Rebuilding the Wall: Walking in Your AssignmentSample

It took 52 days of sacrifice for Nehemiah and the men of the city to rebuild the wall of Jerusalem. Many of the men were not in the construction industry. Their assignments shifted from being a jeweler, priest, goldsmith, manufacturer of perfumes, and more, to being a builder of the wall. For 52 days, people walked away from their occupations, their duties, their daily way of living and everything they were accustomed to doing from sunup to sundown so that they could focus on the assignment that they had been called to complete—everyone, including Nehemiah.

Nehemiah was not exempt from the sacrifice. In fact, as the leader, he was the first one to make the sacrifice, as we saw in Nehemiah 1 and 2. He made one of the greatest sacrifices in walking away from life as he knew it, risking his life, reputation, and more to travel to a place where he was not completely welcomed simply so that he could bring hope back to a city he no longer lived in. His assignment to rebuild the wall was a huge one. He entrusted the rebuilding to the people within the city and gave them the strategy they needed to accomplish the assignment. All of Nehemiah 3 is dedicated to sharing the process and position of the different citizens who helped in the process. Each family was given a section of the wall to repair, and each repair was critical to the structure of the wall itself.

As Nehemiah walked in his assignment, the people who were getting the work done and seeing the fruit from his leadership didn’t even question his qualifications. They probably thought, “Well, he’s made it this far, so he must know something we don’t.” And he did. He knew that the rebuilding of the wall was God’s idea, so he didn’t have to take on the pressure of it. He just had to be obedient to the strategy and instructions God gave him.