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\u201cThen I said to them, \u201cYou see the trouble we are in: Jerusalem lies in ruins, and its gates have been burned with fire. Come, let us rebuild the wall of Jerusalem, and we will no longer be in disgrace.\u201d I also told them about the gracious hand of my God on me and what the king had said to me. They replied, \u201cLet us start rebuilding.\u201d So, they began this good work.\u201d (Nehemiah 2:17-18).

During a war soldiers don\u2019t jump up from behind their protective barricades with hurt expressions and ask the other side, \u201cWas it something I said?\u201d That would be silly to the extreme.

Likewise, the spiritual battles we Christians face are not really about us\u2014our enemy is raging against Christ in us. He is opposing Jesus and his church, pitching various weapons and human obstacles against us. Our task is not to take it personally and wonder if we did wrong\u2014our task is to suit up in spiritual armor, show up on the battlefield, and persevere for Christ. We need to know that resistance is just part of the story when we are being obedient to God.

Of course, opposition always makes things more difficult. As Christians, we often need to be prepared to go the extra mile. Reaching the world with the truth and love of Christ will involve inconvenience and personal sacrifice at the best of times, but especially when others are creating obstacles.

Sometimes God allows things to proceed relatively easily, as when Nehemiah makes his requests to Artaxerxes. But other times it is more of a struggle. In chapter 1, everything goes smoothly. As we saw, he was anxious and did significant fearful praying. But God paved the way for him.

When things go well, we tend to get over confident. We might think that, since God is on our side, nothing can go wrong, all obstacles will be removed. Many Christian organizations have become so enamored with their success that they have lost their way. We make compromises because we believe that success is always necessary.

But not Nehemiah. He knows there is opposition to his work. He has not become over confident. At night, in the darkness, with only a few others, he scouts the broken walls around Jerusalem. The rubble and burned out gates were a sign that Jerusalem had been defeated. In ancient culture, this meant that Jerusalem\u2019s God had been defeated too. That was the disgrace. A rebuilt wall around the city would be a symbol that God was with them and had not, in the end, been defeated.

Thus, Nehemiah speaks with the Israelite priests, officials and nobles (2:16) inviting them to join him in rebuilding the wall in order to remove this disgrace. Along with this invitation, he tells them all about how God\u2019s gracious hand had brought him to this point and how the king had made provision for him.

The NIV then says, \u201cSo, they began this good work,\u201d which is a fair translation. However, a more literal translation of this phrase would be \u201cAnd they strengthened their hands for the good.\u201d Their starting point was to encourage each other to do this good work.

It\u2019s interesting that the opposite happened in Ezra 4:4. In that story, the enemies of the Jews discouraged them from re-building the temple. The phrase translates as \u201cweaken their hands\u201d. Later, God changed the attitude of the king of Assyria so that he gave permission and provision for rebuilding. The effect this had on the Jewish settlers was that \u201ctheir hands were strengthened\u201d or as the NIV says, \u201cthey were filled with joy\u201d (Ezra 6:22).

Throughout Ezra-Nehemiah when Israel overcomes opposition to restoration, it is because of the things that God does. But we see the people encouraging each other as well. None of them can go it alone.

The same is still true today. We can expect to face opposition. Satan does not want Christians nor the church as a whole to succeed. One of his great strategies today is causing us to think that we are alone. That we can go it alone. But God calls us to encourage on another. \u201cTherefore encourage one another and build each other up, just as in fact you are doing\u201d, Paul writes (1 Thessalonians 5:11).

Take some time today to ask God whom you can encourage, whose hands you can strengthen, so that they can continue in the good fight.