When you know what you’re doing is the very thing God is asking of you. The enemy will use fear to sway you and pressure you. This pressure can come in the forms of discouragement, insecurity, and doubt. Nehemiah was a mighty man of God who experienced those attacks from the enemy. You see, God sent him out to close up certain breaches and make the gates of Jerusalem, so the enemy did everything he could to create fear in Nehemiah through public perception in what we call today, “what others may think” approach.
If what you know is what you’re doing gives God the glory, then we should respond as Nehemiah and say, “I only care what God thinks.” When you feel the pressure from the enemy rising, that is when we are to turn to God and not our own abilities.
For they all were trying to make us afraid, saying, “Their hands will be weakened in the work, and it will not be done.” Now therefore, O God, strengthen my hands. Nehemiah6:9NKJV
Go to God in prayer when the enemy wants to pressure you to quit, first, before going to man because we have to be careful who we listen to, for not everyone who says is for you is for you. You will have people misuse the name of the Lord for their own personal agendas or ill intent motives. That is what Nehemiah experienced:
Afterward I came to the house of Shemaiah the son of Delaiah, the son of Mehetabel, who was a secret informer; and he said, “Let us meet together in the house of God, within the temple, and let us close the doors of the temple, for they are coming to kill you; indeed, at night they will come to kill you.”
Nehemiah: And I said, “Should such a man as I flee? And who is there such as I who would go into the temple to save his life? I will not go in!” Then I perceived that God had not sent him at all, but that he pronounced this prophecy against me because Tobiah and Sanballat had hired him. For this reason he was hired, that I should be afraid and act that way and sin, so that they might have cause for an evil report, that they might reproach me. Nehemiah 6:10-13NKJV
In this journey of God’s plan for your life, you will inevitably face your own Shemaiah, Tobiah, and Sanballats. Intimidation or fear will be the force factor Satan will use that will try to steer you in the opposite direction of where God wants to take you. Obedience is moving past the fear of what the world thinks and trusting God through the process. At the end of the day, it doesn’t matter what the worldly outcome looks like; it’s your obedience to Him on what He asks of you that matters. For if it is God’s will, no one can stop what He is set on doing.
Nehemiah‘s Faith Works Outcome:
“When our enemies and the surrounding nations heard about it, they were frightened and humiliated. They realized this work had been done with the help of our God.” Nehemiah 6:16 NLT