Sir Godfrey Gregg D. Div, OHPM, ROMC
The Enemy’s Distractions (Nehemiah 6:1-14)
Life is full of distractions. Have you ever sat in a really bad traffic jam thinking it must have been a really bad accident that caused this, only to find out that it was a simple fender bender pushed off on the side of the road causing passing drivers to slow down, lose focus of the road, to look at the accident, or gape at it (that’s why it’s called a Gaper’s Delay)? We may get angry and frustrated at all the drivers who were guilty of this, but we too are looking at the accident as we drive by as well right?
We are so easily distracted! There are so many times when I wake up wanting to accomplish a lot in that day and I got my list going, only to put my head on my pillow at night realizing that I did a whole lot of things, but not the main things. Ever feel that way? Distractions, distractions, distractions! We deal with it all the time! Whether it is daydreaming, the television, emails or phone calls to answer, or a child pulling at your shirt tail, it is easy to have good intentions, but really difficult to follow through on them, especially with distractions all around. They are not always bad distractions, but distractions nonetheless.
Do you know that a major obstacle in doing God’s work is a distraction? Actually, it is a major obstacle from people even knowing God. The enemy is hard at work keeping people busy and occupied with so many things so that they do not have to think about their soul until it is too late. But his major tactics are geared toward believers. He wants to distract us from the work of God. I am not talking about your prayer or devotion time, but your life course. Satan is not looking to put a little dent in your fender, but looking for a major crash. Perhaps this is why the author of Hebrew exhorts us to “fix our eyes on Jesus, the author and finisher of our faith” (Hebrews 12:2). We need to look at Him all the time because everything around us beckons us away. And if we are not careful, we might live our lives chasing the distraction and end up in front of the Lord one day saying, “Sorry Lord, things came up.” I would hate to be in that position!
We are winding down the first half of the book of Nehemiah as we have been learning about God’s work: how God prepares us for it, prospers us in it and in the last few weeks, how God helps us overcome the problems in God’s work. We looked at the enemy’s ridicule in Nehemiah 4:1-6, the halfway hurdle in Nehemiah 4:7-23, internal strife in Nehemiah 5 and today distractions from serving God in Nehemiah 6:1-14. How do we deal with distractions from serving God? We are going to look at three different distractions Nehemiah will have to face. Let’s begin with this thought:
CONTINUES TOMORROW …..
