I thought I'd share the sermon I gave at Mt. Pleasant Presbyterian Church last Sunday... Then I'll share how ironic it is...
A Prayer For Favor (Read Neh. 1:1-11)
The story today in Nehemiah has us hearing Nehemiah’s prayer to God. The Israelites are in exile. Most of them had not been faithful to God in their living and worshipping and so God had not kept them from harm (which seems to be an on-going theme in the Old Testament).
Nehemiah sees a fellow believer who has just come from Judah and he asks him about the remnant, those few people who had stayed faithful to God’s commands, and is told that they’re in pretty bad shape. It disturbs Nehemiah a lot. The state of his people, where he came from, his family is not good, and it lays heavy on his heart. So Nehemiah goes to God in prayer.
As he prays Nehemiah reminds God, and himself, of what he knows about God - that He is great and awesome, that He keeps His covenant, His promises of love with those who love Him and obey His commandments...And then he asks God to listen to his prayer.
This is a great way to start your own prayers. I remember being at a youth retreat a number of years ago. The teenagers had been presented with the Gospel and were spending some time outside alone with God, so the leadership stayed inside to pray...and we started praying by acknowledging naming the many names and what we knew of the character of God. YHWH, I am, Redeemer, God who forgives, unconditional lover, God of grace (getting what we don’t deserve), Holy One, and God of mercy (not getting what we do deserve), and so on. It was an awesome time of really recognizing and acknowledging who God is.
Back in our story, Nehemiah then confesses the sins not only of the people of Israel, but of himself and his own family as well. He acknowledges they have all fallen well short of God’s desires and commands.
He restates God’s promise to Moses - that God will scatter those people who were unfaithful, but will gather up those who return to Him and obey Him. And then again, Nehemiah asks God to hear his prayer.
Then he asks for something specifically. In his prayer, Nehemiah asks for success today and God’s favor in the king’s presence. In The Message translation he says, “make me successful today so that I get what I want from the king (vs.11b).”
Now at first glance one might look at that and think, gee Nehemiah, you’re being awfully bold and prideful! Asking that he gets what he wants from the king, asking for favor! We need to take note here though, that he’s not asking for a favor, but asking for favor. What’s the difference here?
To ask for “a favor” is to ask someone for something specific, to ask someone to do something for you. But that’s not what Nehemiah is asking for here. He’s asking for “favor.” He’s asking for the king to agree with him, to be in support of him, to find praise in him. So what does Nehemiah have in mind? Well to find that out we have to go on to chapter two.
We have to also take note before we move on that Nehemiah mentions at the end of chapter one that he is the cup-bearer to the king. Just like in the book of Esther, a servant of the king can’t just approach the king and ask for something...to do so could bring death. A servant of the king has to wait for the king to speak to them first, and sometimes even wait for the king to ask them something before they are actually allowed to speak directly to the him.
So chapter two begins by telling us that it’s been four months since Nehemiah first prayed for favor from God, and he is doing his job serving the king. I’m going to read verses 1-6 of chapter 2 from The Message translation:
“At the hour for serving wine I brought it in and gave it to the king. I had never been hangdog in his presence before (which is an interesting word used to mean long-faced or sad-looking), so he asked me, ‘Why the long face? You’re not sick are you? Or are you depressed?’
That made me all the more agitated. I said, ‘Long live the king! And why shouldn’t I be depressed when the city, the city where all my family is buried, is in ruins and the city gates have been reduced to cinders?’
The king then asked me, ‘So what do you want?’
Praying under my breath to the God-of-Heaven, I said, ‘If it please the king, and if the king thinks well of me, send me to Judah, to the city where my family is buried, so that I can rebuild it.’
The king, with the queen sitting alongside him, said, ‘How long will your work take and when would you expect to return?’
I gave him a time, and the king gave his approval to send me.”
So Nehemiah had to wait four months until he finally had the opportunity to even talk to the king, but when the time came he found favor and was first, allowed to speak freely, and second, granted his request to go and help his people in Judah. (If you read the rest of the book you find that Nehemiah was a great leader and rebuilt the entire wall around the city.) Because of the favor God had granted Nehemiah, he was able to do great things for God and God’s people.
Can you think of others who were given God’s favor? As mentioned earlier, Esther is a great example. She was a young Jewish woman who was put in the king’s “harem” in the palace of King Xerxes because of her beauty. Because of her position and, again, finding favor with her king, she ended up being the pivotal person to intervene for her people and save them from being destroyed.
How about today? Are there examples of people who have been granted God’s favor today? I think Jimmy Carter is a great example. Although some would say that as president he wasn’t highly effective, many would say that his greatest work, helping to bring peace to numerous areas of the world, has been done since his presidency. But it was was due to the the influence he gained and relationships he made as president that helped make him so effective in his work after his presidency.
Finally, some of you may be familiar with Pastor Rick Warren of Saddleback Church in California, a huge mega-church that Pastor Warren started from very humble beginnings. He wrote The Purpose-Driven Life, a great book. Warren, by both equipping lay people to grow and act on their faith, as well as by staying faithful to God in his own life, has not only grown a big church, but has become very influential, not only in Christian circles but in governing and political circles as well - both in the U.S. and around the world.
Rick Warren is known for many things, but the two things that stick out to me are his reverse tithing, and what he says about influence.
When Warren and his wife Kay started Saddleback Church they tithed ten percent of their income. Each year they increased their giving by one percent. They didn’t change their lifestyle as his income increased, they gave more. So now they give away ninety percent of their income, and live on ten. That speaks very loudly to me about how seriously Warren takes his faith.
When it comes to influence, Rick Warren recounts his thoughts and conversation with God,
“What do you want me to do with the influence?"--which was a trickier thing. All of a sudden I start to get invitations. I spoke at Harvard and Cambridge and Oxford... All of a sudden I’m going up on Capitol Hill and talking to guys. Producers in Hollywood are asking me to come up and discuss the book with eight or nine major studio producers.
This wasn’t my plan. My plan was just to pastor Saddleback and train pastors. So I’m going, "God, what am I supposed to do with all of this new influence that you are giving me?" I’m reading through the scriptures trying to find an answer, and I find Psalm 72, which is Solomon’s prayer for more influence.
When you read this prayer it really sounds quite selfish. Solomon is the wisest and wealthiest and most powerful man in the world, because he is the head of the United Kingdom of Israel when it is at the apex of its power. He prays, "God, I want you to make me more influential. I want you to bless me and give me more power. I want you to make me famous. I want you to spread the fame of my name to many nations."
It sounds selfish until you understand he says, "So that the king may support the widow and orphan, care for the poor, defend the defenseless, lift up the fallen, release the captive, help the foreigner, the immigrant."
God said to me, "The purpose of influence is to speak up for those who have no influence." That changed my life. I had to repent.”
Over time Warren learned more about the poor, the widows and the orphans, especially in Africa in the midst of the AIDS epidemic. As God continued to open his eyes and break his heart Warren became more and more convicted that he needed to take action. Out of all that came a mixture of what he was already doing - building church leaders and active Christians, along with addressing the issues of AIDS victims in Africa. The P.E.A.C.E. program was created. It stands for:
P - Plan a church, or partner with a church if there is one (it always begins
w/ the church - in, through, and to a church)
E - Equip servant leaders
A - Assist the poor
C - Care for the sick
E - Educate the next generation
Hundreds of churches across the country have adopted this model to help build the Church in Africa so that will be the vehicle to minister to these people and help combat the AIDS epidemic and the trail of brokenness that it leaves. And an extra bonus is that it also builds up the American Church because people feel more connected to their faith. That in partnering with God and His people across the world, they are actually making a difference.
There are two things that I hope you will take from this message today. The first is that, like Nehemiah, God brings things into our lives that break our hearts, that get under our skin, that bother us and won’t let us go - (like the suffering of the people of Israel did to Nehemiah). And He doesn’t want us to inoculate ourselves to the pain it causes us, but to expose ourselves even more to it. He wants us to see the pain of the world as He does.
I know that probably really dates me, but how many of you remember the old Popeye cartoons? Remember when Bluto, the big brute, would get a hold of Olive Oil, Popeye’s girlfriend? Bluto would mess with Popeye to the point where he would say, “That’s all I can stands.....(say it with me!) I can’t stands no more!” Well, that’s the place that God wants to take us to. He wants us to feel it deep enough that we have that “Popeye moment” and we cry out, “that’s all I can stands, I can’t stands no more!”
Bill Hybels of Willow Creek Church calls that phenomenon a “holy discontent.” It’s that feeling we have when we finally get to the point of saying or thinking, someone should DO something - and God takes us to those places because that someone is you!
So become more aware of that thing or things that give you a holy discontent. It may be something to do with the homeless, it may be adult literacy, maybe it’s the lack of help for families with special needs children. For someone else it may be the AIDS epidemic or the rights of women in third world countries, or even mentoring local teenagers. God has a plan and a purpose for each one of us. Tune in and pay attention! God may have been trying to get your attention for a while! And you never know, someone else may have been praying to God about the very issue or problem on your heart - and YOU are to be the answer to that person’s prayer.
The second thing I’d like you to take away from this is to take note of where God has placed you. It may just be that He has already put you in a position of influence to do something. Or it may be that, like the Nehemiah story He has just started to put something on your heart and you need to take some time praying about it before He will put you or bring you together with someone who can bring some power, finances, or influence to the situation.
I want to share with you a story about a man, Mike Berry, from my church back in Colorado. You see, in our new member classes, we showed a video that Bill Hybels made talking about holy discontent and those Popeye moments to encourage our people to be listening for God and what He has planned for them to do in ministry - whether it’s within or outside the walls of the church.
Well, a few years earlier Mike had been walking his daughter to school one morning when a young girl ran in to the school unkempt and crying. He asked her what the matter was and she told him that she had slept in the car with her mom and hadn’t eaten since lunch the day before. The vision of that young hungry girl stayed with Mike over the years and really bothered him, but he felt helpless and didn’t really think that he could do anything.
After watching the video in the new members class, Mike finally felt convicted enough to take action, to do something, and he realized that, having his own financial planning business for over twenty years, he was actually in a position where he had surplus time and money to devote to this.
So Mike and his family started Kid’s Aid. They began at his daughter’s elementary school and invited families to take part in a backpack program. Mike’s family, along with some church volunteers, would get food at the local Food Bank along with supplements they bought at Sam’s Club, and fill around 20 backpacks with ready-made or easy to prepare food for kids to take home every Friday. The kids would return the backpacks the following week where they’d refill them and do it all over again throughout the school year.
I just received the newsletter from our church on Friday with an update. Kid’s Aid is currently serving 1, 260 students in 17 schools. They have come to realize that to meet the need of the entire district they will need to prepare 2,000 backpacks every week, and that is their goal. The program now has other churches involved, and has become its own non-profit in order to take advantage of grants and other opportunities offered to non-profit organizations. And all this because Mike decided to listen to that holy discontent and follow God’s lead in doing something about it. I’m not saying that every movement God makes ends up in some huge project like this, but we just never know where He will lead us if we allow ourselves to be led.
So what has God placed on your heart? Have you inoculated yourself to it? Pushed it aside and tried to not let it bother you? Maybe you need to expose yourself to it a bit more. Maybe you need to spend some serious time with God and see where He leads you. Maybe, like Nehemiah or Mike, He’s got something big in mind for you. Or maybe He’s put a need of someone close-by on your heart and wants you to make a difference for that one person or that family.
Whatever it is, LISTEN. Whatever is it, PRAY. And then wait and watch for God’s favor. Let’s pray.
Now the irony of this sermon is that someone at our home church in Grand Junction apparently had a stirring in their own heart. Apparently it was so strong that they acted on it. They took a BIG check to the church and asked if the church would send us a check (so they could remain anonymous). We received it on Saturday (thinking it was our regular support from the church's Mission Team, sent to me by mistake instead of directly to the seminary). Our pastor told us it was from someone in the church who wished to remain anonymous. I wonder if they know they answered many a prayer! We plan on writing a note that the pastor can give to them to let them know! God is SO good...more than we can ask or imagine.
Blessings to you,
~Sally
