Nehemiah

I am heading into week four of a study on Nehemiah with the Women's Ministry at Southeast Christian Church. For those of you who aren't familiar with Nehemiah, he followed the call of God to beseech his king for permission to go to Jerusalem and organize the Israelites' rebuilding of the wall surrounding the city. There was a note written at the end of Week 1 in the study that has continued to stick with me, "Nehemiah is a message of hope and restoration. What God did for them, He will do for us. He will take the broken places of our lives and rebuild them for our protection and His glory." Isn't that comforting? He will take the broken places of our lives - our sin, areas of our lives affected by generational sin...all of that and we are not bound by those broken aspects of our lives because He will rebuild them and make them healthy. For me, it was the most reassuring to know that I am not bound by the destructive cycle of my family tree. God is taking those faulty and battered walls of my childhood and replacing them with healthy boundaries and functioning gates of communication. It is FAR from being complete, but I am excited about the work He is doing in me even though it is often painful and feels slow-going.

In Week 2, it was during the lecture portion of the study that God chose to impress upon me the importance in asking for permission before suddenly asking for His protection and provision. In chapter 2, Nehemiah asks for permission from the king before then asking for his protection and provision. It hit me - how often do we make our own plans and run ahead of God, and then turn around and ask Him to protect and provide for us? Thankfully, I can say that was not the case with my move to Louisville, but having a "planner" personality I still know that I have done that very thing on many occasions.

And now for a morsel for you to chew on from Week 3 of my study. Often in Scripture water is a symbol of the Word of God. Well, of all the gates that were destroyed by the Babylonians the only gate that did not need to be rebuilt by Nehemiah and the Israelites was the Water Gate. Intersting, huh? The Water Gate (symbolic of the Word of God) stayed standing.