Nehemiah’s Call: Rebuild and Protect Our Spiritual Foundations
Nehemiah 4:14b
...remember the Lord, which is great and terrible, and fight for your brethren, your sons, and your daughters, your wives, and your houses.
In our selected verse, we are coming in right after Nehemiah “set the people after their families with their swords, their spears, and their bow.” In short, each family joined in the reconstruction of the wall of Jerusalem, as well as the protection of the project against threats that were coming in from the enemy.
Today, I would like to borrow from Nehemiah’s strategy and say that in much the same way, the church also ought to organize, equip, and motivate its families to join in the effort of not only rebuilding the church but defending the work. We understand that Christ is the one who builds the church, but we also understand that we are Christ’s body; hence, His hands and His feet. That means that He builds the church through us! And the truth is, a healthy church is made up of families surrendered to God’s will for their lives.
In today’s world, the breakdown of the family is a large contributor to the breakdown of the church. Statistically, strong families have been proven to be the backbone of a stable society. Often, the family that was in church together was the family that stayed together and produced children that later made long and lasting contributions to church, then ultimately society. The devil knows that if the family unit can be destroyed, then all of society will be conquered. Why? Because if there’s no stable parent as an authority to teach right from wrong and to discipline consistently in love and firmness, then children are often left to grow up being instructed by many confusing voices who all work hard to win that child’s mind and allegiance.
Ultimately, many then become a product of mass confusion as they try to figure things out without a guiding light to help them make the right decisions in life. And I’m here to tell you, there’s a better way! This may sound a bit old-fashioned and outdated, but as much as is humanly possible, if we would go back to a Biblically defined family, where mom and dad are married and committed for better and for worse, and where their children are raised together under the same roof, and raised together in church, then the church could grow exponentially, and as a result, society could be saved!
~ Pastor Gary Caudill
...remember the Lord, which is great and terrible, and fight for your brethren, your sons, and your daughters, your wives, and your houses.
In our selected verse, we are coming in right after Nehemiah “set the people after their families with their swords, their spears, and their bow.” In short, each family joined in the reconstruction of the wall of Jerusalem, as well as the protection of the project against threats that were coming in from the enemy.
Today, I would like to borrow from Nehemiah’s strategy and say that in much the same way, the church also ought to organize, equip, and motivate its families to join in the effort of not only rebuilding the church but defending the work. We understand that Christ is the one who builds the church, but we also understand that we are Christ’s body; hence, His hands and His feet. That means that He builds the church through us! And the truth is, a healthy church is made up of families surrendered to God’s will for their lives.
In today’s world, the breakdown of the family is a large contributor to the breakdown of the church. Statistically, strong families have been proven to be the backbone of a stable society. Often, the family that was in church together was the family that stayed together and produced children that later made long and lasting contributions to church, then ultimately society. The devil knows that if the family unit can be destroyed, then all of society will be conquered. Why? Because if there’s no stable parent as an authority to teach right from wrong and to discipline consistently in love and firmness, then children are often left to grow up being instructed by many confusing voices who all work hard to win that child’s mind and allegiance.
Ultimately, many then become a product of mass confusion as they try to figure things out without a guiding light to help them make the right decisions in life. And I’m here to tell you, there’s a better way! This may sound a bit old-fashioned and outdated, but as much as is humanly possible, if we would go back to a Biblically defined family, where mom and dad are married and committed for better and for worse, and where their children are raised together under the same roof, and raised together in church, then the church could grow exponentially, and as a result, society could be saved!
~ Pastor Gary Caudill