OCTOBER 28, 2007
NEHEMIAH: PUT YOUR ARMS AROUND THE CITY
A Monomaniac on a Mission
Scripture Lesson: Nehemiah 6:1–9
©
Dr. Victor D. Pentz | Senior Pastor
Nehemiah was a
“monomaniac on a
mission.” He knew
what God had called
him to do and he
stuck with it. What
might we learn from
Nehemiah?
L
et’s be in prayer this morning for Southern California. The Malibu
Presbyterian Church lost their entire building to this week’s fires. Fifty-seven
members of the Rancho Bernardo Presbyterian Church in San Diego lost their
homes. My brother Oran is a fire chief heading a part of the effort in Lake
Arrowhead and my nephew Mario has been fighting the LA fires. Also here at
Peachtree we have much to be thankful for in the life of ten-year-old Taylor
Willis who was unconscious for five weeks fighting a MRSA infection. There
have been TV specials on Taylor. Last week I happened to be there when he
woke up and I saw him give his dad a “thumbs up.”
Nehemiah, a Jewish patriot working in the court of the King of Persia, got word
of the devastation of Jerusalem, 800 miles away. Heartsick and distressed, he
got permission from the king to go to Jerusalem and head the rebuilding of its
fortifications. In a sense this was like an official in Washington DC—sort of a
high level FEMA administrator—who is from California saying to the President
this week, “I want to go help rebuild those more than a thousand homes that
were lost in the fires in Southern California this week.” So Nehemiah arrives
in this zone of destruction in 444 BC and flings a challenge: “Come, let us
rebuild the wall of Jerusalem, and we will no longer be in disgrace.”
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Suddenly thousands of amateur bricklayers
grabbed their trowels and they went to work. If
I were to say to you this morning “Come down
this week; let’s lay bricks for our new atrium and
youth center,” we might have some disasters
like this letter from a bricklayer who was helping
after Katrina:
Dear Sir,
When I got to the building, I found that the
hurricane had knocked some bricks off the
top. So I rigged up a beam with a pulley
at the top of the building and hoisted up a
couple of barrels full of bricks. When I had
fixed the building, there were many bricks
left over. I hoisted the barrel back up again
and secured the line at the bottom, and
then went up and filled the barrel with the
extra bricks. Then I went to the bottom and
cast off the line.
blow on the head and putting me in the
hospital.
I respectfully request sick leave.
Struggling Every Brick of the Way
As we are about to see, that wall was a
struggle every brick of the way. Please turn to
Nehemiah 6 on page 757 of your pew Bible.
As the wall went up, the critics came out—
and don’t you love their names! Sanballat the
Horonite, Tobiah, and Geshem, those nattering
nabobs of negativism, made their last ditch
attempt to derail the project in a campaign of
disinformation, innuendo, and intimidation. And
it was working. The people are intimidated.
Nehemiah was the target of suspicion and even
sabotage. Let’s look at Nehemiah 6:1-9:
When word came to Sanballat, Tobiah, Geshem
the Arab and the rest of our enemies that I had
rebuilt the wall and not a gap was left in it—
though up to that time I had not set the doors
in the gates— 2 Sanballat and Geshem sent me
this message: “Come, let us meet together in
one of the villages on the plain of Ono.” (Now
when your enemies ask you to meet in a remote
location called “Oh no!” you probably ought to
think twice. It might not be a good idea. Sure
enough....)
1
Unfortunately, the barrel of bricks was
heavier than I was and before I knew what
was happening, the barrel started down,
jerking me off the ground. I decided to
hang on and halfway up I met the barrel
coming down and received a severe blow
on the shoulder. I then continued to the top,
banging my head against the beam and
getting my finger jammed in the pulley.
When the barrel hit the ground it burst its
bottom, allowing all the bricks to spill out.
I was now heavier than the barrel and so I
started down again at high speed. Halfway
down, I met the barrel coming up and
received severe injuries to my shins.
When I hit the ground I landed on the
bricks, getting several painful cuts from
the sharp edges.
At this point I must have lost my presence
of mind, because I let go the line. The barrel
then came down giving me another heavy
But they were scheming to harm me; 3 so I
sent messengers to them with this reply: “I am
carrying on a great project and cannot go down.
Why should the work stop while I leave it and
go down to you?” 4 Four times they sent me the
same message, and each time I gave them the
same answer. 5 Then, the fifth time, Sanballat
sent his aide to me with the same message, and
in his hand was an unsealed letter (we’ll come
back to that later) 6 in which was written:
“It is reported among the nations—and
Geshem says it is true—that you and the Jews
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are plotting to revolt, and therefore you are
building the wall. (Rumor has it the reason
you’re building this wall is you aren’t content
to be Governor, Nehemiah—what you really
have up your sleeve is to crown yourself King
Nehemiah.) Moreover, according to these
reports you are about to become their king
7
and have even appointed prophets to make
this proclamation about you in Jerusalem: ‘There
is a king in Judah!’ Now this report will get back
to the king; so come, let us confer together.”
(That’s called blackmail.)
I sent him this reply: “Nothing like what you are
saying is happening; you are just making it up
out of your head.”
8
They were all trying to frighten us, thinking,
“Their hands will get too weak for the work, and
it will not be completed.”
Nehemiah was a classic example of what
management guru Tom Peters calls, “a
monomaniac on a mission.” Listen again: “I am
carrying on a great project and cannot go down.
Why should the work stop while I leave it and
go down to you?” 4 Four times they sent me the
same message, and each time I gave them the
same answer.
Nehemiah zeroed in like a laser on the one
objective in his life: the completion of the wall.
He ate and slept and dreamt the wall. Notice he
was not sitting in a leather chair in some airconditioned office leaning back with his feet
up. He was up there standing on the wall in his
bib overalls with cement splattered on his face,
grinning from ear to ear.
9
And from his wall he waved to his critics and
said, “Sorry, but I’ve got my hands full up here
doing the work of God.”
But I prayed, “Now strengthen my hands.”
Serving as CEO of Jerusalem Construction,
Inc. was a nightmare job. Nehemiah’s enemies
hatched a kidnap plot. They sent an emissary
to the wall saying, “Nehemiah, come on down.
Let’s have a little meeting between you,
Geshem, and Sanballat out on the plain of Ono.”
Well, Nehemiah wasn’t born yesterday and he
knew that if he went along with this little ploy,
the next morning they’d find his body floating
face down in the Jordan.
My message this morning is about the words
Nehemiah spoke from his perch high atop the
wall. I believe his response gives us a glimpse
into the greatness of Nehemiah and gives
us the key to why he was successful in the
face of overwhelming odds. Listen to what
Nehemiah said to his critics: “I am carrying
on a great project and cannot go down. Why
should the work stop while I leave it and go
down to you?” 4 Four times they sent me the
same message, and each time I gave them the
same answer.
Drawing a Bead on Greatness
From everything I’ve read and experienced
in my life what we witness here in Nehemiah
is nothing less than the dividing line between
true greatness and mere mediocrity. It is this
capacity highly accomplished people have of
focusing prodigiously on a single objective.
While many of us live scattered lives that zig
and zag, somehow the truly great draw a bead
on the one thing that matters most to them in
life and say with the Apostle Paul, “This one
thing I do.”
Michelangelo, for example, worked on the
Sistine Chapel ceiling for weeks on end
without ever even taking off his clothes.
The composer George Friedrich Handel
used to practice such long hours at the
keyboard he’d literally wear out the keys of
his harpsichord, rounding them down into the
shapes of hollowed-out spoons. I once heard
of a sculptor who’d make repetition after
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repetition of a statue saying, “The image in my
head is not yet in my hands.”
In the same way Nehemiah was locked in on
his dream. He was a monomaniac on a mission
from God.
We have a certain kind monomaniacallyfocused person here at Peachtree, and we have
hundreds if not thousands of them who walk
through our building every week. Those I’m
speaking of are those highly-focused humans
known as young moms raising their kids. And
you better be careful out in our parking lot.
Here they become super-focused! The New
York Times columnist David Brooks calls them
“Ubermoms,” and here’s what he writes:
These are highly successful career women
who have taken time off to make sure
all their kids are perfect. You can usually
tell the ubermoms because they actually
weigh less than their children. During
pregnancy they are taking so much soybased nutritional formula they produce
these massive 12 pound babies that look
like toothless defensive linemen. (Then I
have to lift them, by the way, during their
baptisms!) These moms are in the delivery
room cutting the umbilical cord themselves,
adjusting the video lighting and asking the
ultimate ubermom question: Is her Apgar
score above average? Then on the way
home, they’re flashing math flash cards at
the [baby], trying to begin its SAT prep.
And to make their baby environmentally
conscious, they take it to Whole Foods for
organic baby formula. Actually, my favorite
section at Whole Foods is the snack food
section. They couldn’t just have pretzels or
potato chips—that would be vulgar. So they
have these seaweed-based snacks like we
get in my house, Veggie Booty with Kale.
It’s for kids who come home from school
and shout, “Mom, I want a snack that will
help prevent colo-rectal cancer!”
Day by day the Ubermoms perfect their
kids. By the time they apply for college
they’ve started six companies, cured
four formerly fatal diseases and done
community service by doing environmental
awareness training in Tibet. We’ve got a
college president in Washington named
Steve Trachtenberg, who says of his
students’ community service: “I don’t know
where these kids find lepers, but they find
them and they read to them.”
Driven or Called?
Well, we do live in the age of the highly
focused parent. And that segues us into a
rather delicate question: Can we become too
monomoniacally focused? After all, if you
look it up, clinically monomania is listed as
a mental disease, a kind of obsessive tunnel
vision. In literature the classic monomaniac
was Moby Dick’s Captain Ahab, who left a trail
of destruction in his pursuit of the great white
whale that bit off his leg. There’s also Ebenezer
Scrooge who almost lost his soul in his manic
pursuit of the Almighty Dollar.
So one of the key questions people like us have
to answer is: how can we have that healthy,
positive single-minded focus that leads to grand
accomplishments and success like Nehemiah
rebuilding of the wall of Jerusalem or parents
raising happy productive, godly, children while
avoiding the dark side of obsession that can
do damage to ourselves self and all the people
around us?
My friends, it comes down to this: Being in right
relationship with God. As I pursue my dream
for family or career or making the honor roll or
getting into college or making that sports team
or landing that dream job or going after some
grand vision for my life like Nehemiah, I must
ask myself: am I driven or am I called? That’s
going to take some introspection from many
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of us. Am I driven by the demons haunting my
inner self? Am I driven by my insecurities, by
feelings that I’ve got to prove something to
somebody, that without this I would not be a
complete human being? On the other hand can
you say: I throw myself into my dream as a child
of God, beloved of my Heavenly Father, joyously
using those gifts He gives me to bring honor
and glory to him? My friends, this morning as
best as you know your heart, are you driven or
are you called?
A couple of weeks ago Becky and I had the
opportunity to visit New York City where some
friends of ours took us to a Broadway play.
Turns out it was the hottest show on Broadway,
a musical called Jersey Boys, the story of
Frankie Valle and the Four Seasons. Remember
those golden oldies Big Girls Don’t Cry, Sherry,
and Can’t Take My Eyes Off Of You? The play
is the story of these Italian boys, growing up
in a tough neighborhood in urban New Jersey.
One actor in that cast walks away with the
show, and it’s not the Frankie Valle character.
It’s the character Tommy DeVito, the bad boy
of the Four Seasons. He gets into crime and
every form of mischief you can imagine in the
play. The actor’s name is Christian Hoff and he
sings, dances, charms, and schmoozes his way
through that play at such a high level in his craft
he was awarded the 2006 Tony Award for his
role of Tommy DeVito. Imagine the drive and
monomaniacal focus it takes to become a Tony
Award winning Broadway actor, to be the toast
of Broadway with your name in lights. That’s
Christian Hoff.
how at the end of those little bios they allow
the actor a personal comment? It says: “Most
cherished role: Blessed Husband and Father,”
then three Latin words, Soli Deo Gloria—To
God Alone Be the Glory. The hottest actor on
Broadway, who’s risen to the top of his craft, is
not driven by ambition. He’s called as a disciple
of Jesus Christ.
Like Nehemiah, Christian Hoff is up there on
top giving God all the glory: Soli Deo Gloria,
(I must warn you if you see the play, Christian
uses some raunchy language in his role.) Then
a woman in the cast says in her bio, “I give
thanks to my Heavenly Father for giving me this
opportunity.” My goodness, what is God doing
on Broadway these days?
I must confess I spent a lot of my early ministry
as a driven person: Soli Victor Gloria was at
the bottom of my biography. Oh, I preached
impeccable sermons with orthodox theology
but in my heart I knew I was building my wall as
a monument to me. I was driven by a lot of inner
demons in those early years.
If that’s how you’re living your life this morning
I’ll tell you from experience how you can tell:
your Sanballats get inside your head and keep
you awake at night. Your critics really rattle you,
because as you build your wall in your mind you
spend more time worrying about what people
think of you than you spend looking up into the
face of God.
A Test of Wills
Have you ever watched a play and been so
impressed that at intermission you whipped
out the program to find the bio of an actor —
wondering, who is this person? How did they
get to be this good at what they do? Here’s the
program: Christian Hoff, the toast of Broadway,
is in his first Broadway role. The program lists
the community playhouses here and there
where he has appeared, and then you know
It comes down to a test of wills between
Nehemiah and Sanballat. You have to hand
it to Sanballot. He, too, is single-minded,
sort of like the coyote in the Roadrunner
cartoons. He keeps coming back. Finally, he
sends a fifth letter, which verse 5 describes
as an “unsealed letter” (meaning it would get
looked at by lots of other people on the way
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and then the courier would read it aloud when
he arrived in Jerusalem). And what politically
damaging allegations are contained in the
letter: “Nehemiah, you didn’t just come to build
a wall; you came to lead a rebellion. In fact it is
said you’ve already got a prophet all lined up to
anoint you King of Jerusalem.” These charges
were sure to reach the ears of King Artaxerxes
of Persia and could spell death for Nehemiah.
But Nehemiah? He just keeps mixing cement
and piling up bricks. I’m sure there were
moments when Nehemiah thought, “I’ve got to
get down off this wall—Sanballat’s smearing
my reputation. The people are questioning my
integrity.” But the moment Nehemiah steps off
that wall, Sanballat wins.
One of the most helpful comments I’ve ever
heard for putting criticism in perspective comes
from Walter Cronkite. In an interview I once read
Walter made what almost sounds like a cynical
comment, but really is very profound. He said,
“There is a handful of people in your life who
really love you. But most people don’t love you
and they don’t hate you. They’re thinking about
themselves.” Think about that. “Most people
don’t love you and they don’t hate you. They’re
thinking about themselves.” Sanballat and
Tobiah didn’t personally hate Nehemiah; they
felt threatened by that wall he was building.
As a friend of mine was told by his psychiatrist,
“Think of yourself as an anchovy. Some people
love anchovies; other people hate anchovies. It’s
not the anchovies’ fault.”
So we shouldn’t take criticism personally.
Our critics don’t hate us, usually. They’re just
thinking of themselves.
I want to give you a motto as you go out of
here and pursue your dreams. And I hope you
pursue your dream with every passion of your
heart, every synapse of your brain, and every
fiber of your being. And may the words at the
bottom of your bio say “Soli Deo Gloria.” And
as wonderful as it is to tell the world, it’s even
more important to tell yourself every day “By
God’s grace I’m not a driven person haunted by
demons; I am a called person joyously serving
the God who loves me, who sent his Son to die
for me that I might be his child. It’s all about
Him. It’s not about me. Soli Deo Gloria. To God
alone I give the glory.”
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NOTES:
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Prayer:
Lord, help us not to focus on our fears or our pain or what others may think or on our own
idolatrous ambitions. Like Nehemiah, give us a clear vision of what you would have us do and
be .and then may we pursue with joy and passion your calling in our lives. I pray for anyone
between callings this morning who needs your guidance in their career. Lord help us to keep
our heads up and focused on You and on your will, your people, your priorities, your gifts,
your love, and your Son, knowing that with Him we can handle anything.
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