now.
[01:40:53] Those words fit right into what we're talking about in Nehemiah chapter 2 today and I'm excited about how God's setting that up for us.
[01:41:00] And I want to start us out in the time of prayer.
[01:41:02] So that we can get our hearts and minds kind of set free from all the other stuff that's going on and we can focus on worshiping him.
[01:41:09] So let's all stand together here and in the video venue as well.
[01:41:12] Let's stand as we join in prayer.
[01:41:14] Get ready to sing together.
[01:41:16] Let me lead us in a time of prayer.
[01:41:17] Father, we come before you thanking you for your word, for your fellowship that you've created here on Brawley School Road.
[01:41:24] Help us to be able to corporately
[01:41:26] Worship you today through song and open our hearts to your spirit moving that we can kind of get ourselves out of the way and we can get the things we're going through out of the way and we can focus on just how good you are so be with us now hear our hearts as we sing to you may you be glorified first in Jesus name we pray amen

[01:41:49] [SPEAKER SPEAKER_05]:
I am holding on to faith Cause I know You'll make a way
[01:42:19] And I don't always understand And I don't always get to see But I will believe it Yes, I will believe it Cause you make mountains move
[01:42:35] You make giants fall You use songs of praise To shake prison walls And I will speak to my fear I will preach to my doubt That You were faithful then You'll be faithful now
[01:43:11] I am standing on your word I'm calling heaven down to earth You will fight my enemies And this will end in victory Yes I will believe it Yes I will believe it
[01:43:39] You make giants fall You use songs of praise To shake prison walls And I will speak to my fear I will preach to my doubt That You were faithful then You'll be faithful now That You were faithful then You'll be faithful now
[01:44:34] You make giants fall You use songs of praise To shake prison walls And I will speak to my fears I will preach to my doubts You were faithful then You'll be faithful forever
[01:45:03] Make giants small, you use songs of grace
[01:48:17] I have decided to follow Jesus No turning back, no turning back

[01:51:01] [SPEAKER UNKNOWN]:
and more.

[01:51:23] [SPEAKER SPEAKER_05]:
Turn your eyes upon Jesus Look full in His wonderful face And the things of earth
[01:51:59] and Recompense.
[01:52:09] Let us pray.
[01:52:17] Let us pray.
[01:54:08] Our King will return for His own Every knee will bow, every tongue will sing
[01:55:33] So Jesus, as we turn our eyes to you this morning,

[01:56:01] [SPEAKER SPEAKER_04]:
Lord, as we lift you up in praise and glory, God, we just thank you for all that you are and all that you've done.
[01:56:08] As we continue in worship through your word, Lord, may your Holy Spirit have the freedom to move in the hearts of the people in this room.
[01:56:14] God, we love you and we thank you.
[01:56:16] For it's in Jesus' name, amen.
[01:56:18] You may be seated.

[01:56:38] [SPEAKER SPEAKER_03]:
What a sweet time of singing.
[01:56:55] Thank you for that.
[01:56:57] If you really want a really sweet time of really worshiping, if you sit over on this side, you hear some younger voices that'll just touch your heart.
[01:57:04] So not calling anybody out, just saying it was really sweet.
[01:57:07] So thank you for that.
[01:57:10] Today we're going to do something a little bit different with the book of Nehemiah in chapter 2.
[01:57:13] I'm actually going to kind of step, I'm going to use the text, but we're going to step out and connect dots.
[01:57:18] I'm one of these guys, I love to see the dots connect.
[01:57:23] If the dots don't connect, it just doesn't resonate with me.
[01:57:26] I want to see the dots in the scripture connect.
[01:57:29] How does this fit?
[01:57:30] Is this just a story or does it connect?
[01:57:32] I so much so love the dot connecting.
[01:57:36] Do you remember those little sheets they would give you out in school that had to connect the dots where you'd start at number one and you'd go to however many?
[01:57:43] I loved those things.
[01:57:45] I would always love when I'd come in and there'd be a substitute teacher because I knew we were going to do two or three of those that day.
[01:57:51] Just kind of how it worked.
[01:57:52] I can't remember what grade that was.
[01:57:54] I remember probably 11th grade.
[01:57:56] I can't remember.
[01:57:57] But anyway, I just remember loving to connect the dots.
[01:58:02] And I would sit there and I would go, hey, I wonder what the picture is.
[01:58:06] And a lot of times you could tell just by looking at it.
[01:58:08] But sometimes you didn't know what the picture was.
[01:58:11] There was no hint.
[01:58:12] You just saw the dots and the numbers.
[01:58:14] And it used to break me when I would see a friend next to me go from like 9 to 11.
[01:58:20] I'm like, oh.
[01:58:21] You just killed that picture.
[01:58:23] I'm like, he needs another one.
[01:58:25] He needs another one.
[01:58:27] He needs to start over, you know, and he's trying to erase it, ripping his page.
[01:58:30] But I love it when the dots connect.
[01:58:32] And I want us to think in those terms as we're looking at the text today of how it connects, not only to the greater picture of what God's doing through the Bible, Genesis to Revelation.
[01:58:44] I've always said that it points to Christ.
[01:58:46] All of Scripture points to Christ.
[01:58:49] And I've always said that, and that's kind of how we're going to look at it today.
[01:58:51] But not only that, I want us to see how the truths and what we pull out of the text today applies to our right now, to who we are as a people that live in 2026.
[01:59:04] I can't believe I'm saying that.
[01:59:06] Time's fun when you're having flies.
[01:59:08] Did I say that?
[01:59:11] But I want us to be able to connect the dots and I want to ask some strong questions with this text that I'm calling Arise and Build when God is still writing the story.
[01:59:22] When God is still writing the story.
[01:59:23] And I want to start with kind of asking a couple questions.
[01:59:28] And this question that I want to ask is I kind of want to kind of set it up for us so we can think in those terms a little bit.
[01:59:35] It's not necessarily a churchy question.
[01:59:38] But I know it's a real question for two reasons.
[01:59:42] One is I know it's a real question because I've had it before.
[01:59:46] But two is I work with people day in and day out.
[01:59:49] I know who have this question, the underlying thought process that they're kind of thinking.
[01:59:55] But have you ever wondered quietly, is God still actually at work?
[02:00:02] Is he still actually doing something?
[02:00:05] Or are we just trying to manage the decline that we see happening in the world with good intentions?
[02:00:13] Have you ever looked at culture and the direction of the world, compared it to Scripture and the things that are around us, and asked the question, what's the point?
[02:00:25] Is what we're doing here, is it actually moving the needle?
[02:00:29] Is it doing anything to put us in the right direction?
[02:00:31] Which maybe brings us to the underlying deeper question that is this.
[02:00:36] This is the big question.
[02:00:39] Is God still writing a story or are we just trying to survive one?
[02:00:47] Because how you land on the answer of that question will directly impact how your tomorrow goes.
[02:00:57] Because I think that many of us walk through the aspect of we're just trying to survive.
[02:01:04] Just trying to make ends meet.
[02:01:07] Just trying to navigate the next issue.
[02:01:10] Just trying to get from point A to point B.
[02:01:12] And we just are going through these motions and we're not quite understanding how it's fitting into the bigger picture, if there is a bigger picture.
[02:01:22] It seems sometimes when we're studying Scripture, because Scripture is from an older book,
[02:01:29] That was written many years ago.
[02:01:30] Sometimes we can kind of disconnect ourselves and say, well, the story has happened.
[02:01:37] The story has already happened and we're just living in the aftermath of the story that happened.
[02:01:44] And that's a dangerous place to live in someone who's been redeemed by the blood of Jesus Christ.
[02:01:50] That's a very difficult way to walk through life.
[02:01:53] To think that the story has already happened and I'm just on this end of it waiting.
[02:01:59] For God to like fulfill his promise.
[02:02:02] So what do we do with that 2,000 years of the ascension of Christ and where we are now and where he's going to be when he comes back?
[02:02:11] What do we do with that?
[02:02:12] How do we connect the dots for that?
[02:02:14] There is a way to connect it and I want us to dive in.
[02:02:17] To Nehemiah chapter 2 starting at verse 9 and I'm going to read the text and we're going to talk about the text but I'm honestly I'm going to dial out I'm going to pull the objective lens back and we're going to look at scripture as a whole and how Nehemiah was working in God's grand story but didn't know it at the time.
[02:02:38] So let's look at this.
[02:02:39] This is Nehemiah chapter 2 starting at verse 9.
[02:02:42] It says, Then I came to the governors of the province beyond the river and gave them the king's letters.
[02:02:48] Now, if you haven't dialed in to Nehemiah chapter 1, remember Nehemiah had some friends come from Jerusalem.
[02:02:55] He said, Hey, how's Jerusalem going?
[02:02:57] And they said, It's horrible.
[02:02:59] The walls are destroyed.
[02:03:00] The people are
[02:03:01] It's kind of like just out there.
[02:03:03] The gates are burned.
[02:03:04] They're just out in the open.
[02:03:06] It's destruction.
[02:03:06] It's total destruction.
[02:03:07] That burdened him.
[02:03:08] And for four months, Nehemiah prays as the cupbearer to the king.
[02:03:12] He walks into the presence of the king.
[02:03:14] And the king goes, Man, what's wrong with you?
[02:03:17] It's all over your face.
[02:03:19] And he goes, Well, where my ancestors are buried is destroyed.
[02:03:26] So that's got me.
[02:03:28] And the king says, what do you want?
[02:03:30] And he said, I want permission to go.
[02:03:32] And I want permission to rebuild.
[02:03:35] And I want a letter from you that says it's okay.
[02:03:38] And I want free passage and resources to make it happen.
[02:03:41] And the king granted it.
[02:03:43] And we talked about that that was God's hand moving in that.
[02:03:46] It was God's sovereign hand.
[02:03:47] There's a reason.
[02:03:48] There's a purpose behind it.
[02:03:49] We're going to see that today.
[02:03:50] Now the king had sent with me officers of the army and horsemen.
[02:03:58] But when Sanballat the Horonite and Tobiah the Ammonite servant heard this, it displeased them greatly that someone had come to seek the welfare of the people of Israel.
[02:04:11] So I went to Jerusalem and was there three days.
[02:04:15] Now, we know he's going to be there much longer.
[02:04:17] This is how he's going to visit it.
[02:04:19] He's going to walk through it.
[02:04:20] If you read Nehemiah 2 and on, you see how he kind of secretly went in and just kind of looked around to kind of assess what he had heard.
[02:04:29] Let's look at these names.
[02:04:30] Sanballat, he was most likely from Samaria.
[02:04:34] This is going to mean something in just a moment when I pull out and connect some dots for you.
[02:04:39] He was most likely from Samaria.
[02:04:41] Samaria had rejected the fact that Jerusalem was God's central, anyway, the place of worship.
[02:04:47] So the Samarians believed that.
[02:04:49] You see that present in Jesus' time.
[02:04:52] When he says, hey, we're going to walk through Samaria, and they're like, why are you walking through Samaria?
[02:04:56] There's other ways to get to where you're going.
[02:04:59] You don't have to walk through there.
[02:05:00] The woman at the well even says this.
[02:05:02] We know you people say that the place of worship is in Jerusalem.
[02:05:07] Remember the woman at the well saying that to Jesus?
[02:05:09] And then Tobiah, it's interesting because Tobiah actually means Yahweh is good.
[02:05:17] That's what his name actually means.
[02:05:18] But these people were borrowing religious language and religious names, but they were not following the covenant.
[02:05:27] And then so what we see here in these names that are mentioned, they become the villains of the storyline that we see happening here.
[02:05:36] But they're not villains because they're outcasts.
[02:05:38] They're actually villains because they are opposing God's work.
[02:05:43] That's what makes someone a villain, by the way, is opposing God's work.
[02:05:47] At first glance, you see Nehemiah stepping into this work.
[02:05:51] It looks like it's a political mission or a government contract or maybe just a construction job that he's doing.
[02:05:58] But what God is doing here is far bigger than administration.
[02:06:02] It's far bigger than the work that we see.
[02:06:04] It's actually a redemptive plan.
[02:06:10] You have to connect dots to catch this.
[02:06:12] Because if you just read Nehemiah all by itself, you're just kind of looking down at Nehemiah and you see it and you're reading through the account that's happening there.
[02:06:20] If you don't understand how it's connected to the bigger picture, you miss what God is doing behind the scenes and it's important.
[02:06:26] Because Nehemiah is not just arriving in a city, he's stepping into the center of God's long unfolding plan.
[02:06:36] And that only matters if you understand what this city is.
[02:06:40] The weight of Jerusalem.
[02:06:43] Jerusalem is not just a dot on the map, by the way.
[02:06:47] It is a theological address, in my assessment.
[02:06:51] It was the city of David, the dwelling place of God, the center of worship, the location of promise, basically.
[02:07:00] This is the city God chose to place His name on.
[02:07:02] It's the city from which God had promised the King would come from.
[02:07:06] It's the city through which God said salvation would flow.
[02:07:12] But when Nehemiah arrives, the walls are broken, the gates are burned, the people are discouraged, and the nations around are mocking.
[02:07:22] From the outside, this looks like a pointless project.
[02:07:27] This is what these two that are opposing at this moment are saying, what's the point?
[02:07:32] What are you doing here?
[02:07:32] Why are you checking on the people of Israel?
[02:07:36] But from heaven, this is a necessary assignment because God had already promised that a Savior would come from this place.
[02:07:45] So before God sends His Son, He sends a servant named Nehemiah.
[02:07:54] Before God reveals His glory,
[02:07:57] He rebuilds the place where it's going to stand.
[02:08:02] So to Nehemiah, he's rebuilding a wall.
[02:08:07] But to God, he is preparing a stage.
[02:08:12] That's the weight of Jerusalem.
[02:08:17] We say, hey, he's rebuilding the walls.
[02:08:18] No, he's preparing a stage that plays into the greater picture of what God is doing.
[02:08:24] So we're not just studying a book, we're watching God unfold history.
[02:08:30] The history that we know it as believers in Christ today.
[02:08:33] I want to show you a picture of modern day Jerusalem.
[02:08:40] Interesting fact, I took this picture standing in Israel with my iPhone in front of a poster.
[02:09:00] That's a true story.
[02:09:01] We had spent time in Jerusalem, walked around, and all my pictures were kind of semi-lame.
[02:09:07] And I was walking down the gate of the airplane the day we were leaving.
[02:09:16] And I look on the wall of this gate, I see this poster, and I'm like, really?
[02:09:22] So I just centered it just right and took a picture.
[02:09:24] But I can say I took that picture with my iPhone.
[02:09:28] Now, you know the back story.
[02:09:30] I want to leave that up there for a few moments because I want us to think about Jerusalem.
[02:09:36] Let's just think about the bigger story here, God's long game.
[02:09:42] The city had been destroyed for over a hundred years.
[02:09:45] The temple had been burned.
[02:09:47] The people had been scattered.
[02:09:48] And it looked like God's promises were buried in rubble.
[02:09:53] But God had already said a Messiah will come.
[02:09:57] A king will reign.
[02:09:58] Redemption will flow.
[02:10:01] And so God starts to move.
[02:10:02] You know the bigger part of the story.
[02:10:04] He moves in Cyrus to release the people so that they can start coming back.
[02:10:08] He moves on Ezra to restore the Word of God.
[02:10:13] And now he's moving on Nehemiah to rebuild the city.
[02:10:16] It's connected.
[02:10:17] Follow me here.
[02:10:18] Because the redemption is not just theological.
[02:10:21] It is also geographical.
[02:10:26] God does not just redeem people, He prepares places, environments for things to happen.
[02:10:36] And this is where the story gets even bigger.
[02:10:39] During the 400 years of silence, that's what we call it between the Old Testament and the New Testament, we call that the 400 years of silence because nothing has been recorded that we know that God was moving.
[02:10:54] But what was happening?
[02:10:55] From the time that Nehemiah and the people of God rebuilt the walls and reestablished Jerusalem between the coming of Christ, there were things going on behind the scenes.
[02:11:05] It seemed silent, but it was not inactivity.
[02:11:09] God was quietly preserving a city for 400 years.
[02:11:14] Are you catching this?
[02:11:15] He preserved this city for 400 years.
[02:11:19] He sustained the people and he prepared the moment so that when the time was right, Jesus would arrive on the scene.
[02:11:28] Not randomly, but intentionally.
[02:11:31] Into a city God had been keeping for himself all along.
[02:11:36] Now that's a big dot connector there.
[02:11:39] That's that 400 years we say, well, it's 400 years God was silent.
[02:11:42] Yeah, but he was also raising up, in a weird kind of way, he was raising up the Pharisees and the Sadducees that were going to help tell the story of the gospel redemption of what we would need for Christ to experience.
[02:11:57] Because the city Nehemiah rebuilds is the city where Jesus will walk.
[02:12:04] It is the city where the temple courts will hear Jesus' teaching.
[02:12:10] It is the city whose gates will see Him ride in on a donkey.
[02:12:16] It is the city outside the walls He will be crucified.
[02:12:20] It is the city near which the tomb will be empty.
[02:12:25] And it is the city where the Spirit of God will fall in the book of Acts.
[02:12:32] And Scripture doesn't just tell us how God prepared a city for Christ's first coming.
[02:12:39] It tells us He is preparing for His return.
[02:12:45] The New Testament doesn't end where the church is confused or kind of in disarray, but it's a people that's watching and waiting and being preserved.
[02:12:58] Just as God quietly preserved Jerusalem then,
[02:13:03] He is quietly sustaining His church today.
[02:13:06] That's us.
[02:13:09] Refining our faith, purifying our witness, and holding history steady until the appointed time when Christ will return.
[02:13:20] Not in chaos, but into fulfillment of God's plan.
[02:13:28] Here's a couple cool things I want to connect for us when I'm talking about connecting dots.
[02:13:32] Luke 24, 47.
[02:13:34] This is what Jesus says about Jerusalem.
[02:13:38] And that repentance for the forgiveness of sins should be proclaimed in His name to all nations beginning from Jerusalem.
[02:13:50] Then we see it connected in Acts chapter 1 verse 8.
[02:13:54] It says this, But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you, and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem and in all Judea and Samaria.
[02:14:05] Remember that?
[02:14:06] Remember that thought that even back in Nehemiah's time the Samarians were kind of pushing against this?
[02:14:11] But now Acts is saying, oh yeah, and even Samaria and to the end of the earth.
[02:14:18] The Gospel does not launch in Rome.
[02:14:20] It doesn't launch in Athens or get its flight in Alexandria.
[02:14:24] It actually launches in Jerusalem.
[02:14:29] And here's the thing.
[02:14:29] Nehemiah rebuilt the city so the Messiah could come.
[02:14:35] Jesus redeemed in the city so that the Spirit could fall.
[02:14:42] And the Spirit fell in the city so the world
[02:14:47] Could be reached.
[02:14:49] Here's what I'm talking about when I'm talking about connecting.
[02:14:52] We don't go through the book of Zechariah.
[02:14:55] Okay, that was good.
[02:14:57] And then we kind of go through the book of Mark.
[02:15:00] Okay, that was good.
[02:15:01] And then we go through the book of Genesis.
[02:15:04] Okay, that was great.
[02:15:05] And then we go through the book of Acts and then Nehemiah for us to not understand that it's all connected.
[02:15:15] We're not going book by book, chapter by chapter, verse by verse just so we can say, well, what's it say today?
[02:15:20] We're learning the picture that God has been, is, and will always be in control of what we see happening in this world.
[02:15:33] This is the pattern that God has always done.
[02:15:35] In Nehemiah, there was a city rebuilt, a temple protected, people gathered, and a covenant renewed.
[02:15:44] In Acts we see the Spirit is poured out, people are gathered, gospel is proclaimed, and the church is formed.
[02:15:51] It's the same rhythm under a new covenant.
[02:15:57] Here's one way that I kind of like to look at it.
[02:15:59] Nehemiah tells the story of restoring the container.
[02:16:04] Acts tells the story of it being filled with His glory so that it can spill out into the world.
[02:16:12] And that's the pattern.
[02:16:13] You can't miss it.
[02:16:14] City, Temple, People, Mission.
[02:16:20] And when you zoom out, the timeline in my assessment, because I'm a dot connector, gets really stunning to me.
[02:16:28] Now, I kind of geek out over these kind of things, so this may bore you.
[02:16:32] If anybody near you dozes off, just punch them like this when it's time for them to tune back in.
[02:16:37] But this is cool to me.
[02:16:38] Look at these numbers here.
[02:16:40] In 586 BC, you see the city destroyed as you're following the history.
[02:16:44] In 538 BC, you see the temple begun to be built.
[02:16:48] In 458 B.C., the people are reformed, they're coming back together, the Word of God is meaning something to them again.
[02:16:54] In 445 B.C., you see the city rebuilt, that's Nehemiah.
[02:16:58] And then somewhere in 4 B.C., you see the Messiah arrives.
[02:17:02] And then in A.D. 30, the cross and resurrection and the church is launched.
[02:17:07] Right in the very center of that timeline is the structural hinge between promise and fulfillment.
[02:17:18] Nehemiah doing a work that he didn't know was going to be by design.
[02:17:25] It's not accidental.
[02:17:28] Here's what gets me every single time I read through the book of Nehemiah.
[02:17:33] Nehemiah never sees the cross, the empty tomb, Pentecost, or the church.
[02:17:41] And yet he obediently builds.
[02:17:49] He invests in something he will never personally benefit from.
[02:17:53] And that is one of the most consistent patterns in Scripture.
[02:17:58] Abraham never sees the nation.
[02:18:00] Moses never enters the land.
[02:18:02] David never builds the temple.
[02:18:04] Nehemiah never meets the Messiah.
[02:18:06] But they all build for what is to come after.
[02:18:10] Faithful obedience will always outlive the one who obeys.
[02:18:19] The legacy will carry on.
[02:18:22] If we, in our generation, are faithful to obey what God's calling us to do now, it will outlive us all because it's a part of something bigger than ourselves.
[02:18:37] God prepares environments before He reveals glory.
[02:18:41] God builds infrastructure before He sends power, and God shapes foundations before He displays fruit.
[02:18:47] What do I mean by that?
[02:18:48] Well, first, God prepares environments before He reveals glory.
[02:18:52] God is not dependent on environments, but He chooses to work through prepared ones.
[02:19:00] Oh yeah, show me something else.
[02:19:01] Oh, the Garden of Eden.
[02:19:03] It starts there.
[02:19:05] And He created environments all along the way.
[02:19:09] Abraham, go to a place I will show you.
[02:19:14] God builds infrastructure before He sends power.
[02:19:17] This doesn't mean that if something is built that God owes power.
[02:19:22] It means God often chooses to pour power where He has already shaped the structure.
[02:19:30] And then God shapes foundations before He displays fruit.
[02:19:33] God is not interested in visible success built on invisible weaknesses.
[02:19:38] He is always more concerned with depth than display.
[02:19:44] And then you read on down in Nehemiah 2.
[02:19:46] I'm not going to take time to read it, but just kind of to acknowledge it.
[02:19:50] I'm not blind to the fact that Nehemiah sees opposition rise.
[02:19:57] But I want to connect it to the book of Acts so that you can see this.
[02:19:59] The bigger picture of the story of what's happening.
[02:20:02] In Nehemiah, Sanballat, Tobiah, and Gishom are mocking, threatening, and resisting.
[02:20:10] In the book of Acts, the Sanhedrin, the Pharisees, and the priests are imprisoning, beating, and threatening.
[02:20:18] Different names, same resistance.
[02:20:23] What's happening there in the bigger picture?
[02:20:26] The enemy doesn't care about walls.
[02:20:29] He cares about what the wall is protecting.
[02:20:34] In Nehemiah, the wall was to protect the covenant identity that the people had with God.
[02:20:40] In the book of Acts, it's the gospel advancement.
[02:20:44] That's the real battle.
[02:20:45] In Nehemiah, the walls were about security and identity and covenant distinction.
[02:20:51] In the book of Acts, Jerusalem becomes the place of preaching, the place of persecution, and the place of sending.
[02:20:59] Here's one, when I'm connecting dots, I know sometimes I can connect some dots that don't belong, but this one gets me.
[02:21:06] Because I think about Nehemiah going to reestablish the covenant and rebuild the walls and put the gates back up and bring the people back together so that they can gather to set the stage for Christ to come into the promised city that was told he would come into anyway, for the Spirit to fall in this city, and then you get to Acts, it's chapter 5, verse 28.
[02:21:31] Look at what this says, saying, We strictly charged you not to teach in this name, yet here you have filled Jerusalem with your teaching.
[02:21:49] You know why it cracks me up?
[02:21:51] Here's Nehemiah saying, Hey, we need to rise up and build walls.
[02:21:54] He had no idea that one day the Spirit of God was going to fall and the teaching of the gospel was going to saturate
[02:22:01] The City.
[02:22:03] See, we may not know at the moment when he's saying build a wall what he's going to do down the road.
[02:22:09] That's not what's important.
[02:22:11] What's important is that we're obedient now, in the now, in our shoes.
[02:22:15] If he's telling us to do something today, we do it.
[02:22:18] We don't have to have a 100% clear picture of there.
[02:22:23] Nehemiah had what he thought was a simple task, rebuild the wall.
[02:22:27] He didn't realize that it fit on the larger scale.
[02:22:31] So it's not an accident.
[02:22:34] The same city once broken is now saturated with the gospel.
[02:22:38] And Nehemiah's bricks becomes the backdrop to the apostolic boldness that we see in the book of Acts.
[02:22:47] Now with all that in mind, let's look at verses 17 through 20.
[02:22:50] Listen to what Nehemiah says when he stands in front of the opposition.
[02:22:55] Verse 17, Then I said to them,
[02:23:00] You see the trouble we are in?
[02:23:03] How Jerusalem lies in ruins with its gates burned?
[02:23:07] Come, let us build the wall of Jerusalem, that we may no longer suffer derision.
[02:23:14] And I told them of the hand, remember we talked about the hand of God last week, that word hand actually means complete control, authority, and movement on God's part is basically what it means.
[02:23:25] So basically what he's telling them
[02:23:27] And I told them of the complete control and authority of my God that had been upon me for good, and also of the words that the king had spoken to me.
[02:23:38] And they said, Let us rise up and build.
[02:23:42] So they strengthened their hands for the good work.
[02:23:44] Now it's a little bit different thought process of hands there.
[02:23:48] They strengthened their hands as a moment where vision becomes action.
[02:23:54] It's where belief becomes obedience.
[02:23:57] It's where God's initiative becomes human participation.
[02:24:02] In our process of seeing a vision, of building our programs, of building our discipleship pathway, of expanding our space here, the moment for us when we strengthen our hands is when we ask the church to give to the Pathway Project.
[02:24:16] You turn a card in and that strengthens our hand toward the forward movement that we see God is calling us to.
[02:24:23] and then you move on but when Sanballat the Horonite and Tobiah the Ammonite servant and Gishom the Arab heard of it they jeered at us and despised us and said what is this thing that you are doing are you rebelling against the king then I replied to them the God of heaven will make us prosper and we his servants will arise and build but you have no portion or right
[02:24:53] or Claim in Jerusalem.
[02:24:57] This is not Nehemiah being optimistic.
[02:25:01] This is not hype.
[02:25:04] This is not leadership flexing.
[02:25:08] This is theology that Nehemiah is speaking to them.
[02:25:12] Nehemiah is a man standing in the middle of rubble and he's saying, God is not finished.
[02:25:20] This is Nehemiah looking at the opposition and saying, you don't get a vote in what God is saying needs to be done.
[02:25:27] This is Nehemiah declaring that we are not managing decline, we are participating in design.
[02:25:40] So Nehemiah is not saying we hope this works.
[02:25:44] He is saying the God of heaven will make us prosper.
[02:25:47] And the word prosper there literally means to advance.
[02:25:50] To break through, to move forward.
[02:25:54] In other words, God Himself will push this forward, is what Nehemiah is saying to them.
[02:25:59] But we, the servants, will arise and build.
[02:26:05] God empowers, God initiates, and God involves His people.
[02:26:10] That's divine sovereignty and human responsibility in one verse.
[02:26:15] You see it coming out.
[02:26:16] That's the story of the Bible.
[02:26:17] This is the story of the church.
[02:26:19] This is the story of redemption.
[02:26:22] And here's the part that should leave us all kind of awestruck.
[02:26:29] Nehemiah thought he was rebuilding a wall, but God was preparing a world.
[02:26:35] Nehemiah thought he was restoring a city, but God was setting a stage for salvation.
[02:26:42] Nehemiah thought he was answering a burden, but God was actually advancing a promise, which means when God asks His people to build, He is never thinking small.
[02:26:57] Now, I don't mean size of facility.
[02:27:00] I mean in how He's going to use what we obediently step forward into.
[02:27:06] God's not thinking small.
[02:27:09] We cannot imagine what this group of people, being obedient to God now, how it's going to impact the future 40 years from now with people having divine appointments with God that they don't even know exist yet.
[02:27:22] They're going to walk into a relationship with Christ because of our obedience now.
[02:27:30] It's always much bigger than we could ever imagine.
[02:27:35] And so sometimes the most spiritual thing that we can do is build infrastructure for what God has not yet revealed.
[02:27:44] And that's where this meets us.
[02:27:46] Because there are some seasons when God causes people not just to gather, but to build.
[02:27:51] Not just to attend, but to invest.
[02:27:55] Not just to preserve, but to prepare.
[02:27:58] Not because everything's easy, not because everything is clear, but because God is still writing.
[02:28:07] Peninsula Baptist Church, we are not building programs, we are building pathways for people to mature in Christ.
[02:28:17] We are not maintaining tradition, we are participating in mission.
[02:28:24] And like Nehemiah, we may not see everything God intends to do through this body of people, but that has never stopped God from using it.
[02:28:35] God has never waited for the world to look promising before He started building, not with Abraham, not with Moses, not with Nehemiah, not with the cross, not with the church, and He's not waiting now.
[02:28:50] So if you've been wondering, is God still at work?
[02:28:58] Is this just a story of old that we're riding on the coattails of, or is God still actually doing something?
[02:29:07] Is any of this going anywhere?
[02:29:11] And Nehemiah answers, yes.
[02:29:16] And the book of Acts proves it worked.
[02:29:23] And for some, this isn't about cities or centuries.
[02:29:31] It's about your own life.
[02:29:35] I know that when we read this text there are places in your lives that feel broken, delayed, or unclear.
[02:29:45] There are seasons in our lives that feel like things just aren't happening.
[02:29:49] And this passage reminds us that silence is not absence.
[02:29:57] Delay is not denial.
[02:30:00] And confusion is not the end of the story.
[02:30:04] The same God who prepared Jerusalem for Christ's coming is still at work today, often quietly, often patiently, preparing what He intends to reveal in His time.
[02:30:17] Pastor Nate and I have lots of discussions about theology and different things, and we use each other as a sounding board and bounce different ideas off of one another.
[02:30:27] We had a discussion one time about God's attributes.
[02:30:32] And as we were talking about God's attributes, we were talking about Him being the Creator of the universe.
[02:30:37] And the question was, the Creator of the universe, once He created the universe, did that creativity go out of Him?
[02:30:43] No.
[02:30:43] The Scripture teaches us that He is the same yesterday, today, and tomorrow.
[02:30:47] So if creativity was who He was then, that means creating is something that He is still today.
[02:30:56] What I'm trying to get to you is this.
[02:30:58] God is still writing the story.
[02:31:04] The wall led to the world.
[02:31:08] The obedience led to the gospel.
[02:31:11] The faith led to salvation.
[02:31:13] And the same God is still writing.
[02:31:23] Let's pray.
[02:31:37] Father, thank you for your word.
[02:31:40] How it's so perfectly connected and how when we dive in we find little nuggets that points the picture of you being in control, your sovereignty, your providence.
[02:31:56] The pointing to Christ, the one that brings and provides our salvation through his shed blood.
[02:32:07] But my prayer is that we don't just stop there.
[02:32:13] That we would understand that you have purpose for us individually, for us as families, and for us as a corporate body meeting here on Broadway School Road.
[02:32:24] You have purpose that continues to write and lean into your story.
[02:32:35] But just being completely transparent, God, is difficult to see.
[02:32:44] Navigating life sometimes is just overwhelming.
[02:32:57] But Jesus, You told us not to worry about tomorrow because tomorrow is going to have enough worries in itself.
[02:33:06] To me, Jesus, that tells me I need to be faithful and obedient in the moment where I'm standing.
[02:33:17] It doesn't mean I negate planning or thinking ahead or moving forward, but it means that I'm more in tune with the speaking and the gentleness of your spirit today.
[02:33:31] Because you're already in tomorrow.
[02:33:35] And if I can be obedient now and still before you now and allow your spirit to lead me now with you already seeing tomorrow, then now means everything.
[02:33:56] Thank you for being a God that
[02:34:00] In the greatness and the goodness of your love, you love us exactly where we are, who we are, and what we stand for now, but you refuse to leave us there because you've called us to be more like your Son, Jesus.
[02:34:16] So Father, through the gentleness of your Spirit, pierce our hearts, reveal, shine light in those areas that we're trying to control and help us to freely allow you to point those things out
[02:34:33] That we would walk into this week different because we've fellowshiped with one another, because we've been in Your Word, but more importantly because we're allowing Your Spirit to guide our steps.
[02:34:52] Help us to lean on the promise that You're still writing our story and help us to enjoy watching it unfold.
[02:35:00] In Jesus' name we pray.

[02:35:09] [SPEAKER SPEAKER_04]:
Amen.

[02:35:15] [SPEAKER SPEAKER_05]:
The weapon may be formed but it won't prosper
[02:35:27] When the darkness falls I won't grieve in Cause the God I serve knows only how to triumph My God will never fail My God will never fail There's power in the
[02:35:57] Every war he wages he will win I'm not backing down from any giants Cause I know how the story ends Cause I know how the story ends I'm gonna see a victory I'm gonna see a victory
[02:36:31] I'm gonna see a victory I'm gonna see a victory For the battle belongs to You, Lord You take what the enemy meant for evil And You turned it for good You turned it for good You take what the enemy meant for evil
[02:37:01] You turned it for good, You turned it for good I'm gonna see a victory, I'm gonna see a victory For the battle belongs to You, Lord I'm gonna see a victory, I'm gonna see a victory
[02:37:29] I'm gonna sing a victory I'm gonna sing Who the battle was to be won I'm gonna sing

[02:38:00] [SPEAKER SPEAKER_02]:
Well, it's good to be together and worship together.
[02:38:03] Glad to see everyone together, especially this morning.
[02:38:07] I don't know if any of you, we had some who thought we might have snowmageddon around here, you know, because there was like 1% chance of snow.
[02:38:13] So we're glad to be here together and worship, especially if you're a guest with us here.
[02:38:18] We want you to know that we are so thankful that you chose to be with us today, and we'd love to have a chance to say hello to you after the service.
[02:38:25] We also want you to know
[02:38:26] In just a couple of weeks, on Sunday, February 1st, we have what we call Starting Point, which is a lunch designed if you're newer here to Peninsula, you will know about how to get involved, groups, ministry for you and your family, membership, baptism, any of those sort of things.
[02:38:41] That'll be Sunday, February 1st, right after this service, about 12, 12-15.
[02:38:46] We look forward to that.
[02:38:47] You can sign up and register for that.
[02:38:49] We have lunch, childcare.
[02:38:50] Look forward to seeing you there.
[02:38:52] Also, that coming week, Friday, February 6th, we have our annual marriage event.
[02:38:58] If you were here last year for it, it's called Two Steps Closer.
[02:39:02] This year is called Two Steps Closer Part 2.
[02:39:04] Okay, so come as a follow-up to that.
[02:39:07] We've got over 70 couples and families already signed up to be here, so we look forward to that.
[02:39:14] You can register for that online with your kids and everything, and we look forward to seeing you for that.
[02:39:20] Also, as you leave, out all of our doors and at the Welcome Center, we have these little bottles.
[02:39:25] You can grab these.
[02:39:26] It's a great way that we can help support one of our local ministry partners here, the Community Pregnancy Center of Lake Norman.
[02:39:33] This is one of their annual events.
[02:39:34] Fundraisers, great way to support them and a fantastic ministry.
[02:39:38] You can put cash in here, checks in here.
[02:39:41] Our kids like to put coins in here.
[02:39:43] Whatever you want to do, there's also instructions on the paper about how to give online to that.
[02:39:48] And it's a great way.
[02:39:50] All of that goes directly to the Pregnancy Center and we're thankful for them.
[02:39:53] So you can pick one of those up and don't worry, over the next couple of weeks, we will remind you to bring them back, okay?
[02:39:58] So you can have those and we look forward to being able to help out with them.
[02:40:03] But as we go, I want to lead us in reading together today from Nehemiah chapter 2 verse 20 and being reminded of God just using us as we are sent out together this week.
[02:40:13] So let's read Nehemiah 2 verse 20 where it says, Then I replied to them, The God of heaven will make us prosper, and we his servants will arise and build, but you have no portion or right or claim in Jerusalem.
[02:40:29] Church family, this week we are being sent out by the Lord to be used by Him, trusting He is the one at work.
[02:40:35] He is the one building at work and we, His servants, are going to carry His good name with us as we go.
[02:40:41] Have a great week.